News Bites: Trolls and Tomorrow

Good morning folks, it’s Friday, time for the News Bites. For my regular readers, a quick update on when I’m getting back to regular content: very soon. The bad tooth was pulled out Tuesday, and while I’m still catching up on sleep and awaiting eating solid food again, I’m feeling pretty good. I want to build up a small buffer of watched films before I start posting reviews again, but hopefully those will start going up on Tuesday. The MMV will be along on Monday; I’m undecided right now on whether I’ll be posting a Sunday article or using the time to build up the buffer. It depends a bit on how things go; got a busy couple of days today and tomorrow.

But enough about me. You’re here for news about the movies. And there’s quite a bit of that, with sci-fi films, comedies, and family films all being heavily represented in this week’s News Bites. Read on to find out what’s going on!

News Bites: Pilots and Planes

It’s Friday morning, and time for another weekly dose of entertainment news. This week’s news bites include a healthy dose of mighty Marvel Movie news, a little speculation on Green Lantern, some other sequel news, and a little bit of talk about television and music. So while the movie talk may be pretty fantasy-centric, overall it’s a pretty well-rounded batch.

Awards Season 2013

The 2013 film awards season is now officially underway. The Golden Globe nominations were out a few weeks ago, with the ceremony tonight, and this past week the Academy Awards, the largest awards ceremony (at least as far as public awareness is concerned) released their nominees. Their shadow archetype, the Golden Raspberries, have also been released.

I haven’t seen a lot of the films up for contention on either; there may come a year in which I’ve seen several of the likely candidates, but 2012 wasn’t it. Still, I do have a few thoughts on the nominees, which I’ll get to in a moment. But it’s fairly likely that this year I’m just going to read the results in the paper instead of watching them live.

News Bites: A Million Ways to Die and Three Days to Kill

This Friday morning, we’ve got a few small things to discuss, and a whole lot of Golden Globe nominations. Those in a bit. Up first are a couple news bites that are intriguing, and a couple which are groan-worthy (not necessarily in that order.)

Apparently the new fad genre is going to be spoof-westerns. It was announced a few weeks ago that Adam Sandler is making The Ridiculous 6 for a 2014 release, but now comes the news that Seth MacFarlane is beating him to the punch with A Million Ways to Die in the West, which is planned for release in summer 2013.

Kevin Costner and Amber Heard will co-star in Three Days to Kill. Costner will play a Secret Service agent who is dying; Heard plays a woman who offers him a second chance at life through a wonder drug if he goes on a mission for her. Complication: the drug is hallucinogenic. The movie will be directed by McG (This Means War). It sounds pretty interesting, but I’d be a little more interested if storywriter Luc Besson (The Professional, The Fifth Element) directed it instead.

Some concept art of Frozen, Disney’s animated feature for next year, has been revealed; see below. The film, which at one point was canceled and then revived, is based on Hans Christian Andersen’s The Snow Queen. Kristen Bell and Idina Menzell are lending their voices to the project.

At what point can we say a franchise has reached the saturation point? Angry Birds is getting a movie, to be released in 2016. Rovio Entertainment, the producers of the game, will be developing the film themselves, with Finnish animation studio Kombo. The producer is John Cohen, who produced Despicable Me; the director, voice talent, writers, and just how they’re going to stretch that game’s barely-there concept into a 90 minute film have not been announced.

Last and certainly not least, the Golden Globe nominations are out. Click through for the full list of nominees.

Weekly Weblinks: Willis and White Whales

It’s the first Friday in October, and you know what that means! Being Friday means it’s time for the Weekly Weblinks, and being October means there’s a lot of spooky and scary content to be shared. From other bloggers, we have reviews of two spooky flicks for kids, a horror anthology for adults, and an in-depth look at the master of suspense, plus a new sci-fi feature that’s getting a lot of love lately and a whole lotta love for some actors who don’t get the spotlight often.

The press agencies are getting into the Halloween spirit as well, although there aren’t any horror films mentioned in the news bites. No, instead they’re settling for just making the news itself horrifying. You’re sure to find something to scream about, so read on for the Weekly Weblinks!

Weekly Weblinks: First Feature

This morning I’m starting a new feature here on Morgan on Media, the Weekly Weblinks. I’ve been seeing a few other bloggers start up various “Follow Friday” features, or other ways to share readers around the net, and I felt like this would be a good way to do my part. Each Weekly Weblinks feature will include several links to specific blog posts that I have enjoyed reading, and think are worth sharing. It will also include various news tidbits that I felt like saying a few words on, but which didn’t warrant a full post on their own (news pieces where I do have more to say will remain as their own posts under Media News). And it’ll often have another item just for the fun of it.

Because these are articles that I’m finding as I go along the week, the exact nature and number of the links will vary from week to week. Bloggers who I follow are likely to have a greater representation — I wouldn’t be following them if I didn’t like what they write, after all — but other posts I come across can and will show up as well. If any of the posts sound interesting to you, check them out; that’s what it’s all about.