Category: Television News

Posted on in Television News

Updates On Marvel Studios’ Disney+ Shows

The Ronin has caught-wind of some interesting developments concerning the releases of the first two Disney+ shows from Marvel Studios and the potential production order of the ones that haven’t started to begin shooting.

First, it seems like WandaVision may indeed be finished enough to debut before the end of the year. We know that the series is still planning to do some pick-up shots or reshoots but it doesn’t seem like it will be enough to hinder a 2020 release.

However, The Falcon & The Winter Soldier is expected to have been pushed back to 2021.

Disney has yet to make solid announcements recently about when either show will be released other than reaffirming that Season 2 of The Mandalorian will be ready to go in October.

One big reason for the delay might not even be related to The Falcon‘s production pause, as it’s been months since Disney+ content has been shot due to the pandemic and that will leave a content gap next year for many streaming services. This could see places being a little more reserved and Disney dropping two Marvel shows alongside The Mandalorian might be a little too much at once.

Loki was always set to be released in 2021, so that doesn’t seem to have changed in any major way.

Also, while this could change due to COVID-19 and location scheduling, below seems to be the current production order of the new shows that haven’t started shooting.

  • Hawkeye
  • Ms. Marvel
  • Moon Knight
  • She-Hulk

This does make sense since Hawkeye and Ms. Marvel are further along in the casting process. Then again, multiple Marvel shows were in production in Atlanta at the same time, so the start dates might not be as staggered as they are with the feature films.

She-Hulk might be done with their scripts but it’s possible that Mark Ruffalo’s schedule is a factor, if he has indeed signed-on as expected.

On the film side, release dates are influx as there is a very good shot that Shang-Chi & The Legend of The Ten Rings might not make it’s May 7th, 2021 release because of the production delays in Australia shortening the post-production window.

It’s unknown if Black Widow will stick to it’s November 6th theatrical release date or will be bumped to Eternals‘ February 12th, 2021 spot instead. There has been plenty of fan speculation it’ll simply be dumped on Disney+’s Premier Access section like Mulan, but little evidence to support it.

It is a little upsetting that without San Diego Comic-Con Marvel hasn’t made any big announcements. Hopefully, they’ll give some updates in the very near future taking cues from the upcoming event DC FanDome and doing their own in-house version of it.

Posted on in Television News

‘Day of The Dead’ Series Adds ‘The Void’ Director Steven Kostanski

The Ronin has learned that the upcoming Day of The Dead series loosely based on the George A. Romero zombie flick has added director Steven Kostanski, best known for directing The Void. 

Production (fingers crossed) is expected to take place between September 14th and December 4th in Vancouver. There is a chance these dates can change or production pausing as the pandemic will make any future productions unpredictable and British Columbia has seen some recent upticks in new cases. 

It was announced in February that the series landed at SyFy and was aiming to begin airing in 2021. 

The horror series will be written and showrun by Jed Elinoff and Scott Thomas. 

The new incarnation of Day of the Dead is the intense story of six strangers trying to survive the first 24 hours of an undead invasion.

The third in the Romero Zombie Saga, the film focused on a group of survivors in a military facility and it’s one of the more action-packed out of the series. 

DAY OF THE DEAD – Trapped in a missile silo, a small team of scientists, civilians and trigger-happy soldiers battle desperately to ensure the survival of the human race, but tension inside the base is reaching breaking-point, and the zombies are gathering outside.

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‘The Boys’ Season 3 Officially Adds Jensen Ackles As Soldier Boy

Today, it was announced via Twitter that Supernatural actor Jensen Ackles has landed the role of Soldier Boy in the third season of Amazon’s mature superhero series The Boys.

The Boys is an irreverent take on what happens when superheroes, who are as popular as celebrities, as influential as politicians and as revered as Gods, abuse their superpowers rather than use them for good. It’s the powerless against the super powerful as The Boys embark on a heroic quest to expose the truth about “The Seven”, and their formidable Vought backing.

Ackles made the announcement on the official account for the series in a cheeky video.

The news comes ahead of the Season 2 drop on Prime Video which will debut September 4th.

I’d totally recommend catching up with Season 1 before the new season drops if you haven’t already.

In a more intense, more desperate Season 2 of THE BOYS, Butcher, Hughie and the team reel from their losses in Season 1. On the run from the law, they struggle to fight back against the Superheroes. As Vought, the company that manages the heroes, cashes in on the panic over the threat of Supervillains, and a new hero, Stormfront, shakes up the company and challenges an already unstable Homelander.

SOURCE: AMAZON

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Lucasfilm’s ‘Cassian Andor’ Prequel Series Adds ‘Morbius’ Actress Adria Arjona In Lead Role

Deadline has word that up-and-coming actress Adria Arjona has been tapped for an undisclosed role in the untitled Cassian Andor series from Lucasfilm set within the Star Wars universe. Andor, a character from Rogue One: A Star Wars Story is a Rebellion spy and operates mostly in a very grey-area. The series is expected to play-up the spy aspect of the Rebels and Andor played by Diego Luna.

Arjona’s recent credits include Triple Frontier, Narcos, True Detective, Pacific Rim: Uprising, 6 Underground, and will be seeing alongside Jared Leto in Sony’s Spider-Man spinoff Morbius. She’ll be joining Luna, Alan Tudyk, Denise Gough, Genevieve O’Reilly, Stellan Skarsgard, and Kyle Soller.

Filming had been originally expected to begin this summer before the pandemic delayed multiple film and television productions.

SOURCE: DEADLINE

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Guillermo del Toro’s ‘Mimic’ Getting The Series Treatment With ‘Resident Evil’s Paul WS Anderson Directing The Pilot

Deadline is reporting that Guillermo del Toro’s 1997 creature horror flick Mimic will be adapted into a new television series from Miramax TV with Resident Evil and Event Horizon director Paul WS Anderson tackling the show’s pilot episode. 

Jim Danger Gray will write and showrun Mimic with previous credits that include Hannibal, American Gods, and Orange Is The New Black. 

The horror film was based on a short story from author Donald A. Wollheim with a script from Matthew Robbins and Guillermo.

MIMIC – When a cockroach-spread plague threatens to decimate the child population of New York City, evolutionary biologist Susan Tyler (Mira Sorvino) and her research associates rig up a species of “Judas” bugs and introduce them into the environment, where they will mimic the diseased roaches and infiltrate their grubby habitats. So far so good … until the bugs keep on evolving and learn to mimic their next prey — humans.

The original film’s cast included Mira Sorvino, Josh Brolin, Jeremy Northam, Charles S. Dutton, Norman Reedus, Giancarlo Giannini, and F. Murray Abraham. It would end up getting two direct-to-video sequels. 

Sadly, Guillermo del Toro won’t be involved in the new series. 

I thought the original Resident Evil movie was fine and Paul’s work on Event Horizon might be the highlight of his career, hopefully, there is a bit more care put into this new horror series than the Resident Evil sequels that got increasingly worse. 

I would recommend giving Event Horizon a shot.

SOURCE: DEADLINE

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Netflix Announces New Series ‘The Witcher: Blood Origins’ – Prequel Takes Place 1200 Years In The Past

Today, Netflix took to Twitter to announce a new prequel series spinoff set in the world of The Witcher. The prequel titled The Witcher: Blood Origins from Declan de Barra and Lauren Schmidt Hissrich will focus on the first Witcher taking place 1200 years in the past. 

The fantasy series is based on the novels turned video game franchise. 

The Witcher starring Henry Cavill as the infamous Geralt of Rivia is currently in the middle of filming Season 2 (expected to resume filming in the United Kingdom next month). 

SOURCE: NETFLIX

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Peter Shinkoda Says Marvel Promised Him Nobu Would Be The Lead Villain In ‘The Defenders’ Before Sigourney Weaver Took That Spot

Daredevil actor Peter Shinkoda has been highlighting his experiences working with Jeph Loeb and Marvel Television, highlighting some racism behind the scenes at the production company concerning his character Nobu and Wai Ching Ho’s Madame Gao.

After pointing out that Loeb had told writers/showrunners to throw away plot lines for Nobu and Gao because “nobody cares about Chinese people or Asians”, the pair of actors were never invited to the Season 2 premiere despite having decent sized roles in the series.

Peter has now taken to Twitter to further state that Marvel promised him a larger role in The Defenders, as the show’s main villain which instead went to veteran actress Sigourney Weaver.

https://twitter.com/PeterShinkoda/status/1287502670962388992

All these things combined seem to reveal a huge bias towards both the actors and characters.

SOURCE: PETER SHINOKDA

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‘Daredevil’ Showrunner Doug Petrie Pitched An Asian-American/Mixed-Race Version of ‘Iron Fist’ To Marvel Television Early On That Was Rejected

It seems like Marvel Television didn’t only have issues with Asian villains in Daredevil having flushed-out storylines, they also weren’t too keen about having Danny Rand in Iron Fist being Asian-American or possibly mixed-race. 

During a panel for #SaveDaredevil on YouTube, the subject switched from Daredevil to almost having a mixed-race version of Danny Rand and this potentially was pitched to Marvel at some point in the development process by showrunner Doug Petrie (Daredevil, The Defenders).  

Daredevil actor Tommy Walker revealed that Doug attempted to pitch a progressive version of Iron Fist that was ultimately rejected while teasing that version of Danny might have been mixed-race. 

WALKER: “A very good friend of mine Doug Petrie, the showrunner of Season 2 of Daredevil, he was on Season 1 as you know and then an executive producer on Defenders. I think I can say this much safely that man came up with some brilliant pitches for Iron Fist early on before Iron Fist was well into production…but they were along those lines, very very thoughtful very progressive for the time.”

At the time of Iron Fist‘s casting Shang-Chi hadn’t been announced and Marvel didn’t have any public plans to give fans an Asian superhero, so there was an effort by fans to see various Asian-American actors considered for the role.

Ultimately, Danny was played by British actor Finn Jones and the character seemingly will be under the management of Kevin Feige in the not too distant future. 

SOURCE: #SAVEDAREDEVIL

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‘Daredevil’ Actor Reveals Racism Towards Asian Characters From Marvel Television’s Jeph Loeb

Former Daredevil actor Peter Shinkoda (played Nobu) reveals to #SaveDaredevil in a panel chat on YouTube some racism behind the scenes from former Marvel Television head Jeph Loeb. 

Suggesting that his character Nobu and Wai Ching Ho’s Madame Gao were essentially kneecapped by Loeb because he held some prejudice against Asian characters on the show getting deeper storylines. Revealing his own character Nobu had stuff scrapped directly by Loeb’s racist attitude.

Here is what Shinkoda had to say. 

Jeph Loeb told the writers’ room not to write for Nobu and Gao. Saying that Loeb’s reasoning was “Nobody cares about Chinese people and Asian people. There were three previous Marvel movies a trilogy called Blade made where Wesley Snipes kills 200 Asians each movie, nobody gives a shit, so don’t write about Nobu and Gao”. 

You can hear Peter’s words for yourself. 

He also highlighted on Twitter that neither himself or Wai Ching Ho were later invited by Marvel/Netflix to the Season 2 premiere.

https://twitter.com/PeterShinkoda/status/1287490338958041088

We support and believe Peter.

Loeb’s bizarre attitudes towards Asian folks/culture isn’t a new thing. It was on center stage at San Diego Comic-Con in 2018, where he wore a Karate Halloween costume to moderate the Iron First panel when actress Jessica Henwick rightfully had him take the costume off before the panel began.

There had already been some backlash from the fandom that Iron Fist had been a potential entry point to have an Asian-American leading superhero character from Marvel, years before Shang-Chi was announced. 

Below you can see that exchange between Jessica and Jeph right here. 

Jeph Loeb is now out at Marvel Television with the company re-branded as Marvel TV Studios with Kevin Feige overseeing it. It’ll be interesting to see if Shang-Chi was a direct response to this nonsense and if other stories will be made public. 

This isn’t the first claim of odd sexism/racism from Marvel brass. At one point, Ike Perlmutter had direct control over projects at Marvel Studios and was said to be behind the delay of films such as Black Panther, Captain Marvel, and Black Widow. Perlmutter was later removed from the film division after an intervention from Disney giving Kevin Feige more control over the studio.

SOURCE: #SAVEDAREDEVIL

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Rumor That Donald Glover Is Getting A ‘Lando’ Series On Disney+ Resurfaces

Ever since the release of Solo: A Star Wars Story, there has been chatter about Donald Glover’s return as the charming Lando Calrissian in a future Star Wars project. It eventually led to a handful of rumors online suggesting that Donald Glover could be getting a Lando series on Disney+.  

Now, that Lando returning rumor is back with Noah Outlaw revealing on the Kessel Run Transmissions podcast that Glover is expected to lead his own Disney+ series reprising the beloved Star Wars character. 

You can watch below with a snippet posted by Noah on Twitter. 

The Kessel Run guys previously stated that Lucasfilm would be making a spinoff animated series focusing on the clone trooper unit The Bad Batch from The Clone Wars, which turned out to be accurate and was confirmed by Disney/Lucasfilm not too long ago in an official press release. 

This new tidbit is certainly far from official as Lucasfilm hasn’t made any announcements about Glover or Lando making a return but it’s worth considering for the time being. 

If this Lando series comes together it would be interesting to see what characters from Solo: A Star Wars Story would end up returning and if the criminal syndicate Crimson Dawn would have a presence.

SOURCE: KESSEL RUN TRANSMISSIONS PODCAST