Guillermo del Toro Talks ‘Haunted Mansion’ & ‘Justice League Dark’

In 24 hours Guillermo del Toro might transition from lesser-known acclaim to household name, but that doesn’t mean he’s going to abandon pet projects like Pacific Rim in the future. In an interview with Collider, del Toro discussed the future of Justice League Dark (also known under the working title of Dark Universe) and Haunted Mansion, just two of the many movies on the hard-working director’s plate.

Coming off the success of Pirates of the Caribbean, Disney has put their Haunted Mansion ride forward as the next attraction-turned-movie experiment, but it’s already been three years in the making and it sounds like production is still far from finished:

[box_light]“…I’m a huge fan of Haunted Mansion and I would love to do it, but Disney at the same time wants to move really fast on it, and I’m busy for a year and a half or two so they don’t want to wait that long.  But if we keep chasing writers that we don’t get, it’s getting to be difficult.”[/box_light]

Haunted Mansion

In the same interview del Toro announced that he’ll be producing and not directing Haunted Mansion, but hopefully that still means he’ll be able to lend some creative attention to creature design – it’s what he does best after all. And if he has to drop directing control of Haunted Mansion, at least it means he has room to work on meatier projects like Justice League Dark.

For those who don’t know (I was one of ‘those’ until just recently) Justice League Dark is a team-up series featuring many of DC Comics’s supernatural/stranger characters, including the likes of Constantine, Frankenstein, Zatanna, and Deadman to name a few. In other words, it’s the Justice League… but dark. Guillermo del Toro has been attached to the film adaptation for some time now, and while the film is still in its preliminary stages, he has been working hard on the first steps already:

[box_light]“Justice League Dark is very active.  I’m doing one more revision while we wait for the writer.  It’s somebody big, [and] we’re patiently waiting for that writer.  I think it’s worth it, I think it’s a guy we all admire.  I’m doing my revisions on my sort of Bible, on my story for the film.  I can tell you it’s the writing project I’ve enjoyed the most in English […] this was so much fun because it was character.  It was a pretty easy plot, but the character interaction, Swamp Thing with Deadman and Demon, it’s so joyful for me to write that.  Constantine is such a great character, so dry.  I think it could be a great movie.  I don’t want to do many changes until the proper writer comes onboard.”[/box_light]

Justice League Dark

I’m very curious to know who this mystery writer is, as it’s basically the only missing piece in what sounds like another hauntingly strange story for Guillermo to sink his teeth into. If he can build the same wonderfully weird atmosphere that he managed in the Hellboy series I’ll be front-row center on opening night, even if I barely know who any of the characters are.

Even better? Del Toro is all for blending his JLD franchise with the inevitable Justice League movie that will hopefully see the light of day, now that Man of Steel has got the ball rolling.

The Newest Marvel One-Shot Features the Return of Hayley Atwell as ‘Agent Carter’

Despite previous reports, it looks like Hayley Atwell and her Peggy Carter character will be coming back to the Marvel Cinematic Universe… Sort of. According to Entertainment Weekly, Peggy Carter will make her return, but not in a way that everyone previously thought. As Captain America’s would be love interest from the first movie, most thought she should make her return in Captain America: The Winter Soldier. It was announced months ago that she would not return for that and most of us closed the book on her involvement in future Marvel ventures. Apparently, we thought wrong.

She will actually be returning in her own little Marvel One-Shot, a short film series made popular at last year’s 2012 Comic-Con in San Diego with Item 47, which starred Jesse Bradford and Lizzy Caplan. Marvel has had a succesful run of  One-Shot’s, with a couple featuring Agent Coulson and the previously mentioned Item 47, and this new short will act as the bridge to the next Captain America movie. The title is Agent Carter, and it will obviously follow the lovely Peggy Carter as she navigates a world that just survived Red Skull and Hydra and the issues that arise when you happen to be a female secret agent in a world dominated by men.

Hayley Atwell as Peggy Carter in 'Agent Carter'

The short film is directed by Marvel’s go-to short film guy, Louis D’Esposito, who did Item 47 and produced some of the Marvel Studios films. Seeing that Disney chairman and CEO Robert Iger greenlit the Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. series based off of Item 47, you know that they have a lot of faith in this type of entertainment medium. Agent Carter starts off a year after Cap decided to chill out (yep, Batman & Robin reference for Kronner) as she works for the precursor spy agency before S.H.I.E.L.D. called the SSR (Strategic Scientific Reserve) and is on the hunt for Zodiac. We don’t know what  iteration Zodiac might take in the MCU (person, weapon, item, key), but we do know he/she/it/they are the evil element in this story.

Of course, Ms. Carter must also deal with her superiors, namely one Bradley Whitford, who plays her sexist boss who obviously frowns upon having a woman attempt to rise in the ranks of his office. He does whatever he can to keep her down, because he believe that her meal ticket was Captain America and with no Cap, there’s no reason to keep her around.

Bradley Whitford in Agent Carter

Of course, she probably exercises some form of girl power to rise above the sexism and crap but that’s beside the point. It’s important that some of these characters will still have a say in the MCU and won’t go away once they’ve left the main narrative. Having these One-Shots are a great way to branch out without having to sacrifice the main story to pigeonhole someone in, while giving these ancillary characters their time to shine. Also returning is Tony Stark’s dad, Howard Stark (Dominic Cooper) to help bridge the gap from Iron Man 3 to the Winter Soldier. We`ll have to wait and see if he’ll look more gray and have a chance to hook up with Joan from Mad Men (Iron Man 2, anyone? When Howard Stark was Roger Sterling?), but it’s good to see throwbacks and the promise of other cameos will definitely make this a worthwhile venture.

For those not attending Comic-Con this year in lovely San Diego, you can still catch the One-Shot when Iron Man 3 comes out on DVD/Blu-ray on September 24th. However, those that are going to be in SoCal (ED. NOTE: Chris was just fired for using that term) next week, keep your Friday night open and check the Marvel booth to see if tickets will be available. It won’t be like the scavenger hunt that took place last year to secure a spot into Item 47, so just ask around and hopefully we’ll see you there to catch Agent Carter.

Marvel One-Shot - Agent Carter

 

‘Bond 24’ Gets A Director, and He Seems Familiar…

Well, it looks like Sam Mendes is a huge liar.

According Entertainment Weekly, Sam Mendes will in fact return for Bond 24, the new obviously permanent title for the next James Bond movie. You might recall that he had backed out of committing to return because of his obligations to theater productions of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and King Lear. However the lure of the spy world, beautiful women and double crosses have brought the critically acclaimed director back the franchise he helped revitalized with Skyfall last year.

Daniel Craig

Here’s what Mendes had to say in the statement:

[box_light]“I am very pleased that by giving me the time I need to honor all my theatre commitments, the producers have made it possible for me to direct Bond 24. I very much look forward to taking up the reins again, and to working with Daniel Craig, Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccoli for a second time.”[/box_light]

This announcement obviously reunites him with Daniel Craig again, as well as Skyfall screenwriter John Logan. Hopefully we get another fantastic film that essentially continues its journey towards recapturing the feel of the Bond movies with Q, and the new M and Moneypenny, of course. The new movie is slated to come November 6th, 2015 in the United States with the United Kingdom (damn you Brits!) getting their official release earlier on October 23, 2015.

We can’t complain too much that the UK are getting it first. After all, James Bond is their national treasure as far as I’m concerned.

Daniel Craig - New James Bond movie Casino Royale

Summer Glau Headed to Arrow, But As Who?

Filming of the second season of Arrow just started. Like yesterday. And already there is big news when it comes to casting and her name is Summer Glau. That’s right, the geek princess herself is coming to Starling City. With a show that has been drawing heavily from pretty much every other nerdy show out there – Battlestar Galatica, Doctor Who, more that I can’t remember right now – it feels like it was only a matter of time. Not only that but it appears as if I already believed that the character Glau is slated to play would someday appear on the show.

Robert Queen's Book of Names

As you can clearly see, the name Isabel Rochev appears there below David Drayson. Waaaaaayyyy back towards the beginning of the season. I made note of this page when talking in this post about the upcoming episode with the Royal Flush Gang.

That’s right, Summer Glau has signed on in a “major role” in season two as Isabel Rochev, the Serbian businesswoman who is a bit off her rocker.

A fairly new character in the DC Universe, Isabel Rochev is a woman who once met Robert Queen, is starstruck by him and sets out to make her own life better using him as an example. Long story short (not too long it’s been less than five years), she sort of goes off the deep end. As she gets older she gathers up small companies and is able to in the long run own a controlling share of Queen Industries. Somehow in between the time of being a Serbian slave girl to actually taking over Queen Industries, she gets it in her head that she is actually the rightful heir to QI and that Robert Queen truly loves her.

Isabel Rochev and Oliver Queen

Oh and most importantly? She wants Oliver out of the picture. For good.

Of course that’s the Isabel Rochev of the Star City. Isabel Rochev of Starling City, played by Glau, is the head of Stellmore International which is in the hunt to take over Queen Consolidated. Talk about kicking a man when he’s down. Moira is off to jail, Oliver is likely going to start the season off brooding over Tommy, and Thea? Who the hell knows what Thea will be doing. Seems about the right time for a ruthless business woman to step in and right the floundering ship.

As a matter of fact, Summer Glau will first appear as Isabel Rochev in the season two premiere of Arrow in October.

Summer Glau

Vin Diesel Meets With Marvel, and He Drops a Few Hints On Who He Might Be Playing

We reported last week that Vin Diesel was set for a meeting with the Marvel Studios crew, and according to his Facebook page that meeting has in fact happened. Diesel went on to his FB page to briefly discuss his meeting and offer a few teased as to who he could be playing in a future film:

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