Did You Hear? is a weekly examination of headlines in the entertainment industry and a take on what they could mean for the future of the industry and (often), the little geeky bubble that we occupy.
Idris Elba Replaces Will Smith as Deadshot
Last week we reported that Will Smith had bowed out of reprising his role as Deadshot in the upcoming Warner Bros. sequel Suicide Squad 2, he was then joined by Joel Kinnaman who also stepped away, and then a couple days ago Variety broke that former Marvel Cinematic Universe actor, Idris Elba, would be stepping into the role of Deadshot in the DC Cinematic Universe where he would be offered a starring role rather than a supporting doorman.
Besides Elba there are no other confirmed cast members of Suicide Squad 2 although most people are assuming Margot Robbie will be returning as Harley Quinn, particularly with her becoming a producer on the upcoming Birds of Prey movie.
If I may be brutally honest here, I don’t really need anyone else to join them. Elba and Robbie are celebrated actors, genre stars, and extremely popular right now. Their combined star power may be enough to elevate the Suicide Squad franchise from the mixed reviews that bogged down the first installment.
Arrow to Hang Up the Quiver at Season 8
Arrow star Stephen Amell took to Twitter to announce that the grandfather show of the current CW DCTV Universe will be ending next season.
Stephen Amell on Twitter
Playing Oliver Queen has been the greatest professional experience of my life… but you can’t be a vigilante forever. Arrow will return for a final run of 10 episodes this Fall. There’s so much to say… for now I just want to say thank you.
Two days ago he announced Arrow would be wrapping up it’s run with a protracted 10 episode season.
He later took to Facebook to say a little bit more about the end of this era:
Stephen Amell
All good things…
Amell claimed he approached Executive Producer Greg Berlanti about ending the show at the end of Arrow’s sixth season. With episode 8.10 brushing right up against the DCTV Crossover Event Crisis On Infinite Earths comic book fans can probably see the writing on the walk about why the show was extended this long and what may precipitate Oliver Queen’s exit from television.
I’m surprised Arrow didn’t stick it out and hit 10 seasons – which is uncommon for dramas and uncommon for genre shows – to join the ranks of shows like Stargate SG-1 and to hit the 200 episode landmark which would earn everyone involved an incredible amount of syndication residuals.
Like Amell stated “all good things must come to an end” and one of the Arrowverse show was going to shutter itself eventually. Now that this announcement has broken the doors are open to speculate on which will follow next …
Welcome to the Second Age!
Amazon Prime’s upcoming Lord of the Rings series has been much discussed since its announcement. Everything from rumours of no more hobbits to young Aragorn starring in the show have swirled over the course of the past year or so.
On Monday we got an official announcement about when and where the show was going to be set:
The Lord of the Rings on Prime on Twitter
Welcome to the Second Age: https://t.co/Tamd0oRgTw
Numenor during the Second Age. What does this mean? Human-driven narrative. Low production cost of makeup, costumes, and prosthetics. Aragorn’s ancestors. Heavy foreshadowing, but truly, very little that should tie to what an average audience will recognize as the players in The Lord of the Rings.
Will any of that actually happen? Perhaps. With such a huge gap of time between the events of the show and the events of the movie there’s plenty of room for original storytelling and an original world. However, The Hobbit movies went out of their way to beat us over the head with references to the original trilogy and I deeply fear this Amazon series will do the same. Time shall tell.
