Lots of Star Wars fans, including J.J. Abrams himself, have sat down to talk about their confidence in Star Wars Episode VII. Those statements, possible video games, and more are all in today’s Star Wars Bits. After the jump read about the following:
- J.J. Abrams is focusing on Star Wars Episode VII, not any spin-off films.
- Simon Pegg has some ideas on how J.J. Abrams can reinvigorate Star Wars.
- Damon Lindelof would love to write a Star Wars film.
- Leonardo DiCaprio is super excited for Star Wars Episode VII and could be interested in appearing.
- Has a glimpse of a new Star Wars animated series been revealed?
- Disney CEO Bob Iger suggests more Star Wars is coming to theme parks and television.
- Star Tours opens at Disneyland Tokyo
- Lucasfilm registers domain names hinting at Gungan and Wookie themed video games and more.
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The Muppets brought Jim Henson’s family-friendly crew of clever puppet characters to new audiences in 2011, and Disney is now in production on a sequel, The Muppets… Again! We know that the film features a road trip that takes the Muppets to London, and that actors Tina Fey, Ty Burrell, and Ricky Gervais play major roles.
We also know that Jason Segel and Amy Adams, the human stars of the 2011 film, won’t appear in this movie.
So what’s the story with the photo above, which is a crop of a picture taken last night during the shoot for the sequel? The picture evidently shows stand-ins for Adams and Segel, and other photos from last night’s shoot strongly suggest that Disney has recreated the end of The Muppets. While we don’t have any info about whether Adams or Segel might actually return for a cameo here, we do understand that the sequel starts just moments after the end of The Muppets. Read More »
The King of the North will now be a Disney Prince. Richard Madden, who plays Rob Stark in HBO’s Game of Thrones, has been cast in Kenneth Branagh‘s live-action remake of Cinderella as the Prince. He was rumored to be up for the role in April and now officially joins a cast that includes Lily James (Downton Abbey) as Cinderella and Cate Blanchett as the wicked stepmother. Read More »
Many people assumed that we would eventually see some animated result from Disney’s purchase of Marvel, and now the first project is out in the open. It is not a Marvel/Pixar crossover, however, and Disney has taken the approach of adapting a fairly obscure Marvel property.
Steven T. Seagle and Duncan Rouleau were responsible for the 1998 series Big Hero 6, a Tokyo-set story about government-sanctioned heroes, specifically “a robotics prodigy named Hiro Hamada and his robot companion BayMax, who join a team of superheroes in a high-tech city called San Fransokyo.” Director Don Hall (Winnie the Pooh) found the series and pitched it to John Lasseter, and he’s been directing a CG-animated film at Walt Disney Animation Studios, which will be released on November 7 2014. Read More »
Here’s the reason Marvel signs actors to long contracts whenever possible. After the success of Iron Man, Robert Downey, Jr.‘s agents worked out a deal with Marvel in which the actor would receive a percentage of the first-day gross for future films. That’s what led him to nabbing between $50m and $75m for The Avengers. Studios hate paying anyone up front like that whenever it can be avoided, and even Downey has laughed about the unusual pay rate he got to play Tony Stark.
Now, after the release of Iron Man 3, Downey has no contract with Marvel. In fact, a few actors have no contract to appear in The Avengers 2, and after the billion-dollar-plus success of the first film, bringing them back together won’t be cheap. Marvel likes cheap, and so actors have begun to master the art of negotiating in public by letting us know that there’s a chance Marvel will make films without them. How’s that going to work out?
Well, Downey is reportedly in talks for two more Avengers films, but there’s no plan set in stone just yet, and no public talk of Iron Man 4. Read More »
Since Disney purchased Lucasfilm, most of their business-related activity has been in the subtraction column. They got rid of Lucasarts, cut employees at Industrial Light & Magic, and disbanded the animation department. Monday they made their biggest addition to date, hiring Electronic Arts to exclusively make Star Wars-themed video games in the future. Two of the company’s subdivisons, DICE (best known for the Battlefield franchise) and Visceral (the Dead Space franchise) will both make brand new games while BioWare (makers of Star Wars: The Old Republic) will also continue to make games. Read More »
Lots of cool little happenings in the movie-based theme park world, so we figured it was time for another edition of Theme Park Bits. Read about the following below:
- Follow the progress of a new Ratatouille ride in Paris.
- Check out a new Monsters University float.
- A viral campaign for Transformers: The Ride has begun in Orlando.
- Disney might soon offered rooms based on the Haunted Mansion, check out some images.
- Roger Rabbit has gone missing, kind of, at Disney Hollywood Studios.
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Two of the most anticipated sequels in history will reportedly start filming around the same time. Star Wars Episode VII and Avatar 2 will each begin production early in 2014, according to the producer of one project and star of the other. Bryan Burk, the long-time producer for J.J. Abrams and co-founder of Bad Robot, suggested the window for Star Wars. Zoe Saldana, the star of James Cameron‘s Avatar, mentioned the shooting schedule for Avatar 2. Saldana, who’ll next shoot Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy, also confirmed what we’ve already known, that both Avatar 2 and 3 will shoot back to back. Read their quotes below. Read More »
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