Web of Lies: Casting old farts

Well, it was a matter of time before we moved from casting hotness like this:
To casting hotness like this:
And this:
The new Spider-man movie is apparently determined to cast things as on-the-nose as possible and has selected Sally Field and Martin Sheen (supposedly) to play Aunt May and Uncle Ben, respectively (wouldn't it be great if it was the other way around...now THAT would be some inspired casting). Whatever. I mean, it works. I like both of them as actors, it was just nice to see some people we weren't as familiar with in those roles so they could really become them as people. Don't get me wrong, after all those years as President Bartlett, if Sheen commanded me to do anything, I would respond "I serve at the pleasure of the President" and run into traffic or whatever. It's just...sigh...you know the cast is finally rounded out, and I like Emma Stone (that's an understatement) and think Andrew Garfield could do a nice job, even though he looks nothing like Peter in my opinion. But the villain is Rhys Ifans...who is The Lizard...who kind of sucks as a villain. And they're using Gwen Stacy...but she's played by a girl who should be MJ. And they're casting good actors in the adult roles...but they're so familiar and obvious. Look, it's just that if you're going to REBOOT things, it would be nice to see some creativity. That's all. This by-the-books stuff is just exhausting.

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Emma Stone FINALLY cast as...WAIT WHO?

You sing and dance it up, Emma Stone! You just landed a role everyone knew you were going to get: You're going to be in the new Spider-man as Gwen Stacy. Wait...what? But...but you were supposed to be MJ! How can people look past your red hair (that's really blond but you dye it red) and spunky personality? Why, you'll have to...ACT now!!!! Look, I love that she's in this movie (and that we can stop with the rumors about it), but I do kind of hate that she's Gwen Stacy. Why? Because I always envisioned Gwen as that shy, sweet girl-next-door, the girl who never did anything wrong in her whole life, who is sweet but not full of life and personality, who is your first love but not complex or varied enough to settle down with. What always struck me about how they handled it in the comics was that you could love Gwen AND love MJ for two very different reasons, and there were ways in which MJ was superior. I can't imagine them casting a better MJ than Emma would have been. So maybe they won't. All this speculation has been based around them having two ladies in the movie, but I don't know that has ever been 100% confirmed. If they cast someone else as MJ, they are missing the boat. If they only had a role for one woman, I'll take Emma Stone any day of the week. I didn't mean that how it sounded (yes I did).

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Superheroine-ism

I figure I died sometime around 1:30 yesterday morning. As I suspected, going to a midnight movie on Thursday, writing a review and driving to Manhattan Kansas on Friday night, getting up at 5:30 am on Saturday and Sunday, before driving back to Omaha at 11:30 or so and watching my Bears get molested and broken by the Giants until 1:30 in the morning was a recipe for the death of my soul and mind. Oh, and this week just happens to have in it my brother-in-law and dear friend Cody's wedding at the end of it...and his bachelor party I'm throwing on Thursday night. So, you're going to have to forgive me for this week's bloggery, which will be absent totally on Friday, cut somewhat short today, and will likely be mediocre on the remaining days of the week, whatever those may be (Smorklesday? Is that a day? The one between Tuesday and Flootlesday?).

Let's kick off the shenanigans with a double-dose of the only real movie/TV news of the weekend...and it's all about the ladies.

First up: Here's MJ if she'll take it. Word is out that Emma Stone has been offered the role of Mary Jane Watson in the Spider-man reboot. The second piece of good news about the movie, after the fact that The Social Network proved Andrew Garfield is pretty damn good as an actor...even if he has a weirdly long neck. I'm not saying I'm EXCITED for this reboot now, because I'm not. I still think it's stupid. But if you have Garfield, Stone, and a really good villain (like Philip Seymour Hoffman as Venom...as has been drunkenly rumored), I may just end up liking it. That's the best I could hope for.

Second: Someone will be putting these on.
David E. Kelly, he of law shows, law shows, and law shows, is going to adapt a TV series out of "Wonder Woman," which is a terribly stupid idea. Superheroes should work on TV, but don't because the budgets are too small, so you inevitably have a lackluster confrontation in each episode. What we'll get will be some relationship-heavy, silly take on a relatively simple character. They should just make a movie, beef up her Greek origins, and really make something DC can be proud of. Oh, right, DC makes terrible entertainment outside of their comic books. Nevermind. This is about right. I look forward to the wave of nubile actresses from Nickelodeon and Disney Channel who will be targeted to slink into Wonder Woman's underoos for a series that will be canceled 5 episodes in. I give it that long because we all know it will go to the WB and they don't cancel things quickly, because if they did, their channel would be all-static all the time.

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Web of Lies: Halfway to a good decision

And a good Friday morning to you, my sweet bloggies. If you're reading this, I just assume you watched "Community" and "30 Rock" last night. How great were those shows last night? This great.


"Because boobies, we got em." "Dogs used to eat me, but now they bring the paper in." Yeah, just incredible stuff. And the scene where everything you thought they'd take multiple episodes to reveal all came out: Ah-Maze-Ing. "30 Rock" had some great moments of it's own, including a hilarious "Mentalist" tote bag joke.

So combine my 2-0 Chicago Bears with hilarious Thursday night shows and today being Friday and you get a great mood that someone in Hollywood must sense. The scoop is this: we have our female leads for Spider-man: We're Going to Reboot This Shit Whether We Need to or Not. What? It's still a catchier title than "Turn Off the Dark" (apologies to U2). Supposedly, the following ladies have been reading with Andrew Garfield.

Mia Wasikowska (best known for Tim Burton's sucktastic suckfest Alice in Wonderland)

Emma MF Stone (best known for being insanely talented, hot, and generally awesome)

Obviously, we have ourselves Gwen Stacy and Mary Jane, right? I don't know about the former, as all I've seen her in was a movie that made Johnny Depp look stupid. The latter, that's just pitch-perfect casting yo. The problem is going to be getting me to believe I'd want the former and not the latter because, hello look at Emma Stone. But you know what, that works for the characters. MJ was always the hottie party girl and Gwen was the sweet girl next door. What's interesting about this casting is that, if it's true (and remember, it almost never is), are they setting us up to see Gwen get offed? I mean, Stone is CLEARLY the more known actress and as hot as she is right now, I doubt she'd be willing to play "supporting actress number 2" seeing as "supporting actress number 1" is usually not given more to do than run around, get kidnapped, and get water poured on her shirt in a superhero movie. Call me interested, as this may indicate they are at least considering the storyline that broke my heart and made me a man. Not like that.

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Web of Lies: Who's gonna be Spidey's gal

We're going to be doing a lot more talkity-talk talk about ole web head coming up here. Not only is the musical made from my imagination, featuring the music of U2 (oddly, it is the soundtrack of every dream I've ever had), going to debut on Broadway soon, but we're heating up fast on the production of the new Spidey reboot, an event unparalleled in its potential to infuriate me. The most interesting thing about the interesting thing I'm about to tell you comes down to what isn't happening: The shortlist for Spidey's "love interest" is being circulated. Note that I said "love interest" and not "Mary Jane." Why? Because it isn't Mary Jane. Didn't I tell you that was interesting? Whether this is Gwen Stacy (it is) or not (it is) nobody is saying (but it totally is), at least not officially (but unofficially, come the hell on, it is). This would excite me if the whole thing weren't being compared to Twilight by some industry folks, and if the dude behind the massively overpraised 500 Days of Summer weren't doing it...and if it weren't an origin story...and if they were going to focus on superhero stuff and not love interests...and I could do this all day.

But you didn't come here to hear me kvetch (actually, you probably did). Here's the short-list along with some photos for reference of the people considered to be Spidey's new love interest:

Imogene Poots
Experience: played Young Valerie in V for Vendetta, Tammy in 28 Weeks Later, Allyson in Solitary Man, Arianne in Centurion, Eva in Chatroom and Amy in the upcoming remake of Fright Night

Thoughts: She looks innocent and young, does evoke Gwen Stacy-like qualities, fairly generic, has a hilarious last name.

Ophelia Lovibond


Experience: Played Marie Kennedy in Nowhere Boy.

Thoughts: Looks more like Betty Brant than Gwen Stacy (not not just her hair color), relatively little experience, looks slightly older, is also a Brit (meaning we would be handing over both Spidey AND his lady to the limeys)

Teresa Palmer

Experience: The Sorcerer’s Apprentice and the upcoming adaptation of I Am Number Four.

Thoughts: Generic blonde, fairly obvious, willingness to star with Nicholas Cage indicates possible mental imbalance.

Lily Collins

Experience: Played Collins in The Blind Side, Kate in the upcoming film Abduction and Lucy in Priest, as well as Phoebe in the new "90210" television series.

Thoughts: Looks like a cute mouse, too "model"-esque, starred alongside Sandra Bullock when she won an Oscar (thus may be partially responsible for that travesty)

Emma Roberts


Experience: who played Addie on the television series "Unfabulous," and Poppy in Wild Child, Molly in Twelve, Grace in Valentine’s Day, and has parts in the upcoming films Scream 4 and It’s Kind of a Funny Story.

Thoughts: More Mary Jane looking, is the most likely choice, is related to Julia Roberts (all hail nepotism), talks a lot in interviews about how she won't do nudity even when nobody is asking her to

Mary Elizabeth Winstead
Experience: Scott Pilgrim vs the World and Live Free or Die Hard.

Thoughts: Clearly best choice, incredible talent and poise, rumored to be already out of the running (of course)

Donald Glover
Experience: "Community," Derrek Comedy, my dreams

Thoughts: Well, if Spider-man can't be a black guy, can he at least DATE a black guy? You laugh, but I think I'm on to something.

More to come as it happens.

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God bless people who work harder than me

Slashfilm.com took the time to compile various comic book-related news and info from recent days into one handy-dandy post. Apparently, when you get paid to just work on a blog, you have time for such things. When you have many other jobs, you just post a link to someone else's blog and resynopsize it on your own, adding flippant comments to make yourself feel as though you contributed. This just in: I have now realized that I'm lame. This won't change anything you read here, but know that I know that.

Starting in the same order as those hard workers from Slash (not the guy from Guns N' Roses, who we all know is in no way a hard worker), they report that fellow hard-working blog Collider took part in a conference call with Joss Whedon. If you don't know who that is, I'm really going to have a hard time capturing your interest for the next few minutes. The man picked to direct The Avengers was asked about this task, to which he replied "I have no directing skills." As we all know, this is self-deprecation...although he hasn't done anything NEAR the level of the giganto-flick that this superhero orgy will be. I wonder how many blog hits I'll get for including the phrase "superhero orgy?" Also, that was all of the news reported from that conference call. This begs the question, what was the point of that conference call?

Alvin Sargent has been brought back in to work on the Spider-man reboot's script, which I constantly convince myself is just a nightmare I created in my own brain after bad Thai food. THR notes that Sargent has worked on every Spidey film, which is interesting because that's both a compliment and an insult. Supposedly he's the guy who works on the more emotional stuff...so it's up in the air the degree of responsibility Sargent has in the "emo Peter Parker" department. This incredibly small news nugget only serves to remind me that despite my wishing it away, they really, truly are going to ruin Spider-man, aren't they? They're going to Twilight-up my favorite character in the world, presumably to punish me for something I didn't really do. I'm like the A-Team, really.

Now, the big one. How many of you recognize this guy?

Again, if you don't know him, I'm seriously wondering if you meant to read a different blog this morning. The Playlist talked to a source who supposedly said that Fillion is up for a small role in Captain America and a big, big, big role in The Avengers and beyond. This is clearly nothing more than fan dreaming, but what can I say, it's a good dream. The role is Hank Pym. Ant-Man. This would be incredibly perfect for Fillion, who has deserved not only his own superhero role, but something far grander than "Castle" for a long time now. He has oodles of charisma and a bond with Whedon that some may describe as akin to a "heterosexual life-mate." I don't care if this is just a rumor right now. It needs to happen. So let's push hard, now and make this a reality.

So there you have it. There's the news from other people, collected by someone else, and retyped here for your benefit. I'm a valuable member of society. At least my last name isn't McClammy.

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Web of Lies: Your new Peter Parker?

He may have a superhero name, but Logan Lerman does not inspire a great deal of confidence in me despite having been supposedly cast as Peter Parker. Mostly because it looks like he has yet to get pubes. I get going younger, but was the second choice a fetus?
Spider-man, Spider-man, does whatever a spider can...provided that isn't driving a motor vehicle, consuming alcohol, or achieving "second base." Seriously, what's going to be the big romantic story element? Will Mary Jane check "yes, no, or maybe?" BREAKING NEWS: They've just cast Mary Jane.
I know my hopes weren't high for this reboot/relaunch/total clusterf**k going in, but this has done little to assuage my fears. I know it's all rumor for now, but they're going to have to make a splash in the toilet water soon if they want to hit their LOCKED IN STONE release date. There's nothing quite like realizing that you're a whole generation and as much as a decade away from seeing your favorite character show up in the movies in a form that doesn't work like ipecac. Le sigh.

Web of Lies: Brian Michael Bendis...don't give me false hope

Latino Review noticed that "Ultimate Spider-Man" scribe Brian Michael Bendis had tweeted "Just spent a very interesting morning at Sony with the entire spidey movie team!! Very very cool stuff!!" Latino Review then proceeded to write an article in which they referred to Brian Mendes being involved with the new Spider-man reboot (not Brian BENDIS). This isn't funny to many people, but it made me chortle. I thought about some schlub who is like a distant cousin of director Sam Mendes jumping up and yelling "NOW IT'S MY TURN!!! THANK YOU GOD, IT'S MY TURN!" Look, whether or not Bendis is involved (or Mendes...teehee), this new movie will likely suck. It's probable that they just brought the comic writer in to give a few general pointers and then immediately went back to casting actors from the Twilight franchise and crapping all over a beautiful character. The things that make the Ultimate Spidey series work in the comics COULD so easily be plugged into a movie version, and Bendis IS the guy who could do a revision on the script and make Peter Parker sound like a reasonable teenager and not some emo chode who walks around whining and lusting after vapid starlets. It's probably not going to happen though. Here's what I don't get...I mean, what I don't get beyond them rebooting a billion dollar, successful franchise. I don't get why they don't just pick up Bendis's long run on the comic, choose one of the better storylines (NOT THE ORIGIN STORYLINE DAMMIT), and use the comic as a straight-up storyboard. If they did that, they'd make a good movie. So maybe that's why they don't want to. FYI: The budget of the new Spidey reboot is only $80 million. But what Bendis is known for is cramming waaaay too much of the talky talk and not enough of the action. Seriously, his shit is PERFECT for this movie. So it won't happen.

Web of Lies: Let's talk about grit, baby.

The stupidity currently flowing out of Sony Pictures should be bottled and sold to smart people who "want to get away from it all" or dropped on our enemies in other countries so that they will annihilate themselves by licking electrical sockets. The decision to scrap Spider-Man 4 and release Sam Raimi, Tobey Maguire, and Kirsten Dunst is frustrating (sorry, the decision to release Raimi and Maguire is frustrating), but pales in comparison to Sony's proclaimed next move. According to EW, the latest move wasn't some spur-of-the-moment decision: They've been planning a reboot for awhile now either in case what just happened were to happen or as the next film to follow the fourth one. They've had this plan in place to the point that they have a script already...and not just any script, an origin story...and not just any origin story, a "gritty" and "contemporary" story. To quote Jules Winfield from Pulp Fiction, "Well, allow me to retort."

Dear Sony,

Making a "gritty" and "contemporary" Spider-man is a lot like making a sexier Dora the Explorer or a less violent UFC. During the more than 10 years you've owned the rights to this franchise, have you ever read a single Spidey comic? If you were able to stop Scrooge McDuck-ing around, swimming in your gold coins, you may have glanced at even a cover and realized that Spidey's whole gig is not being "gritty." He's anti-gritty. That's his thing. It'd be like making a movie about Ghandi and having him tote a machine gun. It's that against the character. Is there a chance that James Vanderbilt's script doesn't suck and that people are blowing these angles out of proportion? Sure. But this is the guy who last wrote Zodiac, a serial killer movie, and the direction you seem to be suggesting is a move to follow Batman, which Spider-man isn't. Yes, they're both heroes with "man" in their names, but other than that they are diametrical opposites. Look, I stuck by this film series when you switched from mechanical shooters to organic ones, when you cast Kirsten Dunst, when you made Spider-man 3!!! But what you are clearly gearing up to do is a maneuver so stupid that whenever I refer to somebody doing something stupid in the future, I'll likely refer to it as "pulling a Sony." And the three directors rumored have to be a joke. Marc Webb, who shares only a pun-laden name with this project, has only really done the incredibly average (500) Days of Summer. Gary Ross did Seabiscuit. And then there's the third name...the one that will cause me to engage in such verbal acts of hatred I can't help but pray it never happens: Michael Bay. I am not a man of violence, but so help me Sony if this happens and I'm in an elevator with whoever made that decision...pain...lots of pain. There's still hope for you simpletons, for you glue-sniffing paint eaters. Instead of promising a "return to high-school" for Spidey AND a "gritty" movie, just go with the former. Don't do an origin story (we got it already), don't make this a Batman retread. Keep the spirit of fun, cast Anton Yelchin, hire a director with a sense of whimsy and play (what about Jason Reitman?), take some time to speak with the guys who WRITE THE COMICS AT MARVEL (look how much good press they got for Iron Man), and don't biff this up.

Listen, I spent the better part of my life waiting to see Spider-man on the big screen. I was thwarted time and again by idiots like you doing crap like this. Stop it. Just, stop it. You like money, right? You want a ton of it? Make a good movie that appeals to everyone, not a shoe-horned attempt to make Spidey into Batman.

To recap: Stop everything you're doing because you suck and if you hire Michael Bay someone gets hurt.

Thanks.