Star Wars Episode VII: Jaina Solo.

This week has seen the reports that Harrison Ford is set to reprise one of the most iconic roles in cinema history as Han Solo for Star Wars Episode VII. When a new trilogy was announced fans were quick to question whether Ford, Mark Hamill and Carrie Fisher would be returning and this news seems to be positive, especially because Ford’s role is being called ‘significant’. This would also support the theory that the new trilogy would focus on the children of Han Solo and Princess Leia (Jaina, Jacen and Anakin Solo) who were introduced as part of the expanded universe.

There were also reports (because, of course, this is all speculation at the minute) that the main character in the new trilogy would be a female, which seems to point to Jaina Solo. Jaina and her twin brother Jacen are primary protagonists in a lot of the expanded universe literature so it would make sense that they would be the focus of the new trilogy, especially as this would easily allow Han Solo, Princess Leia and Uncle’s Luke Skywalker and Chewbacca (maybe?) to return. So if this was to come to fruition, who would play Jaina Solo?

 

Jennifer Lawrence

We don’t know if Jaina Solo will be the main character but if she is she’s going to be pretty young, late teenage years at oldest, surely? And Lawrence is currently playing the most famous teenager in film, Katniss Everdeen. She is also playing a younger version of Mystique in the X-Men trilogy so she is clearly adjudged to look the part. Although her working in these two big franchises already mean that she may not have the time to appear in the new Star Wars trilogy as well. However, she is one of the hottest talents in Hollywood at the minute so surely will be considered?

 

Odette Annable

Annable is another relative unknown but is a more likely choice than Tonkin. She has film experience and one of those films she has been in was (another JJ Abrams project) Cloverfield. Since then, most of her high profile work has come on television appearing in Life On Mars, Brothers & Sisters and the final series of House. At twenty seven years of age producers may feel that it is a bit late for her to try and force her way into being a Hollywood starlet but could easily fit the role of Jaina Solo in my opinion. The only problem here is that she just looks too ‘nice’ and clean cut for the part possibly.

 

 

Phoebe Tonkin

Tonkin is a little known Australian actress best known for her work on television shows Home and Away, The Secret Circle and The Vampire Diaries. She is soon set to appear in The Originals, a Vampire Diaries spin-off but I highly doubt that her television work would stop her from being considered for a role in Star Wars. I think that Tonkin has a shine to her and would not look out of place as the daughter of Han and Leia. When the original Star Wars films were made they took a bold step by casting unknowns in the lead roles. If they’re willing to be as daring again then maybe Tonkin should be looked at. I think Tonkin would be my pick of these three candidates.

 

So they are my three picks for the role of Jaina Solo. Tomorrow I’ll be looking at who could play her twin (younger by five minutes) brother; Jacen Solo.

Pixar, Marvel, Star Wars – Which Disney Purchase is Best?

Disney now owns three of the biggest companies in the world of movie making: Pixar, Marvel and LucasFilm, in particular the Star Wars franchise. So with these three huge franchises all working under the same roof it is inevitable that comparisons will be made, but just which is the biggest and best franchise? I will be ranking Pixar, Marvel and Star Wars out of 10 in categories such as Oscar recognition, box office takings, quality of the films and star quality.

 

Box Office

The box office takings are vital to companies and film franchises such as these three as it indicates whether there is any demand for their films any longer and obviously, at the minute, there is. The Star Wars franchise (the original trilogy and prequel trilogy) have taken $3,793,650,642 at the box office, making an average of around $632million per film. Marvel Entertainment have so far released six films of their own, from Iron Man to The Avengers and have made $3,772,055,196 (with The Avengers making up the most of that) averaging $628million per film. None of this quite matches Pixar who, since releasing Toy Story have amassed an incredible $7,794,770,758 at the global box office, however on average this only amounts to just under $600million per film.

Marks out of 10 for Box Office takings:

Pixar: 6

Marvel: 7

Star Wars: 8

 

“Son?”

Oscars

Each year the Oscars acknowledge the best films and the best efforts in making films. Marvel are really lagging behind in this area with just three nominations, two for Iron Man and one for Iron Man 2. Star Wars have so far managed to win seven Oscars with another fifteen nominations! But still this is far far behind Pixar who have been storming the Oscars with almost all of their films and have won ten Oscars for their feature films with another 30 (yes 30!) nominations!

Pixar: 10

Marvel: 1

Star Wars: 6

 

Film Quality

There is no doubt about who makes the best films out of Pixar, Marvel and Star Wars. Ever since their first release Pixar have continually churned out near perfect, enjoyable family films almost every year. With their recent releases it looks as though they have started to lag but their discography cannot be ignored. Marvel, aside from Christopher Nolan’s Batman trilogy, have dominated the superhero genre and continue to bring out fun, light hearted but still very very good films and all of this culminated in one of the best films of 2012: The Avengers. I have never really liked Star Wars but I can appreciate that the original trilogy was good (yet nothing to really shout about) however the prequel trilogy is universally disliked.

Pixar: 10

Marvel: 8

Star Wars: 6

Star Talent

Star Wars made stars out of Mark Hamill, Carrie Fisher and Harrison Ford primarily, although they were virtual unknowns at the time. However, they did attract Peter Cushing and Alec Guinness to the franchise. In the prequels they managed to cast some good British talent with Liam Neeson and Ewan McGregor along with the huge Samuel L. Jackson. Marvel also signed Samuel L. Jackson up along with huge stars Robert Downey Jr, Ed Norton, Scarlett Johansson, Gwyneth Paltrow, Jeremy Renner, Hugo Weaving, Tim Roth, Jeff Bridges and Sam Rockwell (and that’s not even all of them!). Tom Hanks, John Ratzenberger, Michael Keaton, Kevin Spacey, John Goodman and Steve Buscemi have all provided voices for Pixar characters but a lot of the time the actors are unknown to audiences.

Pixar: 6

Marvel: 9

Star Wars: 4

 

Overall Ratings:

Pixar: 32/40.

Marvel: 25/40.

Star Wars: 24/40.

So overall Pixar comes out on top which is unsurprising to say the least! Although with their two most recent films (Cars 2 and Brave) not going down as well as previous efforts are they on the decline? Marvel have just released the third highest grossing movie of all time this year and their universe of films is only going to continue to grow and get more and more exciting. Star Wars has continued to live on in television shows since the end of the film franchise and everyone is expecting big things from the new instalment. In the next few years it will be interesting to see who Disney is getting the most from.

News of the Week (07/11/12) – Jamie Foxx, Star Wars & Dominic Cooper

Last week we discovered that Star Wars was going to return to the cinema screens in 2015 with the help of new owners, Disney. This week there has been speculation as to who will be the director and a couple of cast members stating that they would like to return to the series. Harrison Ford, who famously played the iconic hero Han Solo, has stated that he would love to reprise his roles in the sequel/reboot/continuation. Also said to be considering returning are Mark Hamill and Carrie Fisher as Luke Skywalker and Princess Leia. Jeremy Bulloch famously brought Boba Fett to life back in the original trilogy and has stated his optimism and willingness to return but doubts that he will get his chance. I don’t think the story will really involve Luke, Leia and Han that much but it would be nice to see them back to make a connection between the films. Reports this week have linked Matthew Vaughn with the directing gig. Vaughn recently dropped out of directing X-Men: Days of Future Past and is not directing Kick-Ass 2: Balls to the Wall either so his schedule should be pretty clear for this job.

 

One of the most enjoyable films that has been released this year, in my opinion, is The Muppets. The best bit about The Muppets was the music sequences without a doubt and it is not very well known that Bret McKenzie, one half of comedy duo Flight of the Conchords, was responsible for this music. And it has been announced that McKenzie is writing some new music for the sequel, set to his screens Christmas 2013. Nicholas Stoller is once again writing the script even though Jason Segel will not be returning. Attached to star at the minute is Christoph Waltz of Inglourious Basterds and upcoming Django Unchained. Waltz and Kermit the Frog don’t seem to go hand in hand but it can only lead to success!

 

The Amazing Spider-Man successfully rebooted the Marvel hero this year with Andrew Garfield in the lead role. With Garfield, Emma Stone and Marc Webb all returning for the sequel all they need is a villain, and it looks as though they may have found one. Jamie Foxx, who will coincidently be starring alongside Christoph Waltz in Django Unchained at the end of this year, is in very early talks to play the super villain Electro. Electro is another villain that we are yet to see on the big screen and Marc Webb has described Foxx as one of the best actors around today and he is pretty good, it has to be said.

 

Finally, a couple of weeks ago it was announced that Breaking Bad star Aaron Paul would be taking the lead role in the upcoming Need for Speed movie adaptation. Now it has been announced that young British actor Dominic Cooper will be joining him in the driving seat. I am a big fan of Dominic Cooper and this would be something very different to what he normally does, I look forward to seeing it.

‘Best Movies Ever’ That I Think Are Overrated.

With so many movies made it is inevitable that nobody will enjoy all of them. There are also some movies that are frequently named as the best movies ever made and whilst I think that some of them live up to the hype (The Departed, Back to the Future, Toy Story) there are some classic films that I do not like despite the majority of people thinking they are absolutely perfect. Here are a few of my controversial choices:

Pulp Fiction is ranked at number five on IMDB’s list of Top 250 films and is commonly referred to as one of the best films ever made and Tarantino’s best. I don’t think this is Tarantino’s best work, in fact of all the films I have seen of his this is my least favourite, I much preferred Reservoir Dogs and Kill Bill. I was expecting to be blown away by Pulp Fiction when I finally got round to watching it because of the way people spoke so highly of it, yet I was left bored and unentertained. I think the storyline is very weak and the dialogue is dull and unnecessary; it lacks the punch that Reservoir Dogs and Inglourious Basterds packs. And the way fans of the film bang on about it being a non-linear structure you would think it would be the only film to ever have done that and it doesn’t even add anything to the story by editing it in this way.

Taxi Driver, directed by Martin Scorsese and featuring Robert De Niro in an Oscar winning performance, is another film that left me feeling like I had missed something. As I have mentioned in  previous post I do really enjoy the first half of Taxi Driver, the way that the character is created and we get insight into this person and his life is very very good drama indeed. But then the gear changes in the film and the wheels seem to come off; I know some people like it but I just feel like it makes no sense, it becomes boring and where it tries to become exciting it fails. I would definitely place Taxi Driver up there with one of the worst gunfights in movie history for its climatic action scene.

Star Wars is undoubtedly one of the most iconic films in history. Many of the characters have become staples in popular culture: Darth Vader, Yoda, Chewbacca, Han Solo. Everybody knows Star Wars, that much is true. But I don’t see what all the fuss was about. I am a fan of science fiction so that’s not the problem here; I like Star Trek and Back to the Future but I failed to see the hype surrounding this massive franchise. I felt very underwhelmed and very bored, Han Solo who is supposedly one of the coolest characters around disappointed me as did many of the others. I really wanted to like Star Wars but found it impossible.