Fox 21 and Hulu have teamed for a television series based on
Hitman, the global best-selling video game from IO Interactive. A pilot script will be written by Derek Kolstad, creator of the
John Wick action film series, who wrote the first film and scripted the third one that will be released in 2019.
Kolstad will be an executive producer along with Adrian Askarieh and Chuck Gordon. The project will be overseen at Fox 21 by Bert Salke, Jane Francis, Gloria Fan and Kira Innes, and at Hulu by Jordan Helman. The hope is for
Hitman to become a flagship series.
Hitman has sold more than 25 million copies since being launched in 2000. It centers on Agent 47, a meticulous and lethal assassin with a mysterious backstory. The character has been the subject of two films released by Fox — 2007’s
Hitman and 2015’s
Hitman: Agent 47 — and the intention here is to hew closely to the mythology of the perennially popular video game. The latest game is simply called
Hitman, and it sold 7 million copies. Two more
Hitman games are in development at IO Interactive.
We’re just weeks away from the release of the first
Supergirl movie in over 40 years and with ticket presales well underway, experts are making their projects on opening weekend. After the initial sales started happening, most sites were predicting anywhere from $45 to $55 million domestically, but after a few days of higher-than-expected numbers, some sites have adjusted up to as high as $60 to $77 million. This would put the
Milly Alcock lead film right in line with the last few Marvel Studios films (except
Deadpool and Wolverine). While there has been some debate,
Deadline claims the film’s budget is $175 million and the breakeven point would be around $315 million. Other sites claim it’s as high as $425 million globally to call it a success. Only DC Studios and its co-heads
James Gunn and
Peter Safran know what would make this film a success for them, but with trying to rebuild a franchise that had been pretty much run into the ground with underperforming films like
The Flash,
Aquaman 2 and
Shazam 2, having a film that makes most of its money back and is a critical and audience success could be more valuable. Coming off the success of last year’s Superman film, DC is hoping that
Craig Gillespie’s vision will continue to excite fans and keep building the new DCU to higher and higher heights. The success of this film and this universe may be driven more on word-of-mouth than box office numbers and the studio appear to be confident enough in the film that they have already had media screenings over two weeks before the film’s release. Yes, there is still an embargo so they can have those reviews come out closer to when the film is in theaters, but you can probably tell the way the project is being covered whether or not it was well received.
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A new rumor is shaking up what fans are expecting from
The Batman Part 2. On the same day that writer/director
Matt Reeves posted that filming had begun, insider
Jeff Schnieder posted about how everything we knew about
Sebastian Stan’s role in the project was wrong. Sites had been reporting that Stan would be playing Harvey Dent/Two-Face and while that had never been confirmed by Reeves or DC Studios, people took comments from Stan as confirmation such as how he would be playing, “multiple roles” as a hint at him playing the split-personality of the Batman villain. But the new report claims that Stan is not Dent but rather the serial killer Victor Zsasz and actor
Bryan Tyree Henry would be playing Dent. Other insiders have some out since and claim to have collaborating information. Zsasz is an interesting character, a killer who notches a mark on his skin for every kill. He’s been portrayed in live action a couple of times including on
Gotham and in the
Birds of Prey movie but has never been the main focus of a story. This would match up to Reeves saying that the film would be exploring a story never done in film before. It doesn’t really match up to Stan’s comment about “multiple roles” or reports that he was already working with make-up to figure out the look. Reeves is not confined by what is in the comics so he could make major changes to characters, even to the point of making Zsasz a divergent personality of Harvey Dent that manifested prior to the acid attack causing Two-Face to emerge. It’s also possible that Schneider’s information is slightly off and instead of playing the serial killer, Stan could be playing Charles Victor Szasz who is also known as Victor Sage or The Question. How’s that for a twist? The bottom line here is that Schnieder is hearing this from an insider, and it has not been confirmed by any official source and I wouldn’t put it past film studios to start leaking false information to protect a movie that is just starting to film. I think this one stays in the, “take with a grain of salt” category and we wait to find out more.
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DC Studios and their co-head
James Gunn have talked about a lot of potential series and films with some of them being mentioned and then sort of forgotten about. One of those seemed to be
Paradise Lost, a Wonder Woman prequel series showing life on Themyscira before the birth of Diana. Though after its initial mention, the project hadn’t been talked about in a while and someone asked Gunn its fate. Gunn insisted the project was still in the works and now we are seeing some possible confirmation. Back in 2024, two names were attached as writers on the series
Kira Snyder and
Janet Lin and now, according to the WGA website, both are set to work on
Paradise Lost for 2027-2028. Snyder is known for writing and producing on
The Handmaid’s Tale and
The 100 while Lin has credits on
Bridgerton,
Cursed, and
Bones. There has been talks recently about trying to fast track a new
Wonder Woman film and while there is no confirmation, rumors persist that the character may debut in
Man of Tomorrow, so seeing Paradise Lost finally moving forward would make a lot of sense.
Sony’s new
Spider-Noir series has out done the MCU when it comes to fans. According to
Forbes, the new
Nicholas Cage lead series with him playing a 1930s variant of Spider-Man has garnered the highest audience score of all Marvel related television projects on
Rotten Tomatoes. In the new series, Cage plays detective Ben Reilly who used to be the web-swinging hero called The Spider but hung up his mask after the death of his fiancée. Audience have really taken to the series that is available in both color and B&W, giving it a 93% (a point higher than when Forbes did their article) and even scored well with the critics at 92%. While the critic score is impressive, other Marvel projects have done better such as
X-Men ’97 with a 99% score and
Ms. Marvel with a 98% among critics. But on the audience side, 93% is tops beating out shows like
Agents of SHIELD,
Daredevil (Netflix) and
WandaVision. While there has been no word on a second season, it would be hard for Amazon and Sony to ignore results like this.
James Gunn, co-head of DC Studios and writer/director of the upcoming Man of Tomorrow film, was back on social media this week answering questions and one in particular stood out. A Threads user named “boyturizmo” asked, “Will we ever see General Zod, Doomsday, Dr. Fate, Black Adam, Ultraman (with his Crime Syndicate) or Darkseid?” Gunn replied, “Two of them in not too long…” This of course led to a ton of speculation on which two and where? Now the obvious one is Darkseid, and while Gunn has said his DCU isn’t building toward a big Thanos like battle with Darkseid, the character is going to be appearing in the upcoming animated series
Mr. Miracle. The series is in production with comic writer
Tom King onboard as the showrunner and he recently showed off a clip to interviewer
Brandon Davis, who did not share what he saw. Mr. Miracle is an escape artist raised on Darkseid’s planet Apokolips who falls in love with a warrior woman named Big Barda and they escape to Earth. Though no casting has been announced for the series, Gunn has stated that the animated series are cannon to the DCU and actors cast in the animated shows, like
Frank Grillo as Rick Flag Sr., would carry over into live action like Grillo did in both
Peacemaker and
Superman. As for the second character we will see soon, it is possible that Gunn could bring back more characters from the DCEU and have
Dwayne Johnson return as Black Adam or
Pierce Brosnan don the helmet of Dr Fate once more. And Ultraman could return from the black hole he was sucked into… but I think the most likely possibility will be in flashbacks to Krypton, possibly in
Supergirl, where we could see General Zod cameo in a scene with Jor-El (
Bradley Cooper) and Zor-El (
David Krumholtz) discussing the fate of the planet and how to handle it. This would be a great scene for world-building… though part of me really wants Brosnan back as Fate.
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With
The Batman Part 2 going into early production, fans are eager for news, information and confirmations and we may just have one thanks to one of the newcomers to the franchise,
Sebastian Stan. It’s been rumored for months that the actor who has played everything from Bucky Barnes to Donald Trump to Tommy Lee was moving to Gotham in the role of District Attorney Harvey Dent aka coin-flipping villain Two-Face, and while his casting was confirmed by director
Matt Reeves a few days back, we have not had an official announcement on the part he will be playing. While speaking to Deadline about his film
Fjord, Stan spoke a bit about his summer plans which include a trip to London to work with Reeves where he says he will be playing “many roles in this one”. The article states that he’s talking about the role of Dent and how the character transforms from D.A. to villain when acid is thrown in his face by mobster Salvadore Maroni. Stan goes on to say, ”I’m excited, I’m nervous and trying to keep surprising myself.” He also he has been working with hair and make-up already trying to figure out how his disfigurement will look. Stan doesn’t come out and say in the quotes that he’s playing Two-Face, but Deadline strongly implies it and are one of the sites that had been reporting that he had been cast in the role early on.
The Batman Epic Crime Saga, as Reeves calls it, does have one hitch to overcome. During The Penguin series on HBO Max, Maroni was played by
Clancy Brown and does not make it through the series. So, either the attack on Dent takes place prior to the events we’ve already seen portrayed or Reeves is going to change up who throws the acid. Not a huge problem but it will be interesting to see how the moment will be handled if we end up seeing it at all.
The Batman Part 2 is beginning to film and is on track for an October 2027 release.
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Winter is coming to Gotham and
Matt Reeves is heating up the internet with his social media posts. He started it off with a couple camera tests showing the Batmobile in the snow, letting us know that production had begun on the long-awaited sequel. Then he began letting fans know the cast for the upcoming
The Batman Part II starting with a gif of Robert Pattinson as the caped crusader with the quote, “We meet again, my friend.” This led into a series of posts that welcomed back the Dark Knight’s to main allies,
Andy Serkis as Alfred Pennyworth and
Jeffrey Wright as Jim Gordon. Then we got the two sides of the city fighting for control represented by
Jayme Lawson as newly elected Mayor Bella Real and
Colin Farrell as crime boss Oz Cobb aka The Penguin. Then he welcomed back the true hero of the film, Gil Perez-Abraham as Officer Martinez. Martinez is the representation of how the GCPD views The Batman as he appears multiple times in the first film, each time becoming more comfortable with working with the vigilante. Reeves would return to posting the next day and introduce the new characters to the film, but through gifs from their previous projects and not officially naming characters. This would include three MCU veterans starting with
Scarlett Johansson and
Sebastian Stan. Then
Game of Thrones patriarch
Charles Dance, from
A Good Day to Die Hard,
Sebastian Koch and from Atlanta and the Eternals,
Bryan Tyree Henry. Stan has been heavily linked to the role of Harvey Dent aka Two-Face with Dance likely playing his father Christopher. Johansson is believed to be playing Dent’s wife Gilda but that has never been confirmed and there had been no rumors at all about Koch and Henry, though Koch’s management posted a tweet about him helping rid Gotham of evil. Many on-line are speculating that Henry could be playing Detective Harvey Bullock. What is interesting are the names not mentioned in posts such as
Con O’Neil as Chief Mackenzie Bock,
Barry Keoghan as the Joker and
Paul Dano as the Riddler. I wouldn’t assume that not being mentioned doesn’t mean they don’t show up in the film, just that the character may not have a lot of screen time. The assumption is that the film will focus on Dent working with Gordon and Batman to clean up Gotham, so there will be lots of room for other characters in this film. The film has started production and is on track to premiere in October of 2027.
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We are in the age of
Matthew Lillard and everyone except
Quentin Tarantino seems to be happy about it. The
Scream and
Scooby-Doo actor has been having a bit of a resurgence lately coming shortly after Tarantino made some disparaging comments about the actor with no provocation. Many in the industry stood up for Lillard and now the actor seems to be popping up everywhere including the latest
Scream film, the second season of
Cross and the second season of
Daredevil: Born Again. The latest news reported by multiple sites has the actor joining the cast of
Man of Tomorrow, the next DC Studios film written and directed by
James Gunn. Gunn, who is good friends with Lillard and has worked with him previously on both Scooby-Doo movies, posted the below image of the pair together, commenting on the news reports as “pure speculation” and saying that they are just “casually hanging out”. Most took the posts to be sarcasm and assume that Lillard is now in the film as that is where Gunn is right now, filming the project. Fans on-line have begun even more speculation as to who Lillard could be playing including various heroes and characters with the most notable being Jim Gordon from Gotham and Plastic Man, a character that Gunn and Lillard once tried to pitch as a project to DC/Warner Bros. It’s my belief that he will be a more Superman centric character such as STAR Labs Professor Emil Hamilton or police detective Dan Turpin. But that also would be pure speculation.
Fans of
Matt Reeves’ film
The Batman got excited this week because of driving in the snow. The director posted images to his social media showing test footage of the Batmobile driving in winter conditions, which were the first signs that the long-awaited sequel had begun production. Though it has been postponed many times, it is set to be released in October of 2027 and will make the first time live-action
Batman and
Superman films will be released in the same year. The cold weather setting has long been assumed for the film based on the timeline created in both the first movie starting on Halloween and ending on Election Day and then The Penguin series on HBO Max which took place over a week or so immediately after the flooding of Gotham. The new film will pick up right after the award-winning series which places the time frame squarely in December. The plot for the film is still under wraps, but along with returning stars
Robert Pattinson,
Andy Serkis,
Colin Farrell,
Barry Keoghan and
Jeffrey Wright, the project has reportedly added
Scarlett Johannson,
Sebastian Stan and
Charles Dance. Stan is reported to be playing Gotham DA Harvey Dent aka Two-Face while Dance is said to be his father, Christopher. These castings have been reported by multiple reputable outlets but not confirmed by DC Studios or Reeves. With production having begun, the film is on track to keep its release date of October 2027.
James Gunn, co-head of DC Studios, has addressed the strange “partial reboot” of the DCEU and why he didn’t just start completely fresh. With the new DCU starting with the animated
Creature Commandos series and the new
Superman movie, certain elements from the previous regime carried over like
Viola Davis as Amanda Waller and there were some questions about more recent projects like Gunn’s own
The Suicide Squad and
Blue Beetle. And Gunn’s first DC movie also had elements from previous films including
Margot Robbie as Harley Qiunn. So why not just start over? Turns out a lot of it has to do with the
John Cena lead
Peacemaker series on HBO Max. According to a social media post by Gunn, “Peacemaker Season 2 deals were all in place when I became head of DC. It was either break everyone's contracts and pay out all that money and take away HBO Max's biggest show at the time or find a way to make it work. I chose the latter. Mostly tho because I love the character and the show and thought he/they could be an important part of the DCU.” Now, this has left quite a mess trying to figure out what is and isn’t cannon, and Gunn realizes this. He posted, “I've been thinking about this a lot in regards to The Suicide Squad & Blue Beetle and I've been meaning to rewatch both with an eye towards that knowing what I know now almost three years into the DCU (with a couple more years of scripts being actively filmed or created). Maybe after MoT Jenn & Steve & I can get together for a special couple podcasts to discuss. What do you guys think is potentially or definitely NOT canon from TSS & BB?” He is referring to
Jennifer Holland, his wife and actress who plays Harcourt and
Steve Agee who plays Economos. The three of them did the post-episode podcasts for Peacemaker season two. Doing
The Suicide Squad film makes sense with its ties to
Peacemaker, but the reason for the
Blue Beetle is that there are talks of an animated Blue Beetle series based on the 2023 film with
Xolo Maridueña continuing in the role of Jaime Reyes. The fact it’s included here confirms the animated series is still happening.
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