How does The Wolverine compare to Origins? Star Wars news up the wahzoo and Superman/Batman filming location changes.

Hugh Jackman

Logan slashes his way to the top:

Despite the previous lackluster X-Men Origins: Wolverine film, movie goers had some love left over for the Canucklehead this weekend. The Wolverine opened with $55 million but ended with $141.1 million world-wide. The film is being deemed a studio success after covering the budget and getting generous reviews from critics and fans.

“In 2009 Origins opened to $85 million on it’s way to a decent $179.8 million..”

However, the opening was still deemed soft by the trades; Variety originally trumpeted an $85 mil opening then had to backpedal, and Deadline called it a whimper:

More disappointment at the domestic box office even though it’s the biggest international opening for anX-Men film ever. Hugh Jackman. The Wolverine. ‘A-’ CinemaScore. No fresh competition. What better is there to say? Twentieth Century Fox seemed as if it couldn’t go wrong with this domestic weekend’s #1 tentpole. Or could it? Fox says this 6th X-Men opened with only $55M for its domestic weekend in 3,924 theaters (3,063 in 3D). That’s way less than the $85.1M which 2009′s X-Men Origin: Wolverinemade in its debut. But the older pic opened the first week of summer while this installment is releasing in the crowded 2013 midsummer where in the past 5 weeks no live-action movie has opened over $45M. “We didn’t expect this, either. But there have been times before when audience fatigue from the summer sets in,” a Fox exec explained to me.

 

Maybe 20th Century Fox lucked out considering The Conjuring was its the only real competition for the number one spot. Now that the mega franchises are done for the summer, the big question is if there’s any money left for the indie guys like Kick-Ass 2 and Two Guns? (via Latino-Review, photo by AP)

Warner Bros. change Superman/Batman production site:

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Doesn’t look like we are in Kansas anymore, Jimmy. Superman/Batman was originally set to be produced in Vancover where Man of Steel was filmed; however, due to “tax benefits” the studio has decided to relocate to Toronto. This was just salt on the wound after the news leaked regarding the Fantastic Four reboot relocated from Vancouver to Louisiana. FF is set to start production in September. (via VanCityBuzz, photo by: Susan Gittins)

“Man of Steel brought an estimated $100-million in local economic spinoffs to the province, and its sequel would likely have done the same – if not more. The Superman reboot had a total budget of $225-million.”

lucaslightsaber_a_0

Star Wars promises less CGI, more retro, and interesting casting meetings:

We are still in the dark on Star Wars VII details, but thankfully Lucasfilm’s president Kathleen Kennedy is our only hope and confirms appeasing information for fans. Kennedy revealed that there will be less CGI and film using real life settings news at the Star Wars Celebration Europe event in Essen, Germany.

“We’re looking at what the early Star Wars films did; they used real locations with special effects. So [for ‘Episode VII’] we’re going to find some very cool locations, we’re going to end up using every single tool in the toolbox.”

Kennedy also confirmed that John Williams will return to score the latest installment. Abrams and other Bad Robot Production writers are developing new characters for the movie. Do these characters have anything to do with the Ryan Gosling and Zac Efron meetings? Meesa think so. (via HR Heat Vision, Photo by: Reuters/Hasbro/Ray Stubblebine/Handout/Newscom)

Flash_(flash_tv_show)

The Mary Sue broke the news on Warner Bros. plans on developing a Flash television series. Yeah because that worked the first time. WB hasn’t been able to recapture the Smallville magic and couldn’t get Wonder Woman green lit. Jill Pantozzi brings up an interesting point regarding how the studio obviously lacks the desire to make a Wonder Woman series and is looking elsewhere. (via The Mary Sue)

Henry Barajas is the co-creator, writer and letterer for El Loco and Captain Unikorn. He has also written and lettered short stories for two successful Kickstarter SpazDog Press projects: Unite and Take Over: Stories inspired by The Smiths and Break The Walls: Comic Stories inspired by The Pixies.  He is the Newsroom Research Assistant for The Arizona Daily Star and was nominated for the Shel Dorf Blogger of the Year award for his work at The Beat.  You can follow him on Twitter @HenryBarajas.

1 COMMENT

  1. I thought that where the first ‘Flash’ TV show went wrong was that the storytelling was too formulistic and predictable. Like CBS’s ‘The Incredible Hulk’, most of teh episodes were by-the-numbers to the point of where a viewer could predict in advance exactly when Wally would change into The Flash and how the story would be resolved. The show runners were not allowed to take risks and it showed.

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