When Wicked opened on Broadway 21 years ago, famed New York Times critic Ben Brantley provided the musical with one of his typically backhanded notices. While giving high marks for Kristin Chenoweth’s undeniable talent in creating Galinda, as well as specific elements of the production like Eugene Lee’s sets, the Times arbiter remained cool toward the musical’s songs, book, and even its allegorical ambitions. “As a parable of fascism and freedom, Wicked so overplays its hand that it seriously dilutes its power to disturb,” Brantley wrote when comparing the show’s vividly technicolor subtexts to the more opaque leanings of L.…

This article contains major Gladiator II spoilers. Ridley Scott has made a triumphant return to the arena with Gladiator II, a piece of cinema with a capital “C” that has all the spectacle you would want from a sequel to his 2000 masterpiece. But just as with the Russell Crowe-starring original, Gladiator II doesn’t simply coast on its epic military campaigns and brutal Colosseum battles. It wants to say something too. It’s also clear that Sir Ridley is a fan of the classics—a fact you might’ve picked up on in Prometheus and Alien: Covenant. And in Gladiator II, he and…

If you have the slightest familiarity with Wicked, you know Jon M. Chu’s film adaptation had to shatter the roof off when it came time to bring Stephen Schwartz’s iconic song, “Defying Gravity,” to the screen. Marketing is supposed to sell you on a film, of course, but every trailer that featured the number in some teasing capacity undersold it—as if hoping not to get expectations up. Yet for some fans, the choice left a sour taste in the mouth due to incomplete visuals and Cynthia Erivo’s voice not being as theatrical as the Ephabas who came before her. Now…

This article contains major Gladiator II spoilers. Denzel Washington is one of those truly gifted actors. The kind where watching him read from a tax return could be amusing. So witnessing him devour the scenery of Ancient Rome as the ambiguous, and ultimately sinister, Macrinus is nothing less than pure joy. Over the course of 148 minutes, Washington’s double-dealing social climber is able to manipulate every other character in the film and dominate each scene, right up until the end of the film where we learn Macrinus has nothing less than the throne in his sights. During Gladiator II’s third…

Toward the end of Star Trek: First Contact‘s first act, an away team from the USS Enterprise describes their world. “Mankind [starts] exploring the galaxy,” LeVar Burton’s Geordi La Forge declares. Deanna Troi (Marina Sirtis) continues, “It unites humanity in a way that no one ever thought possible. When they realize they’re not alone in the universe, poverty, disease, war—they’ll all be gone within the next 50 years.” These descriptions ring true to anyone who has seen Star Trek before. Ever since Gene Roddenberry created the first episodes back in 1966, the franchise harnessed a Kennedy era optimism while building…

The term “stagebound” is familiar to anyone who’s seen enough Hollywood adaptations of Broadway musicals. In the desire to get everything people like about a stage show into the movie, producers move heaven and boards to squeeze it all onto the screen, no matter how antithetical it might be to another medium. Jon M. Chu and Universal Pictures’ extravagant transfer of Stephen Schwartz’s beloved Wicked musical is the opposite of that. It’s something new. Not in terms of fidelity. Wicked the Movie is slavishly faithful about duplicating your favorite moments from Wicked the Show—but only half of that show. Aye,…

Even the grouchiest viewer of She-Hulk: Attorney at Law swooned a bit when Tatiana Maslany’s Jennifer Walters asks the robot K.E.V.I.N. the question on everyone’s mind: “When are we getting the X-Men?” While the robot Kevin dodged the question, the real Kevin Feige finally provided a more serious timeline during the Disney APAC Content Showcase in Singapore. “I think you will see that continues in our next few movies with some X-Men players that you might recognize,” Feige told attendees (via Deadline) while talking about bringing more characters together in future MCU films. “Right after that, the whole story of Secret…

Live-action adaptations of beloved animated movies are nothing new. Disney has been creating such films for three decades. However, they didn’t hit their stride until the last 10 years or so. After the immense success of Alice in Wonderland (2010), Maelficent (2014), The Jungle Book (2016), Beauty and the Beast (2017), and many others, Disney has delved deep into their vault, seemingly remaking every popular animated property they have at their disposal.  It was only a matter of time before another animation powerhouse dipped their toes in these waters, and DreamWorks Animation has unsurprisingly become the first to bite. The…

About half a year ago, I had a disagreement with a colleague about the prospects for Wicked. Admittedly, I am the more agreeable when it comes to musicals, but even as someone who never loved the Wicked stage show, I got a shiver of excitement when I heard the first teaser end with Cynthia Erivo’s voice warming up a “Defying Gravity” crescendo. It was like a vocalized mic drop. Even so, my musically-allergic friend seemed less impressed about Wicked’s box office future. After all, didn’t the In the Heights movie, which like Wicked was directed by Jon M. Chu, and…

In the first trailer for Deadpool & Wolverine, Ryan Reynolds’ ever loquacious Wade Wilson gives a suspicious glance at the batons in the hands of the TVA Agents who interrupted the birthday party. “Is that supposed to be scary? Pegging isn’t new for me, friendo,” Wade tells his assailants. Then, after waiting the appropriate beat of time for an audience giggle, he looks directly into the camera. “But it is for Disney.” With that last part, Deadpool his full arrival in the MCU. The gag doesn’t just highlight the Merc with a Mouth’s famous fourth-wall breaking awareness. It also indicates…

When audiences return to Rome’s Colosseum for Ridley Scott’s Gladiator II they will surely be entertained by the spectacle of warriors fighting for their lives—and for the fickle attention spans of Roman emperors and an angry public. It’s WWE 200 A.D.. Much like its Oscar-winning predecessor Gladiator, Gladiator II is a story of an unlikely hero from humble beginnings who wants to rain bloody vengeance upon an empire’s elite. In that regard, Paul Mescal’s Lucius is not so different from Maximus, the titular gladiator played by Russell Crowe. But what many fans might not know is that Maximus was almost…

What is the most underrated James Bond movie? That is a question that might have as much to do with when you ask it as it does the films themselves. Take On Her Majesty’s Secret Service for example. Over years and decades, it was generally treated as the black sheep of the Eon Productions canon; the one that was rejected by audiences in 1969 because Sean Connery isn’t there, and the one that would get slipped in very late at night on TBS marathons in the ‘90s because it starred the one-and-done George Lazenby. Yet today the film’s bittersweet tone…

As it turns out, Christmas did not come early this past weekend at the box office, even with a nominal holiday action movie playing in theaters around the world. Indeed, the long troubled and forthcoming Dwayne Johnson and Chris Evans two-hander, Red One, saw its Yuletide hopes dashed over the weekend when estimates came in pegging the Christmas spectacle’s opening at $34 million. While technically the number one movie in North America, that number is down considerably when even compared to plenty of Johnson’s other family friendly high-concept films like Black Adam (which was considered a disappointment when it opened…

Surprise cameo appearances have become the bread and butter of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The MCU has been chock-full of cameos since the franchise’s inception, from introducing major players in post-credits scenes to featuring A-list celebrities in hilarious bit parts. So today we are counting down the 25 best cameos the mega-franchise has to offer.  Before we begin, it’s essential to specify precisely what constitutes a cameo. For the sake of our list, cameos are brief appearances from a notable character or actor which do not extend for longer than a couple of scenes. Some surprise reveals, such as Tobey…

Both the Rebel Alliance and the Resistance have called a few different planets and moons home over the course of Star Wars’ history, and yet Yavin 4 continues to be the best of them all. Finding somewhere safe outside the purview of a fascistic government can’t be an easy task, but Rebels somehow keep finding their way to the jungle moon of the gas giant Yavin Prime. We first see this moon in Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope as the home base of the Rebel Alliance and again in Rogue One. Though we’ve yet to see how or…

By this point, the interstellar hunters known as Yautja have appeared in several movies, comics, and video games. Yet, each Predator movie follows the same basic structure: we’re introduced to human protagonists, we see them get killed by a mysterious force, and it’s not until late in the film that we finally see the ugly motherf—-r in its full glory. Not so for upcoming new entry Predator: Badlands, which is seemingly changing up the usual formula. This film puts the Predator “front and center, leading the charge,” according to director Dan Trachtenberg in an interview with Empire. “He’s still badass,…

This article contains Deadpool & Wolverine spoilers. As is typical of the one they call the Daywalker, Blade is unimpressed. In the front seats of an abused and debased Honda Odyssey, two of his superpowered colleagues are jabbering about variants, different versions of the same characters, and all those other multiversal nonsense things that’s made superhero movies a chore in the 2020s. “That’s Punisher’s AT4,” Jennifer Garner’s Elektra says about the glorified rocket launcher resting snugly in Wesley Snipes’ arms. “Which Punisher?” quips Ryan Reynolds’ Deadpool, “there’s been like five of them?” That is when Snipes gets the line of…

When most people think of Mission: Impossible III, two things leap to mind. First, people remember Philip Seymour Hoffman‘s tremendous performance as villain Owen Davian. Second, people ask, “What was the deal with the Rabbit’s Foot?” While the Entity, the self-aware AI villain of the upcoming Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning, probably won’t prompt any comparisons to Davian, the Rabbit’s Foot may come up again. The first trailer for The Final Reckoning features plenty of images one would expect from this well-established franchise. Tom Cruise runs. Simon Pegg and Ving Rhames look on with awe. Tom Cruise jumps. Side…

It’s no secret that the film side of Star Wars has really struggled to get off the ground again following the end of the Sequel Trilogy. Countless Star Wars movie projects have been announced in the last five years, but The Mandalorian & Grogu is the only film that’s actually completed production since The Rise of Skywalker. A trilogy of films said to be helmed by The Last Jedi director Rian Johnson was announced and then put on hold indefinitely; new movies to be developed by Game of Thrones creators David Benioff and D.B. Weiss were shelved; Patty Jenkins’s exciting…

The James Bond franchise is one of the oldest and most respected in movie history—and it currently sits at a crossroads. It’s been several years since Daniel Craig hung up his Walther PPK and stepped away from the role in No Time to Die, the end of an era on the road to a new one. Since then, there’s been a lot discussion about who or what Bond will be next, even as producers Barbara Broccoli and her step-brother Michael G. Wilson keep things close to the chest. Speaking with The Independent at an event honoring the late Albert “Cubby”…