Warner Bros.
Lord of the Rings Anime Movie The War of the Rohirrim in the Works
The Lord of the Rings franchise is expanding with a new anime movie titled The War of the Rohirrim. New Line Cinema is teaming with Warner Bros. Animation to produce the new addition to J. R. R. Tolkien’s fantasy world. The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim will be directed by anime veteran Kenji Kamiyama, who helmed the TV series Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex and Blade Runner: Black Lotus. Kamiyama’s frequent collaborator Joseph Chou is set to produce. The script is penned by Jeffrey Addiss and Will Matthews, who created Netflix’s Emmy-winning series, The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance. Consulting on the project is Oscar-winner Philippa Boyens, who co-wrote the live-action Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit trilogies with filmmaker Peter Jackson and Fran Walsh. Per The H...
Regina King Discovers She’s Rumored To Direct The New Black Superman Film
HipHopWired Featured Video Source: Handout / Getty As much as the award-winning actress and director Regina King is on top of her game, there are some things that can escape her. One of those things happens to be the rumor that she’s on a shortlist to be the director of an upcoming Superman film for DC and Warner Bros. This past Saturday, King was being interviewed on MSNBC’s The Cross Connection hosted by journalist Tiffany Cross as part of special coverage centered on the 100th commemoration of the Tulsa Race Massacre in Oklahoma. Towards the end of the interview, Ms. Cross delivered this question: “I’m curious because this is a little bit of gossip. You’re rumored to be on the shortlist to direct Superman. You and Barry Jenkins, both of your names have been thrown out there,” the MSNBC ...
New Merger Alert: AT&T Announces It Is Merging WarnerMedia With Discovery
HipHopWired Featured Video Source: SOPA Images / Getty After fighting to make the initial merger happen, AT&T has decided to switch things up by creating a new media giant. Monday (May 17), AT&T announced that it would be spinning off WarnerMedia by merging it with the TV company Discovery leading to the creation of a new media giant that could compete with streaming titans Netflix and the new kid on the block Disney+. The new deal will see WarnerMedia properties like HBO, CNN, Cartoon Network, TBS, TNT, and the Warner Bros. movie studio plus channels like HGTV, Animal Planet, Food Network, and TLC which Discovery operates under one tent. Both companies also have their own streaming platforms with HBO Max and Discovery Plus. As per the press release announcing the move, the b...
Elizabeth Banks’ Flintstones Reboot Bedrock Picked Up by Fox
<span class="localtime" data-ltformat="F j, Y | g:ia" data-lttime="2021-04-27T17:54:43+00:00“>April 27, 2021 | 1:54pm ET Fox has picked up Elizabeth Banks’ reboot of The Flintstones, which is now titled Bedrock. According to The Hollywood Reporter, the adult animated series will be set 20 years after the 1960s original and star Banks, who is also executive producing the project. The reboot was first announced two years ago as a collaboration between Warner Bros. and Banks’ own Brownstone Productions. Bedrock will center around a grown-up Pebbles Flintstone (voiced by Banks), who is embarking on her own career while her father, Fred, nears retirement. With the Stone Age giving way to an “enlightened new Bronze Age, the residents of Bedrock will...
Warner Bros. Releases 2021 EDM Rework of Classic Mortal Kombat Theme: Listen
Later this month, fans of the legendary fighting game franchise Mortal Kombat will be treated to a new movie based on the series. To many players, especially those who are fans of dance music, the only thing as iconic as the games’ large cast of characters is its original soundtrack. Over the past three decades, we’ve seen many different artists create songs inspired by the lore of the game. Many remember back in 2011, when Skrillex, TOKiMONSTA, Felix Cartal, and more each released a theme song for a different character in the series. While these have become fan favorites in their own right, the most memorable track to come out of the franchise is the 1994 theme song from The Immortals, “Techno Syndrome (Mortal Kombat).” In honor of the soon-to-be-re...
Ray Fisher Details Justice League Drama with Joss Whedon and Warner Bros.
Any fan who has watched Zack Snyder’s Justice League realizes that Ray Fisher was done dirty by the theatrically released version spearheaded by Joss Whedon and Warner Bros. brass. But you need not have seen either movie to know that, as the Cyborg actor has been telling everyone for the last year about Whedon’s “gross, abusive, unprofessional” conduct on set and WB’s allegedly sketchy, racist attempts to cover up Fisher’s complaints. Today, The Hollywood Reporter published an extensive interview with Fisher, who digs into the weeds of his allegations against Whedon and studio executives Geoff Johns, Walter Hamada, and Jon Berg. He detailed how his concerns over representation of DC’s first live-action Black superhero were dismissed by the studio, which pushed for the character “to be...
An Animal Ethologist Reviews Godzilla vs. Kong
Godzilla vs. Kong (HBO Max) In the super-sized slugfest Godzilla vs. Kong, now in theaters and streaming on HBO Max, two of cinema’s mightiest monster-movie titans go toe-to-toe on a cross-continental rampage, leaving comically outsized destruction in their wake and finally answering the question of which beast can truly claim the title of “king of the monsters.” In one corner, there’s Godzilla, the noble warrior Kaiju, he of the atomic breath, armored scales, and ear-splitting roar. In the other, there’s King Kong, the greatest of the great apes, who can extend one finger in a gentle caress or ball his hands into fists to hurl a fearsome haymaker. That this massive, long-fated melee between giant lizard and giant ape is not a bastion of scientific accuracy somewhat comes with the blockbus...
Godzilla vs. Kong Is Punch-Drunk Fun: Review
The Pitch: Godzilla and Kong square off in battle to determine who will be the planet’s apex predator. Five years have passed since the events of Godzilla: King of the Monsters when Godzilla established himself as Earth’s alpha Titan. Presently, only Godzilla and Kong remain active, and both are continuously monitored by Monarch, the scientific organization that tracks and studies Titans. Kong now resides in a large dome on Skull Island, designed to look like his natural habitat before the island’s climate shifted into near-constant hurricanes, but also to protect him from Godzilla. Doctor Ilene Andrews (Rebecca Hall) oversees his daily life along with her adopted, deaf daughter Jia (Kaylee Hottle), who can communicate with Kong through sign language. Jia and Kong’s connection is unmistake...
The Ellen DeGeneres Show Has Lost Nearly 50% of Its Audience Since “Toxic” Workplace Scandal
Last year, The Ellen DeGeneres Show came under massive scrutiny after allegations of a “toxic” work culture surfaced. WarnerMedia investigated the claims, Degeneres wrote a letter to her staff apologizing for her supposed ignorance, and three high-up executive producers “parted ways” for good. Following a multi-month hiatus, The Ellen DeGeneres Show has finally returned to TV only to discover that its viewership has taken a huge nosedive. Over 110 episodes have aired since Season 18 kicked off in September 2020, and Ellen DeGeneres has spent them interviewing the biggest names in pop culture, as is normal for the series. According to The New York Times, however, these new episodes have drawn an average of 1.5 million viewers over the past six months — a 43% drop compared to the 2.6 million...
Tom & Jerry Is Just a Lazy Brand Exercise: Review
The Pitch: Did you read that Vulture interview with David Fincher where he described Alien 3 as making “a library title for a multinational, vertically integrated media conglomerate”? And you know how Scorsese reasonably tsk-tsked the usage of the word “content” because of how media companies and journalists have been using that condescending term to describe works of art? Ladies and gentlemen, here’s the latest piece of content for vertically integrated media conglomerate WarnerMedia’s library, Tom & Jerry. Yes, Tom & Jerry 2021 arrives this weekend on HBO Max, and answers the age-old question of what a Tom and Jerry ‘toon would be like today, and whether they could fight to Eric B. & Rakim’s “Don’t Sweat the Technique”. The Short, Short, Short of It: Your kids will probably l...
Tim Burton’s Batman Returns in New DC Comics Series
Cue up the Danny Elfman score — maybe even Prince’s “Batdance” — and get ready to revisit Tim Burton’s Batman universe. Today, DC Comics announced they’re spending this summer in the filmmaker’s Dark Deco’d Gotham City with Batman ’89. Written by original screenwriter Sam Hamm and brought to the page by artist Joe Quinones, the DC Digital First series will tell all new adventures featuring Michael Keaton’s incarnation of Batman. A press release promises the return of Michelle Pfeiffer’s Catwoman, the debut of a new Robin (perhaps Marlon Wayans, as originally planned?), and the two-faced evolution of Billy Dee Williams’ Harvey Dent. Altogether, there will be 12 new chapters that “pull on a number of threads left dangling by the prolific director.” The first six will debut on July 27th with ...
50 Most Anticipated Movies of 2021
Anticipating movies these days is a fool’s errand. Unless it’s guaranteed to be hitting a streaming platform, the release date of any film should have an asterisk appended to it. That’s not cynical, but the nature of covering this industry amidst the pandemic. So, you could imagine how fun this list was to put together. (Spoiler: It wasn’t.) Dragging over last year’s offerings to this one seems like an easy task, but the shift opens the door for so many questions, all of which boil down to: “What are the odds?” For many features — you know, like Ghostbusters: Afterlife, or No Time to Die, or Halloween Kills, or any film without a streaming opt-in — the release date is as certain as we are about anything right now in life. “We’ll see” is the name of the game. Having said that, a few studios...
