May.6 2009

Superhero Movie News! Green Lantern & Deadpool

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So now who’s the front-runner to play Hal Jordan/Green Lantern in Warner Bros. scheduled $150 million superhero blockbuster The Green Lantern? Ryan Gosling? No. Chris Pine? No. Bradley Cooper? Apparently.

“Who the hell is that?” some of you may ask. He’s the reliable comedic supporting actor who can be seen in Wedding Crashers, Yes Man and the upcoming comedy drunk fest The Hangover. He’s at the point in his career where most people have seen him and can identify his face, but cannot put the name Bradley Cooper to that face. The bros over at HitFix are reporting that Cooper is the clear front-runner to dawn the power ring at this point, claiming “the process is far enough along that this is more than just a meeting or some spot on a wish list.”

I’m on the fence about this one. While he’s obviously a fine actor, with a look and build that would suit Green Lantern, he’s only really been in comedic roles thus far, so we haven’t been able to see his potential serious and bad-ass side. Then again, I will never second guess a casting decision until I’ve seen footage of the performance; thank you Heath. My choice would have been Chris Pine. He’s the perfect look and has this bad-ass attitude, which you will see displayed as Captain James T. Kirk in Star Trek this weekend. He would have also gained a massive amount of nerd-cred being in a successful and well-regarded Sci-Fi blockbuster like Star Trek; making him a much more acceptable and credible Green Lantern candidate for fanboys. But we’ll see. Maybe Bradley Cooper is just a mega-action star waiting to blow up?

ryanreynoldsdeadpool21 Up next on the superhero movie news agenda is Deadpool. Variety has the scoop that 20th Century Fox already has the ball rolling on a Deadpool spin-off, based from his appearance in X-Men Origins: Wolverine which opened last weekend to crappy reviews, but a solid box-office showing. Ryan Reynolds is set to return as Wade Wilson/Deadpool. In my review of Wolverine, I admitted that my lack of knowledge of X-Men comic lore would prohibit me of analyzing Deadpool’s on-screen interpretation effectively. A conclusion that I’ve made upon speaking with friends who are intamtely familiar with X-Men and Deadpool claim two things: 1) Ryan Reynolds is the only person on earth who could/should play Wade Wilson/Dead Pool, and 2) The movie interpretation of Deadpool’s mutilation was inaccurate and stupid. IDK, but it looks like we’ll have Deadpool, good or bad, back on the big-screen in the next couple years.

So here’s a couple good little comic-book movie tidbits for you to chew on:

Is Bradley Cooper the right guy for GL? Who would you want to be cast?

Should they even bother with a Deadpool spin-off? What other X-Men should be included? Who should be cast?

What Do You Think? Discuss.

Categories : News

http://intensedebate.com/people/MovieMike MovieMike

ya know, i actually like bradley cooper. he was good in yes man and nip/tuck. I'm sure most people still see him as the douchey Sac from Wedding Crashers. But it saw him on SNL and he was pretty funny.

As for a superhero, i dont know if he could pull a franchise like this but then again who knew that robert downey jr. could before iron man. so i think it could be a good choice. its something out of the box and different but it could work.
http://intensedebate.com/people/Moosh Moosh

I'm with mike on the downey interpretation. I think Cooper can pull it of. I can see that charming face with furrowed brow and mean mug, aint-takin-shit-from-no-one look. So it'll be interesting to see.

Now for Dead Pool. As many of my friends know and my past posts have alluded to, I'm an avid Wade Wilson/Dead Pool fan. I'm also a huge Ryan Reynolds fan and thought the casting for the Wolverine movie was perfect. Having said that, I can't afford to get excited over a Dead Pool spin-off. Having already seen the Wolvi movie and witnessed the terrible interpretation of Dead Pool the writers of that mediocre pre-summer blockbuster brought to the table, my hope for a decent portrayal of Dead Pool has been dashed. However, re-casting Ryan Reynolds is a first good step. Now all they need to do is write a completely different Dead Pool (Wade Wilson was portrayed just fine) and keep it truer to the comic versions of my favorite wise-cracking, sadistic, assassin anti-hero. Getting excited for the flick at this point in the game would be torture, for being disappointed twice would weigh heavy on my heart. ='(
http://intensedebate.com/people/Matt_Damon Matt_Damon

I agree with moosh and mike, Cooper will be able to hack it, and will have a good opportunity to show his stuff. I don't know if any of you have of heard of the show "Alias",( it was a Davinci code esk/CIA drama a couple years back, and a kick ass show by the way) but Cooper was a regular as Sydney Bristow's (Jennifer Garner) husband who becomes pretty bad-ass when he gets entangled in her CIA conspiracy shit. I know it's been a while, and we relate his face to only comedic movies, but the guy can bring his A game when he needs to.