The trailer for the sequel to last year’s hit Maze Runner was released this morning; hopefully it will be a more faithful adaptation than its predecessor. While the cast was strong, the original left much out from its source material. This film looks to be an improvement though. Judge for yourself when you view below:
I was recently challenged by a friend to predict the success or failure of upcoming films. So here goes, I will be using a couple of measures in my predictions, the first being Rotten Tomatoes- I will be predicting both the critics’ percentage as well as the audience’s. Secondly I will be predicting the films’ opening weekend haul along with their final gross. (I promise I will not change any numbers once the article is published.)
Seeing as how I have written about it numerous times before (as evidenced here), I figured I would begin with the upcoming release Pixels. When I first heard that they were making this into a feature length film my inner child was ecstatic. After all, I loved the short film that the movie was based on, which is delightfully dark and nostalgic at the same time. Then I saw the trailer… The first problem that this film is going to face is the fact that two of its main stars, Adam Sandler and Kevin James, have not had a good recent track record with their latest movies. The second problem that I see is the film’s marketing. Most films will show you a bit more or some other aspect of their film the closer they get to release; this movie seems not to want to do that, they simply show the same scenes over and over again regardless of the trailer, which indicates to me that they may not have that much funny material to work with.
So here we go with the predictions:
Rotten Tomatoes: 26%- Critics, 58%- Audience
Movie Gross: Opening Weekend- 21 mil, Total Gross- 51 mil
Update 7/26: You can see the Rotten Tomato results here and you can see the opening weekend gross here. As you can see I wasn’t very far off.
Recently, I was excited to discover that actors from The Raid: Redemption and The Raid 2 were rumored to be cast in Star Wars: The Force Awakens. Iko Uwais, who played the lead role in both Raid movies, and two other actors from The Raid 2 are reportedly cast in Episode VII. Even though the roles of these actors are yet to be revealed, their inclusion in the film will likely mean that the energy and intensity of the fight scenes from their previous movies (like The Raid 2) are being brought to the Star Wars franchise.
Although the bloody violence The Raid 2 is known for will probably not be transferred to the Star Wars film, the new casting may mean that their martial arts skills will be included in lightsaber duels and other fight scenes.
If you are unfamiliar with the Raid movies I highly recommend them to any fans of kung fu or action movies that want to see some amazingly choreographed fight scenes. The Raid 2 displays these scenes of combat especially well. Overall the actors from the Raid movies being cast in Star Wars would be a welcome and beneficial addition to the franchise. Although the overall impact on the movie is yet to be seen, I am hopeful that this added talent will enhance the series.
After indicating that they were not going to release a hi-def version of the trailer, Warner Brothers had a change of heart and ended up releasing one after all. In a statement today Warner Brothers stated
“Warner Bros. Pictures and our anti-piracy team have worked tirelessly over the last 48 hours to contain the Suicide Squad footage that was pirated from Hall H on Saturday. We have been unable to achieve that goal. Today we will release the same footage that has been illegally circulating on the web, in the form it was created and high quality with which it was intended to be enjoyed. We regret this decision as it was our intention to keep the footage as a unique experience for the Comic Con crowd, but we cannot continue to allow the film to be represented by the poor quality of the pirated footage stolen from our presentation.”
See the results for yourself below:
After quick teasers during the Super Bowl and then a bit later, the good people at NBC have finally released a full three minute-plus trailer for the upcoming season of Heroes: Reborn. The trailer does not disappoint, we get to see a combination of new characters and old (welcome back Micah, among others) it looks like this reboot might stick. View for yourself below.
The Dark Side 