Hello once again from Islington in North London!
Day two of Kapow! 2012 was much shorter than yesterday, with things starting at 9am and lasting until just 3:30, but it was still a packed day. First up was an announcement from a man who's very well known here in the UK, but who is not so famous in the States...
Peter Serafinowicz
Star of "Shaun of the Dead" and "Spaced", as well as his own comedy sketch show on British TV, Peter Serafinowicz announced this morning that he's making a step into the comic book world. I was going to explain it myself, but I grabbed Peter after the panel, and so he's here to explain the project:
The Amazing Spider-Man
One of the biggest treats of the weekend, and one of the biggest draws for fans, was the exclusive footage that was shown from one of the biggest superhero movies of 2012 (let's be honest, it's 3rd biggest really isn't it). The queue for the screening started outside the Business Design Centre about 2 and a half hours before the doors opened, and included one Ghostbuster, two captain Americas, one Rorschach, and several hundred people clutching coffee cups after the night before.
After everyone had got into the auditorium and donned their 3D glasses, and after a bloke from Sony told us that the film uses 3D in the best way it has ever been used, we finally got to see what we'd all come for. And the audience went nuts.
It was probably a good seven or eight minutes of footage that was shown, including everything we've seen in trailers before, but so much more besides. There were several long shots of Peter Parker doing some crazy skateboarding, enhanced of course by his Spidey-Sense, so expect plenty of that in the movie. There was also a long scene with Peter speaking to Gwen Stacey by some lockers in a corridor at school, a scene that was excellently and charmingly written. It involved the two of them speaking very awkwardly but basically admitted that they sort of liked each other and that maybe they should go on a date or something, but not right now - all without actually saying any of those things explicitly. If that's a sign of how they handle the awkward teen romance in the film, then they've definitely nailed it. My only worry is that Andrew Garfield is actually possibly too cool to be PP - he's not quite enough of a geek perhaps - but this is a new Spider-Man, so perhaps they're taking him in a slightly different direction. At the end of the scene Peter literally skips away down the hall, happy in the knowledge that Gwen likes him.
There was also plenty of action on show - shots of the Lizard throwing Spidey off a building, plus the villain throwing cars off of a bridge, and Spider-Man catching one of them just in time with a web, leaving it dangling in mid air over the edge. Another brilliant scene featured Spider-Man attaching a crook and playfully webbing him in a really funny and inventive way that had the audience laughing a lot.
My favourite part of all the footage we saw though was a sequence in which the webslinger is on his knees, surrounded by armed police, and Dennis Leary's character actually removes our hero's mask. Still facing the ground, Spidey leaps into action, and takes out all of the cops without actually looking straight at them, so that no-one catches a glimpse of his true identity before they're all out for the count. It was a very well put together sequence. Overall, I was impressed with the clips we saw, and my interest in the movie has now shifted from "YAWN" to "HMM... MAYBE":
Total Recall
It was only announced quite late that the lucky people who'd queued were also in line to see material from the Total Recall remake. Here's the big headline: THREE BOOBS IS BACK. One of the scenes shown involved a space-hooker offering her services to Quaid (Colin Farrell of course), and opening her shirt to reveal three large boobies. The audience applauded.
As well as that bombshell, we also saw a variety of extended fight sequences between Quaid and his (sort of) wife, played by Kate Beckinsale. There was a lot of jumping around and blocking punches and squeezing people between thighs and into walls, and smashing through windows and firing guns. In fact, it's clear that the role of the wife ("Lori") is perhaps greater than we might have thought - the fight sequences shown clearly stretched across a large part of the film, and not just one scene. Lori also exhibited a very different accent after it's revealed that she's against Quaid - perhaps almost Russian.
Another scene showed Mr Farrell watching a video message from himself, just like in the original Arnie version. We didn't get to see if he had to shove something up his nose though.
There were plenty of flying cars too, reminding me of The 5th Element, and unfortunately also taking me back to that sequence in Star Wars Episode II. Bryan Cranston popped up a few times, being awesome as usual, but looking quite different from normal too, and the role of robots was also hinted at. It seems that some robots (who look very much like the "I, Robot" variety) may be part of a bigger political conspiracy of some kind. Not quite sure what that's all about.
Having had zero expectations, and from the start having been sceptical about any project remaking one of my favourite science fiction action movies, I was pleasantly surprised with what I saw - I think this could be in the Minority Report league of "serious" sci-fi action.
DC New 52 panel
Probably the biggest comic book event of the day was the DC New 52 panel, featuring Dan DiDio, Bob Wayne and Scott Snyder. I've tried to sum up the main points of a pretty fast-paced discussion (big thanks to Tom Treasure for help on this):
- The diversity of the new 52 is part of a plan to broaden the spectrum of the DC Universe. Question: How long will the new 52 last? Answer: Why not forever?!
- The UK represents 10-15% of DC's business now
- Scott Snyder inevitably talked quite a bit about batman - explaining that they're currently in the middle of Night Owls - and that Greg Cupullo is "having a ball" doing the art. Scott explained that the next two issues involve revelations, and a big finale to the arc.
- An upcoming annual will involve a huge reintroduction of Mr Freeze
- One of the biggest moments was when Dan DiDio started speaking about the use of the new 52 storylines in movies and TV shows - basically, it's clearly going to happen, though officially they can't confirm or deny it - Didio kept talking so much that Bob Wayne had to shut him down!
- The panel explained that in general, one of the best things about the new 52 is that they're aiming for a "wider, more expansive DC Universe" that doesn't "lean too much on time travel"
- Dan DiDio said he thinks that Earth One books are so great because they're like movies, and have unique pacing and aren't broken up like monthlies. He said that it's really great to see early.careers re imagined, and the level of risk is also exciting.
- He spoke about the Batman Earth One and the upcoming Superman Earth One too.
- There was also talk about LGBT characters, and whether it would make more sense to 'retcon' an existing character to not be straight, rather than to introduce a brand new one, if there's a desire to bring in more non-straight characters. Scott Snyder says there's a new gay character coming to Batman soon
- Bob Wayne said that there are definitely new plans for the Shazam going forward.
- Constantine will appear in Swamp Thing & Animal Man very soon.
Jonathan Ross
- Dave said that he still doesn't mind signing copies of the landmark graphic novel, and still doesn't mind drawing Rorshach.
- He's incredibly proud of the work, and says that he and Alan Moore were surprised at the gigantic success at the time.
- He's also proud of the fact that if a newcomer to comics walks into a comic shop and asks what they should start with, they're invariably told that they should start with Watchmen.
- Dave spoke about the attention to detail that Alan Moore had, and described one of the very descriptive notes that Moore had given him for a Watchmen panel - "we see motes of dust dancing lazily in the afternoon sunshine"
- Dave compared Alan Moore with Mozart, and Frank Miller with Miles Davis - because of his much more improvising and ad-hoc methods
- He also had a surprising amount of positive things to say about the Watchmen movie, though admitted it wasn't perfect.
- He's currently working on "The Secret Service" with Mark Millar - and described it as being like a Man From Uncle spy story - a genre that he feels has been much neglected. He explained that it has much to do with pressures within families, and "living in the crummy end of town"
- Question: Out of all the work he's done, what else does he think would make a good movie? Answer: Martha Washington.
