Pop Culture Princess

Pop Culture Princess
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Tuesday, December 13, 2016

Everything old is new again at the 2017 Movie Trailer Park

While we still have a few new movies to get to before the last bell on New Year's Eve has chimed, one of the somewhat positive things to look forward to for 2017 are the fresh flicks set to arrive then.

However, a good number of those films will be reboots/remakes/revivals of former cinematic and/or TV fare. Such a development isn't an automatic recipe for success or disaster but let's check out a handful of 2017 trailers that are clearly on this bandwagon.

First up is Spiderman Homecoming, which is giving us a newer,younger version of the web crawler who was recently showcased in Captain America; Civil War. This Peter Parker(Tom Holland) is still in high school and while he does get a visit or two from  his Avenger mentor Iron Man, that doesn't mean that he has on-call backup when villains such as The Vulture(Michael Keaton) and The Shocker(Bokeem Woodbine) show up to cause trouble.

So far, this appears to be a lot of fun and a good way to work Spiderman into future Avengers movies. Granted, we've had more than our fair share of Spidey film franchises within the last decade but I think that this particular revamp will work out well:




I'm afraid that I can't say the same for the upcoming Tom Cruise helmed The Mummy which,based on the trailer alone, looks like Mission Impossible does The Monster Mash.

Other than the title creature being a pissed-off princess instead of a high priest seeking his lost love, there's not much evidence of this latest take on the horror movie classic having anything original to add to the already well established mythos of this creature feature or being anything other than a special effects fest.

Sure, you could say that about those Brendan Fraser Mummy movies,too but at least the first two had some period piece fun and adventure with that concept. This one just appears to be a fancy pile of CGI dust:


Turning to TV based films, I have to say that I've never been a fan of Baywatch yet do appreciate the camp value of the show.

Apparently, so the filmmakers as casting Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson as the new head lifeguard as well as Zac Efron being his less than welcome sidekick tells me that they're going for a 21 Jump Street movie translation.

David Hasslehoff and Pamela Anderson are set to make appearances here(no word on Yasmine Bleeth,alas) and all in all, this could be good goofy fun, something we will be in sore need by the time that this flick hits the multiplex beach:



Last but far from least for many longtime fans, Power Rangers will be back in action with a much gritty take on the space age super teen squad.

For one, Elizabeth Banks plays a more involved Rita Repulsa, the wicked woman with evil and then some on her mind. No longer a cartoonish villainess, she appears to be just as much of a threat as the fierce flunkies that are sent to stop this new crop of heroes.

While I was too old for Power Rangers(that was more of my sister's generation), I did enjoy some of their hijinks way back when and this modern makeover should win over a new set of fans and hopefully please the older ones to boot:



Certainly, there will be many more reworkings of previous done material than this and the best we can hope for this that the better editions will inspire new interest in those franchises.

After all, things can be even badder than that as the arrival of Fifty Shades Darker is looming ahead of us and just in time for Valentine's Day! It's hard to decide which is worse; unwanted sequels or warmed up versions of our favorite films and TV shows?

On the other hand, FSD is bound to be more of a cinematic trainwreck than it's pretty awful predecessor was,which should be prime meat material for all of those parody makers out there. The way things are going, we're all going to need a good laugh at the movies, one way or the other, so let's take our mirth where we can get it:


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