thedast

I'm black as well. Not American, though, so maybe I can't relate because I know there are enough African historical tales that fighting to be cast in a historically white one feels weird. I've been back and forth on this issue. I personally only believe roles should limited on race (like say painting someone black, which is stupid or man taking an obvious woman's role in say, a biopic). Everything else feels like fair game. It's acting. If everyone matched up on every characteristic for a character, then where's the fun in that? Instead, work on getting more out gay, trans, disabled, minority actors into diverse roles. Let them play straight, or bi or non-stereotypes. Give them more opportunities that isn't them playing themselves in real life. The race-bending of popular characters has never done much for me, because it's not giving minority actors their own stories, it's just allowing them to remix beloved ones e.g MCU Spider-man is towing the line with MJ. They should have just called her something else and kept everything else the same. Let her be her own character the same way Miles Morales is. Black Panther is an amazing example of giving fantasy work to black actors and letting them form their own artistic legacies with their own stories that celebrates their ancestory. Disney spending 60 years pushing 90% white heroines and then instead of creating new ones based on African/American folktales, just recasting a black one to tell some dead white man's story is lazy. You're championing diversity? Prove it. Give me more Moanas, Mulans, Shuris. If you want to do an African-based 'mermaid' story, there's plenty of mythology there, most popularly 'Mami Water', which is a spirit/witch believed to kidnap people and drag them into the water in many African tribes. https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Mami_Wata. If you want to talk about Gods of Thunder and Lightning, there's Sango. https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Shango. And that's just the most popular of hundreds of African gods. If you want to talk real historical figures, female war heroines like Mulan, there's the Hausa woman, Amina of Zazzau https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Amina. There are tons of sources and scholars who you could talk to for new, refreshing tales. Look at how much people went out to see Black Panther. There's clearly a market there for more non-European stories but why do more of that when you can just take what was already successful and slap a black actor in one of the roles for the extra sentimental dollars I guess.

Lolwhat. One historically self-absorbed person =/= much of the acting community.

caption aside, yes, he confirmed he got bigger. It's obvious in the one shirtless shot.

It could be Hollywood creativity, but honestly after a century of cinema a large problem for me personally is that a huge percentage of stories have been done to death in every genre especially comedy and horror. So unless they're upping the anti in some other way it's like... eh. You could watch some variety of many movies on Netflix, so going out to see something marginally different doesn't feel worth the effort. I watched Booksmart online. It was okay, but I've watched that movie before named something else starring different actors. I've never cared about Oscar bait biopics. Fantasy is a bit better because you can literally come up with any idea and are not limited to contemporary rules. With that said, we're probably a decade away from feeling the same about superhero movies. MCU's saving grace is that it's a universe, so it feels more like watching a long running, expensive TV show. You feel invested because you grow with these characters and form an attachment you can't in one-off movies. You want to see what they're up to next. If these movies weren't connected people most likely would have burned out on them quicker because they too have roughly the same structure. With that in mind, it's kind of shame other cinematic universes haven't taken off yet. It's funny because TV is very slowly getting more cinematic and people are flocking to movies that are getting more episodic. One day the line will completely blur. I think we're in a period of transition personally. Tastes and habits are changing. It's just a matter of figuring out how to serve that and still do well. Maybe not $2b well but still well enough that everyone keeps eating.

If anything he needs to stop doing so many pointless sequels and reboots, so I respect this decision.

I don't care for Grace Randolph's opinions of anything but I was surprised to see her speak so positively of this one. So far from the few social media comments I've seen it seems the actors good to great but the story is weak.

I've been following the marketing for this and the strategy here seems to be to put all their press energy into Europe and Asia with maybe a day or two in US. Doesn't seem like they're counting on domestic intake for this much, which makes sense I guess since MIB3 made 70% of its gross OS last time. That said, I love these two actors, I just... have little desire to see this. MIB as a concept only made sense to me for the first movie. Never saw 2 or 3. In 2019, where every other sci fi movie has to do with aliens or mutants it just feels unnecessary. Hope it's at least a moderate success just so it'll make Hemsworth do more El Royales and Rushes. I'll even take straight, original comedies. Step away from the reboots and remakes and sci-fi for a bit. People like him a lot and with the right choices he could do well but he almost never makes good non-MCU choices. I don't know if he's limited by what he's offered or something.

This is the first FF/Statham/Rock-related movie in YEARS that I actually want to see, and I couldn't tell you why. Maybe I'm just nostalgic for some 90s-esque action comedy.

Was writing something similar. I think over time theatres will become more of a prestige thing. Like only the super big productions will get a cinema release because they're only ones with enough spectacle and budget to get butts in seats. Maybe 2 a month. Everything else gets some fanfare release on streaming. The age of the movie star carrying multiple blockbusters is already dead. After all at one point people used to watch a lot of plays, now it's a once in a while (if ever) thing on Broadway. Not sure how that would work for actual theatre revenues though. And in it's own way it's kinda sad because this is the least 'social' iteration of consuming entertainment. Sure 50,000 people are livetweeting your Netflix release on it's premiere day, but all the interactions are happening through a screen.

I remember Feige saying they probably won't do huge team ups like this again. We're probably going to be getting more of crossovers, like Hulk in Ragnarok, or IM and Cap in Spiderman. They have a huge enough roster now that they can do 2-3 supes per movie. Maybe another decade from now they'll have another event with the newer folks.

saw a bus ad for this and thought it looked stupid so thanks for the rec.

I don't think anyone believes anything's fundamentally wrong with their characters on a basic level, afterall they were considered iconic for decades for a reason and have had the most translations to the big screen (pre-MCU). It's just how some of them are portrayed on screen in a time where the world feels like its burning and people want escapist spectacles. Their universe started with a flavorless Superman where MCU started with a charismatic Tony Stark. Before the MCU not a lot of people were itching for Captain America but he was portrayed so well on screen that people grew to love him. Thor is another character that didn't work directly interpreted on screen, and had to be given some juice by the actor and director. Not to mention the great supporting characters. WW worked because Diana and Trevor were fun to watch. Aquaman, for all its faults, had interesting interactions. Some DC fans have complained it's Marvelization, I thin it's just making characters people have fun watching. No point going to the theatre to watch an angry, self-loathing superhero fight another angry self-loathing superhero for 3 hours. No reasonable person 'hates' DC, they want better DC movies.

Still no update? How did they have prelim numbers hrs ago, and nothing else since...

Agreed. But this is the sort of thing that can only really work with a franchise that's built up the goodwill the MCU has.

I've come across this person a couple of times and they seem to not only have an unholy obsession with Chris Hemsworth but I feel like half of what they say is embellished? Like they seem to have all this obscure, unprovable scoops about things (usually negative) happening on the Hemsworths' productions and theirs only. Look at how only one of those things turned out to be true and reshoots are par for the course on many movies. Don't think MIB reshoots lasted more than a week or so. But anyway, saw the first MIB trailer at the Endgame screening in London last night. Surprisingly that was the only trailer that got reactions from the audience which surprised me, considering the other trailers included Toy Story, 21 Bridges and John Wick. Could be the 'London' connection though but I doubt it.

Pretty much all the midnight showings for Vue Stratford are sold out. There were seats this morning/afternoon, but they're all gone now. Can't wait.

Does this mean the number on the site right now is kind of an estimate? Or that it will make more after midnight?

CM's numbers for her sequel might depend on how she's used in Endgame, just like I feel certain Dr Strange's sequel will be boosted by his popularity in IW.

You can't have watched all 20 of those movies and sincerely think this. Especially for Phase 3 movies.

Didn't love the trailer for this for some reason, but I do love Keanu and I miss good romcoms so I'm willing to give it a shot.