These Are Your GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY

There've been snaps from the SDCC trailer around for months, but this is the first official heroes-lineup still from James Gunn's GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY - the last new Marvel Studios movie before AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON and the first test of whether the Marvel brand can extend it's thus-far bulletproof box office credibility outside of the superhero genre; in this case, to a space-set scifi/action-comedy:

From left to right: Zoe Saldana as GAMORA, Chris Pratt as STARLORD, Bradley Cooper (voice) as ROCKET RACCOON, David Bautista as DRAX THE DESTROYER and Vin Diesel as GROOT.

In the SDCC footage, this scene (they're in a police lineup) served for irreverent tone-setting: following a big dump of action/FX footage, there's a hard-cut to this lineup, overseen by a pair of NOVA CORPS officers (including John C. Reilly!) who opine: "They call themselves 'The Guardians of The Galaxy..." [beat] "...what a bunch of A-Holes."

Big Picture: WORST MOVIES OF 2013

The Escapist : The Big Picture : MovieBob's Worst of 2013

THE RAID 2 Indonesian Trailer

In case you missed it: I'll be at MAGFest starting Thursday afternoon. Come say hi :)

Anyway, here's the first full trailer for THE RAID 2: BERENDAL, which supposedly takes place (or, at least, starts taking place) 2 hours after the end of the original. First thing I can say in it's favor: I'm glad they didn't try to contrive a way for this to all take place inside another fortified building. Instead, hero cop Rama (Iko Uwais) will be doing the Yojimbo/Dollars/Last Man Standing thing versus rival local and Yakuza-affiliated gangs in Jakarta. Director Gareth Evans also returns. Honestly, I don't need any reason to see this beyond that baseball-bat beatdown at 1:58...

Come See MOVIEBOB at MAGFEST 2014!

Hey guys! Just a quick FYI: I will be at MAGFest from Jan 2nd to Jan 5th this year, and should you see me on the floor your invited to come up and say hello (unless, y'know, you can tell I'm in the middle of something like or phonecall or whatever.)

Officially, I'm scheduled (you can see the whole MAGFest Schedule Map HERE) to appear at four panels on what they call the "MAGES" circuit:

"THE POLITICS OF GAMING" (Friday 1pm-2pm)

"ARE AAA STUDIOS STILL CREATIVELY RELEVANT" (Saturday 11:30am-12:30pm)

"PROMOTING GOOD GAMING COMMUNITY" (Saturday 5:30pm-6:30pm)

"GAMES AS A NARRATIVE MEDIUM" (8:30pm-9:30pm)

I'm also planning to bring copies of SMB3: BRICK BY BRICK with me to sell (probably cash only, but we'll see how my Square Reader is working) and sign on request, for anyone whose interested.

Look forward to seeing folks there!

ASM2 Blog Starts Teasing Venom. I Know, You're Shocked.

I called yesterday's rumor/speculation that, if Green Lantern turned up in JUSTICE LEAGUE he'd be the John Stewart version "one of the easiest" things to predict in genre film right now. THE easiest thing to predict? That Venom will turn up in the AMAZING SPIDER-MAN movies. Because it's always the mid-90s somewhere, and because Venom has always moved a shit-ton of merchandise for Marvel - so long as you don't include "comic books" as part of the merchandise.

Anyway, Sony has a Daily Bugle Tumblr running as cheezy viral marketing for the movie (attributed to Fredrick Foswell - heh) that basically blogs references to Spider-Man characters as fake news articles. he most recent update is a bit about Herman Schultz - aka The Shocker, but what jumped out at me was the name "NYPD Special Crimes Unit Detective Stan Carter."

Ah. Okay, then.

I'll err on the side of not totally spoiling what may or may not be a plot detail in the movies (go HERE and read the entry if you don't care), but Stan Carter figures prominently in a mid-80s storyline revolving around a serial shotgun-murderer called "Sin-Eater" (for awhile it was trendy for every "city" superhero to get at least one "what if he fought a real-life style killer?" story) that also involved Daredevil and the death of long-recurring character Captain Jeanne DeWolfe.

The main thrust of the Sin-Eater arc was that his identity was especially hard to suss out, with only Daredevil's recognition of his heartbeat to go on. The long-term ramifications come in when Daily Bugle reporter Eddie Brock lands what he believes is an exclusive interview with a guy who confesses to being Sin-Eater... and, suffice it to say, he's not the guy. Brock didn't so much lie as jump the gun, but he's disgraced and unemployable as a result; which is why/how he winds up contemplating suicide in a church that happens to contain the The Symbiote Suit and... you know the rest.