FILM 1795: THOR: RAGNAROK

FILM 1795: THOR: RAGNAROK

TRIVIA: Sir Anthony Hopkins had decided against returning as Odin, but upon reading the story, he changed his mind.

Thor's "friend from work" line about the Hulk was suggested to Chris Hemsworth by a Make-A-Wish child who paid a visit to the set on the day the scene was filmed.

Taika Waititi based Korg's character on Polynesian bouncers: "We wanted to change the idea of what a hulking guy made of rocks could be. He's huge and heavy, but with a light soul, and he's funny and friendly."

This marks the first time in the Marvel Cinematic Universe that The Hulk is not voiced by Lou Ferrigno, but by Mark Ruffalo. Ferrigno voiced Hulk in The Incredible Hulk (2008), Avengers Assemble (2012) and Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015).

Taika Waititi appears in this film as Korg. Waititi is the second Marvel film Director to have a major role in his own film, after Jon Favreau (who directed the first two Iron Man films, and appeared as "Happy" Hogan in the Marvel Cinematic Universe).

Chris Hemsworth plays Thor in the film, while his older brother Luke Hemsworth plays Thor in a play within the film. Their younger sibling Liam Hemsworth was considered for the role of Thor.

Led Zeppelin's "Immigrant Song" appears in the film, and the trailer. This is noteworthy, because Led Zeppelin is known for very rarely licensing out their music for use in feature films, television series, or video games. The majority of other films that have had Led Zeppelin music are related to rock journalist Cameron Crowe (Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Almost Famous), making this one of the few films to feature Zeppelin music that in no way involves Crowe. School of Rock is another.

Taika Waititi described the film as a "1970s and 80s science fiction fantasy, the most 'out there' of all the Marvel movies." He cited Big Trouble in Little China (1986) as a major influence on the film: "It's a fun adventure film that has big stakes, but also has a breakneck speed and takes you on a crazy adventure."

In the comics, the Grandmaster has blue skin. Taika Waititi decided against applying blue on Jeff Goldblum, because he felt Goldblum was a good enough actor to not need it, and because Goldblum had already played a blue-colored character in Earth Girls Are Easy(1988).

The retirement home in New York City is named "Shady Acres", the same name as the retirement home where Stan Marsh's grandfather lives in South Park (1997), and the same as the psychiatric institute in Ace Ventura: Pet Detective (1994), which was a play on that film's director Tom Shadyac.

CAMEO: Stan Lee: comic-book writer who co-created Thor and the Hulk, appears as the barber who cuts Thor's hair.

FILM 1782: DEADPOOL 2

FILM 1782: DEADPOOL 2

TRIVIA: The sequel was announced 3 days before the release of Deadpool (2016).

Ryan Reynolds personally offered Rob Delaney the role of Peter after seeing him in Catastrophe (2015).

In one scene, Deadpool (Ryan Reynolds) refers to Cable (Josh Brolin) as One Eyed Willy; 'bring it on, One Eyed Willy'. One Eyed Willy was the pirate character in The Goonies (1985) starring Josh Brolin.

It was announced in October 2016 that Tim Miller would not be returning as director for this sequel. He decided not to return due to creative differences with lead actor Ryan Reynolds during pre-production. Miller later stated that he left the sequel because he "didn't want to make some stylized movie that was 3 times the budget", and wished to create the same kind of film that made the first one a success.

Brad Pitt met with the director to discuss the part of Cable, but couldn't commit due to scheduling conflicts.

In the trailer, Deadpool remarks about the effects on Cable's arm not being done, saying it's "not as difficult as removing a mustache." This is a reference to how Justice League(2017) had to remove Henry Cavill's moustache for re-shoots.

FILM 1734: GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY: VOL. 2

TRIVIA: According to the Visual Effects Artists, Ego's planet comprises a trillion polygons, and is considered to be the biggest visual effect ever made.

Prop Master Russell Bobbitt had difficulty finding the cassette decks used in the first film, and all of the Sony Walkman headphones they found were broken. Bobbitt contacted Sony to see if they had any available for filming, which they did not, so he eventually created six from scratch.

Dave Bautista's Drax make-up took only ninety minutes to apply, down from four hours for the first film. However, he would have to sit in a sauna at the end of the day, to get the make-up off.

James Gunn choreographed and served as the motion-capture model for Groot's dance during the opening credits sequence. It took the visual effects team nearly two years to complete the CG rendering of the scene for the final film.

According to James Gunn, Kurt Russell was de-aged for the film's opening flashback (set in the 1980s) by visual effects company Lola VFX, in what was a "long, painstaking process that took many, many months to accomplish." He continued, "I know Lola did Michael Douglas, and I think they did Tony Stark and Steve Rogers as well. They're the best at what they do, and keep getting better."

Vin Diesel recorded Groot's voice for sixteen foreign-language releases of the film, up from six in the first film.

FILM 1587: DOCTOR STRANGE 

TRIVIA: Before becoming the Sorcerer Supreme, Stephen Strange received training at an Eastern monastery. Benedict Cumberbatch spent his gap year volunteering as an English teacher at a Buddhist monastery in Darjeeling, India. He had stated that the experience was very profound and influential on his life, and sought to draw from this experience in preparing for the role.

Doctor Strange's creators Stan Lee and Steve Ditko based his appearance on Hollywood actor Vincent Price; the character even bears the middle name of Vincent.

According to Kevin Feige, the concept of magic in the Marvel Cinematic Universe is inspired by The Matrix (1999) and the fantasy works of Stanley Kubrick and Hayao Miyazaki: "Have you watched the Cosmos (1980) series? That's magic, the quantum physics. If somebody knew how to tap into that stuff, what's the difference between that and magic? You don't get into it in Harry Potter, but if a scientist went to Hogwarts he'd find out how some of that stuff is happening! We're not going to spend a lot of time on it, but there will be some of that, particularly for a character like Doctor Strange, who goes from a man of science to a man of faith and who traverses both worlds. And sometimes there won't be an answer! Sometimes he'll want an answer - 'How is this happening?' - and nothing."

In 1992, Wes Craven was set to direct. Later in 2001, David S. Goyer was going to write and direct. In 2008, Guillermo del Toro was brought on as director. In 2014, Mark Andrews, Jonathan Levine, Nikolaj Arcel, Scott Derrickson and Dean Israelite were on the shortlist to direct. In the end, Derrickson was officially announced to helm the film.

Cinematographer Ben Davis cites the Disney experimental film Fantasia (1940) as a visual influence on the film: "It has a very psychedelic grounding, and most of the work is about other dimensions."

FILM 1509: AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON 

TRIVIA: Scarlett Johansson was pregnant during filming of this movie so many of her scenes were scheduled early in filming before she began to show. To help hide her pregnancy later in filming, three stunt doubles were hired. This caused a lot of confusion among the other actors since, according to them, all of the stunt women looked very similar to Johansson. Chris Evans stated that it got to the point where he would say hello and start a conversation with one of them, only to realize midway that the person he was talking to wasn't Johansson. Ultimately, some scenes used CGI to hide Johansson's belly.

Because Ultron was 8-9 feet (2.4 - 2.7 meters) tall, the 5-foot 10-inch (1.77 meter) James Spader had to wear an antennae-like contraption made out of a thick piece of wire with two red balls attached to the top that went up his entire back and 3 feet above his head. This was done so that the actors that shared scenes with him would have a reference point for where his eyes would be; the two red balls represented the placement of Ultron's eyes. Elizabeth Olsen stated that this was actually distracting because Spader would be giving an intense performance and out of instinct she would look at him rather than the balls representing his eyes. Much to everyone's amusement, whenever this happened, Aaron Taylor-Johnson would yell, "Red balls! Look at his balls, Lizzie!" at her in order to get her to look in the right direction.

James Spader was Joss Whedon's first and only choice for the role of Ultron, because of his "hypnotic voice that can be eerily calm and compelling while also being very human and humorous".

Aaron Taylor-Johnson was asked to lose weight (muscle mass in particular) because he looked too strong to portray a runner, who is usually trim.

The trailer was viewed 34 million times on YouTube in the first 24 hours after it was released. This broke the record that was previously held by Iron Man 3 (2013).

The addition of Quicksilver to the cast sparked wide discussion over the direction of the character who is also slated to appear in X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014). Quicksilver had been discussed previously as a potential character in both X-Men: The Last Stand (2006) and The Avengers (2012), but legal complexities over the license to the character resulted in his omission from both films. However, in May 2013 both Marvel and Fox Studios announced a resolution to the previous legal issues, and that Quicksilver would appear in this film as well as an X-Men sequel, though under certain parameters: no allusion to his relations to the X-Men or Magneto (the character's father) can be made in an "Avengers" film, and no reference to Quicksilver's membership in the Avengers can be made in an "X-Men" film; the rights agreement between Fox and Marvel even goes so far as to stipulate the character cannot be referred to as a "mutant" in any Marvel film. Additionally, the day after Fox announced Evan Peters as Quicksilver, Marvel and Fox entered into a legal standoff over provisions of the rights agreement for the character, including the issue of whether Peters would be allowed to portray Quicksilver in any other film outside the "X-Men" franchise, necessitating a second actor to play Quicksilver in any Marvel film, resulting in two different versions of the same character appearing in two competing film series.

"Marvel Ultimates" comic is famous for featuring a controversial incestuous story-line between Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch. According to Elizabeth Olsen, while this particular aspect would not be overtly present in the film, she and Aaron Taylor-Johnson "played around" with certain parts of it: "Every time you see an image of them, they're always holding each other's hand and looking over each other's shoulder. They're always so close, it's almost uncomfortable. Aaron and I have been playing a little bit with those kinds of images just for ourselves."

Cameo [Stan Lee]: A veteran at the Avengers' party, who takes a drink of Thor's ale. Lee has said this is his favorite cameo to date.

Lou Ferrigno contributed to the voice of the Hulk in this film. He has played the Hulk in almost every live-action version since 1978: he played the Hulk in The Incredible Hulk (1978) and its subsequent three TV specials, and he voiced the Hulk in the big-screen The Incredible Hulk (2008) in which he also played "security guard" - he also played a security guard in Hulk (2003). He also has voiced the Hulk in various animated productions.

Paul Bettany (the Vision) is good friends with co-star Stellan Skarsgård (Dr Selvig). In fact, Bettany and his wife Jennifer Connelly named their firstborn child Stellan, after Skarsgård.

When Tony Stark tries to lift Thor's Hammer he jokes saying "I'm re-instituting prima noctis". Primae Noctis was, allegedly, a law in Late Medieval Europe by which a feudal lord could claim the "first night" (implying the night subsequent to her wedding) with any bride in his dominion, in order to have sexual relations with her. This practice was depicted in Braveheart (1995).

FILM 1237: GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY

TRIVIA: The soundtrack album "Awesome Mix, Vol. 1" reached number one on the US Billboard 200 chart, the first film soundtrack ever to reach number one without a single original song.

Vin Diesel recorded all of his "I am Groot" lines in several different languages, including Russian, Mandarin, Spanish, Portuguese, German and French so that they could use his real voice in the film around the world.

The mid-credits scene where Groot dances to "I Want You Back" was animated using footage of James Gunn dancing privately to the song.

Drax's comment about Groot's ability to release "fireflies", "When did you learn to do that?" is an inside joke, as Groot has never shown this ability in the comic books.

Chris Pratt cites heroes Han Solo and Marty McFly as influences on his performance as Star-Lord.

Prior to release, Bill Mantlo, the comic book writer who created Rocket Raccoon and has been permanently institutionalized since a crippling traffic accident in 1992, was granted a private screening by Marvel Entertainment and Walt Disney Pictures. According to his brother, Michael Mantlo, Bill was pleased with the adaptation (which credits him by name as the character's creator) and considered the occasion a happy day for himself and his family.

Rocket Raccoon was modeled on a raccoon living in the UK named Oreo.

James Gunn compared the Avengers and the Guardians to music bands: "The Avengers are like the Beatles, but the Guardians are like the Rolling Stones!"

Benicio Del Toro described the Collector as "Liberace in outer space."

Nathan Fillion is the blue alien that Groot picks up by the nostrils during the escape scene in the Kyln.

Adam Sandler, David Tennant, Sharlto Copley, Jim Carrey and H. Jon Benjamin were considered to voice Rocket Raccoon.

London's Millennium Bridge can be seen during the the Battle of Xander.