When There Is No More Room In Development Hell: World War Z Trailer Released

Between our choice to cover the Hellblazer cancellation yesterday and our decision afterwards to pour out a couple in memorium of the book (and if we filtered the pours through our kidneys, well, we didn’t come here for a semantics argument, and it’s the thought that counts, and fuck you, anyway), we missed the release of the first trailer for the upcoming movie World War Z, based on the Max Brooks novel.

If you read the original book, you know the conceit is that it’s an oral history of an old-school, Romero-style slow zombie apocalypse, told years after the world pulled together, changed the nature of military tactics to deal with shambling ghouls who can only be killed by a bullet to the head, and won the war.

And if you watch this trailer, you’ll see that, well, this is none of those things.

Mark Hamill Teases Star Wars Episode IX… in 1983

Busy day here at the Crisis On Infinite Midlives Home Office… much if it involved with trying to figure out what the hell time it is (we don’t handle time changes well here, particularly not on a day coming after a day we started drinking at about 1:30 p.m.). 

But the big news of the week continues to be the acquisition of Lucasfilm by Disney, and the ramification of that purchase, including the announced new movie for 2015. It was actually the topic of conversation amongst the regulars at the bar yesterday (here’s a hint: if you’re looking for a new local bar to talk comics and genre stuff, find one where the head bartender has a Rebel Alliance logo tattoo), and whether or not the movie would follow any of the comics or novels that have come up since the early 90s.

Well, the announcement has been made that, whatever the movie is gonna be, it won’t be based on any existing released stories… but whatever it is, it might have been percolating for a while. And here’s some evidence: an interview between Mark Hamill and Maria Shriver from 1983, before the release of Return of The Jedi, where Hamill freely talks about a third trilogy… and that he might be back for the final, at-the-time theoretical ninth movie, “sometime in 2004.” Proving that Mark Hamill has no better sense of time than we do.

Then again, he might have just been addled and contact-intoxicated by the volume of mousse in Maria Shriver’s hair.

New Star Wars Movie! Oh Yeah, And Bryan Singer To Direct X-Men: Days Of Future Past

Twenty four or so hours ago the news that Bryan Singer, the director of the first two X-Men movies that ushered in the modern age of generally excellent superhero movies made by A-List directors who give a shit about the characters as opposed to slumming and giving the thumbs-up to nipples and asscracks on the hero’s costume, had literally just signed to direct the fifth X-Men movie, Days of Future Past, would be the biggest geek movie news of the past six months. Particularly considering that the time travel nature of the story could allow Singer to liberally include cast members from later-set his X-Men movies, which appears to be a thing that is actually happening.

Yup, just yesterday morning, the word that Singer might be taking over from Matthew Vaughn, director of X-Men: First Class, while keeping Vaughn on as a producer (which, on one level, is good news, since Vaughn did a damn good job directing First Class, so I’m glad he’ll be involved… although the role of producer in movies and TV can vary widely from an active, hands-on role in development to, “Yeah, yeah; put my name wherever you want in the credits, so long as it’s on the right place on my check.”) would be the biggest news in genre film, particularly considering the change in directors so far hasn’t had an effect on the projected July 18, 2014 release date.

In A Galaxy Far, Far Away… in 2015: Disney Buys Lucasfilm, Announces New Star Wars Film

Editor’s Note, 8:45 p.m.: Updated after the jump

We are still without Internet service here at the Crisis On Infinite Midlives Home Office, thanks to that bitch Sandy, so all we can handle today is a brief, quick hit update, sent via my dwindling 4G plan, using my smartphone as a hotspot, hopefully before my cell provider becomes hip to my grievous violation of the terms of service of my contract.

Thankfully, that quick hit is about one of the biggest that could possibly occur in the world of genre geeks.

To wit: reportedly, Disney has bought Lucasfilm from George Lucas for 4.05 billion dollars.

Oh yeah: and Disney has announced they will be releasing a new Star Wars film in 2015.

So what the hell’s going on, George?

Deleted Scenes From “The Amazing Spider-Man” Hit You Tube

A collection of deleted scenes from July’s The Amazing Spider-Man has found its way to the Internet via YouTube. If you’re longing for answers to unresolved questions about Peter Parker’s parent, well, tough titty. But, if you’d like to see unfinished special effects, never seen before glimpses of Curt Connor’s son, and an alternate version of poor Uncle Ben’s death then hit “play”, after the jump.

Crisis On Multiple Earths: Hurricanes and Hobbit Trailers

Busy day here at the Crisis On Infinite Midlives Home Office, what with Frankenstorm preparation in full swing: running around, buying bottles of drinking water, emptying them and refilling them with beer.

So as we flail about, charging every piece of personal electronics we own so we can keep ourselves entertained and productive in the event of power failure (it’s hard to try and convince the neighbor kids to read Black Kiss 2 when they’re hiding from downed power lines), it’s important to remember that the summer storm season is almost over, to be followed by the holiday movie season. And that means we will soon be able to put aside our mortal world of shitty tropical storms in favor of Middle Earth, where the sun shines on the Shire, Elevensies includes ale, and it only storms when you get too close to Mordor.

So in that interest, let’s all stop boarding up our windows for a moment, and watch the latest TV spot for the first Hobbit movie, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, which is out in American theaters on December 14th. A time of year when there are no hurricanes or tropical storms… only crippling blizzards. Because one does not simply walk into genre movies.

Has He Lost His Mind: Iron Man 3 Trailer Released

So I heard a weird and crazy rumor that that spastic behind the awesome 80s classic film script for Lethal Weapon, the underrated scripts to the 90s movies The Last Boy Scout and The Long Kiss Goodnight, and the director behind the vastly underrated 2000s movie Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang was maybe gonna do a superhero movie. A rumor to which I put the normal weight one who has drunk a half-quart of whiskey would normally put.

And then I woke up with a crippling headache, and the following further evidence that one with a legally binding addiction should never comment on movie rumors:

A Leader We Can Believe In: The Dark Knight Returns Part 2 Trailer

A little busy here watching a couple of white guys argue over being second in command, all while sorting through the early news coming from New York Comic-Con (Turns out “Superior” actually stands for Superior Spider-Man, and Scott Snyder and Jim Lee are gonna be doing a Man of Steel book, but we’ll address those in the next couple of days.

In the meantime, how about video of a real leader? One who inherited a society in crisis and implemented some old fashioned law and order? I mean, of course: The Batman.

Batman from the upcoming second act of the animated adaptation of Frank Miller’s Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, and this video has the good stuff: Batman versus Superman. Batman doing… actually, who gives a shit? It has some Batman versus Superman. You’ve wanted to see it in motion since 1986. And it beats the living shit out of watching two rich guys call each other scoundrels.

J. J. Abrams Reveals First Star Trek Into Darkness Footage. All Three Frames Of It.

So last night, J. J. Abrams was on Conan. And he announced that principal photography on the next Star Trek movie, Star Trek Into Darkness, was wrapping up in anticipation of its May 17, 2013 release date… and that he’d brought a clip of the flick to show. So the first footage from a movie that I am personally really looking forward to (sure, the real Trekkers complained that Abrams’s 2009 Star Trek was a little too much like Star Wars, but so what? Star Wars is fucking cool) debuted last night…

The problem is that “footage” is probably too strong a word, as it implies there was more than one foot. In fact, the clip was exactly three frames long. And considering standard film runs at 24 frames per second, well, you get the idea.

But this is a Web site focused on geek culture, so this is technically news, so the video clip (sorry about the opening advertisement; the clip is from the Conan Web site, and those guys would monetize sunlight if they could get it behind a paywall) appears after the jump… along with a screen grab of one of those three frames. I sat here for probably five minutes, pressing “pause” and “rewind” to get a clear image for you… and have spent the ten minutes since questioning the poor choices I have made in life that brought me to this place, where I am doing these things.

The Main Vein: First Image From The Wolverine

With this past summer’s excitement over The Avengers and The Dark Knight Rises, combined with its mild anticipation of The Amazing Spider-Man and what has turned out to be its complete and utter apathy over Dredd 3D, it’s easy to forget that there are other comic book movies in the pipeline. Sure, we’ve got Iron Man 3, but let’s not forget that the sequel to 2009’s X-Men Origins: Wolverine, titled counterintuitively as The Wolverine for some reason, is supposedly in production.

Sure, it’s easy to forget about the old Canucklehead, given that in his last cinematic outing, he met Will.I.Am and allowed him to live, and spent time fighting the only version of Deadpool, The Merc With The Mouth, that nobody wanted – namely, one with no fucking mouth. But this time around, he’s got a new director – no more weirdness from the guy who played “German Champion” in Kickboxer 5, now we have the dude who played Dr. Gold in The Sweetest Thing! Wait, what? *

Regardless, Marvel certainly doesn’t want people to forget that there’s a new Wolverine movie coming out, so earlier today, they released the first image of Hugh Jackman, wearing the claws and about thirty pounds of hair product: