‘Thor’ sequel setting the stage for cosmic Marvel

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thor and loki thor the dark world

When Marvel released “Thor” in 2011, I doubt that most of us on this side of the screen realized how important the adventures of the Thunder God would become to big-screen Marvel.

I liked “Thor” really pretty well. Maybe not as much as “Iron Man” or “Captain America,” but I thought the movie did a very good job of introducing the more fantastic elements of the Marvel Universe to the moviegoing audience. With “Thor” a success, how far behind could “Dr. Strange” or the cosmic Marvel stories or even the horror-tinged reaches of the Marvel universe be?

As it turns out, Marvel and director James Gunn are making the “Star Wars”-ian “Guardians of the Galaxy” now, for release next year. There’s a connection between “Thor” – spoilers ahead, I’ll warn you before – and “GOTG” but after duty in “The Avengers,” the Asgardian god of thunder returns in “Thor: The Dark World,” which stakes out, even more than the original, the more mystical, more space-bound corner of Marvel.

I won’t go very deep into the plot. Suffice it to say that Thor (Chris Hemsworth) returns to face an enemy (former Doctor Christopher Eccleston) intent on avenging himself on Odin (Anthony Hopkins) and Asgard and recapturing the Aether, force of cosmic power not unlike the Tesseract, the mystical Cosmic Cube from “Captain America” and “The Avengers.”

The movie skips from Asgard to London, where Thor is reunited with Jane Foster (Natalie Portman) and her crew, and to other stops among the Nine Realms.

Director Alan Taylor (“Game of Thrones”) and the screenwriters make this sequel a far grittier – literally and figuratively – story than the original. Asgard has texture and the Dark World itself is a nightmarish landscape. London is the steely blue/gray we’re familiar with in modern-day TV outings like “Sherlock.”

The action is thrilling and the realm-skipping action shows every penny of the production budget.

Hemsworth is so at ease as Thor it’s fun to imagine him  playing the part for years to come. Likewise, Tom Hiddleston is such a welcome presence as Thor’s trickster brother Loki that I hope he becomes omnipresent in movies.

“Thor: The Dark World” could feel like just another step in setting up the decade-long Marvel movie plotline, as I talked about in this recent entry. But it doesn’t. It never feels perfunctory. It’s a grand, thrilling adventure in its own right.

Random observations:

Spoiler this line only: What I reported the other day about the two end credits sequences was correct. The first featured Benecio Del Toro as the Collector and sets the stage for “GOTG.” It’s a fun if oddball scene, directed by “GOTG” director James Gunn. It’ll be interesting to see how “GOTG” comes out next year.

Obviously Chris Hemsworth’s contract calls for a minimum of one shirtless scene per “Thor” movie.

Hiddleston gets to play more vulnerable and more multifaceted here than in “Thor” of “The Avengers.” It’s great and unsettling at the same time.

No spoilers here, but I loved the cameo. That’s the advantage of a shared big-screen universe.

‘Thor: The Dark World” marks the eighth movie in the official big-screen Marvel universe. Eighth.

 

Good time to be a fan

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luca parmitano long shot

Those of us who grew up in the 1960s have to be forgiven for occasionally wandering through the world of 2013 and wondering if we’re dreaming.

In the 1960s, comic books and science fiction and horror movies were an almost underground part of the culture, barely more tolerated by adults than eating paste or girlie magazines.

Now, science fiction and fantasy rule TV, from “The Walking Dead” to “Game of Thrones.” Books with sf and fantasy themes like the “Hunger Games” trilogy and the “Harry Potter” books top the best-seller lists.

And at the movies … Marvel’s merry marching movie machine rolls on. The sequel – sequel! – to “Thor” comes out tomorrow. It’s already playing in some theaters. And it’s the latest in a years-long chain of interconnected movies exploring the Marvel universe.

And today Marvel and Netflix announce original series like “Daredevil” and “Luke Cage” are coming, with a “Defenders” team-up series to follow.

If, before “Iron Man” debuted in 2008, anyone thought “The Avengers” was below-the-radar fun only enjoyed by geeks, you can only imagine what a head-snapping development a “Defenders” series would be.

DC is still plugging along with big-screen Batman and Superman movies, but doing impressive work on TV with “Arrow” and other series like “The Flash” still coming.

I sat down and watched an episode of “Arrow” tonight with Green Arrow and Black Canary, for pete’s sake. Tell me who thought that would have been possible a few decades ago.

And the picture above.

On Halloween, Italian astronaut Luca Parmitano, aboard the International Space Station, dressed up like Superman and took advantage of the lack of gravity to fly around.

I don’t care that he looks more like Lex Luthor. He’s flying like Superman!

It’s a good time to be a fan.

‘Thor’ sequel spoilers and Marvel’s long game (maybe)

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thor the dark world poster

It has been there, right in front of us, since 2011.

Marvel’s long game, its plan for its big-screen universe, through the next several years.

odin's vault with gauntlet

2011 is when “Thor” came out, and figuring prominently into the plot were MacGuffiins – the objects of desire that spark movie plotlines, rare and powerful objects like the Casket of Winters and other arcane weapons in the arsenal of Odin in Asgard.

Marvel gave us another big hint that same summer, as “Captain America” fought the Red Skull to possess the Tesseract, also known as the Cosmic Cube. Another artifact of power. The Tesseract even showed up at the end of “Thor.”

The Tesseract, lost when the Skull’s airship went down in the ocean after Captain America defeated the villain, figured prominently into 2012’s “The Avengers.” In Loki’s hands, the cube opens a portal that allows an army assembled by Thanos, a cosmic villain, to attack Earth.

thanos avengers credits

Thanos. That smiley purple guy who appeared in the mid-credits scene at the end of “The Avengers.”

Now that Marvel has announced that the next “Avengers” adventure, 2015’s “Age of Ultron,” will be about Ultron, the robotic villain, it became clear that Marvel and Joss Whedon didn’t put Thanos at the end of “The Avengers” for no reason. They were, obviously, building to something bigger for the third “Avengers” movie. And they were laying it out for us to see.

Remember, in “The Avengers,” when Nick Fury asks Captain America about the Tesseract, Cap replies, “You should have left it on the bottom of the ocean.”

Okay, so items of great power. Check.

Here’s where we get to the spoilers for “Thor: The Dark World,” which opens this Friday. So don’t continue reading if you don’t want to know. But it’s essential to my theory about Marvel’s long-term plans.

Ready?

There are two end-credits scenes in “Thor: The Dark World.” The latter scene, at the very end, is a nice character moment and establishes that Thor’s relationship with Jane Foster will continue.

But it’s the mid-credits scene that sets up several years worth of Marvel movies.

In that scene, Sif and Volstagg, two of Thor’s cohorts, have possession of the Aether, a powerful MacGuffin that plays into the plot of “Thor: The Dark World.”

Thor and his allies have captured the Aether and, in the end credits, Sif and Volstagg take the Aether to the Collector, a longtime Marvel Comics character played by Benicio Del Toro, who just so happens to play the same character in “Guardians of the Galaxy” the Marvel movie coming in late 2014.

Thor’s allies give the Collector the Aether and note the Tesseract is in Odin’s arsenal.

“It’s too dangerous to have two Infinity Stones in the same place,” they say.

thanos infinity gauntlet

Six Infinity Stones, or gems, are the power source for the Infinity Gauntlet in Marvel comics. It is a tool and a weapon of … Thanos.

After Sif and Volstagg leave, the Collector says the words that set the next several years worth of Marvel movies on their path:

“One down, five more to go,” he says.

In the comics, the Infinity Gems were not artifacts like the Cosmic Cube or Casket of Winters. They were literal stones or gems, albeit with supernatural powers.

Now consider the plot description Marvel released last year when it announced “Guardians of the Galaxy:”

“In the far reaches of space, an unlikely cast of characters including an American pilot and a group of futuristic ex-cons go on the run with a highly coveted object and must join forces to defeat a cosmic force of epic proportions.”

What highly coveted object? Possibly another Infinity Stone?

It now seems apparent that the Marvel movies are pursuing the years-spanning storyline of Thanos trying to acquire the powerful Infinity Stones and the Avengers, Guardians of the Galaxy and other heroes trying to foil his plans … coming to a theater near you in “Avengers 3,” maybe in 2017 or 2018.

In the meantime …

Marvel movie universe mastermind Kevin Feige has been quoted recently as hinting that the company has its movies roughly planned out into 2021 or so. Considering that’s only three years after the third “Avengers” film completes Phase Three of Marvel’s big screen plans, it’s probably not surprising.

Okay, so bonus round: What’s Marvel planning through and post Phase Three?

What could possibly top the showdown with Thanos?

(FYI, I’m not counting the movies based on Marvel characters that the company doesn’t have the rights to for the screen, so there’s no mention of “Spider-Man” or “X-Men” movies here, although those are certain to continue, as likely will “Fantastic Four” films.)

So here’s the rough timetable as we know it so far.

2014: “Captain America: The Winter Soldier,” “Guardians of the Galaxy.”

2015: “The Avengers: The Age of Ultron,” “Ant-Man.”

2016: Two still-unspecified Marvel films.

2017: One still-unspecified Marvel film, with at least one more likely to come.

2018: The third “Avengers” film maybe, if they continue to turn them out every three years.

Mentioned as likely or possibilities: “Dr. Strange,” “Black Panther.” Possibilities since their rights have reverted to Marvel: “Daredevil” and “The Punisher.”

Also almost certain: “The Inhumans,” about Marvel’s other race of super-powered beings besides “The X-Men.”

Any of these movies would be fine post-Phase Three fare.

And any of them would be appropriate for shoe-horning into the Phase Three build-up to the third “Avengers” movie.

Maybe they’ll turn up in one of those 2016 films, or one in 2017 or 2018.

I don’t know about you, but I’m planning to be there.

Classic TV movie: ‘The Norliss Tapes’

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norliss tapes title card

“The Norliss Tapes” is one of those TV movies best remembered for its freaky, scary moments.

It seems it scared the hell out of a lot of kids back in the day. I know it made an impression on me.

The movie, which aired in 1973, was pretty clearly inspired by the success of “The Night Stalker” a year earlier. The two movies shared a premise – a writer investigating the undead – and Dan Curtis, the producer of “The Night Stalker,” produced and directed here.

“The Norliss Tapes” is no “Night Stalker,” however. But it’s a pretty good scare-fest.

The story begins with David Norliss, a writer with a contract to write a book exposing phony psychic phenomena, talking to his publisher and sounding bleak. Norliss (played by David Thinnes of “The Invaders” fame) recounts – via audio cassettes – how he found it easy to debunk mystics and psychics … but then he got caught up in the story of Ellen Cort (Angie Dickinson). Cort tells Norliss that she’s been attacked by – and she subsequently shot – a particularly strange intruder in her home: Her late husband Jim.

the norliss tapes creature

The storyline plays out not unlike “The Night Stalker,” with seemingly random murders by a supernatural being running counterpoint to the mystery of the apparently resurrected Jim Cort. The plots tie together, of course. As a matter of fact, there’s not a lot of mystery or subtlety, as Cort – freaky eyes and blue skin prominently displayed – is clearly the attacker.

Norliss begins investigating the possibility that Cort – whose body rests peacefully in his family crypt – is getting up and attacking people in the dead of night. And what about that mysterious Egyptian ring Cort was wearing?

dan curtis

Director Curtis was the man behind groundbreaking supernatural TV shows like “Dark Shadows” and “The Night Stalker,” and “The Norliss Tapes” shows that. The movie has a style and a music soundtrack familiar to fans of those shows. Robert Cobert, a Dan Curtis regular creative partner, was the composer of the score here.

Some cast members of “The Night Stalker” even recur here, including Stanley Adams as a witness and Claude Akins as a gruff sheriff who’s only too happy to keep a lid on spooky happenings.

Michelle Carey, a gorgeous 1960s and 1970s actress with a breathy, throaty voice, plays Ellen Cort’s sister and a friend of Norliss.

Keep watching through the end credits: There’s a recapping series of  scare scenes, ala “The Night Stalker,” among the credits.

Comic Book Odd: Sure they’re superheroes. But they’re girls!

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wasp-roomfullofmen

Sure this recurring feature on the blog is Comic Book Odd, but there’s really nothing odd about the history of female characters being treated as punchlines for jokes.

It’s not a surprise, really. Comic books were mostly written and drawn by guys, particularly in the Golden Age and even into the Silver Age. And although girls bought comic books at a much greater rate back then than in later years, boys were still the targeted readers for comic books.

So you have panels like the one above, poking fun at Janet Van Dyne – AKA The Wasp, one of the founding members of The Avengers.

too complicated wonder woman

And this one, taking a shot at everybody except Wonder Woman.

Thank goodness the days of treating women as second-class characters in comics is over, huh?

starfire

Right?

Today in Halloween: Calvin goes trick-or-treating

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calvin and Hobbes 1995 halloween

Apparently only a couple of Bill Watterson’s “Calvin and Hobbes” newspaper strips make reference to Halloween, although it would seem like a natural holiday for a kid like Calvin.

Earlier this month, I posted the first Halloween-themed Calvin here.

Here, as we begin the long slow wind-down of our month of Halloween, is the other.

Today in Halloween: Collegeville costumes and the Tylenol scare

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collegeville_1981_masks

How did a horrific health threat change Halloween as we know it?

We’ve noted before that Halloween has shifted from a holiday for kids when I was young to one for adults. It’s a billion-dollar industry now, with teens and 20-somethings – and older people too – vying to see who can wear the grisliest or sexiest costume.

Above is a detail from a 1981 costume catalog from Collegeville, a Pennsylvania company that started out in the early 1900s as a manufacturer of flags but ended up being second only to Ben Cooper as the store-bought costume supplier to generations of kids.

But a 1989 article in The New York Times profiling Collegeville put a twist on Halloween trends that I’ve near heard before.

That’s the year that someone tampered with Tylenol capsules, secreting cyanide in the over-the-counter medicine and causing the deaths of seven people.

The Times – this is in 1989, remember – theorizes that the resulting scare might have prompted parents to keep kids home from trick-or-treating, years after the first rumors of razor blades in Halloween apples couldn’t kill the holiday.

But The Times maintains it also sparked interest in at-home Halloween parties, which prompted interest in more elaborate costumes for kids, which led to more costumes for adults, who had to be on hand for the party.

Here’s how The Times reported it, back in 1989:

When people in the Halloween business explain why, they quickly get around to a key date – the fall of 1982. That was when the chilling news broke that seven people had died from Tylenol capsules laced with cyanide. The infamous Tylenol scare almost completely destroyed Halloween. Some towns outlawed trick-or-treating that year, and parents everywhere kept their kids from venturing into the streets.

As a result, costume makers were devastated. But then some bizarre events began to unfold.

Children wanted to do something on Halloween. So if they couldn’t go asking strangers for bags of sweets, then they were going to party. Partying became much more popular. At the same time, parents got fussier about what their children wore. ”When they went door to door, the kids could wear a costume that you just get by with,” Mr. Cornish said. ”But when you went to a party with all your friends, you had to start dressing up a little more.”

As parents watched their children go to parties, they got envious. They wanted to dress up as the grim reaper or Yosemite Sam, too. So the morbid events of that year turned out, in the long run, to have been just about the best thing to happen to costume makers since Halloween was invented. As Bob Cooper, the president of Ben Cooper Inc., a Brooklyn-based costume maker, put it, ”There’s been a change in the way that the holiday is celebrated.”

I’m going to extrapolate here and suggest that since 1982, people have mostly gotten over their fear of tampered treats, so that’s no longer affecting Halloween.

But an entire generation of people born after the Tylenol tampering case are very accustomed to teen and adult Halloween parties now. They’ve been high school students, college students, members of the workforce and now, more than 30 years later, they’re parents.

And elaborate costumes for kids and adults, along with parties and trick-or-treating, are the norm for them.

So perhaps something fun and good came from something horrible.

(Image from plaidstallions.com)