(Left) LaKeith Stanfield attends a Special Screening of ‘The Book of Clarence’ at Pacific Design Center on December 11, 2023 in West Hollywood, California. Photo by Rich Polk/Getty Images for Sony Pictures. (Right) Dennis Rodman at the Comedy Central Roast of Bruce Willis. Photo: Comedy Central.
Preview:
LaKeith Stanfield is starring in ‘48 Hours in Vegas.’
He’ll play Dennis Rodman in the movie.
Rick Famuyiwa co-wrote the script and will direct.
A couple of years ago, the news wasn’t good for gonzo two-day drama ‘48 Hours in Vegas’: Jonathan Majors, embroiled in his legal issues surrounding assault allegations, exited the movie, and studio Lionsgate dropped it.
What a difference two years makes: now Lionsgate is back aboard, and it has a new star in LaKeith Stanfield, recently seen in ‘Play Dirty.’
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The movie, which focuses on a wild two-day period in the life of controversial basketball star Dennis Rodman, has ‘Dope’ director Rick Famuyiwa aboard to call the shots after working on a new script draft, and it’ll mark a reunion for the director and Stanfield, since the actor was part of the ‘Dope’ cast.
Dennis Rodman in 1997’s ‘Double Team’. Photo: Sony Pictures Releasing.
Apocryphal or not, the story of Rodman’s crazed trip to Sin City inspired writer Jordan VanDina to chronicle how the NBA star went on a madcap adventure with his skittish assistant GM in the middle of the 1998 NBA Finals. The film will detail a budding friendship that neither one of them ever thought was possible but will end up solving both of their problems.
People had heard the rumors of this crazy story when it first happened in the ’90s, but it was recently given the spotlight again following the success of the Michael Jordan-Chicago Bulls doc ‘The Last Dance,’ which premiered to massive numbers in 200. The incident was given the full treatment in the documentary.
Here’s what Stanfield had to say about joining the project:
“I’m genuinely excited to help create an exhilarating, joyful work that both honors and thoughtfully examines the legacy of Rodman and fellow trailblazers. Those who moved to the beat of their own drum, undeterred by the obstacles placed before them, then and now.”
And here’s Erin Westerman, president of Lionsgate Motion Picture Group:
“Dennis Rodman is more than a basketball player, more than a personality—he’s an entire cultural phenomenon. His bold style and physical presence, combined with an iconic persona, created a larger-than-life impact on and off the court. There’ll never be another like him. LaKeith and the incredibly talented team on this film will bring the legend to life in this most extraordinarily unbelievable story.”
When will ‘48 Hours in Vegas’ be on screens?
Lionsgate has yet to announce a release date for the movie, but if it shoots next year, it’ll likely be in theaters in 2027.
LaKeith Stanfield in ‘Die My Love’. Photo Kimberley French/Mubi.
Marvel Studios’ Kevin Feige at Disney’s 2024 CinemaCon Presentation. Photo: Disney.
Preview:
Kevin Feige has given a wide-ranging interview about the state of Marvel.
He touched on the delays with ‘Blade’.
He also admitted that recent disappointments necessitated a change in thinking.
With the studio’s latest giant release –– and one of its biggest gambles in years on the way via ‘The Fantastic Four: First Steps’, Marvel boss Kevin Feige took the opportunity to address some of the topics that have been floating around, including recent underperforming movies and TV series under the Marvel Cinematic Universe, his own future (spoiler alert: he aims to stick around!) and more.
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Among the other subjects? The long-gestating and troubled development of a new ‘Blade’ movie, and his team’s new seven-year plan for new movies and shows and whether we’ll see actors from end credits cameos in the future.
(Left) Mahershala Ali attends the 89th Annual Academy Awards at Hollywood & Highland Center on February 26, 2017 in Hollywood, California. Photo by Kevin Mazur/Getty Images. (Right) Marvel Studios’ ‘Blade.’
Blade, the Daywalking half-human-half-vampire character most famously played by Wesley Snipes, was announced for a reboot back at 2019’s San Diego Comic-Con. Since then, it has been a drawn-out log of multiple script drafts, directors coming and going, different time periods considered and, all through it, Oscar winner Mahershala Ali staying attached to the lead role.
Here’s what Feige had to say about it:
“You can start and have a good script and make it a great script through production, but we didn’t feel confident we could do that on ‘Blade’. We didn’t want to do that to Mahershala and didn’t want to do that to us. we landed on modern day and that’s what we’re focusing on. We didn’t want to put a leather outfit on Mahershala and have him start killing vampires.”
Feige also joked that Ryan Coogler –– who is developing a third ‘Black Panther’ outing for the company –– added to the delay by utilizing some of the costumes the company had created for a Prohibition-era take on the story in his own recent hit, ‘Sinners’.
The executive also touched on complaints that the sheer output and deepened connectivity between the Disney+ MCU series and the big screen outings were feeling like homework and turning off viewers who hadn’t seen them, which in turn hurt the box office revenues of ‘The Marvels’ and ‘Thunderbolts*’:
“Some of them were still feeling the residual effects of that notion of, ‘I guess I had to have seen these other shows to understand who this is,’ I think if you actually saw the movie, that wouldn’t be the case, and we make the movie so that’s not the case. But I think we still have to make sure the audience understands that.”
According to Feige, the company has a seven-year plan to take it up to 2032, admitting that while he most much of it will stay on track, projects are on magnets on a board in a conference room so they can move around as necessary.
His answer wasn’t entirely convincing, but he took a stab at explaining the change:
“We had started even before what had happened to the actor happened, we had started to realize that Kang wasn’t big enough, wasn’t Thanos, and that there was only one character that could be that, because he was that in the comics for decades and decades. Because of the Fox acquisition, we finally had it, and it was Dr. Doom. So we had started talking about Dr. Doom even before we officially pivoted from Kang. And in fact, I had started talking with Robert [Downey Jr.] about this audacious idea before ‘Ant-Man 3’ even came out. It was a long plan that we had, to take one of our greatest characters and utilize one of our greatest actors.”
What’s next for Marvel?
As mentioned, ‘The Fantastic Four: First Steps’ lands in theaters on Friday.
Jonathan Majors stars in ‘Magazine Dreams’. Photo: Briarcliff Entertainment.
‘Magazine Dreams’ originally premiered more than two years ago at the Sundance Film Festival, following which Searchlight Pictures planned to release the film later in 2023 and build an Oscar campaign about the performance of star Jonathan Majors. But Majors’ subsequent arrest for assaulting his then-girlfriend and conviction on misdemeanor charges of assault and harassment (which also cost him his role as Kang the Conqueror in the Marvel Cinematic Universe) led Searchlight to drop the film, which stayed in limbo until Briarcliff – the small indie also behind the release of last year’s controversial ‘The Apprentice’ – picked it up and is now releasing it.
On the merits alone, there’s simply no question that Majors’ performance may have sent him home with an Oscar had events turned out differently. While ‘Magazine Dreams’ itself is uneven and begins to break down toward the end, the film is visually arresting and narratively gripping for most of the way. Majors is simply a force of nature in the movie, his work as aspiring bodybuilder Killian Maddox a vortex of physical, emotional, and psychological trauma that’s almost too intense at times. Whatever you think of Majors as a person, ‘Magazine Dreams’ is a powerful testament to his raw talent as an actor.
Story and Direction
(L to R) Jonathan Majors and Elijah Bynum on the set of ‘Magazine Dreams’. Photo: Briarcliff Entertainment.
Killian Maddux is a young man with, literally, magazine dreams: he aims to land on the cover of bodybuilding magazines and become a celebrity like his idol, Brad Vanderhorn (played by real-life bodybuilder and magazine cover staple Mike O’Hearn). Posters and photos of Vanderhorn – who he writes constant, unanswered letters to — and others cover the walls of Killian’s room in the small house he shares with his grandfather, William (Harrison Page), who is ill and needs Killian to take care of him and the house. As we find out later, Killian has been raised by William following tragic events in the past.
Killian’s daily routine otherwise consists of painful, lengthy, extensive workouts that leave him clutching his abdomen in agony while every muscle pops out in emulation of the inhuman standards set by this most bizarre of competitions. He works out maniacally, competes in local bodybuilding contests with hopes of ascending to national meets, and posts what he thinks are inspirational videos online that draw comments like “Why hasn’t this guy killed himself yet?” and “Hella incel vibes.”
It’s clear from the start that Killian is lonely, isolated, psychologically scarred and emotionally stunted; his interactions with the customers at the supermarket where he works are awkward and socially inept, and his attraction to checkout girl Jessie (Haley Bennett) leads to a date that the word “disastrous” doesn’t really do justice to. But Killian’s other interactions with the world, unfortunately, end up in much worse places than his date slipping out the back on the pretense of going to the bathroom: after a dismissive phone call with a paint shop that refuses to come back to the house for some touch-ups, Killian heads there and promptly destroys the storefront, literally hurling himself through the glass windows in a senseless rage that can only be described as primal.
Jonathan Majors stars in ‘Magazine Dreams’. Photo: Briarcliff Entertainment.
As we find out from the doctor that treats Killian after that incident (which oddly – in one of the movie’s strange lapses of logic – does not end up with Killian behind bars for even one night), he is wrecking his body with the steroids he takes to achieve his physical goals (he’s obsessed with the size of his deltoids, which one judge a while back told him were too small). He’s also decimating his mind: “I control my emotions, my emotions don’t control me,” he tells himself at one point, which is about as far away from the truth as even his delusional imagination can handle.
But Killian is clearly a figure who also deserves our empathy: as a large Black man who can clearly intimidate people, he’s already isolated from normal social interaction to a certain extent, which writer-director Elijah Bynum emphasizes in subtle yet pointed ways (one customer in the supermarket apologizes to him for no discernible reason after she catches him glancing at her). On top of that, his haunted past, his search for human connection of any kind – which leads him to both his labored attempt at romance and his obsession with fame and celebrity culture – and the punishment he puts himself through all lead him down the same dark path we’ve seen in films like ‘Taxi Driver, ‘You Were Never Really Here,’ and ‘Nightcrawler.’
(L to R) Jonathan Majors and Elijah Bynum on the set of ‘Magazine Dreams’. Photo: Briarcliff Entertainment.
Bynum’s film doesn’t quite travel to the same conclusions as any of those, and as ‘Magazine Dreams’ rolls on, there’s a certain repetitive nature to the narrative that kicks in. The repercussions of some of Killian’s actions are never made quite clear, and during the movie’s third act we begin to wonder how much of what’s happening is real and how much is occurring in his head. After the excruciatingly intense realism of the earlier parts of the film, this more surreal final stretch isn’t quite as effective, and the ambiguous way in which ‘Magazine Dreams’ ends doesn’t match the power of the rest of the film.
Despite its flawed structure, this is still a provocative film to watch, and a striking one as well: Bynum and cinematographer Adam Arkapaw have crafted a beautiful succession of images, often casting Killian in deep blues and reds to indicate his emotional wavelength while capturing every gleaming striation of the formidable physiques of him and other bodybuilders. Jason Hill’s original score complements this quite well, as do the passages of both classical music and screaming death metal that accentuate certain scenes – the latter effectively deployed as Killian races in his car to enact his wrath on the paint shop. The production design also captures the drab, rundown nature of Killian’s world, from the empty, staring windows of defunct businesses to the sweaty, kaleidoscopic club at which Killian finds himself one night, dancing frenziedly among others who have no idea of the human timebomb in their midst.
Cast and Performances
(L to R) Haley Bennett and Jonathan Majors in ‘Magazine Dreams’. Photo: Briarcliff Entertainment.
The supporting cast here is effective in what are truly minor roles: Haley Bennett brings a tentative grace to the role of Jessie, while Harrison Page delivers an exhausted, wounded dignity to William – a scene in which he gives some long-overdue comfort to his grandson stands out for its vulnerability. Elsewhere, Harriet Sansom Harris is a natural as the therapist that Killian sees, listening to him and encouraging him even as she knows he’s probably lying to her, while Taylour Paige is more or less wasted as a sex worker with whom Killian has an ultimately pointless encounter.
But let’s face it: this movie is pretty much a one-hander, and Majors – for whom this movie would have followed earlier triumphs like ‘Creed III,’ ‘Lovecraft Country,’ and ‘The Harder They Fall’ – dominates the screen for the entire two-hour running time, much of which he spends alone. Not only did the actor clearly sculpt his own body into the tortured form that passes for excellence in bodybuilding, but he brings an intensity to Killian’s volatile nature that is often as frightening and unpredictable as it is uncomfortable to watch. He’s in many ways a truly tragic figure, and Majors also brings his pain, loneliness, and sadness to light in a way that is both electrifying and moving. While ‘Magazine Dreams’ and Majors’ portrayal are both extreme in many ways, Killian’s broken nature is not.
Final Thoughts
Jonathan Majors stars in ‘Magazine Dreams’. Photo: Briarcliff Entertainment.
The release of ‘Magazine Dreams’ brings up a question that has bedeviled society for almost a decade in the wake of #MeToo and its cultural impact: can people pay their debt to society, be forgiven as a result, and resume their lives and careers? There’s no definitive answer to that, and in a way, the movie itself echoes those concerns: can a person climb out of an abyss that’s at least partially self-imposed, achieve peace, and find a way to flourish in the world?
The resolution is ultimately as uncertain for Killian Maddox as it is for the actor who portrays him, and on a moviegoing level, the age-old dilemma of separating the art from the artist is fully in play here. But if you can do that, ‘Magazine Dreams’ is a flawed, somewhat shaky, yet spellbinding experience that encapsulates the loneliness of living in a world where aspirations, connection, and serenity often elude our grasp.
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What is the plot of ‘Magazine Dreams’?
A lonely, deeply troubled aspiring bodybuilder (Jonathan Majors) pursues his dreams of fame and celebrity while also looking for human connection. But the damage he’s doing to both his body and psyche soon lead him to spiral down a dark, rage-fueled path.
Who is in the cast of ‘Magazine Dreams’?
Jonathan Majors as Killian Maddox
Haley Bennett as Jessie
Harrison Page as William Lattimore
Harriet Sansom Harris as Patricia Waldron
Taylour Paige as Pink Coat
Mike O’Hearn as Brad Vanderhorn
Jonathan Majors stars in ‘Magazine Dreams’. Photo: Briarcliff Entertainment.
Jonathan Majors has been found guilty of Misdemeanor Assault.
Marvel has announced that the actor is no longer working on its projects.
The trial even before the verdict has had a negative impact on his career.
There was a time when Jonathan Majors was a rising star who looked to be the Next Big Thing. He had been praised for his work in movies such as 2019’s ‘The Last Black Man in San Francisco’, 2020’s ‘Da 5 Bloods’ and had serious buzz off indie movie ‘Magazine Dreams’, which scored praise at Sundance this year.
And then there was the tag-team kudos from his role as Kang (and variants) in Marvel shows and movies such as ‘Loki’ Season 1 and ‘Ant-Man & The Wasp: Quantumania’, with the studio betting big on his character for future projects, and his performance in ‘Creed III’.
Now? All seems to have gone very wrong for the actor.
Majors was arrested back in March on several assault and harassment charges. In the complaint, his accuser claims the defendant “struck her about the face with an open hand, causing substantial pain and a laceration behind her ear.” She also claims he “put his hand on her neck, causing bruising and substantial pain.”
He was charged with several counts of assault in the third degree, three counts of attempted assault in the third degree, one count of aggravated harassment in the second degree, and one count harassment in the second degree.
Neither he nor his accuser testified during the nearly two-week trial, and he was today convicted of assaulting his ex-girlfriend, Grace Jabbari. A Manhattan jury found the actor guilty of two misdemeanor counts of harassment and assault but acquitted him on two other counts.
The six-person jury found Majors not guilty on one count of intentional assault in the third degree and one count of aggravated harassment in the second degree. He’ll be sentenced on February 6th, with the potential of up to a year in jail, which could be reduced to probation.
Marvel, via a spokesperson has announced that it is severing ties with the actor following the verdict, which means plans for him to feature in ‘Avengers: The Kang Dynasty’ have been scrubbed.
What exactly Marvel will do about the movie remains to be seen, though it’s worth noting that it’s in need of a director after ‘Shang-Chi’ filmmaker Destin Daniel Cretton stepped away to focus on other projects.
As for Kang, whether the character will simply disappear, or the company plans to re-cast the role remains to be seen for now.
Disney’s Searchlight arm had picked up ‘Magazine Dreams’ at Sundance for a sizeable (though not officially disclosed) sum and was planning to release it this month. But the movie is now off the schedule for the foreseeable future.
As the trial continued, Majors was fired by his manager 360 Entertainment and publicist The Lede Company. The actor was also let go from myriad projects including Protagonist Pictures‘ feature adaptation of the Walter Mosley novel, ‘The Man in My Basement’, ad campaigns for the Texas Rangers MLB team and the U.S. Army. Several other projects involving Majors — including Spike Lee’s ‘Da Understudy’ for Amazon and the Dennis Rodman film ‘48 Hours in Vegas’ for Lionsgate — remain in limbo.
‘Loki’s Michael Waldron will write the script for Marvel’s ‘Avengers: The Kang Dynasty’.
He previously wrote ‘Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness’ for the studio.
Destin Daniel Cretton recently dropped out of directing ‘The Kang Dynasty’.
Michael Waldron is quickly becoming a go-to writer for Marvel. Which isn’t too surprising, since he launched and ran (alongside director Kate Herron) the first season of ‘Loki’, which became one of the most successful Marvel/Disney+ series to hit small screens.
For his latest assignment, he’s going to write the script for the company’s ‘Avengers: The Kang Dynasty’ (assuming it keeps that title; more on that below).
That, in turn led to the company hiring Waldron to write ‘Avengers: Secret Wars’, which is following ‘The Kang Dynasty’.
In addition to his MCU duties, he’s also set up a wealth of other projects (all being kept quiet for now) via a big deal between Marvel/20th Television and his production company, Anomaly Pictures.
At San Diego Comic-Con in 2022, Marvel Studios boss Kevin Feige announced a swath of new Marvel movies and shows, outlining much of Phases 5 and 6 for his company.
With ‘Loki’s first season dropping the first breadcrumbs about the multiverse-spanning villain Kang (played by Jonathan Majors in the show and ‘Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania’), the plan was to build him up as the next big bad to follow Thanos.
That whole connected storyline was to have concluded in ‘Avengers: The Kang Dynasty’ in 2025 and ‘Avengers: Secret Wars’ in 2026.
It wasn’t long after that that Destin Daniel Cretton was announced as director for ‘The Kang Dynasty’ as part of his big overall Disney/Marvel deal in the wake of ‘Shang-Chi’ doing well.
Now, though, after some release date shifts for both ‘The Kang Dynasty’ (to 2026) and’ Secret Wars’ (moving to 2027), Cretton has stepped away from the director’s chair for the former movie.
Cretton will focus on other projects in the pipeline, including an in-the-works ‘Wonder Man’ TV series for Marvel and Disney+ and a potential ‘Shang-Chi’ sequel.
Marvel has been wrangling over how to deal with the Jonathan Majors situation. With the actor involved in a thorny legal issue, he’s not exactly someone the company’s parent Disney is looking to be in business with.
Jeff Loveness, who had been on board to write ‘Kang Dynasty’ was reportedly let go from the company at some point before Cretton left the movie.
Thanks to the multiverse idea, there is scope for the studio to pivot away from him, while there are plenty of other villains who could conceivably threaten the group of heroes. And with Waldron aboard, it appears that Kevin Feige and co. are looking for consistency between the two giant movies that wrap up Phase 6.
When Will ‘Avengers: The Kang Dynasty’ and ‘Avengers: Secret Wars’ Be in Theaters?
Currently ‘The Kang Dynasty’ is set for release on May 1, 2026, with ‘Secret Wars’ due on May 7, 2027.
Marvel Studios’ ‘Avengers: Secret Wars.’
Other Movies Similar to ‘Avengers: The Kang Dynasty:’
At San Diego Comic-Con in 2022, Marvel Studios boss Kevin Feige announced a swath of new Marvel movies and shows, outlining much of Phases 5 and 6 for his company.
With ‘Loki’s first season dropping the first breadcrumbs about the multiverse-spanning villain Kang (played by Jonathan Majors in the show and ‘Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania’), the plan was to build him up as the next big bad to follow Thanos.
That whole connected storyline was to have concluded in ‘Avengers: The Kang Dynasty’ in 2025 and ‘Avengers: Secret Wars’ in 2026.
It wasn’t long after that that Cretton was announced as director for ‘The Kang Dynasty’ as part of his big overall Disney/Marvel deal in the wake of ‘Shang-Chi’ doing well.
Now, though, after some release date shifts for both ‘The Kang Dynasty’ (to 2026) and’ Secret Wars’ (moving to 2027), the word has arrived via Deadline that Cretton has stepped away from the director’s chair for the former movie.
Between this news and rumblings about the future of Kang as a whole, it’s looking increasingly likely that Marvel might be moving away from the character altogether.
Talking on the House of R podcast, writer Joanna Robinson (who has plenty of Marvel sources having written a huge book on Marvel’s movies to date), mentioned that ‘Quantumania’ screenwriter Jeff Loveness, who had been on board to write ‘The Kang Dynasty’ was no longer working for the studio? The reason –– he’d been deep in planning the Kang storyline, but the studio appeared to be moving away from the whole idea.
It’s far from a giant shock, though, since Marvel has been wrangling over how to deal with the Jonathan Majors situation. With the actor involved in a thorny legal issue, he’s not exactly someone the company’s parent Disney is looking to be in business with.
Thanks to the multiverse idea, there is scope for the studio to pivot away from him.
Simu Liu in Marvel Studios’ ‘Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings.’
Yet unlike Loveness, Cretton is staying on Team Marvel.
He’s been busy working on the ‘Wonder Man’ series he co-created with Andrew Guest, which has been delayed because of the actors’ strike. Now that is back in action, and he can dedicate more of his time to it.
Plus, Cretton remains attached to make the ‘Shang-Chi’ sequel, though that has no official release date yet.
From the sounds of it all, this is another wrinkle for Marvel, but the studio is naturally staying tight-lipped on its plans, so nothing is official until actual announcements.
Marvel Studio’s ‘The Multiverse Saga.’
Other Movies Similar to ‘Avengers: The Kang Dynasty:’
(L to R) Sebastian Stan, Scarlett Johansson, Chris Evans, Mark Ruffalo, Danai Gurira, and Chadwick Boseman in ‘Avengers: Infinity War.’ Photo: Marvel Studios.
Preview
Marvel is reportedly considering a return for some beloved Avengers stars.
Jonathan Majors’ ongoing legal problems are proving a headache.
The studio has faced issues with newer movies such as ‘Blade’ and others.
There was a time when Marvel was on top of the Hollywood tree –– its movies were almost always guaranteed hits, people were loving the interconnected storylines and there was hope that the Marvel Cinematic Universe could stretch its Hydra-like tentacles into the world of streaming, providing a wealth of content for Disney+.
These days, there is more trouble than an assault from Doctor Doom (who we’ll have to wait to see on screen). Recent releases aside from ‘Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3’ have failed to set the box office alight and there have been quality concerns about visual effects on screens big and small, a key element of making the stories work.
(L to R) Chris Hemsworth, Scarlett Johansson, Jeremy Renner, Mark Ruffalo, Chris Evans, and Robert Downey Jr. in ‘The Avengers.’ Photo: Courtesy of Marvel Studios.
While this is far from a concrete possibility, the Variety story cites sources saying there have been discussions about bringing back the likes of Robert Downey Jr., Chris Evans and Scarlett Johansson to reprise their roles as fan-favorite Avengers characters.
Of course, all that would depend on whether the actors would even want to return at this point, and perhaps more crucially, the realization that the budget to pay the salaries of the likes of RDJ would require breaking several piggy banks.
Still, the idea of the Avengers as a selling point would help assuage issues with someone who was planned to be the big bad of future team-up films. ‘Avengers: The Kang Dynasty’ and ‘Avengers: Secret Wars’.
Yes, one of the biggest problems currently facing Marvel is Jonathan Majors, who appeared as different variations of the multiversal character Kang in ‘Loki’ Season 1 (he’s back as another version for Season 2) and ‘Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania’.
But Majors is embroiled in a huge domestic violence legal case with a trial set for later this month. And that is a giant headache for both Marvel and parent company Disney (which pulled the planned release of his Sundance movie ‘Magazine Dreams’ from the release slate amid all the legal worries).
The MCU team has yet to specify how it’ll address the issue going forward –– but it needs to figure it out quickly as the first of the new ‘Avengers’ movies was supposed to be shooting next year (though that could also be delayed thanks to the knock-on effect of the actors’ strike). There’s a chance the studio could recast the role or pivot to some other villain.
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‘Blade’s blunted path to screens
Marvel Studios’ ‘Blade.’
‘Blade’ was supposed to be one title that got fans particularly excited. Marvel boss Kevin Feige announced Oscar winner Mahershala Ali as the new version of the vampire-battling vigilante once portrayed by Wesley Snipes.
Yet that has faced its own issues – two directors so far, several writers, innumerable drafts of the script (including, reportedly, one where Blade was the fourth lead in his own movie) and a shutdown six weeks before shooting was to begin.
Michael Green, who wrote ‘Logan’, is the latest writer aboard and the aim is to shoot the movie on a cheaper budget next year.
(L to R) Ryan Reynolds as Deadpool and Hugh Jackman as Wolverine in ‘Deadpool 3.’ Photo courtesy of Ryan Reynolds Instagram account.
There are, at least, some positives if the Marvel team can get the right –– the Fox deal gave Disney the rights to the Fantastic Four and X-Men, and Feige and co. have been figuring out how to introduce two of the most famous comic book teams into the MCU.
‘Deadpool 3’, which was halfway through shooting when the actors’ strike shut it down, is certainly seeing some excitement, and that’s a potential way to bridge to the future.
And no one should write off the Marvel team completely –– they’ve shown a remarkable ability to bounce back and come up with hits.
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Hugh Jackman will return as Wolverine in Marvel Studios’ ‘Deadpool 3.’
‘Loki’s second season scored huge viewership on Disney+ upon its return last week.
Only ‘The Mandalorian’s Season 3 premiere this last March had higher initial viewership.
The show sees the return of Tom Hiddleston’s Marvel character, whose original season debuted in 2021.
After some less than thrilling reviews and audience figures for recent Marvel series such as ‘Secret Invasion’, Disney must be breathing a sigh of relief and offering up blessings to the God of Mischief.
Because the first episode of Season 2 for ‘Loki’, starring Tom Hiddleston, has racked up some healthy viewing figures.
What were the viewing figures for the premiere of ‘Loki’ Season 2?
The premiere of the new season, which dropped on Thursday, October 5th, has garnered 10.9 million views globally within three days of becoming available for streaming, at least according to Disney’s own calculations.
And the Marvel series was not just popular with viewers, but also critics. Season two of ‘Loki’ holds an 88% score on review site Rotten Tomatoes, which makes it certified “fresh”. That goes along with a stellar 94% audience score on the site.
So clearly, people are happy to see the return of Loki and the Time Variance Agency. And we also enjoyed the latest episode.
In fact, the only series that has scored higher than ‘Loki’ is the third season of ‘The Mandalorian’, which landed on Disney+ this past March. Mando’s triumph is not really a surprise since there was plenty of pent-up demand for the return of the ‘Star Wars’ series.
‘Loki’ similarly benefitted from fan anticipation since Season 1 landed all the way in 2021.
The new season picks up immediately in the aftermath of the shocking season finale when Loki (Tom Hiddleston) finds himself in a battle for the soul of the Time Variance Authority.
Along with Mobius (Owen Wilson), Hunter B-15 (Wunmi Mosaku) and a team of new and returning characters, Loki navigates an ever-expanding and increasingly dangerous multiverse in search of Sylvie (Sophia Di Martino), Judge Renslayer (Gugu Mbatha-Raw), Miss Minutes (Tara Strong) and the truth of what it means to possess free will and glorious purpose.
Returning from Season 1 is Eugene Codero as Casey, a low-ranking TVA worker who was shown as a Hunter in a parallel timeline at the end of that first season but will be back in his original role to help Loki and co. Jonathan Majors, meanwhile, is once more playing another Kang variant, this time a 19th century professor named Victor Timely (first glimpsed in an end credits scene of ‘Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania’) who has a strong connection to the organization.
Premiering on Disney+ beginning October 5th is the six-episode second season of the popular Marvel series ‘Loki.’
What is the plot of ‘Loki’ Season 2?
Following the events of ‘Loki’ season 1, Loki (Tom Hiddleston) finds himself in a battle for the soul of the Time Variance Authority. Along with Mobius (Owen Wilson), Hunter B-15 (Wunmi Mosaku) and a team of new and returning characters, Loki navigates an ever-expanding and increasingly dangerous multiverse in search of Sylvie (Sophia Di Martino), Judge Renslayer (Gugu Mbatha-Raw), Miss Minutes (Tara Strong) and the truth of what it means to possess free will and glorious purpose.
Moviefone recently had the pleasure of speaking with Producer and Marvel Creative Executive Kevin Wright about his work on ‘Loki’ season 2, the show’s time-jumping, if Loki is truly a hero or a villain, Loki and Mobius’ relationship, Tom Hiddleston and Owen Wilson’s on screen chemistry, introducing Victor Timely, and setting up Kang’s variants for other MCU projects.
‘Loki’ Season 2 producer and Marvel Creative Executive Kevin Wright.
You can read the full interview below or click on the video player above to watch our interview.
Moviefone: To begin with, season 2 of ‘Loki’ deals with the concept of time and you also play with time within the story. Can you talk about plotting the second season and the challenges of playing with time?
Kevin Wright: They are immense. We thought, “Hey, we made a show about timelines and multiverse in season one. We’re going to make it even harder on ourselves this season by doing time loops.” It was something we decided really early on, Eric Martin, our head writer, and myself. It was really appealing. Eric had said jokingly early on, but also seriously, “We can land this. It’s going to be messy for a while because we’ve got to take apart the engine and plant flags in various places, but we can get there. It’s just going to take a lot of refinement and fine-tuning.” It was an exciting proposition because we didn’t want to come back and just repeat season one. We knew we couldn’t come back and play the hits, and we knew that the audience was on board for the weird timey stuff in season one, and that if we are smart about it and we make it digestible, they’ll be on board for this too. The trick was just always make it as serviceable as possible so that we can tell our character story. If it doesn’t get in the way of that, if it ever starts feeling like homework, or it’s confusing and not intriguing, we’ve got to recalibrate. So that was always the baseline for us.
MF: One of the questions season 2 asks is: Is Loki truly a hero or a villain at his core? What is your personal opinion?
KW: I think to ever be the best version of yourself, you have to embrace all aspects of your past. Loki has a lot of things in his past that I’m sure would be seen as villainous. He’s been an anti-hero. He’s played completely in that gray. He’s had redemptive arcs. I think what we liked was putting him on the path to heroism and seeing if this character could get there or if it becomes too hard, if he backslides, or if he’s going to make the right choices. Because heroism gets very tough if you’re put in a position where maybe you have nothing to gain from it. So to me, it was about, could this character ever be the best version of himself because we all see the promise, and it feels like the audience is always rooting for him to get there. That was fun to build into the narrative itself.
MF: Can you talk about Loki and Mobius’ relationship in season 2 and Tom Hiddleston and Owen Wilson’s on screen chemistry together?
KW: It’s unreal what the two of those have captured. Look, I think the exciting thing was, people really liked them in season one, and it makes it very easy then to continue on to not only the detective work but the further exploration of these two characters. The great thing in season one was, Mobius disarms Loki in that first episode in the time theater by saying, “I see what you are. I’m not judging you. Let’s have a conversation.” He was very accepting in a way that I don’t think Loki ever had, and it allowed us to kind of get this version of Loki that we hadn’t seen before. So it just felt natural that we could continue to do it this season. But also that Loki hopefully could start disarming Mobius so we could learn more about him and what makes him tick. So for those guys, I’m sure every one of our writers would say it’s a joy to write for them. So it’s about giving them meaty things to dig into because they’re going to bring so much of their own to it, not just in performance, but character, dialogue, and everything. They take it and run with it.
MF: Finally, can you talk about the challenges of introducing He Who Remains last season, as well as Victor Timely this season, and setting up the different variants of Kang for other future Marvel projects?
KW: I think for us, it wasn’t a challenge. I think the fun thing was, we knew we wanted to do Victor. Victor was an idea that we were trying to get into season one, and it was just never going to be able to fit because there’s too much story. But it was exciting because the last thing we’re hearing is that war’s coming. All of these terrible things are happening, and then the most unexpected version of this guy pops up, and he pops up in the past. That was exciting. He was going to be an eccentric. I think for us, we were like, “Are we going to be allowed to do this? Do we have to go further and do the scary version?” It was nothing but embraced because I think it just allows for that much more dynamic storytelling going forward that this guy can be anyone. He can pop up in any form. That’s what gets exciting about it.
Launching on Disney+ on October 5th (with one episode), the second season of Marvel’s ‘Loki’ is a welcome return for one of the better shows to be produced by the company and maintains a lot of what worked the first time around.
And new additions to the story, such as Ke Huy Quan (who knows a thing two about acting in a multiversal story after ‘Everything Everywhere All at Once), add to the entertainment value.
The new season picks up immediately in the aftermath of the shocking season finale when Loki (Tom Hiddleston) finds himself in a battle for the soul of the Time Variance Authority.
Along with Mobius (Owen Wilson), Hunter B-15 (Wunmi Mosaku) and a team of new and returning characters, Loki navigates an ever-expanding and increasingly dangerous multiverse in search of Sylvie (Sophie Di Martino), Judge Renslayer (Gugu Mbatha-Raw), Miss Minutes (Tara Strong) and the truth of what it means to possess free will and glorious purpose.
The ensemble for the new season also features (as mentioned) Ke Huy Quan, plus other new recruits Rafael Casal, Kate Dickie and Liz Carr.
Returning from Season 1 is Eugene Codero as Casey, a low-ranking TVA worker who was shown as a Hunter in a parallel timeline at the end of that first season but will be back in his original role to help Loki and co. Jonathan Majors, meanwhile, is once more playing another Kang variant, this time a 19th century professor named Victor Timely (first glimpsed in an end credits scene of ‘Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania’) who has a strong connection to the organization.
Even without show creator Michael Waldron (who remains peripherally involved as an executive producer) and director Kate Heron, who was responsible for so much of the style and tone of the first season, it’s pleasing to report that ‘Loki’ continues to be a fantastically fun watch.
With Eric Martin, who was a key part of the team for the first season, taking over running the show here and the likes of Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead (‘The Endless’ and ‘Synchronic’ in theaters and already part of the MCU thanks to their work on ‘Moon Knight‘) inheriting directorial duties, ‘Loki’s second run happily maintains the quality and pulp fiction of the first.
Shouldering the heavy load of continuing the story after that universe-hopping cliffhanger, the new episodes (press were given the first four), throw us straight back into chaos and confusion of the Time Variance Authority as Loki (Hiddleston remains perfect in the role, switching between confident and frazzled on a whim), Mobius (Wilson, still a great counterpart for him) and others try to figure out what is really going.
There are several solid cast additions, but we have to single out Ke Huy Quan, who continues to enjoy a remarkable yet well-earned career renaissance. Off the back of his Oscar win for ‘Everything Everywhere’, he’s superb as genius technical whizz Ouroboros (“OB” for short) who maintains all the technology of the TVA from his cluttered basement lair. Quan fits in perfectly into the show’s world, able to make the humor work and delivering exposition without having you scratch your head or reach for the fast-forward button.
This is a show that knows how to use its ensemble and while the focus is usually on Loki, Mobius or the ever-snarky Sylvie (Di Martino continues to impress), the character love is shared, with some of the supporting roles (Quan and Casal’s Hunter X-5) given their own convincing stories.
Reason to celebrate the show and its title character’s return, then –– which has not always been the case for recent Marvel TV work (looking at you, ‘Secret Invasion’).
The problems with the second season are relatively minor –– though, again, we were only sent the first four episodes, so it remains to be seen if it sticks the landing, and whether it opts for the frustration of another cliffhanger.
There might be some checking their watches through the first episode, which somewhat has the burden of re-introducing the complex central conceit with all of its time branching, time-slipping and odd technology. Fortunately, later episodes pick up the pace and the story kicks into gear, though there is something of a whiff of familiarity occasionally as many of the plots involve a mission to find [insert name of object or person here] so as to avert [crisis X].
And in the annals of Obvious Product Placement, having Sylvie tracked down working at a McDonald’s must rank as quite the most ridiculous for a show as smart as this –– but then, Disney does love a good tie-in. What, no place for her at an Apple Store, with Loki-themed Apple Watches just waiting for eager consumers? Probably wouldn’t work with Loki’s retro futuristic aesthetic. But that’s a minor complaint.
More troubling is one aspect that ‘Loki’, even with all of its time-jumping couldn’t have predicted –– the more dubious (allegedly) aspects of Jonathan Majors’ personal life that complicate the experience of watching his work. His performance as Timely is good (it’s actually more entertaining in some ways than ‘Quantumania’s Kang), but it’s tough to separate what is going on legally from what is on screen.
Yet ‘Loki’s second season still represents one of the most inventive and entertaining examples of what Marvel’s team can do. Even with the connective tissue that is required to the rest of the MCU, this does a lot more than some more basic superhero stories and continues to proudly chart its own weird branch of the massive, linked universe.
