This Week In Movie Posters, February 12

Every movie franchise requires a spreadsheet now.

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It’s the day after the Super Bowl, but here on The #Content Report, we’re all about Not Football. It’s going to be nothing but Not Football around here for at least nine months. Okay, six. At least six! Anyway, in the spirit of Not Football, It’s been a few weeks since we did a This Week In Movie Posters, so let’s get back on track.

This Week In Movie Posters

Welcome to the This Week In Movie Posters, the feature in which we go through all the week’s new movie posters and read way too much into them. Blessed are the paid subscribers, as without them, none of this would be possible. All posters via IMPA.

We begin this week with this ugly green poster for… W? No, the movie is called Wicked, they’re just playing coy by dropping letters. Which I suppose is fair, the movie doesn’t open for another nine months. We’re going to be talking about football again by then!

Did you know that Wicked is about the witch from the Wizard of Oz? Not to be confused with Maleficent, who was the Wicked Witch from Sleeping Beauty? And that Sleeping Beauty is different than Cinderella, even though the same actress did the voice of the Sleeping Beauty witch and the evil stepmother in Cinderella? I’m going to have to make a spreadsheet to keep track of all these things. I can’t believe they haven’t combined witch universes yet. It’s going to happen. Maybe in The Witcher. (That was a show, right? Adding it to the spreadsheet).

It’s Deadpool. Remember Deadpool? Deadpool was the Marvel character whose movie rights were owned by Fox, as part of the X-Men/Wolverine movie universe. Well, Disney bought Fox, and Disney owns Marvel, so now Disney/Marvel gets to make Deadpool part of the proper Marvel Universe. Which is kind of weird, considering the Deadpool movies’ entire brand was being naughty and R-rated and performatively Not Marvel.

This one is going to be called Deadpool & Wolverine, apparently, with Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman. It looks like they did a deliberate cum pun in the poster, just to convince us that Deadpool will still get to be all cheeky and vulgar, even with Marvel in charge. Phew, I should probably make another spreadsheet. Kids love spreadsheets.

This one is called Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire, and hey, didn’t they just release a Godzilla movie? And a Godzilla show? Well, the last Godzilla movie was Godzilla Minus One, which was produced by Toho Studios, the original Japanese creator of Godzilla. This one is produced by Legendary Studios. The two share rights to the Godzilla franchise, with a stipulation that they won’t both release Godzilla movies the same year. Which is apparently part of why Godzilla Minus One left theaters early. Monarch: Legacy of Monsters, the Godzilla show, is from Legendary, like this one. Dammit, I’m going to have to make another spreadsheet, aren’t I.

Oh thank God, it’s just a regular movie with no corporate backstory to unpack. Barry Pepper! What the hell has that guy been up to? Before I check IMDB, I’m going to guess some network procedural. (*checks IMDB*) Well, unless you count eight episodes of Lawman: Bass Reeves in 2023, his filmography tends more towards indie action movies than Law & Order spinoffs. Shame, there’s no steadier paycheck than a network procedural.

Anyway, Sam Neill is one of my favorite actors and there’s been a Rachel Griffiths-sized hole in my heart ever since Six Feet Under ended, but this poster seems like it’s more interested in the car than any of the actors. Ah, well. Alas. Hope they had fun together on the set in Bulgaria or wherever.

Aaaaand we’re back! To explaining complex corporate backstories, that is!

Based on the poster, you might get the idea that Madame Web is connected to Spider-Man somehow. Which she is! In the sense that Madame Web is part of Sony’s Spider-Man Universe (the SSU, an acronym I didn’t even make up). Not to be confused with the Marvel Cinematic Universe, which has included Spider-Man since 2017. Sony’s Spider-Man Universe is notable for not actually having Spider-Man in their movies — which include Venom, Venom: Let There Be Carnage, and Morbius. The animated Spider-Man movies are “connected” to the SSU, whatever that means.

Anyway, this one is about Madame Web, a tertiary Spider-Man character. She’s psychic! And she knows Spider-Man. “He was in the Amazon with my mom when she was researching spiders right before she died.”

I saw the commercial for the new Twister movie during the Super Bowl, and everyone there was mad that they were remaking Twister. Then it was pointed out that this is not Twister, it’s Twisters. The little S makes all the difference. Remakes? Boooo! Sequels? Sure, why not.

As for the poster, not bad. That tornado is really going to tear up their wheat field. And I guess there are some wind turbines included there for irony. Sort of a visual be-careful-what-you-wish-for-situation there.

Tagline: Chase. Ride. Survive.

I get the chasing and the surviving part, but who the hell is riding? Is someone going to “ride” the tornado? I could see Michael Bay directing a great movie about guys who ride tornadoes, but this doesn’t seem like that movie.

Dune 2? Dune 2. It can’t get here soon enough.

Please do no ask me whether the Minions movies and Despicable Me movies are separate franchises, I cannot bear to make another spread sheet. Instead I will simply share my favorite Minions-related fact, which is that when former president of Brazil Jair Bolsonaro fled to the US, he stayed at UFC fighter Jose Aldo’s house in Orlando, a house which famously has a Minions-themed bedroom.

I like to think every third or fourth house in Orlando has a Minions bedroom. That’s just a standard amenity there.

La Cocina?! Someone actually made the fake play from Seinfeld? I had to check the IMDB to make sure the chef’s name wasn’t Pepe. (It’s not).

Follows the life in the kitchen of a NYC restaurant where cultures from all over the world blend during the lunchtime rush. [IMDB]

And it’s in black and white? Oh boy! Whenever I think of Rooney Mara and food, I think about that shot of her eating a pie in Ghost Story that felt like it went on for 20 minutes. This concept feels like someone got Ghost Story and the La Cocina scene from Seinfeld trapped in that machine from The Fly.

“Revenge gets ripped” seems like a tagline better suited to the previous Love Lies Bleeding poster, with Kristen Stewart’s toned triceps, but it still plays. I don’t know if I’m supposed to be horny, scared, or intrigued, but I appreciate that it’s not asking me to choose. Another solid poster.

My somewhat unpopular opinion is that I can’t take the relentless humorlessness of this franchise (except for the James Franco one, which was the last one Matt Reeves didn’t direct). This is the first one since that one that Matt Reeves isn’t directing, so maybe I’ll like it again. Plus it has a hawk!

I haven’t seen any of the Kung Fu Panda movies. Are they good? At the very least, they gave Pablo Sandoval one of the all-time best baseball nicknames.

“Hear how it all began.”

Didn’t the last A Quiet Place also start on day one? I could’ve sworn it did. Cool poster, but please, one origin story per franchise.

Oh look, here’s another ape guy. He’s wearing a crown. I bet he and the other ape guy are going to fight.

I have to commend the No Way Up poster designer for a classic b-movie VHS cover that would’ve scared the shit out of me when I was 10 or so. I like that the idea of being trapped inside a crashed plane under the ocean filled with giant sharks wasn’t scary enough, they also had to put the plane on an undersea ledge. Implying that there’s another, even deeper layer of ocean even scarier than this one.

I like how they made her face dirty but she still looks like she just came out of the shower. Give me an actual feral human, with crooked gross teeth and a bushy unibrow.

What are those blurs supposed to be there? Sparks? Need some sparks in there to generate excitement.

My stepson used to watch shows like this, and I’m honestly grateful that he spends all day into his Fortnite headset instead these days. I would rather get a root canal than watch more than five minutes of one of these Nickelodeon shows. I don’t even have to hear dialogue or see full scenes for it to annoy me, they have that Big Bang Theory quality of being grating even on mute. Look at everyone’s stupid hair. Ugh. Everyone at Nickelodeon should be in prison.