New Trailer for "The Avengers"

EmoElmo wrote:

I just watched a horror flick last night written by Whedon called "A Cabin in The Woods", it was weird and fun, silight rip-off to "The Hunger Games" though, but overall it was a good movie

Awesome flick, I saw it in the theater. I think the inspirations for that movie pre-date 'The Hunger Games" by quite a long time since that film is inspired by many earlier novels and films.

Whedon called Cabin In The Woods "a loving hate letter to horror films". It's really a deconstructionist comedy, but much more intelligent and witty than the Scream series. Whedon was tired of the torture porn stuff and wanted to go back and have fun with some of the earlier horror film cliches.

It's official, ABC just ordered pilot episode of S.H.I.E.L.D. from Joss Whedon, production to begin soon.

http://insidetv.ew.com/2012/08/29/s-h-i-e-l-d-pilot/

Additional Avengers stuff - the "alternate" opening sequence of the movie was posted online - I think Whedon got it right with the one he used:

S.D. wrote:

It's official, ABC just ordered pilot episode of S.H.I.E.L.D. from Joss Whedon, production to begin soon.

http://insidetv.ew.com/2012/08/29/s-h-i-e-l-d-pilot/

Cool!

Ill watch it.

S.D. wrote:

It's official, ABC just ordered pilot episode of S.H.I.E.L.D. from Joss Whedon, production to begin soon.

http://insidetv.ew.com/2012/08/29/s-h-i-e-l-d-pilot/

Think it will work? Joss may be the Hollywood Golden Child at the moment, but comic book-based programs seem to fare better in the theater than tv.

It'll start off strong, then the budget gets cut in half mid-season, the viewship declines and it either gets cancelled or the SyFy network picks it up and runs it back-to-back with whatever half-assed shark/dino/alligator creature their interns created last week.

And will there be enough interest in just the SHIELD charaters themselves? They're like the CIA of the Marvel World. Are they gonna be like Men In Black that keep tabs on alien creatures or will there be other 'super hero' guests for them to interact with? I don't see Iron Man and Cap'n America showing up on a weekly basis to bump ratings. Are they gonna get D-list Marvel hereos and villians to fight?

Just wondering out loud.

MetalGuy71 wrote:

S.D. wrote:

It's official, ABC just ordered pilot episode of S.H.I.E.L.D. from Joss Whedon, production to begin soon.

http://insidetv.ew.com/2012/08/29/s-h-i-e-l-d-pilot/

Think it will work? Joss may be the Hollywood Golden Child at the moment, but comic book-based programs seem to fare better in the theater than tv.

It'll start off strong, then the budget gets cut in half mid-season, the viewship declines and it either gets cancelled or the SyFy network picks it up and runs it back-to-back with whatever half-assed shark/dino/alligator creature their interns created last week.

And will there be enough interest in just the SHIELD charaters themselves? They're like the CIA of the Marvel World. Are they gonna be like Men In Black that keep tabs on alien creatures or will there be other 'super hero' guests for them to interact with? I don't see Iron Man and Cap'n America showing up on a weekly basis to bump ratings. Are they gonna get D-list Marvel hereos and villians to fight?

Just wondering out loud.

Well I think you may be on to something there about the budget and it will probably go down the path you're predicting,unfortunately.

As for villains, I could see them dealing with A.I.M., perhaps Fury's evil brotherScorpio and the Zodiac cartel, and even Hydra (even though they showed up in Captain America).

Oh and I'll defintiely be watching it too.

Whedon managed to turn a little vehicle called Buffy The Vampire Slayer (the lowest budget show on TV...the first two seasons were shot in 16mm because they couldn't afford 35mmm) into a massive hit and cultural icon that still resonates to this day. His secret? Focus on the characters, pick unknown but highly capable actors to play them and write intelligent dialogue for them. The action was fun, but it was never the primary focus of the show. Whedon knows that it's not the special effects that win over an audience, it's having believable 3-D characters for the audience to identify with.

The reason he was hired for The Avengers in the first place is because of his talent for dealing with large casts and the ability to make them all memorable.

He has a much larger built-in fanbase with something like S.H.I.E.L.D. and it's essentially a blank canvas he can use to create whatever type of show he wants. Whether it works or not remains to be seen, but they have the best person for the job.

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He has a much larger built-in fanbase with something like S.H.I.E.L.D. and it's essentially a blank canvas he can use to create whatever type of show he wants

Does he though? Are you talking built-in fanbase of Whedon fans or the comic book geeks?Either way, this built-in fanbase is gonna have high expectations for a reasonable comic-book adaptation. If he goes too far into either direction (ie character development), the geeks will pan it for not enough action or sticking to the source material. If he "Michael Bays"-it, the Whedon fan-boys willl say he sold out and it's all flash and no story.

I never watched Buffy or really even know who Joss Whedon is, so I'll have to take your word for it regarding his talent. I'm just playing Devil's advocate here. From an outsiders point-of-view, I'm just questioning the whole comics-to-tv formula.

Honestly, I'm not even sure that I'll watch it, but I've got nothing better to do here in work today so I'll discuss this.

I was referring more to the built-in fanbase if the name "Marvel" is attached to anything. Joss also has quite a legion of fanboys (myself included) who will watch anything he does.

I'm not a big comic book fan, the only reason I went and saw The Avengers in the theater was because he was the writer/director. I know absolutely nothing about S.H.I.E.L.D. but I'll be happy to see what he comes up with.

It's not completely unprecedented for super-hero type vehicles to work on TV. It's going to end up boiling down to casting and tone of the show, we'll see what happens.

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It's not completely unprecedented for super-hero type vehicles to work on TV. It's going to end up boiling down to casting and tone of the show, we'll see what happens.

Heck yea. I was a Hulk fan for years! It'll be an uphill battle for him, but if anyone is up for the challenge, he seems like the guy. I guess. Or not. I have no idea.

I'll catch The Avengers when it hits OnDemand.

MetalGuy71 wrote:

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It's not completely unprecedented for super-hero type vehicles to work on TV. It's going to end up boiling down to casting and tone of the show, we'll see what happens.

Heck yea. I was a Hulk fan for years! It'll be an uphill battle for him, but if anyone is up for the challenge, he seems like the guy. I guess. Or not. I have no idea.

I'll catch The Avengers when it hits OnDemand.

I'm kind of surprised you never saw Firefly or it's follow-up film Serenity, I bet you would enjoy them.

I think you would also like his deconstructionist-horror-comedy "The Cabin In The Woods" which comes out on DVD next month.

Having just tried to decipher the plot of 'Firelfly' on Wikipedia, I'm pretty sure I'm not interested.

'Cabin In the Woods' piqued my interest after the discussions here. I'd probably watch that.

MetalGuy71 wrote:

Having just tried to decipher the plot of 'Firelfly' on Wikipedia, I'm pretty sure I'm not interested.

It's not that complicated, essentially the plot is the least important part of the show. The characters and their interaction is where the meat and potatoes lie. It's essentially a comical approach to merging sci-fi & western genres together, very well-written and acted.

+1

It's great. And Serenity is one of my favorite movies.

Whedon's "Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D." debuts tonight.

You noticed I said "Whedon's" instead of "Marvel's"...that shows where my interest lies.  

Buffy The Vampire Slayer - Absolutely fantastic.
Angel - Great
Firefly - Great
Dollhouse - a bit of a miss but could have been good as it had interesting characters, wasn't given enough time IMHO.

I don't really think that he'll care what the Marvel fanboys expect. He'll make the show that he wants to make and it will stand or fall on that. I'll give anything that he puts his name too as his track record is so good.

I love the mixture of fantasy and reality in Buffy (she may be the chosen one, battling the forces of evil and saving the world, but she still ends up dropping out of college and flipping burgers because she has to become the family breadwinner etc..) and his other shows.

S.D. wrote:

Whedon's "Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D." debuts tonight.  

You noticed I said "Whedon's" instead of "Marvel's"...that shows where my interest lies.   

And I thought is was pretty good. I'll be watching it from here on out.

I saw half the first episode of SHIELD I dont know what the hub bub is about I gotta say I am not very impressed so far, but will probably finish this episode and then the next one before I decide to watch it or not

Off topic a bit I just read that there is going to be a series called Gotham focused on Commissioner Gordon's days in the police force.

The new show was okay, not great, it always takes time to get to know characters. Thought there would me more actors from Whedon's 'inner circle' of actors.

I caught the debut of "S.H.I.E.L.D." via On Demand last night. Not a bad start, enough to get me to stick around for a few more episodes at least...

The pilot episode had a LOT of information that had to be conveyed in a very short 42 minutes.  They had to introduce the overall mythology of how it fits into the Marvel universe.  They had to introduce 5 new characters plus re-introduce Coulson.  And because of ABC's insistence that every episode be self-contained they also needed to introduce the "hero of the week".  Any one of those 3 elements could have been expanded into a 42 minute episode.  

I think we will get a chance to see more development of the characters over the next few episodes, at this point we've been introduced to them but don't really *know* them yet.  If the pilot episode had been 90 minutes juggling those various story-lines would have been easier and more time could have been taken to develop each one, but they did the best shorthand they could squeezing everything into a single episode.

I also wouldn't worry about the show getting the budget cut or get cancelled anytime soon, Disney owns both ABC and Marvel so that's as safe a bet as any TV show.

Boris2008 wrote:

Buffy The Vampire Slayer - Absolutely fantastic.
Angel - Great
Firefly - Great
Dollhouse - a bit of a miss but could have been good as it had interesting characters, wasn't given enough time IMHO.

I don't really think that he'll care what the Marvel fanboys expect. He'll make the show that he wants to make and it will stand or fall on that. I'll give anything that he puts his name too as his track record is so good.

I love the mixture of fantasy and reality in Buffy (she may be the chosen one, battling the forces of evil and saving the world, but she still ends up dropping out of college and flipping burgers because she has to become the family breadwinner etc..) and his other shows.

Buffy The Vampire Slayer - It was really good up until college. Then it died a slow, miserable death.
Angel - I was pretty skeptical about Angel but I pretty much like all the seasons.
Firefly - Excellent show. I can watch re-runs without getting tired.
Dollhouse - This is one of those I really like some episodes and really dont like others. I thought it was too quirky for its own good.

I agree with TheKing, "Buffy" hung around for about two seasons too long. Sarah Michelle Gellar was very vocal about wanting to move on so for the last two years she was just punching the clock. During that time, "Angel" surpassed "Buffy" in terms of quality.

I tried to get into "Dollhouse" (mainly due to my raging crush on Eliza Dushku), but it never quite clicked with me. I enjoyed it for the eye candy factor but the episodes were hit-and-miss.

For whatever reason, I never watched "Firefly" (it got cancelled too quickly for me to get on the bandwagon, I guess)... but I did finally check out the "Serenity" film version fairly recently and enjoyed that, so I'll probably get around to the series at some point.