Yes, I know there are 2 Strange Logs released back to back and a lack of actual articles for awhile, sadly there hasn't been much news in terms of entertainment just a lot of various bits and pieces here and there that really only warrant a few paragraphs so in this Strange Log we're going to talk about those things, so away we go...
For starters, I don't think I 100% talked about The Justice League trailer so let's get that outta the way. While The DC Extended Universe has been working like The Flash to catch up to Marvel's massive cinematic universe ("Doctor Strange" being released recently), DC/Warner Bros. has made major missteps along the way. While "Suicide Squad" was a success box office wise, the feelings on the film are largely mixed. Personally, I still can't finish it...if/when I do I will have a review of it coming...eventually...At any rate, DC/Warner Bros. looks like they're trying to get their heads back together with hiring Geoff Johns as a Producer. Not sure how this will pan out. The "Justice League" trailer looks like it's headed in the right direction but I'm not 100% sure how I feel about it. While I'm optimistic (because I REALLY want DC to succeed) I can't help but be concerned that DC is relying too much on what worked for Marvel. This is made evident by "Suicide Squad" having popular music in the trailer and film...for no damn reason if only to make their film appear to be "Guardians Of The Galaxy"-esque. That being said, I'll be seeing this and I'll probably have much to say about it later.
Something I haven't talked much about is the upcoming "Power Rangers" reboot, and now that we have our first look at Alpha 5...ummmm, WHAT. THE. HELL?! Seriously, I wished this was a joke but unfortunately it was posted on The Power Rangers official Instagram account so...yeah...this is Alpha 5...If you can't tell, I believe this thing is hideous and scary looking. I understand that they're trying to mature the "Power Ranger" property but in doing so they completely took away the humor "Power Rangers" is meant to have. Not to say that Alpha wasn't a serious character but Alpha was simply a robot, an android. Would it have killed them to give us an RD2D-esque or C-3PO-esque being rather than this alien looking...whatever the hell this thing is? Even Alpha 5 in the "Turbo Movie" just looked like a more up to date Alpha, this thing looks like...this thing looks like E.T. wearing some kind of battle armor. NO, THANK YOU!
Along the same lines still we have a bit more information to go on thanks to Wikipedia, and while I don't consider Wikipedia to be a reputable source on many things, on movies it's usually 99.99% accurate. So here's some information on the "Power Rangers". It looks like Rita Repulsa is a former Green Ranger which explains her costume, Zordon is a former Red Ranger who merged with the Morphing Grid. As it turns out Rita is in search of The Zeo Crystal to give it to her master Lord Zedd. Okay, some thoughts, for starters, I'm actually okay with Rita & Zordon being former Rangers. I like the idea of Rita using The Green Ranger power coin for herself, I like the mention of The Zeo Crystal (will we see King Mondo? Dear God, I hope so!) and I like the mentioning of Lord Zedd (clearly sequel bait). You see while Power Ranger was purely Sentai footage mixed in with American actors and such, Lord Zedd was completely an American creation, so having Lord Zedd be the man behind the woman in THIS movie that doesn't rely on Sentai footage is actually solidifying this as AMERICAN Power Rangers.
While Alpha 5's design gives me EXTREME pause and my suspicions about the direction of The Yellow Ranger make me a bit skeptical of this film, I'm more interested than I am apprehensive. The trailer, while leaving much to be desired did a solid job is setting up this new continuity of Rangers. So a full length trailer ought to do it. Now, I don't mean a 3 minute movie spoiling trailer where all the best bits are edited together, but a solid trailer that gives me the feel of the movie, the tone, and characterization, I'd like to see some motion shots of Alpha & Zordon but I DO NOT want to see The Zords and I DON'T want to see The Megazord (you save those for the movie) If they can compel me with a solid trailer, I'll give it a watch. More than likely I'll check this movie out, but if not I'll check it out down the road and you can bet your sweet bippy there will be a review!
There's still no trailer out for Netflix's 2017 American "Death Note" adaptation and I'm eager to see what they produce. Directing will be Adam Wingard and while I enjoyed "The Guest" and "You're Next" (I have nothing but scorn to heap upon "V/H/S" and "The ABCs Of Death") I am nonetheless interested to see how he handles such material. Wingard and co. are already in hot water with some fans for the casting of Keith Stanfield as "L", and I can see why considering how iconic "L" is to the whole "Death Note" mythos. That being said Willem Defoe as Ryuk does give me confidence, seeing as how Willem Defoe has the voice and the appearance of Ryuk already. The man's a great actor and if anyone will be turning in an excellent performance, it'll be him. Cannot wait to see a trailer for this movie.
Moving right along, the trailer for "Spider-Man: Homecoming" looks great, for starters it's NOT an origin story (Thank God, How many more Uncle Bens must die?) and secondly, and I can't believe I'm typing this but The Vulture looks awesome (when was the last time you've heard that?). Michael Keaton does a good job at playing scumbags and Adrian Toomes looks pretty scumbaggy(?). Bokeem Woodbine as Shocker, I'm not sure how I feel about it. Shocker was always one of those villains that I knew very little about but thought was always cool. I like the feel of this movie and I really like this quote from director Jon Watts "It's fun to think that if Spider-Man is a regular kid who becomes a superhero, there's got to be a bunch of regular guys who become supervillains, too." Anyways, it looks like Marvel has it's head on straight about what it'll take to make Spider-Man fit in their universe and I'll be happy to see this incarnation now that Spidey's home.
Anyways, changing the subject "The Last Of Us 2" has been announced and I feel the same way about this that Ian Malcolm felt about "Jurassic Park" in that (I'm paraphrasing) "We were so preoccupied about if we could we didn't think about if we should.". Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed "The Last Of Us" but in my opinion I felt like The Joel & Ellie story was finished and if there was going to be a sequel (which was certainly not out of the question) it should follow another group of survivors just trying to make ends meet. One of the things I felt "The Last Of Us" didn't do is REALLY drive home the lack of food. If I were working on "The Last Of Us 2", I'd make the mission less about getting from point A to point B and more about survival and scavenging. It can be as simple as having a group of people simply trying to protect their home from raiders and the like. What I'm saying is with a concept like "The Last Of Us" you have an entire world to discover and to return back to The Joel & Ellie story is just well...uninspired if you ask me...but I'll be keeping abreast of this.
Speaking of abreast, with the EXTREMELY unfortunate cancellation of "Silent Hills" which would have been manned by Hideo Kojima, Guillermo Del Toro and artistic direction from Junji Ito, Kojima decided to team up with Del Toro for a new video game titled "Death Stranding" which features Norman Reedus & Mads Mikkelsen. The trailers and INSANELY cryptic and strange, but from what we know it appears to be an action game. Despite not being interested in playing it, I am nonetheless interested in the story and what the game is exactly about so I'll be keeping abreast of this and I hope it's worth it, considering all the hype surrounding "Silent Hills", I hope this can live up to that.
Last but not least, television, here we go, I officially dropped "Pretty Little Liars", "The Blacklist" and that's about it. Thankfully, "Stranger Things" and the upcoming "Iron Fist" and so on "House Of Cards" included are all on Netflix and I don't need to do anything really to watch those shows, it's just the waiting that makes it unbearable. That being said "The Man In The High Castle", is anyone watching it, can anyone tell me about it? It looks AMAZING, I love me some Philip K. Dick and alternative timelines, what can you guys tell me? Not sure if I'll be check this out or not but all signs point to "Yes." but we'll see if I can create time to check it out, I'm gonna be VERY busy soon. Anyways, that'll do it for me. Here's a GIF of Michelangelo checking out The Yellow Space Ranger, why? Because why not?
Moving right along, the trailer for "Spider-Man: Homecoming" looks great, for starters it's NOT an origin story (Thank God, How many more Uncle Bens must die?) and secondly, and I can't believe I'm typing this but The Vulture looks awesome (when was the last time you've heard that?). Michael Keaton does a good job at playing scumbags and Adrian Toomes looks pretty scumbaggy(?). Bokeem Woodbine as Shocker, I'm not sure how I feel about it. Shocker was always one of those villains that I knew very little about but thought was always cool. I like the feel of this movie and I really like this quote from director Jon Watts "It's fun to think that if Spider-Man is a regular kid who becomes a superhero, there's got to be a bunch of regular guys who become supervillains, too." Anyways, it looks like Marvel has it's head on straight about what it'll take to make Spider-Man fit in their universe and I'll be happy to see this incarnation now that Spidey's home.
Anyways, changing the subject "The Last Of Us 2" has been announced and I feel the same way about this that Ian Malcolm felt about "Jurassic Park" in that (I'm paraphrasing) "We were so preoccupied about if we could we didn't think about if we should.". Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed "The Last Of Us" but in my opinion I felt like The Joel & Ellie story was finished and if there was going to be a sequel (which was certainly not out of the question) it should follow another group of survivors just trying to make ends meet. One of the things I felt "The Last Of Us" didn't do is REALLY drive home the lack of food. If I were working on "The Last Of Us 2", I'd make the mission less about getting from point A to point B and more about survival and scavenging. It can be as simple as having a group of people simply trying to protect their home from raiders and the like. What I'm saying is with a concept like "The Last Of Us" you have an entire world to discover and to return back to The Joel & Ellie story is just well...uninspired if you ask me...but I'll be keeping abreast of this.
Speaking of abreast, with the EXTREMELY unfortunate cancellation of "Silent Hills" which would have been manned by Hideo Kojima, Guillermo Del Toro and artistic direction from Junji Ito, Kojima decided to team up with Del Toro for a new video game titled "Death Stranding" which features Norman Reedus & Mads Mikkelsen. The trailers and INSANELY cryptic and strange, but from what we know it appears to be an action game. Despite not being interested in playing it, I am nonetheless interested in the story and what the game is exactly about so I'll be keeping abreast of this and I hope it's worth it, considering all the hype surrounding "Silent Hills", I hope this can live up to that.
Last but not least, television, here we go, I officially dropped "Pretty Little Liars", "The Blacklist" and that's about it. Thankfully, "Stranger Things" and the upcoming "Iron Fist" and so on "House Of Cards" included are all on Netflix and I don't need to do anything really to watch those shows, it's just the waiting that makes it unbearable. That being said "The Man In The High Castle", is anyone watching it, can anyone tell me about it? It looks AMAZING, I love me some Philip K. Dick and alternative timelines, what can you guys tell me? Not sure if I'll be check this out or not but all signs point to "Yes." but we'll see if I can create time to check it out, I'm gonna be VERY busy soon. Anyways, that'll do it for me. Here's a GIF of Michelangelo checking out The Yellow Space Ranger, why? Because why not?
++Hey, come on, even I catched up with Pretty Little Liars by the end of 2016, and now it's the final 10 episodes. You should keep trying, ridiculous 'dream logic' and all sorts of absurdity guaranteed lol
ReplyDeleteLoved The O.A. BTW, kinda enjoyed Channel Zero
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