Episode 87 - Wii U-logy

After a week off the ToB Crew returns refreshed and ready to break down all the latest geek news. They jump right in by discussing the latest movie trailers, including the highly anticipated Scarlett Johansson film Ghost in the Shell. Every week brings new comic book movie news so Julian Meush, Daniel D'Souza and Jeremy Kozier examine the rumour of Green Lantern possibly making an appearance in next years Justice League film, David Leitch taking over Deadpool 2 and why we may never see the X-Men in the same movie as the Avengers. Over with Star Wars, it was revealed that Josh Trank's Star Wars anthology film was going to centre around Boba Fett, Emilia Clark joins the cast of the Han Solo film and early tracking numbers are looking good for Rogue One. Before moving onto the news of the big Inhumans TV/IMAX deal the guys discuss the potential future of "variable ticket pricing" at the movie theatre and why it might not be the worst thing in the world. In terms of gaming news, the Wii U has reached the end of its life so its time for its eulogy and then to look forward to the Switch and a possible price point for the hybrid handheld/home console. A brief spoiler review of Arrival wraps up the show along with a brief discussion on The Master, The Theory of Everything, The Edge and The Accountant.

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Show Notes

Nerd Association

Theme: Creators

• Round 1: Alan Moore
• Round 2: Chris Nolan
• Round 3: Quintin Tarantino

Movies

• Trailers:
  • Scarlett Johansson's Ghost in the Shell
  • DC Animations next film Justice League Dark
  • Kong Skull Island
  • Valerian and The City of a Thousand Planets
• The screenwriter for Arrival, Eric Heisserer, happens to also be working on the Sandman movie script and he recently had this to say about the project. 
  “with Sandman, I’ve done about a year’s worth of work on that and I’ve come to the conclusion that I don’t believe it can be adapted into a film, or if it can I’m not the person to make it one. I think the best version of it is as a series, and therefore I am recommending that they fire me [laughs]. So hopefully it will find the best iteration possible.”
• The Harley Quinn solo movie has found a screenwriter in Christina Hodson. The movie is apparently being pitched as a Harley Quinn/Birds of Prey movie and will focus on an array of DC’s female characters.
• The Wrap is reporting that Green Lantern will make an appearance during a “key sequence” of Justice League.
• David Leitch, the director of John Wick will be taking over for Tim Miller on Deadpool 2. Which according to a producer will be going for a smaller budget feel.
• According to a rumour out of LRM it looks like the next X-Men movie will focus on the Dark Phoenix storyline
• News has come out that the Star Wars anthology film that Josh Trank was working on was a Boba Fett movie. But beyond that, a teaser reel and official announcement were ready to go before being aced “at the last minute” at Star Wars Celebration 2015. - EW
• The movie that moved up to take its place was the Han Solo solo movie which just added a new cast member. GoT’s Emilia Clarke joins the cast in a unspecified role.
• Sticking with Star Wars for a moment, with Rogue One set to open in under a month now some of the early tracking data has come out. According to Variety, the film is projected to open to approximately $130 million domestically which if true would make the movie the second biggest December opening of all time with only Star Wars Episode 7 above it at $248 mill.
• Angela Bassett has joined the cast of Marvel’s Black Panther as the mother of T’Challa.
• According to producer Sam Rami the Last of Us movie is still stuck in development hell:
  • "Well, unfortunately that one -- when we went to Neil with Ghost House Pictures we were hoping to get the rights like we do any project and then we'd take it out and sell it but we'd control the rights. With this one he went to Sony -- who I have a very good relationship with -- but they have their own plans for it and I think Neil's plan for it -- I'm not trying to be political -- Neil's plan for it is not the same as Sony's. And because my company doesn't have the rights, I actually can't help him too much. Even though I'm one of the producers on it the way he set it up, he sold his rights to Sony, Sony hired me as a producer by chance, and I can't get the rights free for him so I'm not in the driver's seat and I can't tell you what Sony and Neil together will decide on. If they do move forward I'd love to help them again."
  • “I'm attached to it. I'm not too sure what that means. Right now it's just sitting there. They don't want to move forward, and it's not my place to say why, and Neil, I think, is in a slight disagreement with them about how things should go so there's a standstill. And I don't have the power to move it."
• Paramount is looking into rebooting Green Hornet.
• The director of Guardians 2, James Gunn, explained how Marvel was able to use Ego the living planet even though Fox owned the rights. As far as I understand it, Gunn wrote the script without knowing Marvel didn't know the rights so when it came to actually making the movie the studios got together and made a trade. Marvel could use Ego if Fox could take some “creative liberties” with Deadpool’s Negasonic Teenage Warhead. Unfortunately this cooperation does not seem to extend much further. In an interview with Variety, Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige said that although Marvel and Sony had struck a deal to introduce Spider-Man into the MCU, similar deals with Fox are an “impossibility at this juncture. We certainly have enough films to keep us busy for a number of lifetimes."
• AMC Entertainment, one of, if that THE biggest owner of movie theaters in the US is considering “variable ticket pricing”

TV

• Disney/ABC and IMAX are teaming up for Inhumans. The project which was originally slated as a phase 4 film in the MCU has apparently been reworked into an 8 episode series that will premier its first 2 episodes in IMAX theatres with the rest of the series airing on ABC next fall.
  The upcoming TV adaptation promises to "explore the never-before-told epic adventure of Black Bolt and the royal family."
• Westworld will officially be coming back with HBO confirming the second season order for the western scifi series. But it might not be coming back until 2018 according to EW.
• DC’s Legends of Tomorrow is getting a few extra episodes. CW has ordered an extra 4 episodes for a total of 17.
• The Y The Last Man FX series has found its show runner in Michael Green who worked on the script with Brian K Vaughan.
• Talks between HBO and George RR Martin about a prequel series to Game of Thrones are still very much underway. EW reported that they are “in preliminary talks
• The Walking Dead is facing its lowest ratings since season 3.
• The latest episode hit 11 mill viewers which is a drop from 17 mil for the seasons premier (7)
  AMC already green lit an 8th season. 

Games

• The Wii U is officially done. A brief statement from Nintendo confirmed the rumour we discussed a few weeks back that the Wii U was ending production. Any last words?
• “As recently posted by Nintendo on the Wii U website in Japan, Wii U production will end in the near future for the Japanese domestic market. We have nothing to announce in terms of exact timing. We can confirm that as of today, all Wii U hardware that will be made available in the North American market for this fiscal year has already been shipped to our retail partners. We encourage anyone who wants Wii U to communicate with their preferred retail outlet to monitor availability.”
• The Canadian arm of Toys R Us may have inadvertently outed the base price of the upcoming Nintendo Switch, briefly listing the hybrid console at $329.99 CAD - roughly £200 UK / $250 USD / $330 AUD. The listing has since been removed. - IGN
• Speaking of the Switch, during a Gamepot investors call the CEO was talking about the console and said this:
  • "A movement-related game is more fun for kids, you know, taking those accessories off - [the detachable Joy-Con pads] - you can really do a lot of interesting things with that in gameplay."
• Super Mario Run will be released on December 15 for iOS devices and cost $9.99 USD
• Rumour has it that Telltales Marvel project will be a Guardians of the Galaxy game. 
  Mortal Kombat and Injustice creator Ed Boon took a pole on Twitter asking if people would like to see Watchmen characters in Injustice 2.
• October game sales numbers are here. NPD Group.
  • Battlefield 1
  • Mafia III
  • Gears of War 4
  • FIFA 17
  • NBA 2K17
  • Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
  • WWE 2K17
  • Civilization VI
  • Titanfall 2
  • Madden NFL 17

What We've Been Watching

• Arrival
• The Master
• The Theory of Everything
• The Edge