Movie theaters tempt audiences with nostalgic blockbusters

It’s been a tough couple of months for a lot of industries, even ones we would have considered bulletproof. So for the operators of multiplex theaters - already a shaky concern in the age of YouTube and home streaming - things have been absolutely disastrous. After a record-breaking $42.5 billion passed through the box office in 2019, this year’s events have already slashed an estimated $10 billion off of profits through the end of May. 

Worse still, every planned schedule for re-opening with a blitz of big-name releases has faced logistical chaos, as the coronavirus refuses to be contained in a manner convenient to economists. The entire Hollywood calendar has been pushed back by months, or in some cases directly onto streaming release, as was the case for Disney’s torrid Artemis Fowl adaptation last week. 

Determined to get the doors open again despite this uncertainty, many theaters reached into their back catalogue to fill schedules, tempting audiences with the chance to see legendary blockbusters on the silver screen. As a result, titles like Jaws, Back to the Future and E.T. hit the national charts for the first time in a generation! 1993’s original Jurassic Park wrapped its jaws around the top spot with a cool $500K weekend take, once again proving that despite a global pandemic, life (and the movie business) finds a way.

Amazon's new Wheel of Time series eyes the fantasy TV throne

If superheroes have become the banner-bearers for movies, then fantasy owns the realm of prestige TV. First Game of Thrones, then Netflix’s The Witcher have proven audience’s voracious appetite for high-budget adaptations of sweeping sword-and-sorcery epics, offering powerful escapism and rich visual detail for us at home to enthuse about on social media.

Amazon Prime honchos are hoping that The Wheel of Time will be a successor fit to take the fantasy TV throne, with production spinning up on the adaptation of Robert Jordan’s hefty 14-book saga.

Before this recent trend of adaptations elevated Game of Thrones to household notoriety, The Wheel of Time was arguably the best-known and most prestigious fantasy saga since The Lord of the Rings. Like J.R.R. Tolkien, Robert Jordan spent an incredible amount of time and effort cataloguing the history and minutia of his fantasy world, and was uncompromising in laying out a story of truly epic scope.

Beginning with the first volume in 1984, Jordan continued writing the series until his death in 2007, leaving his intended final volume unfinished. A generational passing of the torch saw younger fantasy author Brandon Sanderson complete the series from Jordan’s notes, bringing The Wheel of Time to a shelf-creaking 14 volumes!

Of course, a series of this scale and length makes a difficult dragon to tame for TV, and by the standards of any other era The Wheel of Time would be considered un-shootable. But things are different in the post-GoT world, and Amazon’s twitter for the series is announcing an almost full cast for the first table reads. They’re also running an online book club for fans to familiarize themselves with the source material - what better time to plow into the War and Peace of fantasy novels than now?

The first episodes of The Wheel of Time will be directed by Uta Briesewitz, who has had previous success in the streaming realm with Westworld. No release date has yet been offered, but Amazon’s head of TV Vernon Sanders promises “there will be news as the year progresses… we feel incredibly optimistic about the show.”

Fast fandom

As always, there is a ton going on in the interconnected world of pop culture and fan media. Here are a few of the stories that caught our eye:

New competitive Pokémon title unites community in all the wrong ways

It’s hard to go wrong when you’re literally the world’s largest media franchise, but the Pokémon Company’s latest product announcement shows us that 2020 is determined to turn everything we know on its head.

Speculation was rife as the latest Nintendo Direct touted a new, ground-breaking Pokémon game. But nobody could have predicted Pokémon Unite. A collaboration with all-powerful Chinese conglomerate Tencent, Unite seems to be a baldfaced re-skin of that company’s megahit League of Legends, with famous pocket monsters shown clashing in stereotypical MOBA-genre battles.

It’s hard to imagine much common ground between LoL and Pokémon fans, and the announcement video quickly instantly racked up some 60,000 dislikes to just 10,000 likes. It’ll be interesting to see if the concept survives!

Patty Jenkins wants Wonder Woman 3 to reflect the post-pandemic world

The seemingly-unstoppable tide of superhero media has met its match in COVID-19, with a range of titles being delayed into next year thanks to the global lockdown. Star director Patty Jenkins’ Wonder Woman 1984 is among them, forcing audiences to wait for their follow-up to Gal Gadot’s refreshing debut as the Amazon Diana.

But with that production already in the bag, Jenkins is already turning her mind to the inevitable three-quel, and how a chaotic 2020 will force changes to her previous outline. “I’ve really hit the pause button because the truth is, where that plotline was coming from was our state of being six months ago. And so I want to make sure that I’m totally absorbing whatever the result of this pandemic is… I think the plotline will stay very similar, probably. But I want to make sure it’s influenced by all of this.”

BONUS TRIVIA

Robert Jordan always intended for The Wheel of Time to be concluded by another author after his death, having made extensive notes and dictation regarding his plans for the series after being diagnosed with terminal heart disease. Brandon Sanderson, a best-selling fantasy writer who had grown up obsessing over Jordan’s books, seemed the ideal choice. But did you know that Jordan never actually met the man who would complete his life’s work?

Jordan’s last will entrusted his wife, Harriet McDougal, with the task of choosing an author to finish the books. Sanderson (shown here with McDougal), was unaware of these plans and had no connection to McDougal, but after she noticed his heartfelt eulogy for the late Jordan she offered Sanderson the task of ending the saga.