| | | | | | “It’s likely over for us.” That tweet from Deadpool & Wolverine writer Rhett Reese summed up the dread he felt watching that viral clip of Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt fighting that has consumed social media over the past few days. Dread, not because it was AI slop, but because of how good he found it. It’s caused the MPA and SAG to issue statements against platform Seedance 2.0, which was used to create the video with a simple, two-line prompt. Reese has amassed a startling amount of credits, not just on Deadpool, but on original concepts like Zombieland as well, which may be why people are so rattled by his prediction. We’d like to think AI won’t be able to match human creativity, but Reese isn’t sure, writing, “In next to no time, one person is going to be able to sit at a computer and create a movie indistinguishable from what Hollywood now releases. True, if that person is no good, it will suck. But if that person possesses Christopher Nolan’s talent and taste (and someone like that will rapidly come along), it will be tremendous.” Meanwhile, Wong Updates, a parody account that tweets its own brand of humorous genre “news,” took a moment to skewer a Deadpool & Wolverine fight — and has a fight that has some users apparently unaware it was not in fact created by AI. There was different kind of consternation earlier this week, this time in the never quiet Star Wars fandom zone. A lot of people had a lot to say about the Budweiser beer ad-inspired Super Bowl spot for The Mandalorian and Grogu, and it wasn't pretty. (We, though, would have been fine seeing the pair sitting at a Pizza Hutt. Get it? Pizza HUTT?? Sheesh. Tough crowd.) Don’t worry Star Nerds, there will be a new trailer out very soon. And in another example of the Internet being stupid, a rumour spread about a Star Wars/Marvel/Avengers cross over comic book to be written by love him or hate him author Mark Millar. It was like Alderaan exploded all over again. In any case, we’re hearing it’s not true, so have some blue milk and cookies. Well, fake entertainment news and AI fears aside, we do have three big movies made by humans are in theaters this weekend: Emerald Fennell’s horny take on Wuthering Heights; GOAT, Sony Pictures Animation’s first theatrical movie since the last Spider-Verse three years ago; and the big budget Chris Hemsworth feature Crime 101. And Hollywood is planning on being around for at least awhile longer. In fact, we’ve got two scoops about human writers who at this very moment are working on scripts for what its makers hope will be big movies …. —Aaron Couch and Borys Kit. |
DEAD BY DAYLIGHT HAS SCARED UP SOME WRITERS. A movie based on the popular video game has been in the works since 2023, when Blumhouse acquired the rights, but there's been no news since then. Now, it's moving forward with Blumhouse-Atomic Monster and video game developer Behaviour Interactive hiring Aquaman scribe David Leslie Johnston-McGoldrick and Crawl filmmaker Alexandre Aja to pen the script. Aja, who will be helming Under Paris 2, will not direct, so the hunt is on for a director. Launched in 2016, Daylight focused on a group of four survivors who must find a set of generators in order to escape a killer who seeks to sacrifice them using hooks to appease a being known as The Entity. The game has reached over 60 million players worldwide. Lighten up. |
SONY IS REVIVING CHARLIE'S ANGELS. The studio is in early development on a new big screen take on the classic TV property, with The Proposal and Crazy Rich Asians scribe Pete Chiarelli working on a script. Charlie’s Angels was a crime drama that aired on ABC from 1976 to 1981. A pop culture sensation, it made stars out of Farrah Fawcett, Kate Jackson and Jaquelyn Smith, and also helped establish Aaron Spelling as a bigtime TV producer. McG directed a pair of hit movies in the early 2000s, while Elizabeth Banks and Sony attempted to revive it for a 2019 movie that proved to be a bomb. Chiarelli's halo. |
➤ We went inside Wonder Man's meta marketing campaign (complete with a THR magazine cover).
➤ The TV trailer of the year? (OK, it's only February, but still.) Nick Cage gets drunk and beats up some guys (and does much more) in the gonzo Spider-Man Noir trailer. A legend already spreading about the show: we're told that Cage, who is known for taking his work extremely seriously, had ALL his lines memorized for the season on DAY ONE.
➤ He won't be back: Terminator Zero is cancelled at Neflix, said show creator/screenwriter Mattson Tomlin, who then had a lot things to add about it.
➤ We were going to show you a DeLorean that was for sale on bringatrailer.com but it sold on Monday for $72,000. Oh, well.
➤ Cowabunga: Under Skydance, Paramount is ramping up the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles franchise on all fronts...including restaurants.
➤ Misty-eyed: Mike Flanagan is plotting yet another Stephen King adaptation. This time, it's The Mist.
Catch up on these Heat Vision interviews...
➤GOAT star Caleb McLaughlin bluntly told THR's Brian Davids that he thought the Stranger Things secret finale fan theory was "dumb."
➤ No, Kpop Demon Hunters 2 won't be ready for 2029 as has been reported. But yes, Sony Pictures Animation is actively working on Spider-Punk and Spider-Gwen movies. A wide-ranging chat with SPA bosses Kristine Belson and Damien de Froberville.
➤ Gore Verbinski goes off on AI: "I don't want AI to breathe or fuck for me; I want it to solve cancer.”
➤ Madelaine Petsch uppacks the ending of The Strangers: Chapter 3, which scrapped 80 percent of its original shoot.
➤ Dylan O'Brien explains why he sides with Rachel McAdams' murderous Send Help character over his own. |
David Canfield has this dispatch from an afternoon with Ryan Coogler for this week's cover story...
You hear a lot about Ryan Coogler’s humbleness when speaking with his collaborators, but it’s still disarming when you spend an afternoon with him. This is one of the most successful, big-ticket directors of his generation, and yet as I sat down with the Sinners filmmaker over coffee in his Oakland hometown, it took an awfully long time to get him to start talking about himself.
The first 10 minutes or so of our formal sitdown were dedicated to recommendations for how I should spend the weekend in the city (for the record, they were all great). Gradually, we got to the man himself — and Coogler, true to form, gave one of the more generous longform interviews I’ve been given in my career: thoughtful, patient, candid, and at times very funny.
We took on his whole career, which despite his age — he turns 40 later this year — already has an impressive shape to it, from the Sundance triumph of Fruitvale Station to the billion-dollar-grossing Black Panther franchise.
Oh, and now Sinners — newly the most-nominated movie in Oscars history. Watching Coogler reflect on this arc was fascinating, since he’s a guy who admits to struggling greatly with imposter syndrome.
That makes for an interesting dynamic when you spend a few hours with him, going over his remarkable resume. I did a ton of research in the lead-up to this profile, and spoke to nearly a dozen of those who’ve worked with him over the years. In actually getting to know him, though, I still learned a ton — both in what he said and what was left between the lines. I hope you do too.
Read the cover story here. |
A PROJECT HAIL MARY LEGO SET?
Well, it doesn’t surprise us that Phil Lord and Chris Miller, the team that made The Lego Movie, would have a Lego set for their upcoming movie.
Hailing from the company’s Icons line, it is a microscale spacecraft model kit for adults. The 830-piece set will retail for $99.99 when it hits stores March 1.
And it comes with a minifigure of Ryan Gosling! Uh, we mean Ryland Grace, the character he plays in the Amazon MGM Studios movie. And there’s also a minifig of Rocky, the alien friend Grace makes along the way.
The set also comes with a display stand that has a crank, that when turned, simulates the spaceship’s centrifugal gravity system.
Now, Lego is touting the set as capturing the design of “the iconic interstellar spacecraft,” which seems a tad much, considering the movie doesn’t come out theatrically until March 20. But maybe not.
We’ve been told that the studio tested the movie three times, and the scores from the screenings were 94, 95, and 96.
Astronaut? More, like Astro-yes! |
SAM RAIMI IS ENJOYING A HOLLYWOOD MOMENT WITH SEND HELP.
It's a return to form for a filmmaker has tried his hand at various genres. In this century, he’s best known for helping usher in the comic book movie revolution with the original Spider-Man trilogy.
His roots, however, lie in horror with the Evil Dead movies, the third of which was 1993's Army of Darkness.
The movie enjoys a cult status among the Raimi faithful as does the Frank Frazetta-vibe giving poster, which features artwork by painter Michael Hussar.
The poster, in a 27” V 41” variety, is one of the more active items on Heritage’s Monsters & Spacemen Movie Posters Showcase, which culminates Feb. 21. Current bidding is at $204. |
You made it to the end, one last tidbit ...
This week it was heralded that David Boreanaz would be playing put-upon private investigator Jim Rockford for a long in the works redo of The Rockford Files. One erstwhile publication mentioned that another actor had received the offer but fell out over location issues. We're being told that the mystery actor is The Walking Dead star Jeffrey Dean Morgan.
Thank you, as always, for reading to the end, and have a nice weekend.
Look for us in your inbox most Fridays. We want your thoughts and suggestions. Email us: aaron.couch@thr.com, borys.kit@thr.com. And to share this newsletter with a friend, have them sign up here. |
| | | |
Commentaires
Enregistrer un commentaire
Thank you to leave a comment on my site