New Shazam! Video References Superman And Justice League

New Shazam! Video References Superman And Justice League

Shazam! will be the first DCEU solo film that features a superhero who wasn’t introduced in Zack Snyder’s Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice and didn’t fight alongside the trinity in Justice League. At a glance, Shazam! might appear to take place in a different world entirely, but a new video from the film makes it clear that Billy Batson’s superhero exists in the DC world with references to Superman and the Justice League. Take a look:

This Chinese spot for Shazam! on Twitter shows that this movie takes place in a world like ours where kids are big fans of superheroes, but unlike ours it is a place where superheroes actually exists. Freddy Freeman is a big superhero fan and is thrilled to find that his new foster brother has superpowers, dropping references to Superman and other members of the Justice League.

As we’ve seen in the previous trailers, Freddy has one of Batman’s Batarangs, so not only is Batman someone kids idolize, he has his own memorabilia. It’s also fun to hear Freddy say “heroes fly” after the first Shazam! trailer, where Billy Batson was testing out his new powers and having difficulty doing much more than impressive jumping. To Freddy and kids like him, Superman is at the top of the superhero mountain, in large part due to his powers of flight.

Freddy specifically references Superman's death in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, showing how the events of the previous films are common knowledge in Shazam!

The best reference to the Justice League in this video is when a clearly out of his element Billy Batson tells Freddy Freeman that he can’t talk to fish, asking what good that power would be even if he could. This is a hilarious reference to the long-standing criticism and joke about Aquaman that he is the hero that talks to fish.

Freddy Freeman dunks on this oversimplification, saying that Aquaman’s powers allow him to command an army of billions of ocean dwellers. This seems to reference the events of December’s Aquaman and the war that took place beneath the surface. While saying this Freddy also tugs at his shirt that appears to have the Aquaman logo on it.

Unlike The Walking Dead, which takes place in a world where zombies were never part of pop culture, Shazam! takes place in a world where superheroes are something kids obsess over while also being real. That’s what makes the conceit of this movie so fun, a kid gets the kinds of powers that every kid dreams of having. He gets to experience all the joys of those powers while also discovering that with great power…you know the rest.

These little Easter eggs are fun for DC fans but they do raise some interesting questions about the DCEU overall and where Shazam! fits in it. The underwater world was being denied in the media in Aquaman, Superman was a controversial public figure and Batman was being viewed as a criminal in BvS. In Shazam! these superheroes are beloved by kids and have their own merchandise.

That makes the timeline for Shazam! in relation to the rest of the DCEU kind of murky. We know that at one point Henry Cavill’s Superman was expected to make a cameo in Shazam! and Zachary Levi is still hoping for his character to be part of the Justice League one day, but the continuity is all a bit unclear.

It’s probably best not to overthink it. The DCEU may be dead as Warner Bros. seems to be moving further and further away from the shared cinematic universe model and just focusing on making the best movies it can one at a time. To that end the early reactions to Shazam! are very positive teasing that the actual film is just as fun as the trailers and videos like the one above make it out to be.

Shazam! bolts into theaters on April 5. Check out our 2019 Release Schedule to keep track of this and all the other big movies coming this year.

Captain Marvel Directors React To Rumors About Nick Fury Being A Skrull

Captain Marvel Directors React To Rumors About Nick Fury Being A Skrull

Marvel fans have always been attentive - just look at all the references the filmmakers packed into Avengers: Endgame to provide us with a rewarding experience after going out to see MCU movies for over a decade. However, there is such a thing as reading too much into a character’s screen time, which is perhaps what fans have done with a bit from Nick Fury’s backstory in Captain Marvel.

In a scene in Carol Danvers’ origin movie, she sits across from a digitally de-aged Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury as he attempts to convince her that he’s not a shapeshifted Skrull. As they get to know each other, Carol asks him to “name a detail so bizarre a Skrull could never fabricate it” to which Fury opens up about his inability to eat diagonally-cut toast.

The answer sparked a theory when fans referenced a scene in Avengers: Age of Ultron in which Fury is at Hawkeye’s farmhouse, makes himself a sandwich and then cuts the bread diagonally!! So obviously, fans think present-day Fury is a Skrull in disguise.

In a recent interview with ET, the Captain Marvel directors were asked to address the theory and here’s what they said:

Anna Boden: Well, there are two options here. Either Fury became a Skrull or he got over his weird fear of diagonally cut toast, and we'll never know the truth. [Laughs]

Ryan Fleck: He actually became okay with people calling him Nick. So, you know, either he's a Skrull or he just changed, like we all do.

Does anyone else feel like they’re trying to confuse us more? The pair of directors do bring up a good point; Nick may have just changed his mind about diagonally-cut toast between the ‘90s and Age of Ultron, just as he became a more hardened as the years went on. However, the change in his demeanor is much of the reason why fans believe Fury is really a Skrull.

Another supporting idea for the Fury Skrull theory is that four of them landed on the beach in Captain Marvel and only three were ever seen again. Could it be true? The Skrulls did end up to be the good guys in the Kree-Skrull war, but maybe they wanted to be behind the Avengers Initiative? Wouldn’t that be quite the plot twist! The question would then be what happened to the real Nick Fury we met in Captain Marvel? Maybe it would explain why he never called on Carol for help in the previous Marvel films before Endgame.

Or perhaps this is just a random situation that the MCU forgot to fact check before the release of Captain Marvel. It is a pretty deep cut (pun intended) that most fans would not have noticed or remembered upon Fury bringing it up.

Maybe we'll get some answers when Samuel L. Jackson reprises his role as Nick Fury in Spider-Man: Far From Home, coming to theaters on July 2.

Toy Story 4’s Forky Almost Had An Even Funnier Name

Toy Story 4’s Forky Almost Had An Even Funnier Name

Disney has produced tons of iconic animated blockbusters, but there is one property that's never been far from theaters: Toy Story. Starting back in 1995, Andy's group of toys have consistently made moviegoers laugh and cry. Toy Story 3 was especially tear-inducing, but it seems like the Disney/Pixar will outdo itself with the highly anticipated fourth movie.

Toy Story 4 will arrive in theaters in a month and change, and the generations of fans are eager to catch back up with Woody, Buzz, and the rest of the group. But in addition to catching up with the toys and Bonnie, audiences will also be introduced to some new characters. Chief among them is Tony Hale's Forky, a spork brought to life by Bonnie's creativity. Director Josh Cooley recently shared the hilarious origin story of the character's name, saying:

Well, you know, we were coming up with a bunch of different names for him, and I showed a picture of him to my son. I think he was probably four at the time, and I go, ‘Hey buddy, what do you think the name of this character is?’ He looks at it and he goes, 'Hmm, Fork Face.' And I’m like, ‘That’s hilarious. We cannot use it.’ But the fact that he’s around the same age as Bonnie and didn’t know what a spork was, I thought, ‘That feels real to me.’ So Forky felt like a kid would name him that.

Yeah, this is a solid story. Some moviegoers may have FOMO that the name Fork Face wasn't chosen, but it's not exactly the family friendly title that Disney is known for.

Josh Cooley's comments to Collider show how organically the character of Forky came about, and how it was influenced by actual kids. Cooley wanted to make sure Toy Story 4's upcoming addition would come from a place of childlike wonder, so he went straight to source when trying to nail down a name for that character. And that's exactly how Forky came out.

Related: Could We See A Toy Story 5?

It's fun to see exactly why Josh Cooley didn't name Tony Hale's character Sporky, considering what he's made out of. The name Sporky seems arguably more appropriate, but the Toy Story 4 director realized that a 4 year-old girl probably wouldn't know that word yet. And Fork Face was out of the running for obvious reasons. So Forky was born, and will no doubt be stealing the show once the third sequel finally arrives in theaters.

Forky is going to be a macguffin for Woody's adventure in Toy Story 4, as trying to rescue him will eventually find the sheriff reunited with Bo Peep. And with Veep and Arrested Development favorite Tony Hale voicing him, smart money says Forky will be a serious scene stealer in Toy Story 4.

Toy Story 4 will finally arrive in theaters on June 21st. In the meantime, check out our 2019 release list to plan your next trip to the movies.

Pet Sematary Could Get A Prequel

Pet Sematary Could Get A Prequel

While any novel being adapted for the screen is going to lose some pieces that are deemed unnecessary for the film to flow, Pet Sematary gave up a lot of real estate when it came to the story of its iconic next door neighbor Jud Crandall. It doesn’t hurt the film’s narrative, though viewers familiar with the source novel or even the 1989 adaptation might miss those parts of the story they remember pertaining to the big lesson Jud learned when dealing with the titular burial ground. Those fans might be consoled by the fact those pieces of the story are not only fresh in producer Lorenzo Di Bonaventura’s mind, he’s open to adapting them into their own story.

Naturally, it feels like this whole conversation started with the fact that the 2019 adaptation’s radically different ending leaves some room for a sequel to Pet Sematary; and that notion is certainly not out of the realm of possibility. Regardless, while making the rounds with the press, Di Bonaventura expressed that going forward isn’t the direction that intrigues him most with this particular story. Speaking to that point in one interview, he laid out his thoughts as follows:

I generally don’t start thinking about [sequels] until they’re a success. I think if there’s anything here, there’s a prequel. I think if you look at the book, we didn’t cover all that stuff that happens before the Creed family moves in. So, I think there’s a movie there, and I think I’d be particularly interested in doing that, because, again, it’s the source material and you are going toward something that also has a lot of crazy, creepy feelings about it.

With Pet Sematary’s 2019 refresh already grossing almost double its production costs, there’s a case to be made for the film’s commercial viability. Not only does it have the Stephen King brand name working in its favor, but the film’s story is also one of the more popular titles out of King’s catalog. What’s more, the story of Jud Grandall’s youth and the local experiences with the old Micmac burial ground are ripe for fans -- old and new -- to see brought to the big screen.

Lorenzo Di Bonaventura’s remarks to Consequence of Sound during his time at this year’s SXSW festival pretty much sum up why he’d want to explore this particular avenue of franchise extension, and, in my opinion, his reasoning’s sound. But what about the story material? Well, fans of the novel know that Jud’s story about how various pets, and eventually war vet Timmy Baterman, were buried in that stony, supernatural soil turned out. But there’s so much to that particular story that a prequel film could easily inhabit that earlier era, and would only require a bit of padding out to make a unique narrative.

Pet Sematary isn’t even the first Stephen King property to find itself looking towards the prequel treatment as of late, as Season 2 of Hulu’s Castle Rock anthology is going to follow young Annie Wilkes from Misery, and her path to unstable evil. The big difference here is that Jud Crandall’s backstory, as well as that of the town that he inhabits, provides an advantage to expanding the world that the story of Pet Sematary inhabits.

This universe is already built to accommodate this prequel, as Pet Sematary does sneak in references to these past events. Most notably, when Jason Clarke’s Louis Creed is researching Ludlow’s rather colorful history, he comes across a newspaper story discussing Timmy Baterman, now updated to be a veteran of the Vietnam War, rather than his service taking place during World War II in the original novel’s time frame.

Strangely enough, it sounds like some of the storied past of Pet Sematary almost made it into the finished product of directors Kevin Kolsch and Dennis Widmyer’s reboot, as Lorenzo Di Bonaventura shared the following details, courtesy of an interview with /Film:

Do we get to meet young Jud? There’s a lot of opportunity I think that we don’t have to make up out of whole cloth. As fans of the book, I know for me I’ve increasingly liked the idea that that’s how we would approach it. ... Yeah, and one of the things we did try to get in is we tried to get the Micmacs in. At one point we had written an opening scene where you see them flee and you’re left with some information but not too much information about the why of it. Less about establishing what it is they’re running [from] and more establishing what is the thing that’s freaking them out.

It's certainly not lost on Di Bonaventura that Jud Crandall’s story has a lot of potential, should the decision makers at Paramount find themselves in the mood to further resurrect their legacy property. Though given the studio’s recent attempts to bring back some of previous hits through sequels, like Coming To America 2, and reboots, like the smash hit Bumblebee, this has to have been a thought that already crossed several minds before Pet Sematary even opened.

Whether or not this story becomes the next entry in Pet Sematary’s canon remains to be seen, as the film’s only been out for a little over a week. The next couple of weekends will undoubtedly be crucial to such a prospect, and if the numbers add up, it looks like there’s some room to scare up some more box office horror in the sleepy town of Ludlow, Maine. After all, old Jud was right when he said that sometimes dead is better. At the same time, why let the dead rest, when they’re having such a good time?

Pet Sematary is in theaters now, but if you’re looking for more box office excitement, our 2019 release schedule is the place you should be to find it. Though if you’re dead set on seeking out more Stephen King adaptations, we have a special guide to projects strictly from the author’s pen that are currently on track for release and production.

All The Transformers Movies, Ranked Best To Worst

All The Transformers Movies, Ranked Best To Worst

It’s almost hard to believe it’s been over a decade since the Transformers movies started taking the world by storm back in 2007. With director Michael Bay overseeing the first five films as director, the franchise has quite an identity it’s made for itself with those five entries. His tenure seeing him direct Transformers through Transformers: The Last Knight, with Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, Transformers: Dark of the Moon, and Transformers Age of Extinction filling the middle.

But with last year’s Bumblebee, the Transformers movies have seemed to switch tactics and approach their source material with a more family friendly approach. Which makes ranking the franchise itself all the more exciting, as there’s plenty to talk about when not only comparing the tone between the original franchise run, but also that of those previous Transformers movies and the latest film in the line.

Ranking the in order from the best to worst, we’ll run the table through all six entries currently present in the Transformers canon, and describe what makes them great or not so great. Let’s roll out, and start with the top of the heap.

1. Bumblebee (2018)

There are so many things that Bumblebee gets right about being a Transformers movie. With an '80s setting that allows fans to get a bit of era-appropriate nostalgia mixed in with robot action, the stage is pretty well set for last year’s big Transformers kinda/sorta reboot to take flight.

What's even better is the fact that Bumblebee’s breakout star actually takes his original form of a Volkswagen Beetle. Crafted as a film to warm the hearts of Transformers die-hards, going back to his original look was more than wise. However, there’s more than meets the eye when it comes to what makes this particular film work.

At the heart of Bumblebee’s entire effort to do something new is a story of Haliee Steinfeld’s Charlie, and her friendship with Bumblebee himself. Telling the most personal story in the series, while also including a ton of Transformers movie action, is the largest reason of why this film works the best out of the six.

2. Transformers (2007)

Out of all of the Michael Bay directed Transformers movies, the closest his series has ever come to setting the same sort of tone that Bumblebee did was with his first Transformers film. As Shia LaBeouf’s Sam shares a relationship with Bumblebee, similar to the one that particular Autobot shared with Charlie in the ‘80s, the core of human and Transformer co-operation is its strongest in this particular Bay-fueled story.

Though the action is definitely a stand out when comparing 2007’s Transformers to Bumblebee, as there’s tons of frenetic heroism to enjoy in this more modern paced blockbuster. Quite frankly, this film probably works the best because it’s where the entire franchise started, allowing this particular Transformers movie to be a little more experimental in what it wanted to do.

It takes a while to get to the actual gigantic action of Autobots and Decepticons fighting each other in public, which is actually best in hindsight, as it gave Transformers more time to really build its human component But by time things take off, it’s full steam ahead for the rest of the film, as well as the Transformers franchise.

3. Transformers 4: Age of Extinction (2014)

Sometimes, a soft reboot is all you need to boost a series that needs a pick-me-up, and that’s what Transformers: Age of Extinction did in the series’ fourth outing. With a pretty much completely new human cast, led by Mark Wahlberg’s protective father-turned Transformers crusader Cade Yaeger, the possibilities for the series opened pretty wide.

By reintroducing some of the human element that would go missing in the two Sam Witwicky sequels, Transformers: Age of Extinction gave the franchise a new lease on life, as well as room for a new trilogy dealing with an Earth that no longer ignored the presence of Transformers, but in some cases wanted to hunt them down and destroy them for good.

Capped off with the addition of Grimlock and other Dinobots into the fray, Transformers: Age of Extinction was more fun than most sequels get to be in a series that spans over three entries.

4. Transformers 3: Dark of the Moon (2011)

After the writer’s strike of 2007-2008 interfered with the writing process of Transformers: Revenge of The Fallen, it felt like the series had lost a good amount of the wind that was once in its sails. Then Transformers: Dark of the Moon happened, which showed that while it had definitely taken a hit, the series wasn’t out of the game just yet.

The third and final film in the Sam Witwicky trilogy, Transformers: Dark of the Moon had a hell of a secret weapon to help tell the story of a race against time between Autobot and Decepticon forces trying to recover an artifact from the moon, in hopes of ending their conflict for good.

This is where the Transformers movies started to depend a bit too much on human historical events and the secret Transformer involvement in such moments. But even when it things started to sag with this third film, Transformers: Dark of the Moon did have a show-stopping battle in Chicago, and an impressive turn by Leonard Nimoy as Sentinel Prime.

5. Transformers 5: The Last Knight (2017)

Considering how much of a breath of fresh air Transformers: Age of Extinction felt like, the Transformers movies would find themselves dipping in quality yet again with the fifth film, Transformers: The Last Knight.

Doubling down on the “secret history” of humans and Transformers, this adventure would see Mark Wahlberg’s Cade Yeager returning on his own, with some new sidekicks in tow. Throw in a heel turn for Optimus Prime, an evil Transformers sorceress trying to resurrect Cybertron and a sassy robot butler that knows the words to “Move, Bitch,” and you basically have the gist of where this one went wrong.

For all of the care that was taken in laying down somewhat of a mythos for the Transformers and their lost home of Cybertron in the previous films, Transformers: The Last Knight was the fifth and final Michael Bay directed Transformers film, and one hell of a slap in the face to fans.

6. Transformers 2: Revenge of the Fallen (2009)

When pressed to give a reason as to why Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen was as unimpressive a sequel as it was, director Michael Bay basically blamed it on the hoops he and the series’ writers had to jump through in order to complete the film before various industry strikes took place.

It certainly feels like it, as the second of the Transformers movies really feels like the worst of the lot. Taking Shia LaBoeuf’s Sam Witwicky for a second ride in the Transformers universe, our hero found himself saddled with cosmic knowledge that could swing the war between Autobots and Decepticons in favor of the villains. But, of course, what Transformers movie would be complete without zany comedy.

With a story that felt as incomplete as it was offensive in some places, the rush to keep the series up and running definitely showed in Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen’s second bite at the apple. If there was more time and attention paid to the story, this could have been a pretty interesting follow-up, especially with legendary genre actor Tony Todd playing The Fallen, a rogue member of the Prime order.

There you have it. Six Transformers movies, not-so alike in dignity, just waiting for an opportunity to be unified into one whole franchise. While they might not all be amazing, each Transformers film does have its own unique pros and cons in the series. And as always, rankings are personal, so the fans of the series may not agree with our rankings above. So if you have a different opinion on which Transformers movies are good, bad, or indifferent, share your answers with us in the comments below.

The Hellboy Reboot Producers Already Have Ideas For Sequels

The Hellboy Reboot Producers Already Have Ideas For Sequels

Next month, a brand-new take on Hellboy will be hitting theaters. Unlike Guillermo del Toro's version, the 2019 Hellboy takes a bit more direct inspiration from the comics and takes several cues from a storyline called The Wild Hunt. Hellboy has some stiff competition in April, but should the film do well enough, producer Lloyd Levin said that there are already a couple sequel ideas mapped out, but not in any way that's set in stone.

In the new film, Hellboy (David Harbour) takes a trip over to Great Britain to battle the Blood Witch Nimue (Milla Jovovich). The story involves everything from dragons to undead armies to Excalibur to flaming crowns. Most of these were elements in a comic book storyline called The Wild Hunt, which serves as partial inspiration for the reboot.

As such, there’s some direction to take the story, should Hellboy be greenlit for a sequel. All of it is pretty much right there in the comics written by Mike Mignola, which served as the DNA of the establishing the reboot. So, while there is nothing etched in stone, producer Lloyd Levin told Collider that they have an idea where the story would go in a sequel.

Not in a No. 2 will be this and No. 3 will be that, but you can tell yourself. If this starts with The Wild Hunt, the track is laid from there in the comic books where you could go.

Hellboy doesn’t just take from one aspect of the comics. While there is plenty of The Wild Hunt in there, the story also has Hellboy boxing demons in Tijuana, which is from Hellboy in Mexico. The story also draws from Darkness Falls and The Storm and the Fury, and is more like a collage of stories, according to director Neil Marshall.

One thing it isn’t is a greatest hits. It’s a coherent story but it certainly dips into several different stories that Mignola put together, so I suppose it’s a collage of sorts, but we made a through-line that connects everything.

According to Levin, Mignola was involved “in the genesis” of the movie. Mignola and fellow Hellboy comic writer Chris Golden even wrote a draft of the script together. To keep things in the spirit of the comics, the movie shot for an R-rating because the comics don’t really get shy when it comes to violence. Per Levin:

The comic books themselves are R rated. There’s buckets of blood, there’s beheadings, there’s an intensity that equates naturally and organically to the R rating.

You can see a comic book accurate Hellboy in, well, Hellboy, out in theaters on April 12. To learn more about the film, here is what we know so far.

Bad Moms’ Grandmas Are Getting A Spinoff

Bad Moms’ Grandmas Are Getting A Spinoff

The movie Bad Moms was one of those comedies that studios love to see. Relatively inexpensive to make, only a budget of around $20 million, and a box office return approaching 10 timers that. It was no shock that a sequel was green lit quickly. Now another film in the franchise is on the way, though this one, titled Bad Moms' Moms will focus on, as the title suggests the mothers of the Bad Moms.

Susan Sarandon, Christine Baranski, and Cheryl Hines were introduced in A Bad Moms Christmas as the mothers of the three main characters played by Kathryn Hahn, Mila Kunis, and Kristen Bell. The characters were a hit with fans. The actresses made it clear back when the last film came out that they were interested in getting their own movie. Yesterday at CinemaCon, STX Films announced (via EW) that exactly that would be happening.

Little more than the fact that the movie will exist was announced at the industry trade show. This means we don't even have so much as a release window, much less a date. A Bad Moms Christmas came out in 2017, less than 18 months after the first film. At this point there's likely no hurry but the turn around time on a comedy isn't necessarily that long. If the movie is going into production this year we could see it hit screens next year without much problem. Even a release before the end of the year is possible if filming is starting soon.

I feel like appearances by the original Bad Moms are probably a strong possibility, though nothing in that regard was mentioned, and they likely won't be major characters in order to keep the focus on the title characters.

If nothing else, it's nice to see Bad Moms' Moms make it to the screen because Hollywood so frequently seems to forget that actors, and actresses especially, still have something to contribute when they're no longer considered "young." The characters played by Susan Sarandon, Cheryl Hines and Christine Baranski were hilarious in the last movie and they can absolutely lead their own story.

In it's own way, Bad Moms' Moms can even act as a sequel in its own right. For the most part, the three "Bad Grandmas" were basically older, amplified versions of the three Bad Moms. This movie will just show us who Katheryn Hahn, Kristen Bell, and Mila Kunis' characters are going to grow into when they become grandmothers themselves.