The box office has thus far had a bit of a lack-luster run. I don’t think this weekend changes that for any individual film, but the overall total seems to be a bit more positive. Folks came out to the theaters this weekend.

#1 Evil Dead

Not a film I am in the least interested in, it did come in on top this weekend at $26 million in 3,025 theaters. With a foreign total of $4.5 million, the worldwide total is $30.5 million. And on a budget of $17 million I suppose the studios and producers will call it a win. l call it a massive loss for the human race that such a wretched looking film…

So it occurred to me when I saw this trailer that I have not posted anything about this film yet. That is because it does not look interesting to me in the slightest. But I try to cover a broad range of films and whatnot so It seems like I should get some stuff on the site about it. I know literally nothing about the novel by F. Scott Fitzgerald on which this film is based, which may be why I am completely uninterested in the film. It looks like an overly stylized, overly dramatized mess of a film. But it will certainly have appeal to some.

The film stars Leonardo DiCaprio, Tobey MaGuire,…

ABC has released some new information about their pilots, which includes a new title for the S.H.I.E.L.D. TV show, apparently, possibly to separate it from The Shield.

The new title is listed as Marvel’s Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D.

Yeah… that seems like a completely suit driven and politically motivated title for the show. I hope that does not foreshadow other political motivations for the show. Ugh. What a completely uninspired name.

Heres the synopsis.

Fresh from his role in the summer’s box office smash, MARVEL’S THE AVENGERS, Agent Phil Coulson (Clark Gregg) returns to the…

Joss Whedon‘s habit of calling back former Whedonverse alums is well established. But with the exception of Clark Gregg, who’ll reprise his role from the movies as Agent Phil Coulson, the cast of S.H.I.E.L.D. has so far been populated with all-new faces. (Well, new to Whedon.) That changed today, as former Angel star J. August Richards joined the ABC superhero series in a mysterious role.

Excellent! I haven’t seen him in anything for a while and I liked him in Angel so this seems like a good thing to me.

Other info:

Aside from Gregg, Richards joins Ming-Na, who plays soulful…

The realization that I would never again read a new Ebert review was nothing short of alarming. The man is more or less single-handedly responsible for my interest in film criticism. During my teenage years, I would quickly follow each movie I watched with a visit to Ebert’s website to read his review. Sure, I read reviews by other critics, but my relationship with Ebert was on a different level. There was something about the deeply personal, candid, unpretentious way that the famed Chicago Sun-Times critic expressed his views which really resonated with me. His work had a conversational…

For Zack Snyder‘s Man of Steel, composer Hans Zimmer an unenviable task. Unlike in 2006′s Superman Returns where composer John Ottman was able to use John Williams‘ iconic 1978 Superman theme, Snyder preferred to distance his film from all of the previous Superman films. That meant Zimmer was tasked with writing music that would work to inspire in the context of the new film, but also wouldn’t be totally overshadowed by Williams.

I’ve been on record as liking Superman Returns. Still, I am looking forward to seeing what this complete reboot could bring to the table. And yet I still think…

In this episode, TJ talks about last weekend’s box office and what’s hot and making the most money, which is ‘G.I. Joe: Retaliation’, a special version of ‘Iron Man 3’ coming to China, Movieology Episode #4, a new ‘Star Trek Into Darkness’ commercial which aired with an episode of ‘The Walking Dead’, the bait and switch tactics of film trailers and why he empathizes with the makers of the films and trailers, a new trailer for ‘The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones’, ‘Finding Dory’ and Ellen DeGeneres’ announcement of the film, ‘the trailer announcement for ‘Catching Fire’, clips, featurettes and entire streaming score for ‘Oblivion’, the ‘MovieByte Podcast #38: Finding Pixar’, some thoughts on the sad news of the passing of ‘Roger Ebert’ and what an inspiration he was, and what you might like to see this weekend at the theater.

I want to talk a little about opinions, anger, respect, and intelligent conversation.

A comment was made recently on an opinion post I wrote that the commenter had lost respect for the site because of my opinion. I love all of our readers and we are thankful for your support. I’m not upset about the comment, for I realize that we will get this sort of thing all the time. But as MovieByte is young, I do want to talk just a bit about how we should approach our conversation and our respect for one another. I want to lay out a bit of what we are looking for because I do want to have a great…

This week looks like a bit of a dud for new, fresh releases, but there are still some things in theaters we might like to see so don’t give up all hope.

Opening this Weekend

Evil Dead - R
I have zero interest in this film. I can’t find much to recommend it, it looks like all creepy horror with no really good plot or story and I’m just not interested in such.

In the much anticipated remake of the 1981 cult-hit horror film, five twenty-something friends become holed up in a remote cabin. When they discover a Book of the Dead, they unwittingly summon up dormant demons living in the…