The Matrix 4 wrapped months ago and won’t be released until December 22, but a new press kit for the film spotted by Collider has quietly added actress Christina Ricci to the cast. Ricci previously worked with director Lana Wachowski on the anime adaptation Speed Racer in the role of Trixie. Her credits include The Addams Family, Addams Family Values, Casper, Monster, and Sleepy Hollow.
Lana Wachowksi returns to direct a cast that consists of Keanu Reeves, Carrie-Anne Moss, Jada Pinkett Smith, Jessica Henwick, Daniel Bernhardt, Priyanka Chopra, Ibarra, Neil Patrick Harris, Toby Onwumere, Brian J. Smith, Eréndira Ibarra, Andrew Caldwell, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, and Ellen Hollman.
There are expectations that The Matrix 4 will launch a second trilogy.
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.
John Wick 4 is on the cusp of starting production at Babelsberg Film Studio in Berlin, Germany and another actor has joined the high-octane action sequel. Other filming locations are said to include Paris and Japan.
John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum ended with John surviving the fall from the roof of The Continential hotel after Ian McShane’s Winston shot him, Winston’s motivations weren’t entirely clear as he didn’t seem shocked that Mr. Wick got away and could be giving The High Table a false sense of security. Wick eventually lands at the feet of Laurence Fishburne’s Bowery King, who had his organization taken away from him by The High Table and convinces John to go to war with him against the mysterious group of criminal syndicate puppet masters.
Canadian actor Shamier Anderson has reportedly joined the project, according to Deadline. Anderson was most recently seen in the Netflix sci-fi movie Stowaway.
He’ll be joining Keanu Reeves, Ian McShane, Laurence Fishburne, Lance Reddick, Donnie Yen, and Rina Sawayama in the next installment.
Lionsgate has set John Wick 4’s release date for May 27, 2022 and have announced plans to make John Wick: Chapter 5 at some point as well.
Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse made huge waves in the animation community as the Sony Animation Studios project was not only different stylistically, but also a huge departure from other Spider-Man projects they’ve tackled in the past and earned them an Oscar for Best Animated Feature back in 2019.
Of course, a direct sequel and spinoffs have been subsequently announced and Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse 2 is already being worked on. The follow-up film even has a script co-written by Shang-Chi & The Legend of The Ten Rings screenwriter Dave Callaham.
One casting addition that was announced earlier today by The Hollywood Reporter is that comedic actress Issa Rae (Lovebirds) will voice the role of Jessica Drew aka Spider-Woman in the sequel.
It’s expected that Oscar Isaac will reprise the role of Miguel O’Hara aka Spider-Man 2099 in Spider-Verse 2 after being teased at the end of the first film with technology that allows him to move between the Spider-Verse.
The Marvel Comics heroine has been the incarnation of of the superhero that everyone has assumed will be the lead in Olivia Wilde’s Spider-Woman film for Sony Pictures, but hasn’t been announced officially by the studio. Unlike other Sony characters, Jessica Drew didn’t first appear in the pages of Spider-Man comic books as she started as a Nick Fury/S.H.I.E.L.D. villain brainwashed by HYDRA, making her a shared character with Marvel Studios.
Jessica Drew has ties to the big Skrull event Secret Invasion that will be covered in a Disney+ series and was an agent of S.W.O.R.D., making her a strong contender to join the Marvel Cinematic Universe soon. It remains to be seen who will play the live-action incarnation of Jessica Drew and if Marvel Studios will even be involved with the Olivia Wilde project. While Oscar Isaac voices Spider-Man 2099 and Hailee Steinfeld voices Spider-Gwen they have their own hard-canon roles in the Marvel Cinematic Universe with Moon Knight’s Marc Spector and Hawkeye’s Kate Bishop, respectively.
There is also a an all-female Spider-Verse spinoff project in the works that will likely have Rae’s Jessica Drew on the roster too.
The animation and live-action Spider-Man universes haven’t been directly tied to each other, yet.
Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse 2 will release on October 7, 2022.
Bitten by a radioactive spider in the subway, Brooklyn teenager Miles Morales suddenly develops mysterious powers that transform him into the one and only Spider-Man. When he meets Peter Parker, he soon realizes that there are many others who share his special, high-flying talents. Miles must now use his newfound skills to battle the evil Kingpin, a hulking madman who can open portals to other universes and pull different versions of Spider-Man into our world.
John Wick: Chapter 4 is easily going to be one of the most anticipated action films alongside Lana Wachowski’s Matrix 4, both films highlighting the twilight era of Keanu Reeves’ action star status even as he inches closer to his 60s. The John Wick franchise fancies itself as action films made by action guys as director Chad Stahelski went from stuntman to director having extremely close ties with the stunt team, building the action sequences from the ground up and having star Keanu Reeves in training for months behind filming begins.
A huge nod to the franchise’s action roots was the recent hiring of Hong Kong action star Donnie Yenin a supporting role. Instead of playing another foe, Deadline reports that Yen will play a friend of John Wick with a similar history and could potentially help him take on The High Table. Yen is best known for a multitude of martial arts projects like his Ip Man films alongside Hollywood productions such as Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, Guillermo del Toro’s Blade II, and the Vin Diesel sequel xXx: The Return of Xander Cage.
Another interesting addition we missed was Japanese-British singer Rina Sawayama taking a role in the film, as mentioned by Deadline last month.
John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum ended with John surviving the fall from the roof of The Continential hotel after Ian McShane’s Winston shot him, Winston’s motivations weren’t entirely clear as he didn’t seem shocked that Mr. Wick got away and could be giving The High Table a false sense of security. Wick eventually lands at the feet of Laurence Fishburne’s Bowery King, who had his organization taken away from him by The High Table and convinces John to go to war with him against the mysterious group of criminal syndicate puppet masters.
Production on John Wick: Chapter 4 is said to start this month at Babelsberg Studios in Berlin, Germany with other locations such as Paris and Japan.
Lionsgate had previously announced a release date of May 27, 2022, and their plans to make John Wick: Chapter 5 at some point.
It looks like we have our first new casting addition to John Wick 4.
Action star Donnie Yen has landed a main role, according to Deadline.
Yen will play an old friend of Reeves’ super assassin John Wick, who shares his same history and many of the same enemies.
Donnie Yen has made for himself coming from the action star lineage, where he does a lot of his own fight and stunt work. Some of his film credits are Blade II, Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, Hero, IP Man movies, and Highlander: Endgame.
The fourth chapter is expected to see Keanu Reeves’ John Wick and Laurence Fishburne’s The Bowery King going to war with The High Table, the group of mysterious criminal syndicate leaders that control the world of assassins and seemingly most criminal operations as well. There is hope that we’ll see and learn more about The High Table in the next installment.
A portion of the filming of John Wick: Chapter 4 will take place at Germany’s studio facility Babelsberg Film Studio just outside of Berlin in Potsdam.
The iconic German facility where Fritz Lang’s sci-fi masterpiece Metropolis was shot has been used on multiple modern Hollywood productions such as Marvel’s Captain America: Civil War, Quentin Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds, David Leitch’s Atomic Blonde, Duncan Jones’ Mute, The Girl In The Spider’s Web, A Cure For Wellness, Eddie The Eagle, Steven Spielberg’s Bridge of Spies, Speed Racer, Cloud Atlas, V For Vendetta, Ninja Assassin, Joe Wright’s Hanna, Michael B. Jordan’s Without Remorse, Lana Wachowski’s Matrix 4, and Tom Holland’s Uncharted.
Franchise star Keanu Reeves was at the European studio last year filming Matrix 4.
According to Collider, filming will begin this month with locations to include New York City, Paris, Berlin, and Japan. They added that Mike Finch (American Assassin, Predators) will be the main writer on the script after Derek Kolstad revealed he wouldn’t be writing the next two chapters.
John Wick: Chapter 4 director Chad Stahelski is also busy with other various projects but Lionsgate wants him to return for John Wick: Chapter 5 (potentially final installment) and has been attached to helm their Highlander reboot that might end up starring Henry Cavill (Mission: Impossible – Fallout, The Witcher, Man of Stell).
The studio plans to expand the John Wick universe with a Starz series, The Continental, focusing on a young version of Winston in New York City during the 1970s and previously hired Underworld director Len Wiseman to tackle their spinoff movie Ballerina written by Shay Hatten.
Lionsgate has given John Wick: Chapter 4 a release date of May 27, 2022.
Michael B. Jordan is making the jump to director with MGM’s Creed III while continuing to play Adonis, the son of Apollo Creed from the iconic Rocky movies. The last two movies had Sly Stallone reprising Rocky for the spinoff, but has announced that he won’t be involved with this new film.
It looks like they’ve found an actor to play Adonis’ next opponent as Deadline reports that Jonathan Majors is currently in negotiations for the role. Majors got awareness thanks to roles in Spike Lee’s Da 5 Bloods, White Boy Rick, and HBO’s Lovecraft Country. He is officially is playing Kang The Conqueror in Marvel’s Ant-Man & The Wasp: Quantumania as announced by Kevin Feige back in December.
It honestly wouldn’t hurt for Jordan and MGM to hire a seasoned actor to star opposite given that might be considered a weakness with the last two movies. It’s hard to really care about the actors who play Adonis’ opponents as they don’t have the same character that you’d expect.
Quantumania will begin shooting in a couple of weeks in the United Kingdom.
Jonathan Majors recently wrapped on the Korean War film Devotion, directed by J.D. Dillard.
Amazon recently acquired MGM Studios for a massive $8.45 billion.
The sport drama is set to be released by MGM on November 23, 2022.
Yesterday, producer Seth Rogen took to Twitter to announce that his CGI-animated Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie is going to be released on August 11, 2023. The film is directed by Jeff Rowe, who wrote on Disney’s Gravity Falls and Netflix’s Disenchantment. He most recently co-directed the Netflix film The Mitchells Vs. The Machines.
The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles franchise was birthed by a mature comic book that was later adapted into a successful toyline, multiple cartoon series, five live-action films, and various video games since the 1980s. It focuses on a group of pizza-obsessed teenage turtles that have been turned into humanoids thanks to a mutagenic ooze with alien origins and are trained by their master/father figure Splinter, a giant rat.
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles… Aug 11 2023 (Leo takes notes like I used to)
Most of Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg’s experience with comic book properties have been with television projects such as AMC’s Preacher, Netflix’s The Boys, and Amazon’s popular mature animated series Invincible based on the Robert Kirkman comic. Their film credits include Superbad, Pineapple Express, This Is The End,The Interview, and the raunchy animated flick Sausage Party. The producing duo are also involved with Disney’s Darkwing Duck series revival, so they’re not only making mature entertainment.
A new live-action Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles film was reportedly also in the works, but concrete movement hasn’t been mentioned in ages.
James Mangold is set to write and direct Indiana Jones 5 for Lucasfilm with a growing cast that already consists of Harrison Ford back as Henry Jones Jr. aka Indiana Jones, British actress Phoebe Waller-Bridge (Solo: A Star Wars Story, Fleabag), Danish actor Mads Mikkelsen (Fantastic Beasts 3, Casino Royale, Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, Another Round), German actor Thomas Kretschmann (King Kong, Valkyrie, Blade II). Boyd Holbrook (The Predator, Narcos, Logan), and Shaunette Renée Wilson (The Resident).
A new report from Deadline claims that production will begin next week at Pinewood Studios UK.
Steven Spielberg was originally attached to direct Indiana Jones 5, but exited due to script issues and pivoting to his a coming-of age drama inspired by his own childhood. The project stars Paul Dano (There Will Be Blood, Looper, The Batman), Michelle Williams (Venom, Manchester By The Sea), and Seth Rogen (Steve Jobs).
Confirmed crew members include legendary composer John Williams, production designer Adam Stockhausen (The French Dispatch, The Grand Budapest Hotel, Widows, Ready Player One), and cinematographer Phedon Papamichael (Ford v Ferrari, Walk The Line, 3: 10 To Yuma).
We’re all excited to get our first glimpse of Sam Raimi’s return to the comic book genre with Marvel’s Doctor Strange In The Multiverse of Madness, while a trailer is likely months away, actress Elizabeth Olsen is giving a little bit of insight about the latest incarnation of Wanda Maximoff aka The Scarlet Witch.
Wanda Maximoff’s American and Sokovian accent seemingly have a life of their own, but Elizabeth Olsen spoke to Rolling Stone recently and dished that her Sokovian accent will be making a return for the Doctor Strange sequel. She also explained why Wanda pivoted to varying levels of accents in previous projects.
OLSEN: “So that started with Civil War. The Russos [directors Anthony and Joseph Russo] said, ‘Can she just have a softer accent, because she’s been in America, and has to have been speaking English more.’ So I was like, sure. I do have to say that in [Wanda’s next appearance, in 2022’s] Dr. Strange [in the Multiverse of Madness], after the experience she has in WandaVision, she goes back to an accent that’s more true to her. Now that I feel a little bit more ownership of the character, I feel like she does retreat back to having this more honest expression. The sitcom part was totally different, because she’s trying to hold on to an American sitcom world and play the part the best she can.”
The sequel seemingly takes place directly after Wanda becomes the Scarlet Witch and is attempting to bring her family out of the Multiverse using the dark magic spell book, The Darkhold, which suggests that she unwillingly unleashes evil creatures into their dimension and leads to Doctor Strange getting involved.
Marvel has officially announced that newcomer Xochitl Gomez will play America Chavez aka Miss America, but the studio hasn’t announced who will be the main villains other than Baron Mordo or if we’ll see characters such as Clea or Brother Voodoo despite former director Scott Derrickson teasing their involvement on social media.
Other returning cast members are Benedict Wong as Wong, Chiwetel Ejiofor as Baron Karl Mordo, and Rachel McAdams as Dr. Christine Palmer.
The production team includes composer Danny Elfman (Batman, Spider-Man 1-3), cinematographer John Mathieson (Logan, X-Men: First Class) and production designer Charles Wood (Black Widow, Avengers: Endgame).
Doctor Strange In The Multiverse of Madness will be released on Mach 25th, 2022.
Marvel’s next big film Thor: Love & Thunder has officially wrapped production today as it was announced by both actor Chris Hemsworth and director Taika Waititi on Instagram, both posting a nifty beefcake photo of the two of them on the set. Taika wearing his Korg costume and Hemsworth looking super buff after being fat Thor in Avengers: Endgame.
HEMSWORTH: “That’s a wrap on Thor Love and Thunder, it’s also national don’t flex day so I thought this super relaxed photo was appropriate. The film is gonna be batshit crazy off the wall funny and might also pull a heart string or two. Lots of love, lots of thunder! Thank you to all the cast and crew who made this another incredible Marvel journey. Buckle in, get ready and see ya in cinemas!!”
The film’s cast consists of Natalie Portman as Jane Foster aka Lady Thor, Chris Hemsworth as Thor, Christian Bale as Gorr The God Butcher, Tessa Thompson as King Valkyrie of New Asgard, Russell Crowe as Zeus, Matt Damon as fake Loki, Melissa McCarthy as fake Hela, Sam Neill as fake Odin, Luke Hemsworth as fake Thor, Jaimie Alexander as Lady Sif, Chris Pratt as Peter Quill aka Star-Lord, Karen Gillan as Nebula, Dave Bautista as Drax The Destroyer, Pom Klementieff as Mantis, Taika as the lovable Korg, and Sean Gunn as Kraglin.
It will introduce the cosmic beings known as The Olympians with Russell Crowe playing their leader Zesus, it means that Marvel is likely priming audiences to usher in Hercules aka The Prince of Power to the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
Production was taking place at Fox Studios Australia in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, the facility had been previously used for Destin Daniel Cretton’s Shang-Chi & The Legend of The Ten Rings. It was recently revealed that the film’s cinematographer was Baz Idoine (The Mandalorian).
Thor: Love & Thunder will open in theaters on May 6, 2022.
THE RONIN 