Movie News 8/11/14: Ninja Turtles sequel announced, Batman V Superman release date moved, and DC movie slate revealed!

Greetings everyone!  Today I have three little tidbits of movie news to go over with you all today.  I am not in the business of trying to be the one to first break news, as I do not as of yet have the connections to join that field, but rather give my opinion on the stories first reported by more established sites.  Without further banter, lets get into it.

1.  Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Sequel announced!

-  Up until two weeks ago, no movie had ever grossed over 60 million dollars in one weekend in the month of August.  Last week that stat was abolished with the huge 93 million dollar opening weekend by Guardians of the galaxy.  Now for the second week in a row we have another 60 million opener in the Ninja Turtle reboot.  I have not seen the movie yet.  I was perfectly fine skipping it, but I have heard from some people in the business that it actually is not that bad.  Not that bad is a vague score, but nevertheless I have been convinced to give it a chance, so I will be seeing that within the next day or two.  But despite the skeptics, this movie about talking turtles made a ton of money, and as soon as those figures came in; Paramount studios went ahead and announced that the Ninja Turtles sequel is set to come out on June 3rd, 2016.  Good for them.  They obviously feel confident enough that fans will like the movie enough to come back and see the sequel, so bravo to Michael Bay.  The quick announcement of a sequel also gives confidence to people on the fence about seeing the first one that is out in theaters right now.  It must be doing something right if the bosses over at Paramount are already writing checks and making calls to get another one going.  All in all, I am happy when movies are successful and if this movie brought some enjoyment to enough people, then by all means make another one, and keep raking in that dough.  After all, it is a business.

2.  "Batman V. Superman:  Dawn of Justice " changes its release date to March 25th, 2016.

-  The 7 month long game of chicken is finally over.  For those of you who did not know; the scheduled Batman V Superman movie was supposed to be released on June 6, 2016.  Right in the peak of the summer movie season, kids are about to be let out of school; whats the problem right?  Well there is another movie set to come out on that date by the name of Captain America 3.  Never before have

Are you ready for the Batfleck?

two blockbuster movies of that caliber ever come out on the same day.  Why?  Because most of the general movie going audience are going to pick one or the other to see that weekend.  Not both.  Inevitably, both movies would have lost money in the long run if they opened against each other.  Both sides have been adamant that they were not moving under any circumstances.  Well that turned out to be a load of crap because Warner Brothers has officially moved up Batman V Superman to a late March release date.  My thoughts?  Duh.  One of them had to move, because not doing so would have been flat out stupid.  I'm all for keeping ones pride.  But if it came down to pride, or an extra hundred million dollars.....sorry pride, but you gotta take a hike.  Warner Brothers needs Batman V Superman to be a massive hit if they hope to catch up to Marvel in terms of

fan popularity, so naturally they have more to lose.  They had to be the ones to move, they did, and now they can just focus on making a good movie instead of worrying about making a better movie than Captain America 3.  Kudos.

3.  Warner Brothers (DC) locks up 9 dates through 2020

-  Ever since the first Iron Man movie, Marvel studios has had a clear path as to where they wanted their movie universe to begin and end.  The Marvel movies that came out this year had been in the works for years, and at this very moment the Marvel executives are probably discussing what they should do in the year 2025 or something like that.  DC on the other hand, with the exception of the Dark Knight trilogy has had a track record of being wishy washy in what they want to do with their DC comics super heroes.  What was the point of that Green Lantern movie again?  Or that Superman returns movie back in 06?  Marvel has set the standard for how these heroes should be handled, and although DC doesn't have to replicate the Marvel process:  they would be fools not to.  Man of Steel was awesome, and it gave me hope that Warner Brothers finally had a plan to create a DC comics shared cinematic universe.  That was all but confirmed at comic con 2013 when they announced a Batman Vs Superman movie was coming.  But then, that movie got pushed back 10 months, they hired Ben Affleck to be Batman, Jesse Eisenberg to be Lex Luthor, and all of a sudden DC was back to being the ugly step child compared to Marvel.  I for one have faith in Warner Brothers simply because I believe in greed.  These studio heads are some greedy sons of bitches, and these DC heroes have the potential to make Warner Brothers a hell of a lot of money.  They would be wasting a monumental opportunity if they did not try to make a DC universe.  Well apparently that plan has somewhat been enacted.  DC has announced that they have locked up 9 different dates in addition to the Batman V Superman date to release untitled DC comics movies.  Starting in 2016, we will supposedly get two DC movies every year until 2020.  Talk is cheap.  I want to know what those movies are.  They are kinda making a big announcement in releasing these dates, but are still safeguarding themselves by not saying what movies they are.  As for my guesses, one has to be a Justice League movie.  One has to be a Wonder Woman movie.  One has to be a stand alone Batman movie, and one HAS to be a Man of Steel sequel.  As for the rest, I don't care.  Just make them good.  We also know that Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson has signed on to be a character in one or more of these movies; we just don't know who he will be playing just yet.  I wanted him to be the new Green Lantern, but my money is on him playing Shazam.  All in all, I'd say this is good news if you enjoy super hero movies, or big box office dollars.

Shazam

"The Rock"

Well thats all I have for today.  Get out there and see some movies!  Let me know what you think of this news, or tell me about some other pieces of movie news that I may have missed.  It is a great time to be a film fan!  This blog now has a twitter page that you can follow.  By following you will be the first to know anytime anything is posted, plus be subjected to poll questions, live Q & A's, and just some all around fun stuff.  So please follow and tell your friends.  Follow us on Twitter at  @BigD_TMB .  Thanks again!

-  Big D

Hope he leaves this outfit at home.....

Movie Review: Guardians of the Galaxy

Happy Sunday night everyone! I am truly sorry for the absence, but ever since comic con I have had some very time consuming things to take care of.  The last few years I have coached youth football for my cities local team the Corona Chargers.  Well we just started our season last week and it has forced me to switch all my shifts at work to the daytime so that I could be at practice five nights a week.  Very stressful indeed.  Also most recently, I fell very ill and did not have much energy to say the least.

 However all that did not stop me from seeing this little film called Guardians of the Galaxy three times in its opening weekend.  Thats right I PAYED to see this movie all three times, once in 3D Imax and

the other two times in standard.  But enough foreplay, lets talk Guardians.  

Marvel studios, in my opinion, has officially surpassed Pixar as the most successful movie makers in the business today.  Every Pixar movie is amazing, and almost a lock for best animated picture at the Oscars.  Even the weaker Pixar films are still better than anything any other studio picks out.  The difference between Pixar and Marvels success is that Pixar puts out a movie every couple of years, while Marvel is cranking out two every single year, and has a two movies a year on the slate until 2028!  The consistency of quality and box office success is astounding.  This all suddenly came to my attention upon seeing Guardians of the Galaxy (GOTG) for the first time.  Marvel has taken an unknown property about a very diverse group of misfits, put them in outer space, had an unknown director take the reigns, and the people of America and the WORLD came out in droves to see it!  I mean if some unknown rich guy funded the exact same movie without the Marvel brand name I guarantee you it doesn't have half of the same success.  Anyways I think it is safe to say that this is the funnest movie of the year.  Maybe of the last two years.  This film is incredibly paced, and that is all due to the great vision of director James Gunn; who is already hard at work on the sequel.  The movie stars Chris Pratt as Peter Quill, a human who was abducted from earth as a child, and who now goes around the galaxy stealing rare objects and selling them to the highest bidder.  Essentially a hybrid of Han Solo and Indiana Jones.  It also features Zoe Saldana in some green body paint playing some sexy ass assassin named Gamora.  Then there is professional wrestler turned actor Dave Batista playing the steroid riddled vengeance seeker Drax the Destroyer.  These charcters are all awesome, but going into the movie there were a lot of questions about the last two members:  Rocket Raccoon and Groot.  Rocket is voiced by Bradley Cooper, and Groot is voiced by Vin Diesel.  Probably the two most random actors they could have gotten to play these two characters.  Groot is an eight foot tree creature whose powers are so badass that I won't spoil them for you here.  Oh and by the way, he only says three words the whole movie.  Literally.  Rocket is a talking raccoon.  Who likes weapons.  He's awesome.  The strength of this movie is easily the chemistry amongst the five members of the team and their various interactions amongst each other.  It suffers a bit from the whole "they hate

Gamora,  Peter Quill (Star-Lord),   Rocket,    Drax,    Groot

each other at first, but end up rallying together to beat the bad guy and are best friends at the end cliche", but oh well it was to be expected.  Also, it would be criminal to write a review of this movie without mentioning the soundtrack.  Maybe the best use of music to compliment a movie that I have ever seen.  Some people might laugh at me for saying that, but whatever I only have like 10 readers anyway.  The main character, Peter Quill, was taken from earth in 1988, and all he had with him was a walkman music player with a single cassette tape filled with 70's music.  From the opening scene to the ending scene we are graced with multiple seventies hits including "The Pina Colada song" and "I want you Back" by the Jackson 5.  The music shows how much a really good soundtrack can help a movies likability.  The story of GOTG is nothing spectacular so I won't go into great detail.  This movie just needed to get these characters together so that they could work their magic.  I don't really feel like digging into spoilers or sharing jokes from the movie because it truly is a wonderful movie going experience that needs to be had on your own.  Trust me, you do not need to be a fan of super heroes, sci-fi, or action to like this movie.  So if you like fun things, have two free hours plus 12$, then get your ass to the theater and see this movie.  You're welcome.

Score:  9/10
Verdict:  My Grandma would love it (See it!)