What a week. It was one of the more consequential 24 hours in awhile in terms of what we write about in this newsletter.
In a bombshell of a development, Matt Reeves, the filmmaker behind The Batman, will not return to set of the sequel, but instead will allow Steven Soderbergh to complete principal photography in London. This will allow Reeves to be in Los Angeles to attend to a family matter, though he will still be working from afar; he will then be more hands on when the movie returns to L.A. for post-production. The shoot is about 2/3 of the way done, sources say.
Just before that news dropped came word that Bela Bajaria was out as Netflix CCO. Her tenure saw Squid Game become a global phenomenon, even as the company has lagged when it comes to creating valuable IP — one of the reasons the streamer wanted to by Warner Bros. We detailed the vicious regime change here.
One company that is making moves on the IP front is Paramount, which has been picking up hot best-sellers with strong fan bases. Now it's got another one, and it's a big one...—Aaron Couch and Borys Kit.
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RED RISING IS JUST OVER THE HORIZON FOR PARAMOUNT.
The studio has picked up the rights to the best-selling dystopian sci-fi series by Pierce Brown.
Francis Lawrence, no stranger to dystopian sci-fi thanks to his many installments of The Hunger Games franchise, is attached to direct the adaptation of the first novel in the popular series, also titled Red Rising.
Justin Rhodes, who worked with Lawrence developing Netflix’s video game adaptation Bioshock, will pen the script.
A blend of Roman mythology and science fiction, Rising is set on Mars in a future where society is set up in a color-coded class system, with the superior Golds on top. The story centers on Darrow, a young miner who is a Red, the lowest on the ladder and a people who exist to do hard labor. After seeing his love die and discovering the truth about his existence, Darrow infiltrates the Gold society with an aim to bring it down.
Seeing Red.
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JOSH BROLIN HAS A WHALE OF A TALE (AND MORE) TO SHARE.
The veteran actor is in this weekend’s Whalefall as a hard-ass, searfaring father, whose son (played by Austin Abrams) is swallowed by a sperm whale and only has an hour to escape the creature's stomach before his oxygen runs out.
There’s also Lanterns, a show — and role of Hal Jordan — he passed on that is now a major ratings hit.
"I love those actors, and I’ve seen it," he tells Brian Davids. "If I decide not to do something, I never really think, Oh, had I done it, it could have been better. Birdman was that way when I saw what Edward Norton did with it. I was like, That’s excellent. It’s not necessarily what would’ve transpired had I done it, but there’s no comparison."
And then there’s Sicario 3, which finally is happening. He says that he and co-stars Benicio Del Toro and Emily Blunt have spent years sifting through scripts and potential filmmakers. Finally, a page-turner from Steven Knight (who's also writing Sicario director Denis Vihttps://www.hollywoodreporter.com/author/brian-davids/lleneuve's upcoming James Bond film) proved to be “undeniable," as did a pitch from director Padraic "Pat" McKinley, who recently helmed Ethan Hawke's critically acclaimed The Weight.
There’s also his former neo-Western series, Outer Range, which was canceled by Amazon despite great reviews and a loaded cast of actors whose careers have been flourishing ever since.
“Seeing what those actors — Tom Pelphrey, Lewis Pullman, Imogen Poots — have done since then makes me very happy,” Brolin shares. “To me, it’s a great middle finger to those people who canceled that show. It’s like, You had gold.”
Joshing around.
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➤ Zendaya and Alex Garland are staying in business with A24, this time teaming up for a new movie.
➤ Climbing the stairway to heaven: Netflix unveiled its first Narnia trailer amid its consequential week. The trailer came a day before it laid off 1,000 staffers.
➤ High flyers: Esther McGregor and Emilio Sakraya cast as Violet and Xaden in the series adaptation of Rebecca Yarros' Fourth Wing novel.
➤ Slaughter House: The first novel spun off from James Tynion IV's Boom! comic Something Is Killing the Children, titled Something Is Killing the Children: Hope is a Knife, hit stores this week.
Catch up on these Heat Vision Interviews ...
➤ Brian Duffield, writer-director of Whalefall and one 20th Century's prized collaborators, denies rumors that he's helming an Alien movie. He merely chipped in a couple weeks of writing to an existing, unnamed Alien title.
➤ The Social Reckoning filmmaker Aaron Sorkin believes, at least as far as film and television go, that the audience will reject AI.
➤ Scream queen Jessica Rothe, together with writer-director Christopher Landon, reconceived the long-gestating Happy Death Day 3 earlier this year.
➤ Mike Faist, in promotion of East of Eden, charmingly dodges our question about his short-lived reunion with Luca Guadagnino on the defunct Sgt. Rock.
➤ The Lanterns team gets into the weeds of the HBO hit series' season one finale.
➤ Annabelle Wallis, whom James Wan cast as the lead of Annabelle and Malignant, says the horror maestro contacted her recently about a new project together.
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TO OUR EYES, THE MODERN COMICS ERA has not produced that many instantly recognizable or classic covers. Chalk it up to a general lack craftsmanship, or maybe an over-abundance of variants where covers get lost in the shuffle.
But one that has made an impact was the cover for Detective Comics No. 880, published in 2011 and drawn by Scottish artist Jock.
The comic is a bit of an anomaly. It’s not a key issue (although it is an early story written by then-rising star Scott Snyder), there is no first appearance of any character, but that cover…it resonated. Copies sell for hundreds of dollars on eBay. And the original art sold in 2025 for $288,000, a massive amount for a modern piece.
Now Lego is taking that cover and folding it into its Wall Art line.
Coming in at 1,849 pieces, LEGO DC Batman The Joker Wall Art is a snappy brick recreation of the cover. The piece is asking the viewer to look deep into the face and to spot the Easter eggs in a deeper layer of the design, such as Batarangs, swords, flowers, and even a “ha, ha, ha,” per Lego.
The built piece will be a statement, measuring 20 inches (51 cm) high, 15 inches (38 cm) wide, and 2 inches (5 cm) deep. It’s due to hit stores Jan. 1, 2027 and will retail for $169.99.
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THE PULP ERA OF MAGAZINES AND BOOKS did not always produce memorable stories, but it did provide a cascade of wonderful opportunities for artist to draw and paint all sorts of dramatic and original art with handsome heroes, beautiful bombshells, malignant Martians, or whatever was needed to get the impressionable to buy what was considered disposable publishing material.
Among these artists was Edmund "Emsh" Emshwiller, a prolific master of the form who had a modernist touch in the mid-century. His covers earned him five Hugo Awards and he later became known for experiments with computer animation, becoming dean of the school of film/video at CalArts in the 1980s. And at least one of his works is in the Lucas Museum of Narrative Arts.
When one of his cover paintings come up for auctions, it is a notable affair. And so we are taking note of his cover to the February 1957 edition of Infinity Science Fiction Digest Magazine, for the story “Hunt the Hog for Joe,” that is up for bidding as part of Heritage’s Illustration Art Signature Auction, which culminates Oct. 29. It's one of three covers from Emshwiller up for grabs.
Bidding is currently in the $6,250 range, but with 13 days left to go, it will most assuredly go higher. Many of his pieces tend to sell in the $20,000 range. |
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