Welcome to the Hype?

I don't know what's going on lately, but man... every day seems to be an explosion of hype in popular culture.

Let me see if I can recap what happened just this past Thursday (in no particular order of importance):

• The title of the new James Bond film (the 24th in the series) was revealed to be Spectre and the cast was announced to much fanfare.

• Benedict Cumberbatch was confirmed to play Doctor Strange in the next Marvel film of same title.

• Ryan Reynolds was confirmed to play Deadpool in the next Marvel film of same title (but for the Fox branch of the universe).

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• Krysten Ritter and Mike Colter are (unconfirmed) to be playing Jessica Jones and Luke Cage for the Marvel Netflix series of same names.

• The writer of the upcoming Pan was announced as the writer of the new Wonder Woman film.

• A new trailer for Terminator: Genisys (I think I spelled it right without looking for the first time just then) came out, and it's not entirely terrible.

• The Magnificent Seven is apparently being remade, and it's apparently starring Denzel Washington and Chris Pratt.

Whew... I think that's it? Maybe? But it's a little nuts that all of this happened in one day. And all of that was hot on the heels of the day previous seeing casting announcements for Suicide Squad (Jared Leto playing The Joker in the new DC Cinematic Universe among others), and of course the new Star Wars: The Force Awakens trailer having blown up the internet this past weekend. And before that, a Jurassic World trailer. And before that...

How is anyone supposed to keep up with it all? And if it's Christmas every single day, are we going to get sensitized against all the gifts and the massive bombshell announcements? Don't get me wrong, I'm eating most of this up like an eight year old kid sitting at the foot of the Christmas tree every time that it's revealed, but I'm starting to worry that it's getting to be overwhelming for people. Go take a spin through any movie blog website like /film or Collider and every day has been major casting announcements, huge trailers, poster reveals, all sorts of things vying for your attention.

It used to be religion in Hollywood, and one of the first things you learn as an intern after how to page-check scripts, that you need to read the trades every day and scan them for each and every detail. But now all of the above information was widespread on blogs and social media instantly accessible. In fact, you'll notice that none of the links in the above are to the traditional Variety or Hollywood Reporter publications. These casting announcements used to be on the front page of trades traditionally and now they're all over your news feeds on a daily basis.

The big wave-making announcements are great, but when they increase in frequency it ends up being a lot like walking outside the San Diego Comic-Con in its present state. Crowds and crowds of people yelling loudly for your attention and your senses are so inundated that you can't process one of them let alone all of them. And I'm worried that the end result will be people tuning out. 

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The curious part of this embarrassment of riches is that it seems like a good deal of it is being met with negativity, nitpicking, and in some cases: some baffling backwards thinking. Chris Pratt rides a motorcycle among velociraptors? Nerd rage! A lightsaber that looks like a broadsword? Nerd rage! The more that's being presented, the more opportunities for such fussy complaining seem to arise. And that's not even bringing up the absurd "controversy" around John Boyega appearing in the Star Wars: The Force Awakens teaser as a Stormtrooper. If there aren't nits to pick, let's turn the clock back to the 1960s for some ridiculous comments apparently. LSU professor Isaiah Lavender told The Huffington Post, "Evidently, there are still pockets of people out there in America and across the world that don't believe black people have a future."

Maybe this is all just a primer for the outrageously jam-packed 2015 that's on the horizon. Every studio is now trying to launch brands and franchises. And it's a whole lot of fun to try and keep up with anything and everything, even if it's all a bit intimidating. But you can't help but have that nagging feeling in the back of your mind that the bubble might be about to burst. Is all of the hype taking the fun out of the spontaneity of everything?

Are we losing the surprise and awe that used to be evoked when things were fresh and new because we've been so bombarded with trailers and photos and posters and featurettes and so many other things that have been so highly scrutinized (and, to be completely honest, I'm guilty of it too having frame-by-frame compared the Jurassic Park teaser trailer to the Jurassic World teaser trailer)?

All of that said, this deluge of nerdery in the form of comic books, movies, TV shows, video games, and all sorts of other media sure is a lot of fun and I'm trying to enjoy it while it lasts. But sooner or later the 5 Hour Energy that's powering it all is going to start to fade, right?

Bits & Bobs - 8th Edition

Bits & Bobs collects some of the cool things around the interwebs that I think are noteworthy and worth your time but don't necessarily fill up a full blog post or news item. On with the show...

THERE HAS BEEN AN AWAKENING, AND YOU PROBABLY FELT IT...

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Unless you've been off the grid since Thanksgiving, you probably have already seen and know that a teaser trailer for Star Wars: The Force Awakens was released on Black Friday. The new sequel film takes place thirty years after the events of Return of the Jedi and features all-new characters and some familiar faces including Luke Skywalker, Han Solo, and Princess Leia. The teaser trailer clocks in at a mere 88 seconds but is the first official glimpse of the newcomers John Boyega, Daisy Ridley, and Oscar Issac and is intended as something of an amuse-bouche before bigger trailers are released presumably next spring. Of course, fanboys are nitpicking over tiny details including a brand new lightsaber seen sported by what many assume is the new villain of the film but how can you not like everything you see in this trailer? A panicked hero in Stormtooper armor on the run, a tough female jumping onto a souped-up speeder and racing to (or away from) danger, X-Wings, the Millennium Falcon... I mean, c'mon. If you haven't seen it, check it out here in glorious high definition courtesy of StarWars.com.

HER NAME IS AGENT

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Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. is about to head off into its mid-season hiatus with a blow-out Winter Finale on December 9th, but the good news is that in between episodes Agent Carter is going to help you pass the time starting with a two-hour film airing on ABC January 6, 2015. The latest TV spots and promos really make the film look true to the first Captain America: The First Avenger film (and in-turn, gets me stoked for the show because it also feels a lot like The Rocketeer). The seven episodes will presumably air weekly leading up to Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s return later in 2015, and knowing how everything in the Marvel Cinematic Universe is connected, will most likely have ramifications for all of the Marvel shows and films to come.

Bits & Bobs - 7th Edition

Bits & Bobs collects some of the cool things around the interwebs that I think are noteworthy and worth your time but don't necessarily fill up a full blog post or news item. On with the show...

A LONG TIME AGO, IN A MOVIE THEATER FAR, FAR AWAY...

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StarWars.com announced on Monday morning that a new 88-second trailer for the new Star Wars: The Force Awakens will be released in 30 select theaters on the Friday following Thanksgiving. The 88-second teaser trailer will be the first (official) look at the production but has a lot of fans in an uproar that it's such a limited and short-timed release. After weeks of hearing rumors that the teaser trailer would be revealed with something "much bigger than being attached to the new Hobbit film," the confusing marketing and messaging has a lot of Star Wars fans scratching their heads wondering if they'll be able to see the trailer online officially and sadly the overwhelming consensus is that many will most likely be viewing the teaser for the first time as some shaky hand-held iPhone video. Not exactly the ideal viewing conditions for the first live-action Star Wars footage in almost ten years. We'll see what happens later in the week and if the marketing message becomes clearer. Always in motion, the future is (apparently).

HOLD ON, LET ME TAKE A SELFIE

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While it wasn't a big surprise, when ABC canceled the much maligned but incredibly misunderstood show Selfie, I'll go ahead and admit it: I was a little bummed. On the surface level, the Karen Gillan and John Cho starring show appeared to be a vapid reflection of Kim Kardashian culture incarnate. I was apprehensive about watching it at first. But sharp writing and a comment on the socially networked culture was to be had and the show actually really grew on me. That and David Harewood's Seinfeldesque boss character really tickled me. The good news is that show runner Emily Kapnek has "unofficially" Tweeted that the remaining episodes of the show will eventually make it to Hulu, where hopefully it will find an audience that will give it a chance.

HE WEARS THE PAN...

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Joe Wright, the man behind Atonement, The Soloist, and Hanna has been hard at work on a retelling of the Peter Pan legend simply titled, Pan. The trailer for the film was released amidst the fully of trailers this Thanksgiving week and it's an interesting take on the story. Shades of Spielberg's Hook in there, a little bit of Guillermo del Toro feeling storytelling, and a whole lot of Hugh Jackman in heavy make-up playing Blackbeard. Check out the trailer through YouTube here and let us know what you think in the comments. Have reboots gone too far? Is this a good approach to retelling a classic story? Let us know how you're feeling (even if the answer is "hungry for massive amounts of turkey tomorrow").

Jurassic Park vs. Jurassic World: Trailer Comparative Study

I've been a little surprised with the amount of negativity aimed at the Jurassic World trailer that launched on Tuesday. I actually really dug what I saw in the trailer and feel like if you're going to make another Jurassic Park film, this is probably the way to do it. In fact, a lot of it felt really familiar to the first film... As an experiment, I decided to compare this trailer to the original trailer for Jurassic Park from around 1992 in terms of structurally how they were presented as well as narratively what they were conveying.

Here's the results:

:15 (Both Films)

In 1992, Jurassic Park begins its trailer by introducing us to the world that we know: archeologists excavating a fossil while a narrator who sounds like Littlefinger from Game of Thrones sets the stage that mankind has always searched for its past. In 2014, Jurassic World opens on a young kid at an airport, his mother tells her how proud she is of him going on the trip but at the first sign of danger: run. Okay, so in 1992 we have to establish to audiences how and why dinosaurs have been brought back to life but in 2014, we automatically assume that it's possible and that people have knowledge of the dangers (even the past events) of a Jurassic Park. Not much comparison here quite yet.

:29 (Both Films)

In 1992, Sir Richard Attenborough tells us that he owns an island off the coast of Costa Rica and it immediately cuts to a beautiful shot of the InGen helicopter traveling to Isla Nublar. Incidentally, at the exact same time into the Jurassic World trailer in 2014, we see a similar shot of the plush boat traveling to the exact same island. Now we're talking.

:47 (Jurassic Park) / :42 (Jurassic World)

The 1992 trailer needs to drop in a little more exposition to establish how these dinosaurs have been genetically engineered, while the 2014 trailer hits us right with the familiar Jurassic World gates. However both trailers both literally and figuratively tell us that the "Park is Open" (the 2014 trailer by dropping it as a full-screen text card) followed by a shot of a Downtown Disney-looking environment... around the same time that the 1992 trailer opens the doors to the iconic atrium in a similar over the shoulder shot.

:58 (Jurassic Park) / :53 (Jurassic World)

John Hammond tells us in the 1992 trailer that his creatures are going to capture the imaginations of every living creature... and we immediately reveal character reactions to the Brachiosaurus. What happens in the 2014 trailer? We see hordes of audiences at the park with their imaginations being captured and, sure enough, at around the same time get a similar reaction to our friends, the brachiosaurus.

1:08 (Jurassic Park) / 1:04 (Jurassic World)

Jurassic Park: King Kong reference. Jurassic World: Jaws reference.

1:25 (Jurassic Park) / 1:29 (Jurassic World)

Dr. Alan Grant ominously begins explaining the science to us talking about the dangers of genetic modification while in the new trailer, Bryce Dallas Howard's Claire discusses genetic modification. Both lines of dialogue set up what will fundamentally be the harbinger for what's to come in the remainder of the trailer's events.

1:32 (Jurassic Park) / 1:30 (Jurassic World)

At the conclusion of Dr. Grant's speech, your subwoofer gets a workout with a big thump to the LFE channel as you see the iconic waterglass shot from the first film. Meanwhile, in 2014 as Claire's speech comes to a conclusion, your subwoofer also gets a workout from a big thump revealing this weird genetically modified spinal column-type thing.

2:00 (Jurassic Park) / 1:56 (Jurassic World)

In Jurassic Park, we learn that the fences are down all over the park and Samuel L. Jackson can't get anything back online without Dennis Nedry... then it cuts to this fantastic shot of Dr. Sadler surveying post-attack wreckage. In Jurassic World, Chris Pratt warns against the danger of something that escaped its fence and cuts to this image of his character: surveying post-attack wreckage.

2:04 (Jurassic Park) / 2:02 (Jurassic World)

Both trailers getting into their action montage sequences - both hit a similar palms sweating moment because our main characters are up in the air without a net at roughly the same time (Jurassic Park: the characters climbing over the high-reaching electric fence, Jurassic World: the characters jumping off a waterfall). A bit of a stretch, but identical moments eliciting the same type of response.

2:07 (Jurassic Park) / 2:05 (Jurassic World)

Jurassic Park: "Oh no." / Jurassic World: "Oh god."

2:14 (Both Films)

The young boy character sees something with a high eye-line that makes their jaws both drop.

2:21 (Both Films)

Raptors!

2:28 (Both Films)

Raptors... who learn how to open doors (Jurassic Park) / Raptors... who learn to ride with Chris Pratt (Jurassic World). And both trailers end on that note of the dinosaurs evolving in ways that we would never expect them to have.

Conclusion: Did you like the first movie? There's a good chance you might like the new one.