Gary Ross is the latest to try his hand at bringing the Spider-Man shoot-off Venom to the big screen for Sony. We told you last week that the Zombieland writing team of Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick had submitted two drafts for the project, and Jacob Estes had worked on the project before that. Now it looks like the man who turned Kevin Kline into the President will take on writing a Venom movie. Read the rest of this entry »
Disney Studios stayed in the news yesterday as the Mouse House officially named Rich Ross as the replacement for former Disney chairman Dick Cook. The move had been somewhat expected as the head of Disney Channels Worldwide emerged as the favorite shortly after Cook left the company.
According to Variety, Ross has been largely responsible for Disney’s branding efforts over the last five years, and is likely to focus on building franchises that can not only become tentpoles at the box office but transfer to other media. Ross will be in charge of the company’s live-action and animated feature labels, including Walt Disney Pictures, Touchstone, Miramax, Marvel Entertainment and Pixar. Ross will also oversee its music group and theater productions including Broadway and tours like High School Musical and Disney on Ice. Read the rest of this entry »
Is there a psychological condition out there in which the patient presents the need to throw all of their belongings, including the crap they find in their garage, on to big silver screens? If not, I’m giving it a name now: Marvel Disorder. Many of you might say that outside studios are the real enemy here (as Marvel Studios has yet to make a bad film), but Marvel sold the rights to some of our favorite characters and they should have known better. Now, it looks as though Columbia and Fox will be reaching into the well of comic-book disasters to disappoint us again, with the former digging up Ghost Rider and the latter bringing back The Fantastic Four, Daredevil, and creating a spin-off for The Silver Surfer.
After a relatively quiet week in Hollywood, Disney dropped a bombshell Friday night as they announced Dick Cook was out as their chairman. The official company line maintains that Cook left the company as reported by THR, meanwhile Nikki Finke and others are reporting that the former chairman was forced out by President and CEO Bob Iger. I’m more inclined to believe Cook was fired, but this move is arguably more important for the impact it may have on Johnny Depp’s future in Pirates of the Caribbean as well as Pixar and Marvel entertainment. Read the rest of this entry »
The most interesting character in the X-Men lineup, Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine was the runaway star of Bryan Singer’s (and sadly Brett Ratner’s) series and as one of the most popular characters in comic book history, there was a substantial amount of good will for a solo story. X-Men Origins: Wolverine unfortunately throws it all away, along with any pretense of story, failing as both an action film and an X-Men story.
Yes, this movie was even worse than X-Men 3: The Last Stand, a good reason Gavin Hood is currently not involved to the planned sequel, as any time Brett Ratner outdoes you, you don’t deserve to keep your job. Read the rest of this entry »
YouTube user ItsJustSomeRandomGuy has put up another winner with Marvel/DC: Disney Buys Marvel (Parody). As geeks worldwide now know, Marvel was purchased by Disney in an epic $4 billion deal that shocked the world two weeks ago. In its wake, however, fans have been left asking, “what does this mean for future comic-book movies?” There are, of course, two possibilities, but I won’t spoil the video. Be sure to watch the whole thing to catch the amazing Batman/Spider-Man conversation at the end. So wise. Read the rest of this entry »
It seems like it’s been a comic-centric week here at Geek on Film, but fresh off a record breaking summer at the box office largely fueled by comic properties, studio heads are making them a top priority.
Deadline.com is reporting that Warner Bros Pictures Group president Jeff Robinov fresh off having his contract re-upped, will be taking direct control of D.C. comics along with Diane Nelson, who runs the management of the Harry Potter film franchise. Read the rest of this entry »
Wow.
Disney agreed to buy Marvel Entertainment in a deal reported by the New York Times for $4 billion. In their biggest deal since acquiring Pixar in 2006, once finalized, this would give Disney control of Marvel’s licensing, publishing and film branches for the stable of over 5,000 characters including the X-Men, Spider-Man, Iron Man and countless others. Read the rest of this entry »
Marvel.com, in all their glorious wisdom while on a set visit to Iron Man 2, snapped some photos of the goings on and released them in a four-part article about writer Randy Ma’s trip to the site. The new photos are below as is a link to the article: Read the rest of this entry »
Eric Eisenberg
Amani
Geek on Film 