News: Patty Jenkins to Direct Thor 2

The sequel to 2011′s Thor now has a director. Replacing Kenneth Branagh at the helm is Patty Jenkins, whose prior directing work includes the critically-acclaimed Monster. The film, with a simple working title of Thor 2 for now, has been re-scheduled from a summer release date to November 15, 2013.

On the one hand, Jenkins doesn’t have a lot of directorial experience, especially not in action films. But she wouldn’t be the first director to overcome that hurdle, and at least she has a respected film under her belt. I’m a little more curious about the schedule change; it might indicate that things aren’t going as swiftly as they had hoped. Still, it’s going to be in the early holiday season, which is as good a time for fantasy blockbusters as early summer.

Captain America: The First Avenger

I felt like I needed to watch something a bit more uplifting after yesterday’s viewing of Boyz N The Hood, and it seemed like the right time to go see Captain America: The First Avenger. One advantage of being late to the game is that by this time, word of mouth has gotten around and I had reason to think I wouldn’t be disappointed. The early promotional material — blurbs from the director, hints from the writers — before the trailers hit gave me some mild concerns, but I held onto my optimism for once. Captain America’s been subjected to some very bad movies in the past, but I felt that, handled correctly, a Captain America movie could and should be one of the best of the superhero genre.

I was not disappointed.