The time has finally come, Suki and Joe can finally react to the live-action One Piece trailer. It arrived during TUDUM and they used the opportunity to live-stream it on Suki’s Twitch account.
Author: Joseph Aberl
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Sony’s Scrapped ‘El Muerto’ Would’ve Included Tombstone
Many questioned what exactly Sony was thinking about when they wanted to adapt the minor Spider-Man character of El Muerto into a film. While it seemed like it was mostly a project driven by its main lead, Bad Bunny, the project was seemingly scrapped. In a new report by The Hollywood Reporter, it seems the film was shelved due to it needing work and that isn’t happening with the ongoing Writer’s Strike, as many writers are fighting for livable wages.
The big reveal is also that they were seemingly already eyeing someone to play an iconic Spider-Man villain in the film. El Muerto was seemingly going to explore the antihero’s story and introduce Tombstone, a famous mafia boss from the Spider-Man comics. They were eyeing Marvin Jones III for the role, who also voiced the character in the animated film Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse.
He’s not the only one, as they were also going to add Mercedes Varnado, better known as Sasha Banks in an unnamed role. It’s unclear if they might be open to retreading the project at some point later on, but that all depends if the Writer’s Strike finally coming to an end and receiving what they deserve given the work they put in to give us some amazing projects.
Source: The Hollywood Reporter
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‘The Flash’s Sasha Calle Met With DC Studios Heads to Return as Supergirl
The Flash may have had a rocky weekend at the box office, but many seem to agree that the biggest part is Sasha Calle’s Supergirl. While we’re entering a new DC Cinematic Universe under the new leadership of Peter Safran and James Gunn, the future for many existing characters is uncertain.
Luckily, it seems that Calle is not going to just accept she won’t return and is seemingly already in talks. In an interview with USA Today, she revealed that she’s already in talks with Peter Safran to potentially return. Sbe also goes on to highlight her love for portraying Supergirl.
I hope to continue playing Supergirl. I love her so deeply and I feel so connected to her.
Sasha CalleIt’s always great to see such a talent love the character they portray and the determination to return as much as they could to keep playing them. While her future remains a mystery given the multiversal storyline of The Flash, there’s always a way for them to bring her back. They have a Supergirl film planned later down the line and it would be a shame not to bring her back.
Source: USA Today
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‘One Piece’ Episode Titles Potentially Revealed
At TUDUM, we finally got our first look at the official One Piece live-action adaptation from Netflix. Showrunners Matt Owens and Steven Maeda have been busy at work on this project for many years, and are currently continuing an important fight to ensure the safety of their industry. In the meantime, the cast gets to promote the new season and it looks like right after the trailer dropped, the WGA has updated its database.
As first noticed by @OP_Netflix_Fan and the OPLA discord, WGA database has seemingly listed the episode titles for the upcoming One Piece series. While the directory for the actual show hasn’t listed them, the titles seem fitting for the show. There’s a chance these aren’t the final titles, but they are definitely interesting.
Here are the titles of the eight episodes in no specific order as it is provided by the WGA currently:
- Eat at Baratie!
- Romance Dawn
- Tell No Tales
- The Chief and the Chore Boy
- The Girl with the Sawfish Tattoo
- The Man in the Straw Hat
- The Pirates are Coming
- Worst in the East
So, we can definitely connect some of these episodes. “Romance Dawn” is oddly spelled “Down” but we know that is the pilot episode’s name. “The Man in the STtaw Hat” could either be the second episode or even the last one, as it’s how Smoker describes Luffy when they meet.
The “Pirates are Coming” and “Tell No Tales” seem very easy to connect to Usopp’s Syrup Village arc. “Eat at Baratie!” and “The Chief and the Chore Boy” match the Baratie beyond the obvious connection. “That only leaves “The Girl with the Sawfish Tattoo” is also obvious for the Arlong Park storyline.
So, we only have “Worst in the East” and “The Man in the Straw Hat” without any truly fitting. As previously mentioned, the latter could be either the first or the last, but “Worst in the East” seems fitting for Arlong. Though, they could also use it as a way to hint at the dangers that Buggy represents. For now, let the speculation begin.
Source: WGA
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‘One Piece’s Inaki Godoy on the Challenge of Playing Luffy
Iñaki Godoy may have decided to tackle one of the hardest characters to bring to live-action, the loveable Monkey D. Luffy in Netflix’s live-action One Piece series. There’s a lot of cynicism surrounding these types of adaptations due to the way animation or drawings are generally translated into live-action. With quite a few projects not capturing the spirit of the original, they have a big goal to accomplish, but Godoy seems very aware of that challenge.
In an interview with Decider, Godoy got a chance to sit down and discuss what it’s like to bring this iconic character to life. He highlights the biggest challenge is simply in balancing the two worlds of this kind of pirate-themed adventure with supernatural elements, especially when trying to still ground it as much as possible.
You have this world where there’s Laos pirates and stretchy pirates, and you need to find a way to make that feel real human.
Iñaki GodoyHe goes on to highlight the biggest challenge being how should he bring someone who is made of rubber to live action. He definitely used existing material as a reference, such as trying to replicate the way Luffy grabs his arm after punching. He definitely tried to look into as many details as he could in bringing the character to life.
How can I translate this rubber-man into live-action? In those cases, I really used the anime and manga for reference and I literally tried to replicate the way this guy [Luffy] fights. I can see how this guy fights. Why wouldn’t I use that as a reference? When he throws a punch and he takes it back, he puts his hand on his bicep or his shoulder. So, if he does that, I should do that too, right? And when he’s about to throw a punch, sometimes he lifts up his leg. I just tried to look for those little details in the original product.
Iñaki GodoyOf course, TUDUM’s reveal was just the teaser trailer for the adaptation and we still have some time before we get an actual full look at what to expect. The only villain teased so far was Buggy, who is the only one with his own Devil Fruit power. So, the early season won’t have to juggle that many VFX elements. A lot of focus is already on the portrayal of his stretchy powers and here’s hoping the final product can deliver.
Source: Decider
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Eiichiro Oda Would Send Storyboards for the Live-Action ‘One Piece’ Series
For quite some time, the Netflix cast has been quite open about the involvement of Eiichiro Oda in the live-action adaptation of the classic manga series. He even stated recently that he has the final say if the show is allowed to release, which highlighted that they are respecting his involvement. Yet, it turns out that he did quite a bit more than one would think.
Netflix’s Director of Original Series Ted Biaselli offered some insight in an interview with The Mary Sue, where they highlight that they have a lot of respect towards Oda. They stated that he would regularly give notes to the series, but even the shape of storyboards. That sounds a lot like how he handled the movies but it would be amazing to get one’s hands on scenes of the live-action crew being showcased in his iconic art style.
He went on to highlight that Oda is “brilliant.”
I don’t throw the word ‘brilliant’ around very often, but he is brilliant. He is a master of the pop culture zeitgeist. He’s well-versed and articulate about music history … He has a playlist in his mind every time he writes.
Ted BiaselliThey also seemingly made sure to inform Oda of any changes they made early in the scripting phase. Sometimes they would get “Try it out, let’s see” statements that would lead to him getting screenings to evaluate how it turned out. Not just that, it seems he got pretty much everything screened and teased he got “misty” during one scene in the end-of-season screening. This was also highlighted by Emily Rudd, who plays the role of Nami.
They also highlighted his involvement in the casting process. One part was that he actively praised Rudd’s work and spent time with Iñaki Godoy, who took on the role of Luffy. Here’s hoping all his work comes to fruition with this live-action adaptation breaking the curse that others have seemingly had over the years.
Source: The Mary Sue
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‘The Flash’ Stumbles to $55M in its Opening 3-Day Weekend
It’s not looking good for releases this Juneteenth holiday weekend, as some of the biggest releases of the summer are not performing as one would hope. While most expected Elemental to have a softer opening due to Pixar’s unique situation with the Disney+ releases throughout the last few years, The Flash is a very different story. Yes, it was a troubled production due to its star but with a B CinemaScore, expectations still had it hitting around $70M throughout the three-day weekend.
Early estimates after a softer-than-expected Friday did retract that to them reaching that high throughout a four-day weekend with at least $60M in the bank. Mixed word-of-mouth might not carry it throughout the upcoming weeks. However, it still had the potential that people pick it up afterward due to long-time fans wanting to relive the DCEU before it is closed completely. Though that B CinemaScore has been quite detrimental to recent films as it stands for an “I’ll get it on streaming later” kind of tepid reaction.
Now, the film has hit a snag and is likely to open around $55.1M over three days. Four-day predictions range from a low $62M to $64M which doesn’t look good for the film to make up its ballooning budget. It would place the film even behind Black Adam’s $67M that it made in just three days. Though, that film had the star power of Dwayne Johnson to push it forward a bit even with a C-list character. Yet, one could argue that The Flash is one of the biggest members of the Justice League and should be a crowd-pleaser.
Elemental continues to show a different side of the streaming issue due to it being set to open around $29.5M over a three-day weekend. That would make it the lowest opening weekend for any Pixar title since the original Toy Story almost 30 years ago. Also, it only pulled in $17M in its first 17 markets. Even an A CinemaScore will have to go a long way to build up that loss in box office revenue.
Source: The Hollywood Reporter
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TUDUM: Live-Action ‘One Piece’ to Release in August
It’s crazy to think that we first heard about the live-action One Piece series back in 2017. After all this time, we finally have a first look at the adaptation of this iconic series from the TUDUM event. While Netflix has accidentally leaked the trailer ahead of the actual panel featuring the cast. Yet, the first look is finally here, and with it comes a long-expected confirmation.
Having been teased quite some time ago, live-action One Piece will arrive in just a few more months. Luffy and the rest of the Straw Hats will arrive on streaming services on August 31st. A perfect way to end the summer with one of its wildest adventures yet.
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‘The Flash’ Had 3 Endings Throughout the Production
The Flash has had a troubled production for so long that it’s hard to think that even up to its release there wasn’t any chaos behind the scenes. Not only was the film handed over from director to director, Ezra Miller started to gather troubling news as time went on just as the film finally was about to start promotion. Plus, Warner Bros. Discovery decided to change things up with its initial leadership kicked out of the company. Then, they decided to restart a brand new universe with James Gunn and Peter Safran heading the new DC Studios.
As it turns out, every leadership change also ended up changing the final version of The Flash. In a new report by Hollywood Reporter, it seems that the film had around three different sequences that seemingly got chopped up. We won’t spoil the one that is currently being showcased in the final version of the film, especially as it just released but we’ll take a look at the previous two versions.
Still, only continue at your own risk if you want to remain completely spoiler-free on watching The Flash in theaters.
The initial ending seemingly had a sequence of only Sasha Calle’s Supergirl and Michael Keaton’s Batman at the courthouse. It actually matches some of the leaked set photos that we saw of both of them at a set that would match a courthouse. Though, it seems when the initial DC heads left, they kept Calle and Keaton in the sequence but added two more cameos. Originally, Henry Cavill’s Superman and Gal Gadot’s Wonder Woman were going to appear.
That version has also been cut due to the new leadership of DC Studios, who were worried that keeping those cameos would end up confusing viewers going into the “new” DC Cinematic Universe. As such, the current version in theaters was filmed around six months ago and added to the project. This move is also when they decided not to move forward with Cavill’s Superman movie and why Wonder Woman 3 was no longer moving forward.
Source: The Hollywood Reporter
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Mackenyu Arata Teases Changes to ‘One Piece’s East Blue Saga
We’re still anxiously awaiting Netflix’s major TUDUM event, which is just on the horizon. While we don’t know what exactly they might show in their first in-person hybrid event since the pandemic started, the official live-action One Piece account has been quite busy promoting the event adding more hope that we might finally get our first look at the adaptation. Luckily, it also gave us some new interviews that tease the adaptation.
In an interview with Sopitas, as translated by Twitter user @philazora, Mackenyu Arata shared what it was like working with Eiichiro Oda. It’s not every day that an adaptation of manga has its original creator this heavily involved but that doesn’t mean they still won’t have to make some changes to the original story, especially with multiple chapters being retold in just eight episodes.
Whatever Oda-sensei wants for the show is what the fans want. So I’m sure they’ll be happy. We only have 8 hours in the series. There’ll be changes, but they’re necessary. We’re very happy about that. He’s like our dad.
Mackenyu ArataArata highlights that these are “necessary” adding some intrigue on what exactly they may have changed and why. Some of the humor from the original may not have aged and a live-action adaptation can’t carry over every element from the original. Changes are a part of every adaptation and it’s great to know that Oda is so heavily involved that he also ensures it doesn’t stray too far from his vision. Here’s hoping a first look is almost here.
