Today brings us the longest trailer yet for Man of Steel, the Zack Snyder-directed, Christopher Nolan-produced Superman movie starring Amy Adams and Henry Cavill, with Russell Crowe and Kevin Costner as Superman’s adopted gay dads. Zack Snyder rightly got a lot of flak after Sucker Punch for his penchant for excessive slow motion and ridiculously over-stylized everything, but now that he’s making a Superman movie and not a weird, thickly-veiled allegory for child rape, all the epic affectations actually seem like they fit. This is… a pretty badass trailer. I kind of want Russell Crowe to narrate my life now. And if Michael Shannon manages to be half as scary as General Zod as he was as that Jew-drowning psychopath on Boardwalk Empire, this is going to be amazing and small children will pee their pants when they see it.

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From my “paparazzi pictures juxtaposed with fan art wallpapers” series

Even after Get Smart, Dark Shadows, Bewitched, etc., the prevailing attitude of “why take a risk on something new when we can adapt TV shows no one under 50 remembers” still appears to be going strong in Hollywood. Today’s news is that Tom Cruise is eyeing Guy Ritchie’s uncle. I mean, eyeing the lead in The Man from U.N.C.L.E., to be directed by Guy Ritchie. In other news, Firefox still doesn’t think “eyeing” is a real word, but tell that to the trades.

I’m hearing that Tom Cruise is in early talks to star in the film that will be directed by Sherlock Holmes helmer Guy Ritchie. The original TV series ran from 1964-68, with Robert Vaughan and David McCallum playing Napoleon Solo and Illya Kuryakin, two agents of the United Network Command for Law Enforcement. [With some initial involvement from James Bond creator Ian Fleming -Ed.] With gadgets and their wits and charm, they fought the evil forces of Thrush. Warner Bros has long been high on the project, especially when the studio had Steven Soderbergh ready to direct George Clooney in the lead. The actor dropped out because he needed surgery on his neck and back, and he wasn’t up for a physical role. [Deadline]

So… a Cold War-ish version of Sherlock Holmes, basically? I’m not that familiar with Man from UNCLE, but especially with Guy Ritchie directing, you’d expect the modern version to have elements of wit and humor. Good luck with that, because Tom Cruise is no Robert Downey Jr. Cruise is good at “intense” and “driven” and especially “sociopath” (as in Magnolia and Collateral, his best roles), but he’s never been particularly witty or charming. Meanwhile, Robert Downey Jr. seems to spend his entire life perpetually in that peak of a cocaine high where everything you do is f*cking awesome because you’re the coolest guy in the world and everyone knows it. Sherlock Holmes was okay, but I hope Guy Ritchie goes back to making real movies soon, because I feel like I’ve already seen Man from UNCLE 17 times. At the very least, I hope they throw in a bulldog sidekick like they did in Sherlock. Secret Agent movies = played out. Dog Sidekicks = timeless.

“Damn you… *hic*… Chris Nolan.”

Last we checked in on the perpetually-crumbling Justice League film, writer Will Beall’s first script was allegedly locked in the deepest, darkest cell of Arkham Asylum, never to be seen again. Almost everything about this seemingly doomed DC and Warner Bros. answer to Marvel’s The Avengers has been bad news, and now the rumor mill would have us believe that this cinematic kryptonite is poisoning the Batman franchise as well.

After the Beall script news hit the Intertubes, another report suggested that Warner just wanted to wait to see how Zack Snyder’s Man of Steel performs this summer before moving ahead with Justice League’s targeted release date of 2015, which of course coincides with the Avengers sequel. The only problem with that, suggests one questionable-but-intense source, is that it leaves Bruce Wayne trapped in silver screen limbo.

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It wouldn’t be a day of the week ending in –y if we didn’t have some juicy HOTT GOSS about the Justice League movie, and wouldn’t you know it – it’s all really bad. First up, there’s a fat nugget of rumor jizz drying on our prom dresses regarding the first screenplay, penned by Gangster Squad’s Will Beall. According to Badass Digest, which is like Reader’s Digest but in a monster truck, Warner Bros. and DC read it and determined that they had approximately 110 pages of toilet paper.

The story from each source is the same: it’s terrible. Some sources seem to think the whole movie is going to fall apart and never happen, while some believe that Warner Bros will keep moving forward, unwilling to lose the superhero arms race.

Beall’s script was focusing on a 4-man and 1-woman Justice League, as Superman, The Flash, Green Lantern, Batman and Wonder Woman would be taking on Darkseid in an Avengers-like battle to save the Earth. Unfortunately, it seems that the Warner and DC execs have been f*cking with the story so much that Beall never stood a chance.

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Not so fast, metal dude and fish boy.

The other day we talked about how Marvel Studios was possibly going to screw the pooch by casting Adam Sandler to voice Rocket the Raccoon in Guardians of the Galaxy, but the good news to take away from that was that at least Marvel was actually casting. On the other hand, it’s another day and another rumor for Justice League, which has a writer, villain and possibly a storyline, but still has no director or cast. Oh, and it has a targeted release for the summer of 2015 to nut up to the Avengers sequel, so you could say that this movie is an absolute mess right now.

But DC and Warner Brothers work in baby steps, because they supposedly have the main heroes finally picked out. According to the comic movie scoops at Latino Review, 2015 is going to be a terrible year for Aquaman fans.

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