Until about ten minutes ago, I had forgotten we are getting a Flatliners remake. We don’t need a remake of Joel Schumacher’s Brat-Pack-Goes-To-Hell semi classic thriller, but here we are. It’s 2017, and the movie has been amped up and repackaged to take everything to 11.
This morning, Ellen Page, who plays the Julia Roberts character, shared the first trailer on her Facebook page. And it’s okay. Check it out:
In Flatliners, five medical students, obsessed by the mystery of what lies beyond the confines of life, embark on a daring and dangerous experiment: by stopping their hearts for short periods of time, each triggers a near-death experience – giving them a firsthand account of the afterlife. But as their experiments become increasingly dangerous, they are each haunted by the sins of their pasts, brought on by the paranormal consequences of trespassing to the other side.
And here is the poster:
So… yeah. It looks fine, but it also looks like some sort of glossy, generic Final Destination riff. Part of the charm of the 1990 original was its grimness, it’s bleak outlook on these cocky medical students playing god. This looks too much like a modeling shoot at times. That being said, there could be some solid horror elements at play here, we’ll just have to see.
Aside from Page, Flatliners also stars Nina Dobrev, Diego Luna, and Kiersey Clemons. Oh yeah, and Kiefer Sutherland is in the credits as well, so this might be less a remake and more a continuation. It’s directed by Niels Arden Oplev, who directed the original version of The Girl with The Dragon Tattoo.
We’ll see is Flatliners has any life on September 29.
After ten years, Meredith Gran is ending her slice-of-life webcomic Octopus Pie. Set in New York City, OP followed the adventures and existential musings of late-20s Eve Ning and her roommate Hannah. The last strip, published on June 5th, is a fond goodbye to the longtime readers of OP.
Over the last decade, OP has won and been nominated for several awards. The comic won the 2008 Web Cartoonist’s Choice Awards for Outstanding Newcomer. It was nominated for Outstanding Black and White Art and Outstanding Website Design, and the “Brownout Biscuit” storyline won the 2014 Ignatz Award for Outstanding Story.
Sadly, despite its many successes, Octopus Pie like anything else must come to an end. It’s always nice to see a comic come to a natural, fitting end. It’s the norm in the webcomic world to have things quietly spin out into silence, or just end abruptly without warning. Instead, Gran speaks from the heart in wishing her readers a fond farewell.
“This comic began in spring of 2007. It was two short months after the death of my father. I was shocked and lonesome and wished to fully dedicate myself to something. If that’s all it had given me, it would’ve been enough. The ways in which this comic has opened up my life to new people, places, skills, and ideas are endless. No form of expression could’ve changed my world so much. I can never fully express how grateful I am.”
-Meredith Gran
OCTOPUS PIE: WHAT NEXT?
Gran recently signed a deal with Image Comics and all of Octopus Pie is available in book form here. However, she’s unsure where to go next. As she says in an interview with Alenka Figa of Women Write About Comics;
Now that I am in my thirties and married and thinking about different parts of my life, I feel like it’s a perfect time to say goodbye to that world that I’ve been writing for so long.
Still, with Gran’s history, it’s reasonable to assume she’ll head right back into comics. Gran’s first webcomic was Skirting Danger, which she wrote as a teenager. (Skirting Danger appears to no longer be available online). So with the ending of Octopus Pie, it’s exciting to imagine what Gran will bring to the webcomic scene next.
Babyteeth#1 is one concept that has been done in media but not quite like this. A baby being born on this Earth is usually a good thing right? Well, as you see in Babyteeth, this one is more of a bad omen. Trying to be vague on this is difficult but trust me, Babyteeth is a wild ride. For sure this is one that’s tough to not spoil but I’m going to try not to. It’s a comic that has a quiet beginning but by the time it ends, life isn’t going to be calm for long. Hang in there for this one as we’re all going to be on this journey together. I’m ready to start up the after party and dark celebrations to come in Babyteeth #1. Keep your hats on your heads and all that good stuff because this one is going to be bonkers.
In all honesty, Babyteeth has a strange sort of calm to it. At least until the end where you see that this calm is leading to a powerful storm.
Yeah it is weird as you read Babyteeth how oddly calm it can be. Donny Cates and Garry Brown have created a unique beast of a comic. It all starts with the epitome of calm Sadie as she’s telling her son the story of how he was born. You can see from Mark Englert’s colors that despite the smile that Garry Brown puts on her face, something has gone down. Between the odd kind of optimism that Cates puts into Sadie’s voice, the atmosphere that Brown and Englert create show a different story. I love that the only illumination we have initially is from Sadie’s phone and the tiniest bit of moonlight. I say this, this intro creates the right tone for what is to come here. Does it ever create a tone for what’s to come.
Sadie as a character, I like her. She’s optimistic, kind, and as I said before, she’s calm and she’s perfect for this piece. You get to see her life before whatever it is is happening as she’s recording this story. At the point we see her she’s hidden her pregnancy and these people are trying to give her a hard time. Which leads us to her sister Heather, who is amazing, and which leads into the whole sequence of her baby being born. Now this is where the ominous tone begins. Every time Sadie has a contraction an earthquake begins. The earthquakes are a testament to Taylor Esposito’s lettering amongst other factors in the comic. The rumbles from the quake get more intense and the lettering for them reflects that. It’s in all the little touches at times my friends.
Babyteeth is thoughtful and optimistic in between the hints of dark times to come as we near the end of the issue.
It also is going at a slow pace, which is great. You get the idea as to what this birth is going to give us as the baby is about to arrive. It’s a wild looking scene with a sparse looking segment with Sadie alone with a sort of thoughtful and oddly sorrowful look to her face and body language. Props to Garry Brown for conveying this scene and what Cates was aiming for, it works beautifully and Mark Englert’s deep reds was perfect. The design of the layout too with the signs of life was brilliant. Then it all leads to the name of the baby, which is a nice touch. It all builds to a level of optimism until the end of the issue. That’s when you realize, all is not well and I cannot imagine what will lead us to this point.
I like what Donny Cates is building towards so far. Sadie is a great lead and I am curious about her and her family in the months to come. Another factor will be how her baby plays into this because you know something is about to go down. It makes this first issue one that will make many readers ponder about in the months to come. We know something is going to happen, we just don’t know what. I can see this being a series many people including myself get addicted to. A well paced comic that creates many exciting possibilities which makes for a strong first issue.
It’s a quiet beginning with a few shocks to the system that create much suspense for the future of Babyteeth’s universe. One wicked and powerful ride awaits us.
It will be interesting to see what other readers think of this book as it goes on. As this first issue gives us many tantalizing hints of events to come. Babyteeth‘s first issue will be one to look back on but until then, I am excited to see how crazy this series will get. Excellent start for a series that seems primed to be one to shock and amaze readers as it goes on. Get on the ground floor for this one, you won’t regret it.
E3 2017 is upon us. I’ve ventured to the expo to bring Monkeys Fighting Robots readers great photos, videos, interviews, and game impressions. E3’s show floor opens tomorrow, but that didn’t stop me from getting a few photos of outside the convention center. Check out the gallery below.
Yesterday’s Bethesda’s E3 conference had a bunch of announcements that can be found here. The one I want to focus on though is Dishonored 2: Death of The Outsider.
I’m not normally a fan of downloadable content as they normally add little to nothing to the base game and are just a simple cash grab. The DLC for the Dishonored series are different. While the main games normally focus on Corvo and his quest to save the empire, the side stories instead focus on Daud, played by Michael Madsen.
As is normally the case with any good story, the character we find ourselves rooting for isn’t always the hero. Often times an old antagonist turned protagonist is where development finds itself.
That is what makes Dishonored DLC so great. They’re all about Daud!
Based off the trailer we know we’re probably going to be given the choice of playing as either Daud or Billie Lurk while getting the chance to explore their shared past.
Oh and we also have as our target The Outsider.
A lot of people seemed disappointed by the title of the DLC and called out the impossibility of the task. We need to keep in mind that he was shown to be vulnerable in 2 when Delilah took over the void. A repeat by the assassin Daud and his protégé Billie shouldn’t be too farfetched.
In any case, this is probably the only DLC I’ll probably ever be excited for. I can’t wait for the extra lore.
The proof everything must come to end is becoming apparent for everyone’s favorite blue blur. Rumors and speculation are swirling around the possibility of Archie’s Sonic the Hedgehog comic book series coming to an end after being with the company for over two decades.Though there has been no official cancellation, the property has been put on a “hiatus” which is never a good thing in today’s market. In the film industry, a delay is usually the first nail in the coffin for a project and in this era of intense “need it now” style of media consumption, any time of holdup could prove to be fatal for product or service.
Unfortunately, the comic community doesn’t seem to be rioting through the streets in an effort to do something about this development. Upon researching this article, few other news stories were mentioning it and the main coverage seem to be from an article or two from other pop culture based websites. Why aren’t fans making this more of a big deal? Where is the all the passion and dedication Sonic and all his friends have received over the years?
If the series would come to an end, it would mark the finale of a series which ran for over 25 years, had a collective issue count (including spin offs and miniseries) of over 500 issues, and be the death of what was the quintessential grounding point for Sonic fans for ages. Whenever a bad game featuring the character would come out, fans would always have the better stories in the comic for evidence the franchise was indeed worthwhile and still entertaining.
Previously, when franchises were coming to a close the fans would join hands and find a way to solve the situation. Fans of Firefly and Green Lantern, found ways to protest and stand behind their products to try and save the media they love. Where is the same level of commitment for a series which has been around for 25 years? Where are the Sonic The Hedgehog fans when he needs their help?
If there is some kind of petition for the series to keep going and we haven’t heard of it, please post a link in comment section and let us know. Perhaps the more active members of the Sonic fan community are up in arms and devising a way to save him. It would be a shame if such a well loved series came to an end with a whimper instead of a Sonic Boom.
In 1987, a team of ex-military mercenaries was sent into the jungles of “Val Verde” to track down a downed military helicopter carrying a high-ranking official. Only one member of the mercenary team survived, and it was Arnold Schwarzenegger. Of course, I’m talking about the classic action movie Predator. The film turns 30 today, and it’s every bit as good as ever.
As even the Black Lodge itself calls out for Cooper to regain his senses, Twin Peaks continues to delay offering any easy answer. But in a surprise twist, a face is finally attached to a name.
The Case
Janey-E proved she is built of sterner stuff as she tackles Dougie’s infidelity, debts and Coop’s condition. She offered a speech about the heartlessness of bookies even as paying off a pair of greasy men (Jeremy Davies cameo!) $20,000 and some interest.
Meanwhile, at Lucky 7, Coop’s scribblings on the case files led Dougie’s boss to a surprising discovery. Not that the show gave us any insight into those findings. Perhaps Tom Sizemore’s Anthony Sinclair is a greater peril than he ever thought. Or maybe the mystery Vegas millionaire is about the be revealed.
Which may be the case as his assistant took out a hit on both Dougie and another woman. The killing blow on the woman was delivered by Ike “The Spike” Stadtler (Christophe Zajac-Denek) — needlessly violent, but par for the course Twin Peaks death. Her connection to Dougie is yet another mystery to add to the pile.
Back in Twin Peaks, the current drug trade became more solidified as Red (Balthazar Getty) granted Richard Horne (Eamon Fadem) a distribution concession in town. Not that the negotiation was conducted in any normal fashion. Red blew Richard’s mind with a bit of close-up magic involving a dime (or was it two) and the classic adage, “Heads I win, Tails you lose.” Now, how the second dime appeared in Richard’s mouth is anyone’s guess.
And for those drawing maps and charts, Richard was the cruel grouper in the Roadhouse last week. His last name also suggests a certain family tie. He added to his list of crimes by callously running over a child in the street. In fact, it appeared to be the same intersection where Gerard accused Leland Palmer of stealing the corn. Even if it is not the same spot, Richard certainly added to the pain and suffering for one family.
At the station, Hawk found pages behind a bathroom stall door thanks to yet another dime and the Nez Perce Manufacturing Company. It is unclear if these pages are the missing element, but one hopes Hawk is finally on the right track.
The Updates
Making only his second appearance in Twin Peaks is Harry Dean Stanton as Carl Rodd. As manager of the Fat Trout Trailer Park, he appeared in Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me. But as readers of The Secret History of Twin Peaks, Carl has a connection to Margaret and the late Doug Milford. Maybe this connection allowed him to see the soul of the boy Richard hit escape the mortal coil. If nothing else, Carl was able to offer the mother some sympathy while the rest of the town looked on in horror.
Elsewhere, we learned Heidi, the German waitress, still works at the Double R and everyone still loves Norma’s pies. It also seems, despite the trouble with her daughter, that Shelly is happy still working there. You almost have to wonder if, someday, she’ll be running the place.
The troubles with Sheriff Truman’s wife Doris took on a deeper meaning this week as we learned their son committed suicide. Not that Deputy Chad Broxford (John Pirruccello) had any empathy for her. Chad is the worst.
The Questions
Who was Richard delivering the drugs to?
If Richard is a Horne, is he Audrey’s son? A product of one of Ben’s many dalliances? An unlikely heir to Jerry’s pot fortune? An … attempt to keep the line alive via Johnny?
Is Sinclair the secret Vegas millionaire? And does he have any ties to the secret New York billionaire?
How screwed up was Dougie that people find Cooper’s behavior only slightly more bizarre?
Why did Janey-E marry Dougie in the first place?
Did Tamara offer Gordon the glass of Bordeaux?
Is the Linda living at the trailer park the Linda mentioned at the very beginning of the new season?
Not about Judy
While the path of Phillip Jeffries went seemingly cold this week, the hunt for him led to the most show-altering appearance. At long last, viewers saw the face of Diane. In the form of Laura Dern, it is unclear if Diane (now given the last name of Evans) still works for the Bureau. She did not seem happy to see Albert. Presumably, she is the person Gordon referred to in Part 4 that needs to see Bad Cooper.
And while not directly connected, the scene of Richard’s latest crime ends with a shot of power lines, a well-known means of travel for Jeffries.
Close-Up Magic
The mysteries continue to pile up. And it’s difficult not to think of a discussion between Major Briggs and Doug Milford in The Secret History of Twin Peaks about their respective viewpoints on mysteries. Milford believed they deserved to live without answers, otherwise they just become secrets. One wonders if author Mark Frost was preparing the audience for the ambiguity of the new season.
But one thing which is crystal clear is Lynch’s willingness to film horrific accidents and stabbings. Thanks to digital technology, the boy’s gruesome end could be realized without a cutaway, making it almost needless cruel. Similarly, the Ike the Spike’s brutal — and at this point senseless — stabbing also adds to the out-of-tone level of violence in the new Twin Peaks.
Of course, that may be part of the point. The series always stood at the crossroads between a quirky nighttime soap and something darker and brutal. But the added brutality of late almost punishes the viewer for being interested in garmonbozia.
What do you think? Add your thoughts in the comments below.
The Mummy was all set to be Universal’s launching pad for its Dark Universe, an MCU/DCEU shared universe digging up all their classic monsters to make all the money. IT didn’t get off on the best foot.
Turns out, people (in the U.S. anyway) don’t really care about another Mummy movie since, you know, we just finished up with Brendan Fraser’s Mummy movies and The Rock’s Scorpion King spinoff about a decade back. And it also turns out, this Tom Cruise-led version of The Mummy is a soulless, messy, incoherent, tonal disaster from the top down, a bad movie that commits the cardinal sin of intentionally bad movies: it’s boring as hell to boot. Nevertheless, it brought in plenty of dough intentionally, so no matter how stillborn the star may have been, this Dark Universe is here to stay.
And yet, for the life of me, I cannot understand why Alex Kurtzman and the other creative “masterminds” behind this Dark Universe thought The Mummy was the right place to kickstart this new extended, multi-movie franchise. The Universal monsters are a big group of iconic characters, some of whom we haven’t seen in decades. Many, in fact. Unless my memory is failing me, the last appearance of The Creature from The Black Lagoon in any capacity was the 1987 horror comedy The Monster Squad. The invisible man has had it’s different versions in John Carpenter’s awful Memoirs of An Invisible Man and Paul Verhoeven’s pretty sweet Hollow Man. But even Hollow Man was almost twenty years ago.
Same thing can be said for Frankenstein’s monster, even though he has become basically part of the thread in the pop culture fabric. There were so many opportunities for Kurtzman to kickstart the Dark Universe with a new version of a classic character whom we haven’t seen in a long time on the big screen. Instead, they decided to ape off a mildly successful pile of garbage franchise (don’t try and tell me the first Fraser Mummy is “actually” good) that started in 1999 and gradually deteriorated over the next 7 or 8 years. It’s the very definition of laziness, and it could have been avoided had the producers and Universal not been so eager to start this entire universe before even making one movie.
Next in line is supposed to be The Bride of Frankenstein, which is a good direction. However, James Whale’s original Bride of Frankenstein is one of the greatest horror films in the history of motion pictures, so there’s that little hurdle to clear. Javier Bardem has been cast as the monster, and Gods and Monsters director Bill Condon is set to direct; both of these are infinitely more fascinating than a Tom Cruise adventure movie masquerading as a horror.
Now, Kurtzman and the producers need to get the fuck out of the way. Seriously, the last thing Condon and Bardem need is a team of franchise-focused #brand nuts swooping in and undercutting any artistic vision the two may have when it comes to bringing something fresh and original to a classic character. Don’t try to incorporate analytics into the structure of the story, don’t try and check off boxes in the screenplay. And while we’re at it, hire someone competent to pen a script; don’t bring in six (SIX!) screenwriters to cobble together an empty-headed screenplay with six different tonal directions. Let someone creative do the creating, and sit back and think about marketing.
And speaking of that marketing, why don’t we make this Dark Universe dark? It’s supposed to be a horror franchise, correct? Let it happen! Stop showing me The Cruiser running, show me tortured should and ghoulish castles and laboratories and jump scares and science gone awry. Show me women screaming and monsters terrorizing, all without a CGI cloud of indistinguishable dust destroying cities. Been there, done that. And let’s tap the brakes on Dr. Jekyll turning into the franchise’s Nick Fury. Awful idea.
Of course none of this will be considered as we churn along to the next movie in the Dark Universe. Screenplays will be thrown together quick enough to get to work on what really matters: explosions and CGI. At least the U.S. seems to have gotten its shit together with this movie and will deny any terrible subsequent films by not going to see them in the theater; hopefully the rest of the world will figure it out before it’s too late.
Bethesda had a relatively short press conference to close out Sunday E3 2017. Yet in that short time they revealed some exciting new tech, games, and platforms. Check out the whole show here, or just read Monkeys Fighting Robots’ five highlights of Bethesda’s press conference below.
Their first announcement of the night was VR for both Doom and Fallout 4. The former, called Doom VFR, is coming to Vive and PSVR, though no date on that one. The latter, Fallout 4 VR will be coming to HTV Vive this October. Both games showed gameplay footage that demonstrated their VR capabilities. Given the popularity of these titles already and the ever increasing presence of VR, not to mention the VR capability of the Xbox One X, Bethesda’s future looks bright.
More support for Skyrim and Fallout 4 is coming your way this summer, with the Creation Club. This new platform will marry Bethesda, third-party, and community designers to create new content for their famous open world RPGs. Included in this is new items, weapons, outfits, and accessories. Anything created will be fully compatible with all saves, add-ons, etc. Look for it Summer 2017.
For the first time, a Bethesda game is coming to a Nintendo platform. Skyrim is coming to the Nintendo Switch, though no release date was given. This isn’t technically news, since Skyrim was first seen in the Switch teaser trailer almost a year ago. However, their official confirmation and gameplay trailer was welcome to any Nintendo fan looking to slay dragons on the go. Perhaps even more exciting for them, Skyrim will have Amiibo support, with players able to unlock the Master Sword with the Link Amiibo. No release date at this time.
The sequel to the popular survival-horror game, The Evil Within, is getting a sequel, aptly titled The Evil Within 2. It will be developed by Tango Gameworks (Bethesda subsidiary), run by Resident Evil‘s Shinji Mikami. The game will focus on saving your daughter Lily, though the heavily cinematic trailer did not reveal much more about the plot. For fans of horror games, this is a definite must watch. Be scared October 13, 2017.
Homefront meets Fallout meets Man in the High Castle. The Wolfenstein sequel, The New Colossus, is here. Series protagonist BJ Blazkowicz is back, with all the size and gore of the first game. The game trailer had a fantastic retro-American feel, mixed with interesting steampunk-esque weapons and mechs. You can join the revolution on October 27, 2017.
