Matrix 4 is going to be a brand new installment in the Matrix mythology and trade reports stated that actress Jessica Henwick (Game of Thrones, Iron Fist, Star Wars: The Force Awakens, Godzilla vs Kong) would be playing a Neo-type character in the film with her potentially becoming the next “One”.
While speaking recently with Comic Book, Jessica had nothing but praise for director Lana Wachowski and highlighted how the technical side of the project could again have a huge impact on the film industry. As the original film did help to shift the mature factor of storytelling alongside well-crafted action scenes with proper use of CGI and practical effects.
HENWICK: “There are definitely moment on set where Yahya [Abdul-Mateen II] and I look at each other and we just go, ‘Matrix 4’. Those pinch me moments. Yeah, Lana is doing some really interesting things on a technical level in the same way that you know, she created a style back then. I think she’s going to change the industry again with this film. There’s some camera rigs that I’ve never seen before that we’re using. That’s probably all I can say for that.”
This seems to echo other stuff we’ve heard previously heard about how gung ho Lana has been with this shoot as she has been directing the bulk of second unit action sequences which is normally handled by the stunt coordinator as it can be the more dangerous shots in the film.
The sequel’s cast also includes Keanu Reeves, Carrie-Anne Moss, Jada Pinkett Smith, Daniel Bernhardt, Priyanka Chopra, Ibarra, Neil Patrick Harris, Toby Onwumere, Brian J. Smith, Eréndira Ibarra, Andrew Caldwell, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, and Ellen Hollman.
Fans like myself are hoping it’s a return to form as the two sequels didn’t have the same impact as the original and there is an expectation that Matrix 4 will be the start of a brand new trilogy possibly led by new actors like Jessica Henwwick with the original cast passing the torch.
While there has been some plenty of release date delays as the studio has moved up the release of Matrix 4 from April 1st, 2022, to December 22nd, 2021.
THE MATRIX – Neo (Keanu Reeves) believes that Morpheus (Laurence Fishburne), an elusive figure considered to be the most dangerous man alive, can answer his question — What is the Matrix? Neo is contacted by Trinity (Carrie-Anne Moss), a beautiful stranger who leads him into an underworld where he meets Morpheus. They fight a brutal battle for their lives against a cadre of viciously intelligent secret agents. It is a truth that could cost Neo something more precious than his life.
Warner Bros. has announced via trades such as Deadline that they are indeed moving forward with their Mad Max: Fury Road prequel spinoff Furiosa written and directed by George Miller.
They’ve also announced that the cast will indeed include Anya Taylor-Joy (The Witch, The Northman, The New Mutants, Last Night In Soho), Yahya Abdul Mateen II (Watchmen, Matrix 4, Aquaman), and Thor/Avengers actor Chris Hemsworth. All three names had been circulating for the lead roles before today’s confirmation.
It had been suggested that Hemsworth could be playing the film’s villain.
Miller’s production team will include cinematographer John Seale, production designer Colin Gibson, and stunt coordinator Guy Norris.
When filming begins is a little unclear as Miller is busy with Three Thousand Years of Longing and his cast is busy themselves at the moment with Hemworth set to begin shooting Marvel’s Thor: Love & Thunder in early 2021 at Fox Studios Australia in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. Anya is currently shooting Robert Eggers’ Viking epic The Northman in Belfast, Northern Ireland and recent Emmy-Winner Yahya Abdul Mateen II is finishing up Matrix 4 in Berlin, Germany.
Warner Bros. hasn’t given the film an official release date.
The film will focus on the Mad Max: Fury Road character Furiosa originally played by Charlize Theron.
MAD MAX: FURY ROAD – Years after the collapse of civilization, the tyrannical Immortan Joe enslaves apocalypse survivors inside the desert fortress the Citadel. When the warrior Imperator Furiosa (Charlize Theron) leads the despot’s five wives in a daring escape, she forges an alliance with Max Rockatansky (Tom Hardy), a loner and former captive. Fortified in the massive, armored truck the War Rig, they try to outrun the ruthless warlord and his henchmen in a deadly high-speed chase through the Wasteland.
After spending some time filming scenes in Norway, the production of Mission: Impossible 7 has moved to Rome, Italy as The Associated Press has posted some set footage of actors Tom Cruise and Hayley Atwell (Agent Carter, Captain America: The First Avenger) filming an action scene that features a police car.
They had been planning on filming in Venice before a COVID-19 outbreak in the city led to a production halt.
Christopher McQuarrie has returned to write and direct the next two installments which would be using the working title Libra as primary filming was taking place at Warner Bros. Studios Leavesden in Watford, England.
There was a recent casting shake-up as character actor Esai Morales (Ozark, Titans) has replaced Nicholas Hoult as the film’s villain after Hoult had to bow-out over a scheduling conflict. The rest of the cast includes Rebecca Ferguson, Simon Pegg, Vanessa Kirby, Pom Klementieff, Shea Whigham, and the original film’s cast member Henry Czerny.
The studio had recently bumped the release dates for the pair of action sequels due to the production delays, those new spots in the release calendar are November 19th, 2021, and November 4th, 2022.
Yesterday, the Walt Disney Company announced a new initiative to get more content going for its streaming services such as Disney+, ESPN+, and Hulu from its sports, television, and film divisions. The new division will be called The Media & Entertainment Distribution group led by Kareem Daniel.
It sounds like they’ll be dedicating a lot more resources and money than they have previously as means to compete with competitors like Netflix and Amazon. However, this announcement says nothing about them throwing their 2021 theatrical slate on Disney+ and never mention a thing about ending theatrical releases altogether only pushing to place more content on their streaming services.
We will get more details on these plans on December 10th.
During an interview with CNBC, Disney’s new CEO Bob Chapek was quick to point out that they aren’t looking to stop the theatrical experience and would be announcing further details.
Also, specifically downplayed COVID-19’s role in the decision.
CHAPEK: “I would not characterize it as a response to Covid. I would say Covid accelerated the rate at which we made this transition, but this transition was going to happen anyway. Because essentially what we want to do is separate out folks who make our wonderful content based on tremendous franchises from the decision making in terms of prioritization is on how it gets commercialized into the marketplace. And what we want to do is leave it to a group of folks you can really see objectively across all of the constituents we have and various considerations we’ve got and make the optimal decision for the company as opposed to having it predetermined that a movie is destined to theaters or that a TV show is destined for ABC. So what we really want to do is provide some level of objectivity and really make it a decision that benefits the overall company and its shareholders.”
When pressed on Disney’s commitment to the theatrical model Bob said the following that gives the impression they’re not giving up on the theatrical model just yet.
CHAPEK: “We’ve benefited from a tremendous relationship with theatrical exhibition for many many many years as dynamics change in the marketplace though we want to make sure that we are giving consumers who want to go to theaters to experience everything that a theatrical release can give them, we want to continue to give them that option but at the same time there are a lot of consumers that want to experience a movie in the safety, comfort, and convenience of their own home for whatever reasons they do.”
To me, it sounds like either they are going to pursue a shorter theatrical window or a mixed model of day-and-date which obviously the theater industry wouldn’t be terribly pleased about on either front.
Here is the official press release from the Walt Disney Company website that gets a little more into the weeds about what all this means.
In light of the tremendous success achieved to date in the Company’s direct-to-consumer business and to further accelerate its DTC strategy, The Walt Disney Company (NYSE: DIS) today announced a strategic reorganization of its media and entertainment businesses. Under the new structure, Disney’s world-class creative engines will focus on developing and producing original content for the Company’s streaming services, as well as for legacy platforms, while distribution and commercialization activities will be centralized into a single, global Media and Entertainment Distribution organization. The new Media and Entertainment Distribution group will be responsible for all monetization of content—both distribution and ad sales—and will oversee operations of the Company’s streaming services. It will also have sole P&L accountability for Disney’s media and entertainment businesses.
The creation of content will be managed in three distinct groups—Studios, General Entertainment, and Sports—headed by current leaders Alan F. Horn and Alan Bergman, Peter Rice, and James Pitaro. The Media and Entertainment Distribution group will be headed by Kareem Daniel, formerly President, Consumer Products, Games and Publishing. All five leaders will report directly to Bob Chapek, Chief Executive Officer, The Walt Disney Company. Disney Parks, Experiences and Products will continue to operate under its existing structure, led by Josh D’Amaro, Chairman, Disney Parks, Experiences and Products, who continues to report to Mr. Chapek. Rebecca Campbell will serve as Chairman, International Operations and Direct-to-Consumer. Bob Iger, in his role as Executive Chairman, will continue to direct the Company’s creative endeavors.
“Given the incredible success of Disney+ and our plans to accelerate our direct-to-consumer business, we are strategically positioning our Company to more effectively support our growth strategy and increase shareholder value,” Mr. Chapek said. “Managing content creation distinct from distribution will allow us to be more effective and nimble in making the content consumers want most, delivered in the way they prefer to consume it. Our creative teams will concentrate on what they do best—making world-class, franchise-based content—while our newly centralized global distribution team will focus on delivering and monetizing that content in the most optimal way across all platforms, including Disney+, Hulu, ESPN+ and the coming Star international streaming service.”
Under the new structure, the Company’s three content groups will be responsible and accountable for producing and delivering content for theatrical, linear and streaming, with the primary focus being the Company’s streaming services:
STUDIOS: Messrs. Horn and Bergman will serve as Chairmen, Studios Content, which will focus on creating branded theatrical and episodic content based on the Company’s powerhouse franchises for theatrical exhibition, Disney+ and the Company’s other streaming services. The group will include the content engines of The Walt Disney Studios, including Disney live action and Walt Disney Animation Studios, Pixar Animation Studios, Marvel Studios, Lucasfilm, 20th Century Studios and Searchlight Pictures.
GENERAL ENTERTAINMENT: Mr. Rice will serve as Chairman, General Entertainment Content, which will focus on creating general entertainment episodic and original long-form content for the Company’s streaming platforms and its cable and broadcast networks. The group will include the content engines of 20th Television, ABC Signature and Touchstone Television; ABC News; Disney Channels; Freeform; FX; and National Geographic.
SPORTS: Mr. Pitaro will serve as Chairman, ESPN and Sports Content, which will focus on ESPN’s live sports programming, as well as sports news and original and non-scripted sports-related content, for the cable channels, ESPN+, and ABC.
The Media and Entertainment Distribution group, led by Mr. Daniel, will be responsible for the P&L management and all distribution, operations, sales, advertising, data and technology functions worldwide for all of the Company’s content engines, and it will also manage operations of the Company’s streaming services and domestic television networks. The group will work in close collaboration with the content creation teams on programming and marketing.
It’ll be interesting to see if Disney+ will start mining IP from the 20th Century Studios side of things soon as Disney+ series and limited series focused on properties like Avatar and Planet of The Apes could be extremely successful. In the press release they suggest that they could end up making episodic projects based on 20th Century properties.
A live-action Flash Gordon series stands out as a property that Disney really could do justice with on Disney+ and be a counter of sorts to their Star Wars shows as it could be way more swashbuckling than the Lucasfilm property that was inspired by it. Taika Waititi (Thor: Ragnarok, Thor: Love & Thunder, Jojo Rabbit) is attached to direct an animated Flash Gordon film and at one time 20th Century was developing a live-action feature as well from directors Matthew Vaughn (X-Men: First Class, Stardust, Layer Cake) and Julius Avery (Overlord) involved at different points.
I wouldn’t even put it past Disney to reboot John Carter eventually given the Volume/StageCraft would allow them to make a series more cost effective that world like Flash Gordon is different enough from Star Wars it would be worth pursuing.
Of course, this could mean a major influx of more shows from Marvel, Star Wars, and Pixar universes but might also see Hulu getting a bump of adult content as well with franchises like Alien (Noah Hawley pitched an Alien series to FX) and Predator just collecting dust while they could be helpful to get more eyeballs on Hulu. HBO Max had recently crowed about Ridley Scott’s sci-fi series Raised By Wolves being the most popular original on their service when announcing they were moving forward with a Season 2 order.
Matthew Vaughn has also been talking up the idea of a Kingsman spinoff series that could fit nicely at Hulu.
Disney certainly has a massive gap in the adult market and places like Canada don’t have access to Hulu and that really needs to change if they want to compete with Netflix/Amazon on an international level as those services offer content to both kids and adults alike. Cornering the kid market just won’t be enough for Disney if they want to grow their streaming presence.
I guess we’ll have to wait for December 10th to get more concrete answers about what all this actually means for content that is already in the can or is about to begin filming.
Deadline reports that Universal Pictures has landed the rights to The Others remake from Sentient Entertainment, as the two will partner on a reboot feature film.
The 2001 horror film from director Alejandro Amenabar starred Oscar-winner Nicole Kidman. Neither a writer nor director have been officially hired for the new incarnation.
THE OTHERS – Grace (Nicole Kidman), the devoutly religious mother of Anne (Alakina Mann) and Nicholas (James Bentley), moves her family to the English coast during World War II. She awaits word on her missing husband while protecting her children from a rare photosensitivity disease that causes the sun to harm them. Anne claims she sees ghosts, Grace initially thinks the new servants are playing tricks but chilling events and visions make her believe something supernatural has occurred.
The Avatar sequels are chugging along as Avatar 2 has completed live-action filming with Avatar 3 about to complete as well.
It’s official Twitter account has been posting random information and set photos revealing tidbits about the new movies including new military vehicles likely from RDA’s SpecOps. The latest one includes a science lab at a new RDA installation that will be called Bridgehead as they lost the other installation Hell’s Gate in the last film.
From the set of the Avatar sequels: A glimpse of a small part of the Science Lab, a key facility at the RDA’s new Bridgehead installation. pic.twitter.com/oC2txKEPdZ
The evil corporation attempted to commit genocide against the native population of Pandora to secure their mining operation and likely will be more than a little upset when they return with extra forces.
Avatar 2 has new release date of December 16th, 2022 and Avatar 3 is set for December 20th, 2024.
Comic Book Movie was able to speak with Iron Fist actress Jessica Henwrick while promoting her upcoming film Love & Monsters revealing there were light talks from Marvel Television and Netflix about making a Daughters of The Dragon series featuring characters Colleen Wing and Misty Knight (played by Simone Missick) in their own superhero adventures. Something fans had been asking for since the characters showed up in Luke Cage and Iron First.
HENWICK: “There had been very light discussions about Daughters of the Dragon happening which I would have loved because working opposite Simone [Missick] was such a dream, and I think she’s so talented and perfect for the role.
“I do remember some very vague discussions, but you keep your fingers crossed and never know what’s going to happen in this industry. I’m just glad I got to play such an incredible arc with Colleen and I feel very happy that we ended on such a high note for her.”
Henwick is currently working on Matrix 4, where she is reportedly playing a Neo-type character in the new sequel.
With Marvel Television now under the purview of Kevin Feige and rebranded as Marvel TV Studios the relationship with Netflix has been severed, how or when Marvel will want to use the Netflix characters remains to be seen. It’s neat to know that Marvel Television was at least considering giving the Daughters of The Dragon their own show.
Filming on The Batman has resumed in Liverpool, England after Robert Pattinson’s positive COVID-19 test and brand new set photos have made their way online, which seems to reveal exterior shots for a funeral scene.
In the new batch of set pics, we get images of Robert Pattinson’s Bruce Wayne, Paul Dano’s Edward Nash aka The Riddler, Barry Keoghan as Officer Stanley Merkel, and new shots of Colin Farrell in his Penguin makeup.
One of the set photos included Zoe Kravitz’s Selina Kyle standing/walking with John Turturro’s Gotham mafia boss Carmine Falcone. This image might suggest Selina could be the daughter of Carmine in The Batman, like in Batman: The Long Halloween, either legitimately or illegitimately in this version.
There had already been hints to the film taking cues from Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale’s Batman: The Long Halloween with what seems to be a serial killer plot featuring the Riddler murdering people and in the teaser trailer leaves a Halloween card as a clue for Batman. Many fans had jumped to the conclusion that the Halloween card in the trailer was directly related to the villainous group called The Court of Owls, but in reality was more likely a nod to The Long Halloween given all the other elements we’re starting to see from it.
The Batman has been recently delayed from a release date of October 1st, 2021 to March 4th, 2022 as Denis Villeneuve’s science-fiction fantasy epic Dune has landed that October spot next year.
The film takes place around two years into Bruce Wayne’s time as Batman in Gotham City and the HBO Max series focused on the Gotham Police Department will take place in Year One.
Deadline has some interesting news this weekend as Wonder Woman duo of director Patty Jenkins and actress Gal Gadot are set to reunite on a Cleopatra biopic film written by Laeta Kalogridis (Avatar, Alita: Battle Angel, Altered Carbon, Shutter Island) for Paramount Pictures. The studio won a biding war that included contenders such as Warner Bros., Netflix, Universal, and Apple.
It most recently had Dune and Blade Runner 2049 director Denis Villeneuve attached for a time before it eventually moved to Jenkins.
Cleopatra is the daughter of Ptolemy, ancestor of the leader of Alexander the Great’s army. When Rome’s ruler Julius Caesar’s mentor-turned-rival Pompey fled to Egypt after a brutal war for control of the empire, Egypt became a fixation of Roman rulers. Two siblings battled for the throne of Egypt. After winning that internal struggle by appealing personally to Caesar, Cleopatra had a complicated relationship with Rome, becoming the lover of Caesar and later Marc Antony. The latter alliance would become the undoing of both Antony and Cleopatra.
While Jenkins is currently known for directing Wonder Woman and the upcoming Wonder Woman 1984, she has tackled mostly serious features including the serial killer film Monster that earned Charlize Theron a Best Actress Oscar.
Laeta Kalogridis’ background in the action genre would suggest that the film could be more than strictly a period drama.
When filming is expected to begin is a little unclear at the moment as Gal is currently shooting Netflix’s Red Notice and has other projects in the works as well.
While the final installment of the final Daniel Craig film in his era of the James Bond franchise with No Time To Die won’t be released until April 2nd, 2021, there is some possibly good news about director Cary Joji Fukunaga potentially returning in the future.
In the Wall Street Journal’s new No Time To Die coverage they were able to get some indication from both Cary and franchise producers that his return in the future could very well happen. They also mention he was courted by Disney for Marvel and Star Wars films.
Hypothetically speaking, Fukunaga would be interested in reuniting on another Bond film, or perhaps a series of films introducing the new 007.
In reality, though, Fukunaga’s future with Bond will depend on the film’s reception.
FUKUNAGA: “I have never been able to predict how people react to something I’ve made. It could fly or completely fall. It doesn’t change how I view the film.”
Franchise producers Barbara Broccoli and Michael G. Wilson also had kind words for Cary suggesting they’d like to work with him again.
BROCCOLI: “He’s a perfectionist, but that’s what you want. He far exceeded anyone’s expectations. He’s made probably one of the best Bond films ever…. He’s delivered a film on an epic scale, but it also has a tremendous, tremendous intimacy…. It’s a classic Bond movie but also a Cary Fukunaga film.”
WILSON: “He’s certainly someone we’ll work with again.”
This wouldn’t be a strange concept as Martin Campbell directed both GoldenEye and Casino Royale, covering two eras of Bond.
Bond 26 is indeed in development as Phoebe Waller-Bridge was previously linked as writing the script after tackling rewrites on No Time To Die. There have been plenty of rumors concerning the next James Bond actor but nothing has been made official and remain to be rumor/speculation until producers make an announcement. It means we’ll have to endure many more casting rumors for the foreseeable future.
Cary is a busy gent as it was recently announced he will direct three episodes of the Apple TV+ series Maters of The Air, the WWII show produced by Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg.
THE RONIN 