It was only a little more than six years ago that we were discussing here at borg the first trailer for the first reboot of The Equalizer. What would become two major action blockbusters starred Denzel Washington as Robert McCall, a role originally cast in the 1980s by British actor Edward Woodward in a successful four-season television series. Denzel proved exactly what we believed: What made McCall’s character had nothing to do with the color of his skin. In fact Washington’s retired former special ops operative was one of the best badass action characters to hit the big screen in the past decade–Washington truly made the character his own. Next month the series gets its second reboot as Queen Latifah fills in the shoes as lead heroine, playing not Robert but Robyn McCall in the new network TV series The Equalizer. Check out the trailer for the series below.
Back in the 1990s when the dot-com revolution took off, it was difficult to find a telecom, Internet, or other tech start-up business that didn’t have a CEO at the helm who drove us all to accept Hawaiian shirt Fridays as the new norm. I still have a closet full of Hawaiian shirts (historically, “Aloha” shirts, a fashion that dates back to the 1920s, popularized in the 1930s). With this crazy 2020, why not resurrect the fad again? We spotted three online outlets ready to answer the call. One hails from the family of one of your all-time favorite comedians, another is a throwback to all things good and Hawaiian, and the third is where Magnum shops today. This will have you pulling out your Israel Kamakawiwoʻole or Don Ho albums and re-start your next Magnum, p.i. or Hawaii Five-O binge. Make no mistake, despite recent fringe elements trying to usurp this traditional Friday garb and 50th state trademark wear for their own political ends, Hawaiian shirts don’t go with guns or camouflage (see instead #HawaiianshirtsforPeace).
Warner Brothers continues to struggle with how next to turn the DC universe of films into a cash cow like the Marvel Cinematic Universe. First a report that Ben Affleck′s replacement will be Robert Pattinson, an actor known for both the lucrative Harry Potter franchise and Twilight franchise, was then followed by a report that Nicholas Hoult was being considered. Hoult, co-star of the X-Men movies as Beast, among other roles, makes more sense, as first–he has the charisma and look to be both Batman and alter ego Bruce Wayne, and second,–because he’d follow that common casting preference that already has seen two dozen actors playing superheroes flip from DC characters to Warner characters or vice versa. These reports were followed by word that two other actors were on the Batman shortlist: Aaron Taylor-Johnson (who already portrayed both Quicksilver in the MCU and Kick-Ass in his own series) and Armie Hammer. Why wouldn’t they just stop with Armie Hammer? If the studio has already ruled out Denzel Washington (just watch him in the Equalizer franchise, he’d be perfect!), then the closest to how Batman and Bruce have been drawn in the comics for 80 years is Armie Hammer. He has that John Hamm suave manner and he’s already shown he can play a great hero opposite Superman Henry Cavill in The Man from U.N.C.L.E. With the next new comics adaptation it does seem like Warner Brothers may be doing something right. It’s on television instead of at the movies, where the Arrowverse group of series has seen greater success than the studio’s movie efforts. It’s the new Batwoman series, and the CW released the first trailer for the series late this week (check it out below).
For whatever reason, Warner Brothers, the CW, etc. are hesitant to put their prime DC character–Batman–on the small screen. Just like they were hesitant showing Superman on Smallville back in “the WB” days, or giving Batman his due within the Gotham series continuity. But this new Batwoman series looks like it could be the closest viewers are going to get to a TV bat-hero. Series star Ruby Rose proved she has the charisma and physicality for a major superheroine/action role in The Meg, Resident Evil, Vin Diesel’s XXX series, and the John Wick series. Her character of Kate Kane aka Batwoman in last August’s CW Arrowverse crossover “Elseworlds,” the highlight of the event (along with John Wesley Shipp donning his 1990 Flash costume), was received well by viewers. The new trailer seems as “Batman” in look and feel as anything Warner has produced for TV–or film.
Even better, the great Rachel Skarsten (former Black Canary of Birds of Prey and star of Lost Girl and Reign) plays a villain named Alice–Batwoman’s twin sister who took on the persona of an evil Wonderlander in the comics–who looks like she can run circles around Harley Quinn.
Batwoman has been one of DC Comics′ most fascinating characters since she was re-designed by Alex Ross for DC’s 52 series in 2006, but she really came into her own in 2009 in the Justice League: Cry for Justice mini-series written and drawn by Eisner Award nominees James Robinson and Mauro Cascioli, and she was fleshed out further in 2010-2013 in the award-winning Batwoman solo series written and drawn by J.H. Williams III and W. Haden Blackman.
Take a look at the first trailer for CW’s Batwoman:
A character who gives of himself to save lives, repeatedly, using his unusual mental and physical abilities–that’s pretty much our definition of superhero. If The Punisher is a superhero, if Batman would be a superhero without the costume, then you have the The Equalizer. Denzel Washington is back again, in the sequel to the surprise 2014 reboot of the 1980s television series, and if you missed Washington as this character in 2014, it’s time to catch up, as The Equalizer 2makes its way to several steaming platforms, including Vudu and Amazon Prime, and it’s now showing on Starz.
And what a sequel! It is another one of those rare films that surpasses its predecessor. More intrigue, more action, and even without the origin story from the first movie, The Equalizer 2 proves audiences don’t need it to jump into a finally crafted story of spies and revenge. Washington is back as Robert McCall, and he’s The Saint, Ethan Hunt, James Bond, and The Shadow all rolled up into one. This time he’s started a new life in Boston, and learns about the city through his job as a Lyft driver. Diehard film fans really only need to see the one other name on the marquee with Washington to know what they’re in for: Antoine Fuqua. Fuqua (Training Day, Shooter, The Magnificent Seven) directs the film like he does all his others, like he has something to prove. The Equalizer 2is worthy of its popular and critically acclaimed star, and Fuqua adds to the character with a spectacular setting for the film’s finale: a hurricane pummeling the coast of Massachusetts.
If you’re looking forward to the new Star Wars television series The Mandalorian, you have another reason to catch The Equalizer 2, as the series star Pedro Pascal(Kingsman: The Golden Circle, The Great Wall) plays a former team member of McCall in his CIA days. The subplots may even be better than the main story, and in one McCall mentors a young neighbor played by Ashton Sanders (Moonlight). Other supporting roles are filled by some familiar faces, including returning actors Melissa Leo (Homicide, Oblivion, Wayward Pines, Veronica Mars) and Bill Pullman(Deceived, Independence Day, Spaceballs), plus the always versatile Sakina Jaffrey(Heroes, Sleepy Hollow, Mr. Robot).
Director Antoine Fuqua, who is pretty much an ace in the hole with great movies like Shooter, The Equalizer, and last year’s The Magnificent Seven, brings another one of his hit movies to television this month. This time Fuqua is in the executive producer role along with Jerry Bruckheimer for Training Day, a sequel series to the film, airing Thursday nights at 9 p.m. Central on CBS, starring Bill Paxton (Aliens, Apollo 13, Edge of Tomorrow, Twister, Weird Science) and newcomer Justin Cornwell, with Julie Benz (Angel) and Marianne Jean-Baptiste (Without a Trace). The series is directed by Danny Cannon (Gotham, CSI, Eleventh Hour).
Training Day was the 2001 surprise hit that garnered Denzel Washington an Oscar and Ethan Hawke one of his four Oscar nominations. It’s known for its gritty realism and its view of urban street life with a rookie (Hawke) in his first day in a new role with a veteran cop of questionable motives and actions (Washington). The series is far less gritty, fitting the modern police procedural framework with more humor and bordering a bit on the melodramatic.
For the series, which aired its first episode last night, we’re brought 15 years after the events in the movie with young do-gooder detective Kyle Craig, played by Cornwell, tasked by the squad’s deputy chief (Jean-Baptiste) to track the actions of an alleged crooked cop, Detective Frank Rourke, played by Paxton. Training Day’s first episode reveals this is just the latest in decades of L.A.P.D. shows going back to Dragnet. It’s plenty fun simply to watch an hour of Bill Paxton spouting those quirky words of wisdom his characters are known for. Episode one even throws in a Western stand-off complete with some background music straight out of an old Western TV show.
The plot of the series is swappable for any police procedural. The hook with the series is the title, which fit the movie better since the entire movie took place in one day, but Training Day could easily be a follow-up to Martin Scorcese’s Departed, another film about a rookie trying to get the goods on a bad cop. The change-up is in the title–who is training whom? The TV series updated the movie’s 1979 Monte Carlo with an even earlier muscle car for the series taking place so many years later–you can envision a series 40 years from now still using 1970s cars as their street rides. Ultimately it will be enough for Paxton fans to see him driving around in that car in a seedy L.A. doing his shtick every week.
Here is a behind the scenes look and a preview for CBS’s Training Day:
It’s almost more useful to critique the critics than the new movie The Magnificent Seven, released in theaters this weekend. You’ll find the whole lot so predictable. The Magnificent Seven is a reboot or a remake (call it what you want) and so the best that critics are willing to do is provide the phoned-in, knee-jerk dismissal of it being something less than the original and therefore not worth the time it takes them to write a thoughtful review. Or they will compare it to the best Westerns of all time, and tell you why it falls short. The better reviews will point out that it’s a remake of the 1960 classic Western starring Yul Brynner and Steve McQueen. The smarter ones will remind you that even that version was based on the original Japanese version, Akira Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai. Paycheck earned. Existence justified. But that’s all too easy.
Yes, the original 1960 John Sturges version is both a great Western and quite fun (it’s on my top ten list). The darker original Japanese film is more dramatic, brilliant in its simplicity, and not so much a rousing popcorn movie. Is the 2016 remake among the best Westerns of all time? Maybe not. But is it a good Western? Absolutely. Do we always want to see the best picture nominee when we go to the theater? I don’t. I want to have fun. And The Magnificent Seven is a blast. In fact, critics are looking at it wrong. It’s actually the year’s best superhero movie.
I understand the modern film critic’s dilemma, especially when Hollywood seems to have lost its imagination, churning out remake after remake. It’s the same old song: If you were a fan of–or better yet–love the original, you’re more likely than not to brush off the remake altogether, or at least not give it the attention it deserves. Those who never saw the original or those who can view a remake as its own incarnation–those who can tell themselves their feelings for the remake will not “ruin” their feelings about the original–probably enjoyed the Star Trek reboot from 2009, or Always, or Assault on Precinct 13, or The Flight of the Phoenix, The Fog, The Jackal, The Man from U.N.C.L.E., The Money Pit, Ocean’s Eleven, RoboCop, The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3, or Walking Tall. Each of these, viewed on their own merits is a great film. They may even be good remakes. Those who avoid The Magnificent Seven are missing out on a fun outing. And a good remake.
Today’s ensemble movie is mostly found in the superhero genre. Stack up The Magnificent Seven against The Avengers, The Avengers 2, or Captain America: Civil War, or any DC Comics superhero film of the past 20 years, and it leaves them all in its dust in its success in introducing a team, getting them to work together, and MacGyver the situation into some giant climactic battles. Each of the titular seven stars of the movie have their own extraordinary abilities, they just don’t wear capes. It’s an ensemble piece. A superhero team-up. So why don’t we have a casting Oscar? The three casting directors knew what they were doing–they created the teams for Suicide Squad, Batman v. Superman, No Country for Old Men, True Grit, Sin City, and Star Wars Episode VIII.
Sony has finally released the first trailer for the remake of The Magnificent Seven, which we first previewed here at borg.com last May. Based on a reworked script by Nic Pizzolatto (True Detective) and John Lee Hancock (Snow White And The Huntsman) from the classic John Sturges film starring Yul Brynner and Steve McQueen, the new version will be directed by Antoine Fuqua (The Equalizer, Shooter, King Arthur, Training Day).
The list of leading actors is promising: Denzel Washington (2 Guns, Unstoppable, The Manchurian Candidate, Training Day, Philadelphia, Much Ado About Nothing),Chris Pratt(Guardians of the Galaxy, Jurassic World, Moneyball, Everwood),Vincent D’Onofrio(Men in Black, Jurassic World, Daredevil),Byung-hun Lee(Terminator Genisys, G.I. Joe: Retaliation, G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra, RED 2),Matt Bomer(White Collar, Tru Calling, Chuck), and Ethan Hawke (Gattaca, Dead Poet’s Society, White Fang, Alive, Training Day, Assault on Precinct 13) should come together to form an interesting ensemble cast.
The 1960 cast was as gritty as they come: Brynner and McQueen were joined by Charles Bronson, James Coburn, and Robert Vaughn with Brad Dexter and Horst Buchholz.
If you think a remake of one of the greatest Westerns of all time is a bad idea, recall that The Magnificent Seven itself was a remake of Akira Kurasawa’s equally superb The Seven Samurai from 1954, starring Takashi Shimura and Toshirô Mifune. We’d also count Washington, Bomer, Hawke, Lee, and Pratt among our favorite actors in Hollywood, so this is promising. Other actors slated for the remake include Peter Sarsgaard, Luke Grimes, and Haley Bennett (who is a ringer for Bryce Dallas Howard in the previews).
Check out this first trailer for The Magnificent Seven:
The great composer James Horner died last year in a plane crash, leaving behind a legacy of some of the biggest and most memorable soundtracks that defined nearly 40 years of film history. One of the most memorable for sci-fi fans is his score to Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. To celebrate Star Trek’s 50th anniversary, Mondo–the guys known for their redux poster interpretations–are releasing an extended LP edition of Wrath of Khan with music never before available on vinyl. And the release includes Mondo’s killer level of artwork interpreting Khan and Kirk on Ceti Alpha V and the Genesis Planet.
But Mondo didn’t stop there. The vinyl albums reflect the look and colors of the Mutara Nebula, where the Enterprise and the Reliant faced off.
Horner’s work on Wrath of Khan is impressive and established Horner as a major film composer. His score adapts themes from Prokofiev’s Alexander Nevsky and Romeo and Juliet, and Horner would work cues from classical masters in many of his film scores over the course of his career. Order your copy of Horner’s Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan 2-LP set today here at the Mondo shop.
Never heard of James Horner? You certainly have heard his work. His last score will be featured in the remake of The Magnificent Seven due in theaters September 23, 2016, but the variety of films he wrote for is unprecedented. He wrote themes that made many an actor look good–many in multiple films, including Arnold Schwarzenegger, Sigourney Weaver, Mel Gibson, Harrison Ford, Matthew Broderick, Russell Crowe, Jennifer Connelly, Ed Harris, Denzel Washington, Julia Roberts, and Brad Pitt, and collaborated on movies with the likes of big filmmakers, including Ron Howard, Steven Spielberg, James Cameron, Ridley Scott, Phil Alden Robinson, Wolfgang Petersen, Jean-Jacques Annaud, Michael Apted, Joe Johnston, and Edward Zwick.
Our annual “All the Movies You’ll Want to See…” series has been one of the most viewed of all of our entries at borg.com each year. So this year we again scoured Hollywood and its publicity machine for as many genre films coming out in 2016 as have been disclosed. Usually we select the 24 that look like the biggest hits, but we’re going all out for 2016. The result is a whopping 48 movies, many you’ll probably want to see in the theater or catch on video. We bet you’ll find a bunch below you’ve never heard of. Bookmark this now for your 2016 calendar!
Most coming out in the second half of 2016 don’t even have posters released yet, but many do. We’ve included descriptions and key cast so you can start planning accordingly.
What do we think will be the biggest hits of the year? How about Star Wars: Rogue One? Or Star Trek Beyond? You’ve heard endlessly about Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, but 2016 will also see Doctor Strange, Captain America: Civil War, and X-Men: Apocalypse. There’s even a handful of Westerns, with The Hateful 8, Jane Got a Gun, and another remake of The Magnificent Seven heading our way.
The Hateful Eight – January 1
Tarentino’s Western! Ennio Morricone score! Kurt Russell, Samuel L. Jackson, Jennifer Jason Leigh, and Channing Tatum!
The 5th Wave – January 8
Chloe Grace Moretz and Liev Schreiber in an alien invasion.
400 Days – January 12
The CW’s Brandon Routh, Caity Lotz, and Tom Cavanaugh in a movie about astronauts that seems to be a play on Ender’s Game.
The Pelican Brief, Philadelphia, Crimson Tide, Fallen, The Manchurian Candidate, The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3, Unstoppable, 2 Guns—movies big and small, and all feature the Academy Award-winning actor Denzel Washington. In each, like with Cruise, Schwarzenegger, Stallone, Willis, and most recently, Wahlberg, the lead character is really Denzel as Denzel, but each new time round the actor is lurking around in a different environment. In each, he has a new name and a new job, but it’s Denzel—striving to fight his way to the end, to wrestle with anger or grief, or pain, or to just get by.
In the 2014 theatrical release The Equalizer, as retired ex-CIA operative Robert McCall, Denzel gets to be the guy usually played by Cruise, Schwarzenegger, Stallone, or Willis, or even Chuck Norris or Charles Bronson. He gets to be the Dark Knight, or name any other superhero. He’s not only the good guy, but the good guy with the means.
Have you ever considered taking responsibility for everyone around you–everyone you regularly encounter each day? Maybe for you that’s the shop owner, the barista at your coffee shop, the guy who cleans your office, your family, friends, co-workers? Have you ever considered what it would take for you to stop what you’re doing and assume responsibility for everyone around you? Everyone’s problems, every failing, every pain—it’s all on you. If you see it, you own it. Like the character and TV series the movie is based on, Robert McCall takes charge with that message repeated on each episode of the TV series, and parroted in the film: If someone has a problem, if the odds are stacked against them, if they have nowhere else to turn, McCall will help. He is the Equalizer.
Denzel’s acting work in The Equalizer is great, as you’d expect. It’s among his best. And the character itself is great. Those two elements are enough to get anyone to watch The Equalizer and enjoy the ride. Even the several payoffs in the film are worth cheering for. But the film still has its problems. Unfortunately, as exciting and intense as it is, the movie itself doesn’t live up to its potential.
