Happy Birthday Elijah Wood!

Happy Birthday Elijah Wood!  He had a very early role playing a video gamer in Back to the Future Part II (1989).  Next, he was in Forever Young (1992) discovering Mel Gibson’s pilot who has been put in cryogenic freeze.  He took the lead role in The Adventures of Huck Finn (1993) directed by Stephen Sommers.  Elijah was one of the students fighting the teachers possessed by parasites in The Faculty (1998) directed by Robert Rodriguez. It was in 2001, that Elijah took a defining role as Frodo Baggins in Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring.  He traveled to Mordor in The Lord of the Rings: the Two Towers (2002) and then fulfilled his task as Ringbearer in The Lord of the Rings: The Return fo the King (2003). 

Elijah Wood played the villainous serial killer, Kevin, in Sin City (2005) based on the Frank Miller graphic novels.  He was the voice of the lead penguin, Mumble, who has to dance in George Miller’s animated Happy Feet (2006) and the sequel Happy Feet Two (2011).  Elijah had a brief cameo reprising Frodo in The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey (2012).  He provided the voice of the lead, Beck, a program joining Tron in the animated series Tron: Uprising (2012-2013). Wood was on the other side of an invasion at a school as a teacher fighting kids infected by a strange virus in Cooties (2014).  In 2015, he fought alongside Vin Diesel as Dolan 37th, a priest tasked to fight witches in The Last Witch Hunter.  Elijah recently played Todd Brotzman, a sidekick to the detective investigating the supernatural in the BBC series, Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency (2016-1017).  He currently voices hotshot pilot Jace Rucklin in Star Wars: Resistance animated series.  Happy Birthday Elijah Wood!  

#ElijahWood, #LordoftheRings, #TheHobbitAnUnexpectedJourney, #StarWarsResistance 

Doctor Who, “Spyfall Part I”, Review!

The premiere episode of season twelve of Doctor Who is here!  It is currently streaming on BBC America in case you missed it.  There was also a showing in the theaters of part one and two at the theaters.  The episode written by Chris Chibnall begins with a pan down to reveal the Ivory Coast of West Africa.  A soldier (Melissa De Vries) with a sniper rifle is targeting a truck through her scope.  Something moves in the rocks behind her and she screams!  Then, it shifts to night over the Pacific Ocean, there is an aircraft with passengers.  A man (William Ely) asks a woman with glasses (Sacharissa Claxton) about a wash bag.  She takes it and enters the wash room to remove a message from toothpaste.  The woman uses her glasses to record the coded message and then eats it.  Again, there is a strange light as a blurry figure reaches for her.  Next, we have Moscow, Russia at night.  An Asian, young man (Brian Law) runs in the streets and reaches the safehouse.  The man rests on a couch and then looks up to see the blurry figure falling towards him!  The spy element mixed with a new Doctor Who monster is perfect. 

DOCTOR WHO - “Spyfall, Part I” - MANDIP GILL, TOSIN COLE, JODIE WHITTAKER, BRADLEY WALSH - Ben Blackall/BBC Studios. 

Then, we get a basketball game at Sheffield, Yorkshire.  The ball is passed to Ryan (Tosin Cole), a closeup as he sets himself up for a throw.  He does so and it bounces off the rim. Ryan is alone in his disappoint as his friends leave.  Tibo (Burom Tihngang), Ryan’s friends, asks him about his health problems to explains his travels with the Doctor.  They both see men in black suits with sunglasses in front of a car.  At her family’s home, Yasmin Khan (Mandip Gill) argues with her sister, Sonya (Bhavnisha Parmar) over giving her Ryan’s number.  Meanwhile, their father, Hakim (Ravin J. Ganatra) struggles with getting Alexa to work.  Najia (Shobna Gulati) worries over Yasmin taking time off work.  At the Sheffield police station, Yasmin’s boss, Sgt. Sunder (Asif Khan) doesn’t like her time away from being a probation officer.  He hints at her time away is undercover work.  They see the men in suits.  At a doctor’s office, Graham (Bradley Walsh) is finishing his exam, the doctor notes that he is healthy.  Graham leaves the hospital to see the mysterious men.  This is a great peek at ordinary life with Team Tardis of course disrupted by something unusual.  

At a garage, the Doctor (Jodie Whittaker), with welder’s goggles, is busy working on the underside of her Tardis on a lift with dangling cables.  She is on her phone leaving a message to the fam, then she sees the cars, one of which has Graham in the back.  On the night ride, the Doctor lets the team in on her plan to go along to find out who sent for them.  The agent checks the malfunctunting navigation screen and it suddenly vaporizes him!  They are caught in a wild ride as the accelerator pedal drops.  The car stops and the screen notes that they will die.  It hurtles backwards through traffic, the Doctor can’t stop it with her sonic screwdriver, and the screen sends out blasts.  Graham notes that the road is ending and the Doctor uses the car’s mirror to reflect the ray back at the screen!  She slams on the brake and the car just reaches the edge of the road touching traffic cones.  A voice (Stephen Fry) questions what has happened, he identifies himself as C, and that they were meant to be taken to MI6 in London.  At night, we get the MI6 building, impressive since I stayed at a hotel just four buildings away on the other side of the street.  

DOCTOR WHO -- “Spyfall Part I” -- JODIE WHITTAKER -- Ben Blackall/BBC Studios. 

The Tardis is being taken across a hall, C mistakes Graham for the Doctor, he asks for the help of the Doctor.  I do like Fry as the head of MI6 and his letter name.  C explains that agents are being attacked across the world and takes them into an examining room.  The woman with glasses is now on a hospital bed.  The Doctor realizes that her entire DNA was re-written, just a “shell”!  C shows Team Tardis briefcases of equipment including laser shoe guns.  Next, he shows them a file on the man that the agents were investigating, Daniel Barton.  He is the founder of VOR, a company “more powerful than most nations.”  The Doctor asks about the MI6’s best man, “Horizon Watcher”, but C says he sacked him.  The extraterrestrial threats should be handled by U.N.I.T. or Torchwood and the Doctor says they are all gone.  The Doctor decides to call Horizon Watcher and gets a picture of a fish.  C says that Barton worked for MI6, but may be working for someone else, then he is shot!  Team Tardis hurries out of the room as the creatures pull themselves from the walls.  

The Doctor sets her phone on the Tardis console and explains that coordinates were hidden in the fish photo.  Graham looks and sees the creatures are trying to breach the Tardis door!  The Doctor activates the Tardis and the creature is thrown from the door.  She decides to split up with Graham to go see Horizon Watcher in Australia and then Yazmin and Ryan are on the other team.  She gives Yazmin a bio-scanner.  In San Francisco, the VOR building, Ryan sets their identities as Yaz as a journalist named Sofia and himself as a photographer named Logan.   They enter and are met by Daniel Barton (Lenny Henry), casually dressed with glasses.  Then, we get a home set in the Great Victoria Desert in Australia.  Watching the materialization of the Tardis is a man in a chair. Two security guards, Seesay (Darron Meyer) and Browning (Dominique Maher), are surprised at it.  He introduces himself as O (Sacha Dhawan). The Doctor and Graham inspect O’s house looking at his collection, she calls him a hoarder, and Graham looks through his Fortean Times.  He confirms that O heard about C getting shot and connects it with the agents.  Graham pulls back a curtain to show a computer center.   

DOCTOR WHO -- “Spyfall, Part I” -- JODIE WHITTAKER -- Ben Blackall/BBC Studios.

At the interview, Yaz sets the bio-scanner as a recorder, Ryan takes photos scanning him.  He takes one of Barton’s id card and duplicates it.  Barton has to cut the interview short and invites them to his birthday party at his house.  Yaz sees on the bio-scanner that Barton is 93% human.  Browning wonders about the desert night.  O finds that his sensors are activated.  Lights suddenly turn on as the agents are armed.  The Doctor uses her sonic screwdriver and senses the creatures.  Seesay orders them back in the house as they try to protect them.  Browning swings her gun at the lights flashing in and out.  The creature, a figure of light, in what seems like a hat appears.  Browning fires at it, but the creature is unaffected.  They overwhelm the two guards.  O uses his console and activates the house defenses setting up a barrier that stops the creatures.  One has survived and enters the house, the Doctor uses her sonic to drop a trap, and contain the creature.  The Doctor questions the creature that says it’s from “far beyond.”  They are ready to take the universe! 

The VOR building is after hours, Ryan and Yazmin use the counterfeit i.d. to enter Barton’s office.  Yaz puts the device to download all of the data from Barton’s computer.  She brings up that she hasn’t given Ryan’s number to her sister.  Ryan sees that Barton’s i.d. has been used and they hide behind a couch.  He has sensed that the creatures are there and they threaten him.  They want the project to continue.  Barton leaves and Yaz wants to check the computer, the creature appears, and uses its power to sweep him away.  Yaz finds herself in an empty, green world with strange columns like giant synapses.  Ryan runs out the building and sees the creatures showing up all over the building.  Yaz sees the creatures scattering through the columns.  There is something happening to the creature in the box.  Yaz is suddenly in the box!  Team Tardis must infiltrate Barton’s estate James Bond-style with formal wear, uncover these mysteries, and find out who or what is behind them.  Another mystery is that O has gathered information on the Doctor which is something that the team has uncover.  

Five Sonic Screwdrivers out of Five! 

#DoctorWho, #SpyFallPart1, #JodieWhittaker, #BradleyWalsh, #MandipGill, #TosinCole,  #SachaDhawan.   

2020 Top Expected Movies!

2020 promises some movies that were long delayed, some with trailers, and others with little information.  Wonder Woman 1984 was set for release on December 2019, but pushed back.  The trailer was released on December 8th, 2019 and the film will finally be in box offices on June 5th.  The first movie is the best comic book adaptation in the modern era.  Black Panther followed up the next year and overshadowed Wonder Woman at the awards, but its sequel is set to open two years from the opening of the first movie.  I like the 80’s setting and hope the Amazons find their way in the sequel.  Next, A Quiet Place Part II, again the original was stunning.  We are more familiar with the horror so it will be interesting how the filmmakers will raise the tension.  The trailer released on January 1st seemed to show the terror dimension is in the humans like Walking Dead, but I hope the creatures evolve like in the Tremors sequels.  The sequel comes out on March 20th.  

Then, there is Dune, I have the most excitement over the potential of this film.  I think Brian Herbert as producer will bring the movie in line with the Game of Thrones political complexity and sci fi concepts of the novel.  Of course, there is Denis Villeneuve as director, who stunned me with Blade Runner 2049.  Once, he was announced, this catapulted the film to top anticipated.  Dune stands as the same level as Lord of the Rings in terms of masterpiece so I hope this cinema work will be equally award winning.  No trailer or full cast announcement, but the release is December 18th.  Death on the Nile, I loved Kenneth Branagh’s Murder on the Orient Express (2017), I love the 1974 film.  There was also a 1978 adaptation of Agatha Christie’s novel, but again I want to be surprised at both stories.  His first Agatha Christie film had a great cast and it looks like it will be same with this one.  No trailer yet, but I can’t wait for October 9th when it opens.  

The top five movie is Raya and the Last Dragon was the animated movie that was previewed at D23 Expo.  This one took my breath away at its beauty.  It is another Walt Disney Animation film that stood out to me far from Pixar’s Onward.  The screenwriter, Adele Lim, appeared at D23 Expo and also worked on Crazy Rich Asians (2018).  Awkwafina, also from that movie, provides a voice really becoming prominent as an actress.  This would rate higher with a trailer.  It opens on November 25th!  Mulan which has the potential to be a standout to the other animated film adaptations.  There is room to expand on the licenses taken in the original which may have offended the Chinese audiences and also appeal to world audiences.  The trailer that dropped on December 5th showed only hints of the animated movie and no songs, but I hope those parts are being saved for the film.  Mulan opens in theaters on March 27th. 

February 7th brings us Birds of Prey: And the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn.  Probably most filmgoers will not use the full title when buying tickets.  The comic book Birds of Prey was Oracle, Huntress (who reappeared in Crisis), and a young Black Canary.  The film by Cathy Yan features Harley Quinn, who hasn’t been a part of the comic book team, with Margot Robbie standing out from Suicide Squad (2016), Huntress, Black Canary (two original team members), Orphan, and Renee Montoya, two of the cast from the Batman comic book.  The first trailer was released on October 1, 2019, its focus on Harley Quinn took away from the group dynamics, maybe this will be revealed later.   Jungle Cruise is another movie that wowed me at D23 Expo.  It was announced in 2017 with Dwayne Johnson posted a pic of himself on the attraction boat in April 10th.  He appeared with Emily Blunt at D23 Expo, he arrived in a boat through the audience, and Blunt showed up on a car on stage.  They both showed trailers from the perspective of their characters, very clever, I hope this shows up somewhere in the movie. The trailer showed some of the fun on October 11, 2019 and the movie will open on July 24th! 

The Universal Blumhouse monster films seem to be headed with Invisible Man directed by Leigh Whannell.  He has shown potential with the action of Upgrade (2018) and of course his work with the Insidious movies.  The trailer was released on last year on November 7th.  The modern setting is good, but even more is the perspective and terror of Elizabeth Moss' character being stalked, topical and relevant.  The Invisible Man appears in theaters on February 28th!  The next expected movie is New Mutants.  The new trailer just dropped and of course there has been long delays and uncertainty.  I don’t care.  I liked Dark Phoenix and don’t think it marked a turn to the X-Men franchise.  If the movie discards the Demon Bear storyline by Chris Claremont and Bill Sienkiewicz, I wouldn’t mind.  If Sam Guthrie’s power is to literally turn into a cannonball, okay.  I really like the cast and the film’s director, John Boone from The Fault in Our Stars (2014), believing in the project.  It has been delayed so long, the anticipation is high for me in whatever form it takes on April 3rd.   

There were some problems I had with Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019), but I’m finding I like it more and more as time goes on.  Godzilla vs. Kong will hopefully be the Kaiju Movie of Kaiju Movies!  No trailer yet, but I’m hoping this is just all out Kaiju action.  It comes out on November 20th!   So let’s move to Titanos and cover Eternals!  The characters were created by Jack Kirby as a solo creation.  He had finished working on Darkseid and the New Gods at DC.  Kirby went deep into the cosmic part of the Marvel Universe, but with really human (Eternal) characters!  The closest the MCU has gotten to Kirby was Thor: Ragnarok (2017), but I have yet to see Kirby action on film.  I want to see the extreme poses and fists right at the camera!  I have hope that director Chloé Zhao from The Rider (2017) can bring the Kirby sensibility to screen and maybe with the complexity of Neil Gaiman and John Romita, Jr.’s 2006-2007 series. Eternals hits theaters on November 6th.  

I loved the November 27th trailer for Artemis Fowl, again I met the author, Eoin Colfer, at Comic Con.  Also, this is another Kenneth Branagh movie that somehow got shuffled from its August 9th, 2019 release and now opens on May 20th!  Another film that was delayed is King’s Man, with trailers in July and September, and pushed back from November 15, 2019.  I like the last movie in the series directed by Matthew Vaughn, Kingsman: The Golden Circle (2017).  This looks like fun and has expanded from the Secret Service comic book from Mark Millar and Dave Gibbons.  The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It, I think the director Michael Chaves needs to step up the horror.  I saw his last film, The Curse of La Llorona (2019).  I love The Conjuring franchise and this is time it is without James Wan.  It is coming out on September 11th.  

There may be surprises with long awaited sequels like Bill & Ted Face the Music, Keanu Reeves is just having an endless string of hits, and this one opens on August 21st, Coming 2 America opens on December 18th, the original is beloved, Eddie Murphy is having a resurgence with Dolemite Is My Name, funny, and his director, Craig Brewer, is helming the sequel with a Kenya Barris screenplay!  Will Bloodshot launch a Valiant Universe of movies?  It is opening on March 13th, not my favorite character, but Vin Diesel seems like he can play this part.  Could West Side Story fulfill Steven Spielberg’s dream of making a musical?  The 1961 film is one of my favorite musicals and I met some of the cast.  I have hope with the casting of Ansel Elgort from Baby Driver (2017).  The Jets will be making a scene on December 18th.  The same day as Dune? I'm picking Dune.  I’m gun shy about musicals with movies like Cats.  Will there be some surprises with dramas and other films?  Most likely.  What films can make you hardly wait?  

#2020movies, #WonderWoman1984, #AQuietPlacePartII, #Dune, #DeathontheNile, #Mulan, #BirdsofPrey, #JungleCruise, #NewMutants, #GodzillavsKong, #Eternals, #RayaandtheLastDragon