io9
At WonderCon over the weekend, everybody was talking about a handful of spring/summer scifi flicks that all had one thing in common: the kind of moral ambiguity that would never fly in Superman. We saw an action-packed clip from Wanted, whose superheroes are assassins with a mission to control the world's destiny that sounds creepily like the tenets of Scientology. No fighters for truth and justice these — they're just using their powers to become godlike. Get ready for a giant moral gray area in other flicks coming your way, like Iron Man, the new X-Files flick, and Starship Troopers III. Get a quick look at all three below.
We didn't see much more of Iron Man than you did if you watched the Superbowl commercial a few weeks ago, but director Jon Favreau did let it slip that he had to do some very creative editing to make this flick kid-friendly. No wonder, given that Iron Man as a character is about as dark as you can get: in recent series Civil War, he led the government crackdown on the superhero community, rounding up his cohorts and forcing them to be placed under surveillance under the Superhero Registration Act.
Starship Troopers III writer and director Ed Neumeier, who worked on the first film, said the new film will be a lot more darkly satirical. The soldiers are sick of the war, and just want to go home. It's based much more faithfully on the original Heinlein novel, and from what we could see from the hefty clips they showed us the action scenes will be fun and exciting to watch. A new generation of bugs have cool robo-suits that make them look like a cross between bug and Tripod from War of the Worlds.
And of course the biggest draw of the weekend was the new X-Files movie, which is being shot even as I write. The packed crowd of thousands was going crazy for every little word dropped by director Chris Carter, and the teeny taste of the movie we got to see was exciting. X-Files protagonists Scully and Mulder have always been morally ambiguous — even, at times, obviously insane. And the new flick has 9/11 looming over it like a dark cloud. The fans couldn't stop talking about conspiracy theories about how the original series was destroyed by the 9/11 disaster, and even Carter admitted the movie had to wait until the mood in the country was lighter again. Just to prove how light their moods were, stars Gillian Anderson and David Duchovny spent a while joking about how XF3 should be about Mulder's experiments with autoerotic asphyxiation. (And we got it on tape — you can see it if you click through.)
Comments
Um, shouldn't the first paragraph say Starship Troopers III not Storm Troopers III?
Don't get me wrong, I'd love a film about the life of storm troopers; sort of like the short "Troops" but darker. Think stormtroopers crossed with Platoon or Apocalypse Now or Full Metal Jacket.
@lillian27: Fixed.
@lillian27: Haha I guess some people see what they want to see. I would take a whole Storm Troopers movie. However I am also very jazzed about a new Starship Troopers.
@Garrison Dean: I want a movie all about the Clone Army frankly. I've always thought the clone army was the most interesting thing about the prequels.
Wanted looks incredibly lame--especially giving up the whole "There is a reason why the Golden Age ended" subplot.
I mean, it's the Matrix with Morgan "I'm God" Freeman.
@mitchel_stevens: I gotta say I thought the flick looked pretty great. But I'm not a big fan of the books, so there you go.
So far ST3 sounds even further removed than the original. The combat suits are pretty integral to the plot and instead of introducing more bugs why don't they just include the other alien race they left out?
I picture a Clone Army moving being a lot like an Oompa Loompa musical number from Charlie and the Choclolate Factory, only instead of singing, there's a lot more shooting things.
I could watch that...
I always wanted a clone war series done Band of Brothers style. Each episode would be a different planet/battle. The last episode could be an hour long Order 66 fest.
I just hope that ST:III keeps the satirical bite of the first movie. Any film that snips at fascism while at the same getting you to go "cool, kill those bugs!"(who were actually the first to be invaded), is a classic in my book. More Doogie Howser in S.S. gear! BTW, the trailer for Marauders hits tomorrow on the Sony site.
Jumping on the "I'd like to see something done with stormtroopers" wagon.
[starwars.wikia.com]
They could do an hour short of that battle and another short of a different one and release them Grindhouse-style.
@Annalee Newitz: YEah Annalee no doubt I was hooked on the clone army after I played Star Wars Battlefront 2 and got to play as all the different classes of Clone Soldiers :)
@_MARVKO_: holy crap that would be sweet
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