WWE World Heavyweight Champion Seth Rollins tore his ACL, MCL and meniscus during the WWE overseas tour in Dublin, Ireland.
It is rumored that WWE plans called for Seth Rollins to lose to Roman Reigns at Survivor Series this month, but with the main event scrapped WWE has elected to hold a tournament at the 29th Survivor Series. Will WWE have the same result at the end of the night with Reigns winning it all?
Maybe, but let’s theorize who else may deserve to win the gold.
Dolph Ziggler – The crowd went NUTS when he won the title last time but his concussion shortly after getting the belt seems to have WWE hesitant on giving him the ball. It would be a great moment but one that seems unlikely given Ziggler’s current task of helping get Tyler Breeze FaceTime.
Sheamus – An extremely likely scenario, especially with the obvious chaos that WWE was hauled into with the injury to Rollins, is that Sheamus cashes in his Money in the Bank contract. A grueling tournament is an opportune time to strike if you want the champ at his weakest. Although if he has a calendar he can see next months and pay-per-view is TLC.
Kevin Owens – He beat John Cena in his first match. He holds the intercontinental title currently so WWE probably doesn’t want to put all their eggs in one basket but it wouldn’t be because Owens doesn’t absolutely deserve the honor. He has raised the bar since coming to the main roster and John Cena may have had some of his best matches ever with Owens. That’s saying something.
Bray Wyatt – 25 years ago the Undertaker debuted at Survivor Series, if WWE wants you to believe that Bray Wyatt is now a supernatural force akin to the deadman and Kane then you have the Wyatt family run the card on this event. Have the Brothers of Destruction lose to the family and have Bray make his way to the finals and spoil it for Reigns again. Unfortunately, Wyatt wasn’t included in the tournament won’t be the title picture for now…
Dean Ambrose – In my opinion, this is the best scenario and would make WWE the most money moving forward. Dean Ambrose and Roman Reigns begin the tournament in separate pools and the main event is Reigns vs a different member of the shield, Ambrose. The match is an absolute war with Ambrose knocking out reigns with the belt while the ref is distracted.
Who do you think will go the distance at Survivor Series? Let us know!
The Weinstein Company released a new trailer for Quentin Tarantino’s eighth film, The Hateful Eight, starring Kurt Russell, Samuel L. Jackson, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Walton Goggins, Tim Roth, Michael Madsen, Bruce Dern, and Demian Bichir.
In THE HATEFUL EIGHT, set six or eight or twelve years after the Civil War, a stagecoach hurtles through the wintry Wyoming landscape. The passengers, bounty hunter John Ruth (Russell) and his fugitive Daisy Domergue (Leigh), race towards the town of Red Rock where Ruth, known in these parts as “The Hangman,” will bring Domergue to justice. Along the road, they encounter two strangers: Major Marquis Warren (Jackson), a black former Union soldier, turned infamous bounty hunter, and Chris Mannix (Goggins), a southern renegade who claims to be the town’s new Sheriff. Losing their lead on the blizzard, Ruth, Domergue, Warren and Mannix seek refuge at Minnie’s Haberdashery, a stagecoach stopover on a mountain pass. When they arrive at Minnie’s, they are greeted not by the proprietor but by four unfamiliar faces. Bob (Bichir), who’s taking care of Minnie’s while she’s visiting her mother, is holed up with Oswaldo Mobray (Roth), the hangman of Red Rock, cow-puncher Joe Gage (Madsen), and Confederate General Sanford Smithers (Dern). As the storm overtakes the mountainside stopover, our eight travelers come to learn they may not make it to Red Rock after all…
Tarantino’s latest film will be released on Christmas Day.
In anticipation of the November 25th release of CREED, we’ll be taking a look back at the ROCKY franchise and discussing why these characters and this world are still relevant and necessary forty years later.
Rocky (1976) is where it all began.
I was still twelve years away from this world when Rocky was released and thusly imprinted on the face of America. Although I know I didn’t actually watch the movie until my second decade of life, I can’t remember a time when I didn’t have images from the film in my head. Because of this, so much is made of the film being part of the American experience and deservedly so. Rocky throws us into the melting pot of this country and proves to us that no matter a person’s upbringing, hard work and belief in oneself are powerful, life changing qualities. For a country built on an unlikely revolution, there isn’t a much more poignant message to tell. Each film in the series is able to serve as an extension of the country itself during its respective time of release. The first, Rocky, shows a country reflecting on what it has become and what it aspires to be during its bicentennial year. Beyond its inextricable ties to America, what makes this film a truly indelible experience is the creation of and dedication to the character of Rocky Balboa (Sylvester Stallone).
Rocky Balboa is bad at his job. Serving as the muscle for local loan shark, Gazzo (Joe Spinell), Rocky is unable to enforce Gazzo’s rule over the delinquent. Tasked with breaking the thumbs of a debtor, Rocky merely accepts partial payment and tells the man to pay more next week. When explaining to Gazzo why he didn’t break the man’s thumbs, Rocky rationalizes that if he broke his thumbs, the man wouldn’t be able to work at the dock, thusly making it more difficult for him to pay back his debt. Does this way of thinking make sense? Probably. Is it bad for business? Yes, for Gazzo and yes, for Rocky as his employee. What it does is show us that the underbelly of this oafish fighter might not be an underbelly but rather an overt sense that he can do no true harm to anyone other than himself.
Rocky is a lover. This is a man whose version of crushing on a woman is visiting her at the pet shop twice a day, telling a bad joke (though never dirty) and buying turtle food. Once he has Adrian (Talia Shire) out of her shell, it’s clear that his life revolves around making her happy by being the best Rocky he can be. He pays off a skating rink attendant to leave the ice open an extra ten minutes. He uses an inopportune moment during a television interview to give Adrian a shout-out. He confides in Adrian when things look the bleakest before the fight. He only thinks of Adrian as soon as that final bell rings, signaling the end to his epic showdown with Apollo Creed (Carl Weathers).
Rocky is a guiding light to everyone around him. Nothing exemplifies this more than his oft-parodied run through Philly, culminating at the top of the stairs in front of the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Those around him aren’t quite sure what to make of the man sprinting toward what is sure to be grand defeat. He wasn’t always sure of himself either, until finally facing his past grievances when his manager, Mickey (Burgess Meredith), comes calling for the first time. When his friend, Paulie (Burt Young), gets too drunk and out of control, Rocky steps in to defend Adrian who is also Paulie’s sister. Rocky is also the one to tell a neighborhood girl that acting tough and cursing at strangers with the bad boys of the neighborhood is something she will come to regret (and in his own special way, “You hang out with yo-yo people, you get yo-yo friends”). He doesn’t care the fashion in which he comes across, he knows what’s right.
Sylvester Stallone would be an American icon if this was the only film he made. Stallone was nominated for two Oscars with Rocky (Best Actor in a Leading Role and Best Screenplay), a feat that anyone born in the last few decades might deem unbelievable. He brought a slack-jawed bravado and simplicity to a role that could have come off as overly oafish or brutish in less deft hands. Sly understood that his character was always more about the journey than the end and played him fearlessly as a result. One scene involving Rocky’s courtship of Adrian in his apartment could very well have come across with Rocky as the creep (and it definitely straddles that line) but it doesn’t get there because Stallone knows how to undercut his advances. The script by Stallone also serves the point that Adrian has been pushed so deeply inside herself from her brother’s constant negative remarks that it takes Rocky cornering her and complimenting her in order to break her wall. It’s a true testament to Stallone’s talents here that he is able to do the things he does and get away with them so nicely.
Rocky isn’t afraid to hint at the ugly or the fear that peers in at the edges. Its Philadelphia is a dreary city, awakening only as Rocky finds his footing in training and in the ring. The side characters are shady, drunks, accepting of their less-than-stellar lot in life or a combination of the three. No one has faith in Rocky or Adrian and they can only begin to dig out of the gloom once they find each other. The movie may have been a perfect fit for 1976 America but it transcends period as it hits the very essence of what we aspire to be, bruises and all.
Now, strap yourselves in as we continue our trek through what becomes one of the most absurd and entertaining series in American history. The masterpiece that is Rocky casts a shadow over each other entry, but damn it if everything doesn’t become a lot more fun and also awful.
After a few missteps iZombie’s Second Season is back to the greatness we expect.
iZombie Season Two ‘Love and Basketball’ Spoilers
The season’s plotlines are really picking up, at a pace that was actually a bit surprising. Though ‘naught a bit of Peyton was to be found this episode, we can expect that plotline to return soon, what worries me is the health of the family arc. Other than the first five minutes of the first episode of this season it has not made an impact in any way. While time apart from the family could actually benefit the nature of that storyline, I wish it had even a moment of reflection from Liv to remind us that it is in fact still alive. But enough talk of dead things, the show does enough of that.
One thing that really surprised me was the pace of the Clive/Meat Cute arc. Thanks to a certain Mrs. Suzuki we got an episode cliffhanger that might result in some serious changes to Liv and Clive’s relationship coming really soon. Clive’s FBI Agent friend (who seems to be nameless from what I can tell) is still a blast to have on-screen, but this episode seemed to hint at her involvement to Clive soon discovery of a certain dead person. My guess at this point would be a mid-season reveal of this, which kick-starts FBI’s manhunt case, and the rest of the season from Liv and Clive will focus on recovering trust, at best. Also I just noticed Liv’s name in inside Clive’s, shippers must have an easy time with that ship name.
Gilda had more of a presence this episode as well, mostly with Liv, and she felt decidedly more evil this episode. Probably because she’s actually exploiting her relationship with Liv for work, which hasn’t happened until now. She was also really hot while exercising. Gilda seemed really interesting in Liv’s romantic exploits this episode, for a reason we all know of, it’ll be interesting to see her extended reaction to Major dumping. Even if she was just using him.
Speaking of Major he seemed to be simultaneously getting better and worse. I sure hope these basketball kids stay in the narrative for a while (actually a small plotline was hinted at with curly-haired kid). However, that hasn’t stopped him working on his job, which as long as it’s around will reflect negatively in Major’s character, He did save a couple of zombies lives though. Eight of them to be exact, eight suspicious and most likely zombies, which hasn’t helped him win trust with Gilda, though I loved the Star Wars quote. Finally we have Majors new relationship with Liv. With her being helpful with the vices she’s aware of (speaking of which, when did Major tell Liv about the Utopium addiction? I guess Live put two and two together and the show just shrugged it off), it could become a health relationship like it once was… we’ll see.
Goodbye, Gabriel, and any hope of getting a Zombie cure sometime soon.
The frustrating part of this episode was on the other side of the Utopium coin, with Ravi accidentally creating a zombie killer and using it to kill they guy that cut the tainted Utopium! Also all our Utopium is gone, thanks Ravi. This puts the whole zombie cure thing on the back burner for now, though I’m confident this zombie poison will make a return very soon, considering Blaine’s interest in the substance.
The mystery this episode wasn’t that bad either, that dead ends still held emotional significance, Liv’s persona was tons of fun, and it was entertaining overall. I wonder if Clive beating that guy will show up again sometime… yes, it definitely will. I guarantee it.
Overall this episode just got me excited for future episodes, and there’s nothing wrong with that.
I had given up hope, or at least thought, that Sony was going to continue their American remake of Stieg Larsson’s Millennium series after David Fincher’s The Girl with The Dragon Tattoo failed to meet expectations. It’s been four years, and nobody involved in the original seemed to be interested in returning. Fincher mentioned it from time to time, but the sequel – which should be The Girl Who Played with Fire – felt like a pipe dream at best.
But not for Sony, who continues working hard to take the mantle as the worst film studio in Hollywood. They have decided to movie forward with the series, but this is where it gets interesting: there will be no Daniel Craig, there will be no Rooney Mara, there will be no David Fincher. And, to top off the list of terrible ideas for this “sequel,” it will not be The Girl Who Played with Fire, the second book in the series. Instead, it will be the 2004 book The Girl in The Spider’s Web, written not by Larsson but by David Lagercrantz, who took over the series after Larsson’s death.
According to The Wrap, screenwriter Steven Knight (the brilliant Locke and the abhorrent Burnt) will adapt the screenplay. In addition, Alicia Vikander, who broke out this year in Ex Machina and has a busy slate of films on the horizon, will step in as Lisbeth Salander. So there’s a faint hope. But, what are we doing here Sony? This is certainly a reboot since none of the original players (who made the original film compelling) are involved, but it isn’t a reboot. I’m confused.
The Girl with The Dragon Tattoo is not one of Fincher’s top five films or anything, but it’s a solid foundation for a competent trilogy. It looked beautiful and held on to the darkness of Larsson’s novel. But the subject matter was much too harsh for mainstream audiences; and, if you ask me, releasing it so close to Christmas was a weird move. This should have been an October release where audiences were more in the mood for the morbid macabre flicks. The mediocre reception of the film was one of the main reasons why I didn’t think the sequels were coming. But I don’t work for Sony Pictures, so what do I know?
Executive Chairman Rupert Murdoch of Fox singled out 2015’s The Fantastic Four as a major reason for the studio coming $340 million dollars short of the projected $6.42 billion it had been expected to make by Wall Street during the first fiscal quarter of 2015. As reported by The Wrap, Murdoch praised the success of The Martian and the television show Empire, while singling out The Fantastic Four as a major failure for the studio. “Our quarterly results also reflect the expected impact of challenging comparisons for our film studio due to the timing of key releases, as well as the poor performance of The Fantastic Four,” Murdoch said in his statement.
The critical and commercial disaster of Fantastic Four, as well as the recent announcement of two X-Men television shows which Marvel and Fox will co-produce, has led to rampant speculation that the Fantastic Four film rights will soon be back in Marvel’s hands. Whether this is a well-grounded rumor or merely a reflection of fan dreams remains unclear, but either way Fox’s failure with The Fantastic Four will clearly have major ramifications for the future of this franchise.
We have our first trailer for Alice Through the Looking Glass, the followup/sequel to Tim Burton’s massively successful 2010 adaptation of Alice in Wonderland. All the players are back in their roles, including Johnny Depp as the Mad Hatter, and Tim Burton is on board as a producer this time with James Bobin in the director’s chair.
Here is the Alice Through the Looking Glass trailer:
And here is the synopsis:
In Disney’s “Alice Through the Looking Glass,” an all-new spectacular adventure featuring the unforgettable characters from Lewis Carroll’s beloved stories, Alice returns to the whimsical world of Underland and travels back in time to save the Mad Hatter. Directed by James Bobin, who brings his own unique vision to the spectacular world Tim Burton created on screen in 2010 with “Alice in Wonderland,” the film is written by Linda Woolverton based on characters created by Lewis Carroll and produced by Joe Roth, Suzanne Todd and Jennifer Todd and Tim Burton with John G. Scotti serving as executive producer. “Alice Through the Looking Glass” reunites the all-star cast from the worldwide blockbuster phenomenon, including: Johnny Depp, Anne Hathaway, Mia Wasikowska and Helena Bonham Carter along with the voices of Alan Rickman, Stephen Fry, Michael Sheen and Timothy Spall. We are also introduced to several new characters: Zanik Hightopp (Rhys Ifans), the Mad Hatter’s father and Time himself (Sacha Baron Cohen), a peculiar creature who is part human, part clock.
If you’re into this sort of thing, and if you liked the first film (I didn’t particularly enjoy it), Alice Through the Looking Glass hits theaters May 27, 2016.
Jesse Eisenberg was on The Diane Rehm Show promoting his book of short stories, “Bream Gives Me Hiccups.” The last caller on the show asked Eisenberg what his inspiration was for his portrayal of Lex Luthor in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice.
Eisenberg in all his awkwardness gave a real and honest answer and depending on his performance could prove creepy.
“I’ve always noticed the best thing to channel, as an actor, is yourself. To figure out what makes you angry, what makes you feel vengeful or righteous. Those are the feelings that Lex Luthor has. And use that as opposed to kind of watching Gene Hackman, who’s a great actor obviously and played that part originally, and think, ‘How can I kind of mirror that?’ Because the truth is, me mirroring him would just come off weird. We have different faces, different life experiences, different emotions, but what I do have – that I have more than anybody – is my own feelings, and so I use those, and then the character seems not only real but emotional and just. He believes he’s the hero of his own story – is the kind of the actor cliche – when you’re playing the villain, you’re the hero of your own story. That’s the kind of most interesting way for me as an actor, and I think, for an audience to appreciate as well,” said Eisenberg.
The interview is worth a listen as Eisenberg is relaxed during the show and gives un-guarded answers (The Diane Rehm Show).
Without a doubt, SPECTRE, the twenty-fourth film in the long-running 007 series, is the worst of the films featuring Daniel Craig as 007, if not the worst Bond film in recent memory. Cursed with a laden, nonsensical script, full of overwrought, listless set pieces and pedestrian action, it’s an affront to all the progress the series has made in terms of revitalizing the 007 brand since Craig’s tenure as Bond began with 2006’s Casino Royale. It’s the sort of underwhelming effort that should leave fans of the series livid, especially considering all the wasted talent assembled for the production and the potential they represent.
SPECTRE picks up some time after the end of 2012’s Skyfall, with the loss of the previous “M” (Judi Dench) still casting a shadow over MI6 and Bond in particular. After an unsanctioned mission in Mexico City during the famous “Dia de los Muertos” festival causes an international incident, 007 finds himself in hot water with the new “M” (Ralph Fiennes) and relieved of his duties. That sort of technicality, having his license to kill revoked and whatnot, has of course never stopped Bond from doing his work before, and so he sets off to follow up on the waves he made in Mexico, the trail leading him to Rome and a secret meeting of what appears to be a massively powerful international criminal syndicate. What he discovers there, and the man he sees sitting at the head of the table in that secret chamber, changes everything he and MI6 thought they knew about some of Bond’s most important and dangerous adversaries of the past: that they were all connected, all arms of this one powerful organization, simply known as “SPECTRE.”
Forced to operate with limited help from M, Q (Ben Whishaw), or Moneypenny (Naomie Harris), who all are being watched by the new Centre for National Security into which MI6’s operations are being folded into and marginalized, Bond seeks out Madeleine Swann (Léa Seydoux, Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol), a doctor whose own mysterious past unwillingly links her to SPECTRE and makes her one of their primary targets. Together, they’ll track down and come face to face with the shadowy head of SPECTRE, who in addition to his ambitions for world domination has a long-standing personal score to settle with 007 that he plans to settle in the most painful and humiliating manner possible.
The Bond film series has enjoyed a prolonged revitalization over the past decade with Daniel Craig in the lead role primarily because the creative minds at work behind the camera kept finding new and interesting ways to tweak the 007 formula, to further distance the series from the rote cheekiness that came to define the series during the Roger Moore era, and which crept back into the films at the end of Pierce Brosnan’s tenure in the early 2000’s. While some longtime fans of the series point out that the changes made the films far too serious in tone, for the most part the grittier, more character-driven style that characterizes Casino Royale, 2008’s Quantum of Solace, and Skyfall has been readily embraced by contemporary audiences, who applaud the more realistic and hard-hitting action as well as enjoy each time the series’ writers would take a playful jab at their own creation’s well-known conventions and clichés.
So if the recipe for success was to evolve away from the elements of the series that had clearly become tired and stale by the late 1990’s, why in the name of Dame Judi Dench would the powers that be here decide to reverse course entirely with SPECTRE, and go back to utilizing those very same tired, stale elements in almost precisely the same ways as before? Oh, it all looks pretty — having Oscar-winning director Sam Mendes return for a second stint at the helm after the success of Skyfall assures audiences of at the very least a pleasant visual experience — but all the style and beautiful framing of shots and locations cannot hide the flaws in the hackneyed script churned out by seasoned Bond script writers Neal Purvis and Robert Wade, working alongside John Logan (The Aviator, Gladiator) and Jez Butterworth (Black Mass, Get on Up). Bond suspended and goes AWOL? Been there, done that. Bond girl doesn’t like 007 at first, but opinion absurdly changes in moments after a near-death experience? Done and done. Bond restrained to a chair and tortured as he’s taunted by the villain? Done, done, and DONE. Yawn.
To be fair, yes, all those same elements were utilized in Casino Royale, arguably Craig’s best Bond outing. But the manner in which they were executed was tweaked in such a way that their silliness in and of themselves was mitigated — they staged it all in a way that made sort-of real world sense, not just Bond-world sense. Here, in SPECTRE, we get it all back the way it was done in the campy, cartoonish era of Bond: with no sense of self-awareness, no wink and creative twist, just the same old trope, as though giving it a break for a few decades would somehow make it fresh enough again to use.
Compounding the outright clunkiness of the script is the absolute absence of innovation and energy that characterizes the film’s many overly-long set pieces, each of which owes a debt to earlier Bond films in which they were executed to far more enjoyable effect. Whether the action takes place in the air, on a train, or in a speeding car chase through the narrow streets and alleys of Rome, it all feels obligatory and uninspired, as though the second unit director simply watched a few older Bond films the morning of the shoot and decided, “Yeah, we’ll recycle that sequence. That’ll work.” Watch for how the helicopter sequence early in the film that recalls a similar set piece in 1081’s For Your Eyes Only, or how the aforementioned car chase seems to drag on and on simply to provide an opportunity for a few ill-timed jokes regarding gadgets not working quite the way they should. And what happened to this Bond getting bloody when he gets into a fist fight? In one of several examples of wasted casting, SPECTRE features former WWE star Dave Bautista playing a henchman in the mold of Odd Job, Jaws, and Tomorrow Never Dies‘ Stamper, which you’d think would result in a fight that would leave our hero at least a little bloodied once the two throw down. But no, not even a nick or scratch. The white dinner jacket does take a beating, though.
Speaking of wasted casting, perhaps the greatest waste in SPECTRE is Christophe Waltz, who apparently Mendes and the producers felt didn’t need to do much of anything aside from recycle that soft-spoken, quietly menacing demeanor he used to such great effect in 2009’s Inglourious Basterds. He sleepwalks through his on-screen time here, playing what should be THE iconic Bond villain role with the same level of effort and energy that he played the villain in Seth Rogen’s attempted Green Hornet film back in 2011. He steals his paycheck here, and he’s not the only one, though the others one could just as easily fault the producers and casting directors for their involvement. Case in point: was it really necessary to cast Monica Bellucci, 51, for the role she’s called upon to perform, a role so woefully underwritten, forgettable, and beneath her talents that its very presence screams “obligatory for the formula”, just so that SPECTRE could claim the distinction of featuring the series’ oldest “Bond Girl”? Hopefully, there was more to it and the role was simply cut back for time, although at 2 hours and 28 minutes, the longest running time of any Bond film in the series, why not have a few more minutes to have her role be more meaningful? Or better yet, cut back on the overly-long set pieces that go nowhere in order to give the characters just a little more heft, as they did in the earlier Craig films? Mio dio!
Taken all together, SPECTRE is easily the most disappointing sequel of 2015, if not one of the year’s most disappointing films, overall. If it does turn out to be Craig’s final outing as 007 — he’s contracted for one more, but that means relatively little — it will serve as the worst possible crash-and-burn ending for a tenure as Bond that arguably soared higher and won more acclaim than any since that of Sir Sean Connery. At the very least, it’s a terrible waste. He, and everyone involved in this production, are simply capable of so much better in terms of film making than this, and his time as Bond deserves a finer coda.
SPECTRE
Starring Daniel Craig, Christoph Waltz, Léa Seydoux, Ben Whishaw, Naomie Harris, Dave Bautista, with Monica Bellucci and Ralph Fiennes as “M.” Directed by Sam Mendes.
Running Time: 148 minutes
Rated PG-13 for intense sequences of action and violence, some disturbing images, sensuality and language
