Merkel

Yeah, Ra's Al Ghul has never been really faithfully adapted to the screen, Lazarus Pit and all

I did not say he can't work, just that he works best. Mind you, my all time favorite Batman story has Superman in it (The Dark Knight Returns). But it is very much an exception to the rule. I just vastly prefer a universe where Gotham is almost like a self contained place. Part of the US, yes, but it kinda lives in its own reality and rules, not too afected with what happens in the outside world. The vigilante aspect of Batman, which is one of his coolest aspects, always gets downplayed when you start having superpowered heroes flying around. Even the Bat-family became too large for its own good

This quote from Reeves fills me with hope: "‘Here’s the thing: I respect that the DC Universe has become an extended universe and all the movies were kind of connected. But another Batman film, it shouldn’t have to carry the weight of connecting the characters from all those other movies. I didn’t want them in there.” Batman works so much better without all this extended cinematic universe crap

The domestic numbers haven't been updated in a while, but those won't make much of a difference at this point

I wish. I would be very happy if there weren't any after credits scenes or whatnot. I really hate when they try to connect the Batman universe with other superheroes and expanded universes. I hated it in the comics, I hate it even more in the movies. I only really worked in The Dark Knight Returns, and that was at the expense of the Superman character and in an almost Elseworlds setting. Please keep the Batman universe self contained. It's how it works best. It's how it makes the most narrative sense

I do miss the time when often the biggest movie of the year was unexpected and a bit of a wild card. Stuff like Home Alone, Ghost, Mrs. Doubtfire, Forrest Gump, Saving Private Ryan. When was the last time when the biggest movie of the year wasn't seen coming at least one or two years away? The pattern has become too predictable

Seriously, though, how can anyone watch a movie on their phone?

The Numbers has the overseas gross at $268,870,572, which seems to be a far more precise number. So which one is correct?

Indeed. There's no way to claim that this version of Dune relied on the existence of the 1984 film to gain any sort of exposure or brand recognition. It is not a remake. It's a re-adaptation

You make some very good points and I could never debate you in Shakespeare related subjects, as you are far more knowledgeable, but my beef with this sort of project it's not so much the rehash of story elements of tropes, but rather the easter egg scattering and on-the-nose references to elicit an instant sympathetic, albeit meanigless response from the audience. It feels almost as this movie and its characters (and others with similar "appropriation" of the success and iconography of previous movies) live in a world where Ghostbusters was a very popular movie instead of a world where those events actually happened. Can't really put it in any other way

The problem here it's not so much using nostalgia as a trope or a gimmick. It is indeed a very strong emotion and brilliant movies have been made using nostalgia as its main lense, mostly in movies dealing with some sort of childhood reminiscence. The problem isn't either the story potentially being a retread or a remake. The problem, in my view, lies somewhere else. It's when you have to resort to the iconography of previous works to do all the heavy lifting, to create goodwill with the audience using little signposts that remind them of how much they enjoyed other works. I haven't seen the new Ghostbusters yet, but from a clip alone you already get a really egregious example of this: when Rudd's character tries to get the Ghost trap working. And all the characters exhibit a sort of a reverence for that thing that was never, ever, part of the original films. All the hardware associated with ghostbusting was never treated as anything other than the tools of the trade. They never had big, reveal shots, with rousing music. They were just there, they were never assumed to be cool or awesome. But of course, kids that grew up watching those movies wanted to have those toys. They looked awesome. And thus, they become iconic. But only outside of the movies. But when you see that fanboy, real world, reverence seeping into the movie, I take it as a very bad sign. Treating something as iconic when it was only ever iconic outside the movie universe. And seeing glimpses of terror dogs, stay puft marshmallow men, Ecto 1 being revealed like some sort of Batmobile only further ciments this impression. Taking your Shakespeare example, would be akin to having Hamlet pop up in another play and make some bad pun with "To be, or not to be, that is the question", or having the dagger that killed Caesar pop up in Antony and Cleopatra. That is the problem with these nostalgia driven projects. It's not the nostalgia itselft. It's using what other movies did right to save you work and give you a quick dopamine rush of recognition that will lead nowhere and have no lasting power

For some reason, it is now fashionable to bring actors from previous, unconnected iterations of the character to the more recent movies (as in The Flas with Batman), and because people have a nostalgic attachment to those previous iterarions, somewhow it seems like a good idea. Honestly, it feels very cheap, creatively speaking, and there's no way the actual scenes of the three Spiderman actors together lives up to how cool the idea might seem. It's like the starting point was to have the actors all together in this and then work out a story to somehow justify it. I apologize for being so bitter, but this is lame. It's just reinforcing two of the most pervasive tendencies in blockbuster filmaking these days: one-liners and nostalgia catering.

Nothing really surprising, but Villeneuve confirms in a interview with Empire that Feyd will be in Part 2: https://www.empireonline.com/movies/features/dune-spoiler-interview-denis-villeneuve-ending-paul-dreams-and-part-two/ Feyd-Rautha, the Harkonnen heir – might he be in Part Two? Definitely. That's a choice that I personally brought on. There was enough characters that were introduced in this first part, and it will be more elegant to keep Feyd for Part Two. It will be definitely a very, very important character in the second part. I also thought this passage was very interesting, lore-wise: The transport ships themselves echo the shape of the worms – is it a sort of stargate that people pass through, or is that the ship itself? The Heighliners that are used by the Spacing Guild are ships. We went through a long period of design. When we came [up] with that shape, I knew we had the right one. It feels like an echo to the worm, and at the same time it feels like it could be seen as a stargate. It's like the system that [the Imperium] are using to travel and to bridge space and time is… I like again to not explain it and try to stay in a zone of [the] unknown. I think it's absolutely beautiful. And that's where we took a little bit of liberty from the book, where it has a feeling that it could be something that is folding space in a way, that you can see it as almost as a stargate. But I like to keep it [a] mystery right now. It will be more permanent and explained in Part Two.

Chris Clemmenson often pans Zimmer's work. Nothing new here

So a similar production schedule to Blade Runner 2049

Well, Villeneuve did churn out Sicario, Arrival and Blade Runner 2049 in three consecutive years. I'm still amazed he was able to do that

As long as we get Dune Messiah besides part 2, I couldn't possibly ask for more

And some of sets are surely to be re-used

It should have a fairly similar production schedule to Blade Runner 2049, which was shot between July and November and was released on October of the following year

The should film this during next Summer up until fall and and then have 1 full year of post production. Unless it is prohibitive to shoot the desert scenes on location during the summer months

That scene would chronologically come after the end of the movie, so I assume it will be in Part 2

The climax of this movie might not seem to be momentous on a purely plot level, but it absolutely is on a story level. It is a culmination of Paul as character. Of the death of Paul Atreides, as it were, and the birth of something else. Would've liked to see him being named Muad'Dib at the end, but that would probably would've been too on the nose

I think it only opens in Portugal on the 21st, not next week

The upcoming LEGO sets give us a good look at the Riddler and Alfred: Also, the Batcave More views of the new LEGO sets here: https://www.brothers-brick.com/2021/10/08/lego-reveals-new-sets-from-upcoming-the-batman-movie-including-technic-batmobile-news/