Comic-Con Recap: Day Two
By Ben Johnson
Day two of Comic-Con had a lot going on, with panels from Sony Pictures, The Walking Dead, Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., and plenty more. So let’s skip right to the highlights from Friday!
– When it comes to cult television, very few people can claim more of a following than Joss Whedon. But with the worldwide success of The Avengers, his new show Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. will probably have too big a fan base to qualify it for cult status. The show’s panel surprised everyone by actually screening the entire pilot episode of the series, and initial reactions seem pretty positive. It’s said to have all of the trademark humor that we’ve come to expect from Whedon, plus solid charisma among the team of agents Clark Gregg’s Agent Coulson puts together. As I said in my preview, it’s going to be interesting to see how well S.H.I.E.L.D. translates the comic-booky elements of the Marvel universe to TV. The response to the pilot has me excited to see for myself.
– Sony brought three sequels to Comic-Con this year, two of which I didn’t realize had previous installments successful enough to warrant follow-ups. Vin Diesel’s Riddick is faced with the very easy task of being better than The Chronicles of Riddick, and Empire’s response to the panel suggests that it might very well do just that. Apparently one of the interesting things to come out of it had nothing to do with Riddick, but the possibility of Diesel appearing in a Marvel Studios movie. Empire quotes him as saying to expect “big news at the end of the month.”
The Kick-Ass 2 panel showed some clips from the anticipated (?) film, apparently focusing on the large Russian woman employed by the movie’s villain (played by Christopher Mintz-Plasse). The first Kick-Ass was remarkable for how over-the-top everything was, and it seems that the sequel is pushing that boundary even further. Just consider that Mintz-Plasse’s character goes by “The Motherf—er” and that we’re going to see Jim Carrey in military camouflage and an eye-mask, certainly doing his best to be as subtle as possible (hopefully you hear the sarcasm).
The biggest movie to make an appearance on Friday was The Amazing Spider-Man 2, which of course screened some rough footage, most notably of a fight between Jamie Foxx’s Electro and Spider-Man that, according to IGN, has the potential to be pretty epic. Director Marc Webb has said in several interviews that they worked hard to include things in this second film that set up the next two confirmed installments, such as villains like Paul Giamatti’s Rhino (revealed b Webb yesterday to be in the movie only briefly) that could return in larger roles down the line. Unfortunately Webb and company didn’t give much of new info about the movie overall, and there has still been nothing seen of Chris Cooper’s Norman Osborn or if he will be hopping on a goblin glider at any point in the film.
– For me, the biggest impact was made yesterday by The Walking Dead. AMC released a four-minute long trailer for the fourth season that shows a renewed focus on defending the prison from the ever-dangerous walkers. Several new characters are spotlighted in the trailer, along with a bigger role for Carol, who may finally shed the label of “most annoying character not named Andrea.” And once again, it’s not just the undead that pose a threat, as we see that at some point next season someone sabotages the group from the inside and allows walkers into the cell block. That looks to set things up for a “stay or leave” debate among the survivors, and likely causes healthy doses of mistrust among the old guard and the new arrivals. It’s a really effective trailer (which you can watch in full here) and gets me excited for the new season in October. If Walking Dead can maintain the mojo it had at the beginning of season three for a full 13 or so episodes, we’re in for a treat this fall.
Stay tuned right here for news from the biggest day of the convention as Fox, Marvel Studios, and a whole heck of a lot more are on tap for Saturday!