Murphy's Multiverse

Author: Charles Murphy

  • Stephen Lang on His Villainous Return in ‘Avatar: The Way of Water’

    Stephen Lang on His Villainous Return in ‘Avatar: The Way of Water’

    In 2009’s Avatar, Stephen Lang played Colonel Miles Quaritch whose disdain for the inhabitants of Pandora made him both memorable and hateful. At the film’s end, Quaritch met his fate at the hands of Neytiri making the actor’s return for the sequel, Avatar: The Way of Water, an interesting proposition. Director James Cameron stated that the character will be the main antagonist for the next three Avatar films and it was revealed earlier this year that Quaritch’s return came with a twist: his consciousness has been uploaded into a Na’vi avatar.

    During the global press event for Avatar: The Way of Water, Lang sounded thrilled for the opportunity to return to the role that gained him some significant cachet in Hollywood.

    Oh it was very exciting to come back and it was, I was just so honored to be able to deepen and expand on the vision that Jim had for this character. I think in the first film he’s very, very colorful, he’s got personality, he’s got some great qualities. But essentially he moves through like a mindless shark, in a way.

    Stephen Lang

    Continuing on, Lang talked a bit about the “irony” of returning as what is known in the film as a Recombinant and how it lead to a new understanding of the character

    …There’s the absolute magnificent irony that Jim has written of coming back as the very thing he has been trying to destroy. And having to make the adjustment to that, to adapt to that. And I think it’s just, it’s been a… it was a total pleasure for me to continue to massage this character, and find the depth, and maybe some of the humanity that’s in him.

    Stephen Lang

    As for that humanity, Quaritch seems like a character who might be fairly hard to redeem. As Lang quipped, “He’s such a warm character, and beloved by so many…” and to that end, there are probably a lot more fans waiting to see him suffer more than anything.

    Avatar: The Way of Water will continue the villainous tale of Quaritch when it hits theaters December 16th.

  • Peyton Reed Teases “Great” ‘Fantastic Four

    Peyton Reed Teases “Great” ‘Fantastic Four

    Long before Marvel Studios regained the live-action rights to Fantastic Four, director Peyton Reed pitched a version of the film to the execs at Fox. That film obviously was never made and Reed has since gone on to become the driving force behind Marvel Studios’ Ant-Man franchise. With the third film in the franchise, Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania, next up on Marvel Studios’ theatrical slate, it seems that the first round of press has begun and Reed found himself asked about his never-was Fantastic Four.

    In an interview with Somos Geeks, Reed quickly dismissed his take on Marvel Studios’ First Family in favor of hyping the upcoming film which is due to hit theaters on February 14th, 2025. Marvel Studios Fantastic Four was originally set to be directed by Jon Watts, who directed Marvel Studios and Sony’s Spider-Man trilogy; however, Watts had to depart the project and after a long search, Marvel Studios brought WandaVision director Matt Shakman on board. Though Shakman has only been on the project for a little less than four months, development on Fantastic Four has been ongoing for years, including an ongoing cycle of concept art. That art, it turns out, is something Reed has been fortunate enough to catch a glimpse of while hanging out at Marvel Studios. “Matt Shakman is gonna do great,” said Reed, continuing on to say. “and I’ve seen initial artwork for the Fantastic Four…stuff around the Marvel offices…it’s gonna be great.”

    Concept art does not a movie make, of course, but Reed’s vote of confidence, which he volunteered on his own, should not be taken lightly. While there are some parts of the internet who don’t appreciate the Ant-Man films or believe Reed should be helming Marvel Studios projects, the perception of the director by those in charge of Marvel Studios couldn’t be any more different than that. Reed’s voice and passion for Marvel are valued and respected at the studio and he may even be a contender to direct the capstone of the Multiverse Saga, 2026’s Avengers: Secret Wars. Concept art isn’t just lying around everywhere at the studio, so Reed’s ability to take a peek could hint as his involvement in Secret Wars. Of course, it could also mean absolutely nothing. But as every day goes by without a director for the sixth Avengers film and the release of Quantumania (which is going to really surprise MCU fans) draws nearer, one does have to consider the very real possibility that Reed might be on the shortlist to helm the big saga-ending project.

    Source: YouTube

  • ‘Avatar’ Producer Cautions Fans About Leaked Sequel Titles

    ‘Avatar’ Producer Cautions Fans About Leaked Sequel Titles

    In 2018, the BBC reported that they had seen documentation indicating the titles of the next four films in the Avatar franchise. The BBC is certainly not known as a hotspot for pop culture leaks, but it is absolutely one of the most reputable news sources there is. The report listed the following titles for the films:

    Avatar: The Way of Water

    Avatar: The Seed Bearer

    Avatar: The Tulkun Rider

    Avatar: The Quest for Eywa

    At this point, the accuracy of the BBC report doesn’t seem to be in question; however, according to franchise producer Jon Landau, fans might want to pump the brakes on having the future titles added to their Avatar tattoos. “We have decided on titles,”Landau told i09, “but I would not go by those other three titles that were out there. You know, if you roll the dice one in six times, you’ll pick the right number.”

    Landau’s comments are especially noteworthy given the fact that the BBC’s report has already been proven 25% true and one would assume that the documentation for the other films they referenced is from the same source as that which correctly gave them the title The Way of Water. Of course, there’s nothing less important than the name of a film no matter how much of hot button topic it is among fans. Avatar 5 could be called Avatar: Lots of Blue People and as long as the film is well-done, audiences will grow to love it.

    While we wait to find out what the titles for Avatar 3-5 turn out to be, the wait for Avatar: The Way of Water is getting shorter by the day as it hits theaters on December 16th.

    Sources: BBC, iO9

  • Zoë Saldaña Discusses the Changes to Neytiri in ‘Avatar: The Way of Water’

    Zoë Saldaña Discusses the Changes to Neytiri in ‘Avatar: The Way of Water’

    While it’s been 13 years in the real world from the release of Avatar to its sequel, Avatar: The Way of Water, there’s also been a significant passage of time experienced by the characters who inhabit the fictional world of Pandora. In Avatar: The Way of Water, a decade has passed since the events of the first film and that means a great deal has changed for main characters Sully and Neytiri. So much changed, in fact, that director James Cameron wrote what star Sam Worthington called “Avatar 1.5” in order to prepare the cast by sharing with them the experiences their characters had during that decade.

    For star Zoë Saldaña, who has had 3 children in the time between films, the changes in her personal life are mirrored in her character, Neytiri, a fierce and fearless Na’vi warrior who now has children of her own. During the global press junket for Avatar: The Way of Water, Saldaña talked about the changes to her character and how they reflect her personal growth since 2009.

    Neytiri and I, in a way, we’ve lived parallel lives. There is, there’s a level of fearlessness and rebellion that I have, as I guess as a person, that Neytiri had as herself. And I, we were able to sort of find kindred in that. You know, but the leap of falling in love with something outside of you, that challenges you to see something that you’ve never seen before, that has always been her dilemma. To surrender to that, and then to bring forward, you know, fruits of that love, and… but that presents the challenge for her. Because forcing her to grow, it’s forcing her to love something that she’s been taught to hate. And it’s, you know, it’s hard, it’s really, really hard.

    Zoë Saldaña

    Saldaña continued on about the role that fear plays in the life of a parent and how that helped her find a connection with where Neytiri was on her journey in Avatar: The Way of Water.

    Also fear. In my personal life, when I became a parent, fear entered my realm. The fear of losing something that you love so much, you know? And you just spend a great deal of your time creating these hypothetical scenarios that just unimaginable. When I read, you know, the second script, that was her, that was Neytiri. But I didn’t see it then. I see it now.

    Zoë Saldaña

    Traditionally, actors give their best performances when they can find real-life inspiration for the roles they inhabit. In this case, it sounds like Saldaña and Neytiri have so much in common that they’re almost kindred spirits. That’s good news for fans of the franchise who can look forward to an intense portrayal by Saldaña as she looks to protect her children from those “unimaginable” scenarios she described.

    Avatar: The Way of Water debuts in theaters on December 16th.

  • Crazy MCU Theory Posits That the Ending of ‘Avengers: Secret Wars’ Has Already Been Spoiled On Screen in Another Project

    Crazy MCU Theory Posits That the Ending of ‘Avengers: Secret Wars’ Has Already Been Spoiled On Screen in Another Project

    Time travel! As Tony Stark warned in Avengers: Endgame, when you mess with time, it tends to mess back. Thanks to Sylvie’s actions at the end of the Season 1 finale of Loki, the heroes of the MCU are about to find out what happens when you come face-to-face with the Master of Time as Jonathan Majors‘ Kang the Conqueror is set to wreak havoc across the Multiverse. Rumors have Kang wiping the floor with the Avengers in Avengers: The Kang Dynasty before facing off against a multiversal team of heroes in Avengers: Secret Wars. While everyone ultimately expects a big win for the good guys, a crazy theory puts forth the idea that fans may have already seen the aftermath of the big battle against Kang!

    The theory comes courtesy of Heavy Spoilers and it packs a pretty meta punch. Rumors of the plot of Avengers: The Kang Dynasty have the Avengers teaming with a version of He Who Remains, a Nathaniel Richards Variant first met in Loki. This Variant, who hasn’t become He Who Remains yet, goes by Nathaniel and eventually helps put together a multiversal team of heroes that take on Kang in Avengers: Secret Wars. According to the theory, once Kang is defeated, Nathaniel will go on to become He Who Remains and create the TVA in order to oversee the Sacred Timeline, just as seen in Season 1 of Loki!

    If that theory were to play out in Avengers: Secret Wars, it would mean that the aftermath of that film will already have been shared with fans years in advance of it occurring on screen! This would mean that the story He Who Remains tells Loki and Sylvie about the peace between realities erupting into an all-out war was only in the past from his perspective and that he was actually describing the events of Avengers: Secret Wars to fans years before they would ever see the film. To quote Marty McFly, “this is heavy.”

    Time travel!

    Source: Heavy Spoilers

  • ‘Avatar’ Producer Confirms ‘Avatar 5’ Will Indeed Head to Earth

    ‘Avatar’ Producer Confirms ‘Avatar 5’ Will Indeed Head to Earth

    James Cameron, the creator and director of the Avatar franchise, recently teased the possibility of the fifth film in the franchise taking place, at least in part, on Earth. While Cameron’s tease was a little light on detail, his longtime creative partner, producer Jon Landau, was a little more forthcoming about how Avatar 5 would include a trip to Earth.

    In an interview with i09, Landau explained that a portion of the plot will involve Zoë Saldaña‘s Neytiri headed to the third rock from the sun. “In movie five there is a section of the story where we go to Earth,” said Landau, “and we go to it to open people’s eyes, open Neytiri’s eyes, to what exists on Earth.” Earth, of course, is the home planet of the RDA, the Research Development Administration, which serves as the main antagonist of 2009’s Avatar as the come to strip Pandora of its natural resources.

    As Landau explains, part of Neytiri’s journey there is to come to understand that there’s more to Earth than the RDA. “Earth is not just represented by the RDA”, he pointed out. “Just like you’re defined by the choices you make in life, not all humans are bad. Not all Na’vi are good. And that’s the case here on Earth. And we want to expose Neytiri to that.”

    Avatar 5 is currently slated for a December 22nd, 2028 release and there’s obviously a lot of story to tell between now and then. Given Cameron’s commitment to the franchise and his continued desire to push the limits of what’s possible in the realm of visual effects, it’s fun to think about what advances might be developed in the next 6 years and what kind of spectacle Avatar 5 might end up being!

    Avatar: The Way of Water premieres December 16th!

    Source: iO9

  • ‘Avatar: The Way of Water’ Producer Talks the Film’s Core Themes

    ‘Avatar: The Way of Water’ Producer Talks the Film’s Core Themes

    Oscar-winning producer Jon Landau has long been a partner of director James Cameron in bringing both cutting-edge technology and well-crafted stories to the big screen. The two partnered up for Avatar and Titanic, which sit at #1 and #3, respectively, on the all-time box office list and both films have stayed with audiences because they had relevant stories to tell. 13 years after Avatar was released, its direct sequel, Avatar: The Way of Water, is about to hit theaters across the globe and while it’s already being praised for its technological advancements, Landau believes there’s a whole lot more going on in the film than just fancy VFX.

    As part of the global press junket for Avatar: The Way of Water, Landau expressed what he was looking forward to in the film and why the time was right for the long-awaited sequel:

    Well the excitement are the themes that Jim writes into his stories. You know, themes are what you leave the theatre with, and this movie has heart, has emotion, and it also has, you know, a message again about our world, not just the environment, about people, about accepting people for their differences. In the movie Jim wrote in the line, (Speaks Na’vi), ‘I see you.’ And we want people to know that they’re seen, and that to see others that same way.

    Jon Landau

    The film will see the Na’vi encounter a new tribe who look to be very similar to themselves but who also have evolved quite differently. Footage has shown the Na’vi coming to understand that the new tribe, which inhabits coastal regions of Pandora, aren’t quite as familiar as they might think. In this way, Landau’s comments become a little clearer. While fans have come to know the Sully family, they’re not the only ones on the planet whose way of life is jeopardized. Perhaps Avatar: The Way of Water will partly focus on these tribes putting aside their differences and uniting to save their world, a theme which is always relevant.

    Avatar: The Way of Water hits theaters across the globe on December 16th.

  • DC’s Scrapped ‘Batman Beyond’ Film Featured the Return of Another Burtonverse Icon

    DC’s Scrapped ‘Batman Beyond’ Film Featured the Return of Another Burtonverse Icon

    Amid the wreckage created by THR’s bombshell report that Wonder Woman 3, Man of Steel 2 and a Black Adam sequel were all falling apart under the newly minted DC Studios label came word that a Michael Keaton-led Batman Beyond film had also been in the works. The film, which was set to spin out of the events of The Flash, was being written by Christina Hodson (The Flash, Birds of Prey) but development on it was halted once James Gunn and Peter Safran took over.

    A new report from THR has now added a little more detail to what Hodson had in mind and how things fell apart. According to the report, Hodson was given the green light to develop the script prior to the hires of Gunn and Safran. Just a couple of weeks after they came on the scene, probably just enough time for the two of them to get the lay of the land, they asked Hodson to put down her pen.

    Integral to Hodson’s pitch, it seems, was the return of Selina Kyle/Catwoman, who appeared in the Burtonverse sequel Batman Returns in 1992. The Batman Beyond film would have seen Catwoman “resuscitate” a romance with Keaton’s Bruce Wayne which was left open-ended at best in the 1992 film. It’s highly probable that had the film gone forward, the studio would have approached Michelle Pfeiffer, whose performance as Catwoman in Batman Returns was genuinely iconic, to reprise the role. With the film being scrapped, fans will never know if she’d have returned.

    Source: Heat Vision

  • DC’s Change in Leadership May Not Be Able to Resurrect ‘Justice League Dark’

    DC’s Change in Leadership May Not Be Able to Resurrect ‘Justice League Dark’

    Once upon a time, director Guillermo del Toro was deep into development on a big screen adaptation of Justice League Dark for Warner Bros. Even after del Toro left the film in order to work on Pacific Rim Uprising, work continued on bringing his vision to the screen. That vision would have featured DC Comics’ characters John Constantine, Swamp Thing, Deadman, Etrigan the Demon and Zatanna, along with appearances from others such as Doctor Fate and Detective Chimp and was far enough along in development that a great deal of concept art was generated for the project.

    Obviously, the film never came together with several directors opting for other projects instead. Earlier this year, JJ Abrams announced plans to develop Justice League Dark characters for a series of projects on HBO Max but those plans seem to have already materialized as well, causing fans of the characters to wonder if they’ll ever find their way together on screen.

    However, the silver lining there is that without Justice League Dark ever having been made by anyone, the option for del Toro to pick the project back up remains. While nobody is suggesting that any of the others who passed would have done poorly, it’s hard to imagine many creatives better for the job than del Toro. In a recent interview with Comic Book, the question of whether or not the director had any interest in revisiting the project now that there was a new team of visionaries in place at DC. Unfortunately, it doesn’t sound promising.

    Oh, I don’t know. My love for Swamp Thing, The Demon, knows no bounds, but I don’t know. You don’t get a manicure from a big machine, that’s what I learn, you lose a few fingers. So I don’t know if I want a manicure from a big machine. As Danny Glover would say, “I’m too old for this shit”.

    Guillermo del Toro

    That’s certainly not a no, but it also isn’t a yes. Perhaps a sit down with DC Studios co-heads James Gunn and Peter Safran might turn del Toro around on this, but given all the uncertainty surrounding the future of the newly minted studio, there’s no telling if Justice League Dark is in the plans now or ever will be.

    Source: Comicbook.com

  • Rumored ‘The Kang Dynasty’ Leak Has the Avengers Finding a Wild New Ally

    Rumored ‘The Kang Dynasty’ Leak Has the Avengers Finding a Wild New Ally

    As fans await the beginning of Marvel Studios’ Phase 5, they are already looking ahead to Phase 6 where a pair of Avengers movies will wrap up the Multiverse Saga. The first of those is Avengers: The Kang Dynasty, which is set for a 2025 release and is beginning to sound like it will have serious ties to Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania which kicks off Phase 5 in February as the Variant of Jonthan Majors’ Nathaniel Richards introduced there will be the main threat to the Multiverse moving forward. According to a new rumor, the Variant introduced in Quantumania isn’t going to be the only previously introduced one to play a key role in The Kang Dynasty.

    According to a rumored plot leak by Heavy Spoilers, He Who Remains, who was last seen being murdered by Sylvie in the Season 1 finale of Loki, will play a key role in The Kang Dynasty. He Who Remains is a Variant of Kang who inhabited the Citadel at the End of Time and watched over the Sacred Timeline. Upon his death, the Timeline splintered and created the Multiverse.

    According to the rumor, He Who Remains won’t have ascended to that lofty station quite yet in The Kang Dynasty and will still go by Nathaniel Richards. What’s even more interesting is that Richards will ultimately join the Avengers in their fight against Kang the Conqueror. Their alliance will continue into Avengers: Secret Wars where he and the Avengers will collect heroes from across the Multiverse to take on Kang.

    As absolutely fascinating as this sounds, it’s important to note that Avengers: The Kang Dynasty is still more than 2 years away, making this and any other rumor, no matter how great they sound, nothing more than fun topics for discussion!

    Source: Heavy Spoilers