canon | the m0vie blog

New Escapist Column! On “Across the Spider-Verse” as a Superhero Empowerment Fantasy…

Posted on June 2, 2023 by Darren

I published a new In the Frame piece at The Escapist this evening. With the release of Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, it seemed like a good opportunity to delve into what the movie is about, particularly its relationship to other recent superhero movies.

After all, what is the point of superhero movies? What are they about? What purpose do they serve? In recent years, the superhero genre has come to be shaped by the language of militarism and law enforcement, treating superheroes as cops and soldiers who just happen to wear masks. Across the Spider-Verse is a film largely about grappling with the legacy of that trend, in which the central villains are “an elite strike team” of “all the best Spider-People” whose job it is to maintain the status quo, no matter how many innocent people suffer to maintain the established order.

You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.

Filed under: Movies | Tagged: canon, continuity, cops, in the frame, into the spider-verse, law enforcement, miles morales, militarism, policing, spider-man: across the spider-verse, status quo, the escapist | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Column! On How Film Culture Became Online Culture…

Posted on December 5, 2022 by Darren

I published a new In the Frame piece at The Escapist this evening. With the publication of the once-in-a-decade Sight & Sound poll last week, it seemed like a good opportunity to dig into the results and consider what they say about modern film culture.

The list has provoked some response online for being too modern and too recent, including films like Portrait of a Lady on Fire, Get Out, Moonlight and Parasite. However, it’s part of a rich tradition of updating and modernising the cinematic canon. The most interesting aspect of the list is the way in which it demonstrates how film culture is online, how so many of the films to appear and climb on the list did so by becoming more readily and available, and by being embraced by an internet-literate generation of film critics.

You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.

Filed under: Movies | Tagged: canon, cinema, criterion, film, in the frame, internet, modernity, Online, sight & sound, the escapist, twitter | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Video! On “The Rings of Power” and the Limits of the Franchise-Era Mystery Box…

Posted on October 31, 2022 by Darren

We’re thrilled to be launching a fortnightly video companion piece to In the Frame at The Escapist. The video will typically launch every second Monday, and be released on the magazine’s YouTube channel. And the video will typically be separate from the written content. This is kinda cool, because we’re helping relaunch the magazine’s film content – so if you can throw a subscription our way, it would mean a lot.

This week, we took a look at The Rings of Power, the prequel series to The Lord of the Rings. In particular, the way that it is built around so many mystery boxes. It’s a problem facing a lot of modern franchise media, where these shows attempt to keep audiences hooked by building elaborate mystery boxes around established lore. The mystery box was a problem for early serialized television at the turn of the millennium, and it is a shame to see it return in the streaming age of franchise media, where the answer is always nostalgia.

Filed under: Television | Tagged: audience, canon, continuity, franchises, in the frame, mystery, mystery box, nostalgia, the escapist | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Column! On How “Star Trek: Lower Decks” is Embracing Its Own Continuity…

Posted on October 25, 2022 by Darren

I published a new piece at The Escapist last week. We’re doing a series of recaps and reviews of Star Trek: Lower Decks, which is streaming weekly on Paramount+ in the States and on Amazon Prime in the United Kingdom. The penultimate episode of the third season released last week, and it seemed like a good opportunity to take a look at the series.

With the end of the third season fast approaching, there is an interesting shift taking place in Lower Decks. The animated show is built around Star Trek fan services, driven and shaped by continuity references to earlier shows in the franchise, particularly those from the nineties. As the seasonw raps up, it is interesting to see Lower Decks embrace the idea of continuity itself. Trusted Sources is an episode that explores evolving Star Trek continuity from the early episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation to the final sweeping epic of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, and finds continuity within Lower Decks.

You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.

Filed under: Star Trek | Tagged: canon, continuity, references, star trek, star trek: lower decks, the escapist, trusted sources | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Video! “A Marvelous Escape” – What If – “… Earth Lost Its Mightiest Heroes?”

Posted on August 30, 2021 by Darren

With a slew of Marvel Studios productions coming to Disney+ over the next six months, The Escapist has launched a weekly show discussing these series

This week, I join KC Nwosu and Amy Campbell to talk about the third episode of What If…?, streaming on Disney+.

Filed under: Podcasts!, Television | Tagged: amy campbell, avengers, canon, continuity, hank pym, kc nwosu, nick fury, the avengers, what if | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Column! On Hollywood’s Next Franchising Trend, the “Requel”…

Posted on August 1, 2021 by Darren

I published a new column at The Escapist today. The success of David Gordon Green’s Halloween and the announcement of his upcoming Exorcist trilogy seemed like a good time to discuss one of the more interesting modern trends in studio franchising: the rebooted sequel, or the “requel.” The idea is that if an original movie is iconic, but subsequent sequels have devalued the brand, the studio can just roll the franchise back to the earlier beloved film and effectively start franchising again from that point onwards.

It is a frustrating and unsettling trend that illustrates the cannibalistic feeding frenzy that is modern franchising. Hollywood has already franchised every viable property, but this approach allows studios a second (or third) bite of the apple by effectively erasing perceived mistakes and rolling the clock back to earlier and more nostalgia-friendly points in the shared continuity. It’s interesting to see this approach becoming increasingly mainstream.

You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.

Filed under: On Second Thought | Tagged: canon, continuity, david gordon green, Franchising, halloween, intellectual property, prequel, reboot, requel, requels, sequels, terminator, the escapist, the exorcist | 2 Comments »

241. Kimetsu no Yaiba: Mugen Ressha-Hen (Demon Slayer – Kimetsu no Yaiba – The Movie: Mugen Train) – This Just In (#238)

Posted on July 3, 2021 by Darren

Hosted by Andrew Quinn and Darren Mooney, with special guests Graham Day and Bríd Martin, The 250 is a (mostly) weekly trip through some of the best (and worst) movies ever made, as voted for by Internet Movie Database Users. New episodes are released every Saturday at 6pm GMT.

This time, Haruo Sotozaki’s Demon Slayer – The Movie: Mugen Train.

Following a series of mysterious disappearances on a train from Tokyo to Mugen, three young demon slayers are dispatched to investigate possible supernatural influences. The three quickly team up with a veteran soldier in the battle against evil, and discover just how quickly their mission can go off the rails.

At time of recording, it was ranked 238th on the list of the best movies of all time on the Internet Movie Database.

Continue reading →

Filed under: This Just In | Tagged: animated, anime, blockbuster, brid martin, canon, children, continuity, demon slayer, Demon Slayer - Kimetsu no Yaiba - The Movie: Mugen Train, Demon Slayer - The Movie: Mugen Train, demon slayer: mugen train, demon slayer: the movie, demons, film, graham day, japan, Movie, mugen train, ova, serialisation, series | 1 Comment »

New Escapist Column! On “WandaVision” and “Loki”, and the Challenges to the MCU Canon…

Posted on June 16, 2021 by Darren

I published a new In the Frame piece at The Escapist earlier this week. With Loki delving into the continuity of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, it’s interesting to wonder why the modern stage of the MCU seems so preoccupied with its own history and continuity.

Black Widow will be a prequel. The Eternals will chart the secret history of a corner of the larger universe. Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings will potentially retcon Iron Man 3. On top of that, Spider-Man: Far From Home teased the possibility of a multiverse, while WandaVision warped reality. As such, it seems like the franchise is building towards something – but what could that be and what does it mean for the shared universe’s canon?

You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.

Filed under: Television | Tagged: canon, continuity, history, in the frame, loki, mcu, the escapist | 2 Comments »

New Escapist Column! On “Loki” as a Fugitive From Continuity…

Posted on June 14, 2021 by Darren

I published a new column at The Escapist yesterday. Following the premiere of Loki, it seemed like an opportunity to take a look at some of the meta-fictional aspects of the beloved trickster.

At its core, Loki is essentially the story of a character trying to escape their own narrative and wrest control of the story in which they’ve found themselves trapped. The title character of Loki has always been a supporting player, an antagonist or an ensemble player. Loki finds the character pushing his way to the fore, trying to figure out his own arc and his own place when he is no longer defined by the role that he has played for the past decade of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.

Filed under: On Second Thought | Tagged: canon, continuity, loki, marvel, Marvel Studios, mcu, the escapist, thor, tom hiddleston | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Column! On How “Mission: Impossible” Would Cause Fan Outrage Today…

Posted on May 31, 2021 by Darren

I published a new In the Frame piece at The Escapist this evening. With Brian dePalma’s Mission: Impossible turning twenty-five years old this month, it seemed as good a time as any to take a look back the film that started the modern iteration of the franchise.

In hindsight, it is impossible to imagine Mission: Impossible getting made today. The movie’s big twist is the revelation that the one character carried over from the television show, a standard bearer for the larger franchise, has secretly betrayed everything that the audience took for granted. The twist was controversial at the time, with several members of the original cast and some fans objecting to the characterisation. However, in a franchise-driven age where any deviation from the template is a source of outrage, it’s impossible to imagine Mission: Impossible attempting anything so bold today.

You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.