20th Century Fox has released a new trailer for Hugh Jackman’s upcoming musical, The Greatest Showman. Set to land in theatres this Christmas, The Greatest Showman is directed by Michael Gracey and tells the true story of P.T. Barnum, who founded the circus that became the famous travelling Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus.
More – New Look At Hugh Jackman In ‘The Greatest Showman’ Released
Watch the new trailer below:
Inspired by the imagination of P.T. Barnum, The Greatest Showman is an original musical that celebrates the birth of show business & tells of a visionary who rose from nothing to create a spectacle that became a worldwide sensation.
The film stars Hugh Jackman, Michelle Williams, Zac Efron, Zendaya, and Rebecca Ferguson.
There are more comic books to choose from now than ever were before. The industry is filled with so many wonderful options for every type of reader. Allow me to point you in the direction of a few that I think are crucial comic pulls for 11/15/17.
TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES #76
Following the big space adventure and trial of Krang, our heroes in a half shell return home to Earth. There’s some major fallout from the trial of the universe, including the Triceratons returning to Earth as well. It was promised to them as their new home after having fought many wars for another race and helping to secure Krang.
TMNT doesn’t get enough credit for how long it’s been going, and how long it’s been good. It’s the longest running Ninja Turtles comic book series in history, and for good reason. This new arc should be explosive and heavy. When the brothers left New York, it wasn’t exactly in the best shape.
They have a lot more on their plate than the impending invasion of dinosaur-aliens. This is the start of a five-part story, a perfect jumping on point for anyone looking to get more into our favorite mutant teenagers.
MAESTROS #2
If you missed the phenomenal introductory issue, pick up the second printing this week along with issue two. Maestros is an inter-dimensional shit-show that takes the concept of wizardry in a very different direction.
Cranking up the strange and unusual, Steve Skroce (writer and artist) is building something spectacular and different. Even if you’re not usually into fantasy books, this series is worth checking out for it’s unique take on the genre.
THE REALM #3
Seth Peck and Jeremy Haun’s genre-mashing epic has taken no time at all to immerse readers in a dangerous and exciting world. Will and the group of people he’s taken on as a job look to face some serious trouble on their journey.
There are a ton of mysterious characters lurking in the shadows of this world. We’ve only just begun to explore this fascinating landscape. The little bit we’ve seen has been brutal and unique, this is already one of the best new series of the year.
DOCTOR STRANGE #381
Donny Cates has been absolutely on fire recently with his indie books (Baby Teeth, God Country, Rednecks). He takes over Doctor Strange as the title makes its Marvel Legacy debut.
After last seeing the God of Mischief in Marvel Legacy #1, Loki has taken over the Sorcerer Supreme role from Stephen Strange. This new direction for the title is an ambitious one, Cates brings a lot to table potentially. In his cache of writing tools, Donny brings a horror sensibility to a book that works best when diving deep into the abnormal.
PUNISHER #218
In one of the bolder moves for Marvel Legacy, Frank Castle finds himself in the vacant War Machine armor. As Rhodey is no longer with us, and with Frank being eager to return to work after Secret Empire, is Punisher’s new look in poor taste or in honor of a fallen hero?
Written by Matthew Rosenberg, and art by Guiu Vilanova, there are a lot of questions to start this new chapter in Castle’s life. A lot of Legacy‘s shifts in focus were reverting back to a more classic take for most titles. Punisher is going in the opposite direction and exploring places we’ve never been with the character.
When ‘The Walking Dead’ remembers it’s ‘The Walking Dead’ the show can emotionally destroy you, the fourth episode of season eight ‘Some Guy’ did just that Sunday night. ‘Some Guy’ was a personal tale of Ezekiel as his whole world comes crashing down.
There will be spoilers about tonight’s episode of ‘The Walking Dead’ after the break, you’ve been warned.
Let’s talk about the elephant in the room before we critique the episode. Negan did not appear again! Jeffrey Dean Morgan as a Negan is a very charismatic character, Negan is the Darth Vader of ‘The Walking Dead’ Universe. Fans crave his screen time, and the lack thereof is killing the show.
As the world grows in ‘The Walking Dead,’ the series needs to do a better job at incorporating as many characters as possible in an episode. These one-off adventures are great for fans of Ezekiel but are god awful for the viewers that are dying to see Negan, Rick, Daryl, Maggie, and or whoever it is that you love on the show.
‘Game of Thrones’ is a well-produced show because HBO does a great job cramming as many characters as possible into a single episode. The story may unfold slower, but you please a broader audience.
Cooper Andrews as Jerry – The Walking Dead _ Season 8, Episode 4 – Photo Credit: Gene Page/AMC
Okay, let’s get back to ‘Some Guy’ and the deconstruction of Ezekiel’s character. In the episode, Ezekiel loses everything and is forced to rethink every choice he’s made since the outbreak of zombies. Not everything in the episode is fully explained, which lets the viewer have an individual experience as they watch and reflect on the episode. With ‘Some Guy’ you can go as deep and meaningful as you care to go. I recommend going as deep as possible.
What does it mean to be a leader?
Is Ezekiel a fraud?
What does Shiva’s death represent?
When you can have a long-winded debate with your friend about a character on a show, that show is doing something right. ‘Some Guy’ is just another example of why ‘The Walking Dead’ is a well-produced show. These are the episodes that fans will talk about in the future. As a reader of the comic, I knew that Shiva dies a valiant brutal death. Yet, when I was confronted with it in the episode, I was more heartbroken than when I read it in the comic. Translating comic book moments to the screen has been a flaw in the series, but not tonight. RIP Shiva!
Another sign of a good episode is being left with the right amount of questions. With ‘Some Guy’ the main question is where does Ezekiel go from here, and how does he rebound from this extreme loss. The drama is there, and as a fan of the series, I’m eager to see how it unfolds.
Can we give some props to Cooper Andrews as Jerry, his role tonight was minor, but he’s the Hugo “Hurley” Reyes of ‘The Walking Dead.’ The show needs an extended conversation between Negan and Jerry, just saying.
It looks like Negan finally returns next week, and it couldn’t happen soon enough, as the season has become bland with only one side of the story.
What did you think of Sunday night’s episode? Sound off in the comment section below.
You can picture his face and hear the sounds he makes when the name Chewbacca is dropped. He is one of the most-famous sidekicks in sci-fi cinematic history, serving primarily as the traveling companion of Han Solo (may he rest in peace), but now serving as that to Rey, as she has taken lead ranks in navigating the Millennium Falcon. He is the lone standout Wookiee in the Rebel Alliance and has appeared in nearly all the Star Wars films, namely Episode(s) III, IV, V, VI, VII(‘The Force Awakens’) and will also play a role in the soon-to-be-released VIII (‘The Last Jedi’).
‘Chewie’ hails from the homeworld of Kashyyyk. His planet is masked in a dense forest, while his kind are not primitive, but rather comprised of minds capable of sophisticated technology and intricate architecture. His weapon of choice, a Bowcaster, which is a traditional wookiee-wielded rifle, which is much more powerful than a blaster.
The character has historically been tamed by Peter Mayhew and, he will reprise the role in the upcoming The Last Jedi, but has sincepassed the crown to basketball player-turned actor, Joonas Suotamo, for 2018’s ‘Solo: A Star Wars Story’ film. This will serve as a huge responsibility and one that he welcomes with enthusiasm. For reference on both Mayhew and Chewie, check out these 15 Facts in Honor of Mayhew (Mental Floss) and these 10 Interesting Facts by Viral Killer (YouTube).
What makes this lovable wookiee so important though? Despite having served as a galactic smuggler alongside Han Solo, he has always remained loyal, while proving you don’t have to be a bad guy to smuggle. He has a plethora of good deeds on his resume, including, but not limited to: Helping Ahsoka Tano, a Jedi apprentice, escape Trandoshan slavers, guiding Yoda to flee his planet when ‘Order 66’ was issued (an attempt to wipe out all remaining Jedi) during the Clone Wars, assisting in rescuing Princess Leia from the Death Star, finding and helping reassemble C-3P0 on Cloud City, having a hand in rescuing Solo from his carbonite imprisonment at Jabba the Hutt’s palace on Tatooine, navigating an AT-ST on Endor to pave the way for an anti-Imperial advancement and, most recently, pulling the trigger to blow up The First Order’s Starkiller Base shortly after lacing a shot into Kylo Ren, who had just killed his own father, Solo. Simply put, he has lost a lot of his own kind, his best friend and colleagues along the way, but has chosen to keep fighting in conjunction with the Rebels. He’s one of the last remaining true heroes of the Clone Wars era and has been behind some of the biggest achievements for the alliance, including having helped keep numerous Jedi alive. For these reasons and so much more, we salute you, Chewie!
One of the biggest things we can’t wait to see in The Last Jedi is how the Porg will interact with Chewbacca. These are a species of sea bird native to the planet Ahch-To, where Rey first meets Luke Skywalker, at the end of ‘The Force Awakens’ film.
A complete history of Chewbacca can be found HERE. He also had a pre-Han Solo team-up, five-issue miniseries run via Marvel’s Star Wars comics back in 2015, which you can check out HERE. If you have ever wanted to learn how to talk ‘Wookie’, check out this Translator. Click HERE for his Top 10 film quotes (Buzzfeed). Lastly, if you want to sit in dim candlelight and listen to him spout off for an hour, if you need to get in the holiday spirit early or if you just want to have a good laugh, check out the videos below.
Star Trek: Discovery has had a controversial start. With its odd take on the appearance of the Klingons and moody interpretation of humanity’s future, the creative team behind Discovery has made choices that have left many Trekkies scratching their heads. Although the series looks fantastic — the effects, sets, costumes, and makeup are great — the dialogue has for the most part been lackluster with acting to match.
In this reviewer’s opinion, Discovery’s nod to Star Trek’s franchise history “Magic to Make the Sanest Man Go Mad,” in which Harry Mudd takes control of the U.S.S. Discovery by way of a temporal loop machine, was a confused attempt to placate Trekkies while simultaneously poking us in the collective eye.
Star Trek: Discovery – No Time To Think About Time
Despite the fact that Discovery’s premiere was pushed back repeatedly, “Magic to Make the Sanest Man Go Mad” felt like it needed more time in development. When telling a story that involves time travel, it’s important that everything be clear to the audience, but instead this episode and its parameters were muddy — no pun intended. These were the basic facts of the episode:
Harry Mudd has control of a device that allows him to set up localized time loops.
Mudd is using this device in order to highjack the Discovery in an effort to sell the experimental ship to the Klingons.
Lt. Stamets, because of his gene modification, is somehow able to remember the events of each successive loop.
That’s more or less it. Keeping three facts in mind doesn’t require much concentration, so why wasn’t Discovery’s own creative team able to remember them? Based on the events of the episode, it seems like the writers and editors couldn’t keep track of the third fact.
If Lt. Stamets alone is able to retain memories of each loop because of his modified genes, why does Burnham spontaneously develop the ability to retain memories partway through the episode?
In a frustratingly schmaltzy scene, Stamets teaches Burnham to dance so that she can persuade Lt. Tyler into believing her about the time loops, but how does she know how to dance or understand anything about the time loops after looping back through time? Presumably, her memories, like everybody’s but Stamets’s, would be erased every time the loop recycled. This means that Stamets would need to both teach Burnham to dance and inform her about the temporal loop every time they went around.
Star Trek: Discovery – “Do Your Own Script Editing!”
Instead of addressing this inconsistency by coming up with a reason for it or modifying the script to remove it, the writers and producers apparently thought it better to just gloss over it. Unfortunately, this has been a problem with the show since the premiere. Good execution gets left behind in the constant struggle to showcase “intriguing” ideas, but any idea, intriguing or not, handled with poor execution turns into just another bad idea. That said, the most recent episode “Si Vis Pacem, Para Bellum,” was executed relatively well and set the stage nicely for the final episode before the mid-season break.
Star Trek: Discovery – Putting the Break On
With just seven episodes left out of fifteen, Discovery’s first season is already over halfway through its maiden voyage. One wonders what new twists the creative team has up their collective sleeve. The introduction of the Pahvans last episode is an interesting touch. Other iterations of Star Trek have featured similar non-corporeal aliens, and I’ve always enjoyed stories that feature them. But even though “Si Vis Pacem, Para Bellum” is my favourite episode of the series so far, I could see how people familiar with the franchise might feel that it was derivative. Specifically, the Pahvans have a lot in common with the Organians, a non-corporeal alien species featured in Star Trek who enforced the Treaty of Organia between the Klingon Empire and the Federation.
I’m looking forward to seeing the mid-season finale and its inevitable cliffhanger ending. With Cornwell free of the Klingons and L’Rell sowing dissension and seeking to defect, something’s brewing, and I’ll bet Burnham will get entangled somehow.
The “Lonely Place of Living” storyline wrapped up in Detective Comics this past week, and it had a ton to offer fans of the pre-Flashpoint DC Universe. First, the arc reintroduced the future version of Tim Drake as a murderous Batman, originally seen in Geoff Johns’ seminal run on Teen Titans. Then, writer James Tynion IV teased fans by having future Tim name-drop a character that readers have been missing since 2011: Conner Kent, Superboy.
In a recent interview about Dark Nights: Metal, Newsarama took the time to ask Tynion about the references, and whether or not he’ll be bringing Conner back in full:
Nrama: And I just have to ask James really quick – dude, you’re killing us with all the Conner Kent references in Detective Comics. Are you going to bring him back already?
Tynion: I think all I can say is, after reading “The Lonely Place of Living,” head over to the “Super Sons of Tomorrow” crossover [in Superman, Super Sons, and Teen Titans] in December.
Superboy was first introduced in 1993 in the wake of “The Death of Superman” as a young clone of the Man of Steel. He later gained a following as a member of Geoff Johns’ Teen Titans, and as a main character on the Young Justice animated series.
However, the new Kon-El has been mysteriously absent in Rebirth. With DC bringing back more and more of its classic characters, the references in Detective Comics makes it increasingly more likely that Conner Kent will be making his full return soon.
What do you think? Do you want to see pre-Flashpoint Conner return to the DC Universe? Sound off in the comments!
Though the media and fans often pit Marvel vs. DC, Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige doesn’t understand the rivalry. Speaking to Crave about Thor: Ragnarok, the topic of division regarding DC and Marvel came up. Here’s what Feige said:
“I think movies are awesome and people should go out and support awesome movies, and I go support those movies and I thought Wonder Woman was awesome. I can’t wait to see what Geoff Johns and Joss [Whedon] and the gang has done with Justice League. I guess people like rivalries, I guess? I don’t know. But I’m seeing Geoff Johns in a couple weeks for dinner. We went to this Dick Donner event together. Dick’s Superman is still the best archetype of superhero films. So yeah, just go see cool movies. What are you fighting about?”
Hear that, comic book fans? Listen to Feige.
There’s no reason for the constant antagonistic behavior between DC and Marvel fans. It’s fine to prefer a company’s content over the others, but at the end of the day, these are profit seeking firms attempting to get your money and attention, not friends, family, or colleagues.
Thor: Ragnarok is in theaters now. DC’s next blockbuster, Justice League, comes to theaters on November 17.
When it comes to DC Comics, this week has been a major one in terms of breaking comic book news. First came the news of its multi-year deal with Writer Brian Michael Bendis. Fast forward a few days later and the publisher revealed it has major plans for Mera the queen of Atlantis. In February she will star in her own six-issue comic book series.
Titled Mera: Queen of Atlantis, Dan Abnett (Aquaman) will serve as writer and Lan Medina (Aquaman and the Others) will provide the artwork for the books. While Artist Nicola Scott (Wonder Woman) will be working on covers for the limited series and provided the first look at the cover for issue #1. Abnett’s story will revolve around the continuing Atlantean civil war. During its continuation, Mera finds herself having to keep the peace between the surface world and Atlantis.
This task will not prove easy as Oceanmaster makes his return for what he believes is rightfully his. The throne of Atlantis and title of the city’s savior. Issue one of her first solo series hits comic store shelves on February 28th, 2018.
The Archies have fixed their van and are back on the road. But getting to Hollywood, California is still far away and a gig is needed to help get there. But what happens when Veronica’s plan for a fancy hotel falls apart and worse yet, so does their much-needed gig! Is the tour over before it even starts?! Will The Archies find a place to stay where they can do more than taking a much-needed nap? And will Jughead get some food?! Find out as the hijinks continue in The Archies!
The Archies #2 Written by: Alex Segura and Matt Rosenberg Art by: Joe Eisma Colors by: Matt Herms Lettering by: Jack Morelli Published by: Archie Comics
Writing
Issue two of The Archies continues everything that made issue one such a great read. Once again Archie narrates directly to the reader, but there is a bit of added suspense as Archie is leading us up to what has happened as he drives the van. It has the feel of a friend telling you a story, catching you up as the details come to them. It’s an infectious way to drive the narrative.
The characterization also remains solid. By now everyone knows these characters and how they relate to each other, but Segura and Rosenberg continue to find ways to make the Archie gang fresh, relevant and funny.
The plot this issue has the planned gig falling apart right after Veronica’s credit card, well her dad’s actually, get’s declined. Vernocia dealing with her usual comforts being taken from her is always fuel for humor, and it’s nice to see that the Lodge’s money isn’t going to be a deus ex machina to get them out of a jam. Each of the gang’s individual reaction to this situation is great, further emphasizing the classic personalities we love about these characters. And as I expected Jughead continues to be my favorite.
Of course, things eventually sway back in The Archie’s direction and things end up better for them then they imagined. The issue ends with a great bit that sets up the first real-life band set to make an appearance; Scottish synth-pop band Chvrches.
Chvrches
Art
Eisma and Herms expand on the great work they did on both the one-shot and issue one. There seems to be more comfort in expressing physical humor through some great cartooning. They also continue to really capture the mood and energy of music being played (not an easy feat for something with absolutely no sound.) The stage scenes, in particular, have the layout, design, and feel of a concert poster. Those pages, in particular, are fantastic to look at. But the art overall is great, and this is the best looking mainstream Archie book on the stands.
Conclusion
The Archies is a book that will appeal to a very broad range of Archie fans, and issue two shows why audiophiles and pop-music fans need to take note as well. This issue is where we really start to see what this title has to offer and following The Archies on tour is something you definitely want to do!
When it comes to DLC in video games, NetherRealm has always been keen on thinking outside of the box. After recently adding Hellboy to Injustice 2, the developer is once again turning heads with its newest DLC Fighters Pack. In the trailer posted below, Ray Palmer (The Atom) and Enchantress are about to square off. But then out of the shadows, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles appear.
While their addition to the fighting game has caused people to tweet and post their surprise and support, others have questioned why the “Turtles In A Half Shell” are a part of the game at all. Though no reason has been provided, the answer does have comic book ties. In 2015, DC Comics and IDW Publishing joined forces to publish a Batman/Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles crossover series. The crossing of the characters continued afterward as the turtles met up with Batman again, but the animated series version.
Recently DC and IDW announced a Batman/Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles sequel. Which will bring back the creative team of James Tynion IV and Freddie Williams II. So there is a basis for their inclusion outside of their general popularity. But what remains to be seen is how the characters will be used in the game when it comes to fighting. As Leonardo says in the trailer “We fight as a team”.
While this could mean we will see all four turtles fighting at the same time, odds are this will not be the case outside of a super move, and combos. What we could likely see is a variety of skins and move lists for each turtle. This is pure speculation. As no gameplay has hit the internet.
These new characters will be a part of the Ultimate Edition of Injustice 2, and can also be purchased separately in the upcoming Fighter Pack 3. The Atom will be available for early access on December 12. What are your thoughts on these new fighters? Comment below!
