Movies

#doomergate? It's about ethics in the Baxter Building? Is Amanda Palmer writing "A Poem for Domashev?"

Jeebus it's dueling franchises today as the actual title of Star Wars Vii, the very first SEQUEL was released. And it's...

The first trailer for the final Peter Jackson movie set in Middle Earth has been released, and it seems The Hobbit; The Battle of the Five Armies will be a three hour battle scene between small dots representing orcs and small dots representing elves. Along the way Lee Pace, Richard Armitage, Martin Freeman, Luke Evans, Orlando Bloom and many other hot hot guys will glower and look sad while getting shouty about who gets to battle where. I'm there.

Feeling a little overwhelmed by the vast movie slates announced by Sony, Marvel and WB? So are we, but here's a chart helpfully put together by our own Tireless Torsten Adair and edited by the Beat that shows 58 superhero, comic book, cartoon, Star Wars and Harry POtter movies between now and the next US Census.

Where to even start? By Chandler Banks-- Kelly Sue DeConnick is a long time hero of mine. I met her at NYCC this year, and my heart melted when she looked me in the eyes and talked to me about the importance of non-compliance (that's a big thing in her upcoming series, Bitch Planet). She's important to me, and her characters are so dear to my heart I wear a Captain Marvel necklace every day.

More Marvel footage unless you are totally over it already.

WHOA -- Marvel really did announce a Captain Marvel movie for 2018, and Black Panther for 2017, with Chadwick Boseman (42) joining Robert Downey Jr and Chris Evans on stage. Today's Marvel presser was roundly liveblogged, and it was apparently a tumultuous event at the Disney owned El Capitan theater. The entire Stage 3 line-up was announced and it goes like this:

Benedict Cumberbatch will play Doctor Strange in the upcoming MArvel movie. Some say he is merely "in talks" but we all know that this was fated to be, and it was doubtless some arcane spell cast by legions of Cumberphiles putting a whammy on Joaquin Phoenix—perhaps some kind of spell of confusion that made him think that playing Doctor Strange in the upcoming Marvel movie would not be the best thing  for his career.   But now all is right with the world, and the 'Batch will play the sorcerer supreme. I mean, really, is there anyone who didn't think this was perfect casting the moment it slippied in a sigh from a Tumblr user's lips?

Why not act like you intended to release it all tonight? After the Avengers 2 trailer leak followed by official release, here is...

http://youtu.be/tmeOjFno6Do Here for a few moments before it's taken down. actually Marvel has made this officially available so you won't have to sit through Agents...

Here's a new movie about cartoonists and comic book making: Comic Book Artists: The Next Generation, which spotlights creators Raid Studios in Toronto, including Ramon Perez, Francis Manapul, Kalman Andrasofsky and Marcus Antony To. Some promising up and comers named Stan Lee and Jim Lee also appear—I believe they are unrelated. It's a nice look at the artist's studio and the collegial spirit that evolves from it.

With this week's epochal news that the Marvel Cinematic UNiverse will be adapting the Civil War event storyline, many are wondering...why? Few of the superheroes introduced in the MCU even have secret identities—which were the crux of the kerfuffle between Iron Man and Captain America. Some just think it's a bad idea on other terms. Noelle Stevenson, of Lumberjanes and Nimona fame, is one of the sharpest commentators on Twitter, with incisive character analysis delivered in short 140-character bursts. Her thoughts on Avengers characterization are below.