Margot Robbie’s Harley Quinn finally gets her freedom in this weekend’s Birds of Prey (and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn), but you can swoop in and snag the first wave of Funko Pop! Vinyls right now!
Funko has made available for pre-order the first Birds of Prey line of Pop! Vinyls, and they’ve teamed up with our friends at Entertainment Earth to include them with limited edition exclusive collector cards. There are 22 cards in all, 3 for each character and a special one for the Black Mask Chase variant. You can get Harley Quinn w/ caution tape, Harley in her Black Mask club gear, Roller Derby Harley Quinn, and Harley Quinn with a beaver (?). There’s also a Funko for Black Canary (played by Jurnee Smollett-Bell), Huntress (Mary Elizabeth Winstead), and Ewan McGregor’s Roman Sionis aka Black Mask. No Cassandra Cain, Renee Montoya, or Victor Zsasz yet, but I guess those are coming later.
Of course, I had to get the Huntress one to add to my special Mary Elizabeth Winstead collection. It’s not as creepy as it sounds.
As expected, there are also a number of Harley Quinn exclusives from Hot Topic, BoxLunch, and as a Funko Specialty Series release.
Pre-order yours now by clicking on the links below! By doing so, it helps us out tremendously at zero cost to you! Thanks!
Sam Raimi, whose trilogy of Spider-Man movies for Sony helped set the stage for today’s blockbuster superhero landscape, may be coming to the MCU. Variety reports Raimi is in talks to direct Marvel’s Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, a film that has been without a director since Scott Derrickson left last month.
This would be one Hell of a coup for Marvel, who are looking to replace Derrickson who introduced Doctor Strange with the 2016 movie. He brought with him a strong horror background, and obviously, that would also apply to Raimi who gave us the classic Evil Dead trilogy. Derrickson would remain on board as a producer.
If all works out, this would be Raimi’s first feature-length directing gig since 2013’s Oz, the Great and Powerful. Prior to that he directed 2009’s Drag Me to Hell. He’s been busy as a producer lately, on horror reboots such as Fede Alvarez’s Evil Dead, Poltergeist, and sleeper genre hits such as Crawl. But it’s his Spider-Man movies that make this such an intriguing move. The Raimi-verse was so huge, so beloved, that it still gets referenced frequently, as recently as Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. The trio of movies, which ended with 2007’s Spider-Man 3, combined for over $2.5B worldwide.
Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness is set to open on May 7th 2021. Benedict Cumberbatch will return as the Sorcerer Supreme, joined by Benedict Wong as Wong, and Chiwetel Ejiofor as Baron Mordo. Rachel McAdams isn’t expected back as Christine Palmer, however.
Is Birds of Prey even a superhero movie? I mean, there’s the DC Extended Universe stinger ahead of it, featuring Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman. But this is no ordinary superhero movie, it shares very little in common with anything we’ve seen and that’s part of what makes it so great. A ridiculously unhinged neon splash of beat ’em up action and rainbow-colored girl power make for one of the most enjoyable comic book movies in years. Call it “fantabulous.”
Margot Robbie slips back into the clown makeup and pastel-colored fashion sense of Harley Quinn, the breakout character from 2016’s Suicide Squad. The ADD-riddled paramour of Joker is no longer his main squeeze (Jared Leto’s version of the villain is barely glimpsed but often referenced), and going solo has only made her more erratic. This plays out in a 4th wall-breaking, quippy, time-jumping, motor-mouthed narration that is both hilarious and patience-testing. We’re speed raced through her origin story using a combo of live-action and animation, ending with her basically being thrown out on the street. She handles the break-up like any normal person would, with a lot of tears, a new haircut, eating herself into a food coma, buying a pet hyena, y’know how it goes. She also gets into a LOT of trouble, because now that Joker’s no longer protecting her, it’s open season on Harley Quinn and she’s racked up a murderer’s row of enemies.
It’s an ingenious point driven home by writer Christina Hodson (Bumblebee, the upcoming Batgirl movie), that Harley Quinn is so used to being under Joker’s umbrella that she never once had to think about the consequences of her actions. “A Harley Quinn is meant to serve”, she weeps somberly to Dinah Lance aka Black Canary (Jurnee Smollett-Bell), while indulging at the nightclub of crime boss Roman Sionis aka Black Mask (a flamboyantly Walken-esque Ewan McGregor). Who is Harley Quinn without a master?
She’s batshit insane, that’s what, only without any guardrails, and the direction by Cathy Yan is appropriately heightened to match her broken psyche. A thin plot emerges involving a dead mob family’s priceless diamond, which gets snapped up by teen pickpocket Cassandra Cain (Ella Jay Basco), who is being protected by cop-on-the-edge Renee Montoya (Rosie Perez), who enlists Black Canary for help, only to run afoul of vengeful assassin the Huntress (Mary Elizabeth Winstead, great at playing deadly serious). These vigilante Spice Girls must team up to stop Black Mask and his face-removing thug Victor Szasz (an unrecognizably creepy Chris Messina) from getting their hands on Cassandra.
There is no shortage of toxic men for these gals to beat up on, and Birds of Prey works best when it goes full-on riot squad. The wilder it gets, the better, like a Terminator-esque siege sequence with Harley Quinn shooting up a police station with a bean bag gun full of glitter, or a chase sequence in which she tries desperately to save the one thing in life she still cares for…a bacon, egg, and cheese sandwich. Quieter moments find Harley Quinn ruminating on her need to break free from the abusive relationships that have defined her (hence the movie’s “Fantabulous Emancipation” subtitle), but it would be too much to say these times are especially deep. They’re enough to give the talented Robbie a little more to do than bash skulls with a giant mallet and crack jokes. Robbie is totally in sync with this character, and in two short films has elevated her from colorful sidekick to figure of female empowerment…albeit one with a penchant for breaking legs. The contrasts within Harley, that she’s a maniacal villain seeking to help an endangered child, mirror the conflicts within all of these women. Each of them must become something new, embrace a different part of themselves, if there’s any hope of them working together and surviving. The theme of evolving beyond past traumas is common among male superhero characters (hello, Batman!!) and it’s refreshing to see it in a major film with some of DC Comics’ best heroines.
Fueled by a roaring soundtrack of stage-setting rock hits (“Barracuda” plays during one notable scene) and manic cinematography by Matthew Libatique, Birds of Prey is undeniably loud and superficially stylish, recalling the early works of Tarantino or his copycats. There’s a random Marilyn Monroe music video sequence that feels ripped from a different movie, but y’know what, it works. Yan throws everything against the wall to see what splatters and sticks, and nearly all of it does. If you’re going to make a movie from Harley Quinn’s fractured personality, this is how you do it. Go big. And that includes the action which includes plenty ofslick John Wick-style fights (the plot is pretty similar, too) elevated to Deadpool levels of comic inappropriateness. The violence is brutal, sadistic, and clashes with the overall cartoonish tone. To put a point on it, the little girl dressed as Harley Quinn in front of me had to have her eyes shielded by her mother on more than one occasion.
As a spinoff of Suicide Squad, there are stylistic similarities in attitude and atmosphere, but Birds of Prey embraces its crazy and leaves nothing left to chance. While it doesn’t all come together perfectly, the gamble pays off in emancipating the film from the confines of a tired genre.
The jokes about Kevin Hart’s height and the bite-sized programming of Quibi write themselves, so I will leave them to others. What matters is the mobile streaming service has added Hart’s star power to its impressive talent roster, and he isn’t coming alone. Hart will be paired up with the legendary John Travolta for an action-comedy series that sounds like the 1991 cop film, The Hard Way.
Hart is set to star in Die Hart, a Quibi show in which he plays a heightened version of himself, a comedic actor making the move from being a sidekick to the action lead. But before he can snag the role he must attend an action star school taught by Travolta. They should’ve titled this The Hart Way, instead.
Behind the camera is Eric Appel (Brooklyn Nine-Nine) with Tripper Clancy (Stuber) and Derek Kolstad as writers, and Hart set to produce. Kolstad is the screenwriter behind the John Wick franchise and the upcoming Marvel series Falcon and the Winter Soldier.
This marks Travolta’s return to TV after the Emmy-winning The People vs. OJ Simpson.
For those who may have forgotten, Quibi is the mobile streaming service with programming offered in 10-minute “quick bites”, hence the name.
Unless you were living under a rock (not THE Rock, although he’s big enough to be a house), you saw the new trailer for F9, aka Fast & Furious 9. You’re either hyped for more of the brand of vehicular mayhem Vin Diesel and Co. have to bring or not, but one thing’s for sure and it’s that audiences love these movies. This franchise has been around nearly two decades and could probably go on for two more, but that’s not what Diesel has in the cards. The finishing line may just be in sight.
When the 9th and 10th movies were announced back in 2016, speculation raised that we could be looking at the end of the road. Diesel had been open about wanting to do one more trilogy, beginning with Fate of the Furious, and he seems to be keeping to that…sorta. Speaking with TotalFilm, Diesel talked about the possibility of splitting the 10th and final movie into an epic two-part blowout!
“I started planning for ‘Fast 10’ before we started filming ‘Fast 9.’ Very much so,” Diesel said. “The universe is so robust and so rich with talent and rich with story that, on one level, it’s totally feasible to have spinoffs, and I think that’s something that is inevitable. Universal deserves it because of how much they’ve invested in this little saga, and it’d be good to give back to Universal. And for the fans, should ‘Fast 10’ parts one and two be the conclusion, it would be nice for this world to continue for generations to come.”
So Fast 10 is already being developed, that much we now know. Also, nobody should be surprised Diesel wants to chop it into two parts. While that practice has gotten a bad rap since The Hunger Games,Twilight, and Harry Potter did it, bigger has always meant better for Fast & Furious. If you can’t go big for the finale, what was the fucking point?
F9 hits theaters on May 22nd, Fast 10 is currently set for April 2nd 2021. [via GamesRadar]
If Manchester by the Sea were a Coens-style crime movie it might look a little like Blow the Man Down. Set in a small New England fishing village, it centers on two young women attempting to cover up their killing of a dangerous man, only to be thrust deep into Maine’s criminal underbelly.
The film marks the debut of writers/directors Danielle Krudy and Bridget Savage Cole, with a talented cast led by Morgan Saylor, Sophie Lowe, June Squibb, and Margo Martindale. The fun of a movie like this is watching characters who aren’t practiced in a life of crime, and watching them flail about in an attempt to keep their heads above water. I love movies like this, and we will definitely have a review.
SYNOPSIS: Welcome to Easter Cove, a salty fishing village on the far reaches of Maine’s rocky coast. Grieving the loss of their mother and facing an uncertain future, Mary Beth & Priscilla Connolly cover up a gruesome run-in with a dangerous man. To conceal their crime, the sisters must go deeper into Easter Cove’s underbelly and uncover the town matriarchs’ darkest secrets.
Blow the Man Down comes to Amazon Prime on March 20th.
Take this with a serious grain of salt, but the rumor is too interesting to ignore. It’s possible Oscar-nominated Joker star Joaquin Phoenix may be playing another iconic movie villain. According to The Illuminerdi, Phoenix is being eyed by Disney to star as Captain Hook in Peter Pan & Wendy, and has been offered the role. They also report another DC Comics movie star, Margot Robbie, is being sought for the role of Tinkerbell.
This version of the Peter Pan story (I’ve watched two Peter Pan movies this week and I’m done!!) would be directed by David Lowery, who recently worked with Disney on 2016’s remake of Pete’s Dragon. He’s the indie filmmaker behind films such as Ain’t them Bodies Saints, A Ghost Story, and The Old Man & The Gun. His Arthurian film Green Knight is due to arrive later this year.
It would be somewhat out of character for Phoenix to take on another blockbuster role like this. He’s been notoriously picky throughout his career, and until Joker has shown very little interest in big studio projects. Robbie, on the other hand, has been very open to it. Something tells me not to put too much stock in any of this, but we should learn more soon as production on Peter Pan & Wendy begins this spring.
For the foreseeable future, the place to find Tom Hiddleston will be on your wife’s computer screensaver, and on TV. He’s currently set to return as Loki for the upcoming Disney+ series, and after that Hiddleston will move to Netflix for political thriller series, White Stork.
THR reports Hiddleston will lead White Stork for Netflix, a 10-episode series about a man selected to run for a seat in parliament, only to have damaging secrets from his past emerge during the vetting process. This information has the potential to destroy not only his career, but his marriage and the powerful backers of his campaign.
The series is created by Christopher Dunlop and directed by Kristoffer Nyholm. Producers are the same folks behind Netflix’s hit show, Sex Education.
Hiddleston’s return to TV comes after his Emmy-nominated performance on acclaimed British series, The Night Manager.
The Minions are back! If you love those lemming-like, unintelligible yellow sidekicks then the arrival of Minions: the Rise of Gru should have you shouting “Banana!!!” at the top of your lungs.
Set in the 1970s, the film follows events from the $1.1B smash Minions film from 2015, which ended with them meeting a 12-year-old Gru (with hair!!) before he became the world’s greatest supervillain. They’ll help set him on that path in this story, which finds Steve Carell returning to voice Gru.
Behind the camera is Kyle Balda, who co-directed Minions and Despicable Me 3 and Illumination’s adaptation of The Lorax.
Am I particularly excited for this? Not really, but will the Minions have me dying laughing? Probably. Their silly humor is easy to love and easy to share with others, which is why these films are consistently huge. That’s not going to change here.
I really need to read into the story of how Chris Rock got involved in the Saw franchise, for someone like Rock who has stuck mainly to comedy with a few semi-dramas thrown in here and there, it certainly seemed like an odd pairing. I’d be lying if I didn’t say I had some concerns over the tone remaining in the right place (not that the quality of the franchise hadn’t dropped significantly since it’s heyday). Well, we just got our first look at the film in the form of a quick 1:30 teaser and it certainly looks like all of the pieces are in the right place. Add to that the possibility for some social commentary, the killer is targeting cops, which could add enough weight to the story to take it out of the throw-away Friday night horror category, and you could have something special here. Plus we get a quick F-bomb from that master, Samuel L. Jackson.
Spiral: from the Book of Saw is directed by horror vet Darren Lynn Bousman, based on a story developed by Rock, who obviously takes the lead role. He’s joined by Jackson, Max Minghella, and Marisol Nichols, with the film hitting theaters on May 15th.
