War Machine, who’ll be played by Don Cheadle, promises to get ample screen time in Iron Man 2, which opens in May.  But Anthony Le here didn’t need to wait for the movie to come out before he built his own War Machine costume and made the bitches swoon.  It’s funny, the line “kiss my helmet” never used to work for me.  But then, mine was mandated by the doctor to correct my misshapen skull as I grew.  Ah, high school.  Anyway, you can check out the specs over at the Superherohype forums

It should be noted that Le claims he still needs to add additional hardware like “replusor gauntlets” before it’s complete.  That’s right, it’s not even finished yet and he’s already an unstoppable chick magnet.  So if you want to keep your girlfriend, you’d be wise to steer clear of the Talbot’s in Denver.  “Hello, police?  There’s a guy in a metal suit on a rampage.  Yeah, come quick, I’m pinned down behind the floral scarves.”

One of the biggest problems with mainstream movies nowadays is the way studios buy a “pitch” or option an idea that’s less than a sentence, and then treat the actual script as an afterthought, as if the groins are just going to hit themselves and records will scratch on their own.  Problem is, sometimes it works.  As, if Jeff Bridges is to be believed, in the case of Iron Man. From an interview with In Contention:

“They had no script, man!” Bridges exclaims. “They had an outline. We would show up for big scenes every day and we wouldn’t know what we were going to say. We would have to go into our trailer and work on this scene and call up writers on the phone, ‘You got any ideas?’ Meanwhile the crew is tapping their foot on the stage waiting for us to come on.”

Bridges, director Jon Favreau and Robert Downey Jr. would literally act out sequences during primitive rehearsals, Downey taking on Bridges’s role and vice versa, to find and essentially improvise their way to full scenes, the actor recounts. Bridges says that the entire production was probably saved by the improv prowess of the film’s director and star.
“You’ve got the suits from Marvel in the trailer with us saying, ‘No, you wouldn’t say that,’” Bridges remembers. “You would think with a $200 million movie you’d have the sh-t together, but it was just the opposite. And the reason for that is because they get ahead of themselves. They have a release date before the script, ‘Oh, we’ll have the script before that time,’ and they don’t have their sh-t together.’”

Then Bridges had a very Dude-like epiphany:

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We finally have the first picture of War Machine from Iron Man 2.  He’s the silver dude standing behind Iron Man in the picture (they’re kinda doing that rock-n-roll-shoulder-rub pose a lá Aerosmith).  If you’re not familiar with the comic book, basically, War Machine is a second set of Iron Man-style armor worn by Tony Stark’s friend Rhodey, played by Terrence Howard in the first movie and Don Cheadle in the second.  You see, whereas Iron Man fights crime through hard work, strong fundamentals, and grit, War Machine relies more on explosiveness, natural athleticism, and an extra muscle in his leg that makes him run fast.

[via Yahoo]

The Avengers is Marvel’s answer to DC’s Justice League, a comic book that unites all their heroes into one supergroup, a lá the Traveling Wilburys.  Hollywood can barely get a movie with one superhero made, but every year I have to post 20 or 30 of the latest development rumors about one of these projects that never seem to get very far.  The latest is that Jon Favreau says he won’t be directing The Avengers, which is the kind of critical thinking skill we wish he’d displayed before signing on to Couples Retreat.

“They’ll have to [find a different director], because I’m not going to be available,” he explained. “It’s something I’m being the executive producer on, so I’ll definitely have input and a say.” “It’s going to be hard, because I was so involved in creating the world of Iron Man and Iron Man is very much a tech-based hero, and then with ‘Avengers’ you’re going to be introducing some supernatural aspects because of Thor,” he continued. “How you mix the two of those works very well in the comic books, but it’s going to take a lot of thoughtfulness to make that all work and not blow the reality that we’ve created.” [via MTV, video below]

I would say that I don’t like the idea of these superhero supergroup movies because each character sort of exists in his own alternate reality, and trying to put them all in one is not only hard, but it can ruin the particular strengths of certain characters.  I would say that, but then I’d be a grown man arguing the finer points of dudes in spandex beating people up.  What I will say is that as long as we’re doing supergroups, one of the characters should be Ted Nugent.

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Astro Boy is an upcoming film from Imagi animation.  It’s kind of like that Korean ad where RoboCop eats fried chicken. Only this time they turned Bob’s Big Boy into Iron Man.  Bottom line, Asians are big on their cyborg-American food combos.  Anyway, the movie still looks pretty lame, and the tagline “Meet the boy built for adventure” still isn’t doing anyone any favors.
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