Who play Assassin's Creed games will happy with a trilogy this movie. Considering there have been nine Assassin's Creed games and a bunch of spin-offs, there's probably no shortage of material for a sequel to the movie adaptation. However, star and producer Michael Fassbender says that if all goes according to plan, the upcoming Assassin's Creed will be just the beginning. Fassbender recently told CinemaBlend that the first movie mostly serves as the setup for a bigger story about time traveler Callum Lynch. "This is the sort of origin of his story," Fassbender said. "We have an idea of where he's going to go over the next two films. We kind of did a three-film arc. We'll wait and see how people respond to this, but for sure, we have an idea of where he's going to go next.
As CinemaBlend points out, Fassbender has been vital in bringing the video game series to the big screen since he signed on back in 2012. After a two-year search to find a director, it was Fassbender who recruited Justin Kurzel, who he'd worked with on Macbeth. He also convinced his co-star in that movie, Marion Cotillard, to come aboard.
Of course, video game adaptations have had mixed success at the box office. For every Resident Evil success story, there's a BloodRayne dud. But Assassin's Creed certainly looks poised for big things when it arrives Dec. 21.
Meanwhile, check out some video game movies that never got made.
As spell-binding as the Harry Potter series was (and is, always), a few falsehoods have floated around that fit better in one of Gilderoy Lockhart's self-aggrandizing stories or Rita Skeeter's unreliable articles than in our own Muggle news feeds. Some of these misunderstandings have had a lasting confundus charm effect on the fandom and have become widely accepted canon well outside of Hogwarts. Even when truth serum has been introduced into the potions recipe, they still loom larger than any of those pesky dementors. Here are some false facts about the series even the most devoted Potterphiles might have been tricked by.
It's no secret that the Harry Potter series earned some major loot for Warner Bros. over the course of its eight films, and the studio was happy to expand the magical realm for the Fantastic Beasts prequel. So reports were flying faster than one of Mrs. Weasley's angry howlers that the studio was also planning to develop the stage sequel Harry Potter and the Cursed Child into a film. The kicker was that original series lead Daniel Radcliffe was being courted to reprise his role. Reports that the studio filed for copyright protection of the property for cinematic purposes certainly boosted the claim.
However, Rowling denied that Cursed Child would be lifted from the stage to the big screen. (To be fair, her denial also said Fantastic Beasts would be three films, when it's now expected to include five.) Warner Bros. also issued a statement denying the buzz: "Harry Potter and the Cursed Child is a stage play, with no plans for there to be a film.
Baby Harry becomes Albus Severus
As adorable as it would've been for the Harry Potter series to throw in this Easter egg, this one's about as true as the rumor that Harry manipulated the Triwizard Cup to get in the competition. A 2012 meme that went ultra-viral claimed that the child actor who played baby Harry in those gutting flashback sequences from the night of his parents' murder returned for the last pic to play Albus Severus, Harry's second son. However, baby Harry was actually portrayed by one of the Saunders triplets in Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone and by Toby Papworth in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2, while Albus Severus was played by Arthur Bowen. It's a bigger bummer than every time house points got unfairly deducted from Gryffindor, but lies of any kind are best left to the Death Eaters.
Ronbledore is real
Let's be honest; Ron Weasley got the short stick in the character development department. Sure, he ended up with Hermione Granger in the end, but even J.K. Rowling has said that was an authorial mistake. He couldn't hold a candle to Hermione in the way of brains, he didn't have a percentage point of the charisma Harry carried, and he wasn't even the coolest among his bevy of siblings — not by a long shot from one of the Weasley's Wizard Wheezes' own contraptions. So, it's understandable why fans conjured up their own ideas about his significance to the story by theorizing that he was actually a time-traveling version of Professor Dumbledore. But it still isn't true.
The belief is that the two, widely referred to as Ronbledore, were interconnected by Ron's future as a time-traveler who was sent back in time to live out his days as Dumbledore, based on a loose collection of details scattered throughout the series (and, of course, the hopes that Ron might've been more than a chocolate frog-loving dud). However, J.K. Rowling shot that one down with same brand of brief snippery that made Hermione completely synonymous with proper pronunciation of "leviosa."
Draco and Snape were secretly otherworldly beings
In the Harry Potter world, werewolves sometimes dined on children (except Remus Lupin, RIP), so the idea that bad boy Draco Malfoy might be in the lycanthropy business on the sly isn't too much of a stretch for his personality. But it's also not true. Nor was Professor Snape — despite his looming presence, pallid complexion, preference for gloomy robes, and preference for gloomy locales — a vampire. So sayeth the queen of the Wizarding World.
Neville and Luna were meant to be
Since Rowling admitted to mixing up her 'ships between Harry and Ron where Hermione was concerned, there were some fans who suspected there was another couple who never made it to shore as originally planned: Neville Longbottom and Luna Lovegood. Considering they were both secret heroes of the series who prided themselves on being a little weird and against the grain — not to mention, their shared appreciation for fantastic creatures like the mandrake root and thestrals — many fans hoped the pair would end up together. When they didn't, some said they were meant to like Harry and Hermione.
But Rowling has said that was never in her writing plans for the pair because it "felt too neat." Ultimately, Neville went on to marry Hannah Abbott and fill Pomona Sprout's shoes as Herbology professor at Hogwarts, while Luna ended up with Rolf Scamander — the grandson of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them centerpiece Newt Scamander. So, officially, the Neville-Luna relationship is exclusive to the fanfic regime and has no basis in reality.
An eighth book is on the way
We can probably give this one a little merit for the fact that a new chapter of the Harry Potter series did make it into print form by way of the Cursed Child script (and then a ninth with the release of the Fantastic Beasts screenplay), but the long-rumored eighth chapter of the Harry Potter book series proper was a total hoax. The original story which "confirmed" that Rowling was working on Harry Potter and the [Insert Magical Item Here] was filled with obvious fake news markers like un-sourced quotes and "hush hush" rumor tones, but still, a lot of people were getting their pre-ordering fingers ready for this one after the story dropped … and some are probably still wondering why it hasn't arrived yet.
Harry Potter Go will follow Pokemon Go
As much of a moment as Pokemon Go had within the phone gaming world in 2016, the game's developers aren't planning to have everyone in New York hunting down secret entryways to Ilvermorny any time soon. Somehow, word spread like wildfire that Niantic was officially putting Harry Potter Go into motion as its follow-up to the Pokeball-slinging craze, but the story was as full of wrong as Hermione's first try at Polyjuice Potion.
Alan Rickman quoted Severus in real life
Alan Rickman's character in the Harry Potter series, Professor Snape, was a conflicting figure until the end, but his real-life counterpart Alan Rickman was always a precious gem where the fan community was concerned. In the books and films, Snape eventually got some heart-warming redemption when it was revealed that he carried a lifelong torch for Harry's late mother — cemented by a wistful "always" during his revelatory conversation with Dumbledore.
After Rickman's passing in January 2016, a dormant meme about Rickman went viral and quoted him to state, "When I'm 80 years old and sitting in my rocking chair, I'll be reading Harry Potter. And my family will say to me, 'After all this time?' And I will say, 'Always.'" The originator of the post publicly admitted to having made it up with no malice after it became widely circulated due to his death.
Daniel Radcliffe is gay
Daniel Radcliffe is an avid supporter of LGBTQ rights organizations, so it would seem pretty out of character for him to be harboring a secret about his sexuality. However, rumors have been swirling around for him for years that he's secretly not straight, despite his constant refusals of the same. In 2010, the actor declared quite plainly to MTV, "If people want to say that, they can. I'm not. I'm straight." He went on to add that if he were gay, he wouldn't have felt like he had to hide it from anyone. "I don't think my position would have stopped me if I was gay," he explained, later adding, "Coming out is such an important moment in a gay man's life that I would never want to actually comment on whether or not anyone should or should not.
Emma Watson dated Prince Harry
There's no doubt that after Emma Watson became the plucky academic Hermione Granger for the Harry Potter series, she was one of Britain's most desirable bachelorettes. The actress (turned student, turned model, turned philanthropic spokeswoman, turned Disney princess) was rumored to have been on Prince Harry's radar due to her superstar status. Some sources even went so far as to claim that the two were sneaking around in a secret relationship with one another in 2015. However, Watson herself shot down the gossip by writing, "Remember that little talk we had about not believing everything written in the media?!" and adding, "Also … marrying a Prince [is] not a prerequisite for being a Princess."
Margot Robbie is coming back as Harley Quinn, but this time the boys can't play.
We've known for a while now that Warner Bros. has been working on a Suicide Squad spin-off based on Robbie's character, but The Hollywood Reporter finally revealed the details. The movie will be called Gotham City Sirens, likely based on the comic book series of the same name that centers on Batman's feminine foes, including Harley Quinn, Catwoman, and Poison Ivy.
Suicide Squad director David Ayer will helm the spin-off, which is at least a little surprising considering the reports that his vision for Suicide Squad was compromised by the studio. Geneva Robertson-Dworet will write the screenplay, and she's no stranger to strong female leads. She also penned the script for the upcoming Tomb Raider reboot.
The Gotham City Sirens comics debuted in 2009 part of the Batman: Reborn relaunch in all of DC's Batman titles. In the series, Catwoman gets her revenge on Batman by stealing all his money and giving it to his female enemies.
Aside from Robbie's return, there's no word about casting for the other characters just yet.
The studio is still developing a Suicide Squad sequel, and also reportedly considering another spin-off about Deadshot, the assassin character played by Will Smith. However, Gotham City Sirens is on the "fast track," and we should start to hear more soon.
In the meantime, check out the dark history of Harley Quinn.
The stunning starlet has been absent from the big screen for awhile, and we have a few theories as to why she hasn't made the transition from Twilight Saga star to household name as successfully as some of her contemporaries.
She's not bankable
Be honest: Did you have to Google "Ashley Greene" just now to figure out who we were even talking about? Greene is stunning, but that hasn't added up to name recognition. She had a shot at marquee status in The Apparition (2012) but the movie bombed commercially and received negative reviews, creeping up to only an 18 percent on Metacritic. Though it's unfair to pin all the blame on Greene, the film was designed to be her star vehicle, and that vehicle crashed. Even her supporting roles don't seem to take off: Wish I Was Here (2014) made only half of its $6 million budget back, and CBGB (2013) made $4,000…with a $5 million budget. No, we didn't leave out any zeroes.
She avoids drama
Jonas threw his ex under the bus in October 2016 when he spoke about their sex life, in a lot of detail, in a Reddit AMA. "I lost my virginity to this girl named Ashley," the DNCE frontman wrote. "You can probably just Google it. It's pretty easy to figure out. I dated a girl named Ashley, so just Google it to figure out which Ashley that is." He added, "I didn't have any condoms, so I went to our drummer Jack's room—who was my roommate at the time—and I demolished his room looking for them. [I] found them underneath his underwear drawer. When he came home, he thought somebody broke into his room because his whole room was demolished. I was in dire need. Needed to happen then and now. Safety first, kids." Afterward, Jonas was unapologetic, telling Entertainment Tonight, "Life's too short…I'm just telling my stories and what I can say from my heart."
Greene was classier in her response, which came in the form of an Instagram post that simply said, "Class is timeless." Unfortunately, only Jonas got any real traction from the story.
She flies under the radar
Greene doesn't attend a ton of high-profile events or entertain the paparazzi, which hurts her visibility especially when she's not attracting a ton of memorable film work. She had two relationships that put her in the public eye: a flirtation with Twilight co-star Jackson Rathbone, and a long-term relationship with singer Joe Jonas that started immediately after he split from Demi Lovato. Jonas seemed to court the press more, even revealing in an essay for Vulture that he lost his virginity to Greene. Greene keeps her private life private. At the time of this writing, she's enjoyed a low-key romance with Paul Khoury, a TV personality in Australia and a virtually unknown presence Stateside for about three years.
She's too expensive
Greene and her Twilight co-star Kellan Lutz renegotiated their contracts for the final film, The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 2, with each reportedly requesting $2 million. There were rumors the contract disputes held up production, but a source denied the whispers to People, though director Catherine Hardwicke admitted she considered finding other actors for their roles. "It would really break my heart if they were replaced, but it could happen. Things could turn ugly quickly," she said. "They have all these people and outside influences telling you what to do. They tell you to hold out for this much because you're such an important part of the franchise, and everyone is telling you to ask for more." Greene and Lutz eventually settled for approximately $1.25 million apiece.
Too many projects go straight to video
Outside of The Apparition and the Twilight films (2008-12), many of Greene's projects experienced a very limited release. Between 2011 and 2014, LOL, Butter, A Warrior's Heart, Burying the Ex, and Kristy were barely promoted. That's only five movies, sure, but it represents half of everything she released within that time span—not including the Twilight franchise. Urge (2016), Killing the King (2015), and Staten Island Summer (2015) all faced similar fates.
She's heard, but not seen
Greene has done voiceover work for Max & Me (2016), as well as video games Batman: Arkham Knight (2015) and Batgirl: A Matter Of Family (2015). While voiceover work is respectable and a great way for performers to maintain their income, unfortunately, unless it's a major film (think Pixar-level), it won't shoot her to superstardom.
Her TV shows don't take off
Greene's small-screen efforts don't fare too well, though they're getting better. She played a small part in Pan-Am (2011-12), which only lasted one season. More recently, Greene picked up a recurring role in the third season of Rogue (2013-), joining the DirecTV drama as "a beautiful and highly intelligent former NSA contractor" named Mia Levesque.
She's not relatable
For someone who's taken mostly supporting roles in teen movies, Greene has a bit of a demanding side. She told Marie Claire the Twilight movies gave her some severely first world problems. "Twilight has ruined me. When this is all over, flying internationally is going to be very hard for me. It is just not worth it to buy a first-class ticket, because of the cost." For the average schlub struggling to scrape together enough coins for a middle seat in coach, this comes across as tone-deaf and not terribly PR-savvy.
How she can turn it around
Greene can earn critical acclaim by honing her craft and being a bit more selective. Instead of playing the best friend or the convenience store customer in a bigger movie, she should try getting a larger role in a smaller, well-written indie film to gain credibility. For as stunning and hardworking as she is, her biggest issue seems to be that she's simply not picking great parts. She told GQ that she once physically fought for a role, which she won, but who actually saw the movie? A new agent may be able to work wonders for her and finally get her out of Alice Cullen's shadow.
Greene is off to a good start with In Dubious Battle (2016). The film was produced and directed by James Franco and boasts an ensemble cast that includes Vincent D'Onofrio, Bryan Cranston, Josh Hutcherson, Austin Stowell, Selena Gomez, and more. The movie should boost Greene's resume and respectability in the industry. Here's hoping she keeps it up!
Christina Ricci was just nine years old when she scored her first feature film role in Mermaids, where she all but stole the show from her co-stars, Winona Ryder and Cher. The following year, she snagged the role of Wednesday Addams in the first Addams Family movie, and her status as a pint-sized pre-teen Hollywood icon was complete. From then on, Ricci was ubiquitous in coming-of-age films like Now and Then and big-budget family adventures like Casper, and by the time she reached adulthood she was one of the most famous young actors in the biz — but that can be a liability when it comes to taking on adult roles.
Like many pro actors who made it big as kids, Ricci was still seen as a little girl long after she'd outgrown the desire to play one. And while she managed to bridge that gap with more daring, mature teen roles in smaller films (most notably a haunting turn in Ang Lee's dark, sexy The Ice Storm), it still sapped her momentum at a moment when she could have used a big-budget break into grownup fare.
The curse of the cult character
Admit it: Even now, Christina Ricci just doesn't look right to you without a scowl, a pair of twin black braids, and a disembodied hand named "Thing" sitting perkily on her shoulder. Despite being a grown woman in her mid-thirties, Ricci is still most famous for her role as the only daughter of Morticia and Gomez and for some folks, no matter how many wholesome or comedic roles she plays, she'll only ever be our own little brunette outcast, Wednesday Addams. Not that Ricci is complaining (she's only ever expressed the most sincere gratitude for getting to bring such an iconic character to life), but that kind of typecasting is never great for an actor's career.
She lacks A-list stature
Although Hollywood isn't necessarily a bad place to be a petite person (see: Tom Cruise, action hero and sex symbol despite being a miniature five-foot-six), body type can definitely play a role when it comes to the roles they'll let you play — and Ricci herself has cited her height as an obstacle to an A-list career. She went on the record about it back in 2007, saying, "I'm five-one first thing in the morning, and I tend to look really small on camera. I can probably go as far as Holly Hunter went, then I think that's going to be it. I have a feeling I am way too small."
Of course, being itty-bitty isn't the whole story for Ricci's career struggles; it certainly hasn't gotten in the way of fellow five-one A-listers like Ellen Page, Kristen Bell, Reese Witherspoon, or—yes—Holly Hunter. But all those ladies have had to fight a similar battle against being perpetually perceived as too cute to play serious dramatic roles, which has to have been a challenge for the former child star as well.
She's a vampire... or something like it
Speaking of being too small and cute to take on heavy roles, Christina Ricci also has to deal with the fact that she apparently doesn't age which isn't a bad thing under most circumstances, but definitely hasn't helped her in the quest to escape being typecast. Even if she doesn't drink the blood of the innocent to maintain her youthful appearance (and yeah, okay, she probably doesn't do that… probably), Ricci can't count on reinventing her career the way many actresses do, with a transition into middle-aged roles. But she's also way too mature in spirit to play a teenager; what's an ageless vampire starlet to do?
She might have overcompensated with too many gritty roles
Much the way certain Disney stars hit the scandal circuit a little too hard in an effort to shed their family-friendly images, Christina Ricci went through a period in her late teens and early twenties where she really tried to push the envelope and establish herself as a grownup actress. The Opposite of Sex, 200 Cigarettes, Buffalo 66, and a turn in John Waters' Pecker all proved that she could hang tough in dirty, sexy, sleazy, limit-pushing roles—but it also may have been a little too much at once. Being pigeonholed as a teen queen of crass offers slightly more opportunity than being pigeonholed as a creepy deadpan child with a disembodied appendage for a pet…but, y'know, only slightly.
Her breakout performance was eclipsed by a Monster
In 2003, Christina Ricci scored what should have been the role that catapulted her onto the A-list: playing Selby, the girlfriend of serial killer Aileen Wuornos, in the terrifying biopic Monster. Only instead of earning mass accolades for her nuanced, heartbreaking performance, Ricci went virtually unnoticed in the film because Charlize Theron's multiple award-winning performance (not to mention her forty-pound weight gain and complete lack of eyebrows) soaked up the entire spotlight.
To her credit, the actress was gracious about it; in a 2010 interview with The Advocate, she said, "I like to think I also made a dramatic physical transformation, so it would hurt me a little bit when people said that…but from the very beginning I understood it was Charlize's passion project. I took the part of Selby knowing that I was going to be a supporting part of that experience, so it never seemed weird to me at the time." And Theron praised Ricci in her Golden Globes acceptance speech as the "unsung hero" of the film, which was no doubt appreciated. Still, it was a lost opportunity at a pivotal moment, and there hasn't been another like it since.
Her confidence took a hit
Many actresses struggle with body image and disordered eating at the expense of their ability to hang in Hollywood, and Christina Ricci sadly wasn't immune from the pressures of her industry. Although she's always been very petite, the actress pointed to her fluctuating weight in the mid-2000s as a detriment to her career at a moment when she really could have used a boost—and as the culprit for her lack of blockbuster roles.
"I know that had I been thinner at the time my indie movies were hitting, I could've been in a much better position in my career," she lamented. As it was, she said, that hit to her image led to her having to work harder than many other actresses to get on the radar of casting directors: "I have to say I still audition for movies. I don't really have as much control over my career as others would like to pretend that I do.
Christina Ricci's latest choices have not just mattered, but they've been good ones—really, really good ones. In fact, the change of perspective brought on by motherhood seems to be exactly what Ricci needed, because she's been on fire ever since. For one thing, she's no longer trying to go against the grain of her legacy for the macabre and quirky; instead, she's straight-up embraced it, and thrived. In 2015, she took on the title role in The Lizzie Borden Chronicles, playing the notorious axe murderess who was acquitted in the late 19th century for the brutal killings of her parents. And in 2017, she'll lead the cast of a biopic series about Zelda Fitzgerald, the beautiful, brilliant, and deeply damaged wife of famed American novelist F. Scott Fitzgerald.
In other words, it's the most natural evolution on earth for the girl who became famous for playing Wednesday Addams—and Ricci is the first to admit that while these roles might be predictable, they also feel right. In an interview with the Today Show in advance of the Lizzie Borden Chronicles premiere, she said, "I've always sort of trusted my instincts, and if you do the things you naturally gravitate toward, there's going to be a through line through your career. And all your choices are going to reflect who you are, and your taste."
And at this point in her life—as a wife, mother, and showbiz professional with nearly three decades of experience under her belt—Ricci knows exactly what her taste is, and what kind of roles she intends to play from now on. As she put it, "I really love a crazy person.
After the original film was released, director Francis Lawrence said that he wanted to do a sequel, and in 2008, he was coming off a huge hit with I Am Legend, so he had a little extra leverage with the studio. In a 2008 interview, however, Reeves said he didn't want to do any sequels because there were no characters he wanted to go back and play again. (Perhaps at the time of the interview, he had just finished watching The Matrix Reloaded and Matrix Revolutions.)
Reeves has since changed his tune when it comes to sequels. In a 2014 Reddit "Ask Me Anything" session, he said, "I love Constantine, too. I loved playing John Constantine. I wish there was a sequel. With me in it." In 2015, he told MTV, "I really enjoyed playing that character, I know it's not the John Constantine from the graphic novels, I know it's in a different flavor… but I liked playing that guy." However, ten years have gone by since the original film, so it might be tough to get the project going again.
The original movie wasn't a big enough success
For some studios, sequels are no-brainers. When Deadpool exploded into theaters after years of non-commitment from Fox, the previously-hesitant suits at the studio suddenly wanted a sequel like an addict wants another hit. However, Constantine wasn't that type of movie.
Much like Fox with Deadpool, Warner Bros. didn't have much confidence in the Hellblazer property. It was a long-running comics series, but it wasn't a household name. The movie was also rated R, which eliminated a lot of the audience that sees comic book movies, and perhaps partly as a result, Constantine wasn't a massive hit for the studio. On its opening weekend, it made just under $30 million, and through its entire run, it earned $230 million worldwide against a $100 million budget. While most of us would be happy with that type of return, for a movie studio those numbers aren't great for a comic book movie. Had Constantine made more money, the sequel would have probably been greenlit before it was even out of theaters.
The pitch didn't spark any interest
Constantine director Francis Lawrence has said he tried a few times to get a sequel off the ground, including a pitch developed around a draft written by the screenwriter of the original film, Frank A. Cappello. The plan for the sequel was to do a smaller film with a $35 million budget and make it a hard R, which sounds pretty awesome for a movie about an occult detective. Unfortunately, the suits didn't find it as interesting as Lawrence, and the studio passed.
As time went on, Keanu Reeves and Lawrence's schedules grew busier, so when the pitch failed, things just fizzled out for Constantine 2. Since then, Lawrence has kept busy directing the last three Hunger Game movies, while Reeves went back to avoiding sequels until he found another franchise with John Wick.
The Constantine television show wasn't successful
What's interesting about Constantine is that after the movie was released, the Hellblazer property didn't just lay dormant—it was made into a television series by NBC in 2014. The show offered a very different take on the material than the film: the star of the show, Matt Ryan, looks and talks like the John Constantine that was created by writer Alan Moore and drawn by artists Rick Veitch and John Totleben (who based the character on rock star and actor Sting).
The show got fairly positive reviews, especially compared to the movie, but it never really found an audience and was canceled after just 13 episodes. While there are plenty of reasons to explain why the show failed (like its horrible timeslot on Friday night), it's still a roadblock to Constantine 2. After all, a failed TV show based on the same property doesn't exactly instill confidence that Constantine 2 would be a big box office draw, especially because at this point the original film is over a decade old.
The Justice League Dark movie may lead to a reboot instead
One of the most exciting projects from the DC Extended Universe is the Justice League Dark movie. A team consisting of DC's more supernatural-orientated characters, it tackles problems that the normal Justice League wouldn't handle. John Constantine plays a large part on the team, and in the comics, he eventually becomes the leader of the group. If original director Guillermo del Toro (who has since dropped out) had stayed on the project, Reeves likely wouldn't have been considered; he wanted a blond Constantine.
As of August 2016, Doug Liman is set to direct the JLD movie and Michael Gilio is writing the script. How this will affect Reeves and Constantine 2 has yet to be seen, but it certainly does complicate the matter for several reasons. First off, Reeves says he wants to do Constantine 2, but is he willing to do the JLD movie as well? Would he be open to multiple JLD films should the first one be a success? What about multiple Constantine films built off the JLD movie? Producers will have to consider these questions when choosing their Constantine. Will they go with Reeves because he was the star in the original moderately successful movie over a decade ago? Or should they find someone new who wants to star in a multi-film franchise?
All things considered, we probably shouldn't expect a Constantine 2, but instead a reboot sadly without Keanu Reeves in the role. Or Matt Ryan, for that matter: DC has been pretty strict about keeping their television and movie universes apart.
Hidden details you missed in the Spider-Man: Homecoming trailer
A new Spider-Man movie is, well, nothing new—next year's Spider-Man: Homecoming will mark the web-head's sixth big-screen outing. However, it is the first solo movie in which Spider-Man is officially part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, allowing him to rub shoulders with Tony Stark and aspire to one day join the Avengers. Now that the first trailer for Homecoming has dropped, fans are analyzing every quip, thwip, and clip. There are quite a few hidden details waiting to be unmasked, and your friendly neighborhood Looper has collected them all here for you.
Tony is still keeping Spider-Man his little secret
When Tom Holland made his debut as Spider-Man in Captain America: Civil War, part of the plot found Tony Stark deliberately keeping Peter Parker's powers—and his very existence—something of a secret from the superhero world at large. This allowed him to call Peter in to help fight Captain America and the others, which clearly gave Peter the inspiration to fight bad guys on a larger scale. By the end of that movie, the Sokovia Accords had been signed, forcing heroes to work with world governments rather than acting unilaterally. In the Spider-Man: Homecoming trailer, audiences can see police forces taking aim at Spider-Man while he clings to the Washington Monument.
There are any number of reasons why the police might think Spider-Man is an enemy, but the most likely is that, partly through Stark's efforts, they don't know who or what he is. Stark's secrecy was probably meant as a courtesy, an effort to allow Parker to enjoy his youth and a normal life (something Stark comes out and says in the trailer), but that means when Spider-Man shows up in Washington, he's an unregistered person with superpowers who's just a hop, thwip, and jump away from the President. In this scenario, it's understandable that the police would have no way of knowing he's a hero.
The School homecoming banner
One of the mysteries surrounding this next Spider-Man movie concerns the "homecoming" part of the title. After all, it didn't seem young Peter Parker would be returning to anything he had left; if anything, he seems to aspire to move on to bigger and better things by joining the Avengers and helping Tony Stark save the world. However, a brief part of the trailer shows potential new love interest Liz Allan putting up a school banner reading "Homecoming is almost here!"
Of course, the title of the movie will likely end up having a secondary and deeper meaning, but this banner seems to crystallize the struggle that Peter Parker embodied in his early years—one foot firmly in the superhero world, and one foot in the life of an awkward teenager just trying to make it through the day. The banner seems to be asking students if they've asked anyone to the dance yet, a plot destined to highlight Peter's romantic loneliness. On a more meta level, that banner helps to excite fans by reinforcing that the movie itself is "almost here."
The other, other love interest
Long before the trailer came out, fans speculated about who Peter's love interest in the movie might be. Since this was a return to Peter's roots, many assumed that Spider-Man would hit the jackpot with a new portrayal of Mary Jane. Others wondered if Gwen Stacy would return in this rebooted universe. When Marvel cast Zendaya, fans wondered if she would be playing either Mary Jane or Stacey, which caused its own internet uproar when certain fans freaked out that a black actress might be portraying a white character.
Now that the trailer's here, though, it's apparent Marvel was throwing curveballs at audiences: Zendaya, who has only been identified by Marvel as "Michelle," primarily serves to throw shade at Peter while our hero's attention is on Liz Allan. In the comics, she was someone Peter liked in school, but she was busy dating jocks like Flash Thompson. Later, she figured out she did like Peter, but he'd moved on to Gwen Stacy and, later, Mary Jane. Liz eventually ended up marrying Norman Osborn's son Harry. In the trailer, it's likely that the focus on Liz is a bit of a misdirect and Michelle will end up being the true love interest, but it's interesting that Marvel's throwing a few extra romantic sparks in the air.
The return of Gwen Stacy?
This one is a bit of a stretch, but not impossible. When it comes to the women in the trailer, most of the focus is on Liz (with Peter ogling her) and Michelle (calling Peter out for ogling Liz). But another scene shows a young blonde girl walking alongside Liz in the hallway. She has no dialogue or meaningful interaction with anyone, but she bears a notable resemblance to Gwen Stacy as portrayed in the comics.
The Peter of the comics ran in a small circle where everyone knew everyone, so it's entirely possible that her appearance in the trailer foreshadows a larger role in this movie and its inevitable sequels. One thing that would seem to increase this likelihood is Gwen's current popularity of the character within the comics. As readers know, Marvel recent introduced Spider-Gwen, a super-powered Gwen Stacy (from another dimension, natch) who fights crime while trying to survive high school. It may be only a matter of time before this young blonde engages in some cinematic superheroics of her own.
Elaborate science equipment
In a blink-and-you-miss-it moment as Peter walks through the hallways of his school, two fellow students seem to be carrying large, colorful scientific equipment. It doesn't seem like anything they'd have for a normal class, and it may point to some kind of scientific competition in the movie.
This isn't much of a stretch, as the teenage Peter Parker of the Marvel comics won awards at various science fairs. More recently, Miles Morales a dimensionally displaced Spider-Man settling into the original Spider-Man's universe showed his competitive streak at a science fair where he ran into fellow teen hero Ms. Marvel. While such a science fair will likely not be a huge part of Homecoming (if, indeed, there is a fair at all), it'll help to underscore Peter's scientific genius. Those smarts, much more than his fancy acrobatics, are likely at the center of his bond with Tony Stark.
Peter's friend is a bigger Star Wars fan than him
In one of the funnier moments from the trailer, Peter's seen absentmindedly watching footage of his own exploits from Captain America: Civil War—specifically, the moment when his plan comes to fruition and the team starts taking down the giant-sized Ant-Man. During that sequence, Peter made both the Avengers and the audience feel ancient when he asked if they'd seen "that really old movie Empire Strikes Back," referring to the icy world of Hoth as "the snow planet" and the Empire's AT-ATs as "the walking thingies."
The Spider-Man: Homecoming trailer introduces audiences to Peter's best pal Ned Leeds (Jacob Batalon), and shows Ned discovering Peter's secret with a funny bit that reveals Ned's much more of a Star Wars fan. How can you tell? When he's surprised by seeing Peter walking on the walls, he drops a completed Lego Death Star. For Lego fans, this is its own moment of tragedy, as he's going to have to put nearly 4,000 pieces back together. In that same scene, the nose of an X-wing peeks into frame, and another shot shows what appears to be Star Wars figures near a lamp. Audiences will have to wait until July to figure out if Peter manages to alienate his buddy by calling the Death Star "that laser moon thingy."
The friendship shuffle
Aside from their mutual love of pop culture, Spider-heroics, and Liz Allan's top, very few details are given in the trailer about Peter's friend, but longtime readers already understand just how sharply he's being reimagined.
The Ned Leeds of the comics was a reporter at the Daily Bugle who, through a complex web of brainwashing and tortured plots, became the villain Hobgoblin…or, depending on who was writing that day, simply someone who thought he was the Hobgoblin. While he seems unlikely to be part of any similarly dramatic plot twists in this movie, it'll be interesting to see if Ned's knowledge of Peter and his Spider-abilities is ever used for evil in future installments. Alternately, he may simply continue to play the role of friend and confidante, helping to separate Spider-Man from brooding loner heroes like Batman.
Vulture repulsor lifts?
The trailer is deliberately stingy when it comes to doling out glimpses of Michael Keaton as the villainous Vulture, but one thing comics fans may notice right away is that this is a much more technologically-focused version of the character.
The original Vulture was technically powered by an electromagnetic harness, but his costume was made to look like it was covered in green bird feathers. The movie version of the Vulture looks like he's auditioning to be an Iron Man villain with his complex mechanical suit. The Iron Man comparison continues with one brief shot of the Vulture hovering over the camera, giving us a glimpse of technology that looks suspiciously like Iron Man's repulsor lifts. Part of the movie's plot may center on stolen weaponry (more on that in a bit), and if this is true, it would give Iron Man a personal stake in helping Spider-Man stop the Vulture. After all, keeping his technology from killing people was Stark's motivation going back as far as his first movie.
Peter's collection of nerdy science shirts
While Peter may have lost his geek cred in Civil War by not knowing some basic Star Wars names, the trailer goes out of its way to establish his nerdy bona fides through a series of dorky science t-shirts. When he's speaking to Tony Stark in Stark's car, Peter wears a t-shirt that reads "The physics is theoretical." While the rest of the shirt is cut off by the framing of the scene, the rest of the shirt's saying is "but the fun is real."
Peter's penchant for nerd humor continues in a later scene with Tony, during which Peter wears a shirt with two atoms having a conversation. "I lost an electron," the first one says. The second one asks, "Are you positive?" Interestingly, Peter seems to only wear these shirts when he's with Stark, which is an absolutely adorable way of trying to bond with the older scientific genius…or just suck up in order to get that Avengers job.
Alien weaponry?
Earlier Marvel movies have often revolved around weapons technology getting into the wrong hands. In Iron Man, Tony Stark was horrified to learn that Obadiah Stane was selling Stark weapons to the Ten Rings and other shady groups around the world. In The Avengers, the titular heroes were shocked to discover that S.H.I.E.L.D. had been working to weaponize recovered alien technology as a way of fighting back against future alien invasions. This concern carried over to the Age of Ultron movie, in which the Avengers shut down Hydra bases that were protected with special alien technology.
There are a couple of quick shots in this trailer that indicate this plot may be making a comeback. In one scene, a henchman fires a powerful-looking laser blast towards something offscreen. In a later scene, the Vulture appears to be firing that same special weapon—or one very similar to it. It's possible that part of the movie's plot involves the Vulture stealing alien technology to use for his own selfish purposes. This would put added pressure on Tony to stop him, too, since he's a major reason half of the Avengers are currently on the run.
Debut of the armpit webs
In one quick scene, Spider-Man escapes some trigger-happy police by gliding away using his "armpit webs." Casual fans of Spider-Man movies might wonder if this is some brand-new power added for the movie, or simply a tweak to his costume made by Tony Stark. And while the jury is still out about whether the webs are supposed to have been Tony Stark's idea, this design is nothing new.
In fact, having those armpit webs was a major part of Spider-Man's design in his very first comics, starting with his debut in Amazing Fantasy #15. The fact that Spider-Man is using them to glide in this movie may point towards a return to another classic trope of early Spider-Man comics: one of the problems he often encountered is that he would run out of webbing at the worst times, and on a poor teenager's budget, that stuff was hard to replace. The ability to glide from building to building means he'll have to use less of that precious stuff for transport, and can save it for webbing up bad guys.
Hey, it's Donald Glover!
Another blink-and-you-miss-it moment from the trailer is the appearance of Donald Glover—and if you didn't see him the first time, don't feel bad; he doesn't seem to be doing much besides standing by the mystery man who's firing the alien-looking blaster. Some fans have speculated this other man may be a version of the Shocker, but the international trailer shows someone else who looks more like the classic villain; this movie may have many side villains or possibly one related gang of electric bad guys, with Glover's colleague being one of them.
Fans online fervently tried to get Glover cast as Spider-Man in 2011, and Glover made a cute reference to this by appearing in Spider-Man pajamas in his comedy classic Community. Later, when Marvel was creating a different Spider-Man character for their Ultimate line of comics, they created a black Hispanic character named Miles Morales, who creator Brian Bendis said was influenced by Glover. Morales developed quite a fan following of his own, and many fans hoped Glover would eventually portray the character he helped inspire. Glover did eventually voice Morales in the Ultimate Spider-Man cartoon and some fans continue to hold out hope that he might somehow play that character in this movie, but in the trailer, he looks more like he might be a bad guy.
Bruce Banner's cameo
Much of the audience's attention goes to Tony Stark in this trailer, but another Avenger makes an appearance—albeit one that's really easy to miss. In Peter Parker's science class, he's busy watching footage of himself kicking ass during Civil War (did the guy from Luke Cage sell him a Blu-ray?) when his teacher calls him out for not paying attention. Above her are pictures of some of the greatest scientists in history, ranging from Albert Einstein and Nikolai Tesla to female science pioneer Marie Curie…and Bruce Banner.
It's actually very interesting to see Banner on the wall because it would imply that the rest of the world acknowledges him as a brilliant scientist rather than as the rampaging Hulk. This seems to either be a soft reboot of Hulk's story or a subtle revelation about a change in status quo, because as far as the world knows, Banner's science experiment on himself ended in tragedy, and he was very publicly confronted by the Army on a college campus before destroying half of Harlem in his dramatic fight with the Abomination. While it's true that he's gone on to save the world on multiple occasions, it seems a little weird that he'd be honored for his failed science rather than his superheroism.
