This Week in Geek

  • Lucasfilm, under Disney, plans to release 2-3 movies every year (Huffington Post)
  • Could Tyrese finally be arriving in The Walking Dead? (EW)
  • American Horror Story has been renewed for a third season and Jessica Lange is returning. (Deadline Hollywood Daily)
  • A new synopsis for The Wolverine has been released. (Collider)
  • The king of movie makeup, Rick Baker, is finally getting a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. (The Mary Sue)
  • David Yates wants Alexander Skarsgard (Eric from True Blood) to be his Tarzan. (Variety)
  • Tom Cruise wants Christopher McQuarrie (The Way of the Gun) to direct Mission: Impossible: 5. (I Watch Stuff)
  • The Kickstarter for an animated The Goon film set a record for the site. (MTV Geek)
  • Apparently they are making a film based on the video game, Splinter Cell, and Tom Hardy is set to star. (Latino Review)
  • If you see The Hobbit in IMAX 3D, you’ll catch the first nine minutes of the horribly-titled (IMHO) Star Trek Into Darkness. (Bleeding Cool)
  • Zack Snyder says that his Superman in Man of Steel is a “more serious version.” (Splash Page)
  • Season three of Game of Thrones has a return date. (io9)
  • Is The Wasp going to be in Iron Man 3? (Screen Rant)
  • If I proposed to Cindy with this R2-D2-inspired engagement ring, I think her “yes” would have changed to a “let me think about it.” (Geekologie)
  • Could George Clooney and Brad Bird be teaming up for Bird’s secret sci-fi flick, 1952? (Vulture)
  • We get our first look at Malekith the Accursed (Christopher Eccleston), the villain of Thor: The Dark World. (Splash Page)
  • Brandon T. Jackson (Tropic Thunder) is set to star as Axel Foley’s son in the pilot of Beverly Hills Cop television series produced by Shawn Ryan (The Shield) and Eddie Murphy (TVLine)
  • James Wan is in talks to direct a MacGyver movie. (Latino Review)
  • A pair of Brits, Elizabeth Henstridge and Ian De Caestecker, have joined the cast of Marvel’s S.H.I.E.L.D television pilot. (Bleeding Cool)
  • Marc Webb confirms that Shailene Woodley (The Descendants) is in The Amazing Spider-Man sequel but not if she’s playing Mary Jane Watson. (Splash Page)
  • New trailers for Oz: The Great and Powerful, House of Cards, Europa Report, The Host and Warm Bodies

This Week in Geek

  • The sequel to The Muppets starts filming in London in January and will feature more songs by Bret McKenzie (Bleeding Cool)
  • Screen Junkies finally made an “honest trailer” for The Amazing Spider-Man (spoilers).
  • The pilot for Marvel’s S.H.I.E.L.D TV series directed by Joss Whedon will start filming in January. (Bleeding Cool)
  • Skyfall‘s director Sam Mendes and writer John Logan are making a vampire hunter TV series. (io9)
  • The Battlestar Galactica prequel Blood & Chrome (featuring Will Adama as a pilot in the Cylon Wars) is finally going to air online starting today as webisodes (EW)
  • Who’s directing Star Wars: Episode VII? Is it Matthew Vaughn (X-Men: First Class)?  Is it Colin Trevorrow (Safety Not Guaranteed)? (Collider/Bleeding Cool)
  • Whoever is directing, it appears Michael Arndt (Little Miss Sunshine, Toy Story 3) has already plotted out the next Star Wars trilogy and will likely be the writer of Episode VII. (Bleeding Cool)
  • Harrison Ford is open to returning to the role of Han Solo in the new trilogy. (EW)
  • Is Disney trying to buy Hasbro next? (MTV Geek)
  • Because no one demanded it, 70s/80s fantasy comic Elfquest might finally be getting a movie. (io9)
  • Stan Lee wants a bigger cameo in The Amazing Spider-Man 2. I say give it to him as long as his character is named Jack Kirby. (Splash Page)
  • Spartacus: War of the Damned premieres in January. (TV Squad)
  • Neil Gaiman’s next Doctor Who episode will feature the Cybermen. (Bleeding Cool)
  • Mark Wahlberg is going to star in the next Transformers movie by Michael Bay. (Latino Review)
  • David Yates is going to direct Tarzan for Warner Bros. Yay for the resurrection of racist franchises! (Vulture)
  • At least someone agrees with me that Preacher should be a TV series not a movie. (Splash Page)
  • Shock surprise, Man of Steel is going to be in 3D. (Deadline Hollywood Daily)
  • One of the best ongoing comic series, Locke & Key, might be getting a movie trilogy. (Splash Page)
  • DC Comics decides to end it’s longest running series, Hellblazer, just so they can relaunch it. (MTV Geek)
  • Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson and Brett Ratner are joining forces for Hercules. (Splash Page)
  • New trailers for World War Z (starring Brad Pitt), The Last Stand (starring Arnold Schwarzenegger and Les Misérables (Latino Review)

Movie of the Week: Harry Potter & The Deathly Hallows, Part II

(Spoilers abound so you’ve been warned)
It would have been pretty hard for them to screw up the second part of Deathly Hallows.  They got all the boring walking, arguing and trying to explain things like Horcruxes and Deathly Hallows out-of-the-way in the first part.  All that was left were the action set pieces.  Harry Potter & The Deathly Hallows was the first book I thought J.K. Rowling wrote with an eye on how it would look on the big screen.  How else could you explain a series that was pretty low on action for the most part ending with a battle that could only be compared to Helms Deep in The Two Towers?

I thought Yates (directing his fourth Potter) did a great job with most of the action pieces.  It was also good to see some of the Hogwarts staff which had been relegated to the background for the last few movies finally have some moments to shine, particularly Maggie Smith (Minerva McGonagall) and Warwick Davis (Filius Flitwick and Griphook).  The all-important Snape backstory was filmed a little over-dramatically but worked mostly because of Alan Rickman’s performance. Continue reading