Emily Blunt is in talks to play Black Widow in Iron Man 2, with Mickey Rourke and Sam Rockwell also negotiating to play villains in the sequel (Variety). But Blunt is also committed to join Jason Segel and Jack Black in Gulliver's Travels (Variety), which may interfere with filming for the Black Widow role. Her representatives are trying to work out a way for her to be in both movies. I loved the first Iron Man movie (I just bought it on Amazon--boy am I a sucker for that "Spend $25 and get free super-saver shipping!" deal), so I am definitely interested to hear how the casting goes. All I've seen Emily Blunt in is Devil Wears Prada, but I think she's great, so I hope she can work out the scheduling conflicts.
>Update 2/16/09: Scarlett Johansson is reportedly in talks to take on the Black Widow role, as Blunt's commitment to Gulliver's Travels will cause her to miss out on the Iron Man 2 role (IMDb).
As of mid-January, there was still talk of a possible Pushing Daisies movie (IMDb). They're keeping my hope alive, at least. Lost and BSG are back on this season now, but I still miss my weekly fix of Pushing Daisies. I wonder if and when they're planning on showing the final un-aired episodes.
This isn't really entertainment news, but I did hear of it on a TV show. Thanks to Stephen Colbert, I now know about the delightful PETA campaign to get people to refer to fish as "sea kittens" in the hope that it will make people think twice before eating fish. Well, to paraphrase Colbert, I'll be happy to give up eating what PETA calls "sea kittens":
as long as I can start eating what I like to call "land fish":
Mmmmm. Now, the campaign did not work for me; for environmental purposes, I think it would be good to be a vegan, but I'm not at a place right now where I'm willing to give up meat, much less dairy. Still, I did go to PETA's sea kitten website, where I made myself a sea kitten:
Isn't she cute? (And do you get the reference?)
The Narnia movies are back on again. After Disney dropped the franchise due to the movies' big budgets and Prince Caspian's less impressive box office take, 20th Century Fox has agreed to develop Walden Media's next Narnia movie, Voyage of the Dawn Treader (Variety, IMDb). I still haven't seen Caspian, but I liked the first movie, and it's always good to know that fantasy movies are still alive. I hope this one will be able to impress at the box office, encouraging more.
ABC has greenlit a pilot for a reworking of 1980s sci-fi series V (Variety). The series is written by Scott Peters, who did The 4400, and tells the story of a seemingly friendly alien race that comes to Earth but turns out to have nefarious plans. I've never seen the original series or The 4400, so I don't really have much to say about the project, but I'm always interested to hear of new sci-fi series coming to network TV. Some new adaptations of old sci-fi series have worked (Battlestar Galactica), and some have not (Bionic Woman). We'll see where this one falls.
By the power of Grayskull! V isn't the only series from the '80s getting a reimagining; a new He-Man movie is in the works. Warner Bros. is financing Masters of the Universe, which will be directed by Kung Fu Panda co-director John Stevenson (Variety). Mattel's toy line will likely be getting a nice reboot as well. My brothers and I loved watching He-Man as kids; we had a bunch of episodes recorded on VHS and we certainly had a lot of He-Man toys. Being a girl, though, I of course preferred She-Ra. Maybe if He-Man is successful, they'll make a She-Ra movie, too. I don't know, though; it's hard to imagine He-Man not being campy (I mean, just the name is pretty silly).
Hyperion and The Fall of Hyperion, two sci-fi novels by Dan Simmons, are being adapted into one film, to be called "Hyperion Cantos", by Warner Bros. The screenplay is being written by Trevor Sands, who also adapted David Brin's Startide Rising into what may be an upcoming Paramount movie, and Scott Derrickson, director of the The Day the Earth Stood Still remake, is set to direct (Variety). I haven't read Dan Simmons, but as I've mentioned, I'm always interested to hear of sci-fi projects. That said, I hear the remake of The Day the Earth Stood Still was awful, so I don't know if we should get our hopes up about this movie.
M. Night Shyamalan is making a movie called "The Last Airbender", which is apparently based on a Nickelodeon series (Variety). I don't know anything about such a series--I don't get Nickelodeon--but it sounds to me like Shyamalan is planning to make a kids movie. *Shiver.* Well, he has mostly disappointed of late, so maybe Airbender will be good for him. And Dev Patel (Slumdog Millionaire) has just joined the cast. I saw him on a recent Daily Show with Jon Stewart, and I'm just a little bit in love with him. But, uh, he's 18. Legal, sure, but still too young for me not to be a little creepy. Anyway, uh, speaking of the Oscars...
Producers of the Academy Awards show have said that the Oscars are going to be full of surprises this year (IMDb, NY Times). Nominees were told they should "be prepared" (ooh, ominous) and that a lot of risks will be taken. One interesting twist is that they said there is actually going to be some kind of story line told in the awards show itself. The presenters of the awards are being kept secret, which is unusual, and audiences should expect host Hugh Jackman to sing a number directed by Baz Luhrmann. With ratings for the Oscars falling in recent years, and without a huge blockbuster presence in the big categories once again, the producers of the show are clearly trying to change things up to attract a larger audience. I'll be watching, at least. Time, and Nielsen, will tell how many other people tune in with me.
3 comments:
Were you She-Ra? Or did you force one of your brothers to play her role?
Haha, no, I was happy to be She-Ra myself. I may have played He-Man as well, but I wouldn't have let my brothers be She-Ra.
Ah, I was afraid you might be some raving feminist... but it's good to see you know your place, when push comes to shove.
I have the power!
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