Posts Tagged ‘Fox’

Halloween Costumes ’10!

October 7, 2009

hallo2

It’s that time of year again.  The leaves are changing, Jack-O-Lanterns are on display, and college girls around the country are trying to come up with what “Slutty” something-or-other they will be this Halloween.  Which is what prompted this article.  I love Halloween.  So it goes without saying that I love an in-depth creative costume choice and loathe a generic, simplistic one.  Below are some 2009-centric ideas that I would LOVE to see out in the public domain this Hallo-day.

indysouthpark

1. George Lukas and Steven Spielberg raping Indiana Jones, or a stormtrooper.

99415_preview-shakiras-she-wolf

2. Shakira writhing around in some form of epileptic interpretive dance, as referenced in her She Wolf video.

KanyeWestTaylorSwift

3. Kanye West-run around all night interrupting people’s conversations with a mic in hand.  Bring a Taylor Swift with you to further interrupt.

13462

4. The Mighty Boosh-Vince, Howard, Naboo, Bollo, and Bob Fossil in some form or other.  Bonus points for going as one of their more elaborate side characters, like the band from the episode, The Priest and the Beast.

jon-kate-gosselin

5. Kate from Jon & Kate Plus Eight toting eight babies all tied to a single rope, sans-Jon.

Lady-gaga-corset

6. A plethora of Lady Gaga’s all fighting for attention and leadership in that poor girl’s clearly multiple-personality-driven head.  It would have to be a group outing, but it would COMPLETELY be worth it.

0000000540_20060919015544

7. I would LOVE to see the entire cast of The Office simply to see if it could be pulled off correctly.  As Michael Scott and crew have fairly uniform appearances, it would take quite the striking resemblance of ALL characters involved to pull this one off.  If done properly, however, it could be FAMAZING.

christian-bale-nude_10

8. Christian Bale (who I still love) constantly attacking a lighting guy as he sets up his rig in the middle of the street.  This would obviously require two people, and some sort of lighting rig, but with an uncanny Bale look-a-like and a slipping Welsh accent, it could be kind of fun.

wolvyyyyyyyyyy

9. Fox Studios Destroying Wolverine-This one is VERY high concept but probably my favorite one.  Dress up clearly as Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine and then spend the rest of the night demolishing toy helicopters (as Jackman does in the film), crappy Deadpools with stitched-up mouths, and comic books in the symbolic act of Fox destroying everything sacred about Wolverine, The X-men, and Marvel Comics.

425_zombieland_Eisenberg_Stone_Breslin_Harrelson_lc_100109

10. Zombieland-Go with me on this one, I know it sounds generic, but just think, if you and three friends dress as the characters from Zombieland (which was AMAZING, by the way), complete with weaponry, you can spend all night running around interacting with people who dressed up as zombies!  Namely, killing them, but that’s not the point.

Bears With Sparklers

#2!

Tags:, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Miscellaneous | 1 Comment »

The Futurama of Futurama…

July 30, 2009

futurama1

…looks pretty bleak.  Way back when Fox first announced that they would be bringing Futurama back to Network Television, I began to actually imagine that the industry juggernaut was really starting to turn around.  Maybe, instead of greenlighting a RECORD-BREAKING 20th stale season of The Simpsons, or even keeping American Dad on the air, they would start to acquiese to some ingenuitive, fresh material that fans are actually clammoring for; other than Family Guy, of course.  But that would all make sense, and after getting word that Jonny Depp is appearing in an Alice in Wonderland adaptation and Patton Oswalt is getting starring attention in a feature-length drama, I knew it was only a matter of time before the scales of suck tipped back the other way and pissed me off.  According to Geek Tyrant, Fox has released a statement that seems to fully sum up their intentions as a whole:

We love the Futurama voice performers and absolutely wanted to use them, but unfortunately, we could not meet their salary demands. While replacing these talented actors will be difficult, the show must go on. We are confident that we will find terrific new performers to give voice to Matt and David’s brilliantly subversive characters.

So instead of taking multiple other roads, such as

A.  Leaving the series dead in the water to be remembered as the virile and multi-faceted show it was while pouring revenue into a new venture with the propensity to become the next Futurama, or:
B.  Reaching a little deeper into Fox’s oh-so-tiny coffers to dig up just a wee little bit more cash for the likes of Billy West and Katey Sagal,

they will bring in new voice actors and kill the entire heart of the series in a single season.  Now, I would love to be wrong about this, but I already know that the repercusions recasting will have will be too great to keep the series afloat.  As trite as it sounds, it really was the voice acting that brought Futurama to life.  Billy West and John Dimaggio are seasoned pros that gave Fry, the Professor, and Bender (among COUNTLESS others) the personality that fans fell in love with.  Without them, Katey Sagal and Phil LaMarr to round out the Planet Express team, fans will have to bend their ears to adapt to the new cast which, let me tell you, does wonders for your suspension of disbelief. 

It’s all bad.  It really is.  Obviously, I’m not in the negotiation rooms when these meetings are taking place, but it seems ridiculous to me that Fox, in the current homeostatic postition it is in as a network, is unwilling to meet the pay demands of a few voice actors who are RETURNING to a cancelled series.  I find it difficult to believe that the actors asked for 8 figure deals.  Not to mention that Fox clearly believes in the revenue of the series enough to bring it back.  Hell, they believe in it enough to bring back the show after gutting its innards.  But they can’t spend a little extra to ensure that they maintain ALL former elements of the show?  This, my friends, is what happens when you let lawyers and executives out of their cages.

Tags:, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in TV | Leave a Comment »

Vindication!!!

April 24, 2009

x-men-origins-wolverine-1

Sometimes, after I’m all tuckered out from ranting and raving all day, I’ll take a step back and ask myself, ‘Self, are you an absolute raving moron, or just a slight raving moron?  Do you actually have concrete, legitimate opinions or are you just a jabbering, incoherent nut?  Oh, and, do you think we have any Mint Chocolate Chip Ice Cream left?’  Usually, I don’t receive much of an answer, but occasionally I’ll stumble across articles like this one that reaffirm everything I’ve been bitching about.  Recently I posted an article stating the ridiculousness of Fox’s struggle against the internet as a way to profit off of its future endeavors.  While scanning the interwebs, I found this beautifully written logic-piece that speaks far more elegantly about a topic I truly believe in. 

The article is found here, on ERC Box Office.

Tags:, , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Film | 1 Comment »

$150 Million for…The Green Lantern?

April 16, 2009

the_green_lantern_sinestro

Oh boy, this one’s a doosey.  According to /Film, Warner Bros. is moving forward with production of their rendition of The Green Lantern in Sydney, Australia at their Fox Studios lot.  They have allocated $150 million as their principle budget, and, despite the recent implosion of American economics, the dollar goes even farther in Australia than it does in the states.

I’m already skepticle of the finished product.  My logic resides within the budget itself.  Of course, I have no insight into the upcoming production, but what I can deduce from the above factoid is that a lot of money will be spent, possibly in an egregious, Michael Bay-esque manner.  Warner Bros. clearly feels the need to invest a decent dime into this cinematic onslaught, and rightfully so, as the story behind The Green Lantern is an epic space opera that enlists a laundry list of alien races that we have never even seen on the silver screen.  And I’m not basing the fact that $150 million is a lot of money on nothing.  Here’s the rundown from /Film of comperable superhero franchises budgets:

Fantastic Four was $100M, Iron Man was $140M, Watchmen was $150M, The Dark Knight was $185M, X-Men: The Last Stand was $210M and Spider-Man 3 topped $258M.

So that means that Fantastic Four, Iron Man and Watchmen all had equal or lesser budgets, and I think we can form unanimous consensus on the interwebs that these three movies had decent production values (Some moreso than others).

So this would lead me to believe that Warner Bros. has entered into the “the more money we throw at it, the better it will be!’ mindset, granted the fact that there has been no prequel in the franchise to gauge viewer satisfaction or ANY certifiable Green Lantern work that has ever made it past footage on the Justice League.

So if Warner has decided to give The Green Lantern a nice, fat budget with which to woo the audience with intersteller combat, then the alternate question I have is; Is $150 million enough?  As I said earlier, the story behind the Lantern is quite complex and takes the viewer into an intergalactic police council (kinda like interpol, only actually effective) where all kinds of crazy, cosmic violence occurs everyday.  The budget to get this sort of thing right will have to be (pardon the punnage) out of this world.  Unless they plan on animating the whole adventure, tackling a bonafide space epic will be an ambitious undertaking.  $150 million may not be enough to fully express the lantern’s indoctrination into his powers in space, let alone simply his powers on Earth.

Before anyone starts screaming about the wonders attained by Lucas with the original Star Wars trilogy, keep in mind that the breath-taking experience Lucas was able to craft was a once-in-a-lifetime outing, not easily duplicated, to say the least.  Also, keep in mind the above fact that Spider-Man 3 (I can barely bring myself to utter the name) cost $250 million and was a certified suck-fest.  Not to mention that the entire movie took place on the streets of Manhattan, not ANOTHER WORLD. 

To wrap up this ramble-fest, I have VERY little faith in the project, which is too bad because I feel that The Green Lantern would be a great project to spearhead…with the right approach.  While Warner Bros. have given us the wonder that is the last two Bat-movies, they are also responsibe for Catwoman and Superman Returns and prone to ginormous fails just like EVERY major studio.  The bottom line is that I’m just not sure we are ready for this brand of epic.  We just recently tackled gritty realism correctly in comic book films (i.e. The Dark Knight).  I believe that we need WAY more time to iron out the details to the genre before we jump the gun and get into Green Lantern-Justice League-Avengers-Thor territory.  I mean, c’mon, we couldn’t even get The Hulk right, and they’ve had two stabs at it in six years!

Tags:, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Film, Superheroes | 1 Comment »

I Think I’m Going to be Sick…

April 8, 2009

s-darko1

Donnie Darko was one of my all-time favorite movies.  Everything about that film screams genius and tends to resonate with an intensely large fan base.  When first released, Darko performed absolutely horribly in the box office.  First seen as a small loss (it only cost 6 million to make, and only netted $517,000 in its original box office run), Darko was released on DVD with little hope to turn  a profit.  But turn a profit it did!  Darko found new life and a cult following on DVD and has amassed quite a little loyal fanbase.  Which in Hollywood-land can mean only one thing: Sequel.

When I had first heard that a sequel was being made to Richard Kelly’s masterpiece, I was livid.  This kind of Hollywood tidbit is something right out of a joke.  Donnie Darko is literally the opposite of a franchise film.  I won’t ruin the ending for those who haven’t seen it, but let’s just say that there is very little room for continuation at the end.  The only light at the end of the tunnel was that no one, let me repeat that, NO ONE, from the original had returned to work on the sequel except for Donnie’s younger sister, played by, Daveigh Chase,who I have lost an exponential amount of respect for. 

ANYWAY…the movie has been getting far more press than it should for its upcoming straight to DVD release, and on Bloody Disgusting I just found a front-page article interviewing actress Briana Evigan about the film. 

Welcome to my nightmare.

First, let me try to condense this next part of my rant so you don’t walk away.  This girl represents the physical manifestation of everything that is wrong with Hollywood.  She clearly did not understand anything that the first film had to offer and clearly barely understands the movie that she was JUST in.  She is an absolutely moronic, unintelligible bafoon who cannot possibly grasp the concepts and themes dealt with in the first film, let alone help to carry them into a sequel!

Here’s where my grievances begin.  When asked what she thought of the film, Briana’s highly enlightend review was…

I got to see S. Darko recently and really loved the way Corey came off in the movie. The movie as a whole to me is awesome, but it’s really weird and it’s kinda slow and sciency. I hope that people who are not interested in the science of it will check it out.

Exact quote. “It’s kinda slow and sciency.” AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHRRRRGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!! In what ring of hell do they find these people? Next manner of business: Please, Briana, explain to the nice reporter man why they had to change the look of Frank the Bunny in the sequel.

I don’t know why it looks the way it looks. I’m guessing that they just had to go different from the first one because they weren’t going to be allowed to use any of the same stuff. The bunny looks very cool, it’s very like hard looking as opposed to the other once.

See, to me, as a traditionalist and purest, if the author of the movie you are producing a sequel to refuses to give you any rights or licenses to even use images resembling the first, well, I would say that you are doing it wrong.

Finally, irony comes full circle to smack me in my face as my jaw hangs off the floor. When asked whether or not our little brain surgeon, Briana can imagine a third movie in the franchise, she dares to actually respond…

I cannot imagine them doing a third, if anything a prequel, but I cant imagine them doing that.

Now, I wonder why she cannot imagine a sequel? Could it be that she feels so strongly about this piece that she cannot fathom anyone adding anything to it without taking something away in the process? ARGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!! MY BRAIN, WHY? WHY? IT HURTS SO BAD!!! So this is how Nic Cage felt at the end of The Wicker Man.

In closing, I would just like to make this plea. Please, people, please, do something about this horrendous mash up of an abortion they’re trying to pass off as a movie. Hit Fox in the only place it hurts them. DO NOT SEE IT. Don’t rent it, don’t download it, hell, don’t even bootleg it. If no one gives this thing a single, shiny penny that it found on the floor of the Blockbuster they’ve just walked into, Fox will take a hint. And if you’re really livid, like me, never watch a single movie this mindless creten Briana Evigan’s in either. There are WAY too many much more talented actressess trying to make it in this industry for THIS girl to be getting cast. Grr…I’m gonna go make myself a bitter sandwich and wash it down with an irate shake.

Tags:, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Film | Leave a Comment »

Another Reason to Hate Corporate Hollywood

April 7, 2009

x-men1_wolverine

Yahoo News just broke a story along the lines that a veteran Foxnews.com entertainment reviewer of 10 years has been fired for reviewing a bootleg version of Wolverine: Origins.  According to Yahoo, Fox promised that the source of the film would be prosecuted and has already contacted the FBI and MPAA regarding the leaked film.

My take on the matter is that it is simply ridiculous.  The day when movie studios and record companies alike both look to the future and agree to engage with the internet and it’s potential for profit, instead of condemning it, will be a fine day indeed.  It absolutely blows me away that with all the revenue and manpower that the studios and record companies have behind them that they have not already found a legitimate way to profit off of the filesharing phenomenon the internet has introduced to us.  This major form of everyday life for many people isn’t going away.  In fact, it’s only getting stronger.  So, to fight against it is losing valuable time and energy that you could be using to research how to best profit from it. 

Not all of this letter is rant, however.  Some studios have taken HUGE strides in the right direction as far as experimenting with the online marketplace and trying to work the kinks out of web-based programming.  Crackle.com, for example, is a Sony-administered website offering content and gameplay to the online community.  Many programs are beta-tested on Crackle before Sony gives them the eye for the bigger picture.  Not to mention that the website is ad-revenue supported.  Hulu is NBC’s portal in which it does a wonderful job of including much of its televised canon on the interwebs.  And other websites, such as Funnyordie.com, are not run by studios, buy by independent directors who produce exclusive content for the internet community.  In this case it’s Adam McKay and Will Ferrell.

I’m no socialist.  I understand that entertainers need profits to further entertain us.  But there is simply no arguing the fact that the internet isn’t a blockade that studios should be looking to break through, but a channel to better serve and recieve from the community.  There is absolutely no logic in fighting something like this movie review when you know that in the near future, the internet will provide people with early screeners and sneak peeks the day after post.

Tags:, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Film, The Intrawebs | 1 Comment »

Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.