Locke & Key Movie Caught In Legal Maze

Joe Hill has been talking to MTV about the legal wranglings involved in getting the proposed Locke & Key movie off the ground.

Fox had initially wanted to make a series of the popular comic, but eventually refused to pick up the pilot, resulting in a legal quagmire for any future adaptation.

Says Hill:

"It's been snared in an endless series of contractual negotiations. Universal took a long, long time to come through with an acceptable contract for myself and IDW.

"Now they're dealing with a bureaucracy as labyrinthine and implacable as their own: FOX TV. Uni wants to avoid spending 25 million dollars on a movie, and then have FOX steal their thunder by releasing a three-year-old pilot.

"Fox wants to see some coin on all the money they sank into the pilot in the first place. The lawyers all have to validate their salaries.

"That said, Alex [Kurtzman] and [Roberto Orci] are the two most tenacious people I've ever met, and if anyone can see Locke & Key through the contractual maze, and on into production, it's them."

Hill then concluded by joking about Fox's decision not to go ahead with the TV show: "Of course all this could've been avoided if Fox had just made the series. I know I'm biased, but I kinda think they bet on the wrong ponies that season."

It's A Wonderful Life Sequel On The Way. This Is Not A Joke.

Sometimes a news story comes along that makes you want to just give up. That makes you say "Fuck this!" and retreat into a cave of tears and remorse. That makes you lose all faith in anything you once held to be true and good.

A sequel to It's A Wonderful Life is due in December 2015.

Karolyn Grimes, who played George Bailey's daughter Zuzu in the 1946 original, is returning as an angel who shows George Bailey's unpleasant grandson how much better the world would have been had he not existed, in It's A Wonderful Life: The Rest Of The Story, Variety reports.

You may well notice that this seems to be the exact opposite message that made the original such a classic.

This batshit notion is the brainchild-slash-satanspawn of producer (and apparent cinematic heretic) Allen J Schwalb of Star Partners and Bob Farnsworth of Hummingbird.

"The storyline of the new film retains the spirit of the original - every life is important as long as you have friends," Farnsworth said in a statement about the new project's script, which he co-wrote with Martha Bolton. Apparently he read between the lines and also took "people with no friends deserve to die" from the first film.

Attaboy, Farnsworth...

The casting for the lead character of Bailey's grandson will not be decided until February, but producers are said to be in talks with original stars Jimmy Hawkins, who was Tommy Bailey, and Carol Coombs, who played Janie Bailey, to reprise their roles.

Because if there's one thing that can save this obvious trainwreck of a movie, it's casting a bunch of people who were mildly famous for bit-part child roles over sixty-five years ago.

Christmas is cancelled, folks.

Driver Denies Nightwing Rumours

A week or so back, The Wrap printed a rumour that Girls star Adam Driver was top of a shortlist to play Nightwing (AKA former Robin Dick Grayson) in the upcoming Batman vs. Superman.

But if there is any truth to this, then it's a surprise to Driver.

Addressing the rumours to Collider, Driver said: "No. Not that I know of, no. No. If you find out, let me know and then I'll know.

"That's like intensely flattering as you can imagine," he answered when asked what it feels to be linked to the upcoming superhero movie.

"I mean, it's Batman and Superman, who doesn't want to be involved in something that's not only of that scale but of who those characters are. That's an incredible world to be able to be in for a bit. Like who wouldn't want to do that?"

There is still no official confirmation that Nightwing will be in the movie.

Batman vs. Superman stars Henry Cavill and Ben Affleck, and is released in 2015.

New Day Of The Doctor Pics

Some more new images from Day Of The Doctor have been released online.

 We get to see John Hurt's The War Doctor exploring the new TARDIS and sharing a cup of tea with Clara. We see our team 
investigating some ruins, and Hurt in the mysterious hut that seems to house The Moment. We see another instance of the strange "NO MORE" graffiti. And we see lots of Rose/Bad Wolf...

...But does anyone else see her? Just an observation here, and pure speculation, but while we've seen Billie Piper taling to John Hurt in the trailer, we've yet to see any character speak to her, or so much as look at her, even in these pics. Again, this is pure speculation, and probably just the insane ramblings of a Mad Man With A Laptop, but it whiles away the week until the episode airs.

Speaking of the episode, showrunner Steve Moffat has been talking to DWM about the reasoning behind the worldwide simulcast of the show on November 23rd:

"If you're going to do a simulcast, everyone should see it at once, rather than the press getting to see it a few days in advance. Sod that. This once, let everybody see it at once. It makes the broadcast into the party somehow, and it is our intent - please God it holds - that there will be all sorts of surprises."

And on the subject of surprises, there's a massive one in store on Thursday night, when we all sit down to watch An Adventure In Time And Space. Unlike some sites (and a certain tabloid paper that really should be ashamed of itself), I'm not going to give the game away here. But trust me, you'll want to stick with this one for the final scene. It's going to be amazing...







The Day Of The Doctor airs globally at 7:50 GMT on the 23rd of November. It is followed immediately after on BBC Three by Doctor Who Live: The Afterparty.

Is This A Hint At Affleck's Batman?

An Interesting tweet from Daniel Alter, a producer at Warner Bros., has potentially given us a bit of a spoiler as to how Batman is going to be portrayed in 2015's Batman vs. Superman.

Says Alter: "Can't wait for #BatmanvsSuperman.. #batfleck semi-retired/not speaking to Robin anymore.. Controlling drones from the batcave."

It should be noted that Alter is not affiliated with Batman vs. Superman, or with Man Of Steel, so this could just be conjecture on his part.

But it does fit in with rumours that Ben Affleck's take on the character would be older and more battle-weary.

Also starring  Henry Cavill, Amy Adams and Laurence Fishburne, Batman vs. Superman is out in July 2015.

The Daily Bugle Wraps Up Amazing Spider-Man Loose End

It says something when you have to turn to a fictional news paper to get the whole picture in a movie, but The Daily Bugle  - in reality the Tumblr page for the Spider-Man movies - has finally revealed just what happened to Dr. Ratha (Life Of Pi's Irrfan Khan) after the character inexplicably vanished halfway through The Amazing Spider-Man.

And for Mr. Khan, it's bad news.

Says the "Bugle":

"The New York City Coroner’s Office yesterday positively identified a badly decomposed body found in the sewers beneath lower Manhattan as that of Dr. Rajit Ratha, 46, formerly of Oscorp Industries. A resident of New York City, Ratha was born on March 13, 1967 in Jaipur, India. Ratha was the Director of Business Development in the Biogenetic Division of Oscorp in Manhattan."

Goodnight, sweet prince... 

That wraps up that little mystery, then. Or at least... it would had the scene that leads up to Dr. Ratha's death not been removed from the final cut of the movie.

Thankfully, you can see the scene here:

Here's hoping that next year's Amazing Spider-Man 2 needs less extra-curricular homework.

ITV Axe Whitechapel

Well this is a kick in the teeth.

ITV have reportedly axed superb horror/crime series Whitechapel after four seasons.

The news came from Rupert Penry-Jones over Twitter yesterday, as he said "Sorry to be the bearer of bad news everyone but ITV don't want any more Whitechapel. That's all folks x".

Whitechapel has been a jewel in the ITV drama crown for four seasons. Starting off as a mini-series about a copycat of Jack The Ripper, the show quickly established itself as one of the most original, gritty, and pschologically terrifying crime shows in recent memory.

A brief dip in quality for the second season aside, where the writers mistakenly chose to follow up on the "copycat" angle instead of the "horror atmosphere" angle, Whitechapel has been the closest thing we've had to "Se7en: The Series", and has been responsible for more than one sleepless night in the Geekin'  Out household.

Ah well, at least ITV is continuing to produce such high quality and thought provoing television as The Only Way Is Essex, I'm A Celebrity... Get Me Out Of Here! and Peter Andre: My Life, so not all is lost...

Whitechapel also starred Phil Davis and Steve Pemberton. All four seasons are available on DVD now.