Disney owns Marvel

Oh, go google it if you want a hard link, it's been reported fucking everywhere already. This is what happens when news breaks while I'm at work...

Anyway, title says it all. The Disney Corporation owns Marvel; as in Marvel Comics, Marvel Films, etc. Which overall means that instead of Marvel producing it's own films starring 3rd and 4th tier properties while it waits for Spider-Man, The X-Men and The Fantastic Four's prior contracts with other studios to expire; Disney will be doing that instead.

No need to worry - yet - about editorial issues in the books; comic book publishers make so little money in and of themselves as to not even EXIST for the companies that own them. DC Comics just KILLED Bruce Wayne, made Dick Grayson the new Batman, yanked Damian Wayne (Batman's son, Ra's Al Ghul's grandson, loooong story) out of continuity-limbo to be the new Robin, and has Bruce set up to "return" as one of the "zombie" Black Lanterns. Think Warners cares how that might reflect on their all-important "Batman" movie franchise? Hell no! They know that at this point only dedicated longtime fans are reading DC Comics right now, and they're all gonna see the movies anyway. As far as the media companies who own comic publishers are concerned, all that "wing" of the company does is hold onto licensed properties until they need to make movies out of them.

Don't expect to see Marvel rides/characters at Disney World just yet - those rights are probably still under contract to Universal Studios. But you can bet there's a legal team who's job it is to wriggle out of that ASAP. I look forward to the day I can have my picture taken with Moon Knight in front of The Jungle Cruise.

The big, super-awesome-mega-happy-good film geek angle on this is, of course, that about 98% of the Marvel Universe is now either under the direct control or at least in grasping-distance of John Lassetter and the boys from Pixar (who along with Steve Jobs are effectively running Disney right now.) Show of hands of anyone who thinks there's ANY Marvel property that would not be done either best or better-than-before by Team Pixar? Didn't think so.

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Escape to the Movies: "Halloween II"

It's ALMOST worth it just for the goofiest celebrity-cameo of the year and a well-deserved swipe taken at some tragically-memorable dialogue from "Halloween: Ressurection."

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Ted Kennedy: 1932-2009

MSNBC is just this moment reporting that Senator Ted Kennedy, last of "the" Kennedy Brothers, has died.

I'm here in MA right now... and somehow that still just feels strange to say. For whatever else he might have been, few figures have ever loomed over American political life for as long and in so many different forms.

This will DOMINATE the news for at least the next few weeks, and probably more considering how much his name will be invoked in the Health Care debate. But for now... wow. It's surreal, and also hugely tragic. Here was one of those figures who goes beyond politics and parties... I don't care who you are or how you vote: If you know thing-one about the last several decades of American politics, you know that a Titan has died this day.

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Escape to the Movies: "Inglorious Basterds"

Boy, I hope people actually turn out for this...



...and, concurrently, I hope that the folks who've turned out for the action aren't angry that it's not quite so all-encompassing; and that the folks who wanted Tarantino to return to his more character-centered style have by now recieved word that this is the case.

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Thought(s) For The Day 8/20/09

Ah, so much going on today...

Well, we got our first look at "Avatar" finally, with a trailer that actually manages to FINALLY tell people what the damn thing is apparently about... without ANY spoken dialogue. That's kind of impressive when you think about it; though one wonders if that's more an indicator of James Cameron's expertise as a visual-storyteller or of how much of the now-evident plot is familiar from other things. Whatever. Campbell, Jung, hero's-journey, only-three-stories, etc. Main thing is, you can't deny it's pretty incredible-looking:

Here ya go:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Qd_IsxgAf8

Gotcha. Look, tell me they DON'T look like that...

Here's the real thing:
http://www.apple.com/trailers/fox/avatar/

We also have the trailer for "The Wolf Man," which is light on the title monster and heavy on the yes-we-did-it-"period"-and-here's-Anthony-Hopkins-to-prove-it. GREAT trailer, oozing class... to the point that the very matter-of-fact monster-movie title coming up at the end almost plays like punchline. The lack-of-monster worries me, suggesting that those rumors about the studio being skittish about having a practical/makeup-FX Rick Baker creature and ordering CGI retooling might have some truth. Dammit...
http://movies.yahoo.com/feature/the-wolfman.html?showVideo=1

But, as some of you may imagine, my interest was most-piqued by far by Script Shadow's rundown of Darren Aronofsky's "Black Swan" screenplay...
http://scriptshadow.blogspot.com/2009/08/black-swan.html

...in which we learn the film features a sexual encounter between character's played by Natalie Portman and Mila Kunis. Yeah, so I'm easy - though anticipation is, of course, tempered by the fact that the last time I went to an Aronofsky movie for girl-on-girl action it turned out to be part of that montage at the end of "Requiem For A Dream."

Yikes.

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Thought For The Day 8/18/09

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Thought For The Day 8/17/2009

POSSIBLE SPOILER ALERT!!!

So... is there a consensus forming yet i.e. Christopher Johnson as THE "breakout" movie character of 2009? Cause... I'm not really sure who it'd be, otherwise.

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