“We do very much have the ambition about creating a bigger universe around Spider-Man. There are a number of scripts in the works,” Sony Pictures Entertainment chief Michael Lynton said. And again, this isn’t exactly Earth-shaking news. There is already a “Venom” movie in the works with Josh Trank attached (though obviously, his first priority is “Fantastic Four” over at Fox), and with Sinister Six already teased pretty heavily and countless other Spidey characters from the canon to tackle, it’s clear the studio is looking at the Marvel model…

I just… I don’t even… sigh…

It’s like, “Oh…

Some of you are not looking forward to this weekend. I know because I have interacted with you in the comments, on Facebook and the like. For others of us, we are expectant and hopeful. This is the week that we catch fire!

New This Weekend

The Hunger Games: Catching Fire — PG-13

While I found the book series was not without its flaws, I did enjoy them quite a bit. I could quibble stylistically with the books, but the story is sound. It was pretty decent cultural commentary. Where is our reality TV culture headed? Could it possibly come to this?

The first film was a good adaptation of…

Hey, this looks really good! Of course it stars two good actors too — Reese Witherspoon and Colin Firth — so perhaps it’s no surprise.

I admit I did not have any knowledge of the events this film is based on prior to reading for about sixty seconds just now on Wikipedia, but it looks like the film deals with some sticky issues, heartbroken parents, false convictions etc. I’m certainly interested to see if this film is any good.

There’s a lot of intersting stuff going on in this trailer and therefore in the upcoming Robocop film. I’m very interested to see if it’s any good. I was never into Robocop before for whatever reason. I’m debating now whether to go back and watch the original film sometime soon. I’m thinking I should. What do you guys think?

As I mentioned when I posted the first trailer for this film, I am not a huge Muppets fan. I mean I don’t hate Muppets, but I just don’t get it. But even I have to admit this looks pretty funny. and I’ll probably be seeing it so I might as well get into the mindset to watch it.

It looks like Kermit gets mistaken for the world’s greatest thief who happens to look just like him, and replaced by said thief. It’s up to the rest of the Muppets to figure it out.

This one is a lot of fun. It sure seems a shame that this is not somehow available in theaters, though I’m not sure how you would get it there. But somehow connect it with Gravity. This is sort of like a deleted scene that was never made. Given the nature of Gravity and the nature of the way the story was told, it would have been odd to cut to this. We only ever get to see things from the perspective of Dr. Stone.

Still, this is the other side of one of the most deeply moving parts of the film. There’s not really a point other than, oh, that’s what was going on. And that’s a lot of fun.

A studio spokeswoman said Wednesday that Paramount would fight the proposed follow-up to the 1946 holiday classic starring Jimmy Stewart as George Baily, a desperate family man who imagines what his town would be like if he’d never been born. Star Partners and Hummingbird Productions announced plans Monday to create a sequel titled It’s a Wonderful Life: The Rest of the Story.

Bob Farnsworth, president of Nashville, Tenn.-based Hummingbird Productions, told trade publication Variety that the film was set for release in 2015 and would star Karolyn Grimes, who played George Bailey’s daughter…

MPAA’s Anti-Piracy Fight Contributed To Financial Loss In 2012 While Chris Dodd Collected $3.3M

The Hollywood’s lobby group’s finances took a hit in 2012, a tax filing shows — but CEO Chris Dodd did just fine even as the MPAA licked its wounds from its failed effort to promote tough anti-piracy legislation.  Dodd’s compensation came to $3.3M last year. (The package: $3M base compensation, $250,000 bonus, $41,930 other compensation, $13,753 retirement benefit, and $19,585 non-tax benefit.) That’s up 36.5% but it’s not an apples-to-apples comparison since he worked a partial year in 2011…

Why, why, why? Quick, can you name a franchise that has been driven into the ground worse than the “Die Hard”/John McClane series? You can’t say “Alien” because a mediocre as “Prometheus” was, it’s still a zillion times better than any of the “AVP” series movies. Jack Ryan sure wasn’t looking healthy last time anyone checked, but that’s why there’s a reboot (scheduled for dumping ground season in January). The “Indiana Jones” series only has one outright disaster (‘Kingdom of Crystal Skulls’) and while there was two terrible “Terminator” films in a row, there were two great ones and a reboot…