Leith Skilling - Critic & Reviewer

January 30, 2020

“Loki” Could Expand Gender Diversity In The MCU!

While the Marvel Cinematic Universe has had an often uncomfortable relationship with the LGBTQ+ community (and recently, specifically the transgender community), things are looking up for the future, as new reports suggest that the upcoming Loki Disney+ series could feature not only a gender-fluid star, but a transgender supporting character. This would be a groundbreaking step forward if either rumor is accurate, and could pave the way for more diversity in future Marvel films and TV properties.

The Loki series recently began production, with star Tom Hiddleston (who, of course, plays the traditionally male trickster god and sorcerer, Loki) sharing a brief video of himself performing some high-flying stunts for an action sequence. In the MCU, Loki has only ever been a male, but while you may think that Loki’s comics-canon gender-fluidity is something that would have come up in the movies already if it were also film-canon, there have been multiple rumors that suggest Loki could shift back and forth between genders throughout the duration of the show, with Hiddleston portraying their male side, and an actress (possibly Yesterday‘s Sophia Di Martino) taking on the role of Lady Loki. It’s worth noting that the Loki we’ll see in this show is the Loki who escaped into an alternate universe during the events of Avengers: Endgame, armed with the Space Stone and possibly a method of time-travel – this isn’t the same Loki we’ve grown accustomed to in the years since 2012’s The Avengers: this is an almost completely different iteration of the character, one who might be more comfortable with their gender-fluidity, and/or more likely to come out. The show, which is also rumored to include magical Marvel villains like Amora the Enchantress, could pose a problem that requires Loki to switch between genders in order to get out of harm’s way. Who knows? There’s any number of reasons why this crucial aspect of Loki’s character is only just being seen onscreen now (and there’s still no official confirmation that it is), and we’ll just have to wait and see which one Marvel decides upon.

As for the other rumor, that a transgender actress will play an openly transgender character in the series, this is one that has been tossed around for a while: the character in question, a transwoman named Sera, was initially rumored to make her MCU debut in Thor: Love And Thunder, but new updates suggest that she will, instead, have a major supporting role in Loki – Sera is one of only a handful of transgender characters in Marvel comics, and her story is one that’s always been linked to Marvel’s Norse pantheon: born a male angel in the kingdom of Heven, Sera transitioned at a young age and was rescued from her dismal life by Thor’s long-lost sister Angela, who soon became Sera’s girlfriend. Considering that we’ve already had one of Thor’s long-lost sisters show up in the MCU, it seems a bit of a stretch to assume that we’re now going to introduce another one, which leads me to believe that either (a) Angela will not appear, and Sera’s storyline will be very different from the comics, or (b) Marvel will replace Angela with Hela, and have the popular villain return, only to find true love. That might sound absurd, but Sera does have a connection to Hela in the comics that, with ~~a lot of~~ just a little tampering could be the base for a solid love-story, I guess? I mean, it’s not like Hela tortured and imprisoned Sera or anything, right?

*she totally did, by the way*

Sera’s inclusion in the series is said to be the stepping stone towards a role in future MCU movies, which probably includes Thor: Love And Thunder, where, completely coincidentally, she’d likely cross paths with the bisexual Queen of Asgard, Valkyrie (who, completely coincidentally, is said to be looking for a partner in the film). So maybe instead of falling for any of Thor’s sisters, heroic, villainous or otherwise, Sera will end up with a very different but no less iconic member of the Thor mythos.

The other notable thing about this is that Sera is said to be played by a transgender actress – meaning that all that controversy earlier this year about Marvel president Kevin Feige tip-toeing around the subject of transgender representation, confirming it and immediately walking it back, could have a happy ending. All that being said, none of this is yet confirmed by Marvel or Disney. So keep your expectations measured, at least for right now.

What do you think? Will Loki and Sera be gender-fluid and transgender, respectively, in the Loki series, and how do you think the Marvel fandom will take this news, if it turns out to be true? Share your own thoughts, theories and opinions in the comments below!

January 25, 2020

Simon Merrells Cast In Amazon’s “Lord Of The Rings”!

Amazon Prime recently announced the main cast for their upcoming Lord Of The Rings prequel adaptation (a multi-talented fellowship of fifteen, all of whom seem like admirable and interesting people), but now, with their production start-date inching closer, it’s time for them to start casting the smaller roles: recurring characters, guest stars, that sort of thing. Simon Merrells is the first such actor to be cast, according to new reporting.

Merrells, best known for his work on the TV series Spartacus (and for his brief but hilarious role on another Amazon Prime series, Good Omens), will supposedly be joining the cast of the epic fantasy in a recurring role: unsurprisingly, we don’t have a character name to attach to his face just yet, nor do we know how many episodes he will appear in. But that’s never stopped me before, and it’s not enough to stop me now from taking a wild shot in the dark and throwing out a guess for who I think Merrells could portray in the first season of Amazon’s Lord Of The Rings.

The character who came to mind immediately, after taking a long, hard look at Merrells’ long, hard face, was Círdan the Shipwright. Círdan is by no means a pivotal figure in the histories of the Second Age of Middle-earth, when this series takes place, but he is still just important enough to warrant popping up from time to time: he was one of the three Elven Ringbearers, and throughout the Second Age he wore on his hand Narya, the Ring of Fire – a responsibility he doesn’t seem to have ever exploited, as there’s no record of him ever using the Ring (and as soon as the Third Age rolled around, he took the first chance he got and passed it off to Gandalf). In this Age, he mostly stayed put in the peaceful country of Lindon, where he was probably a close confidante of the Elven king Gil-galad. He also started construction on the Grey Havens, which would later serve as the Elven peoples’ last escape-route from Middle-earth in times of war and hardship. There, at the Havens, he was probably the guardian of one of the palantíri seeing stones (which technically was housed a couple miles away at Elostirion, but close enough to still conceivably be within his sphere of influence). He stood by Isildur and Elrond on the slopes of Mount Doom after the first defeat of Sauron, and presumably backed Elrond up when the latter tried to convince Isildur not to take the One Ring. He’s a character who stands on the margins of this world’s history, watching events unfold with a patient, foreseeing eye, but rarely getting involved in the action. In other words, he’s not going to be around often in the series, but when he does show up, it’ll probably be for big, dramatic moments.

And of course, Merrells matches his physical description well enough: Círdan is written to be an old Elf, still noble and majestic, but weathered and worn-down a little from the weight of his burdens and the pain he has seen. Merrells, with his gaunt features and deep-set eyes, looks almost exactly like the character – I say “almost”, because Círdan is supposed to have a long grizzled beard, but that shouldn’t be too much of a problem for Merrells, who has grown a decent-sized beard before for multiple roles.

So that’s who I think Simon Merrells could play in the Amazon Prime series. Who do you think he’s playing, and what do you think of the casting? Share your thoughts, theories and opinions in the comments below!

January 23, 2020

America Chavez Will Appear In “Doctor Strange 2”!

It’s long been suspected that the Young Avengers team, an iconic and diverse line-up of teen and young adult superheroes from Marvel Comics, would someday join the Marvel Cinematic Universe – and in a few short months, those suspicions have been confirmed by one announcement after another, until now it’s simply a matter of time before the entire team is assembled onscreen. Today, yet another Young Avenger is rumored to be appearing in the MCU, and, assuming these rumors turn out to have any truth to them, it looks like the team is very nearly complete.

In the comics, the most established roster of Young Avengers includes archer extraordinaire Kate Bishop (confirmed to be a lead character in the upcoming Hawkeye Disney+ series), reality-warping Wiccan and his self-explanatory twin brother Speed (rumored to be introduced in WandaVision on Disney+), shapeshifter Hulkling (currently being cast for an appearance in WandaVision), child sorcerer Loki (likely being cast for the Loki Disney+ series), size-altering Cassie Lang (already an MCU character, and now the perfect age to join the team, thanks to Avengers: Endgame‘s time shenanigans), super-strong Patriot (a bit of a question mark right now, but a possible supporting character for The Falcon And The Winter Soldier on Disney+), and universe-hopping America Chavez, whom new rumors suggest will be a key player in Doctor Strange And The Multiverse Of Madness, one of next year’s biggest Marvel releases.

The sequel to Doctor Strange’s origin film will likely involve the Sorcerer Supreme traveling through the many branches of the Multiverse (of madness) on his next adventure, and it’s not too surprising that he would encounter Chavez, who hails from an alternate reality known as the Utopian Parallel and has the ability to move through the Multiverse (of madness) using magical, star-shaped portals. A teenage Hispanic girl is apparently being cast to play the character, who will likely be one of the MCU’s first Hispanic heroines, and, if Marvel follows the comics with any sort of accuracy, their first LGBTQ+ Hispanic heroine as well. Not only is Chavez herself openly gay, but she was also raised by two mothers who sacrificed themselves trying to close a black hole that threatened their peaceful universe. Hopefully we get to see all of this onscreen, and not have it be merely alluded to (like, you know, every other supposedly LGBTQ+ character that Marvel has introduced thus far).

If Chavez does show up, she’ll probably be very helpful to Doctor Strange, who is going to need to traverse various obstacles and explore dangerous new worlds on his journey through the space-time continuum. Other companions of his may include faithful sidekick Wong, as well as Scarlet Witch and her son, Wiccan. This is just conjecture, but if Wiccan and America Chavez both show up in the same movie together, they could forge a friendship that will become the core dynamic of the Young Avengers.

So what do you think of Chavez possibly entering the MCU, and what will her role be in the Doctor Strange sequel? Who do you want to be cast as the young heroine? Share your thoughts, theories and opinions in the comments below!

January 23, 2020

“Captain Marvel 2” In The Works At Marvel!

To nobody’s surprise, the wildly successful Captain Marvel, released last March, is getting a sequel: the cosmic superhero film, Marvel Studios’ first to be headlined by a female hero, crossed into the billion-dollar club within a couple weeks, and introduced audiences to star Brie Larson as the sassy, headstrong Carol Danvers a month before her small but pivotal role in the mega-hit Avengers: Endgame. And while a tiny, toxic group of angry moviegoers complained that Larson and Danvers were “ruining Marvel”, most people simply ignored the loud discourse that surrounded the film’s release, and found Danvers and her supporting cast to be perfectly likable and fun: her movie was enjoyable, the writing was average (with a couple outstanding exceptions that I will defend to the death), and the directing was fine. Turns out, Carol Danvers was absolutely no different from many of her male Marvel co-stars – in that her debut movie was a strong, if safe, jumping-off point into future installments of her solo saga.

But now, with a new setting, a new screenwriter, and new directors, the Space Stone-powered heroine’s sequel movie could be something truly extraordinary: something that could prove once and for all why Danvers is the perfect candidate to lead the Marvel Cinematic Universe into the new decade. So let’s discuss everything we now know about Captain Marvel 2.

"Captain Marvel 2" In The Works At Marvel! 4 — reddit.com

It appears that Carol Danvers’ sequel will shake things up by giving us a change of scenery: while her origin movie was set in 1995, a couple years after the young fighter pilot was abducted by Kree aliens after absorbing the powers of an Infinity Stone, her second solo outing will take place in the present day (or, rather, the future day), after the events of Avengers: Endgame (which is set in the year 2023, in case you’ve forgotten). That means the Carol we see next will be an older, wiser Carol, a Carol who will have spent almost three decades traveling the stars, helping end wars across the galaxy. There’s no indication yet of who she’ll interact with in her sequel: will her best friend Maria Rambeau still be around to help her? Most importantly to comic-book fans, will Maria’s impressionable young daughter Monica have matured into the superhero known as Photon?

Considering who the sequel’s screenwriter is going to be, I’d guess the answer is “yes”. Megan McDonnell is supposedly set to write the scripts for Carol’s upcoming follow-up film, and her current credits include WandaVision, the hotly-anticipated Disney+ streaming series that will introduce a grown-up version of Monica Rambeau. Considering everything we now know about WandaVision, from the fact that it’s been fast-tracked for a late 2020 release, to the fact that its writers are now being moved into other key positions at Marvel, it looks like the series, which will star Elizabeth Olsen as a dangerously unbalanced Scarlet Witch, is going to be a big hit for the studio, and everybody involved with its production will probably leave with their heads held high.

Captain Marvel directors Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck, on the other hand, may not be able to walk away from their tenure at Marvel with such honor – the directing duo are suspected to be moving on to other projects, and will not be helming Danvers’ sequel: Marvel is supposedly searching for a female director to take on the project, and guide it to its projected 2022 release date. Honestly, while I bear no ill will towards Boden and Fleck, I don’t think this is necessarily a bad idea: they didn’t do a bad job directing Captain Marvel, but they also didn’t do anything particularly new or invigorating – though, as I mentioned, I think the film does have some really good elements, including on-point humor, a subtly campy 90’s vibe, and strong performances. The sequel can do whatever it wants with that: it can go all Thor: The Dark World (a bad decision: don’t do that, Marvel) and double down on everything from the first film, or it can try for a more Thor: Ragnarok approach and branch out in a new direction, test the waters, give us a surprisingly fresh perspective on the character. Personally, I’d love to see Carol spend more time in space in her sequel, rather than moving about undercover on earth – that would also allow her to take on opponents her own size, and face some real challenges: since there’s probably very few villains on Earth who are going to stand a chance against her laser-punches and indestructible, fiery aura.

So what do you think? Carol’s story will have major changes both behind the scenes and in front of the camera, but will all turn out well? Where do you want to see her go next? Should she spend more time in space or on Earth? Share your thoughts, theories and opinions in the comments below!