Welcome to The Rundown report (as gathered by Taryn Belle) with Nerd Union for May 28th, 2021.
MOVIES
Timothée Chalamet has locked in the lead role for the musical Wonka based on Willy Wonka’s origin story, according to yahoo!Entertainment. “Though plot details have been kept under wraps, the Warner Bros. prequel film will explore the upbringing of the man who later created the famous house of confectionary treats. Reps for Chalamet confirm he will be singing and dancing in the movie.”
Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson took to Instagram this week to remind comic book fans of Black Adam’s motivation and origins saying, “If you know the comic book mythology, then you know where his pain comes from. His rage. His wife and children killed. His people brutally enslaved. He is not a superhero, but rather a champion. Champion of the poor and beaten down. Champion of the people. And he is the most unstoppable force in the DC UNIVERSE.” The posts confirms what has been widely reported since The Rock was cast, that this version of Black Adam wouldn’t be a typical villain and would continue to have a stake and influence in ongoing DC projects.
Evangeline Lilly posted the script cover for Ant-man and the Wasp: Quantumania on Instagram…but may have inadvertently leaked a previous Ant-man villain by tagging Corey Stoll, who played Yellowjacket in the first film, in her list of hashtag announcements. Reported by Twitter user Hector Navarro, her list of acknowledgements include previous confirmed cast members along with Stoll, and given that the sequel will have time and/or dimension hopping elements, this accidental leak may be legitimate.
AVClub has announced that Aaron Taylor-Johnson will be starring in Sony’s solo Kraven the Hunter movie: “First publicized last year, the Kraven movie is the latest entry in Sony’s little sideline of Marvel-licensed movies based on characters attached to its Spider-Man rights, only one of which, Venom, has ever actually come out. (The Venom sequel, Let There Be Carnage, is set for September, while Jared Leto’s Morbius has been bumped back to January 2022.) The Kraven film is set to be directed by Triple Frontier and A Most Violent Year director J.C. Chandor, and will center on the second-tier, hunting-themed Spidey villain.”
DigitalSpy notes that Indya Moore of Pose is starring in the upcoming horror sequel Escape Room: Tournament of Champions: “The actor, who rose to fame as Angel Evangelista in Ryan Murphy’s acclaimed LGBTQ+ drama, appears opposite Thomas Cocquerel, Carlito Olivero and Holland Roden, as well as returning players Logan Miller and Taylor Russell… According to director Adam Robitel, the new outing picks up right where its predecessor left off, with the last remaining survivors Ben (Miller) and Zoey (Russell) – who have supposedly beaten their game – determined to expose the truth about Minos’ deadly escape rooms.”
According to Deadline, Daisy Heard, recently seen on Shadow and Bone and who happens to be the daughter of Anthony Heard, has joined Paramount and eOne’s upcoming Dungeons and Dragons film: “Head is joining the ensemble cast that includes Chris Pine, Michelle Rodriguez, Justice Smith, Rege-Jean Page, Hugh Grant, and Sophia Lillis. Jonathan Goldstein and John Francis Daley co-wrote and are co-directing the film, with Goldstein recently tweeting that production was officially underway.”
SHOWS & SERIES
Variety reports that Jac Schaeffer, who was the head writer and executive producer for WandaVision, has just locked in a 3-year TV deal with Marvel Studios and 20th Television: “Under the deal, Schaeffer will develop projects for both Marvel Studios and 20th Television. Projects for Marvel Studios will go to Disney Plus, while projects for 20th Television will be developed for all platforms.”
Variety also reports CW’s Powerpuff is having it’s pilot reworked: ”The show’s four leads — Chloe Bennet, Dove Cameron, Yana Perrault, and Donald Faison — remain attached to the project, as does the remainder of the cast and the creative team behind the show. The network will film a new pilot for the series off-cycle. The show generated significant interest from the time it was first reported as being in development and was seen as a strong contender for a pickup going into pilot season.”
EOnline has the scoop that Schitt’s Creek’s Tim Rozon & Sarah Levy will be together again, this time in a horror based comedy: “On Thursday, May 20, SYFY released the first trailer for their new drama, SurrealEstate. The spooky series, which premieres Friday, July 16, reunites the Schitt’s Creek alums as Luke Roman and Susan Ireland, respectively. And, from what the first look teases, Tim and Sarah’s new characters are vastly different than Mutt and Twyla.” Sounds like a hauntingly good time!
TVLine has covered the cast of the upcoming Netflix adaptation of Neil Gaiman’s Sandman: there are “12 new cast members, including Kirby Howell-Baptiste (The Good Place, Why Women Kill) as … Death, the wiser sister of Tom Sturridge’s Dream. She’ll be joined by Patton Oswalt (The King of Queens, A.P. Bio), who is set to lend his voice to Matthew the Raven, Dream’s most trusted emissary. Also included (are) Doctor Who fave Jenna Coleman, Fargo and Harry Potter vet David Thewlis, Nip/Tuck‘s Joely Richardson, and British comedian Stephen Fry.”
SlashFilm announced that Jesse Plemons will be joining Elizabeth Olsen for HBOMax’s limited series Love and Death: ”Plemons will play Allan Gore in the true crime limited series written and executive produced by David E. Kelley (Big Little Lies, The Undoing) for Lionsgate and Kelley’s own production banner. Elizabeth Olsen is taking the lead role as Candy Montgomery in the series, which is inspired by the book Evidence of Love: A True Story of Passion and Death in the Suburbs and a collection of articles called “Love & Death In Silicon Prairie, Part I & II” from Texas Monthly. The series follows “two church going couples, enjoying small town family life in Texas, until somebody picks up an axe,” per the official logline.”
In addition to Disney+ getting a Ryan Coogler produced Wakanda series, Danai Gurira will be starring in a spin-off origin story focused on Okoye! While plot details have not been revealed, The Nerdist notes Okoye’s arcs in the Marvel comics: “Okoye debuted in the Marvel Knights Black Panther series in 1998. Aspects of her backstory which may appear include Okoye helping to recruit Queen Divine Justice into the Dora. Divine Justice, the actual queen of the Jabari tribe of Wakanda, grew up in Chicago … In the comics, Okoye also has a brief flirtation with Kasper Cole, the White Tiger. Any of these aspects of her past are worthy storylines.”
The Direct reports that details for the brainstorming session by producer Brad Winderbaum with his team on Hayley Atwell’s What If…? episode: “As you can imagine, there are so many great moments in the films to choose from. Very quickly, you start to geek out. And you wonder, ‘What if Peggy Carter got into that pod instead of Steve Rogers and she became a Super Soldier? What would have happened in World War II?’ Then you start to think about what else was happening in that movie. The Red Skull would still be out there, of course, and the Tesseract would still be a problem.”
ACTORS
CNN shares Elliot Page’s recent celebratory photo post transition surgery: “The Oscar-nominated star posted a shirtless picture of himself spending a joyful moment by the pool to Instagram Monday, captioned: ‘Trans bb’s first swim trunks.’ In December, the “Juno” and “X-Men: Days of Future Past” star announced that he is transgender and shared with fans that he/ they were the actor’s preferred pronouns. The actor recently opened up about his transition surgery, describing it as ‘life-saving’ and explaining that it led him to feel comfortable in his body for the first time.”
Social PLATFORMS
Engadget has noted that Twitch is taking steps to right the wrongs experienced by marginalized communities on the platform: “The live streaming service is adding over 350 channel tags that reflect a wide range of communities, including ones for gender and sexual orientation, ethnicity, abilities and veteran status. Twitch said it worked with organizations like GLAAD and AbleGamers to develop the tags alongside the community itself. The site will also accept UserVoice suggestions, and will review the most popular suggestions each week to potentially add them later. And yes, Twitch is aware that bigots and trolls may abuse the tags to harass streamers — those that do will face punishment in line with the company’s anti-hate policy.”
TechCrunch reports that Facebook and Instagram are offering an option to hide Likes on both platforms. “Originally, the idea to hide Like counts on Facebook’s social networks was focused on depressurizing the experience for users. Often, users faced anxiety and embarrassment around their posts if they didn’t receive enough Likes to be considered “popular.” This problem was particularly difficult for younger users who highly value what peers think of them — so much so that they would take down posts that didn’t receive enough Likes.”
MERCH
Doctor Who has officially released a novel based on River Song that was written by Alex Kingston, the actress who plays River Song in the show: “This stylish sci-fi noir adventure features her most famous characters: private detective Melody Malone and legendary time-travelling archaeologist River Song.”
Bloody Disgusting.com shares Funko’s “Funkoween” kicked off with multiple Gremlins figures: “This new batch (pun very much intended) of Gremlins toys includes Gizmo with 3D glasses in both regular and flocked versions, with the flocked variant only available in Target stores. We’re also getting Stripe with a pair of 3D glasses and even a figure recreating the moment from Joe Dante’s Gremlins 2 wherein Daffy has found himself inside a pot of noodles! A jumbo-sized version of the new Gizmo toy is also coming soon, along with keychains.”
CONS
Variety is holding a Virtual TV Festival this coming June 8th-10th featuring Disney+’s Marvel line-up: “An exclusive panel with the stars of Marvel’s “The Falcon and the Winter Soldier,” “Loki” and “WandaVision” will premiere on Wednesday, June 9. This will be the first time that the stars of all three shows will appear together in one panel. Paul Bettany, Tom Hiddleston, Elizabeth Olsen, Anthony Mackie and Sebastian Stan will come together to talk about the three shows and how they co-exist in the Marvel Universe.”
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