The Acolyte has been quite a mysterious project for Lucasfilm. Not only was there a lot of curiosity about it being the first real disconnected story from a previous iteration in the franchise, but it also hinted at exploring an era that has yet to have been seen in live-action. Luckily, the latest Star Wars Celebration has arrived and we got a good look at what the future has in store.
Not only did they unveil a new and much cleaner logo for the series. But they also confirmed some of the castings that we can expect for the series. First off, one of their biggest additions was the breakout star Lee Jung-jae after his leading role in Squid Game. They also confirmed that Joonas Suotamo will be playing a Wookie Jedi.
Among the many upcoming projects on the Star Wars slate is the streaming series The Acolyte. Created by Leslye Headland, the series is set in the High Republic era well before the rise of the Empire giving fans a brand new perspective on the galaxy far, far away. Lucasfilm President Kathleen Kennedy hyped the show at Star Wars Celebration saying that the four finished episodes of the series blew her mind before turning the stage over to Headland, who detailed some of the show’s interesting inspirations.
According to Headland, her original pitch for the series was “Frozen meets Kill Bill.”
Leslye Headland says ‘THE ACOLYTE’ was pitched as ‘Frozen’ meets ‘Kill Bill’.
While that sets up some pretty interesting ideas of what type of action fans can expect from the new series, it was also revealed that the project will take philosophical inspiration from the works of legendary Japanese filmmaker Akira Kurosawa. Kurosawa’s work famously inspired Star Wars creator George Lucas’ take on the franchise and, according to Headland, two of his films, Yojimbo and The Hidden Fortress, have inspired her on The Acolyte.
After a long wait, Star Wars Celebration is back with its big panel teasing what the future has in store for Lucasfilm. They kicked off the panel with their sleeper hit from last year: Andor. The more grounded story of the early days of the rebellion has sparked with many fans and may have become the one series that many believe is even Lucasfilm and Star Wars’ best entry to date.
We’ve known for some time though that the series isn’t quite done yet and would wrap up with a second season. During the big Lucasfilm panel at SWCE, the series showrunner and creator Tony Gilroy unveiled that we might expect the series sometime next year. He highlights that they are already halfway through production and once again confirms that the series will end where Rogue One starts.
As Star Wars Celebration 2023 kicks off in London a rumor about a potential new project is making waves. On the latest episode of The Hot Mic Podcast, Jeff Snieder reported that Star Wars Rebels creator Dave Filoni, who has directed several episodes of The Mandalorian, is directing a film that is expected to be announced at Celebration.
According to Snieder, three movies are going to be announced during Celebration and one of them will be directed by Filoni. The film will reportedly “codify the Star Wars universe around the world” built by Filoni and Jon Favreau.
The story of Mandalore and its disparate clans of Mandalorians is something Filoni has been building both through animation and live-action for over a decade. Beginning in Star Wars: The Clone Wars, continuing through Star Wars Rebels and now The Mandalorian, Filoni created a culture and mythology around characters such as Bo-Katan Kryze, Sabine Wren and Din Djarin. Those characters and their stories captured the attention of audiences and now it seems likely that their journeys–and a few other characters’ journeys as well–will come together on the big screen.
The next installment in Marvel Studios Multiverse Saga, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, hits theaters on May 5, 2023. The Guardians’ story started in 2014 and unexpectedly captured the hearts of audiences across the globe. Those same hearts are set to break as JamesGunn closes out the Guardians trilogy with an emotional finale that is sure to see at least one member of the team meet their ultimate fate.
More than just an emotional roller coaster, Vol. 3 looks to be jam-packed and will be the longest film of the trilogy. The threequel will make good on one of Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2‘s stingers by introducing Will Poulter‘s Adam Warlock as a weapon pointed directly at the team. As if Warlock won’t be enough to handle, the team will ultimately make their way to Counter-Earth where they’ll meet the man responsible for the pain and suffering that has defined Rocket: the High Evolutionary, played by Chukwudi Iwuji. And they’ll be doing all that while their leader, Chris Pratt‘s Peter Quill, continues to deal with the loss of the love of his life, Gamora, while a Variant version of her ends up working with the team out of their brand-new base in the severed head of a Celestial known as Knowhere. Vol. 3 has a lot in store for audiences but to appreciate what’s happening and where things are going in that film, there’s plenty of homework to be done which is why you’re here for the latest installment of…The Ultimate List of Things to Watch Before!
Tier One
These projects are non-negotiable. If you want to know what’s going on right when Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 kicks off, you’ll have to find time to get these in before hitting the theater.
Guardians of the Galaxy
It all started with 2014’s surprise summer hit and any rewatch or first watch should start with the original Guardians of the Galaxy. The core team has grown quite a bit since they first came together in the space prison known as the Kyln in the first film but their origin story is one of the most rewatchable films in the Marvel Studios catalog, even if it does have one of the MCU’s worst villains. Rocket’s tragic origin, which is set to be explored in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, is hinted at here making it worth the watch for that alone. It’s also the start of the romantic relationship between Peter and Gamora which ultimately results in the emotional state Peter is in when Vol. 3 begins.
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2
While James Gunn will undoubtedly include something with the Sovereign in Vol. 3 to help newbies catch up, if you didn’t watch Vol. 2 you might not fully understand why Will Poulter‘s golden godman, Adam Warlock, is after the Guardians…but that’s hardly the only reason to check out Vol. 2. The 2017 sequel is all about relationships, some of which will be key to how you feel walking into and out of Vol. 3. Peter and Gamora’s romance grows; Drax and Mantis begin forming their wonderful friendship; Gamora and Nebula begin the process of repairing their sisterly bond. The core team also expands its roster during the film, adding Mantis and Kraglin. It’s certainly worth a watch to see how hard the next projects hit.
Avengers: Infinity War
Outside of Guardians of the Galaxy, Avengers: Infinity War is arguably the most important project to take in ahead of Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3. Not only does the team play a key role in attempting to stop Thanos’ efforts to cut the population of the universe in half but it’s also the final appearance of “Prime” Gamora. Her death, at the hands of her father, changed Peter forever, something that’s center stage in Vol. 3.
Tier Two
If you can’t get to the Tier Two projects before you head to the theaters for Vol. 3, you’ll probably be caught up on the important events in them early on in the threequel. It’s not to say that they aren’t important because to have a complete understanding of each of the characters, every second of time they spend on screen is ultimately important. However, these two projects don’t add to the overall story as much as the others.
Avengers: Endgame
Gamora is back! Except it’s not really Gamora. Nebula’s redemption is complete. The Guardians take off with Thor on some new adventures.
The Guardians of the Galaxy Holiday Special
While the Holiday Special is incredibly entertaining, for a project whose entire focus is on the Guardians, it’s hardly essential viewing. It established that the team has made Knowhere its base of operations and reintroduced and more fully developed Cosmo. It feels more like a Drax and Mantis comedy project and while the pair offer some great laughs, their relationship with each other doesn’t really change much. The Holiday Special’s effort to treat the audience to a shocking reveal falls pretty flat as most everyone who watched Vol. 2 already figured out that Mantis and Peter were siblings. It would seem that everything important about this project could be summed up in 3-5 seconds of screen time in Vol. 3.
Tier Three
Thor: Love and Thunder
Other than showing that Nebula has officially joined the team, the Guaridans’ time in Thor: Love and Thunder was entirely uneventful and, other than for continuity reasons, entirely unnecessary. Of course, the same might be able to be said about Thor: Love and Thunder itself, so it’s hardly the Guardians’ fault. However, if the film is entertaining at all, it is during the scenes on Indigarr when Thor and the Guardians help King Yakan take on the Booskan army led by Habooska the Horrible. Don’t go out of your way to watch it, but if you’re a completist, fast forward to this battle and then turn the TV off immediately.
While it’s not as extensive as other Ultimate Lists have been in the past, it’s still enough to keep you busy in the coming weeks as you prepare for the release of Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 on May 5th!
Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania‘s theatrical run had a less than stellar theatrical run as it ran out of steam pretty quickly after a big opening weekend in mid-February. Much of the dropoff has been attributed to the generally poor word of mouth around the film, which was essentially an offbeat sci-fi B movie dressed up as an MCU flick. Writer Jeff Loveness has been the target of significant ire from fans who have consistently criticized some odd edits and lack of stakes in the film’s third act. Interestingly enough, in an exclusive interview with Murphy’s Multiverse, Loveness confirmed that one part of the film’s ending was significantly altered from his original drafts; now, in a new interview, he’s revealed further changes to the film.
In an interview with Backstory Magazine, Loveness confirmed that he had written the death of a member of the Ant-Family into an early draft of Quantumania. “We were going to kill Hank at one point,” said Loveness, “and I was going to have him be, like, reanimated.” Loveness is a huge comic book fans and has written books for Marvel Comics. When he was hired for Quantumania, I was told that his understanding of the source material was key to Marvel Studios being brought on board, so it’s not too surprising that he was going to “reanimate” Hank Pym in a very comic book-y way. “His consciousness was going to live on through the ants, and he was going to be like mentally controlling them,” he explained before adding, “yeah, he was going to be almost like this hive mind of the ants, and I like that… that didn’t go too far.“
Given Loveness‘ admission that he liked his own idea, it’s hard to believe he was the one who cut the idea from the script and that it was likely done by the studio somewhere during the editing process. The revelation by Loveness continues to call into question just what went on between early drafts and even early screenings of the film and the final product. Reliable plot leaks suggest a much different cut of Quantumania existed at one point and set photos confirm that the final scenes of the movie were reshot roughly 6 weeks before release. While this news won’t stop the “bad writing” bandwagon from rolling, it’ll hopefully at least give some fans a reason to stop and think about who’s responsible for what when they see a film. Writers write. Editors edit. And someone else makes all the final decisions.
It looks to have found its first four cast members. The upcoming prequel series based on the popular It duology by Andy Muschietti will further explore the early days of the town of Derry. For now, it only has the fittingly working title of “Welcome to Derry” but it seems that the project is moving forward at full speed after it was ordered straight-to series back in February.
As of now, four cast members have joined the production which includes Ma Raney’s Black Bottom‘s Taylour Paige, Babylon‘s Jovan Adepo, Oppenheimer‘s James Remar, and Perry Mason‘s Chris Chalk. Fuchs and BradCaleb Kane are serving as co-showrunners on the project with Muschietti acting as an executive producer through Double Dream.
Currently, the following logline has been shared for the HBO Max original series:
Set in the world of Stephen King’s ‘It’ universe, ‘Welcome to Derry’ is based on King’s ‘It’ novel and expands the vision established by filmmaker Andy Muschietti in the feature films ‘It’ and ‘It Chapter Two.
Supposedly Andy Muschietti will also direct multiple episodes, including the pilot. Fuchs wrote the teleplay for the first episode, but it is based on an idea he worked on with Muschietti and his wife, Barbara Muschietti. It’ll be interesting to see how they might tackle this adaptation and how much the focus may be on Pennywise given he’s an integral part of Derry’s history. Bill Skarsgard, who played him in the last two films, confirmed he has not been in talks to join just yet. So, we’ll see if an announcement will follow.
Even as the reviews from critics are surprisingly harsh, it seems that the collaboration between Illumination, Universal, and Nintendo is heading towards that 1-Up Mushroom, as The Super Mario Bros. Movie is looking to make quite a big bang at the box office this weekend. Wednesday previews are already looking strong and are heading towards $26M sans Tuesday previews, which would potentially mean an $86.2M 3-day opening.
Luckily for it, this will be a 5-day opening and it’ll likely end up around $127.5M, which would put it on the path to becoming the biggest opening for a video game-based adaptation. Sonic the Hedgehog 2 opened to $26.3M but that was including Thursday previews. It held the 3-day record at $72.1M and while critics haven’t loved the Nintendo film, audiences seemingly do going by its Rotten Tomatoes.
Not just that, this film will also pull in the best 5-day debut for Illumination since Despicable Me 2‘s $143M back in 2013. With some strong legs, the film has a good chance of starting its own cinematic universe, as post-credit sequences have already been teased (Luigi’s Mansion, anyone?). The only question is if the legs will hold as family audiences haven’t really been reliable going by previous entries, but this film might be why they weren’t showing up; COVID has led to many saving up for the big releases.
It seems a blocky adventure is on the horizon, as Minecraft finally has a release date. It was in April of last year that it was unveiled Jason Momoa would potentially star in a film based on the popular indie game, Minecraft. While the franchise went on to have more story-focused offerings, it mainly was about a simple concept: survival. In its very simplistic design, you play a character gathering resources and trying to survive the dangers of the night. Now, April 4th 2025 is when we’ll get to enter this blocky world.
There’s no detail on what exactly we can expect from this film and if they might take inspiration from the Minecraft: Story Mode game or even focus on concepts taken from the Dungeons spinoffs. Some time ago, it was hinted it would follow a version of the female protagonist from the game that was on a hunt for the Ender Dragon alongside a group of adventures; not too dissimilar from the recent Dungeons & Dragons film.
Steve Carrel was even at one point set to star when the film had multiple directors attached but now seems to be actually moving forward. Napoleon Dynamite director Jared Hess is still seemingly involved. For now, we’ll have to wait and see what the future has in store for the game adaptation, especially as The Super Mario Bros. Movie faced a surprisingly negative reaction from critics even after positive early reactions. So, we’ll see where the future is heading towards for video game adaptations.
As the tides at DC continue to change, the sequel to one of the most successful DC films to date has gotten a new release date. Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom, which was originally slated to release on Christmas Day, will now hit theaters on December 20th.
James Wan’s sequel, which will now now on a Wednesday rather than a Monday, will be going head to head in theaters with the sequel to Ghostbusters: Afterlife which recently began production.
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