Category: News

It was kind of surprising to learn David Leitch, after his Deadpool 2 made just under $800 million, would not be directing Deadpool 3. (Shawn Levy has been tapped for that assignment, whenever that may even be.) Then again, it’s also actually kind of surprising Leitch, to this point, has never done a second movie in a franchise. He’s done successful stints with John Wick, Marvel, Fast & Furious, then moseyed on to something else. He certainly doesn’t seem against the idea – he gets excited talking about a possible sequel to Atomic Blond – but also admits, yes, he’s drawn to new things. So maybe it’s circumstance, but there’s probably something to this. (Ahead he does explain why he’s not doing Deadpool 3.

Speaking of new things, here comes Bullet Train. Brad Pitt stars as Ladybug, a self-conscious hitman in a movie that plays out more like an episode of Three’s Company than a traditional action movie. (There are a few instances of characters with mistaken information that leads to hilarious hijinks. I mean this as a compliment.) It’s basically a full-on comedy in the body of an action movie. And this is by design, as the original script, based on Kōtarō Isaka’s novel, is a much darker story but Pitt decided people were in the mood for laughs, so the movie takes a different direction.

Speaking of different directions, Leitch’s next film will be The Fall Guy, based on the 1980s series, and starring Ryan Gosling as a stuntman named Colt Seavers (Leitch doing a movie about stunt people should be exciting on its own) who, if it stays true to the series, also learns how to become a bounty hunter. Leitch gives us a preview of The Fall Guy and, perhaps, teases if Ryan Gosling will be singing the theme song just like Lee Majors did on the series.

Last time we spoke was, I believe, Hobbs & Shaw.

Yep.

Like I said then, Hobbs alone, you’ve got yourself a movie. Then you throw in Shaw for free? Come on. That was a deal.

Yes. That movie, you paid for the whole seat, but you only need the edge, I guess. It was a riot. And wildly appreciated. Man, maybe we get to explore that world again someday soon.

So I’m watching Bullet Train, and I mean this as a compliment, it reminded me of Three’s Company.

Oh, awesome. I love Three’s Company.

Because there are a few instances of mistaken information that leads to hilarious hijinks.

I love that. I love that. I think, ultimately, the tone of the movie is so important. And we went for … Brad and I had a conversation early on of, comedically, how far do we want to go because there’s a little more darker sadistic version of this movie.

What was the change in tone? Because this movie is very funny.

Oh, good. Good. I’m glad. Because that was what we set out to do. Look, the novel is … It’s beautiful. Kōtarō Isaka’s work is obviously prolific. In Japan, he’s a rockstar of an artist. And to even be able to have an adaptation of his work is a beautiful thing. But it’s dark. His vibe is a little bit more sadistic and those characters are maybe less relatable. And it’s really hard boiled genre stuff that’s rigged and that I love. I had these conversations with Brad. And he’s like, “Dude, I’m laughing my ass off at Zach’s adaptation, and I think we go for the laughs and we go big and we go broad and we go unapologetic. This is what people want right now.”

I think, right now, that’s true.

And I’m like: Okay. You and me, holding hands. We’re jumping off this bridge, and we’re doing it. So we went big. And even when Aaron and Brian came to set, I don’t even think they knew already what was already in my head and what Brad and I had been discussing. Like, we can be broad. So the minute I unleashed them in that first scene where they start to have banter, and they’re like, “You mean improv?” And we’re like, “Yeah. Have fun.” I already got stuff that’s great. Now you want to try some bigger things? Let’s go big. And then that became the process through the film. We were all trying to have fun.

So I’m curious. So let’s say, for whatever reason, this starts filming before the pandemic starts. Do you stick with the dark version then?

No… I don’t know. I mean…

My opinion is it’s been such a dark time anyway, people are in the mood to feel good at a movie theater and laugh and have fun. And if this was a dark movie, I’m not sure I’d respond to that as much as I maybe would have four or five years ago.

Correct. I think pandemic, no pandemic, wherever we are in the world right now, I think we want to go to a place where we can escape and have fun and laugh and feel good and share sort of this fun, cathartic experience communally and then go home. It’s not to say you can’t explore that in a drama.

Oh, sure. Well, I’ll use an example. I wasn’t in the mood, at this point in history, to watch James Bond die. I wanted to see him win and save the day.

And I think as filmmakers and storytellers, you want to create things that the audience can respond to and enjoy. At least I do. And I want to take the audience on a ride of fun and thrills and feels, but ultimately leaving the theater feeling good.

I’ve noticed this summer there are movies like Top Gun and Nope that have defined characters and a clear plot. And your movie does that, too. Over the last few years summer movies have tended to be unnecessarily convoluted.

I think that that’s sometimes the special sauce. I think too much plot can undermine an experience or undermine a great character. You’re servicing all these different masters, and you have two hours to tell the story. We want to spend time with these characters that are sadistically fun, but ultimately relatable. Ladybug is relatable. The brotherhood between Lemon and Tangerine is relatable. Joey King’s character with Michael Shannon, even though she’s so sadistic, that scene with her and her father, there’s a moment of empathy for her like, “Of course she’s a sociopath. He ignored her her entire life.” And I just love telling that stuff. And the simplicity that was there on the page and that we tried to amplify with the performances made it a special one for me.

Speaking of a sadistic character that we like to spend time with, Aaron Taylor-Johnson as Tangerine. When I see him in interviews, he seems like this jovial fellow. But a lot of movies have him doing an American accent and playing a stoic character. You just let him run loose in this thing and it looked like he was finally having the time of his life in a movie.

I do think he was and I think he was feeling in his wheelhouse. It was the pandemic when we shot this, so everyone was raising their hands to be in it and I had the blessed opportunity to have people read that wouldn’t normally read. Aaron Taylor-Johnson doesn’t need to read. But he wanted to, and he’s like, “I want to show you.”

So he had this character in mind.

Right. “Awesome. You want to read? Let’s hear it.” And he really did come with that character fully fleshed out in this West Ham, East End thug that he knew from growing up in London and he could just turn on at a switch. And he was chaotic and unhinged, and he felt dangerous but also funny. It was instant. Within five minutes of him riffing with the character I was like, “I want him to play this guy.” And so look, I’m glad that fate brought this character to us. He got to show what he’s really capable of. And I think there are a lot of people in Hollywood who know, but he just doesn’t have the right roles where he can really let it go. And thank God that Tangerine was that.

I’m curious what your relationship with Brad Pitt was before this movie. You used to be his stunt double?

Yeah. I was Brad’s stunt double for four or five films.

Okay. So Fight Club, The Mexican…

It was Fight Club, The Mexican, Troy, Mr. & Mrs. Smith.

So you had a pretty good working relationship before this.

Yeah. We had been around the world together and run a show. Troy was six months, and there was a lot of training involved and choreography and wearing skirts together….

You actually just made a wistful face. Like, “What a time that was.”

I look back on that time in my life, it was early on in my stunt career. It was five, six years of back-to-back movies working with Brad. And it was really influential in my development as a filmmaker. I was working, observing these big directors in these big movies like David Fincher, like Wolfgang, Doug Liman, Gore Verbinski. I got to see them all work for the run of the show. And for a guy who wanted to make movies who was a stunt man who had an eye on the director chair, what a great sort of playground to be there every single day and watching these directors make movies.

Well, I’m curious. When I was joking about Hobbs & Shaw when we started and you mentioned exploring that world again. But you haven’t made a second movie in the same franchise yet. And I’m curious why you’re not going to do Deadpool 3. Is that just circumstance, or is it what you’re doing on purpose?

It’s probably more of what I’m doing and some circumstance. I love all of those worlds, and they’re all precious to me. Starting with John Wick. Chad has taken over that franchise and executed it beautifully. And Deadpool is amazing. And Atomic Blonde, I would love to go back. When I look back, I would love to go back to those worlds, but I think the way it’s worked out for me, or fate has brought me to this place, is that I get new opportunities and they’re really awesome, interesting, as well. Now moving on and doing The Fall Guy with Gosling, we’re prepping right now.

So is The Fall Guy the reason you’re not doing Deadpool 3?

No. Look, we had conversations about Deadpool 3, but I just was … I had things in the pipeline, too. And it was never, “Hey, do you want to do it or not want to do it?” or whatever. I think it was more we knew our dance cards were kind of full on both sides. And we have a window. And Marvel has calendars.

I do love The Fall Guy. I still have a The Fall Guy board game and a The Fall Guy lunchbox. So is it Colt Seavers?

It’s Colt.

Is there a Howie? Is it the same thing, or is it different?

Well, it is definitely a re-imagining. I think it’s contemporary idea. I mean, I think that the DNA of him, there’s going to be touchstones to the original. But it’s an origin story and it’s about a stuntman who goes on location and some things happen. And I think maybe through that process, he might discover he’s got a really impressive skill set of things that could be used for not only just stunts.

But also bounty hunting.

Maybe. Maybe.

Will Ryan Gosling sing the theme song?

[Laughs] TBD.

‘Bullet Train’ opens in theaters on August 5th. You can contact Mike Ryan directly on Twitter.

“The Bells” is the 71st best episode of Game of Thrones, as voted on by IMDb users. Put another way, it’s the third worst episode of the series. In the season eight episode, Daenerys Targaryen goes full girlboss and, with some help from her dragon Drogon, destroys King’s Landing. It was the most-watched episode of Thrones ever (until the equally confounding series finale), but the reception was so mixed that the cast and crew tried to defend the muddled motivation behind Daenerys’ heel-turn — and failed.

It would be a reasonable assumption — understandable even! — that everyone associated with Game of Thrones would want to sweep “The Bells” under the proverbial rug and never discuss it again. But the episode came up during a recent Empire magazine interview with House of the Dragon co-showrunner Ryan J. Condal.

“Daenerys resurrected this idea that, when you’re the only person in the world with nuclear weapons, you can either be a force for peace, or you can be a tyrant,” he said about the connection between “The Bells” and the prequel series. “The line between those two things is very thin. That’s definitely something this show will explore.”

Miguel Sapochnik, who directed “The Bells” and oversees House of the Dragon with Condal, also talked about the debate over the episode.

[For Sapochnik], the divided reaction and backlash around Daenerys’ devastation of the kingdom hasn’t factored into how they’ve approached this show; there’ll be no playing it safe, and no easy endings “Life doesn’t end the way you want it to!” Sapochnik told Empire. “I think we very much wanted to pay attention to not that.” Condal agrees: “It doesn’t really factor in at all. I think the minute you as a creator start playing defense, you’re just taking the ground from beneath your feet. Should we be so lucky to have such a large and passionate fanbase that will debate our show! I think that in itself is a sign of success.”

House of the Dragon premieres on August 21.

(Via Empire)

Jake Gyllenhaal’s Road House reboot is actually happening. A little over a year ago, there were rumblings that the actor and director Doug Liman were looking to get the project going after Amazon swallowed up MGM, and now, it’s officially on the books. Gyllenhaal will star in the remake of the Patrick Swayze classic that’s easily one of the late actor’s most iconic roles. Gyllenhaal will have some big shoes (and a big, gorgeous mullet) to fill.

“I’m thrilled to put my own spin on the beloved ‘Road House’ legacy, and I can’t wait to show audiences what Jake and I are going to do with this iconic role,” Liman said in a statement to Variety:

“’Road House’ is a homerun for us. Not only is it a nod to fans of the original, but it is also a big, fun, broad audience movie,” stated Amazon Studios head Jennifer Salke. “We are thrilled to collaborate with Joel, Doug, and this great cast led by Jake Gyllenhaal, and for them to come together to reimagine the classic MGM film as an action-packed adventure for our global audience.”

Meanwhile, over at Hulu, another ’80s classic is getting the reboot traffic. According to Deadline, 20th Century is in final negotiations with Selena Gomez to star in a remake of Working Girl for on the streaming service. Released in 1988, the original workplace comedy starred Melanie Griffith, Harrison Ford, Sigourney Weaver, and a burgeoning young actor named Alec Baldwin. Like Road House, it also had ’80s hair for days, so good luck to everyone involved should any of these projects decide to be period pieces.

(Via Variety, Deadline)

(This post contains spoilers for the Better Call Saul episode, “Breaking Bad.”)

Even though Breaking Bad fans were expecting a Jesse/Walt/Saul Goodman reunion on the final season of Better Call Saul, it was still a wonderful (almost) surprise when the dysfunctional duo showed up on the latest episode of the hit AMC series. And it was also a good reminder of just how long it has been since we first met Walt and Jesse nearly 15 (!) years ago.

Obviously aging exists, but the show decided not to try out The Irishman-style of de-aging the iconic characters. Better Call Saul writer and director Thomas Schnauz told Variety that “it is what it is” when it comes to bridging the gap between Better Call Saul and Breaking Bad’s timeline crossovers. “We don’t do a ton of de-aging on the show,” Schnauz explained. “There’s a little bit of stuff on the guys’ faces to take a few lines out here and there, but other than that, Aaron is not going to look like an 18-year-old kid or however old Jesse was during this time period.”

Despite the fact that they did minimal de-aging, it’s still a little jarring to see the actors jumping right back into a scene from over a decade ago. Fans on Twitter had fun with a 40-something actor getting back in the mindset of his 20-something character.

Meanwhile, everyone had nothing but nice words for Bryan Cranston, who seamlessly became a solid season two version of Walter White.

While reminiscing about older characters is fine and all, we should focus on the bigger picture here: where is Kim Wexler?!

The Miami Dolphins enter the 2022 season with high expectations and high hopes coming off a 9-8 year in 2021 and plenty of chatter this offseason about improvement from young quarterback Tua Tagovailoa, who has a new star receiver in Tyreek Hill and new head coach in Mike McDaniel.

However, if it were up to owner Stephen Ross, Tua would not be under center for the Dolphins this season, and they would instead have Tom Brady suiting up in Miami. We know that for certain after the NFL investigated the allegations from fired Dolphins coach Brian Flores that Ross wanted him to tank in 2019 and help recruit Brady to Miami while he was still in New England — and then again last year while Brady was in Tampa. The NFL released the findings of that investigation on Tuesday, in which they found no firm evidence of Ross offering Flores $100,000 for every game he lost in 2019 (although, the Dolphins pretty clearly were tanking that year), but did find “tampering violations of unprecedented scope and severity.”

The Dolphins were found to have tampered with Tom Brady in 2019 and 2021 — seemingly confirming the report that Brady’s retirement last year was part of a scheme to end up in Miami in 2023 — as well as having impermissible contact with Sean Payton’s agent in an effort to pair the now-“retired” coach with Brady next year. The penalties for those violations are a $1.5 million fine to Stephen Ross, a suspension through mid-October (whatever that means), a $500,000 fine for the team’s vice chairman Bruce Beal, and, most notably to fans, the loss of their 2023 first round pick and 2024 third round pick.

Given the importance of first round picks to building a team (either through the draft or through trades), that’s a significant loss for the Dolphins, particularly when you consider they didn’t even succeed in landing the player or coach they tampered to get. What’s most fascinating is what happens in the near future with Brady and Payton. Payton is still retired but most expect him to return at some point, but you have to think the NFL would not be pleased if he still ended up in Miami next. Brady likewise changed course, unretiring to stick with the Bucs and one would think any plans he had to join the Dolphins on the field in the near future will also not be able to happen.

One of the biggest trades in recent MLB history occurred on Tuesday afternoon. After weeks of speculation that Washington Nationals superstar Juan Soto could be on the move after he turned down a lengthy and lucrative offer from the team, the San Diego Padres went all-in and acquired both Soto and Josh Bell for a gigantic package of young talent.

It’s absolutely worth giving all of this up for Soto and Bell, and now, the Padres are positioning themselves to secure their second playoff berth in the last 16 years. If all goes right, those two, Manny Machado, and a returning Fernando Tatis Jr. will give the team enough firepower to win their first World Series in franchise history.

A number of MLB reporters got in on breaking the news, one of which was ESPN’s Jeff Passan. He’s usually pretty good about being on top of baseball news, and unsurprisingly, his timeline was filled with tweets about the trade.

Like all scoop havers, there were a whole lot of reply guys in Passan’s mentions that wanted to get more info that he was, assuredly, trying to get. The twist this time is that one of them was Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN, who apparently saw Passan working on the story in a break room at the ESPN office, took a picture, and dropped it into his replies with a simple demand.

Woj and Passan are friends, but still, it must’ve felt nice for Woj to be the one who hops into someone else’s replies like this for once.

Ahead of his oft-delayed upcoming album, Drillmatic: Heart Vs. Mind, rapper The Game revealed he plans to digitally unplug He made this announcement via Instagram, citing a lack of loyalty within his circles.

“I’ve always prided myself on my transparency” he said, “in tow with sharing every part of my life & myself with my family, friends & my fans… the past two weeks have been a nightmare for me. I have witnessed disloyalty on levels unimaginable by people I’ve trusted with my heart, money, career & livelihood. Not only have I been backstabbed & betrayed.. I’ve been left to pick up the pieces alone.”

The Game also revealed that he’s been in physical therapy for two weeks to help with inflammed muscles and a bruised tailbone due to overextending himself from working out. Additionally, he had an accident over the weekend in which he cut his “finger to the bone” and had to get six stitches.

He continued, noting that he would be taking a step back from his “phone, social media, group settings, and clubs,” in order to put the finishing touches on Drillmatic. He confirmed that the album, which has been pushed back several times, would be arriving later this month.

Drillmatic: Heart Vs. Mind is out 8/12 via State Of Gold.

We’re in the off-season of Jeopardy! as the calendar rolls over to August, but it’s clear that there’s a lot of new syndicated trivia goodness coming for fans in the fall. The show’s forthcoming Season 39 has its two hosts locked in, and as we learned this week there’s a lot of new content coming in the months ahead.

Even the reruns are a bit different this August. As executive producer Michael Davies detailed in a blog post in late July, the show’s producers hand-picked six weeks worth of episodes that will tease a lot of the content coming in the new season. More importantly, we also learned a rough hosting schedule now that Ken Jennings and Mayim Bialik are firmly locked in to co-host the show. Starting with Jennings hosting most episodes through the rest of the year, including a new tournament altogether:

Ken will kick off the season in September, host the inaugural Second Chance competition and the heavily anticipated Tournament of Champions featuring Amy Schneider, Matt Amodio, Mattea Roach, Ryan Long, and many, many more. His initial hosting run will take us through December. In the meantime, Mayim will host Celebrity Jeopardy! on ABC in primetime. When she takes over from Ken in January, the current plan is to have her host a couple of new tournaments as well as the Jeopardy! National College Championship and as many weeks as she can manage with her other primetime commitment to “Call Me Kat.” We know you value consistency, so we will not flip flop the hosts constantly and will keep you informed about the hosting schedule.

Ahead of the Tournament of Champions, the show will also put on a Second Chance Tournament featuring a group of 18 strong players who will get another shot at glory. The full list of contestants was revealed on Monday, as was the fact that the winner of that tournament gets a bid in the Tournament of Champions itself.

And as revealed on the show’s new podcast, Inside Jeopardy, the ToC will have a slightly tweaked format, likely starting with that automatic bid for the Second Chance Tourney winner. That podcast is likely to have loads of little details about the show and taping, which starts this week. No real offseason for syndicated game show trivia anymore, is there?

(Via Jeopardy.com)

As the MLB trade deadline approached, all eyes in the baseball world were on the future of Juan Soto. The Nationals superstar outfielder had turned down an extension offer prior to the All-Star break and when Washington wasn’t willing to make a new offer, they put him on the trade market and fielded offers from teams around the league.

While it took longer than expected, the Nationals finally found a deal they liked as the San Diego Padres continue to go all-in on their young, talented core, sending three of their top 14 prospects (per MLB.com’s prospect rankings) to Washington in the deal, along with three other players, per Jeff Passan and Jon Morosi.

Hassell and Wood are the Nos. 1 and 3 prospects in the Padres farm system, as the Nats get a pair of talented young outfielders and seriously bolster their farm system in the process. On the Padres side, they’re fine sending two of their top prospects out for the uber-talented Soto, as they are looking to battle the Dodgers for NL West supremacy for the long haul (after also trading for star closer Josh Hader from the Brewers), with Soto joining Manny Machado and Fernando Tatis Jr. (currently rehabbing a wrist fracture) in what will be one of the most fun, young trios in all of baseball.

You don’t often think of local politics when you think of rappers but in Atlanta, it seems there’s a growing political class consisting almost entirely of hip-hop artists who like to get involved by popping up at city council meetings and the like. During one such meeting on Monday this week (August 1), 2 Chainz and Killer Mike spoke out against a controversial new ordinance that they believe could have potentially crippling effects on small businesses in the area — including their own (2 Chainz owns a pair of restaurants; Mike has a chain of barbershops, among other interests).

In May, Atlanta’s city council introduced an amendment to current nuisance ordinances that allows the city to close a business deemed a nuisance by a municipal court twice in 24 months. That’s a lot of leeway — especially when business owners are being held accountable for incidents that occur outside their businesses and outside of their control. The amendment is ostensibly aimed at reducing violent crime around the city but owners like 2 Chainz and Mike are concerned it could be used to target Black-owned nightlife establishments, which would eventually be overtaken by franchises, according to Rolling Stone.

As Killer Mike put it during the meeting, “As Atlanta grows, corporations are going to be coming into here. Somebody is gonna have a nightlife in the convention city.” He noted that this could result in a choice between “the owners of Hard Rock [Cafe] or the owners of Hooters or the owners of a W Hotel, or it’s gonna be the little people that went to Frederick Douglas [high school]… and Southwest DeKalb, and schools like that” — in other words, locals. “We will not be electing council people from here, we will not be growing businesses from here. Because it will all be turned over to corporations… Are we going to keep Atlanta a place where local people can grow and thrive here?”

2 Chainz also spoke up, saying, “I’m very blessed, and I also like to be a blessing to others, and that’s what my businesses have allowed me to do. They need to retract some of the things they have on the ordinance. And I think crime is up everywhere, not just in Atlanta.” He’s right; crime is up around the country. It’s also still down from pre-pandemic levels, although that could change because of record inflation, a rising wave of evictions (after protections were removed by the federal government), and other crime-prevention protections expiring or losing funding (in favor of raising police budgets which… don’t prevent crime).

Even Young Thug’s father, Jeffrey Williams Sr., spoke up on behalf of businesses in place of his son (who is currently incarcerated because he rapped about his label, which supposedly has the same name as a gang). “If a crime happens by city hall,” he asked, “Was it city hall that caused it? You’re trying to hold artists responsible for the crime that’s in the city. Now you’re trying to point the finger at the nightlife to be part of the crime in the city.”