Pim Razenberg on Marvel’s well-oiled marketing machine, which hooked us all to the Marvel Cinematic Universe… Black Panther passed the $1 billion mark at the box office, Avengers: Infinity War is expected to have a $215 million opening debut in North America and Kevin Feige is starting to tease audiences around the world with what […]
Alan Silvestri’s Avengers Theme, and That Infinity War Trailer
Matt Taylor on the music of Avengers: Infinity War trailer… On September 12, 2016, YouTube channel ‘Every Frame a Painting’ published a video entitled The Marvel Symphonic Universe. In it, channel creators Tony and Taylor interview members of the public around Vancouver, asking them to sing theme songs from famous movies, in particular the themes […]
The Genesis of the Excessively Long Action Scene
Tom Jolliffe on the genesis of the excessively long action scene… It has become almost the norm now. The majority of large-scale action blockbusters will have a hugely elaborate, and extremely long set piece in them. In fact some may have several. It used to be that maybe 5-10 minutes at the end of a […]
Marvel’s Murder Problem
Ben Robins on Marvel’s murder problem… With the most celebrated of all the cinematic universes very much knocking on the door of its 10th anniversary, there’s all sorts of retrospective business going round. And something that becomes more and more glaringly obvious within the Marvel world, especially moving forward, is its attitude towards death. Well, […]
The Week in Spandex – Spider-Man: Homecoming tracking, Venom and the Fantastic Four not part of the MCU, Justice League set photos, X-Men: Dark Phoenix casting
In this edition of The Week in Spandex, we look at Spider-Man: Homecoming, Venom, Fantastic Four, Avengers: Infinity War, Black Panther, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, The Defenders, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., Inhumans, Avengers: Secret Wars, Marvel’s Spider-Man, Avengers: Age of Ultron, X-Men: Dark Phoenix, Deadpool 2, Justice League, Wonder Woman, Shazam, Batgirl, Batman, Batman […]
Scarlett Johansson: Lost In Blockbusters!
Tom Jolliffe on Scarlett Johansson… I’m a fan of Scarlett Johansson. As an actress I think she’s interesting. She’s almost always engaging. She has a sultry old fashioned quality. Frankly she’s gorgeous, which whilst that shouldn’t be as important as it is in Hollywood (and it still is) that means she is a leading lady. […]
The Rise of the Disposable Character
Tom Jolliffe on the rise of the disposable character… In recent years there has been a huge rise in the ensemble blockbuster. Films such as Avengers Assemble or the Fast and Furious franchise have popularized the ensemble piece and there seems no sign of this slowing down. Even now in the Marvel universe with standalone […]
Black Widow The Movie: Everyone Wants It, So Why Don’t Marvel Make It?
Tony Black asks why we haven’t seen a Black Widow movie from Marvel… Spoilers for Captain America: Civil War… Before you worry this article is going to descend, as so many do, into a Marvel bashing, feminist rant, let me disabuse you of this right off. I have never, and do not, consider Marvel to […]
Does It Hold Up? Avengers: Age of Ultron – One Year On
Tony Black revisits Avengers: Age of Ultron one year on to see how it holds up… One of my main outlets is podcasting, and recently I asked online if anyone would like to do a speculative episode of my film show in which we ‘fix’ a broken movie, discussing why it failed and how we […]
The Week in Spandex – Suicide Squad, Batman v Superman, Wonder Woman, Justice League, Deadpool, X-Men: Apocalypse, Captain America: Civil War, Thor: Ragnarok, The Punisher, The Defenders, Marvel / Star Wars crossover and more
In this edition of The Week in Spandex, we look at Suicide Squad, Wonder Woman, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, Batman, Justice League, Aquaman, Cyborg, The Flash, Green Lantern Corps, Man of Steel, Sgt. Rock, DC’s Legends of Tomorrow, The Flash, Arrow, Vixen, Constantine, Supergirl, Gotham, Batman: Bad Blood, Justice League vs. Teen Titans, […]
