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Ridley Scott reveals the opening scene of his Blade Runner sequel. Find out why The Dark Knight Rises is the most epic movie made in at least 90 years. Is World War Z in trouble? Plus the latest candidates to play Finnick in Catching Fire.
All that, and plenty more spoilers still to come!
Top image from Game of Thrones.
The Dark Knight Rises
Director Christopher Nolan explains how this movie is massive on the same scale as old silent movie historical epics, which is a pretty spectacular comparison to make:
"I think this is the biggest one I've done. The biggest one anyone's done since the silent era, in technical terms. It's all about historical epics in conception. It's a war film. It's a revolutionary epic. It's looking back to the grand-scale epics of the past, really, and for me that goes as far back as silent films. I've been watching a lot of silent films with my kids on Blu-Ray. We've shot over a third of the movie on the IMAX format, and that naturally puts you more in the mode of staging very large events for the camera. It's my attempt to get as close to making a Fritz Lang film as I could. It's also more in the mould of Doctor Zhivago, or A Tale Of Two Cities, which is a historical epic with all kinds of great storytelling taking place during the French Revolution. There's an attempt to visualise certain things in this film on this large scale that are troubling and genuinely to the idea of an American city. Or, to put it another way: revolutions and the destabilising of society have happened everywhere in the world, so why not here?"
Here are two of the latest TV spots. [First Showing]
Prometheus
Here's an interview with star Noomi Rapace, in which she explains her character Elizabeth Shaw and her similarities to Sigourney Weaver's Ripley:
Yeah, I think he mentioned that there are similarities between them. Elizabeth Shaw is the dreamer, she's the one with the vision, she's the one with passion and this is her dream. She's been trying and struggling and fighting to convince people to do this, and to go on this journey with her, so this is her dream coming true. And then she realizes too late that it was a really bad idea. So it's very personal for her, this whole journey. I think that in the first part of the movie, she's maybe more naïve. She kind of steps into this whole thing with an open heart, and you get to know her a little bit more. With Ripley, I think it's like in the second part of the movie you start to realize she's the main character — in the beginning, she's just one of the crew members and it takes a while to kind of see that she's the one we're going to follow to the end. I think Elizabeth Shaw is more the heart and the engine. She's the one, together with Doctor Holloway, that is the force and the engine behind this mission. Then in the second part there's more similarities with Ripley, I would say. But yeah, we talked about it sometimes, but it was not like, "Oh, we should avoid it or we should go towards it." It was more, we were aware of it, and it's almost like flirting a little bit with her.
There's plenty more at the link. [Shock Till You Drop]
Here are the latest clips.
And here's a lengthy analysis of the movie's plot from Coming Sooner TV, based on all the various trailers.
Catching Fire
There's a few new names to add to the contenders to play Finnick Odair. Along with Tron Legacy's Garrett Hedlund and The Social Network's Armie Hammer, we can now add X-Men: First Class actor Lucas Till, Smallville Aquaman actor Alan Ritchson, and 90210's Trevor Donovan. I think we can say that Hammer remains the most interesting candidate for the role by a fairly decent margin, but we'll just have to see how this all shakes out. [Zap2It]
Blade Runner
Ridley Scott has reportedly come up with the first scene of his Blade Runner sequel:
There'll be a vast farmland where there are no hedges or anything in sight, and it's flat like the plains of — where's the Great Plains in America? Kansas, where you can see for miles. And it's dirt, but it's being raked. On the horizon is a combine harvester which is futuristic with klieg lights, ‘cause it's dawn. The harvester is as big as six houses. In the foreground is a small white clapboard hut with a porch as if it was from Grapes of Wrath. From the right comes a car, coming in about six feet off the ground being chased by a dog. And that's the end of it, I'm not gonna tell you anything else.
A gigantic scifi combine harvester? As unlikely as it might seem, I've heard that one before. Anyway, that sounds pretty spectacular. [Collider via /Film]
World War Z
Brad Pitt and Quantum of Solace director Marc Forster's adaptation of the Max Brooks novel is reportedly heading to Budapest for seven weeks worth of reshoots. While reshoots in and of themselves aren't any big deal — pretty much every movie has them — almost two months of them might well be a sign that there are some serious issues with the film as it is now. [The Daily Mail]
Noah
Liam Neeson is reportedly out of the running for a role in Darren Aronofosky's movie about Noah's Ark. Before bowing out, Neeson was reportedly in talks to play "Noah's nemesis." I'm not exactly sure who that would be, so I'm just going to go ahead and assume Neeson was going to play the anthropomorphic representation of the Flood. It just seems like the sort of part Neeson could pull off. [Deadline]
Moses
Darren Aronofosky isn't the only acclaimed director planning to make a big budget reimagining of a Bible story. Ridley Scott has officially reached Guillermo del Toro levels of movies on his to-do list with this one:
"I've got something else in the works. I'm already doing it. It's called Moses. I probably shouldn't have let that slip out. I'm not supposed to say anything... It's definitely in the cards, though. What's interesting to me about Moses isn't the big stuff that everybody knows. It's things like his relationship with Ramses [II, the pharaoh]. I honestly wasn't paying attention in school when I was told the story of Moses. Some of the details of his life are extraordinary."
[Esquire]
Game of Thrones
This is the rarest of spoilers, insofar as it seems to apply both to the TV show and the as yet unpublished books. Theon Greyjoy actor Alfie Allen reveals he asked George R.R. Martin the answer to one of the saga's biggest unsolved mysteries, and his answer certainly drops some potentially massive clues:
You know, I asked him about who Jon Snow's real parents were, and he told me. I can't say who, but I can tell you that it involves a bit of a Luke Skywalker situation. It will all come to fruition eventually. The whole thing with all the fight over proper succession is partly inspired by the War of the Roses in the late 1400s, and back then, to ensure pedigree, the monarchies were kind of inbred. It's definitely fucked up, but it definitely happened back then, so that's why there's incest with the Targaryen line. It's toned down, though.
Let's assume Allen knows what he's talking about when making the Star Wars analogy. For this to be a Luke Skywalker situation, you'd kind of have to think that Jon Snow's father — the one parent he thought he was sure of — isn't who he thought he was. Also, his father is a monster on the scale of Darth Vader. At the risk of adding 2 and 2 together to make 1,000, his sudden segue into discussion of the Targaryen line might be relevant here. (I'm not going to say any more, since my Morning Spoilers remit doesn't necessarily cover spoiling the books as well, so I'm going to keep this relatively vague.) But, of course, this is all massive speculation, so I'd advise drawing your own conclusions. [Vulture]
True Blood
Here's a promo for season five.
Scott Foley drops some hints about his role as Patrick:
"We're going to see a lot of Terry figuring out who he is and coming to grips with what he has done in his past, especially over in Iraq. And we're going to find out whether Terry and Arlene stay together. I bring in a substantial supernatural element to the show that hasn't been seen yet."
And Kevin Alejandro talks about what's ahead for Lafayette:
"My character definitely has a role in this season, but I can't tell you how. I'll tell you this, the death of Jesus really has affected Lafayette (Nelsan Ellis) in a very dramatic way, so you can expect to see how he deals with that and how it affects the other people around him. There's a lot more depth to Lafayette that audience is in store for, hope you're ready for it!"
Star Wars Live-Action TV Series
LucasFilm producer Rick McCallum gives another update on just where those fifty completed TV scripts stand, and why the show hasn't yet been made:
Well, they're all second draft scripts and it would probably take a year of prep before shooting would start, but that's because they're all very complex.
If the development is this far along, why the impasse?
The episodes are too expensive and…well, we've got two things going on. Firstly, we've got television as we know it about to implode. You've got network TV, which is really where we should be because it has the dollars to pay for this and an audience, but you're burdened by the fact you only get 42 minutes for an hour because of commercials. And then you've got cable, which has the most provocative and daring programming, but has audiences of 1 or 2 million people. They also have a very limited amount of money they can spend without wanting some sort of say or control over the material, which is absolutely repugnant to us in terms of the way we work.
He then expands on just what we might expect from the show's subject matter, in the process comparing the project to one of the greatest shows ever made. So, you know, no pressure or anything:
Our biggest problem is that these stories are adult. I mean…these are like Deadwood in space. It so unlike anything you've ever associated with George before in relation to Star Wars. These aren't for kids. I mean, we hope they'll watch, but it's not being targeted at 8-to-9 year old boys. The situation we have is that each episode –- or if you put two hour long episodes together –- is bigger than any film we've ever done. It's on the Avatar level and we'll only have about $5-6 million we can spend on each episode.
Once Upon a Time
Writer Jane Espenson drops some hints about season two:
"We're picking up right where we left off, but where we left off was in the middle of a veer in a different direction. Season 2 will be different than Season 1... I would hope Ariel would join the show. She's one we've definitely talked about. There are a whole lot of princesses we haven't seen — like Aurora, Rapunzel and Jasmine. And it's hard to look at that list without going, ‘Well, what about Goldilocks?!' And they'd all be good, because what we do is take them and go, ‘Well, the thing you never knew about Little Miss Muffet is...'"
[TV Line]
Eureka
Here's a promo and sneak peek for next week's eight episode, "In Too Deep."
Lost Girl
Syfy has officially picked up the American broadcast rights to the show's third season. For more details for what to expect from season three, you can check out this report here. [TV Equals]
Continuum
Additional reporting by Jennifer Griffith-Delgado and Charlie Jane Anders.