San Diego Comic-Con took place over the last weekend. The biggest pop-culture convention in the world has become the best place for film and TV studios to make their biggest announcements, and fan response within the halls can often gauge how anticipated a certain project is.
While there was no massive bombshell dropped this year (such as last years Batman/Superman announcement) there were still quite a few announcements made over the weekend. So, here are the 8 biggest bits of film and TV news of Comic-Con 2014!
8. No news on Justice League, Doctor Strange or Fantastic Four
This bit of new goes first because in this case the news is actually a distinct lack of news. It was widely suspected that Warner Brothers, Marvel and Fox would use Comic-Con to make some big announcements about their upcoming comic book properties, particularly Justice League, Doctor Strange and Fantastic Four respectively. But no, no they didn’t. In the days leading up to the event, it was being heavily rumoured that Joaquin Phoenix had entered deep talks with Marvel about taking on the role of Doctor Strange, but there was no official announcement. It’s fair enough for Justice League and Doctor Strange; they are both a while away and both studios are clearly more focussed on Batman V Superman and Guardians of the Galaxy/The Avengers: Age of Ultron. But the Fantastic Four reboot is being released next year, and this would have been a great opportunity to show, at the very least, the first image of the cast together in character. This is not a good sign for the film at all.
7. Quentin Tarantino will shoot The Hateful Eight in 2015
After Tarantino’s script for his violent Western The Hateful Eight was leaked online, it seemed unsure whether the beloved director would ever get around to making the actual film. Buzz started growing after Tarantino held a reading of his script earlier this year, which featured actors such as Samuel L. Jackson, Kurt Russell, Bruce Dern and Tim Roth. We finally received confirmation over the weekend as Tarantino announced that he will shoot The Hateful Eight in 2015. The director seems to have a lot of passion for this project, so let’s hope that it results in something amazing.
6. King Kong reboot Skull Island is on its way in 2016
This was arguably the biggest WTF announcement of Comic-Con; it came literally out of nowhere and was met with very little enthusiasm. Seriously, there haven’t been any rumours about a new King Kong movie at all. Apparently the teaser trailer fell quite flat and the brief glimpse of Kong himself was underwhelming. Still, it’s a great chance to improve on the flaws of Peter Jackson’s 2005 film, which was unfortunately almost bloated enough to overshadow Andy Serkis and WETA’s phenomenal work on the film. Current rumours suggest that the studio may be courting Attack the Block director Joe Cornish to call the shots. This one could be quite interesting, especially if it leads to a crossover with a certain giant lizard…
5. Gareth Edwards will return to direct Godzilla 2
After it was announced that Gareth Edwards would be directing one of the upcoming stand-alone Star Wars spin-offs, it was assumed that he would not be coming back to direct Godzilla 2. But Godzilla has been a huge hit this year and Legendary are clearly desperate to have Edwards back for the sequel. This is good news for fans. Edwards did a great job on the first film, and with the announcement that Mothra, Rodan and Ghidorah will appear in the film, the sequel looks set to improve upon its predecessor.
4. Mad Max: Fury Road actually looks awesome
It would be fair to say that not many people were greatly anticipating the fourth film in the Mad Max series. The original trilogy is well respected, but it has been almost 30 years since the last instalment and enthusiasm had died down a little bit. That is until now, of course, as director George Miller brought the first footage from the film to Comic-Con and blew everyone away. This movie looks seriously good. The footage gives pretty much nothing away, but sets the scene for what looks like a thrilling and terrifying chase through a post-apocalyptic wasteland. See the footage here.
3. Guardians of the Galaxy 2 is coming in 2017
Marvel must be pretty confident in the soon-to-be-released Guardians of the Galaxy, as they used Comic-Con as the place to announce that the sequel will hit screens on July 28th, 2017. Director James Gunn will return, as the main cast are also expected to do. Early reactions to the first film have been overwhelmingly positive and Marvel look like they have another massive hit on their hands. A sequel is a no-brainer .
2. Huge new additions to the Game of Thrones Season 5 cast
Game of Thrones just keeps getting better. Season 4 is arguably the strongest season so far, and it left each of the main characters in incredibly interesting situations that we look forward to seeing play out next year. During the Game of Thrones panel, a list of 9 actors was announced as joining the already-massive cast for Season 5. The most well-known of these are Jonathan Pryce (Brazil) and Keisha Castle-Hughes (Whale Rider). A video introducing the new actors was shown and you can see it here:
1. First image of Gal Gadot as Wonder Woman
So here we have it – the biggest bit of news from the 2014 San Diego Comic-Con. Director Zack Snyder and actors Ben Affleck, Henry Cavill and Gal Gadot came to Comic-Con to promote 2016s Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice. Snyder showed a teaser trailer for the film (which has not been released online yet), which apparently brought the house down. But the biggest thing that was released to the public in regards to the film was the first image of Gal Gadot in costume as Wonder Woman. The image has met with a mostly positive yet mixed response; most people think Gadot looks great in the image, but some have been unsure about the dull colour tones of the armour. The costume definitely looks like it will fit in with the Superman and Batman costumes we have already seen, but we’ll have to wait until we can see it in action once some footage is released. Have a look and decide for yourself.
———-
