Sci-Fi Storm

The science fiction community has lost one of its icons today…Leonard Nimoy, who (and I know I don’t need to say this) gained fame as the “pointy-eared, green-blooded, inhuman” Vulcan first officer Spock on the original Star Trek, passed away early this morning at home from end-stage chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), according to his wife Susan. Nimoy had announced he suffered from the disease last year, likely caused by smoking, even though he gave up the habit 30 years ago.

Nimoy also had some success as a writer and director, doing both on several of the movie installments of Star Trek, and he also directed the successful Three Men and a Baby.

Most recently he starred in the rebooted Star Trek film as well as a cameo in the sequel, plus had a recurring role in Fringe.

All we can say right now is, Live Long and Prosper.

Following up on last week’s story, during an interview with Sky Movies about the upcoming Chappie, both director Neil Blomkamp and actress Sigourney Weaver of course had to talk about Blomkamp’s planned Alien sequel – and it appears that he wants it to be a direct sequel of Aliens – basically inserting it as third in chronological order. See an excerpt of the entire interview below:

Of course, there is a slight problem…there was already a direct sequel in Alien 3, which might have to be explained away, and the followup Alien Resurrection, set a couple hundred years later. Perhaps we will learn that you can, in fact, dream in hypersleep, and Alien 3 was just a nightmware…and anything that can erase Alien Resurrection from reality is fine with me as well. 🙂

Chappie director Neill Blomkamp tweeted out the other day a picture of a classic Giger Alien with the text: “Um… So I think it’s officially my next film. #alien”

[We tried embedding the pic, but it failed – see it here]

It has since been confirmed that he will indeed direct a fifth film in the Aliens series, which will be follow up the prequel-sequel Prometheus 2. Blomkamp had been teasing an Aliens film for a while but it appeared to have died out. Star Sigourney Weaver was also expected to return as Ripley but it is not known if she is still attached. Blomkamp is no stranger to directing strange CGI aliens…he directed and received an Oscar nomination for the screenplay of the surprise hit District 9, his feature directorial debut.

Where it will fit in the franchise is unknown but it will definitely take place years after the time of Prometheus 2.

That earthquake you felt wasn’t real…it was just a rumored-but-still-surprising deal being made in Hollywood.

Sony Pictures and Marvel Studios, owned by Sony’s rival Disney, struck a deal on Monday for Spider-Man which will allow the character to appear in the Marvel Cinematic Universe – basically all the Marvel movies not done by Sony or Fox thus far, which all exist within the same “universe”, allowing for the crossover of the characters. Kevin Feige, who has led the MCU juggernaut, will come on board as a producer for a new Spider-Man film alongside Amy Pascal, who helped shepherd the Spider-Man franchise for Sony.

Sony will likely want to re-launch the franchise for a third time with a new face. With the second round starring Andrew Garfield, the release of The Amazing Spider-Man 2 made a decent amount of money but was considered a disappointment given its very large budget.

In the meantime Marvel has wanted to include Spider-Man alongside the Avengers – Spidey is a member of the group in the comics after all. Word is that they’d like to include him at least in a cameo for Captain America: Civil War, and I can forsee a bigger role for the webslinger in the third Avengers team film.

In the meantime, Sony had already penciled in a July 28th, 2017 release date – which had already been planned by Marvel/Disney for Thor: Ragnarok. So Marvel/Disney has agreed to shift all of the Marvel films back, with Thor moving to November, taking Black Panther‘s slot, who moves back to Captain Marvel‘s slot, etc. All the relevant dates have been updated in our calendar.

It appears that the Wachowskis struggles at finding an audience for their epic SF films is continuing. The latest casualty is the super-expensive Jupiter Ascending, which although buoyed by a decent overseas haul (where it was #1 this weekend) managed a mere $18 million domestically, against a more than $200 million (estimated) price tag, not even including marketing.

The brother/sister team of Andy and Lana Wachowski hit it big with The Matrix in 1999, and since then have been trying to develop big epic SF movies. But with now three straight box office flops – the live action revival of Speed Racer, the complicated Cloud Atlas, and Jupiter Ascending…the Wachowskis may need to sets their scope smaller for a while.

We don’t know what they are about…but we might know who will star in the first “interstitial” Star Wars movies that will release in between the main saga movies.

Deadline has confirmed that The Theory Of Everything star and Oscar nominee Felicity Jones is in talks to take the female lead for one of the movies. LucasFilm/Disney is still looking for a male lead.

Jones will next appear with Jonah Hill and James Franco in True Story.

In theaters March 20th, 2015, with tickets going on sale Wednesday, February 25th.

As an added bonus, each advance ticket purchase transaction for Insurgent in the first 24 hours on Fandango, MovieTickets.com, AMCTheatres.com, and Cinemark.com will receive a download of the blockbuster first installment of the Divergent franchise. In addition, Lionsgate has partnered with Fandango to offer more than 50,000 additional gifts with purchase for ticket transactions with 24-hour flash sales each following week leading up to release. Prizes include downloads from the Divergent book series, exclusive tracks from the film’s soundtrack, and more.
(continue reading…)

To be shown during the Super Bowl…
(continue reading…)

Our first look at the upcoming reboot of Fantastic Four from Fox…
(continue reading…)

We’ve got one casting confirmed, and one hot rumor…

The first lead actress to take on the gender-flipping Ghostbusters remake is Melissa McCarthy, who worked with director Kevin Feig in Bridesmaids and The Heat. Bridesmaids cast mate Kristin Wiig is reportedly also in negotiations as one of the team, as is current Saturday Night Live cast members Leslie Jones and Kate McKinnon.

In the hot rumors side, Disney has wanted to relaunch Indiana Jones since obtaining the franchise from Paramount, and even with Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull it appeared that there were plans to hand over the whip and fedora to a younger actor in Shia LeBeouf until Harrison Ford snatched his hat back at the end (and probably for the better…)

Now hey may have found are more apt successor, perhaps to replace Harrison Ford as Indy himself, in Guardians of the Galaxy star Chris Pratt, according to Deadline. It’s all very early, but it appears the studio is looking at Pratt to lead the franchise, but it will have to wait as Starlord needs to finish The Magnificent Seven for MGM/Sony and of course the obligatory Guardians of the Galaxy 2.