Despite the filming stage of The Dark Knight Rises drawing to a close a couple of weeks back, the hype surrounding Christopher Nolan’s third and final Batman feature shows no sign of slowing down. Indeed, if the past week is anything to go by, God only knows what things will be like in the run up to the film’s release next July. The cause of all this excitement was of course Empire’s first official look at the $250m blockbuster, featuring several new images of Batman and Bane, along with quotes from stars Christian Bale and Tom Hardy, in addition to some exciting information about the film direct from Nolan himself. The biggest talking point was the news that The Dark Knight Rises will pick up eight years on from The Dark Knight, which immediately led to a (completely false) rumour about Ellen Page reuniting with Inception co-stars and Gotham newcomers Hardy, Marion Cotillard and Joseph Gordon-Levitt in the role of Barbara Gordon, a.k.a. the future Batgirl [if you’re interested, you can read why I think Juno Temple’s “street-smart Gotham girl” might be Barbara here]. The news that we’d be skipping forward in time for the ‘epic conclusion’ to Nolan's trilogy was something no-one saw coming, despite all of the leaks that seem to have plagued the shoot these past few months. You have to wonder what other surprises the director has in store for us; I’m thinking plenty, and perhaps we’ll get a better idea in a few weeks when the six-minute IMAX prologue debuts with Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol on December 16th – a date that is also expected to see new trailers for The Dark Knight Rises and The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey attached to Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows. I’m thinking all of the early critics will be silenced in the next few weeks, or at least forced to change their minds and profess they’d always known Nolan would knock it out of the park with his Gotham swansong.
Update - Christian Bale has been speaking to the Philippine Daily Enquirer about his third outing as the Caped Crusader, passing on his thoughts about co-stars Anne Hathaway, Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Tom Hardy, and confirming that The Dark Knight Rises will also be his last outing as Batman: "I wrapped a few days ago so that will be the last time I’m taking that cowl [Batman hood] off. I believe that the whole production wrapped yesterday, so it’s all done. Everything’s finished. It’s me and Chris – that will be the end of that Batman era."
Moving on to another of next year’s big superhero offerings and Andrew Garfield’s webslinger was back in New York City last weekend as director Marc Webb and the cast of The Amazing Spider-Man took part in a few days of reshoots for the upcoming Sony reboot. Sure enough there were plenty of spies on hand to capture some images, including shots of a masked Garfield taking part in a stunt sequence and a few of Rhys Ifans sporting a rather slimy-looking hand prosthetic, which is obviously part of his transformation into the Lizard. Newscom posted a whole load of other snaps featuring Garfield, Emma Stone (Gwen Stacy) and Denis Leary (Captain Stacy) and you also can take a look at a set video featuring some pretty impressive Spidey stunts over at SplashNews.Although it’s been a bit of a quiet week in the Marvel cinematic universe, ComicBookMovie posted some new rumours about the possible identity of the villains in Joss Whedon’s upcoming team-up The Avengers: “I am told that in early drafts of the script Loki was to bring his army to Earth via The Negative Zone. But as this was happening, other creatures from the Negative Zone also followed him through. Said creatures were not named but my source thinks they may have been Skrulls and that… wait for it... Annihilus was also involved.” Loki, Thanos, Annihilus, the Skrull… if true, it looks like The Avengers are gonna need a bigger team. Meanwhile in other Marvel Studios news, the head of Disney’s Russian HQ has expressed an interest in bringing Whedon and his cast over to Russia for the world premiere of the superhero ensemble, while Scarlett Johansson spoke briefly about her role as Black Widow to Vanity Fair and Kenneth Branagh had a few more words about Thor 2 director Patty Jenkins in an interview with Vulture.
James McAvoy and Michael Fassbender have spent plenty of time talking up their ideas for a sequel to X-Men: First Class lately and the pair were at it again this past week, with McAvoy discussing Professor X’s future-past in an interview with Collider and Fassbender doing pretty much the same in a chat with Total Film. According to McAvoy, “We’re still waiting for Fox to greenlight it. I think what they’re doing really well is that they’re not just rushing ahead and making another one because it did well. They are just trying to get a decent story together. If they don’t get a decent story together, then we probably won’t do another one because it can be a stand-alone film. We shouldn’t just make another one because we want to make some money. There needs to be a good script there…” If it turns out that Matthew Vaughn decides there isn’t a good script for X-Men: First Class 2 and opts to depart, could he head back to superhero territory once more for the oft-rumoured sequel to 2010’s Kick-Ass? “Call Matthew Vaughn, ask him.” At least, that’s the advice of Chloe Moretz when asked by MTV Splash Page if she’s likely to reprise the role Hit-Girl for Kick-Ass 2 in the near future.And finally, not content with attempting to pull of their own take on Marvel Studios’ ‘shared universe’ approach en route to the inevitable Justice League feature, it seems Warner Bros. are also looking to exploit some of their lesser known DC characters on the small screen. Along with the potential live-action Blue Beetle series that we saw in the recent DC Nation trailer, The Hollywood Reporter announced that SyFy have ordered a pilot script for a live-action show based upon the exploits of Booster Gold. Greg Berlanti (Dawson’s Creek, No Ordinary Family, Green Lantern) will oversee the project, with Andrew Kreisberg (Fringe) tackling writing duties. “The story will center on Booster Gold, a washed-up athlete from the future who travels back to the present in hopes of becoming the greatest super hero of all time,” says THR: “Instead of chasing criminals, however, his main priority is chasing fame and money. But Booster Gold discovers that being a hero takes more than just a megawatt smile, and that the future doesn’t happen without first protecting the present.” Wonder Woman, Mark II?
Gary Collinson
Holy Franchise, Batman! - Coming 2012.
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