“I think the promise of the show was always that we were going to go beyond just the moon and Mars. I think that’s kind of what I think Titan represents. It’s one of those steps we’ve been looking to make from the very beginning. I will say you’ll see more of it. I don’t want to get into details of what exactly is going to happen, but yes, Titan is very much a plan for this season in particular. So anyone who’s been following so far will see the next steps in the next few episodes.“
-Statement by For All Mankind’s executive producer Ben Nedivi in an interview with ScreenRant regarding the latest season of the television series. The alternative history series started the fifth season with a growing Happy Valley Martian colony. The new space race is aiming for Saturn’s moon. Whether this is the last stop before the series ends with season six is anybody’s guess.
I can understand that actors and actresses want to make some extra money on the side with advertising gigs, but sometimes the result is more comical than convincing.
For example, actress Zendaya is now featured in Rolex watch advertisements with images of her as Dune’s Chani. It even has the slogan “Reach for the crown.”
Anyone who understands the Dune books and movies would know that Chani is a Fremen who has no use for ostentatious wealth. The last thing a Fremen would seek is a heavy, ornamental watch in the desert. The only riches for the Fremen is water.
Maybe Rolex would find a better fit with Stellan John Skarsgård and his Dune character Baron Harkonnen (below) for those times the Baron not taking a bath. The Baron seems like a Rolex kind of guy.
Zendaya is just following others here. Dune’s Timothee Chalamet is part of advertising campaigns with Chanel and Lucid Motors. And let us not forget that Omega was the official watch for NASA (below).
I just recommend that the stars and their sponsors show some awareness in their ad work.
On May 22, The Mandalorian will go from our TV screens to the movie screens with the premiere of The Mandorian and Grogu.
Overall, this is the story in the film (and this trailer helps to visualize it all):
The evil Empire has fallen, and Imperial warlords remain scattered throughout the galaxy. As the fledgling New Republic works to protect everything the Rebellion fought for, they have enlisted the help of legendary Mandalorian bounty hunter Din Djarin (Pedro Pascal) and his young apprentice Grogu.
Not too descriptive, but basically the movie is a mash up of the old Star Wars icons, such as TIE fighters, Jabba the Hutt, and All Terrain Armored Transports (or AT-AT walkers), as well as the unique creations of the TV series, including our green friend Grogu.
I would have liked to see the Andor series brought to the big screen as well, but it may be a bit too cerebral for today’s movie goers. The Mandalorian and Grogu has the feeling of the many comic book superhero films filling the theaters these days, but it is still a little more than that.
First, this is a western. Second, Pascal can do a fair bit with dialogue and movement. He is a badass, for sure, but he is also cynical and purposeful, with a weary wit. He is Robocop. He is Clint Eastwood. He is Ryan Gosling in Drive. He is not messing about and neither is the series, as an over-the-odds, off-the-books job takes our man to a secret bunker crawling with black-and-white stormtroopers, which feels like walking into an underground club in 50s Paris and finding it full of uniformed Nazis.
This is a fair assessment of what we saw in the three TV seasons. If the movie can maintain this energy, with its usual tinge of humor, it will be worth the ticket price, and more.
With all eyes on the Moon mission, it is worth revisiting the musings of Frank Herbert as he provided one possible path for mankind.
While the Dune: Part Three movie is not set to premiere until December, the first trailer is out to prepare us for what is to come, and it is a powerful two-and-a-half minutes. You can see bits of our favorite characters as well as new ones, including Timothee Chalamet, Zendaya, Javier Bardem, Rebecca Ferguson, Josh Brolin, Anya Taylor-Joy, Robert Pattinson, Florence Pugh, and Isaach de Bankolé.
This is a mind-bending, beautifully crafted, yet bleak story about the will to power, where one man leads his followers in a war that killed sixty-one billion humans, sterilized ninety planets, and wiped out the followers of forty religions. From this wisp of a teenager in Dune: Part One, we witness him becoming the whirlwind that darkens the galaxy.
Dune was aimed at this whole idea of the infallible leader because my view of history says mistakes made by a leader (or made in a leader’s name) are amplified by the numbers who follow without question. That’s how 900 people wound up in Guyana drinking poison Kool-Aid. That’s how the U.S. said “Yes, sir, Mister Charismatic John Kennedy!” and found itself embroiled in Vietnam. That’s how Germany said “Sieg Heil!” and murdered more than six million of our fellow human beings.
What Mr. Herbert left for us is an amazing story that continues to live on in the careful work of Denis Villeneuve. He has created a piece of art that not only entertains us but also warns us, like all good story-telling.
One of the comments from someone viewing the trailer was:
[M]y grandfather had the original star wars trilogy, my father had lord of the rings, [I] have dune.
“Star Trek exists in more than one world. It exists in the fantasy of science fiction – weird and wonderful things that play unimaginable possibilities of exploration and human endeavor. But it also exists in the fantasy of human beings, the perfection of human beings, the exploration that human beings have made since the dawn of time and the continuing exploration – physically mentally and morally. It’s that aspect of Star Trek that I’ve always loved, to look at something physically that doesn’t exist now by these talented writers & designers but also to tackle the eternal human questions the agonies, the ecstasies. Star Trek should exist for a long time to come based on those truths. I for one would love to see its continuity. It’s with sorrow that I hear about the cancellation of the new Star Trek series.”
-William Shatner’s comments on Twitter/X regarding the recent announcement that Star Trek’s Starfleet Academy will end after two seasons. In a follow-up post, highlighting the criticism that the new series was too woke, he continued:
During the first airing of my Star Trek series where a kiss was objectionable; many southern stations pulled the episode & condemned the show. Using today’s vernacular it would absolutely be called “woke DEI crap” because it went against “norms” of society for its time. Not a lot seems to have changed.
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