POP CULTURE ARCHIVES
SEPTEMBER 28, 2001 - Shatner Must Return!
Last night, I saw the pilot for the new Star Trek show, Enterprise. I enjoyed the new lead characters. I enjoyed that the show was in a different time period than the past few Star Trek shows. I thought all the lead actors did fantastic jobs. Especially Bakula and Blalock. And I liked that they showed the program in a widescreen format. What I didn't like was the new villains, the story in the second hour of the show, and that yet another Star Trek project has begun without William Shatner.
For whatever reason, Rick Berman has decided to exclude William Shatner from his vision of Star Trek. And the rest of the TOS cast. For some reason, he has decided they don't belong.
Berman can't expect us to believe that budget reasons are the problem. William Shatner is going to be a supporting cast member of the ABC comedy, "Bob Patterson" this fall. If they can afford him, why can't Enterprise?
I think we all let Rick Berman get off too easy, when it comes to his abandonment of the TOS cast. That needs to change.
Instead of Enterprise using time travel to feature some silly villain from the future, I have a better idea. Why not use it to feature Captain Kirk?
Would it really kill Berman to try to make the show more enjoyable for us all? I don't think so. But, will he do it? Or do the fans have to put some pressure on him first, to make it happen? Hey, I'm ready to do my part. I think many of us are.
SEPTEMBER 28, 2001 - Site Returns!
After the horrible Sept. 11 attacks in the U.S., I stopped working on this site for awhile. I decided to focus on my other site, and, just wait until it felt fun again to work on this site. After seeing the premiere of the new Star Trek show, Enterprise, last night, I decided the time was now.
SEPTEMBER 28, 2001 - September 11
I want to take this time to offer my condolences to everyone who was hurt by the Sept. 11 attacks in the U.S. I hope in time you can find some peace in your hearts. I send my best wishes to you. We all care about you.
September 1, 2001 - Shatner is Still the Man
Just look at the top photo on this site's index page. (The photo comes from the UPN summer press tour, and is at Zap2It.com, in their tv photo gallery). William Shatner is still the man! Why doesn't every director put him in their movies? And why isn't Shatner in every Trek movie? He can be there, no matter what crew is used. Like an old Obi-Wan Kenobi. And I know he was killed off, but, there are a million ways around that.
Shatner must return! Yes, he must!
August 18, 2001 - Star Trek 10 News
A while back, this site mentioned the rumor that Jonathan Frakes would be directing Trek 10. This was just a rumor. Stuart Baird will be the real director.
The movie will very soon start shooting, if Paramount can make a deal with the actors. They are trying to reduce the cast's salaries, from what they received last movie. We will soon see if a deal can be made.
August 15, 2001 - Travolta: Superman's Villain?
Radio Station KicksFM reports that John Travolta might be playing the villain in the rumored Superman-Batman: World's Finest movie, and not Superman, as some reports have said.
August 13, 2001 - Jolie Photo From Larry King
This photo of Angelina Jolie was taken from her Larry King Weekend appearance.
August 5, 2001 - Jolie Talks Tomb Raider 2
Angelina Jolie was on Larry King Weekend Saturday night. On Tomb Raider 2, she said that right now, they were trying to see if they could put together a good story for it, before going forward.
She also said that she might not try to give birth to a child. She might adopt instead. She said that if she adopted, it wouldn't affect her acting career.
Before, she said that she wanted to have a baby before she did Tomb Raider 2. Now that she's thinking adoption instead, it could speed up the making of Tomb Raider 2.
August 1, 2001 - Tomb Raider 2 Moving Forward?
Angelina Jolie agreed to a clause in her contract with Paramount for the Lara Croft sequel stating that she will not become pregnant before production begins, according to the London Daily Express. It said she did this "because she is eager to build up a lucrative franchise with the computer game-based movie."
JULY 30, 2001 - Big Brother 2 USA
This site now has a page about reality programs. For now, it will focus on Big Brother 2 USA. (It also has a poll you can answer.) To see it, click here.
JULY 28, 2001 - Star Wars: Episode 7 -- Will It Be Made?
Part 1
A while back on this site, I promised to share my thoughts on this. Finally, here they are!
In interviews I saw when he was promoting Episode 1, George Lucas said that after he finished making Episode 3, it was unlikely that he would ever make any other Star Wars movies. He said that after Episode 3, he was going to take a few years off. Then, he'd work on some other movie ideas he's had for a long time, or, make another tv show.
Lucas said that, even though in the past he had talked about doing Episodes 7, 8, and 9, in was mostly because he was asked about it, and not because he had a story for it. He returned to Episodes 1, 2, and 3 because he had stories for them.
He did say that he would like to tell the tale of an old Luke Skywalker. But, he had no story for it, and, he felt that after he finished Episode 3, and took his break, he would be too old to do Episodes 7, 8, and 9. They would be hard movies to make for ten years at that age.
I think that while it may be unlikely that he'll make Episodes 7, 8, and 9, I do think that far in the future, he might make one more. Episode 7. There is no rule saying that he always has to make a trilogy. He could just make one movie this time. One featuring an old Luke Skywalker.
Why do I think this at least has a chance of happening? For the same reason I think he really returned to making Star Wars movies.
To be continued soon in Part 2
JULY 26, 2001 - Planet of the Apes Premiere
Here is a photo of Planet of the Apes actress Estella Warren posing at the premiere in New York, July 23, 2001. The photo is by REUTERS/Brad Rickerby
JULY 23, 2001 - Second Enterprise Article
Here is the second National Post article written by Scott Feschuk, that concerns Enterprise (although, it is just in the end of it). I put it after his first article. To read it, click here.
JULY 22, 2001 (edited July 23) - Enterprise Article
I found two Enterprise articles, both written by Scott Feschuk, of the National Post. To read the first one, click here.
JULY 22, 2001 - Coming Soon
It was promised a long time ago, but, interviews will be coming to the site. Interviews with some writers have been done. In time, they will be up here.
Also, this site is going to soon start documenting the long, long process in the creation of a movie. Watch for that.
JULY 22, 2001 - Enterprise Press Party Transcript Part 2
If you want to see Part Two of a transcript of the recent UPN Enterprise press party, click here. Part Two follows Part One on this page.
JULY 20, 2001 - Enterprise Press Party Transcript
If you want to see a transcript of the recent UPN Enterprise press party, click here. This is Part One.
JULY 15, 2001 - Jim Shooter Wants to Return to Legion
Jim Shooter, who was one of the greatest writers in the history of the comic book, Legion of Super-Heroes, would like to return to tell another adventure. But, he's not wanted at DC Comics (who make Legion) these days. That could be because one of the big bosses at DC is someone Shooter "removed" from Marvel Comics in the 1980's, when Shooter was the boss at Marvel.
Legion used to be a great comic. It has become something to avoid. It could badly use Shooter. Without him, or someone better, continue to avoid Legion.
JULY 11, 2001 - Look Inside the Enterprise
Here is a photo of Scott Bakula inside the new Enterprise, from ET Online.
It's an interesting design. Not too bad at all.
JULY 11, 2001 - Dan Dare, the Movie
The company that made the animated series, "Dan Dare, Pilot of the Future'" has plans to make a feature film based on the classic British comic-book hero. It seems that most of the funding for it is in place.
A while back, Grant Morrison wrote a comic book version of Dare. If you are looking to discover Dare, this might be a good place to start.
JULY 9, 2001 - Star Trek: Nemesis
There is some major Star Trek X talk going around the net. I'm going to make a little summary of it here, without spoiling the movie.
One rumor has Sean Connery in talks to play the film's lead villain, a Romulan leader called Shinzon.
Other rumors are at Ain't It Cool News, which today has a review of the script. It does contain spoilers.
They say that Star Trek X will be called Star Trek: Nemesis. Jonathan Frakes will once again direct it. The screenplay is by John Logan. The story by Logan, Rick Berman, and Brent Spiner. The movie is being done so that if they wanted it to be the last Next Generation movie, it could be. An ending movie. But, the door will be left open to make more Next Generation movies, if they want to.
JULY 8, 2001 - Indy 4 Rumors
Lots of Indy 4 rumors have been going around. The only thing I've heard that seems true is if this movie is to be ever made, it has to be filmed in 2002. That will be the time when Ford, Spielberg, and Lucas will have time available all at the same time.
Ain't It Cool News had the rumor that it * maybe* will be called, "Indiana Jones and the Call of Cthulhu", and have a connection to a H.P. Lovecraft work. I have big doubts about this, but, we shall see.
JULY 7, 2001 - Final Fantasy Clip
Here is a clip for Final Fantasy, which uses the Real Player. To see it, click here.
Sorry the clip wasn't listed yesterday, but there were some computer problems.
JULY 5, 2001 - Final Fantasy Photos
Some Final Fantasy Photos are up at the site. Just click here.
Tomorrow, hopefully a link will be up to a clip from the movie.
JULY 4, 2001 - More Final Fantasy
Tomorrow, there will be a page at this site featuring some more Final Fantasy photos. And, maybe a link to a clip from the movie. So, check back!
JULY 3, 2001 - Final Fantasy Excitement
I don't know how good this summer's Final Fantasy movie will be or not, but, it's creating some excitement over its animation. To me, it looks like this could be a breakthrough movie. At this point, it seems that computers can animate anything perfectly, except humans. But Final Fantasy's animation seems to be very close to doing humans right.
This is the movie to watch this summer. One that's more important than just a movie. Once computer animation is totally perfected, then we get to really see some creative movies. It looks like that day is getting closer.
June 28, 2001 (edited July 2, 2001) - Gorillaz's Animated Music Video
The animated music video for the song "Clint Eastwood", by the band Gorillaz (the side project of Blur's Damon Albarn), looks great. It is an animated video. Tank Girl creator, Jamie Hewlett, was involved with the video. The song is rap/pop/rock, and you might or might not like that. But the video is worth seeing for the animation alone.
The video is being streamed online. I found that I couldn't see it using the Windows Media Player with the Netscape browser, but the Microsoft/AOL one was fine. The video itself looks great, but, of course, sometimes when video is streamed, the viewing quality really falls.
If you want to see it, click the link below, and it will take you to a page that will let you play it.
June 26, 2001 - Green Lantern Settlement
Green Lantern creator Marty Nodell, who reportedly was considering terminating his transfer of the copyright of Green Lantern (which he transfered to DC Comics in the Goldern Age of comics), has worked out a settlement with the company. Details of the settlement are not available, since both sides signed a nondisclosure agreement.
I think this is great news. In the 1930's and 40's, writers and artists signed away the rights to many characters they created, for just hundreds of dollars. Rights that would go on to be worth many millons. It's nice to see one of these people get some sort of real compensation, whatever it may be. And it's nice to see that DC Comics were willing to settle, instead of fighting to the end, as it seems like Marvel is getting ready to do with the rights for Captain America. Maybe DC doesn't want to look like a super-villain in the eyes of the people buying their products. Marvel should realize this is also what's at stake.
June 24, 2001 - No Seven of Nine in Star Trek X?
Reports had said that Seven of Nine, from Star Trek: Voyager, was being written into the Star Trek X movie, and as more than a cameo. Which would have been great! But...now that Jeri Ryan has joined the cast of the tv show Boston Public, it seems she is too busy for the role, and it is being rewritten for the Captain Janeway character. Which is a good idea. Of course, a better idea would be to give the role to the Janeway character, and also give Seven of Nine a cameo. A cameo would only take a few days to film. Boston Public is a show with too many characters. The result is most characters don't get very much airtime. Surely, with this situation, they could find a way to give Jeri Ryan a few days off to do a Star Trek cameo. They could find a way to make the schedules work, if they really wanted to. Easily. Let's hope they do it!
June 22, 2001 - Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles to Return in Movie
It seems that John Woo is going to make a computer animated movie featuring the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Now, I've never watched any of their movies, or read any of their comics, so, this doesn't really excite me. I do think this is an amazing concept, thought. John Woo doing a movie like this... who thinks these ideas up? This is pretty far out stuff.
So, the movie doesn't excite me. But, the concept of taking a comic book (which is what the Turtles started as) and turning it into a computer animated feature... that excites me. That would be a very interesting path to take comics on. Most comics would be too expensive to do live action. But, computer animated is a different story. Let's hope this Turtles movie can lead comics down this new road.
June 20, 2001 - Namor, the Sub-Mariner Movie
A few weeks ago, it was announced that the comic book character, Namor, the Submariner, might get his own movie. Now, I'll believe this when I see it, since underwater movies normally cost a fortune to make, and never do too well at the box office. But, if a miracle happens, and they move forward with this, I think they should consider Nicholas Cage for the part. He looks the part, is a big box office draw, and he love comic books (the Cage part of his name is taken from a comic book character).
June 6, 2001 - David Manning, Famous Fake Movie Critic, Has Joined Us
David Manning, the famous fake movie critic, has his own page at the site now:
May 27, 2001 - X- Men 2: Trouble Time!
The word going around about X-Men 2 does not sound good. Now, for the record, the first movie was good. Not excellent, but, I have no problems at all with it. Wolverine and his pickup truck... well, they were the stars of Movieland for a while. Like Batman and the Batmobile, only better! This was a good movie. I was afraid it was going to be bad, but, luckily, that never happened.
X-Men 2, on the other hand, seems to be moving in the bad direction. Rumor has it that one of the scripts being written for it calls for The Sentinels to be humans. Not giant robots. Humans. A funny idea. Horrible, yes, but funny. If they want the X-Men to be hunted by humans, give them another name. They are not Sentinels, and, they will be hated if they are called Sentinels.
Use the real, giant robot Sentinels, and, you could have an excellent movie. A sequel better than the first. And, it can be done. Just spend the money in the right places. The special effects budget in the first movie was wasted in many places doing effects that weren't needed, or cared about. Give that up this time. And, don't introduce Beast (is Beast really anyone's favorite X-Man?) or Gambit. Save money these ways, and use in it the right place... have Giant Robot Sentinels!
May 25, 2001 - Star Wars: We Are a Year Away!
Yes, a year from now, Episode 2 will be playing. I'll be watching it, and thinking, "Damn! Jar Jar has become a much better actor since the first one. Going to England to do Shakespeare all this time really paid off for him."
That's what I'll be thinking about then. What I'm thinking about now is... Episode 3, and will there ever be an Episode 7? The really far out thoughts I'm having about these two movies will be here in the future. Stay tuned...
May 24, 2001- Superman Lives Must Die!
Unfortunately, Warner is trying to put new life into an idea that never was any good, and needs to remain on the scrap heap. They have hired Paul Attanasio (and are paying him a lot of money) to try and put some life into this bad idea.
Forget it. Please have the sense to forget it.
Go with the Superman vs. Lobo idea. This is the movie people will want to see over and over. Pay someone big bucks to rewrite Keith Giffen's concept of this, if you must. But, please, let Superman Lives die.
May 23, 2001 - David Lynch Good Enough for Cannes, not Good Enough for ABC
The movie David Lynch submitted to the Cannes Film Festival, "Mulholland Drive", gave him a tie for the Best Director award. It's funny. At Cannes, this movie was good enough for an award. Yet, this project was originally supposed to be a tv series for ABC. David Lynch shot a two hour pilot for it. ABC turned it down. (Of course they did. We wouldn't want to try out something good on tv, now, would we?). Lynch reworked the pilot into this movie. Now it's an award winner.
May 22, 2001- Tom Strong, film cousin of Lara Croft?
While I have heard no reports saying this will happen anytime soon, Tom Strong should be the top project on the minds of film makers when it comes to adapting comic books. The Alan Moore written comic book is perfect to be made into a movie. Another Moore comic, "From Hell", will have its film adaptation come out this summer. Moore's "League of Extraordinary Gentlemen" is still having its script rewritten. Moore co-owns both of those comics with their book's artists. This let him made deals with film companies other than Warner Brothers. Unfortunately, Tom Strong's ownership is probably co-owned by Moore, artist Chris Sprouse and Wildstorm, which is owned by DC Comics, which is owned by AOL Time Warner. They normally only let DC characters have movies made at Warner Brothers. Since Warner are already planning out two Batman movies, a Superman one, a Wonder Woman one, a Catwoman one... it makes it unlikely that Tom Strong will be added to the mix soon. Unless they realize that a Tom Strong movie would be more like a "The Mummy" or "Tomb Raider" movie than a superhero one. If you look at Tom Strong that way, which is the right way, it could be made sooner than you think.
May 21, 2001 - Put "Big Apple" back on the street
David Milch, the co-creator of "NYPD Blue", had his fine new police series, "Big Apple", quickly pulled off CBS's apple tree after 5 episodes. I hear that all 13 episodes of CBS's 13 episode order have been filmed (not comfirmed, though). I hope Paramount, the maker of this series, don't just throw it all in the garbage can. Find a way to get it on some tv channel. Or maybe release the whole thing on DVD (hint, hint).
May 20, 2001- Tom Fontana is Cursed!
He must be. I don't see the pilot for his new CBS show on their fall line up. Fontana is certainly one of the best writers in any medium today. Yet, every year, he makes a new pilot that sounds great, and, every year the networks turn it down. It is unbelievable. Maybe he should just stick with cable, where his "Oz" show does well. Forget about the networks.
... COMING SOON... INTERVIEWS!!