From the Marvel Studios panel at Comic-Con come some small tidbits of information from the man, Joss Whedon himself, in regards to his now titled film Avengers: Age of Ultron. Tidbit one: Hank Pym will not be in Avengers 2, hence the second tidbit that Ultron’s origin may be a little different. As you may or may not know, Hank Pym is one of the foremost scientists in the Marvel Universe, able to create such things as a helmet that can control ants and a chemical substance that can shrink someone down to the size of said ants. He also created one crazy ass robot named Ultron (who has quite the Oedipus Complex for ole daddy Pym) seeking to eradicate him, the Avengers and pretty much all mankind.
Since the Ant-Man film won’t be released until November 2015, after Avengers: Age of Ultron, I guess it will stand to reason that Ultron’s creator may be Tony Stark. Shocker, I know, like every geek in geekdom didn’t see that one coming after the announcement of Pym not having a part in Avengers 2. I could be wrong but it would appear that Stark may be done with playing superhero after Iron Man 3. This may lead him into making something similar to Iron Man to do the fighting for him, and once that creation becomes self-aware and threatens the world, Tony may have to don the armor again to take down Ultron with the combined might of the Avengers. Or we could all be wrong and Ultron is a weapon that S.H.I.E.L.D. may have built modeled off the Tesseract technology.
Whatever the case may be, everyone is wondering just how much source material the movie will cull from the actual Age of Ultron storyline that debuted earlier this year. Is it just a cool name or will there be actual time travel stuff involved? Seems like 20th Century Fox is doing the time travel gig and gathering all of their stars to catch up with the Avengers in the cinema, is this Marvel’s counter to that? The answer is no. Whedon has said that they would not be using the recent story and that in the movie they will be doing their own version of Ultron’s origin story. Perhaps they are just trying to usurp the name recognition from Age of Apocalypse since there are rumors that Fox is attempting to make Apocalypse to be their answer to Thanos in their cinematic-comic universe. Time will tell as 2015 approaches and we are treated to the automaton menace of Ultron.
As a quick side note it sounds like Hawkeye will be back, but with a bigger part to play since he won’t be a mind controlled bad guy for more than half of the movie. No news on whether or not Jeremy Renner will be filling the boots of Hawkeye this time around, but we imagine he will stay with the role. Check out Whedon discussing the finer points of Avengers: Age of Ultron.
In some surprising casting news, Bryan Singer has announced that Evan Peters has been cast as Quicksilver in X-Men: Days of Future Past. If the name Quicksilver seems familiar from recent news, it’s because his inclusion in The Avengers 2 was recently confirmed by Joss Whedon. Singer revealed his news on Twitter, as he has grown quite accustomed to lately, revealing looks at Halle Berry As Storm, makeup for both Nicholous Hoult as Beast and Jennifer Lawrence As Mystique, Peter Dinklage’s first day on set, and pretty much every other piece of news we’ve seen over the last few months. Below is the edited tweet:
That’s all the world needs to get excited for the newly announced ABC show, Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.. It’s packed quite a bit of action in just a few short seconds.
Exploding buildings? Check.
Right hook to jaw? Check.
Beautiful women in what looks to be some type of interrogation situation? Check.
Crystal vase to face? Check.
Agent Coulson? Check, check, check.
As a fan of social media, I get a little giddy when I see companies/networks/shows embrace things like a well-crafted hashtag. No vagueness or abbreviation that no one really gets, rather ABC went straight to the point with #CoulsonLives. That could easily be seen as a trending topic and likely will be, perhaps even tomorrow night when ABC will show a longer preview of Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. tonight during Once Upon a Time‘s season finale.
As promised, the full trailer aired Sunday night during Once Upon a Time and it offers a much better look at the upcoming series. More specifically, it looks like we might know who J. August Richards is playing.
Dost my eye deceive me? Or could that be Richards as Luke Cage? Sure does seem like it is. Of course there was plenty of other eye candy there what with even more explosions, and fighting, and action in general. Then there’s Lola. Oh Lola, what a beauty. However, I’d be lying if this Air Force brat’s heart didn’t skip a beat when that beautiful plane rolled out of the hangar.
That right there is something to write sonnets about. Just beautiful.
Anyway, enough of my prattling on about an iron bird, enjoy the trailer and tell us what you thought of it in the comments below!
ABC is set to announce their fall schedule on May 14th so we figured it was about time to round up all the news we could find on Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and put it in one handy dandy place.
First, let’s look at confirmed cast members. Of course we all know about Carl Gregg and his Agent Coulson returning from the dead (or was he ever dead?) but there have been quite a few other cast members added, not the least of which is Angel alum and most recently, Arrow assassin, J. August Richards. It hasn’t yet been announced who Richards will play, but I think we can all agree, it doesn’t really matter because he is that good. Maybe it’ll just be the return of Charles Gunn…
In addition to the three cast members we’ve already discussed here, those being Ming-Na Wen, Iain De Caestecker, and Elizabeth Henstridge, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. also includes Chloe Bennett from Nashville and Brett Dalton. Bennett is Skye and Dalton is the up and coming Agent Grant.
While it is nice to hear about these new characters and who will be playing them, we all are asking the same thing… what about Nick Fury and Maria Hill? Well as for Nick Fury, Samuel L. Jackson was asked about it during an interview with MTV and here’s what he had to say.
So Nick Fury as S.H.I.E.L.D.’s version of Charlie? I could live with that. Of course it would be even better if Jackson were to make cameos occasionally, but that might be asking a bit much. As for Maria Hill? Well Joss Whendon told TV Line that we shouldn’t “expect” her because obviously Smulders has a busy schedule with not only How I Met Your Mother, but also various other projects, but that she could make an appearance. In my dream world, Smulders would wrap up HIMYM and immediately take off her Robin Sparkles costume and put on her S.H.I.E.L.D. uniform. Throw in a stop at SNL (how has this not happened yet?) and, well that would just be great.
Of course everyone is looking for more news and insight to the show and who better to go to than Agent Coulson himself, Clark Gregg. Screenrant caught up with Gregg at the Tribeca Film Festival.
It’s always nice to see when an actor has such a fondness for the character they play and Gregg certainly does for Coulson.
So that gets us all caught up and ready for the upfront next Tuesday where it’s pretty much a sure thing that Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. will be announced. Could ABC finally making a run at beating CBS? They certainly have that potential so we’ll have to wait and see.
What we’ll also have to wait and see? If Robert Downey Jr.’s Tony Stark/Iron Man makes an appearance on the small screen. When asked by EW about it he said, “You know what? There’s no telling. I am open to everything.” which doesn’t mean no. That’s pretty much all fans need to get their hopes up so here’s to Iron Man on S.H.I.E.L.D.!
It looks like S.H.I.E.L.D. is no more. Well at least the title is no more. According to EW.com, apparently there comes news that the title is being changed to (or at least referred to for the time being as) Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. While we can all debate why, they also included a show summary that everyone can read up on before we debate this title:
[quote]
Joss Whedon (MARVEL’S THE AVENGERS, Buffy the Vampire Slayer) shows us not all heroes are super with MARVEL’S AGENTS OF S.H.I.E.L.D.
Fresh from his role in the summer’s box office smash, MARVEL’S THE AVENGERS, Agent Phil Coulson (Clark Gregg) returns to the worldwide law enforcement organization S.H.I.E.L.D. He puts together a small, highly trained, team of Agents to tackle the cases that haven’t been classified yet, the new, the strange and the unknown. That team consists of straight arrow Agent Grant Ward (Brett Dalton), an expert in combat and espionage; pilot and martial artist Agent Melinda May (Ming-Na Wen); and brilliant if socially awkward scientists Agent Leo Fitz (Iain De Caestecker) and Agent Jemma Simmons (Elizabeth Henstridge). They’ll be joined by civilian new recruit and computer hacker Skye (Chloe Bennet).
Prepare for an epic adventure that showcases the hope and wonder of the human spirit. This is a world of Super Heroes, aliens and the unusual – of action, spectacle and world spanning stories. The show will speak to the human condition through the lens of our very human, non-powered S.H.I.E.L.D agents – that together we are greater than we are apart, and that we can make a difference in the world.
Executive Produced and co-written by Joss Whedon, Jed Whedon & Maurissa Tancharoen (Dollhouse, Dr.Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog), Jeffrey Bell (Angel, Alias) and Jeph Loeb (Smallville, Lost, Heroes) comes Marvel’s first live-action TV series, MARVEL’S AGENTS OF S.H.I.E.L.D.
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Credit: nerdlunch.net – Also not a photo from set…
So let’s break it down quickly: I think it’s an odd move. I mean, it shouldn’t be surprising because Marvel wants to tag their branding on everything now (Marvel’s The Avengers ring a bell?) but it’s just too much at this point. Plus just saying S.H.I.E.L.D. would have just made enough waves as a short and efficient attention grabbing title. EW speculates because ABC might want to separate its title from FX’s The Shield but I can’t buy that because the series isn’t running anymore and enough time should have passed so confusion would not be made. Even the ‘Agents of’ part comes off as redundant because who else would we be following in S.H.I.E.L.D.? The Janitors of S.H.I.E.L.D.? The Real Housewives of S.H.I.E.L.D.? (Crap, call Bravo now and tell them to stop that idea from getting on the air.) Regardless, this is all done for the advertisers as Joss & ABC prepare the pilot to show off in May to generate some ad sales so who knows, we might get the title change back or perhaps something more ridiculous might be in hand. Although does it matter? We could probably just stop and declare this the best pilot of the fall season and they could name it whatever they want because even an appearance from Hasselhoff as a Nick Fury doppelganger couldn’t stop the me from watching.
While there is no question NBC is in the shittier, ABC is a bit of a mystery. Their shows are good, and they have a loyal audience but somehow they have been trailing in network ratings. It becomes a little clearer when you take a look at their lineup. They have some very good dramas, Castle, Once Upon a Time, Scandal, Revenge, and even though Grey’s Anatomy should have ended years ago, people are still tuning in. Of course their reality shows are popular – Dancing with the Stars, and The Bachelor, but I ignore that those exist so there are neither here nor there. ABC’s problem area? Clearly their comedies. Don’t Trust the B sadly has been cancelled, Happy Endings is being moved, The Neighbors is in the basement, and if you can name any other ABC comedy besides Modern Family, congrats.
One has to imagine that ABC is wondering what they can do to get to the top. Luckily for them, some of their pilots looks to have great potential, one from a certain Joss Whedon most especially. Without further adieu, some of the best looking prospects for ABC this pilot season.
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Is there an upcoming show that has more geeks all atwitter than this one? I don’t think so. Of course the show itself is exciting but when they announced that Agent Coulson was actually not dead and Clark Gregg would be bringing his character to the ABC pilot? Well that just put a cherry on this fantastic sundae.
There’s been quite a few people added to the cast of this show since that announcement, including Ming-Na Wen from ER and Iain De Caestecker from the long running British soap, Coronation Street.
There is very little doubt that this will make it to series. ABC would be making a mistake of epic proportions if they let this one go.
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Another British import, Spy is about a somewhat unsuccessful man who in the hopes to impress his son, goes out to get a good job and somehow finds himself a secret agent. The British show was fantastic, thanks in part to the cast. I’d like to say the American version looks as promising but I can’t. Now I’m perfectly willing to admit this is just me, but I can not stand Rob Corddry and have a hard time seeing him as Tim.
The most interesting casting news on this show though, would be that of Ken Jeong. Granted he hasn’t been seen much on Community here lately so perhaps they are trying to write him out completely, or even sadder, he’s preparing for the end of Community all together.
If this version has one thing going for it, it would be that Simeon Goulden who created and wrote the British version of Spy is writing this as well. All that said, I’d probably watch this, well at the very least I’d give it a shot because I enjoyed the original that much.
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My love of the ‘Gone Too Soon’ Kings is no secret so you can only imagine how excited I was to see that Christopher Egan was in another pilot. Even better, it looks like a pilot that has potential.
[quote]Modern day show that weaves together a mythology that incorporates the legends of Dracula, Jekyll and Hyde, Frankenstein and Dorian Gray among others.[/quote]
Egan will play Dorian Gray and he has a fantastic cast around him including Tom Ellis (from the incredibly funny Miranda) as Victor Frankenstein, Janet Montgomery (this year’s short lived Made in Jersey) as Grace Van Helsing, and Fringe star, Seth Gabel. As if the actors weren’t enough, the writers just might be. After signing an overall deal with ABC, the creators of Reaper, Tara Butters and Michele Fazakas have been tapped to run Gothica. These two ladies also had a hand in Dollhouse which was another show canceled way before it’s time. Let’s just hope that Gothica turns the tide for them.
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Unlike NBC that has a penchant for hyping crappy sitcoms (whilst ignoring their good ones) and CBS that just makes all crappy sitcoms, ABC has done pretty well. Okay, they’ve done well from a critical standpoint, obviously they haven’t done well on the viewers front because these great shows are getting canceled or just ignored. It really is a crime. However if Super Fun Night makes it to series and is then canceled or ignored, I will be crushed. Crushed!
First off, this pilot is being directed by John Riggi of 30 Rock. That right there should be enough but no, it stars Rebel Wilson and if that wasn’t enough, Keegan Michael Key of Key and Peele has signed on! Seriously, this show has so much going for it. Even it’s premise, while simple, sounds entertaining – Three nerdy female friends decide to have super fun every Friday night. That’s it, that’s all we know about it so far. Is it going to be like Big Bang Theory but with chicks? Who knows. One could hope the writing is better and that the audience will be there but we’ll have to wait and see.
I’m losing a lot of shows this year and if this one is picked up, rest assured, I will be watching. I’d be lying if part of me doesn’t hope it get’s picked up for the sole reason that it would give better odds to seeing Rebel Wilson on SNL.
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[tab title=”Influence”]
If you don’t know, I’m a huge fan of sibling relationships on shows. Of course if you’ve had the pleasure of reading previous Grizzly Bomb contributions of mine you are probably saying “we know! You like siblings! Stop telling us!” but I just thought it bore repeating. Anyways – I like watching sibling relationships.
I also like Steve Zahn. I also like Christian Slater. I also liked Kyle Killen’s shows Awake and Lone Star.
I’m going to go out on a limb and say that a show by Kyle Killen starring Steve Zahn and Christian Slater as brothers just might be a show I’d watch.
[quote]Centers on the complicated relationship between two brothers, Clark, a bipolar genius in human psychology, and Ross, a slick ex-con, who solve their clients’ problems using the real science of human motivation and manipulation.[/quote]
Just on the surface, it seems a bit like Lie to Me but switch out facial tics for psychology. Best part of this casting is who is who. Because I always associate Steve Zahn as the Neil Diamond restraining order recipient/raccoon wrestler from Saving Silverman, I was pretty certain he would be the “slick ex-con” but I would be wrong. Zahn is actually Clark the bipolar genius (yea I can see that) and Christian Slater will be playing Ross.
One can hope that this won’t be a predictable crime procedural, and that it will last longer than both Awake and Lone Star.
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[tab title=”Big Thunder”]
I want everyone that has a screenplay sitting in a desk drawer (or documents folder) to go ahead and dust it off because apparently the world is in desperate need of new ideas. I’m just going to float this logline out there and see what grabs you.
[quote]A late 19th century New York doctor and his family relocate to a frontier mining town run by a powerful, but mysterious tycoon. Unfortunately, they quickly realize that not everything in the titular city is as it seems. (Inspired by the Disney Parks ride Thunder Mountain Railroad.)[/quote]
In case you missed it… Inspired by the Disney Parks ride Thunder Mountain Railroad.
Every single time I’ve seen this show mentioned, my head explodes. I know I mentioned back in the NBC Dramas discussion that I appreciate the idea of a Western coming back to network television but this is not at all what I had in mind. If the fact that it’s “inspired” by an amusement park ride isn’t baffling enough, get this – it’s a drama. A drama, based on a railroad ride at Disney World/Land/whatever.
My “cyborg looks for love in the most unlikely of places, a retirement facility for astronauts” pilot isn’t looking so crappy all of a sudden.
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So there you have it! There’s some that are sure hits (S.H.I.E.L.D.) and some that have real potential, but it very easily could turn out that I have no idea what I’m talking about and Big Thunder will end up being a huge success and having a ten year run. You’ll find me in the corner, rocking and muttering to myself if that happens.
There are a few other shows filming pilots right now like a “Romeo and Juliet-esque” drama called Westside starring Jennifer Beals and Dennis Duffy Dean Winters and a comedy starring MadTV’s Will Sasso but outside of those actors I don’t find much appeal in the shows at all. Hopefully one of the above pilots will find their way to a series order and we can all sit back and laugh at those days when ABC finished behind NBC back in the spring of 2013.
My love of the 
Grizzly Bomb 