While Hollywood blockbusters are still quite capable of producing bona fide solo heroes for audiences to cheer and worry for like John Wick and [insert specially skilled Liam Neeson character name], fewer and farther between are the two-hander action romps that populated video rental shelves in the '80s and '90s. That semi-dearth of duos is largely why I'm so grateful that John Cena and Idris Elba's rip-roaring new action-comedy Heads of State exists.

As produced by Amazon MGM — whose name is basically buddy branding in and of itself — Heads of State likely could have set Cena and Elba up with the dumbest story imaginable and their combined talents would have still made it worth watching. Thankfully, screenwriting duties were handled in part by veteran scribes Josh Appelbaum and Andre Nemec, whose most prominent addition to the action genre was unquestionably co-writing Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol.

Cena brings his WWE confidence as the relatively new President of the United States Will Derringer, who was a globally recognized action movie star prior to entering politics. Naturally, Will is the overly vocal and impulsive yin to the measured and clandestine yang of Elba's Sam Clarke, Britain's Prime Minister. Opposites initially don't attract as they're brought together to unveil a plot-driving plan to fellow NATO leaders, but a nagging terrorist threat forces them to see each other's strengths instead of just the faults. It's a classic set-up, and the two stars make both the clashing and vibing feel genuine throughout.

It's the third and biggest movie yet from director Ilya Naishuller, who is arguably responsible for injecting the biggest surprises and quirkiest moments that make Heads of State stand apart from the sea of overly serious political thrillers and lesser-than action-comedies that sacrifice wowzers stunts for ad-libbed one-liners.

Together, John Cena and Idris Elba are funny, charismatic and badass enough that I already want a sequel.

Idris Elba is the kind of actor who brings his A-game to every role, and he's quite polished at choosing projects that hit above a certain line of quality. Cena by and large shares that first trait, even if his body of work sits on a slightly lower echelon. Put the two together, and where one might expect to see two larger-than-life personalities fighting for screen-supremacy, and the result is instead perfectly complementary. The pairing worked in The Suicide Squad within a larger ensemble but fully thrives here.

Cena's Will Derringer is largely a caricature that mixes Donald Trump's political bravado and impulsive outbursts with former Governator Arnold Schwarzenegger's embrace of his Hollywood past. He's the kind of guy who loves to solve problems with easily digestible catchphrases, which initially puts him at odds with Elba's more stoic and contemplative Sam Clarke. Their argumentative dynamic creates a bit of a grind early on as everyone's personalities are spread out in full, but the pair's chemistry is locked in straightaway, making this way easier to watch than an actual political debate.

The two leaders are forced into teaming up aboard Air Force One after the flight gets targeted by a team of goons guided by Paddy Considine's shady mustachioed villain Viktor Gradov. Once the two heroes are free and clear of the plane crash, they're forced to go on the run to seek out a welcoming U.S. embassy, with plenty of expected and unexpected threats getting in their way. If you think it wouldn't get old watching Cena and Elba punch, kick and shoot enemies with gleeful aplomb, you'd be right.

Not that the two titular Heads provide the only star power. Priyanka Chopra-Jonas is every bit as badass as her co-stars while portraying MI6 agent Noel Bisset, whose prolonged absence during a chunk of the movie feels more like a scheduling issue than a story plus-up. The Boys and Novocaine's Jack Quaid pops in for some brazen and brutal delights, and might actually boast the most highlight reel-ready appearance of anyone.

Nobody director Ilya Naishuller gets his biggest budget yet, with lots of fun, unique, and explosive moments to show for it.

Russian filmmaker Ilya Naishuller made his mark on Hollywood and U.S. audiences with the 2015 action flick Hardcore Henry (budget: $2 million), which is infamous for being shot entirely from the first-person perspective of its main character. Next up, Naishuller turned Bob Odenkirk into a low-key action hero with 2021's Nobody (budget: $16 million), which was a big enough hit to spark a sequel (coming later this year).

With Heads of State, however, the director is working on a completely different level, and his ability to scale his talents up becomes quite evident during the first big action sequence onboard Air Force One. Actually, the moments that occur outside the plane are the best indicators of Naishuller's ability to shake up the norm. A couple of the most memorable shots in the film come from cameras that are attached to drone explosives aimed at the POTUS' plane, calling back to Hardcore Henry's P.O.V. approach.

Other stunts and shots peppered throughout the film also show off Naishuller's imaginative approach to camerawork – be on the lookout for a character who's missing his front teeth – which helps give Heads of State more personality than the majority of less playful releases. Even when explosive weapons aren't in use, Will and Sam's hand-to-hand combat scenes are somehow just as much fun and exciting to watch.

That applies fully to the main antagonist's top pair of hyper-violent enforcers, Sasha the Killer (Alexander Kuznetsov) and Olga the Killer (Katrina Durden), who seem to defy death as they continue chasing the two world leaders wherever necessary. The duo would have felt right at home in The Raid or Oldboy.

I admittedly expected more of those unique and unexpected moments throughout, and it's entirely possible that making such a big budget movie for Amazon MGM stymied some of Ilya Naishuller's wackier instincts in order to keep everything on a clear and understandable narrative path.

Despite early issues with plot and tone, Heads of State boasts a pretty flawless second half.

Had a version of Heads of State come out in the '80s alongside the comparable buddy action classics Lethal Weapon and 48 Hrs., the political exposition laid out in the first act likely wouldn't have inspired a second glance. But at a time when real-world news is affected by partisanship at every level, watching any kind of immature tête-à-tête between two global leaders – even a fictional comedic-minded one – can immedaitely become exhausting.

Beyond the politico murk, the film's opening sequences also have a lot of exposition and character introductions to get through, which is where audiences first meet Chopra-Jonas' Noel and Sarlto Copley's Agent Coop. Which leads to introductions for Will's Chief of Staff Simone (Sarah Niles), Sam's second banana Quincy (Richard Coyle) and Viktor Gradov's American quasi-henchman Arthur (Stephen Root). Let's also not forget Will's Vice President Elizabeth Kirk, though Carla Gugino makes her first appearance a bit later on.

After the stellar Air Force One sequence, however, John Cena and Idris Elba are removed from the bulk of the other main characters, and that's when things get cooking. Without anyone else yapping in their ears, Will and Sam are forced to meet in the middle and work together, which is the foundation of any great buddy action movie. The movie never loses sight of that kinship, either, throughout all the other bone-breaking brawls, bullet-hell gunfights, and twisty plot machinations.

With its surprisingly deft blend of high-stakes action and light-hearted comedy that bumps against the PG-13 rating, Heads of State is 100% the kind of guilt-free popcorn-chomping good time that Amazon MGM should be making, and is definitely worthy of a trip to the theater, as opposed to streaming at home. President John Cena's biceps deserve to be seen on the biggest screen possible... because America.

The idea of having roommates has never been more fun thanks to FOX’s comedy series, New Girl. Even though it’s been over and done with for years, it remains one of the most rewatchable TV shows ever. Aside from hitting play on the hilarious sitcom for all the great bits in the loft, it’s also a blast for all the major actors who guest-starred over the years. While there are way too many for this list to hold, we’ve compiled some of the biggest names that appeared on the show.

Jamie Lee Curtis

Oscar-winner Jamie Lee Curtis guest starred as the mother of Zooey Deschanel’s Jess Day in the Season 2 episode, “Parents.” Curtis was a great pick to match the quirky spirit of the sitcom’s leading character, and she returned to the series five more times after her initial debut on the series in Season 2.

Taylor Swift

When one thinks of Taylor Swift, sure, “actor” isn’t the first title that comes to mind, but over the years the phenomenon of a singer/songwriter has racked up numerous acting credits in projects like The Lorax, Cats and Amsterdam along. Oh, and what about all those epic Taylor Swift music videos? Anyways, Swift made an appearance in the Season 2 finale of New Girl when Cece is getting married to Shivrang. At the altar, the groom calls off the wedding to say that he wants to marry Swift’s character of Elaine instead.

Prince

One of the most memorable moments in New Girl has to be when the cast is invited to go to a party at Prince’s house… and they actually meet Prince. The Season 3 episode came about thanks to the iconic artist expressing interest in appearing in the show as a fan of the comedy. There’s nothing like that scene when Nick and Jess have a freakout when he appears.

Tiffany Haddish

Girls Trip actress and comedian Tiffany Haddish had a small role in the Season 3 episode “Exes” as a date of Damen Wayans Jr’s Coach. She is part of the plotline of Schmidt deciding to get his own apartment and encouraging Winston and Coach to use the place whenever they like for their hookups. In the scene, all three of them have used it at once and it freaks out Haddish’s character of Leslie.

Rob Reiner

All In The Family’s Rob Reiner returned to the sitcom fold as Jess Day’s dad, Bob, in multiple episodes of New Girl. The beloved actor (and director of classics like The Princess Bride, When Harry Met Sally, Misery, This Is Spinal Tap and Stand By Me) was in eleven total episodes of the series, appearing in almost every season of the show.

Lisa Bonet

The Cosby Show’s Lisa Bonet guest starred in the Season 4 episode “Teachers” as an education guru named Brenda Brown. Jess and Coach meet the character while attending together. She calls Coach out for his attitude during the presentation that causes him to stop being Jess’s “buffer” while she tries to ignore her feelings for a British teacher she’s crushing on at her school.

Kaitlin Olson

It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia’s Kaitlin Olson (who is back for Season 17 of the comedy) guest starred in New Girl for two episodes in Season 4. She plays Bob Day’s much younger fiancée, who happened to be the high school rival of Jess and Cece back in the day.

Josh Gad

The Book of Mormon and Frozen’s beloved snowman voice actor Josh Gad guest starred in three separate episodes of New Girl (in Season 2, 3 and 4) as a delivery man named Bearclaw who falls head over heels with Jess. He first appears in the episode “Katie” as a blind date gone wrong before also being in “Birthday” and “Walk of Shame.”

Dermot Mulroney

My Best Friend’s Wedding actor Dermot Mulroney is “Fancyman” in New Girl. The actor appeared as a guest star in eight episodes of the show throughout its run after becoming a favorite in Season 1. In the two part episode “Fancyman,” he is introduced as the wealthy father of one of Jess’s students who she strikes up a romance with.

Olivia Rodrigo

Yes, High School Musical: The Musical: The Series actress turned massive pop star Olivia Rodrigo was on New Girl, but it was before reaching mega-stardom. In the Season 6 episode “Young Adult,” Rodrigo plays one of the students in Jess’s school who becomes a huge fan of Nick Miller’s novel The Pepperwood Chronicles. In an effort for her students (including Rodrigo’s character of Terrinea) to like her better, Jess sets up a meeting between a few of the students and Nick.

Megan Fox

In Season 5 of New Girl, Zooey Deschanel was pregnant in real life and since that was not in the cards yet for Jess Day, the decision was made to have her character leave for a while on Jury Duty while Deschanel went on maternity leave. The creators decided to bring in Megan Fox’s Reagan to take Jess’s place and she ended up being part of 15 episodes of the series. Fox is of course also known for being in the Transformers movies, Jennifer’s Body and the live-action Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie.

Alan Ritchson

Before Alan Ritchson starred in one of the best Amazon Prime shows, Reacher, the actor had a memorable guest spot on New Girl in the episode “Micro”. In the Season 4 episode, Ritchson used his comedic chops as a guy Jess is seeing who she struggles with getting past the fact that Ritchson’s Matt has a micro penis.

Henry Winkler

Happy Days and Barry actor Henry Winkler appeared in New Girl (alongside the incredible Julie Hagerty and Taran Killam) in the Season 5 episode “What About Fred.” In the episode, Jess is dating a guy named Fred (Killam), who she finds very boring, but falls for spending time with his charismatic parents Winkler and Hagerty’s Flip and Nancy.

Parker Posey

Parker Posey, aka the “Queen of the Indies,” especially during the best movies of the 1990s, had a great guest appearance in New Girl during the Season 2 episode “Re-Launch.” Schmidt is having a re-branding party for himself and Posey plays a dishevelled shot girl who was not as advertised.

John Cho

Star Trek’s John Cho appeared on New Girl for the Season 5 episode “Jury Duty.” Jess tries to get out of getting on a case for a chance to be acting principal. She asks her friends to help, but fails miserably in front of Cho’s character, who ends up being the man questioning her for the case after they initially have a flirty meet-cute.

Adam Brody

The OC and Nobody Wants This’s Adam Brody was one of Jess’s ex-boyfriend’s, Berkley, in the Season 3 episode, “Exes.” In the episode, Jess tries to prove to Nick that exes can still be friends by introducing him to Berkley, but she’s proved wrong when she finds out his true intentions.

Quinta Brunson

Before Quinta Brunson was the Emmy-winning creator and star of the hit ABC comedy, Abbott Elementary, she had a brief role in New Girl, in the Season 7 episode “Mario.” When Nick is trying to propose to Jess, she unexpectedly adopts a dog, throwing off his plans. Brunson plays a restaurant host that Nick speaks to on the phone as the plans shift.

Stephen Amell

Arrow star Stephen Amell, who played the Green Arrow for eight seasons on The CW, was on New Girl for a couple of episodes in Season 1. He played Cece’s jerk boyfriend Kyle in “The 23rd” and “Valentine’s Day.” Cece ends things with Kyle in the latter episode after realizing she has feelings for Schmidt.

Jessica Biel

7th Heaven and The Sinner actress Jessica Biel stopped by New Girl for the Season 4 premiere “The Last Wedding.” When the gang goes to yet another wedding, Biel plays a single woman who ends up competing with Jess to earn the affection of its best man (played by Reid Scott).

Justin Long

Justin Long had a memorable guest star arc on the first season of New Girl. He plays Paul Genzlinger, a music teacher co-worker of Jess’s whom she starts dating in time for the show’s first Thanksgiving episode. Paul is often thought of as a male version of Jess. After the couple date for about a month and breakup, Long made a re-appearance in Season 4’s “Walk Of Shame.”

Linda Cardellini

New Girl fans got to meet Jess’s sister, Abby Day, in Season 3 through Linda Cardellini’s three-episode arc. The Dead To Me actress plays Jess’s troublemaker older sibling, who is just about completely opposite to the sitcom’s leading actress. Jess is constantly embarrassed by Abby’s behavior when she comes to stay in the loft after Jess saves her from prison.

Alexandra Daddario

Baywatch and The White Lotus’ Alexandra Daddario played one of the neighbors to the New Girl gang in two episodes of the series. Daddario’s Michelle is deemed as one of the “hot” new neighbors that Schmidt, Winston, Coach scramble to impress after their first meeting left something to be desired. Daddario appears in Season 3’s “Mars Landing” and Season 4’s “Goldmine.”

Andy Samberg

For quite a few years, New Girl and Brooklyn Nine-Nine were both big comedies airing on FOX at the same time. So in Season 6, the networks decided to crossover the comedies with a special New York episode for New Girl. While the friends are in the Big Apple, Jess gets some help from Andy Samberg’s Jake Peralta and the other cast. (The cast of New Girl was also on an episode of B99 called “The Night Shift” that aired the same week in 2016).

Peter Gallagher

The OC’s Peter Gallagher was in multiple episodes of New Girl as Schmidt’s father, Gavin. The vineyard owner first appears in the Season 5 episode “D-Day” when Jess is assisting Schmidt with wedding preparations. Gallagher, who has also been in famous movies like American Beauty and While You Were Sleeping, was a great fit to play Schmidt’s absentee dad.

Randall Park

Before Randall Park became the star of Fresh Off The Boat, Always Be My Maybe and WandaVision, he was briefly in a Season 1 episode of New Girl as an employee at a phone company (with frosted tips), who makes fun of Nick for his crazy low credit score.

Natasha Lyonne

Natasha Lyonne is a famous TV actress for her roles in Orange is the New Black, Russian Doll and Poker Face. Prior to those roles, she had a small role in New Girl’s third episode ever, “Wedding.” She played Gretchen Nelson, an acquaintance of Schmidt, who he ends up sleeping with at every wedding they both attend even though he claims he cannot stand her.

Dylan O'Brien

Teen Wolf star Dylan O’Brien plays the guy Jess Day lost her virginity to on the night of her prom back when she was in high school. In the episode “Virgins” from Season 2, Jess runs into him many years after their first meeting, but what could have been a sexual fantasy turns into an embarrassing moment for the two of them.

Brenda Song

The Suite Life Of Zack And Cody actress Brenda Song was in a few episodes in Season 2 (and one in Season 3) as Daisy, a love interest for Winston. It’s a short-lived romance for Winston, but Song is a guest star in what we consider to be No. 1 of the best New Girl episodes, “Cooler.”

Joey King

Before Joey King was the star of Netflix’s The Kissing Booth movies or the numerous 2024 movies she’s been in like A Family Affair, Uglies and Despicable Me 4, she was a popular child actor who was in Ramona & Beezus with Selena Gomez or the Taylor Swift music video “Mean.” She was also in a Season 1 episode of New Girl called “Bully” as one of Jess’s students.

Carla Gugino

Carla Gugino, known for the Spy Kids movies and being in multiple Mike Flanagan horror projects was in three 2012 episodes of New Girl as Schmidt’s new boss, Emma. In the first episode Gugino stars in “Menzies,” Schmidt gets into a sexual contract with her that doesn’t go as planned.

Nick Kroll

The very funny Nick Kroll is known for starring in The League, along with creating the Kroll Show and Netflix’s Big Mouth. In Season 2’s “Chicago,” where the gang goes to Nick’s hometown for his father’s funeral, Kroll plays one of Nick Miller’s brothers, alongside Bill Burr! You can tell Kroll and Burr had tons of fun with the Chicago accent bringing some levity to a rather emotional New Girl episode.

Fred Armisen

Saturday Night Live favorite (who was behind some of SNL's funniest recurring characters) and Portlandia lead Fred Armisen had a brief role in New Girl for the season five episode “No Girl.” While Jess is at jury duty, the gang rent out her room to random people, and Armisen plays a guy named Brandon. His short time there made a huge impression because of how funny he is with the guys. Remember when he read Schmidt his romance writing or dressed up like Jess at one point?

As March 2024 wrapped, it was revealed that Osgood Perkins’ The Monkey, based on the short story of the same name, had both put together a stellar cast and completed production all in secret. But now the secret is out, and it joins Mike Flanagan’s The Life Of Chuck and Gary Dauberman’s Salem’s Lot as upcoming Stephen King movies that are finished filming and are awaiting a release date. That was an exciting development to discover – but it’s not the only cool King-related story to emerge from the last seven days.

Tomorrow marks the official 50th anniversary of the novel Carrie, the first book that King had published, and the world has delivered some great headlines on the eve of the celebration. This week’s edition of The King Beat has Carla Gugino reflecting on the making of Gerald’s Game, a resurrected article about the author from the run-up to the release of Carrie, some advice on the art of storytelling, and more, so let’s dig in.

Carla Gugino Reflects On The Intense Experience Of Making Gerald’s Game With Mike Flanagan

In accepting the role of Jessie Burlingame in writer/director Mike Flanagan’s Gerald’s Game, Carla Gugino took on an extreme acting challenge. Not only does the film feature the actor handcuffed to a bed for the majority of the runtime, but the story goes to some dark places as the character is forced to confront horrific trauma from her childhood. Ultimately, Gugino is phenomenal in the movie, and she delivers what is arguably her best performance – but in the run-up to it, she was concerned that the work could potentially lead to the end of her career.

Promoting her new series The Girls on the Bus, Carla Gugino recently sat down with Buzzfeed, and she spoke in part about her recent contributions to the horror genre and her collaborations with Mike Flanagan. She has been featured in five Flanagan projects, including The Haunting of Hill House, The Haunting Of Bly Manor, Midnight Mass and The Fall Of The House Of Usher, but Gerald’s Game marked the first time they had worked together, and she quickly saw him as a filmmaker with a specific vision:

Adapting Stephen King’s Gerald’s Game was Mike Flanagan’s dream project for a long time, and he would even bring a copy of the novel to pitch meetings for inevitable inquiries about his personal passion. As noted by Gugino, the book was considered unfilmable because of the story’s content and limited scale, and Flanagan got a number of “Nos,” but Netflix gave him a “Yes” following the successful streaming debut of his 2016 film Hush.

Between the limited amount of time there was in pre-production and the reputation of the Stephen King book, there were some concerns that the lead actress had. Gugino continued:

Gerald’s Game not only earned high marks from critics upon release (CinemaBlend’s Mike Reyes gave it a four star review), but it also came out at the perfect time, as it debuted on Netflix just three weeks after the blockbuster theatrical debut of Andy Muschietti’s IT: Chapter One. It was a stepping stone to Mike Flanagan making Doctor Sleep – another one of the best Stephen King movies of all time – and now he not only has The Life Of Chuck on the way, but he is also working towards his next King-related dream: adapting The Dark Tower saga.

It’s wild to think that this wonderful legacy established within the last decade almost went up in smoke. Carla Gugino explains that if she hadn’t said yes to Gerald’s Game when she did, the whole project would have potentially died:

We can only hope that Carla Gugino and Mike Flanagan continue to work together a lot in the years to come – and I still maintain that she would be a terrific Randall Flagg.

You Can Read The First Bangor Daily News Article About Stephen King From May 1973

There’s a lot of hoopla to be made about the 50th anniversary of Carrie, as there’s an argument that no single individual has had a greater influence on pop culture in the last half-century than Stephen King. His books and the adaptations they have inspired are beloved unto themselves, but they have become part of our everyday language: Cujo, Christine and Carrie alone are synonymous with fierce dogs, out-of-control cars and disastrous prom nights, and clowns, cornfields and coming-of-age tales are forever tied to IT, Children Of The Corn and “The Body”/Stand By Me. Because of the immensity of his body of work, it’s particularly wonderful to take a look back at where it all started.

Timed to the special anniversary, Bangor Daily News has published an article celebrating the legacy of Stephen King, and the piece includes a clipping that exists as the newspaper’s first ever article about the literary icon. It was published on May 25, 1973, a little less than a year before Carrie arrived in bookstores, and it profiles the author as a teacher who has struck it rich with his first publishing deal.

It’s a sweet piece to read knowing everything that is going to happen to Stephen King in the years that follow, but there are two paragraphs in particular that stand out and illustrate who King is as both a writer and a person. In terms of the former, there is this bit that comes from an unnamed colleague of the author’s from the University of Maine:

Stephen King clearly has a mind for storytelling unlike any other… but that’s also easy to say in the year 2024 knowing that he has published nearly 100 books. For a fellow student to see that in him when he was in his early 20s is downright astonishing.

Perhaps even better than that is this penultimate paragraph from the article, which well-illustrates that King not only loves to write, but he loves teaching other people to write:

Stephen King hasn’t been a full-time employee at a school in a long time, but that doesn’t mean that he has given up educating. Case in point…

Stephen King Offers Advice For Writers: “See The Story, Not The Words”

If you’re an aspiring writer, I can’t more highly recommend Stephen King’s On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft. In addition to being an intimate work about King’s life, his expressed passion is palpable and inspiring, and the advice he offers is priceless. Once you read it, you only want more… which is why it’s great that he occasionally doles pearls of wisdom via social media.

Part of what makes Stephen King so special is the fact that he doesn’t plan out his books; he has an idea, he starts writing, and he discovers along the way where the characters take him. It’s a big part of his special gift as an author and reflected in some advice he dropped on Twitter this past Sunday. The host of the Talking Scared podcast (on which King has been a guest) posted about being frustrated by language and efficiency in his own writing, and King quote tweeted him explaining why that approach is not productive:

I can certainly relate to this point. Even when I’m attempting stream of consciousness writing while pursuing an idea, I can sometimes get caught up in the minutia and wording of a particular sentence… and it can eventually get so frustrating that it saps my energy from the work in general. There may be a temptation to sit down and produce two flawless pages in five minutes, but that’s unrealistic, and you can’t get to the second draft if you don’t ever finish the first.

It’s something to keep in mind next time you open a word processor and start creatively clacking away.

Recommendation Of The Week: “A Face In The Crowd”

We talked about Stephen King’s love of writing, but now let’s discuss another one of his passions: baseball. This past week saw the official launch of the 2024 Major League Baseball season, and thus far, King has plenty of reason to smile, as his beloved Boston Red Sox are off to a strong 5-2 start. I figured that I would let this development inspire my Recommendation Of The Week, which is how I landed on “A Face In The Crowd.”

Co-written by Stewart O’Nan and originally released in 2012 as an e-book (Cemetery Dance has since published a hardcover edition), “A Face In The Crowd” tells the story of Dean Evers – a lonely, elderly widower who is watching a Red Sox game on television one day and is shocked to see his deceased business partner in the stands behind home plate. At first, Dean just thinks he is seeing things, but the colleague keeps reappearing at games day after day, and then he begins to notice that other people from his past are there as well. Confounded, he finally tries to solve the mystery by attending a game in person.

That does it for this week’s edition of The King Beat, but I’ll be back with a new column next Thursday here on CinemaBlend, and you can spend the days between now and then digging into my Adapting Stephen King series – a chronological exploration of King books and film.

How do you know Carla Gugino? Your age probably factors into your answer. If you were a kid in the early 2000s, or are a parent (basically at any stage of your life), there’s a very good chance you recognize Gugino from Robert Rodriguez’s entertaining Spy Kids franchise, where she played Ingrid Cortez, mama to Juni (Daryl Sabara) and Carmen Cortez (Alexa Vega) and saver of the planet on more than one occasion. 

Because the Spy Kids fandom continues to grow – and also mature – Gugino tells CinemaBlend that it’s getting harder for her to guess which of her many projects a fan is going to mention when they encounter her out in public.

Others probably know Gugino from a series of films you wouldn’t want to show your kids – not just yet, at least. Gugino frequently works with revolutionary filmmakers who push the envelope when it comes to visual storytelling, be it Zack Snyder (Watchmen, Sucker Punch), Rodriguez for the Sin City films, and Shawn Levy (Night at the Museum). And as of late, Gugino has been a proud member of the prestigious acting troupe that assembles every time genius writer-director Mike Flanagan has a new story to weave. 

The duo’s collaboration dates back to 2017, when Carla Gugino allowed herself to be handcuffed to a bed for Flanagan’s adaptation of the Stephen King novel Gerald’s Game – still one of the best King adaptations ever attempted. The experience proved so rewarding for both sides, Gugino found herself playing pivotal roles in The Haunting of Hill House, The Haunting of Bly Manor, Midnight Mass, and the series that several critics are calling Flanagan’s masterpiece: The Fall of the House of Usher. Collectively, it’s some of the strongest work to reach the Netflix streaming platform, and it’s redefining how storytellers should approach genre storytelling. As Gugino told me during a recent interview:

And by following Flanagan down his complicated paths, Carla Gugino now finds herself on the receiving end of some awards consideration, for the first time in her career. 

Quote The Raven...

Mike Flanagan’s The Fall of the House of Usher masterfully figures out how to interlock several classic Edgar Allen Poe stories underneath the umbrella of one larger arc, this one having to do with the rise and fall of Roderick Usher (Bruce Greenwood), his sister Madeline (Mary McDonnell), and Roderick’s six adult children. Gugino’s mysterious character isn’t related to the Ushers, though she plays a pivotal part in their narrative. Her character, Verna, surfaces throughout each individual story, shepherding characters to their grisly fates. 

There are countless questions swirling around Verna, and most get answered over time. If you are frustrated by how long Flanagan makes you wait for some explanations regarding this character, just know that Gugino was in a similar boat. The writer-director let Gugino read scripts as they became available. But too often, she was up to date, and waiting for the rest of the saga to play out. She told CinemaBlend:

This gave Gugino the role of a lifetime, with range to spare from episode to episode. Verna – an anagram of Raven – could appear as a courteous bartender working New Year’s Eve in 1979. Or as an animal shelter worker. Or as a sultry nightclub patron. 

To Gugino’s remarkable credit, she’s believable in every single role. She credits the writing, but also breaks the code to her approach to Verna when she elaborates:  

The Tell-Tale Heart

She may not have intended to “dazzle” with her performance, but that’s the effect Carla Gugino is having on critics and audiences. Our own Nick Venable refers to The Fall of the House of Usher as “possibly (the) greatest horror masterpiece yet.” And a lot of that boils down to the writing. The way that Flanagan structures Usher, there’s hardly any wasted time, no superfluous narrative addition, and hardly any suggestion of reshoots of deleted scenes. As on display in Hill House, Bly Manor, and Midnight Mass, Flanagan appears to meticulously construct his epic stories so that they lock together like a satisfying puzzle. And Gugino says that tends to be the case on set with the writer-director. She tells CinemaBlend:

It’s important, however, for each episode of The Fall of the House of Usher to build toward its extremely satisfying conclusion, knocking off Roderick’s children in each episode, some in more gruesome fashion than others (yes, we are talking about the party scene at the end of episode 2). Improvisation is one thing. But the real joy of following a Mike Flanagan story arc is just how precise he is in his pacing and execution. It’s like a well-wound clock, and it benefits his actors, as well as his audience. 

The Tower Beckons...

The Fall of the House of Usher is up for three Critics Choice nominations this weekend, with Carla Gugino, Willa Fitzgerald, and Mary McDonnell all competing in different categories. Gugino is up for Lead Actress in BEST ACTRESS IN A LIMITED SERIES OR MOVIE MADE FOR TELEVISION. He co-stars are in SUPPORTING. The best case scenario is that they manage wins in both categories, as each is deserving of recognition for their incredible work on the series. 

Which probably is fine with Gugino. For as she explains to CinemaBlend, the members of Flanagan’s professional troupe are all just instruments in the orchestra that he is conducting. She said:

Which is why they keep coming back to Flanagan’s family for more. I would, too, as an actor being given a chance to work with one of our modern masters. You likely can count on Gugino to say yes any time that Flanagan calls. Even for his highly anticipated tackling of Stephen King’s massive The Dark Tower series. Before we concluded our conversation, I had to ask Gugino if she was picking up copies of King’s novels in preparation. She laughed and told me:

And when I suggested that Flanagan would be wise to just cast his Gerald’s Game collaborator as Roland, the Gunslinger, Gugino gave me the best answer possible when she said: 

So are we. If you haven’t yet seen The Fall of the House of Usher, it’s a masterpiece and it’s waiting for you on Netflix. Drop everything and watch it now. 

Spoilers below for anyone who hasn’t yet watched The Fall of the House of Usher the whole way through, so beware!

Mike Flanagan’s final Netflix horror series (at least for the foreseeable future) is also arguably his most complex adaptation yet, with The Fall of the House of Usher adhering many of Edgar Allan Poe’s plotlines and characters to a largely modern-day story with socially relevant underpinnings. (It’s my new favorite horror TV show, for what that’s worth, and other critics have been equally kind.) Understandably, the complicated web of deceit and corruption spun by Bruce Greenwood and Mary McDonnell’s Roderick and Madeline Usher (respectively) leads to a cascade of devastating, tragic, and absolutely disgusting deaths and more atrocities that are sprinkled throughout the time-jumping season. Which in turn result in largely dark conclusions for not just those within the titular bloodline, but also those who get close to them. 

Join me in stepping into a bar outside of time to sort through House of Usher’s ending, from laying out and ranking the major deaths to pinpointing the one true positive to follow the horrors that plagued the titular family in their final weeks among the living.

The One Positive Outcome From Verna’s Deal With Roderick

As the narrative fully established, Carla Gugino’s mysterious Verna and her reality-adjacent watering hole appeared to younger Roderick and Madeline in the aftermath of their highly immoral murder plot against the latter’s boss at Fortunato Pharmaceuticals, not only assisting the siblings with their alibi for that New Year’s Eve, but also helping to keep them out of any major trouble for the rest of their lives. All it took was Roderick’s amazingly selfish decision to agree to doom his entire bloodline, with that cataclysmic fate still far off in the distance at that point.

But the taxman came to collect, so to speak, as the Usher family was in the midst of a high-profile trial concerning the myriad deaths and other health issues tying back to Fortunato’s biggest moneymaker, the painkiller Ligadone. Each episode highlighted at least one meaningful death, with the body count rising steadily on the way to the family patriarch’s grisly demise, with so many ghastly actions taken along the way. Inarguably the most monstrous behavior came from Henry Thomas’ egotistical and insecure Frederick, who put his burned and suffering wife Morella through the most heinous medical treatment imaginable based entirely on his unproven assumption that she was cheating on him, possibly with his own brother.

By many viewers’ accounts, Frederick’s eventual death would already count as the best possible outcome from the show’s Verna-assisted reign of terror. But I’m speaking more about the prophetic reveal that the supernatural entity regretfully told to Kyliegh Curran’s Lenore just before she took the young girl’s life. Explaining that her mother would go on to successfully heal from her "battle scars" after a lot of hard effort, Verna then shared:

Will the Lenore Foundation be enough to truly counterbalance all of the damage done by Ligadone and Fortunato over the years? Perhaps when enough time passes. Will it be enough to justify all the pain and suffering that Morella went through? I'd expect time would also need to play into that one. Whatever happens, the non-profit is easily the standout slice of positivity to emerge from Roderick Usher's undoing, accompanied by the small amount of comfort gleaned from Lenore have a few seconds to know what she would go on to inspire.

The Fall Of The House Of Usher's Biggest Deaths, Ranked

Now let's take a quick look back at all of The Fall of the House of Usher's big deaths, so that we may rank them by how gnarly, fun, badass, etc. they each were. There are no hard rules here, unlike the way Verna runs things, so everyone's mileage will vary. 

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12. Lenore

As perhaps the only character within House of Usher whose actions and demeanor were entirely virtuous and just, Lenore's death was as big a gut punch as could be. There's no way to celebrate that kind of purely sad conclusion. 

11. Annabel Lee

Similar to Lenore, Annabel Lee didn't seem to have a wicked bone in her body, except for the one that led to her birthing the pair of mini-monsters in Tamarlane and Frederick. Her death wasn't so directly confirmed, but her ghostly visage in the church was revealed to have a particularly nasty exit wound on the back of her head, indicating how she reacted to being ostracized by her kids in light of Roderick's money. Poor Annabel.

10. Leo

The obsession-driven lead up to Leo Usher's death is more harrowing and impactful than the death itself, as he spend lord knows how much time destroying the inside of his apartment while seeking out Verna's cursed feline. But it was certainly disturbing to see him leap-fall over the balcony railing, and it was a delightfully morbid touch to have what appeared to be the "real" cat Pluto walking by Leo's gnarled corpse.

9. Roderick

Weirdly, Roderick's death is the second in The Fall of the House of Usher to come at the strangling hands of a wronged woman who was initially thought dead, but who then rose up again to get her vengeance. (The first was Fortunato's former CEO William Longfellow.) But what makes this one stand out is that his whole-ass childhood home crashed down on top of him to truly seal the deal. House-crushing is quite the under-used horror death, I tell ya.

8. Madeline

Madeline was, of course, the wronged woman who strangled Roderick to death just before the house collapsed on top of them. What puts her above her deal-making brother, however, is the fact that Roderick had replaced her eyes with those mummification stones that were brought up earlier in the series. So she both looked freaky as hell, and was committing murder when she died. It's almost a crime she's still this low.

7. Vic

Few situations in House of Usher turned my guts as topsy-turvy as Vic's total mental break from reality, and while I was thankful to not have to watch a multitude of scenes with her in that lucid and frazzled state, I didn't necessarily want it to be because Vic took her own life all seppuku-like as Roderick stared on in horror. But what a wowzers scene all the same.

6. Rufus Griswold

Michael Trucco's Rufus Griswold was a complete turd, both as a corporate leader and as a human being. We didn't actually get to see his death play out, so it almost wouldn't count here, but I can't imagine anything too wonderful happened as he was trapped alone and masked behind a bricked-up wall in Fortunato's lower floors, with only the phrase "You are so small" written on one of the bricks as reading material. So that's a big win in my book. 

5. Tamerlane

The death of Samantha Sloyan's Tamarlane was a particularly wild one, and not only because it was preceded by her freaking out and violently smashing Juno's head with a mic stand. With Verna plaguing this Usher offspring's reflections, Tamarlane went on tear, smashing all of the reflective surfaces in her home, which included the mirrored ceiling above her bed. Having already gritted my teeth over and over again just from her walking around barefoot, I was enjoyably even more unnerved seeing the mirrored glass puncturing her in those final moments. I'm pretty sure that was the one death in the show that could have theoretically been non-fatal had it happened without Verna's influence.

4. Frederick

If only Frederick had somehow been allowed to suffer the sorded fate of everyone on this list, he would have cemented a spot at the top. But he didn't quite go through as much physical pain as I'd have liked to see, since he was all numb and unable to feel anything. That said, he died in a puddle of his own piss, with the knowledge that he'd been duped by a beautiful woman (or a being that looked like one, anyway), and got lopped in half before being crushed.

3. Alessandra

Perhaps Alessandra would have been a more proper entry for a ranked list post-death awfulness, since her death itself was somewhat non-sensational and accidental, via Vic's impulsive blunt force trauma. But I'm stretching the rules to incorporate her final state of being within House of Usher, with Vic having surgically inserted the still-pumping heart mesh device into Al's corpse. So much nightmare fuel spurting out of that thing.

2. Camille

You know what you just don't get very much of in any kind of TV show, much less in horror? A cockstrong, stoked-by-evil chimpanzee beating a human to death. But that's definitely one of the wild and gory AF ways that the Usher family members are dispatched, with Kate Siegel's Camille serving as the target of furry primate fury. Even if viewers don't actually see the bludgeonings as they happen, the aftermath is enough to tell the tale.

1. Perry

I'm not sure i've ever seen a death that grossed me out quite as much as what happened to Perry and all of the other guests at his fate-ravaged party who all glommed together in interconnected clumps of acid-melted flesh. It's the wildest death of any Mike Flanagan TV show, and I can't imagine that he'll be able to easily top it in the future. Just the very sound of the squishing movements made by those slowest to die, that's the soundtrack of my hell. If ever there was a fantastic reason for Smell-O-Vision to have never taken off as a concept, this muck factory is a prime candidate. 

The Fall of the House of Usher is available to rewatch in full with a Netflix subscription, for anyone who wanted to go about making a personal ranking of the big deaths.

One of the horror genre's greatest modern minds is arguably Mike Flanagan. While the filmmaker is especially notable for bringing terrifying concepts to movies like Doctor Sleep and television shows like The Haunting of Hill House without relying on the popular genre technique of jump scares, over the years, he’s made a habit of employing familiar actors into his work in ways that makes one want to take a double take. 

With the Edgar Allan Poe adaptation The Fall Of The House of Usher set to bring in a number of his returning players, it’s time to answer the question of which actors have appeared in the most of Flanagan's movies and TV shows. Let’s dig in: 

Kate Siegel (8) 

When it comes to the actor who has been in the most of Mike Flanagan’s projects, the answer is currently actually tied between two great talents. The first one, who is arguably Mike Flanagan’s greatest muse, since she is also his wife in real life and the mother to two of his children, is Kate Siegel, who has been in eight of his projects. The actress first starred in Flanagan’s second feature film 2013’s Oculus as the movie’s main evil spirit, Marisol. 

Siegel has since found roles in three other Flanagan movies, including by leading 2016’s Hush and has also been part of four out of five of his Netflix series: The Haunting of Hill House, The Haunting of Bly Manor, Midnight Mass and The Fall of the House of Usher. In the latest series, she plays a silver-haired PR lead named Camille L'Espanaye. 

Henry Thomas (8) 

The other actor involved in the tie for the most appearances in Mike Flanagan movies and TV shows is Henry Thomas. The actor, who's famous for playing Elliot as a kid in E.T., first collaborated with Flanagan in 2016’s Ouija: Origin of Evil as Father Tom Hogan. After that he has played two key roles in two other films: Gerald’s Game and Doctor Sleep, the latter being the most notable considering he played The Shining’s most iconic character, Jack Torrance. Thomas also has the honor of finding a role in every Mike Flanagan Netflix series yet, including The Fall of the House of Usher, where he’ll play Frederick Usher. 

Katie Parker (6) 

Just behind Kate Siegel and Henry Thomas for the most appearances in Mike Flanagan movie and/or TV shows is Katie Parker with six thus far. Parker starred in the filmmakers first feature film ever, 2011’s Absentia in one of her own first roles. Since then, you can also find her as Silent Sarey in Doctor Sleep and four out of five Netflix series as well: The Haunting of Hill House, Bly Manor, The Midnight Club and The Fall of the House of Usher. You might remember her haunting the halls of Hill House as Poppy Hill, Bly Manor’s attic ghost, or The Midnight Club’s founder of the Paragon, Aceso. 

Carla Gugino (5) 

Leading Mike Flanagan’s five-time club is Carla Gugino. The actress already had a massive list of credits when she first worked with Mike Flanagan as the lead of 2017’s chilling Gerald’s Game, but the pair clearly love working with each other considering she’s found a place in almost every Flanagan Netflix series since. From playing Hill House’s matriarch Olivia Crain, to The Storyteller in Bly Manor, the Judge in Midnight Mass, and leading Usher as Verna, Gugino is another clear favorite actress of the filmmaker. 

Robert Longstreet (5) 

The second five-timer of three is Robert Longstreet, who has been seemingly working on Mike Flanagan sets nonstop since his first project with him in The Haunting of Hill House. After playing Horace Dudley in Flanagan’s first Netflix series, he played one member of the True Knot, Barry the Chunk, in Doctor Sleep a year later. Longstreet then starred in Midnight Mass and The Midnight Club is supporting roles before making his way to House of Usher, where he plays a character named Mr. Longfellow. 

Samantha Sloyan (5) 

Samantha Sloyan first worked with Mike Flanagan in 2016’s Hush as the next door neighbor to Kate Siegel’s final girl before being part of all the Flana-verse Netflix shows except for Bly Manor. She played the wife of Steven Crain in Hill House before stealing the show with an incredible performance as Bev Keane in Midnight Mass. A year later, she played a completely different role in The Midnight Club as Shasta. Next, she plays one of the daughters of the Usher family once the 2023 Netflix TV show premieres. 

Annabeth Gish (4) 

Now to the current four-timers of the Flana-verse. Annabeth Gish, who you might also recognize from Mystic Pizza or The X-Files, first starred in a Flanagan-helmed project in 2016 with Before You Wake. The horror project also starring Kate Bosworth and Jacob Tremblay follows a couple who adopt an orphaned child whose dreams and nightmares manifest physically when he sleeps. Since then, Gish played Clara Dudley in Hill House, Dr. Sarah Gunning in Midnight Mass and plays a character named Eliza in The Fall of the House of Usher. 

Rahul Kohli (4) 

Rahul Kohli has been a resident of Mike Flanagan’s Netflix shows since starring in The Haunting of Bly Manor as Owen Sharma, the resident’s cook. He’s been on a Flanagan set every year since, finding a powerful role of Sheriff Hassan in Midnight Mass in 2021 before being in the memorable episode “See You Later” in last year’s The Midnight Club. Next, he’ll play the role of Napoleon Usher in the latest of Flanagan Netflix series, which is inspired by Edgar Allan Poe’s works this time around. 

Michael Trucco (4) 

Michael Trucco, who is also noted for his recurring role in Battlestar Galactica, has also been cast in four roles by Mike Flanagan over the years. Like Sloyan, his first feature with the horror filmmaker was Hush where he played the boyfriend to Kate Siegel’s Maddie. Years later, Trucco reunited with the writer/director to play the mayor of Crockett Island, Wade Scarborough. In Midnight Club, he had a small role in Episode 5, titled “See You Later,” alongside Rahul Kohli, and he's also in The Fall of the House of Usher as Rufus Wilmot Griswold. 

Bruce Greenwood (4) 

Prior to Bruce Greenwood leading the cast of The Fall of the House of Usher as Roderick Usher in his latest role with Mike Flanagan, he’s been part of three other projects. Like Carla Gugino, his first role was in Gerald’s Game as Gerald himself. Then he jumped to another Stephen King adaptation of Flanagan’s by playing Dr. John Dalton in Doctor Sleep. The fourth appearance is rather difficult to find, but Flanagan did reveal it to Variety. Greenwood plays a ghost in Episode 5 of The Haunting of Hill House, but he was uncredited. The cameo was Flanagan’s way of creating a mini-Gerald’s Game reunion since Gugino and Thomas are also both in the scene. 

Alex Essoe (4) 

Rounding out Mike Flanagan’s four-timer club is Alex Essoe, who got to play the role of Wendy Torrance in Doctor Sleep following Shelley Long’s intense experience on The Shining playing the same character for Stanley Kubrick’s movie. Essoe then played the role of the late Charlotte Wingrave, the mother of Flora and Owen, whose death incites the children’s move to Bly Manor. Essoe’s frequency for playing mother figures continues in Midnight Mass where she plays Mildred Gunning, an old woman with dementia. Essoe also appeared in Episode 8 of The Midnight Club called “Road to Nowhere” as Poppy Corn. 

Matt Biedel (3) 

Let’s round out this list with two more notable actors who have each appeared in three of Mike Flanagan’s projects. Matt Biedel has found roles in both of Flanagan’s Midnight series, first playing Crockett Island’s handyman Sturge in Midnight Mass before playing Ilonka’s foster father Tim in The Midnight Club. Biedel finds another role in The Fall of the House of Usher as William "Bill-T" Wilson, a fitness influencer and the husband to Sloyan’s character. 

Zach Gilford (3) 

The 13th of the most recurring actors in Mike Flanagan projects is Zach Gilford of Friday Night Lights fame. Like Biedel, he’s been part of both Midnight series and is set to be part of the Edgar Allan Poe-inspired Netflix series coming this October 13. Gilford plays the lead role of Riley Flynn in Midnight Mass and The Midnight Club’s resident Nurse Mark. In Usher, he plays a younger version of Bruce Greenwood’s Roderick Usher. 

Well, now you’re completely caught up on all the most recurring actors of Mike Flanagan’s horror projects across his career. There are more actors in The Fall of the House of Usher you might find to be familiar from the filmmaker's past projects, including Carl Lumbly (Doctor Sleep), T'Nia Miller (Bly Manor), Kyleigh Curran (Doctor Sleep), Ruth Codd (The Midnight Club) and Sauriyan Sapkota (The Midnight Club), but we’ll keep them here as honorable mentions. Enjoy The Fall of the House of Usher this Halloween season once it drops in October! 

Mike Flanagan has carved out a nice space for himself on Netflix with horror series, including The Midnight Club, The Haunting of Hill House and more. His next project has been in development for a couple of years, as he takes on Edgar Allan Poe with The Fall of the House Of Usher, and finally this one is set for release just in time for spooky season with an October 12 drop for Netflix subscription holders. Critics were able to screen the full series early, and they’re calling it an exquisite tribute to the macabre storyteller.

Fans of Mike Flanagan’s previous projects will see some familiar faces in The Fall of the House of Usher. Carla Gugino, T’Nia Miller, Henry Thomas, Samantha Sloyan, Rahul Kohli, Zach Gilford, Annabeth Gish and Kate Siegel are among those returning for the tale of the doomed Usher family. Critics have weighed in on the upcoming series, and CinemaBlend’s Nick Venable is calling it his new favorite horror series. He says: 

While some people criticized the slow burn of Midnight Mass, Mike Flanagan said The Fall of the House of Usher will be different, describing it as “aggressive and rock ‘n roll and over the top and just violent and insane and horrific.” Amy West of GamesRadar admits to missing a little of the emotional depth from previous series, but gives it 3.5 stars out of 5, saying that overall it's a fun, bloodsoaked watch. West writes:   

Linda Codega of Gizmodo calls the series “exquisite,” noting that it’s not just an adaptation of Poe’s The Fall of the House of Usher, but a “masterful retelling” of his entire collection. Codega continues:  

Fans of Edgar Allan Poe will recognize nonstop references to his work; however knowledge of the gothic poet is certainly not a prerequisite, according to Therese Lacson of Collider, who gives the series a B+ and says:  

Belen Edwards of Mashable calls The Fall of the House of Usher part horrifying family tale, part brilliant adaptation, as Mike Flanagan and his cast draw you into a scary story that you simply can’t tear yourself away from. The critic continues: 

This sounds like a great option as Halloween approaches, especially for those who are fans of Mike Flanagan’s previous projects. You won’t have to wait too much longer to binge the horror series either, with The Fall of the House of Usher coming to Netflix on Thursday, October 12. In the meantime check out what else is new and coming soon to Netflix, as well as all of the upcoming horror movies headed our way. 

Let me get something out of the way immediately: I am as big a Mike Flanagan fan-agan as there can be. His entire career has earned as much appreciation as I have for the horror genre, from Haunting of Hill House to Oculus to Midnight Mass and all the other films and series that fill the space around those upper-echelon releases. To say I was excited for Flanagan’s latest spooky Netflix series, the Edgar Allen Poe adaptation-mashup The Fall of the House of Usher, is to say my lungs are eager to breathe, as much about necessity as enjoyment, and I am oh-so-bugnuts-happy to say that Flanagan & Co. pulled off what currently sits as my new favorite horror TV show of all time. This. Is. My. Shit. Forevermore. 

Without delving into anything spoilery, since this show is definitely best viewed knowing as little as possible — though watching House of Usher’s fantastic first trailer is certainly okay — let’s pinpoint some of the reasons why the Edgar Allan Poe-sourced series is so damned good on every single level. 

Everything Mike Flanagan Excels At Is Embedded In This Show

Regardless of one’s sum-total appreciation for Mike Flanagan’s body of work, it’s nearly impossible to deny at least some of his talents as a filmmaker and storyteller. By and large, The Fall of the House of Usher is a smoothed-out greatest hits collection of the standout qualities that shine through in his movies and series. (I’m admittedly using Flanagan’s name as a shorthand for the many, many other smart and skilled creatives who have helped bring these projects to life, but everyone is appreciated.)

Like The Haunting of Bly Manor and The Midnight Club, among others, the new series hinges on a character sharing a long and winding tale that takes his listener and viewers through the tumultuous history of the infamous Usher family and all of its darkest corners. And it’s a treat to bounce between flashbacks edited and designed to provoke the least amount of confusion for audiences. And like everything else that Flanagan has directed, this show is chock-full of mysteries and twists, though with more than enough clues embedded into episodes for fans to figure things out. (Which means no worries about totally nonsensical reveals at any point.) 

House of Usher is also filled to the brim with dread-induced pacing, juxtapositions between slow camera pans and sudden frights, freaky AF background details, and all the visual motifs and flairs that have made Hill House, Oculus and others so optimal for rewatching. Plus, there’s that whole “adaptation of a horror legend’s classics” element that he also does so well. Speaking of…

Edgar Allan Poe’s Work Is Adapted In Brilliantly Contemporary Ways

Prior to The Fall of the House of Usher, Flanagan has delivered projects based on novels, novellas, and short stories from Stephen King (Doctor Sleep, Gerald’s Game), Shirley Jackson (Hill House), Henry James (Bly Manor) and Christopher Pike (The Midnight Club). And though some very obvious changes were made to the material for each of those, I do believe his final Netflix series is where the biggest narrative leaps were made in the adaptation process. But that’s far from a complaint. 

Rather than taking an anthological approach to blending Poe’s works into a wraparound narrative, the creative team crafted a wholly original modern-day storyline as a prism for all of Poe’s most celebrated efforts to flow through. In this tale, Roderick Usher is the CEO of a notorious pharmaceutical company in the midst of a huge trial, with twin sibling Madeline Usher as a devil on his shoulder, as their lives are rocked by the sudden and shocking deaths of the various Usher children.

But as the episode titles heavily imply, the various stories, characters, and plotlines from Poe’s most recognized works are woven into Flanagan’s universe in interesting ways that also seemingly reference elements of Poe’s own life. The Big Pharma element is obviously something that would not have been a direct throughline in the author’s works, and seems primed for comparisons to other med-related dramas such as Painkiller and Dopesick, but that modern-day crisis feels surprisingly right at home amidst all the narrative tweaks.  

Bruce Greenwood And Mary McDonnell Are Incredible Anchors For This All-Star Cast 

During its production, the biggest news story to come out of The Fall of the House of Usher centered on ousted actor Frank Langella, who was fired from the series over allegations of his on-set behavior. Soon after, Doctor Sleep and Gerald’s Game vet Bruce Greenwood was brought in as a replacement, and to say nothing of Langella’s acting abilities, I don’t think he’ll be sorely missed by anyone. Because Greenwood delivers what could be a career-best performance, with Midnight Mass star Zach Gilford portraying the younger Roderick, and they’re just two gems among many in this stacked cast.

The two actors who stand/sit opposite Greenwood for the majority of the show’s run are Mary McDonnell as Madeline (with Willa Fitzgerald in flashbacks) and Carl Lumbly as investigator C. Auguste Dupin (with Malcolm Goodwin as the younger counterpart). Serving as the closest thing to an audience surrogate as this show allows, Lumbly delivers a performance that’s both stoic and vulnerable as Dupin attempts to finally bring his white-collar whale to justice.

Though there isn’t enough room to justifiably sing the praises of everyone in the House of Usher cast, the show makes full use of its talented ensemble, which includes Flanagan favorites such as Carla Gugino, Kate Siegel, Henry Thomas, Samantha Sloyan, T’Nia Miller, Rahul Kohli, Matt Biedel, Michael Trucco, Ruth Codd, Annabeth Gish, Robert Longstreet, Crystal Balint, Kyliegh Curran and others. Not to mention new recruit Mark Hamill, but more on him in a sec.

The Horror Rings Deeply Emotional, And Features Some Truly Nightmarish Visuals 

To speak too directly to the horror on display throughout The Fall of the House of Usher is to wade into spoiler territory, but suffice to say the opening act of the show teases out the string of events that will be focused on throughout the eight-episode season, and in ways that don’t fully invoke the terrifying events on the way. But buddy, when they do arrive, make sure your floor is freshly cleaned, so that your jaw doesn’t get dirty every time it drops down. 

In many ways, The Fall of the House of Usher feels as if it should have been under the Haunting banner, even though it does stand apart enough. But if you’re as big a fan of such creepy figures as the Bent Neck Lady and the Tall Man, the supernatural intensity of Ouija: Origin of Evil, and the dark and gory splatter of Midnight Mass, Midnight Club and Oculus, I feel comfortable saying there’s something in House of Usher that equals or tops any of those moments in past projects. 

There’s this one scene that just… I mean… You’ll know it when you get to it, and you’ll wish you’d covered your eyes and ears ahead of time, while being agog all the same. It’s the best!

Non-Guiltiest Pleasure: Mark Hamill’s Old Man Joker Voice 

Okay, so this probably doesn’t play heavily into my opinion that The Fall of the House of Usher is the best horror TV show of all time, but it certainly doesn’t hurt. As the Usher family’s prim-faced lawyer Arthur Pym, Mark Hamill is quite subdued in the role, playing things in a way where even though not much is happening, it’s clear there are myriad hamster wheels spinning out inside his brain. And it’s one of the relatively rare times fans get to see the actor in live-action relying on the gruff-throated voice that helped make his version of The Joker a fan-favorite, despite being an animated character.

Though Arthur’s voice doesn’t get to match the manic highs or the disgruntled lows of the Clown Prince of Crime, Hamill’s voice still hits enough of the same vocal territory to keep the villain in mind, which was suitable enough, considering Bruce Greenwood has voiced Bruce Wayne and Batman across several different animated projects himself. None of that has anything to do with Edgar Allen Poe, of course, unless we’re talking about Teen Titans member Raven, of course… But we’re not.

Get ready for the most magical time of year — Halloween, obviously — when The Fall of the House of Usher debuts on Netflix on Thursday, October 12. While waiting, check out all the upcoming horror movies that will also make this year’s spooky season all the more gleefully harrowing.

Mild spoilers below for those who haven’t yet watched Leopard Skin, so be warned if you want to go into it completely blind.

Peacock’s growing library of original series is no stranger to crime dramas (A Friend of the Family), offbeat humor (MacGruber), and potentially mystical stories set within picturesque locations (The Resort). Sebastian Gutierrez’s latest small screen creation, the endlessly alluring Leopard Skin, fits into all three of the above categories, while also sauntering its way through several other genres. It’s arguably star Carla Gugino’s steamiest and most pulse-pounding project with Gutierrez or otherwise to date — which is certainly saying something — and taps into a surprisingly wide range of emotions and themes for a show that blissfully adheres to a swift half-hour runtime. And you better believe Gugino is well aware of how much the show stands out.

Speaking with CinemaBlend to promote the show’s haunting and mysterious first season, as seen above, Carla Gugino spoke to the idea that the streaming drama very likely isn’t for everyone, even if it does feature one or more elements that the majority of TV viewers would enjoy. Here’s how she started:

Fans of Gugino and Gutierrez are no doubt aware that they’ve partnered up creatively in the past on the stellar TV crime drama Jett and slick features such as Girl Walks Into a Bar and Elektra Luxx. But Leopard Skin is on a whole other level or seven when it comes to the story and the twisty-topsy-turvy way the story plays out, even though it does also star some of the actress’ past screen partners, such as Jett’s Gaite Jansen and Gentry White, as well as The Haunting of Bly Manor’s Amelia Eve. Not to mention Watchmen’s Jeffrey Dean Morgan.

Similar to how the various titles listed above fall across a gamut of genres, Leopard Skin wears that idea like a…skin. (Take note that the show has better lines.) Carla Gugino,  continued speaking to that point, saying: 

At no point during Leopard Skin's runtime can or will audiences be able to accurately predict where the story is going three minutes later, which easily makes it one of the most unique shows of the streaming era. 

All eight episodes are streaming now with a Peacock subscription, and while you probably shouldn’t watch with any younger kids around, you should make it your next binge. Head to our 2023 TV premiere schedule to see what new and returning shows are coming soon.

It was less than a year ago that Stephen King’s Later hit bookshelves everywhere, but already there is an adaptation in the works. Late last month it was announced that Blumhouse Television is now developing a miniseries based on the novel, and in addition to having Raelle Tucker (Supernatural, Jessica Jones) on board as a writer, the project has also brought aboard Lucy Liu to star.

The project is still in early days, but it’s never too early to start building excitement, and today that’s taking the form of fan casting – albeit with a twist. Just as I did for the upcoming remakes of Firestarter with Zac Efron and Edgar Wright’s The Running Man, I’ve imagined the ensemble of Later only using actors who have previously starred in Stephen King adaptations. So what does this ensemble look like? Let’s start with the part that I’m keeping my fingers crossed is being reserved for Lucy Liu:

Lucy Liu As Elizabeth "Liz" Dutton

When an actor signs on to a project when it is in the earliest stages of development, generally speaking they are being set up to play a protagonist. In the case of Later, however, I’m hoping that the adaptation bucks that trend and has Lucy Liu aboard to play Elizabeth “Liz” Dutton. Not only is it a more substantial part in the larger scheme of things (she is the book’s primary antagonist), but also a more complex role that Liu could do great things with. In the novel, Liz is introduced as a police officer and Tia Conklin’s girlfriend, but her arc takes a turn toward the dark side as some really terrible and selfish decisions have major consequences.

Carla Gugino (Gerald’s Game) As Tia Conklin

If Lucy Liu does end up playing Liz in Later, Carla Gugino would be a wonderful choice to take on the part of Tia Conklin – and not just because she is excellent in everything she does. It’s a role that requires a perfect blend of grit and sweetness, as Tia is a single mother who runs her own literary agency through a mix of financial ups and downs and always fights to keep her head above water. She moves to the background of the story more in the back half of the book, but she has a vital role in the opening, and the Gerald’s Game star would be brilliant.

Jacob Tremblay (Doctor Sleep) As Jamie Conklin

Admittedly the pool of age appropriate actors who could play Jamie Conklin and have previous Stephen King experience is spectacularly small, but Jacob Tremblay would be the number one choice for the part even without that extra parameter. Jamie is the main character in Later after all, so why not go for the best child actor in the business right now? Tremblay delivered a gut-wrenching performance as Bradley Trevor a.k.a. The Baseball Boy in Doctor Sleep, and he would unquestionably do amazing things in this miniseries as a child who can see and talk to the dead.

George MacKay (11.22.63) As Kenneth Therriault a.k.a. Thumper

George MacKay is probably best known for his spectacular turn as the protagonist of Sam Mendes’ 1917, but a few years back he played a great supporting part in Hulu’s 11.22.63 miniseries, and I get the sense that he could do wonderful things with a psychotic character like Kenneth Therriault a.k.a. Thumper in Later. Therriault in the book is a serial bomber who ends up haunting Jamie Conklin in terrifying fashion, and MacKay has the skills to make him pop as a terrifying villain in the adaptation.

Bruce Davison (Apt Pupil, Kingdom Hospital, “The Word Processor Of The Gods”) As Professor Martin Burkett

When Jamie finds himself plagued by his supernatural ability and advice for dealing with Kenneth Therriault, he makes a wise decision: he turns to the smartest person he knows. This happens to be his old neighbor, Professor Martin Burkett, and it’s with Martin’s help that the protagonist is quite literally able to face his demons. Bruce Davison, who has a plethora of Stephen King experience, certainly has the geniality to play the role, and can give off the necessary air of intellectual authority.

Steven Weber (Desperation, The Shining, Nightmares & Dreamscapes, “The Revelations Of ‘Becka Paulson”) As Regis Thomas

Regis Thomas has a relatively small role to play as a character in Later, introduced as Tia Conklin’s golden goose client who passes away prior to writing the conclusion to his long-running book series – but if a bit of stunt casting is on the table, Steven Weber would be a terrific fit. Not only are his credentials in the legacy of Stephen King adaptations spectacular, but his reading of IT makes for one of the all-time great audiobook listens. Seeing him make a quick appearance in the Later miniseries as the novel’s recluse mystery writer would be delightful.

Gary Sinise (The Stand, The Green Mile) As Uncle Harry

Lastly we have another small but significant supporting role in Later. The character is referred to only as Uncle Harry, as that is his relationship with Jamie, and admittedly it is not a terrifically vocal role, as Harry unfortunately has early onset Alzheimer's and is in a care facility from the very beginning of the story. That being said, he has a moment at the end of the book that deserves to be performed by an actor with real gravitas, and Gary Sinise would be a wonderful choice. It wouldn’t be work unlike his one-scene role as Burt Hammersmith in The Green Mile, and also the actor’s first Stephen King adaptation since that 1999 movie.

Later is still very much in the early development stages, so we may have to wait a while before learning about any of these roles being cast – but you can be sure that we’ll have all the updates for you here on CinemaBlend as the project progresses. In the meantime, you can keep track of every Stephen King adaptation in the works with our Upcoming Stephen King Movies and TV guide.

Usually, the job of comic book movie actors is to smoothly transcend their character away from the pulpy graphics and bring them into the real world. However, that was not quite the case for Jessica Alba, Bruce Willis, Alexis Bledel, and the rest of the Sin City cast, because Frank Miller and co-director Robert Rodriguez did more than just adapt his series of gritty, noir-inspired graphic novels into a film. They brought them to life.

The critically acclaimed 2005 hit stays remarkably faithful to the source material - not just to the stories and character motivations, but also (and most importantly) the minimalistic, grayscale aesthetic that results in one of most refreshingly original and visually stunning films of its time. Many Sin City cast members would later appear in more straightforward superhero movies, including Rosario Dawson and Benicio del Toro, to name a few. To see what else the star-studded ensemble has been up to, read on.

Jessica Alba (Nancy Callahan)

After rising to fame with the 1999 horror-comedy Idle Hands and the sci-fi series Dark Angel, Jessica Alba played Nancy - a club dancer with a disturbing past - in Sin City the same year she starred in the first of two Fantastic Four movies as Invisible Woman. She would re-team with Robert Rodriguez for 2010’s Machete, the fourth installment of the Spy Kids movies in 2011, and Sin City: A Dame to Kill For, in which she returned as Nancy. 

The mother of three and founder of The Honest Company more recently partnered with Gabrielle Union on the Bad Boys movies spin-off series, L.A.’s Finest, and is currently starring in and producing the upcoming thriller Trigger Warning.

Bruce Willis (Det. John Hartigan)

Also appearing in the Sin City sequel, once again as Det. John Hartigan, was Bruce Willis, who seems to be busier now than ever. He already released six titles in 2021 alone (such as Midnight in the Switchgrass with Megan Fox), with three coming out later in the year (including Fortress, which already has a sequel in the works). 

The Die Hard movies star also had a busy and successful 2019, reprising David Dunn in Glass, playing Edward Norton’s mentor in Motherless Brooklyn, and playing himself in The LEGO Movie 2: The Second Part and Between Two Ferns: The Movie. Willis has five 2022 movie releases scheduled, including A Good Day to Die (not to be confused with A Good Day to Die Hard) which also features his Cosmic Sin co-star, Frank Grillo.

Devon Aoki (Miho) 

“Deadly little Miho” was recast in the sequel with Jamie Chung, but was portrayed in the original Sin City cast by Devon Aoki. She broke through two years earlier as Suki in 2 Fast 2 Furious before playing one of the four main teen heroes of D.E.B.S. in 2004. 

In 2006, she played another samurai-sword wielding warrior in the video game movie D.O.A.: Dead or Alive, had a small role in the lighter comic book movie, Zoom, appeared alongside Jason Statham and Jet Li for War in 2007, and entered a future war in Mutant Chronicles the following year. After 2009’s Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Undead, the model and mother retired from acting, but has appeared in a few music videos - most recently one for her half-brother, Steve Aoki.

Benicio Del Toro (Lt. Det. Jack “Jackie Boy” Rafferty)

Miho’s most memorable kill in Sin City would have to be the crooked cop known as “Jackie Boy,” played by Academy Award winner Benicio del Toro in his comic book movie debut. Years later, he appeared in the Marvel movies as “The Collector,” whom he reprised most recently on Disney+’s What If…? in 2021. 

That same year, he re-teamed with Traffic director Steven Soderbergh for HBO Max’s No Sudden Move, and worked with Wes Anderson for the first time in The French Dispatch. Del Toro has a couple of dramas in the works (including White Lies from Oliver Stone), a comedy from writer and director Jamie Foxx called All-Star Weekend, and a Cuban Mafia biopic called The Corporation.

Rosario Dawson (Gail)

Also part of the MCU (if Netflix’s Marvel TV shows still count) is Rosario Dawson. She actually made her comic book movie debut with Josie and the Pussycats four years before playing Old Town’s Gail in Sin City. 

The “Geek Goddess” has since become especially prolific for comic book character roles, including Wonder Woman in several DC animated movies, Barbara Gordon/Batgirl in The LEGO Batman Movie, Catwoman in HBO Max’s Batman: The Audio Adventures podcast, and Ava DuVernay’s upcoming DMZ series adaptation. The Dopesick cast member is is re-teaming with Kevin Smith for Clerks III and will soon lead her own Ashoka Tano TV show - a miniseries spun-off from The Mandalorian - on Disney+.

Clive Owen (Dwight McCarthy)

Gail’s lover - the mysterious, hard-nosed Dwight McCarthy - was first played in the original Sin City by Academy Award nominee Clive Owen. He has probably never played a more badass character, even though his earlier role in The Bourne Identity and later performance in Inside Man offer worthy options. 

After returning to comic book adaptations with 2017's Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets, and playing the enemy of two Will Smiths in 2019’s Gemini Man, the British actor reunited with his Children of Men co-star Julianne Moore for Apple TV+’s Stephen King-inspired miniseries Lisey’s Story in 2021 and, that same year, joined the Impeachment: American Crime Story cast as Bill Clinton. Owen is reportedly planning to head to France to shoot a new TV series called Monsieur Spade, on which he will play Humphrey Bogart’s famous detective character from The Maltese Falcon, Sam Spade.

Alexis Bledel (Becky)

One of the more notably younger Old Town girls is Becky, played by Alexis Bledel - who was best known at the time as Rory from the Gilmore Girls cast, and from her debut film Tuck Everlasting in 2002. This past year, she reprised her Emmy Award-winning role as Emily Malek in The Handmaid’s Tale cast for Season 4 and will reportedly reprise her character from the Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants movies in a third installment.

Jaime King (Wendy/Goldie)

The twin sisters who led Old Town in Sin City, Wendy and Goldie, were both played by Jaime King, who would also star in another visually unique comic book movie from director Frank Miller called The Spirit. A year later, 2009’s 3-D My Bloody Valentine remake made her a bit of scream queen (further proven by her lead role on the Netflix original zombie show Black Summer). 

Of course, the model and actress is also known for lighter roles, such as Lemon Breeland in the Hart of Dixie cast or in 2018’s Ocean’s Eight as herself. King recently reunited with Bruce Willis for the 2021 action movie Out of Death and will play the title role in the upcoming assassin thriller Banshee. 

Mickey Rourke (Marv)

Moments before her untimely death at the beginning of Sin City’s first segment, Goldie captured the heart of an extremely tough, but compassionate, criminal named Marv. I would personally rank this character right underneath Mickey Rourke’s Academy Award nominated role in director Darren Aronofsky’s The Wrestler on a list of his strongest performances. 

After returning to comic book movies with 2010’s Iron Man 2 and the Sin City sequel in 2014, the Angel Heart star would also return to horror movies, such as the Shudder original anthology Nightmare Cinema in 2015 and upcoming titles like The Seeding and She’s Still Here alongside Dexter: New Blood cast member Jennifer Carpenter. Of course, his biggest role in recent memory would have to be on The Masked Singer Season 4 as Gremlin. 

Carla Gugino (Lucille)

Marv’s parole officer, Lucille, is played by Carla Gugino in her fourth collaboration with Spy Kids director Robert Rodriguez. She also did several comic book adaptations directed by Zack Snyder, including Watchmen as Sally Jupiter and all of his DCEU installments as the voice of the Kryptonian ship. 

The Jett star is best known lately for appearing in several projects from Mike Flanagan, including Gerald’s Game, his Haunting Collection on Netflix, and a brief cameo in the Midnight Mass cast as a judge. The Gunpowder Milkshake cast member’s next project, a TV series thriller called Leopard Skin, is now in post-production.

Elijah Wood (Kevin) 

Giving one of Sin City’s creepiest performances (without saying a word) as the cannibalistic Kevin is Elijah Wood. The former child actor became an icon as Frodo in the Lord of the Rings movies, a sitcom star with FX’s surreal American remake of Wilfred, and a horror movie actor (i.e. his inventive 2012 remake of Maniac) and producer (i.e. the brutal revenge tale Mandy from 2018 starring Nicolas Cage). 

In 2021, he played the FBI analyst to whom Ted Bundy revealed the details of his crimes in No Man of God and leant his voice to the video game Psychonauts 2. Speaking of video games, he has a movie about the dark side of video game programming called L.A. Rush in the works, along with his upcoming Toxic Avenger remake.

Nick Stahl (Yellow Bastard)

Perhaps the creepiest and undeniably grossest character in Sin City, however, is Roark Jr., otherwise known as “Yellow Bastard” due to his unique complexion, who is played by Nick Stahl. Also a former child actor who made his film debut in 1991 with Mel Gibson’s The Man Without a Face, he is best known as John Connor in 2003’s Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines or as the lead of HBO’s Carnivale cast. 

In 2021, he joined the Fear the Walking Dead cast in a recurring role and made a guest appearance among the ruthless Animal Kingdom characters on the TNT drama. He is currently filming a live action adaptation of the hit anime, Saint Seiya: Knights of the Zodiac, expected for 2023.

Josh Hartnett (The Salesman)

The first character we meet and the one who first refers to the film’s setting as “Sin City” is the mysterious, deadly “Salesman.” He is played by The Faculty cast member Josh Hartnett, who would star alongside Bruce Willis in Lucky Number Slevin in 2006. 

The following year, he appeared in a more brutal comic adaptation called 30 Days of Night and then, after an acting break, became the lead of the Penny Dreadful cast. After playing himself on Quibi’s Die Hart in 2020, Hartnett appeared in two cool 2021 thrillers (Wrath of Man and Ida Red), and is now working on the TV series The Fear Index.

There are many Sin City cast members who have, unfortunately, passed away in the years since the film was released - including Powers Boothe (Senator Roark), Michael Clarke Duncan (Manute), Rutger Hauer (Cardinal Roark), and Brittany Murphy (Shellie). However, they will forever be seen as a bright, delightful memory from an otherwise beautifully bleak and deliciously dismal masterpiece. 

Of all the Netflix movies to come out in the summer of 2021, few, if any, feature a group of actors more talented and well-known than the Gunpowder Milkshake cast. Navot Papushado’s action thriller about an assassin reconnecting with her estranged mother while also protecting a young girl has everyone from Karen Gillan to Lena Headey and Michelle Yeoh to Angela Bassett, and then some. But after watching the action-packed thrill-ride with more twists and turns than some can handle, you are probably wondering where you’ve seen the members of the cast before.

Well, if you are a fan of shows like Game of Thrones and Doctor Who or movies from the Marvel Cinematic Universe and the James Bond franchise then you’ll surely recognize some, if not all, of the impressive Gunpowder Milkshake cast. In case you forgot, or maybe you’ve never seen any of those movies or shows, we’ve put together a quick yet comprehensive rundown of the cast and where they’ve been.

Karen Gillan (Sam)

Leading off the Gunpowder Milkshake cast is Karen Gillan who portrays the master assassin known as Sam. Before she was carrying out jobs for The Firm, trying to save a young girl, and attempting to reconnect with her estranged mother, Gillan made a name for herself on the iconic British sci-fi series Doctor Who where she portrayed the Time Lord’s companion Amy Pond. It wasn’t long after Gillan’s star-making performance that she ended up portraying the conflicted Nebula in Guardians of the Galaxy, a role she has portrayed multiple times since and will continue to bring to life in a number of upcoming Marvel movies.

Outside of the Marvel and Doctor Who universes, Karen Gillan has also cemented her legacy in pop culture with starring roles in Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle and its sequel Jumanji: The Next Level, with hopefully more of that franchise on the way.

Lena Headey (Scarlet)

To some (okay, most of us), Lena Headey will forever be remembered as the conniving, vindictive, and power-hungry Cersei Lannister on Game of Thrones, even a few years after the Queen of the Seven Kingdoms met a brutal death in the destruction of Kings Landing. The actress, who plays Scarlet, Sam’s estranged mother and the leader of a sisterhood of assassins in Gunpowder Milkshake, has a lot more to her name than eight seasons of the HBO fantasy series.

Leaving Westeros behind, Lena Headey has played pivotal roles in everything from Zack Snyder’s eye-catching adaptation of the Frank Miller graphic novel 300, the 2005 action-horror film The Cave, The Purge, and Fighting with My Family. And prior to landing one of the most memorable roles on Game of Thrones, Headey had a starring role on Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles where she played the titular heroine.

Chloe Coleman (Emily)

The youngest member of the Gunpowder Milkshake cast, Chloe Coleman, takes on the role of Emily, the young girl under Sam’s protection after the latter kills the former’s father. Despite her young age, Coleman has already built up an impressive filmography in film and television. Over the course of the past few years, Coleman has had notable roles on shows like Big Little Lies, Upload, and Kinderwood.

One of her biggest movies to date — 2020’s My Spy — saw her team up with Karen Gillan’s Guardians of the Galaxy (and Stuber) co-star Dave Bautista in the latest version of the “big man paired with little kid” action movie trope. It doesn’t look like Coleman is slowing down anytime soon as she will soon appear in Avatar 2 and Dungeons and Dragons.

Michelle Yeoh (Florence)

Florence, one of the members of the lethal sisterhood of assassins in Gunpowder Milkshake is portrayed by the incomparable Michelle Yeoh, who has been a fixture of international cinema for years at this point, turning out memorable role after memorable role in a number of different genres. Depending on when you were born, you will either recognize Yeoh from movies like Tomorrow Never Dies, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Memoirs of a Geisha, or Crazy Rich Asians, to name only a few films credited to the talented actress.

A Fixture of the Star Trek universe since joining the cast of Star Trek: Discovery in 2017, Michelle Yeoh’s television credits are impressive, and it doesn’t look like she’s slowing down anytime soon. With a list of upcoming shows that includes an untitled Star Trek series, Ark: The Animated Series, and The Witcher: Blood Origin, expect to see Yeoh on the small screen a lot in the near future. And then there’s her upcoming movies like Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, Minions: The Rise of Gru, Avatar 2.

Angela Bassett (Anna May)

Angela Bassett, another member of the Gunpowder Milkshake cast who has a history in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, portrays the assassin known as Anna May in the Netflix action thriller. One of the most talented actresses who surprisingly doesn’t have an Academy Award to their name (this really needs to change), Bassett has received recognition performances in movies like Black Panther, How Stella Got Her Groove Back, What’s Love Got to Do with It (which earned her a Golden Globe), Malcolm X, and Mission: Impossible — Fallout.

Expect to see Angela Bassett reprise her role of Ramonda in Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, which is near the top of the list of most anticipated 2022 movies. Bassett was also originally slated to return as CIA Director Erika Sloane in Mission: Impossible 7 but she was forced to drop out of the movie due to schedule conflicts brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Carla Gugino (Madeleine)

Taking on the role Madeleine, the third member of the sisterhood of assassins (the one with an affinity for Agatha Christie novels and large weapons), is Carla Gugino, whose contributions to the world of cinema goes beyond being impressive. Over the years, Gugino has showed up in family comedies like Night at the Museum and the Spy Kids franchise while also popping up in multiple Zack Snyder films including Watchmen, Sucker Punch, Man of Steel, Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice, and Zack Snyder’s Justice League.

Carla Gugino’s list of television credits is equally as impressive with small roles on classic shows like Who’s the Boss?, The Wonder Years, and Quantum Leap before landing larger spots on the likes of Spin City, Chicago Hope, and Entourage. More recently, Gugino has lent her talents to Netflix’s The Haunting of Hill House and The Haunting of Bly Manor, as well as Manhunt: Deadly Games.

Paul Giamatti (Nathan)

Taking on the role of Nathan, the head of The Firm’s HR department and father-like figure of Sam, is two-time Golden Globe winner Paul Giamatti. Over the years, the son of the former MLB Commissioner A. Bartlett Giamatti (who wrote what is possibly the most beautiful essay about baseball) has turned into one of the most talented actors of his time, turning out one amazing performance after another. Whether it’s lead roles on TV shows like the HBO limited series John Adams (his first Golden Globe) or Showtime’s Billions or one-off appearances on Downtown Abbey or 30 Rock, Giamatti’s done a little bit of everything.

And then there’s Paul Giamatti’s film contributions. With Barney’s Vision (his second Golden Globe), an Academy Award-nominated performance in Cinderella Man, or Alexander Payne’s Sideways, it isn’t all that difficult to make a case for Giamatti being at the upper echelon of living actors.

Ralph Ineson (Jim McAlester)

Ralph Ineson shows up in Gunpowder Milkshake as Jim McAlester, the leader of the crime organization who makes it his mission to take out Sam, Emily, and anyone else in his way. Before playing an over-the-top villain in the Netflix action flick, Ineson appeared in two of the biggest fantasy franchises of the 21st Century: the Harry Potter films (Amycus Carrow) and Game of Thrones (Dagmer Cleftjaw). Ineson also portrayed William in The Witch.

Outside of fantasy and supernatural films and series, Ralph Ineson has also lent his talents to various comedy programs over the years, most notably the original British version of The Office, in which he appeared as Chris Finch. Over the years, he’s also popped up on The IT Crowd and Drunk History. Oh, and let’s not forget his brief role in Chernobyl or Guardians of the Galaxy.

Adam Nagaitis (Virgil)

Taking on he role of Virgil, one of the master assassins sent to kill Sam in Gunpowder Milkshake, is Adam Nagaitis. Prior to landing a spot the Netflix action thriller, Nagaitis showed up in movies like Suffragette, The Man with the Iron Heart, and The Commuter. Over on the television side of things, Nagaitis has been a part of shows like The Terror, Chernobyl, and A Christmas Carol in addition to smaller roles on programs like Law and Order: UK, Outlaws, and The Courtroom.

Michael Smiley (Dr. Ricky)

And then there is Michael Smiley, who portrays Dr. Ricky, the chief of the secretive assassins clinic in Gunpowder Milkshake. With roles in movies like The World’s End, Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, The Lobster, and The Nun to his name, chances are you’ve seen Smiley at least once over the past couple of decades. His television credits are just as impressive with everything from Doctor Who to Luther and Black Mirror to Wire in the Blood making him a recognizable face.

This is just the main portion of the Gunpowder Milkshake, as The Witcher’s Freya Allan appears as a young Sam, Doctor Who’s Samuel Anderson shows up as Emily’s dad, and not to mention all the random assassins that show up throughout the movie.

While some actors are known for one comic book character role, others achieved the honor of playing multiple, such as Jeffrey Dean Morgan, who appeared in four DC movies before playing The Walking Dead’s Negan. Not to mention, Carla Gugino, Morgan’s co-star from Zach Snyder’s adaptation of Alan Moore’s Watchmen, voiced a Kryptonian computer in two DCEU installments and a Supergirl episode, was once considered to be the next Catwoman, and had a major part in Sin City, based on Frank Miller’s Dark Horse title. Surprisingly enough, the Marvel movies have yet to cast either of these prolific comic book movie veterans.

Now, since I have already imagined what personalities from the other comic book giant Jeffrey Dean Morgan should play, it is about time I put the spotlight on the Silk Spectre to his Comedian from the aforementioned 2009 film. Of course, the 49-year-old actress’ versatility goes far beyond transitioning characters from their inked birthplaces to a new life on celluloid, as her roles in Mike Flanagan’s two Haunting mini-series on Netflix will prove. However, she is clearly really, really good at it and I am curious to see what she would could bring top the Marvel Cinematic Universe, or to a Sony-owned property, even.

In fact, I have a few names in mind who I believe would be the perfect vehicle for the DC queen to enter a new continuity. I managed to narrow it down to five Marvel characters total, starting with one that reminds me of my first introduction to Carla Gugino, when I was a child, but with a superhero edge.

Sage

Some recall her role as Michael J. Fox’s girlfriend on Spin City, in the Nicolas Cage thriller Snake Eyes, or even Pauly Shore “classic” Son in Law as the moment they first laid eyes on Carla Gugino, but her role as Ingrid Cortez in Robert Rodriguez’s Spy Kids was that moment for 8-year-old me. Despite the film’s childish appeal, she really plays it straight as the ass-kicking mom of Carmen and Juni, convincing you a seasoned secret agent could exist in such a world of pure fantasy.

A Marvel character who can relate is Sage - a telepath by birth, a badass by practice, and Professor Charles Xavier’s personal spy by request. The mutant spy did not get the live action debut she deserved in Fox’s short-lived series The Gifted, but could be redeemed if Gugino brought that same Ingrid Cortez moxie in an MCU X-Men movie reboot.

Abigail Brand

A proper live action debut could be even closer to becoming a reality for Abigail Brand - another highly-skilled secret agent who also happens to be part-mutant, but also part-extra-terrestrial as well - hence the green hair. Her alien expertise would earn her a position as director of S.W.O.R.D., a subdivision of S.H.I.E.L.D. specializing in otherworldly threats, which hints in the WandaVision teaser and the announcement of a Secret Invasion TV show suggest will be a major presence in the MCU.

According to the comics, Brand takes over S.W.O.R.D. at 28, but I would age her just a bit to allow Carla Gugino the chance to portray with the same bold authority, quick-wit, and ass-kicking stamina she would bring to roles in San Andreas, on her recent TV crime drama Jett, and in Sin City as no-nonsense parole officer Lucille.

Jean DeWolff

Mention of the latter Frank Miller creation reminded me of another potential Marvel heroine for Carla Gugino. It would mean a demotion from secret agent, but a welcome return to the same femme fatale persona she played to perfection in Sin City and other projects like Faster in 2010 or Hotel Noir from two years later.

The character is named Jean DeWolff - a sharp NYPD detective whom you could call the James Gordon to Spider-Man’s Batman for their mutual devotion to upholding the law with honor until her heartbreaking murder by the hands of the Sin Eater. It would be interesting to see this dark story brought to life as something more than a subtle Easter Egg with Gugino in the role of the 1930s fashion-lover, based on the way the actress rocks an old-fashioned trench coat alone.

Black Rose

Horror is another genre I associate Carla Gugino with, particularly for of her gripping performance in The Haunting of Hill House as a mother slowly losing herself to the control of an evil presence. We never saw her possession go much further than becoming a vessel for her family’s psychological manipulation, which is why I would love to see just how crazy Gugino could get as a terrifying, monstrous force to be reckoned, much like what happened to Roxanne Simpson.

Once the wife of Johnny Blaze (better known as Ghost Rider), a powerful villain named Hellgate killed her before she was later resurrected by Blackheart as his demonic servant called Black Rose. We never got to see this tragic element in their story when Eva Mendes played the character in 2007 opposite Nicolas Cage’s Blaze, which is just one reason I think the character could use a reboot.

Shiklah

Speaking of reboots, I am especially excited to see two-time Oscar-winner Mahershala Ali’s reinterpretation of Blade, a half-vampire hunter of vampires, and what horror-centric elements and characters he will bring to the MCU, such as Dracula, for instance. Plus, getting the quintessential bloodsucker into the mix would also mean there would be a chance for the screen debut of his current wife, Shiklah.

I also believe this powerful succubus, co-created by comedian and Deadpool writer Brian Posehn, could be a perfect mix of the alluring disposition Carla Gugino is known for and the more brutal, animalistic side I said I would be interested in seeing from her earlier. Not to mention, her husband before marrying Dracula was actually Deadpool, which also sounds like golden opportunity for Gugino’s sense of humor shine beyond all this darkness.

What do you think? Does a romance between Wade Wilson and a vengeful succubus sound like a match made in hell for the Marvel Cinematic Universe, or would you rather see Carla Gugino be a hero again? Let us know in the comments and be sure to check back for additional information and updates on the Jett actress, as well as even more hypothetical comic book movie casting sessions, here on CinemaBlend.

Zack Snyder is hard at work on his version of Justice League, bringing some surprise characters into the mix in the process. It'll will be packed with characters when all is said and done, including major DC villains like Lex Luthor and Deathstroke. And recently, Snyder appeared to be teasing Catwoman, and many fans pointed to Carla Gugino as a potential candidate for the role. Now, a fan has given us a taste of what that could look like.

In Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, many characters from Batman’s world were surprisingly missing, including Selina Kyle/Catwoman. Since Zack Snyder is now tackling Justice League, many fans would love to see Carla Gugino make an appearance as Catwoman, as evidenced by this fan art recently posted on Instagram. Check it out:

Wow. I have to admit that looks dead on and that Carla Gugino would fit the Catwoman role like a glove. That said, while Zack Snyder has teased the possible appearance of Catwoman in Justice League, there’s been no clear confirmation that Carla Gugino will be playing her. Still, if Zack Snyder wants Catwoman in Justice League, it would make sense for him to pick Carla Gugino. He even previously admitted on a podcast that she would be a great choice.

Zack Snyder and Carla Gugino already have a firm working relationship. Watchmen fans will recall that she played Sally Jupiter/Silk Spectre in the 2008 film. Later, she played Dr. Vera Gorski in Snyder’s Sucker Punch and also offered her voice for Man of Steel and Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. So if she were to be offered the Catwoman role, she’d be right at home.

If Catwoman does make an appearance in Justice League, it’s hard to imagine she would have much of a role, considering the already packed cast list. Would she make a mere cameo? Could she appear in a flashback scene to explain more of Batman’s backstory? Whatever the case, there’s no doubt it would be cool to see her show up in some capacity.

The last time we saw Catwoman make a live-action appearance in a Batman film was when Anne Hathaway’s played the character in The Dark Knight Rises back in 2012. And regardless of whether we see Catwoman appear in Zack Snyder's Justice League, we know she’ll for sure be playing a role in Matt Reeves' upcoming film, The Batman. Mad Max: Fury Road actress Zoe Kravitz will be the one to dawn the claws in that film alongside Robert Pattinson's Batman.

Still, Carla Gugino could easily tackle an older, more mature version of Catwoman, if not any other DC character. She’s long been an underrated actress who proven to surprise audiences with her performances time and time again. Now, only time will tell if Zack Snyder taps her to hop into the Justice League action when it debuts on HBO Max in 2021.

Spoilers below for those who haven't yet watched the entirety of The Haunting of Bly Manor, so be warned!

Despite going into The Haunting of Bly Manor knowing full well that creator Mike Flanagan and his creative team would have twists galore in store for viewers, I was still completely flabbergasted whenever the season finale revealed Carla Gugino's narrator character to actually be the older version of Amelia Eve's gardener Jamie. While that twist wouldn't have made any sense in the premiere episode, the finale properly set it up by laying out Jamie and Dani's tragic post-manor romance. But while certain details made enough sense, it wasn't immediately clear why Jamie returned to the Wingrave family to tell her tale.

During a press event for The Haunting of Bly Manor that CinemaBlend took part in along with other outlets, I asked star Amelia Eve to talk about Jamie's motivations for dredging up the past at Flora's wedding rehearsal dinner, and whether or not something slightly malicious was guiding her decision in that respect. Here's how she answered:

I'll admit that after hearing Amelia Eve's reply, I felt pretty justified for having partially judged older Jamie's actions during the course of The Haunting of Bly Manor. As viewers learned in the final episode, after Flora and Miles left the titular abode with Henry in the wake of Dani trading fates with the Lady of the Lake, the siblings mysteriously lost all their memories of the ghostly terrors they experienced at Bly. They entered adulthood completely free of the darkest moments from their shared history, while all of the other grown-ups seemingly maintained their harrowing and tortured memories. (Poor Owen x1000!)

However, Jamie was the one who dealt with it all the longest, and even made a depressing trip back to the cursed house after Dani stole away to accept her role as the lake's new inhabitant. to witness Dani's drowned corpse, so her mental wounds were no doubt the freshest. Therefore, it wasn't out of the realm of possibilities that Jamie would feel more than a little vindictive when she first begin to tell her long and winding story to the increasingly interested crowd. Still, it wasn't ALL vengeful, as Amelia Eve also noted that Jamie didn't want to do any major damage to Flora or Miles' psyches by reintroducing them to Bly Manor's ghouls. Rather, she wanted it to be more of a cautionary tale.

The actress continued:

That would be quite the baffling crossover if Flora and Miles took Jamie's story overly seriously and turned into the nerve-shattered and selfish wrecks that several of the Crain siblings became in The Haunting of Hill House. But at least that would make for a more concrete connection between broke-neck Hannah and the Bent-Neck Lady beyond just both characters being at the center of each season's fifth (and best) episode.

In the end, for as much angst and bitterness that Jamie may have felt at times about having lost Dani to Bly Manor's clutches, she didn't want to ruin the lives of arguably the two most innocent souls in the bunch. Just maybe to ruin their sleep with all that scary shit. One has to wonder, though. Would Jamie have even made that trip in the first place if she was aware that Dani's spirit was still in her presence? I'd assume not, but that would make for a sweet surprise for the wedding reception.

All nine episodes of The Haunting of Bly Manor are currently available to stream in full on Netflix. While waiting to hear news about a third season, as well as news about Mike Flanagan's other upcoming Netflix shows, stay tuned to CinemaBlend and check out our Fall TV 2020 premiere schedule to see what new and returning shows will be popping up soon.

Spoilers below for the entirety of Season 1 of The Haunting of Bly Manor, so be warned!

For anyone expecting The Haunting of Bly Manor to be a bone-chilling horror drenched with grief in the exact same way that The Haunting of Hill House was, creator Mike Flanagan and his creative team had quite a few surprises in store. While the two season-long arcs shared much in common, Bly Manor was much more of a tragic gothic romance spiced up with spooky ghosts, as opposed to vice versa. Yet it still managed to sweep the rug out from viewers with some of the more surprising story twists and turns, and culminated in quite the satisfying ending in most ways.

Speaking of said ending, let's take some time to talk out exactly what happened to everyone we saw in and around the titular Bly Manor, from Victoria Pedretti's Dani to T'Nia Miller's Hannah and all the others. But first, let's go over the show's actual final (and opening) scenes, which didn't take place at the Manor at all.

What Did The Haunting Of Bly Manor's Wedding Ending Mean?

When The Haunting of Bly Manor kicked off its premiere episode, fans were treated to the surprise return of Hill House's Carla Gugino as the initially mysterious Storyteller at a nondescript wedding. Gugino served as the narrator for the entire series, laying out Bly Manor's dark history for a group of rapt guests as this season's wraparound arc. In the finale, "The Beast in the Jungle," it's revealed that Gugino's silver-haired character was actually the gardener Jamie, as played in her youth by Amelia Eve. As well, viewers are clued in on all the other character. reveals, from Owen to Henry to the "kids," so to speak.

Clearly having spent many years without contacting the Wingrave family and others close to it, Jamie returned at what apparently felt like an opportune moment to test everyone's mental druthers by going over the horrific events that several of the people present had fully lived through, even if two of them were semi-possessed by ghosts at the time. Despite any possible attempts to engage the younger generation's memories, it appeared that Jamie's story only came across as a very powerful anecdote, though one with lessons to live by.

Not to mention one with a lasting effect on Jamie herself, even if she might not realize it. Though she'd never been able to catch a glimpse of Dani's face in any reflections, the season's final moment seemed to prove that Jamie is indeed still with her love in certain times. That said, Dani made the choice not to haunt Jamie's life with her presence, possibly due to learning a thing or two from dealing with Edmund.

How Bly Manor Ended For Dani

In the season premiere of The Haunting of Bly Manor, Dani suggests to Henry that a limited number of children would help her make a bigger difference in those children's lives. By the end of the show, she certainly did just that and then some, making the ultimate sacrifice time and again so that almost everyone else could live a haunting-free life. One big silver lining is that she seemed to have eliminated seeing Edmund and his reflective glasses during her time there, for what that was worth later in life.

Dani's fate was thrown into question at the end of Episode 7, when she was frightfully caught by the Lady of the Lake during the ghoul's nightly constitutional. And then her fate remained a mystery throughout the historical backstory of "The Romance of Certain Older Clothes," which featured the episode-long cameo from Hill House's Kate Siegel that explained the Lady's hyper-cyclical origin story. Viola's specter thankfully released Dani in place of Flora's self-sacrifice, but Dani soon made a nick-of-time rescue with the "It's you, it's me, it's us" line, thus inviting Viola's spirt inside herself and cementing that doomed connection. For another stretch of silver lining here, at least Dani's act broke the ghostly curse on Bly Manor.

On the plus side, Dani and Jamie got to spend some really good years in the aftermath discovering things about one another in ways that only post-trauma couples can. On the downside, there came a time when the Faceless Lady began to haunt Dani's existence the same way Edmund did, calling her back to Bly Manor to take Viola's place at the bottom of the lake. But because Dani wasn't a greedy monster like her predecessor, her cursed reign beneath the water took no lives beyond her own.

How Bly Manor Ended For The Wingrave Family

Both Flora and Miles had been taken advantage of in totally dreadful ways throughout The Haunting of Bly Manor, and by the people/ghosts they put a bulk of their trust into. Though Miles may have initially come across as evil when pulling stunts to get himself kicked out of school, it was very clearly Peter's transcendental selfishness that forced Miles' hands throughout the season. Miles didn't look very forgiving when Peter gave his pitiful apology before disappearing. For better or worse, given he wasn't of sound mind, Miles did manage to get away with Hannah's murder in the end.

Flora showed her innate selflessness with her attempt to save Dani, which somewhat mirrored the long-awaited return of Henry Thomas' Henry, her biological father. Of course, Henry quickly found himself with a foot, a leg and half of his stomach sticking through the pearly gates after he tried stopping the Lady of the Lake. (It was weird seeing him suddenly talking to Hannah for that quick bit before being jerked back into the land of the living.) In the end, Henry, Flora and Miles were all alive and well thanks to Dani's accidental volunteering.

So well, in fact, that over time, both Flora and Miles mysteriously forgot all of the creepy and horrifying shit they went through in the aftermath of their parents' deaths, maintaining only the vague notion of Bly Manor as a summer home. As Rahul Kohli's Owen put it, though, Henry still remembered everything, just as the other adults did. As the wedding celebration scenes showed viewers, both Flora and Miles are extremely happy and well-adjusted in adulthood, though Flora can now be married (and perhaps marred) with Jamie's spooky story as a cautionary tale to guide her through life.

How Bly Manor Ended For Hannah And Owen

Following the tour de force Episode 5 that featured Hannah taking a time-jaunting self-exploration, T'Nia Miller's character continued to recapture some of her darker memories ahead of the finale. She talked herself into stepping up to save the day, but then had a few issues, in that Hannah legitimately ran out of ghost-breath when the Faceless Lady passed through her, which inspired so many questions for both characters.

In any case, Hannah and Owen's tragically adorable time together was cut short by Dani swapping fates with Swamp Lady, since the curse's lifting also vanquished the spirits bound to Bly Manor by their deaths. Hannah's truncated final words were to the disembodied Henry, telling him to pass on to Owen both her declaration of love, and a warning for when he found her crumpled in the well. It was downright heartbreaking to watch Owen as Carla Gugino's Storyteller told of him staying with Hannah's body and cleaning it ahead of her funeral.

To combat all the sad emotions, Owen eventually opened up his own restaurant, which he named A Batter Place in part because the pun was a surefire way to make Hannah groan. Which is so heart-smooshingly cute in every which way, and many viewers were no doubt endlessly relieved to see that Owen's life never became an obvious wretched mess.

How Bly Manor Ended For Rebecca Jessel And Other Ghosts

For as wonderful as Tahirah Sharif was in portraying the downright angelic Rebecca Jessel, that character was infuriating to watch at times due to her infatuation with Oliver Jackson-Cohen's domineering shyster Peter Quint, whose ego and self-obsessed nature rivaled those of Viola herself. (Seriously, he committed the rare one-body murder-suicide by possessing Rebecca for her final walk into the lake.) The pair's final scheme was to permanently become Miles and Flora while leaving Dani for dead, which was a plan that Peter took way more seriously than Rebecca did.

In some of her final moments, Rebecca followed after the Lady of the Lake and, before Dani showed up, she attempted to send Flora off into a sea of favorite memories so that the child wouldn't suffer through drowning alongside the murderous ghoul. A kind-hearted gesture, but she's not getting a gold star for that last ditch effort.

As it was mentioned above, Peter's final moments were spent offering a final apology to Miles: "I'm so sorry, Miles. I'm sorry." And before anyone could worry about drowning in the giant ghost-crocodile tear falling down Peter's face, he disappeared in an instant, along with all of Viola's other victims, both deserved and undeserved, as well as those who died by other means.

How Bly Manor Ended For Jamie

Considering Jamie is revealed to be the captain of this narrative ship, her end is the beginning is the end, and so on. Having formed the foundation for something deeper than a friendship with Dani during the first eight episodes of The Haunting of Bly Manor, Jamie basically got the flip side of the couples coin from Owen, getting to both leave the estate with Dani and have a clear and relatively long-lasting relationship with her. Though it wasn't one without its unique consequences, of course.

Jamie didn't run from unexplainable atrocities within Bly Manor, and she didn't run from any of the things that continued to torment Dani after they started their life together. The bond she shared with Dani was, for a while, even strong enough to outlast Viola's dreadful (and slightly more faceless) beckoning. Though it didn't last forever, and Jamie had to suffer through waking up to realize "today is THAT day" when Dani returned to Bly Manor. Jamie followed that reckoning by also returning to Bly, and then diving into the lake to get a mentally draining image of Dani's staring corpse lying on the bottom.

Going through such a torturous ordeal had to have taken its toll on Jamie mentally, and those events have obviously stayed with her long enough to the point where she went back to darken everyone's lives with a retelling of their history together, if perhaps only to personally witness Miles and Flora complete lack of memory of those days. Telling that tale definitely made her mourn Dani in refreshed ways, which is why it was all the more heartwarming/heartbreaking to realize that Jamie probably won't ever know that Dani is still around and still wearing her ring.

The Haunting of Bly Manor is available to stream in full on Netflix. To see what other new and returning shows are heading to the streaming service in the near future, head to our Netflix 2020 premiere schedule, and be sure to bookmark our Fall 2020 TV guide to keep up with all the debuts as they're announced.

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2018 featured a ton of great television across its twelve months, but nothing that rang with the same emotionally harrowing gusto has Netflix's The Haunting of Hill House, which sat atop my list of the year's best shows. Paramount Home Entertainment is rather excellently giving the Mike Flanagan-created horror-drama an official Blu-ray release on October 15, featuring several episodes recut to the director's wishes. You know who's quite excited about those Blu-rays? Hill House star Carla Gugino.

I had the pleasure of speaking with Carla Gugino ahead of The Haunting of Hill House's Blu-ray release date, and all of the Blu-ray and DVD diehards out there will be pumped to know that the actress is cut from a similar cloth. Here's how she expressed her glee:

Carla Gugino is speaking of course about the Blu-ray and DVD sets' exclusive versions of three key Haunting of Hill House episodes, which each get extended "Director's Cut" iterations. Those installments are Ep. 1 ("Steven Sees a Ghost"), Ep. 5 ("The Bent-Neck Lady") and Ep. 10 ("Silence Lay Steadily"), and Gugino does get more time to shine (oh so darkly) as Olivia Crain.

The actress continued:

Just as exciting as the extended episodes, at least for me, are the audio commentaries that Mike Flanagan provided for the three aforementioned installments, as well as the now-legendary sixth episode, "Two Storms," which showcases several hyper-extended takes that wowed fans upon The Haunting of Hill House's release. Considering all of the visual bells and whistles that Mike Flanagan affixed to the grief-filled story, as well as the multitude of revisions from Shirley Jackson's novel, Flanagan has a lot to say in these commentaries, and offers up a plethora of behind-the-scenes info about this lovingly crafted project.

Amazingly enough, it's already been more than a year since The Haunting of Hill House first showed up on Netflix in October 2018. It definitely speaks to Mike Flanagan's meticulous dedication in crafting the ten episodes that Paramount is giving Hill House a home entertainment release in time for Halloween 2019. Outside of its Marvel dramas and marquee offerings like House of Cards and Stranger Things, not a lot of Netflix shows get pegged for Blu-ray and DVD releases, and the fact that Hill House is a heavy genre show is all the more encouraging, even if awards shows don't care so much.

During my talk with Carla Gugino, who tore up 2019 with her aces Cinemax action-drama Jett, I asked her how awesome it was to get back into promoting this one-of-a-kind series. She said:

A stranger to neither genre filmmaking nor powerful storytelling, Carla Gugino appreciates the fans who can look deeper into the material and find some kind of emotional truth amidst all of the haunted hallways. And in her mind (as well as that of yours truly), Mike Flanagan is the kind of director and writer who knows how to perfectly stack narrative layers upon each other.

Gugino mentioned that Mike Flanagan first brought up the idea of her possibly joining The Haunting of Hill House whenever they worked together for Netflix's Gerald's Game, adapted from Stephen King's novel. (That project was just as stressful and traumatic as Hill House, only with a much shorter running time.) The actress spoke more about her admiration and adoration of Flanagan's take on the material.

During the commentaries for one of the episodes, Mike Flanagan brought up a background ghost sighting that I don't think I'd noticed before, which means there might be more. Which means I'll probably be busy scouring over the episodes until Season 2, The Haunting of Bly Mansion, is available to stream.

Buy The Haunting of Hill House on Amazon now!

The Haunting of Hill House is currently available to stream on Netflix, but those who want the extra footage will need to seek out Paramount Home Entertainment's Blu-ray and DVD releases, which are out on Tuesday, October 15.

For many, Vince Gilligan's Breaking Bad will forever be a mighty beacon of television's scripted prowess, standing toe-to-toe with The Wire, The Sopranos, and The Shield in the annals of superb TV crime dramas. That highly laudable list may have a worthy addition in the form of Cinemax's Jett, the endlessly slick and stylish new series from star Carla Gugino and writer/director Sebastian Gutiérrez.

Without the use of its titular character's method of convincing others, only time will tell whether or not Jett can dig its deadly heels into audiences deep enough to make a permanent impact. But having seen the first half of the season available for reviews, I can easily say that Jett is easily my favorite TV crime drama since Breaking Bad, and without ever ripping it off. Jett hits every key point on the "high quality neo-noir" checklist, along with a few of its own blood-smeared write-in suggestions.

Let's look closer at what makes Jett an ideal slice of summer TV. (Also note that while Better Call Saul is one of my favorite shows on the air right now, it isn't completely a crime drama, so I don't put it in squarely in that category.)

It's Sebastian Gutiérrez's Best Work To Date

Anyone who keeps up with modern noir cinema is familiar with Sebastian Gutiérrez's films, many of which star Carla Gugino, his life partner of the past 15+ years. (Films such as Girl Walks into a Bar, Women in Trouble and Electra Luxx, with the latter two leading off an as-yet-unfinished trilogy.) As enjoyable as his filmography is, the biggest "problem," at least in my eyes, is that movies just don't allow audiences enough time to frolic in Gutiérrez's specifically realized worlds.

Compare all that with Jett, where every 60-minute episode feels like a fully rounded mini-movie, complete with all the Tarantino-esque genre staples and then some. At the center is the tried-and-true hook of a reformed criminal and mother – Gugino's Daisy "Jett" Kowalski – who regrettably gets pulled back into the thievery game with an arc populated by hornball kingpins, brazenly confident henchmen, damsels delivering distress, selfish cops, and lots of other slimeballs and questionable folk.

Here, Sebastian Gutiérrez takes the action and violence above and beyond his past efforts, if largely because there's so much more time for it. Jett ushers in some truly brutal moments that might cause viewers to turn their eyes for some stress-inducing frames; very often, though, the person being brutalized deserves every second of pain. Mix all that with a healthy (or unhealthy?) barrage of gorgeously lit nudity and a constant thread of dark humor, and it's clear that Gutiérrez has found the ideal medium for his pulpy storytelling.

Carla Gugino Is In Beast Mode

Even in Carla Gugino and Sebastian Gutiérrez's least memorable collaborations, the actress is always on her A-game, and Jett is her best shot since the cancelled-too-soon Karen Sisco to win over that show's vocal fanbase. Jett plays to all of Gugino's strengths, from physical dominance to mental superiority to unimpeded confidence and so on.

Of course, the many males characters within Jett are embarrassingly quick to remind Gugino's skilled thief just how beautiful she is. And while it's up for debate how much of that she actually appreciates – read as: very little – she definitely uses others' infatuation to her advantage in figuring out ways to fuck others over before they get to her first.

As the season progresses, Jett peels back its central character's layers to give audiences background info about her prison stint, her roles as a mother, and how she met the most important people in her life, from her live-in babysitter-of-sorts Maria (Elena Anaya) to her trusted friend Phoenix (Gaite Jansen). Carla Gugino anchors every scene, too, regardless of if she's delivering a long, heist-related monologue or if she's lighting a cigarette in deliberate silence. Basically, she's Breaking Bad's Heisenberg without as much "Walter White" shading.

Jett Even Stars Breaking Bad's Giancarlo Esposito

The easiest way to inspire a comparison to Breaking Bad is to employ one of the crime drama's most stellar actors, which Jett did in signing on Giancarlo Esposito, whose drug lord Gustavo Fring is currently alive once more via AMC's prequel Better Call Saul. (Which he actually prefers to Breaking Bad, as far as the acting goes.)

In the same way that Walter White and Daisy Kowalski are two completely different kinds of criminals, Giancarlo Esposito's head honcho Charles Baudelaire has very little in common with Fring beyond an overwhelming sense of authority and power. Charles maximizes his influence for his own enjoyment of life and the luxuries that lots of dirty money can provide. Which means fans get to see Esposito smiling a lot, particularly when it comes to his sexual relationship with Jett.

In fact, perhaps the most enjoyable element about the character is watching the nonplussed passiveness on Giancarlo Esposito's face whenever Charles Baudelaire is in the midst of being frightfully ruthless. It ties in well with the Cinemax series' darkly comedic tones, though the looming shadow of Gus Fring adds an extra layer of menace to the actor's performance.

This Cast Fits The Story Perfectly

While we've already discussed Carla Gugino and Giancarlo Esposito's excellence, it's now time to shine a quick light on the rest of the actors and actresses filling out Jett's darkest corners and brightest mansions. Like Breaking Bad, it's a show that is rewarded by the efforts of a full ensemble.

For me, the standout of the bunch is Bosch vet Christopher Backus as Charles' surprisingly humane henchman Bennie, who delivers some truly A+ lines in Jett's early episodes. He also gets invested in his own side-story as a guardian angel, as it were, for a trouble woman named Rosalie (Lucy Walters), which leads to its own complications.

Then we have The Shannara Chronicles' Gentry White as Charles' son Junior – or just make that Charles Junior – who has built up his own reputation within the underworld as a coked-up sadist. Patriot's always convincing Gil Bellows plays Evans, Daisy's no-bullshit handler in her post-prison crime life. Other actors playing fast-talking delinquents include The Handmaid's Tale's Greg Bryk, Gypsy's Shiloh Fernandez, Law & Order True Crime's Gus Halper and more.

On the slightly more protagonistic side are the aforementioned Elena Anaya and Gaite Jansen, whose Maria and Phoenix are interesting reflections of Jett's own life and experiences, and are given more narrative weight than similar character usually get in pulpy projects like this. Michael Aranov seems like a ticking time bomb as former undercover agent Jackie Dillon, whose stays connected with Jett through their past together, complicating things with his partner/girlfriend, played by The Last Ship's Jodie Tuner-Smith.

I could never make so lofty a claim as to say that Jett will be remembered as one of the greatest crime dramas in all of television. As well, I obviously can't objectively claim it's just as good as Breaking Bad in every single way, considering the comparison would be completely unbalanced. It's not going to be everyone nudity-filled cup of tea, which is fine, because it succeeds in reaching the exact goals it's aiming for.

I think I can safely say, however, that its intelligence and wily storytelling gives Jett the current stronghold on the cops-and-criminals TV that's airing in 2019. Plus, I think I'm technically enjoying Jett (in the most all-encompassing sense of the word) more than I enjoyed Breaking Bad's first season when it aired back in 2008. Now to get started on some Daisy Kowalski and Walter White fan fiction...

While waiting to hear more about Carla Gugino's future within Mike Flanagan's Haunting of franchise on Netflix, make it a priority to get obsessed with Jett, which airs Friday nights on Cinemax at 10:00 p.m. ET.

For my money, and that of many others out there, The Haunting of Hill House was one of the biggest and most splendrous TV surprises of 2018. It had chills to spare, a thick-as-soup atmosphere, and one of the most talented small screen ensembles out there. The matriarch of the generation-spanning family was portrayed by fan-favorite actress Carla Gugino, who's got a wild new Cinemax show debuting soon.

Ever since Netflix officially announced that it was moving forward with a second season for the awards-snubbed horror series, which will go by the name The Haunting of Bly Manor, fans have wondered if show creator Mike Flanagan is looking to tap some of Season 1's actors for the upcoming adaptation of Henry James' Turn of the Screw. Carla Gugino could offer no concrete answers, but what she did say is quite positive.

Even if her declaration couldn't be definitive, Carla Gugino at least convinced me that she would be willing to return to the Haunting-verse to work with Mike Flanagan on this next paranormal fright fest. It would be their third time working together on a project, as Gugino and Flanagan also paired up for the Stephen King adaptation Gerald's Game. The two of them plus a disturbing novel equals a gripping experience regardless of whether it's TV or film.

The way Carla Gugino puts it, the main factor would be figuring out a way to work their schedules around each other. Gugino currently has Cinemax's action-oriented series JETT on the way, which could be a factor if Season 2 gets ordered soon into Season 1. Plus, the actress is currently filming the thriller Gunpowder Milkshake, which also co-stars Michelle Yeoh, Angela Bassett, Lena Headey and Karen Gillan. (Let's get all those actresses for Haunting at Bly Manor, too.)

Not that The Haunting at Bly Manor would be going into filming in the immediate future. Mike Flanagan's latest big screen effort, the Stephen King adaptation Doctor Sleep, is gearing up for its promotional season on the way to its November release. It might be safe to say that Flanagan is getting his pre-production materials together and carving out the story he wants to build within Bly Manor. But there's likely still time before the cast members will all be needed on the sets.

As such, there's still time for Carla Gugino to map out a spot in her future to slot in some filming time for The Haunting of Bly Manor. If she did return, she would obviously be playing a completely different character. Not only did Hill House's Olivia Crain go very much the way of the do-do bird, but we're also dealing with a completely different piece of literary history from the Shirley Jackson novel that Mike Flanagan remixed to make Season 1.

Carla Gugino's words to The Wrap are slightly more vague than comments made by Hill House vet Oliver Jackson-Cohen, who told the outlet he would "get shot" if he ever gave an answer to the question of whether he's in Bly Manor or not. That's not the kind of answer that someone walks away thinking, "That person probably isn't in that project he was just talking about." But it's not like we could instantly figure out who Jackson-Cohen would be playing anyway.

Do you guys hope to see Carla Gugino returning for The Haunting of Bly Manor? Let us know in the comments what your thoughts are, and don't forget that The Haunting of Hill House is available to watch in full on Netflix right now.

It's been said before, and it'll be said again: 2017 has been the year for Stephen King adaptations. And with Netflix's release of Gerald's Game, the famous author's work has yet again been plucked from the page, and given new life on the screen. While the novel seems to have a reputation as one of King's lesser works, the film is the polar opposite, as it is a claustrophobic head trip that is set to dazzle the audiences who are about to enjoy its contents.

Jessie (Carla Gugino) and Gerald Burlingame (Bruce Greenwood) head off to a secluded getaway for a weekend of marital rehab. With Gerald looking to spice things up with a little bit of kink, the couple gets off to a bad start when Jessie confronts him about his obsession with dominating her. Things only get worse when her husband dies due to a heart attack, just after he has handcuffed her to the bed. With no easy means of escape, and no one but herself in the room, Jessie's about to go through quite the interesting weekend.

So far this year, there have been two levels of Stephen King adaptation: either it's a Dark Tower level experiment, or an IT style success. Gerald's Game lands on the better side of the spectrum, as co-writer / director Mike Flanagan takes what could have been a solid hour of anthology TV and turns it into an engrossing feature film. The tension of Jessie's confinement, as well as the mental gymnastics she goes through due to her predicament, are all pitch perfect, with Carla Gugino carrying a substantial portion of the film.

Both Gugino and Bruce Greenwood turn in nuanced portrayals of a married couple on the proverbial rocks, and in the section of the film that opens on that story, they really do a good job of convincing the audience that they'd be perfectly ok if the film just focused on that story. Of course, this being a Stephen King story, things get deadly, and they get weird, with the stranger side of the spectrum allowing our duo to play different facets of their characters' psyches. While the bulk of the film is focused on Jessie's story, Greenwood's Gerald makes himself very much present throughout the narrative of Gerald's Game, without being intrusive or extreme. His character is ambiguous, being left for the audience to determine the level of his true villainy, and it shows through every piece of the finished product.

The best part about Gerald's Game, besides the presence of a powerful script with two equally luminary participants shining in its light, is the cinematography. Michael Fimognari's framing of the limited locations that the film takes place in is tight, but never restrictive for the sake of being so. Naturally flowing with the story's expanding and contracting viewpoint, it's a pretty fantastic film to watch, as well as to digest from a narrative perspective. Of course, all of this praise helps the one flaw of Gerald's Game's narrative stand out all the more.

While the film manages to bring itself in at a taut 103 minutes, the film could have been a little tighter if it didn't fall into an expository rabbit hole in its epilogue. Surely there are pieces and details that are vital to the story's ultimate catharsis, but considering how well paced the rest of the film before it was, the ending to Gerald's Game steals some of the wind from the movie's overall sails. The fact that a sequence of intense body horror and tension precedes this epilogue serves as a hard barrier between the two tones of the film, and if anything, the moments after the shock and awe of Flanagan's well-crafted film should have been shorter and sweeter.

With the thrill and punch of the better Stephen King films we've experienced, Netflix has now officially entered the Stephen King business with Gerald's Game. If this is any indication of what a continued partnership would bring, both parties should look for as many chances as they can to stay together.

Spoilers below for the Season 2 premiere of Wayward Pines.

In Season 1, the surreal Fox thriller Wayward Pines definitely lived up to whatever notoriety that having M. Night Shyamalan as an executive producer earns. And even though everything wrapped up like it did in the novel trilogy that served as the show’s source material, Fox ordered up Season 2, which debuted tonight with new and returning characters, a new narrative direction, and one hell of a shocking death. Alas, viewers only got a short while to revisit with the unsettled Kate Hewson before she killed herself, and here’s why actress Carla Gugino says it had to happen.

That’s rough. The entire situation is rough. I’m still confused as to why people in Wayward Pines fight to keep civilization going when civilization is horrible.

Even though we knew Carla Gugino would be back for Season 2 of Wayward Pines, we didn’t know for how long, and we weren’t quite sure what capacity she would show up in. It turns out she’d kept the resistance front going for the past three years with Ethan’s son Ben, but her efforts landed her in the hospital, and new world order leader Jason Higgins’ aim to get information from her is how the super-confused newbie Dr. Theo (Jason Patric) came in. His medical mission was pretty useless, though, considering Kate had no intentions of ratting out the people she’d been working with to take down the First Generation. It seems she really had only one true intention.

When confronted by the better-than-thou-and-all-the-rest Megan, Hope Davis’ Pilcher fanatic who’d seemingly died in Season 1, Kate had little issue with making it one of the most uncomfortable situations Megan had ever been in. Kate attacked the wheelchair-bound woman and then slit her own throat after expressing a desire to no longer be a part of the world that Megan and the First Generation are in favor of. It was a huge shock in the moment, certainly, but after thinking about it and reading Gugino’s thoughts to EW, it’s probably the most understandable thing that has ever happened on this show. Anything to get out of that abomination-surrounded hellscape.

Given that this was only the first episode of Season 2, we are undoubtedly in for way more surprises from Wayward Pines, both bigger and smaller. And it wouldn’t be dumb to expect to have to wait for explicit answers to the mysteries until another few weeks have gone by. The biggest mystery right now? How Megan is going to do anything anymore without feeling Kate’s blood splattering all around her.

Wayward Pines, and at least some of its cast members, will be around for the next nine Wednesday nights on Fox. To see what else you can find premiering in the coming months, check out our summer TV schedule.

Spoilers for Season 1 of Wayward Pines are below.

Broadcast networks aren’t often places where you’ll find shows that are bafflingly weird and wacky, as they’re less likely to take chances on crazier-than-normal series. But Fox stumbled upon a somewhat surprising hit last summer when it unleashed Wayward Pines on audiences, and even though the show ended in a way that made it seem like it would move in a completely new direction with an almost completely new cast, it looks like plenty of cast members will be returning for Season 2, including Empire’s Terrence Howard.

Along with Howard returning as Sheriff Arnold Pope, Wayward Pines is also bringing back major players Carla Gugino as Kate Hewson/Ballinger, Hope Davis as Megan Fisher, Melissa Leo as Nurse Pam, Toby Jones as David Pilcher, Shannyn Sossamon as Theresa Burke and Charlie Tahan as son Ben Burke. As well, we’ll get to see more from Tim Griffin’s Secret Service agent Adam Hassler and Tom Stevens’ Class One leader Jason Higgins, according to Deadline. That’s basically everyone beyond Matt Dillon’s Ethan Burke and Juliette Lewis’ Beverly Brown.

Not a lot of information about Season 2 has come out beyond the new casting additions of Jason Patric and Djimon Hounsou, but we know that things will kick off not long after the bonkers Season 1 ending. Patric comes in as new Wayward Pines resident Dr. Theo Yedlin, who wakes up and finds himself in the middle of a rebellion between the town’s residents and the First Generation of students, and he has to figure out what is going on and how to keep the human race from going extinct.

That’s all fine and dandy, but we want to know how the hell all of these characters are coming back to the show when some of them are deader than dead. Sheriff Pope got shot through the head by Ethan in an early episode and was soon taken outside the town’s fence by some of the monstrous abbies, although he did return in a flashback a few episodes later, and that’s likely how he’ll show up here. The same thing will presumably happen for Dr. Pilcher, who was killed by his sister Pam during the rebellion in the finale. Considering he was the brain behind this entire affair, he’s definitely got more story to tell.

As for everyone else, we last saw Ben being woken from cryostasis by his former school chum Amy into a Wayward Pines that had largely returned to its former ways, despite everything Ethan & Co. attempted to do in Season 1. Theresa, Kate, Hope and Pam were presumably frozen, while Agent Hassler was assumed dead or serverely injured after everyone watched his video transmission from the San Francisco recon trek, which revealed that there was no one left in the coastal city.

Given how many twists and turns were peppered throughout Season 1, I can’t imagine that creator Chad Hodge and executive producer M. Night Shyamalan won’t have an even bigger number of them hitting Season 2. Find out when it premieres on Fox on Wednesday, May 25.

Casting around Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice is still a bit of a mystery. While the main players and members of the upcoming Justice League have been announced for months, there are still a few cast members, including Jena Malone, who have unspecified roles. Now it appears that one of Zack Snyder’s standby actors will be making an unorthodox appearance in the upcoming superhero romp Dawn Of Justice.

ComicBook.com is reporting that Watchmen alumnus Carla Gugino will most likely be lending her voice as Superman’s Kryptonian computer in the Fortress Of Solitude. This is a reprisal role as Gugino had the same uncredited role in Zack Snyder’s Man Of Steel. Since Zack Snyder has a tendency to work with the same actors over and over again, this is an exciting, albeit not quite surprising, development.

Carla Gugino was recently doing a twitter Q & A with fans, when one of her fans lamented that Gugino wouldn’t be appearing in Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice. Her response, below, seems to confirm her appearance.

I’d say this is a pretty concrete confirmation of Carla Gugino’s role in Dawn Of Justice. Since she has already lent her voice to the DC Extended Universe, it’s unlikely that she’ll be participating in any other type of role in the film.

Since Carla Gugino is a rather suburb actress, this role seems like it isn’t the proper use of her work. Of course, appearing in a huge project like Dawn Of Justice is always an exciting opportunity. And who knows? The MCU saw Paul Bettany make his live-action appearance in The Avengers: Age of Ultron after voicing Tony Stark’s J.A.R.V.I.S. system for all three Iron Man movies as well as the first Avengers outing. While J.A.R.V.I.S. is surely a larger voice acting performance than Gugino’s cameo, things could always expand as the Justice League is formed and fleshed out in DCEU future films.

Carla Gugino is perhaps best known for her role in Zack Snyder’s epic films Watchmen and Sucker Punch. In Watchmen she played the deeply flawed Sally Jupiter. An original member of the Minutemen, we originally saw Sally young and vulnerable, as well as eventually older and hardened by the world. It was truly one of the largest character arcs in Watchmen, especially considering that she wasn’t necessarily in the main cast of the film. While Sucker Punch wasn’t particularly well received, Gugino gave an emotionally raw performance as Dr. Vera Gorski.

I’m excited that Batman V Superman will contain another Watchmen alum, alongside Jeffrey Dean Morgan’s role as Thomas Wayne. Even if we only hear Carla Gugino for a moment, there’s something special about a reunion between the players who made such an awesome comic book adaptation.

Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice will fly into theaters March 25th.

If you pit Dwayne Johnson against massive earthquakes in a summer blockbuster, and crowds show up in droves, you can be damn sure that Hollywood will try and replicate the CGI magic at least on more time. So it shouldn’t surprise too many people that New Line and the San Andreas team are coming together for San Andreas 2, and that they are ramping up the action to reach a global scale.  

In last summer’s San Andreas, The Rock played a rescue pilot named Raymond Gaines who’s forced into action when The Big One hits California, leaving his beautiful daughter (Alexandra Daddario) trapped in San Francisco. Together with his estranged wife (Carla Gugino), Ray helicopters through a series of disasters in order to bring his daughter home safely. Though the plot details on San Andreas 2 are being kept protected, THR goes on the record to say that the sequel likely will pit The Rock against the legendary Ring of Fire, a ring that "circles the Pacific Ocean with fault lines and volcanoes and, according to scientists, is home to about 90 percent of the worlds' earthquakes."

Dwayne Johnson versus Volcanoes. Where do I get my tickets?

It’s safe to assume that it you liked the first San Andreas, you’ll dig the sequel, as THR reports that most everyone will be returning, starting with director Brad Peyton. The filmmaker also helmed Journey 2: The Mysterious Island with Dwayne Johnson, so you know the action hero has faith and confidence in Peyton’s style. In addition, Gugino, Daddario and Paul Giamatti – who played a troubled seismologist in the first movie – are expected to return for the sequel alongside The Rock. Neil Widener and Gavin James have been hired to pen the screenplay for San Andreas 2, though neither of them were involved with the first movie, so expect the sequel to feel slightly different, for that reason.

The biggest challenge, now, might be finding time in Dwayne Johnson’s extremely busy schedule to film San Andreas 2. The actor, from what we can tell, is on the hook for a Baywatch movie (with Alexandra Daddario, coincidentally), as well as an announced Journey 3 movie. He has been teasing fans with a Rampage video game adaptation, and DC Films needs him to play Black Adam in a Shazam movie, at some point. He also remains a major component of the Fast & Furious films, of which there will be several. Where do you guys rank San Andreas 2 in the long line of "Movies We Can’t Wait To See Dwayne Johnson In"? 

There are a ton of potentially excellent pilots and series in development at the moment, and one of the most exciting is Showtime’s Roadies, director Cameron Crowe’s first trip to the small screen. But that doesn’t mean that everything is going smoothly, and there’s already been a casting upheaval, as actress Carla Gugino is taking over a role previously slotted for Mad Men’s Christina Hendricks. Let this be the only snafu-that-isn’t-really-a-snafu that’ll affect this show.

Hendricks was set to play leading lady Shelli, but reportedly decided to exit the hour-long comedy project after the creative team decided to revamp some of Shelli’s characteristics. According to THR, Hendricks’ vacating the series was on amicable terms, and the decision to conceive the character in a new way had nothing to do with the actress or her performance. No feuds here.

So now we’ll get to see Gugino as Shelli – assuming Showtime picks the project up to series, anyway – who will be the production manager for the band that Roadies revolves around. (The concept centers on the behind-the-scenes team that keeps a rock tour from imploding.) Shelli is being described as “a world class multitasker, passionate music fan and tireless work partner” to Bill, the band’s tour manager to be played by Luke Wilson. Their relationship will be a core facet of the show’s comedy-infused drama as they mix their professional relationship with their personal one. It’s a description that doesn’t really sound all that different from the original version, but it’s possible the connection between Shelli and Bill was built up more.

Gugino is the latest addition to a cast that already includes Wilson, Imogen Poots, Rafe Spall, Keisha Castle-Hughes, Peter Cambor and rapper Colson Baker, better known as Machine Gun Kelly. I can’t wait to see who else gets added as it goes on, and hopefully more musical acts will pop in and out.

A veteran of both television and movies, Gugino has been all over the place in recent years, most recently on the big screen with Dwayne Johnson in San Andreas. She was part of the mystery in Fox’s recent bonkers thriller Wayward Pines, which could possibly see her return for a second season if it comes to that. She’s also on the HBO comedy The Brink, which could make her the rare performer to be on two premium cable networks at the same time. Her Roadies role reconnects her with Showtime, where she starred on Californication during Season 4.

The Oscar-winning Crowe (whose career took a recent critical tumble with Aloha) wrote the pilot and will be directing. The showrunner will be Winnie Holzman, who created the one-season-wonder My So-Called Life, and she’ll be executive producing alongside J.J. Abrams, whose Bad Robot cohorts Bryan Burk and Kathy Lingg will be there as well. Here’s hoping we get more info on Roadies soon.

Everyone wants to get in on the superhero movie genre, and Carla Gugino is no different. The San Andreas actress did the press rounds for her earthquake disaster movie and was asked which superhero she'd like to play. Although she didn't specify a character, she did say that because she's worked with Zack Snyder in movies like Watchmen, Sucker Punch and in Man of Steel (she voiced the Kryptonian service robot Kelor), she has her eye on the DC universe. But whom could she play?

Gugino told Digital Spy that a DC role needs to be "next on my list," after emphasizing that she'd go anywhere with Snyder. It's unclear how involved the filmmaker will be in the DC cinematic universe after Batman v Superman. He has been attached to the Justice League movies, but a lot can change between now and then. He also could either act like a Joss Whedon type and help oversee the standalone movies, or he could simply focus on what he's working on. That said, Gugino has proven she can play a number of graphic novel-influenced roles.

Perhaps it's because she played the mother of the Silk Spectre and a former superhero herself in Watchmen, but some fans have already suggested a good role for her could be the mother of Diana Prince/Wonder Woman. Queen Hippolyta rules over Themiscrya, the sacred island where no man is allowed to step foot, and leads the Amazons. The solo Wonder Woman film is coming in the next couple years, even though Michelle MacLaren dropped out as director over creative differences. It's unknown where the story will go, but if there are any flashbacks or scenes that take place on the mystical island, then Gugino would be a great addition.

Given the current lineup of films, including The Flash, Cyborg, Green Lantern and unscheduled solo films for Superman and Batman, there are a few other options that pop in our heads. Mrs. Wayne is one. After all, what's a Batman movie without a flashback to that fateful night in the alley? There's Nora Allen, mother of The Flash, played by Ezra Miller in the films. Or perhaps even someone at Star Labs, which we've seen Easter eggs for in Man of Steel. Warner Bros. is dedicated to expanding its superhero movie offerings to compete with Marvel's ever growing slate, and given her good standing with Snyder, it seems likely Carla Gugino will pop up again in some capacity if she campaigns hard for it. Watch her full statement in the video compilation below.

You can see Gugino in San Andreas when it hits theaters this weekend. The post-Man of Steel DC universe kicks off with Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice on March 25, 2016, followed by Suicide Squad on August 5, 2016. For those of you who want to see her appear in this world, start tweeting like there's no tomorrow.

When Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson takes on his next opponent, which consists of actual rocks in the upcoming earthquake epic, San Andreas, he’ll flex "The People’s Elbow" to rescue people as an emergency helicopter pilot. In a brand new clip released for The MTV Movie Awards Takeover, the world’s most electrifying helicopter rescue pilot tells the laws of physics to know its role and shut its mouth.

With San Andreas, The Rock won’t be portrayed as he’s typically been on the big-screen, as a beefy bounty hunter, some super-soldier, or even a quasi-historical sword-swinger. Instead, he’ll glorify the real life heroes that are rescue workers…at which point, he’ll build them up to ridiculously superhuman standards that no one can ever meet, thereby completely depleting their collective self-esteem.

As we see in this clip, Johnson’s character, Ray, makes such a badass helicopter rescue pilot that he takes his bird out solo amidst what appears to be a continent-crushing catastrophe with zero f**ks given about the danger. Hell, he even steps away from the control stick, leaving the harangued helo parked in mid-air, in the middle of a crumbling, apocalyptic City of Angels. Of course, his motivation for this particular rescue is understandable, seeing as the damsel in distress happens to be his wife, Emma, played by Carla Gugino.

It seems that Ray’s motivation to keep Emma from being crushed by all of Los Angeles is so strong that some kind of forceful chi keeps his helicopter completely still, despite the fact that a giant skyscraper just collapsed to rubble just a few feet away. Perhaps the clip conveniently omitted the moment where The Rock looked at the colossal collapsing structure with an intimidating grimace and told it to "know your role," at which point the until-now unknown survival instincts of the Earth’s gravitational pull decided to make a life-preserving decision and heed his words, toppling the building somewhere else.

The big-budget bonanza sees the Brad Peyton, who directed Dwayne Johnson in Journey 2: The Mysterious Island and its upcoming sequel, looking to revive the tried-and-true genre that is the disaster flick. From a visual standpoint, the effects look stunning, and the various trailers and clips we’ve seen seem to point to this being a fun, accessible popcorn flick that both reinforces the unfathomable dangers of putting a major metropolis directly on a fault line, and the overarching message that natural disasters are no match for bulging biceps and witty one-liners.

Joining the world’s most badass rescue worker and Carla Gugino in this cast are Alexandra Daddario, Paul Giamatti, Colton Haynes, Archie Panjabi, Ioan Gruffudd, and, for some reason, Kylie Minogue. San Andreas could be set to tell the story of how Nevada becomes beachfront property when it hits theaters on May 29.

It’s Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson versus one of the largest earthquakes in recorded history… WHO YA GOT?!?!

As part of his bid to become the biggest action star on the planet, The Rock is balancing his turns in Fast & Furious sequels with his own, solo adventure franchises. San Andreas casts Dwayne Johnson as a California rescue-chopper pilot who springs into action after The Big One hits his beloved state. USA Today brings us the exclusive first-look photos of Johnson’s character, Ray, while filling in details on the film’s plot. The Rock does his part to terrify potential crowds, saying that the threat in San Andreas is inevitable … and fatally complete:

If that didn’t terrify you enough, The Rock adds that the earthquake damage seen on screen in San Andreas will be life-altering. "Everything that you know on the West Coast doesn’t see tomorrow," Johnson says. Unless this dude has something to say about it.

In San Andreas, Ray (The Rock) will be in the air when the Earthquake hits – and he’ll see the destruction of Los Angeles from the sky. After retrieving his wife (played by Carla Gugino), the couple will attempt to get to San Francisco, where they plan to rescue their daughter (played by True Detective’s Alexandra Daddario).

During the production of the film, though, Johnson says that he leaned on the hashtag #SpielbergInspired because he believes that the screenplay for San Andreas has heart weaved among its thrills. The summer blockbuster will reteam him with director Brad Peyton, who helmed Journey 2: The Mysterious Island with the former pro wrestler. We expect to see a San Andreas trailer soon, but before that, you have to see these amazing behind-the-scenes photos of The Rock in action on the movie’s set. This earthquake doesn’t stand a chance.

San Andreas will be in theaters on May 29, 2015. It’s a prime slot for a potentially massive summer blockbuster, and you can get on it becoming an action franchise if audiences flock (as expected).

Following up on her starring role in USA's limited drama series Political Animals and a recurring role as Schmidt's boss and bedmate on New Girl, Watchmen's Carla Gugino has signed on for the female lead in David Shore's drama Doubt. News of her casting follows word that actor Steve Coogan has landed the starring role in the ABC pilot.

Doubt will star Coogan as Vincent, a charming low-rent attorney whose street smarts from his days as a cop come in handy when trying to work the system to help his clients. On the personal side, Vincent's battling his own demons and attempting to win over his ex-wife Linda. Gugino will play that role. Deadline describes Gugino's character, Linda, as "a no-nonsense ADA who has little patience for courtroom antics, especially when it comes to her impulsive ex-husband." She also sometimes has sex with Vincent, which probably complicates (or intensifies) the relationship even further, considering they're split up… technically.

As Deadline notes, Doubt would put Gugino back on ABC, the network that played host to the 2003 series Karen Sisco. Her more recent small screen credits include Entourage, Californication, and as mentioned, Political Animals and New Girl. On the big screen, she's starred in Watchmen, Sin City, Spy Kids, and because I can't not mention two of my favorite guilty-pleasure movies, Son in Law and Troop Beverly Hills. Picturing Gugino as someone beautiful, capable and direct isn't difficult, but how will her chemistry be with Coogan? That could be the very thing to make or break this project, which could be the next House for series creator David Shore, if it makes it onto ABC's 2013-2014 roster.

USA’s Political Animals follows a corrupt and ambitious political family that has been self-destructing from the inside for many years. When USA picked up the show to pilot, I was a little concerned Political Animals would be able to differentiate itself from the other slew of political pilots, including comedy 1600 Penn and Netflix’s more dramatic House of Cards production. Luckily, USA seems fully behind Greg Berlanti and Laurence Mark’s project, and has hired some big names to back it. Now, they have added one more to the cast.

Carla Gugino is joining Political Animals as a Pullitzer Prize winning journalist who works hard to get her stories. According to Deadline, Gugino’s character, Susan Berg, closely follows the decision making processes of recently divorced and even more recently appointed Secretary of State Elaine Barrish, who was once married to the President of the United States. To add even more spice, Political Animals will keep tabs on the Barrish’s two children, one an addict and the other working in politics.

While Gugino has been all over film releases lately, including last year’s Sucker Punch, she is not new to television or playing tough women. In Californication, Gugino played tough cookie Abby Rhodes, who, as Hank’s lawyer, got him out of a lot of trouble in Season 4. She’ll be a fine addition to a cast that already includes Jimmy Wolk and Sigourney Weaver.

Here’s another instance of Arrested Developmentism, a term I invented to describe the incessant teasing of projects which will never happen, by actors, actresses, or filmmakers desperate for attention. Carla Gugino seems to think Sin City 2 is about to happen.

In her defense, she doesn’t get all that specific about it and may just be relaying what she heard, rather than making things up to get the press to interview her. Most of the press is male, so Carla Gugino definitely has no problem getting their attention. But here’s what she said about the long promised sequel to what many consider Robert Rodriguez’s best film:

The people she’s referring to could be the rest of the original movie’s cast, which contains such big names as Bruce Willis, Jessica Alba, Mickey Rourke, Rosario Dawson, Clive Owen, Benicio Del Toro, and Elijah Wood, just to name a few. But I suspect she’s really talking about Robert Rodriguez and Frank Miller, who co-directed the original film and haven’t been able to agree on anything since.

The last official word on the film from Robert Rodriguez came back in October when he promised that Sin City 2 would be his next project. But if you’ve followed Robert Rodriguez’s career at all, you know he promises a lot of things and more often than not it doesn’t amount to much. Rodriguez promises Sin City 2 at least once a year, every year, since 2005.

Here’s Carla’s full interview with Digital Spy in which she drops Sin City 2 speculation:

As you’ve likely gathered from the trailers and plot synopsis, Zack Snyder’s Sucker Punch is about a group of five young women who craft a plot to escape a mental hospital. But where would the story be without a main antagonist and mature voice to help them find their way? That’s where Oscar Isaac and Carla Gugino enter the picture as Blue and Madame Gorski.

Sitting in a roundtable with the two performers, they discussed the reality of their characters both in the asylum and the brothel, their costume designs and their musical number that comes after the credits. Check out the interview below.

I guess the first question is, she’s called Madame Gorski, and we hear a reference at some point to a Polish way or something, is your accent supposed to be Polish?

Carla: What does it sound like to you?

Hungarian, Romanian, I wasn’t sure.

Carla: It is Polish, yeah.

Can you talk a little bit about how you approached it?

Carla: Sure. It actually was not, when I first talked to Zack about this and he asked me about it, we started talking about the character and when I read the script, we weren’t sure, he wasn’t sure where, we were sort of figuring that out. And German was one of the things that came up, and then that felt a bit too somehow on the nose, and then it felt like maybe even she should be American. And then for me that felt really wrong because I started reading that dialogue in the way that I speak, it was too heightened and almost had a poetic nature. It really did make me feel like her choice of words were from someone who English was her second language, and so then I started exploring different ideas of what ones felt the most resonant to me. And because she was very interested in psychiatry and she also had a forward-thinking idea of psychiatry at the time, and certainly was influenced by Freud, and I just all of a sudden started thinking, “Well, if she’s not German, maybe she’s Eastern European...” And then the dance instructors and I had a friend who had this Polish dance teacher who changed her world in a really harsh but ultimately amazing kind of way, so I thought, “Well, maybe she’s Polish.” So at a table reading that we all did I just said, let me give this a shot and let’s here it out loud and see what we think. And then Zack was like, “I think you’re on the right road and that’s what we should do.” Then we started coming up with, Debbie and Zack and I had lists of Polish names and who she was, and then Gorski came from that.

Is it a very self-conscious thing, putting on that accent, or is that something that excites you and intrigues you?

Carla: I love! Personally, just as an actor, I love accents, they’re fun. They really just are. But the truth is that it is much more like a tapestry, it’s much more like a fabric. Once you’re that person you’re never thinking about doing an accent, other than maybe technically if you want to adjust something that you feel is inaccurate or something. But really, it was for me more where, my question came from, where is she from that she behaves in the way that she does and that she has the relationship with him that she does, and she has the relationship with the girls that she does, and that she has the profession that she does. So then came the accent. So it’s actually an integral part, and in fact a really helpful way, especially when you’re filming something over a long period of time, when you come and go, it’s a way that as soon as you start speaking like that person you, everything else kind of falls into place. Sometimes it’s a hat for a character, sometimes it’s a prop, and sometimes it’s a voice. So that was really helpful for me.

Speaking of the way you interact with the other characters, I’m curious, is there going to be a Zack Snyder movie one of these days where you don’t get knocked around by the guy?

Carla: You know, it’s so funny. Well since we’ve only done two, if I have the honor of working with Mr. Snyder again...I don’t think that’s been intentional.

Everybody gets kind of knocked around

Carla: Yeah that’s true, that’s true. Next time I’ll be like, could a girl knock me around? With Watchmen, obviously it was in the source material so clearly and obviously, that rape scene is so intrinsic to many things that happened in Watchmen. And it was really important on that one, Zack and I spoke about it with Jeffrey Dean Morgan really explicitly because it was never meant to be, the important thing about that was that it was incredibly violent and not sexy, that scene. It’s really brutal. And then in this, this was funny because this I don’t even know, was it initially scripted? I can’t remember now.

Oscar: I don’t think so.

Carla: I don’t think so. I think ultimately when we got to that point in this movie, and thankfully we shot that scene later on, it was really about me wanting to have a moment to express what she has been trying to do, which is protect these girls from [Blue]. And that wasn’t in the initial script and it felt really key. And so then out of that came, when I say this to him his character is in a really, not a good state, obviously, and then that kind of emerged. We worked with the stunt coordinator, obviously it wasn’t improvised in that moment but that, when we started rehearsing that scene and working it through with Zack, so I would have to say I had something to do with that.

There are little, we get those ­­­­shards in their relationship throughout the film and for me, a greater clue came, sadly, during the credits, in the fog, your production number, and I go, “Ooh.” I mean, you’re a soundtrack artist so, it’s there, it’s just kinda, so tell me about doing that number together.

Carla: That’s so astute. Because it really was very key.

At the end you go, “Oh my god, they’re nuts about each other.”

Oscar: For us, I think that was a big revelatory moment for us just working on the dance, which we had about a month and a half or so to work on it before we actually had to perform it. And at the time it was, as scripted, it was in the middle of the film. And as we worked on it, it did start to reveal all these levels of our, what our relationship may have been. You know, it’s sweet in one moment, and then all of a sudden it’s violent, and then there’s an incredible sexual charge, and then there’s separation. There’s so many of those elements that are only kind of hinted at in the relationship.

Carla: And some sense that they maybe once were great, or this is the area where they can sort of let go of all that other stuff.

Oscar: And Blue is also not only a man in management, but he’s a performer as well, which is strange.

Carla: And that something had just really soured.

As done, was it a fantasy number or was it really Blue and Gorski doing a number in the club?

Carla: It is. It’s done doing a number in the club and we also see some great dances of everyone but Emily’s character, which you saw glimpses of as well. I think down the road in the director’s cut, you will see the whole, you’ll see it in the body of the movie.

One thing I wondered, is she, did you see her as a psychiatrist? Or as a brothel Madame?

Carla: I think that because the whole movie takes you into a dream world from the moment that first frame starts and that music starts, I really do think that was very intentional on Zack’s part, so even the real world is obviously already kind of a non-naturalistic place. But I think in truth she is a psychiatrist. I think that I had to approach it as that. She is a psychiatrist and that this really is kind of like, if you were to take, I played her as, the two people I played very truthfully from their perspective but I do think when you look at it thematically as to what the point of my job in the movie was to do was that Babydoll gleans very quickly things about our characters and then they are heightened in that brothel world. So each of us become more authoritative, each of us become sort of, she gives us more power in a certain way and I think that it’s also an opportunity to see the flip side of these characters where you see their alter egos and you see their, as you have said, what they wish they could be, on some level.

Carla I just wanted to comment just on your ascension as an actress, and people can cast you for a number of reasons, your talent, your voice, your ability to do different kinds of characters, and seeing you with this very dark hair always sort of reminds me of how Meryl Streep can transform and just go from one camera to another and lose the identity. Are you this way?

Carla: I’m in love with you. Go on!

We could call this a midway point in your career, what do you concern yourself with most as being either typecast, or not typecast?

Carla: I hope I have more than, that I’m not midway yet, even though I have been doing it for a long time because I want to do it until I’m on my death bed. But I do feel that, also because theater is a big part of my life and I’ve really gotten to play some extraordinary characters in that world and some of the best ones are yet to come. Like I’m just getting to the age to be able to play them. So that’s exciting because Hollywood obviously isn’t necessarily, even though I do think there are wonderful roles, it’s sort of this thing about whatever your prime is and all this conversation, that when you’re actually reaching your prime it’s like a different thing than what people perceive to be Hollywood in it’s prime and all that stuff. But in truth for me it’s really just about continuing to play different characters and expand my horizons and I have so many characters I still want to play and I always love to mix it up. I mean I have a lot of dreams and a lot of goals and all those things but, that’s a sort of longer conversation, but in terms of things that just keep challenging me, really, with people that I respect. And that’s pretty much the deal. That’s always been my, it’s never changed I guess.

Are you concerned about missteps? Are you throwing caution to the wind and just going for what feels right?

Carla: I think you always have to go as an artist with instinct, I really do. I think if you start looking at your career from the outside, you’re screwed. It really is, it’s such a, at least for me. I think in order to achieve anything great, you will make missteps along the way. And there are certainly things I look at and think, “I wished that had turned out better,” or “Oh I tried for that and I didn’t really succeed at it,” but I’d much rather have that than play it safe. I don’t have it in me to play it safe, it’s really just too, I sort of like to be challenged. And it’s weird, it’s a weird profession to do that in because you make missteps in front of millions of people. But it’s kind of part of the job if you wanna, at the end of the day, I just want to get better and do things that I’m proud of.

I wondered at the end, you just talked about the two levels with both of your characters, the real world and this other world that it’s got, at the very end of the movie as we go out down the road we see a little farm plot with a scarecrow in it and I thought of the Wizard of Oz and thought he was making commentary, did you see this, as a journey?

Carla: I haven’t spoken to him about that have you?

Oscar: No, but I think that absolutely, yeah. The journey, again, into imagination and the power of imagination and I think that’s one of the big themes of the Wizard of Oz, absolutely.

Carla: Yeah. And I’m not in Kansas anymore in the sense that Sweet Pea is getting a chance to redefine her world

How could your character, have the orderlies, manager, how does he, basically, what was your discussion with Zack that went from whatever it was you were assigned to do whatever it was you ended up doing?

Oscar: Well exactly, yeah. Those things weren’t explicit, so to get specific, part of that was like, alright, well he’s an orderly but how is it that he seems to have control of this place, even the psychiatrist. And I got the impression that the place is kind of a neglected place and this person, through his will and through his quick talking has been able to assert some power in a very non-traditional way. Even when I got on set, you don’t see this, but when I got on set the set design was so cool, right next to my desk there’s this cage of a bunch of stuff, and it was all these little trinkets and knick knacks that he’s collected, that he’s taken off the girls when they come in. And you can see that he’s just got all this, almost to an OCD level. It was those kind of elements that started to inform, this is someone who’s taken control of this place because that’s what he wishes he could be he just doesn’t have the power to do that. And so then when you see him in this fantasy world, this is who he wants to be, someone that’s loved and important, and feared as well.

And the mustache?

Oscar: And the mustache was a whole character on its own!

When did that come in?

Oscar: Again, thinking about who this little orderly wishes he was, you know, he wishes he was a matinee idol of like the thirties and forties or something, and with a spray tan, and with a little mustache. And so that’s why it is kind of a shocking moment when all of a sudden at the end we see him again as the orderly and it’s such a different, you know he’s pale and sickly looking.

And Gorski’s piled hair?

Carla: I have to say I love, I mean that the hair and make-up and wardrobe, it’s just so fun. Yes I had so much hair on my head. And so many lashes on my eyes. I mean, truly at one point, Rosalina, the make-up artist who designed all the looks, she said to me at one point, “Carla, how many lashes do you think you have on?” and I was like, “Including my own?” and she was like, “Four.” Four sets of lashes! Full sets of lashes.

Oscar: That’s the secret to her bedroom eyes.

Carla: I look sleepy, but really I’m just trying to hold them up. Yeah, and the hair was definitely part of her. But that was the thing is this is a woman who put herself together in the morning, you know? And that’s also something of another time. You know now we just throw on some like, whatever lip gloss, and brush your hair, or something. It’s different, it was when women were, ladies were really ladies.

Oscar: And men as well, that was an important thing. He was very meticulous about what he wore and how he presents himself. With Michael Wilkinson the, costume designer, we talked a lot about how meticulous he is.

Did either of you keep souvenirs from this movie, take something home?

Oscar: Yeah I got the little lighter that she steals, with the gold dragon.

Carla: I don’t think I did. This is what happens though, I’m so remorseful of this guy. He got a [soundtrack], I’m like, “How did you get the CD?” I’m clearly far too honest.

I’ve just watched the trailer for Girl Walks Into A Bar, and it’s somehow more bizarre than I expected. Hip, with a classic vibe, smart, with a dash of naked ping pong, and sexy, with a whiff of dangerous, the teaser is like Get Shorty meets Chicago crossed with The Ten. Think of it like making soup when you’re drunk. You add broth to the basic ingredients and then you just throw shit in. Most of the time it sucks, but every now and again, it’s like a whole new world opened up. Of course chicken noodle soup tastes better if you substitute chicken for smoked sausage! How could I have missed this combination for years?

Girl Walks Into A Bar is the story of a dentist putting out a hit on his wife. Overly frugal and not content to let the whole thing play out he intercedes, mucking up not only the assassin’s plan but the evenings of a whole host of Los Angeles residents spread across ten different locations. It stars Danny DeVito, Josh Hartnett, Rosario Dawson, Carla Gugino and Zachary Quinto. Also, it’ll be available for free on the internet come March 11th. Here’s a look at the trailer…

It remains to be seen whether this online distribution experiment will work, but with ready access at a mouse click, it seems likely most cinema fans will check this out. There’s certainly a level of intrigue here. How do all of these people get mixed up in one murder for hire? Further, are all of the stories interconnected or loosely connected? I am prepared to watch at least fifteen minutes of this come March 11th. If it’s awesome, I’ll stick around.

If you know the name of director Sebastian Gutierrez it’s either because you’re some sort of indie-film festival nerd, or because you like to see Carla Gugino wearing as little as possible. Gutierrez has made a whole series of films in which Carla Gugino plays a porn star, and that’s managed to get people’s attention, even though no one ever really seems to think any of the movies are actually all that good.

So that’s the context for Elektra Luxx, the latest entry in the life of Gugino’s Elektra Luxx character. In addition to Gugino the film sports an absolute all star cast with names like Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Malin Ackerman, and Timothy Olyphant. Oh and now it has a trailer. Yes it’s sexy. No, Carla probably won’t be naked in the movie. Enjoy her in lingerie though, by pushing play on the Elektra Luxx trailer below:

Pregnancy, it would seem, is no obstacle to Elektra’s titillating but not really all that revealing eroticism. Fun fact, apparently Alicia Silverstone filmed a cameo for the movie, but you don’t see her in the trailer along side the film’s other celebrities, because her scene was cut. Elektra Luxx arrives in theaters, probably for a very limited release, on March 11, 2011.

For more on Elektra Luxx, including a high-res look at the movie’s new poster click over to Apple where the trailer originated. Or simply leer at a few the most lascivious shots from the trailer in still photo form below.

Writer Richard Levine's entire resume consists of work on the small screen, most notably on Nip/Tuck, so it's no surprise that his first feature film plays out much like a TV show. The unusual thing is that Every Day is as ordinary as they come, whereas Nip/Tuck is far from it. Every Day may be a low-key film about an average family dealing with average problems, but Levine's more twisted side is still evident; its brainchildren are just kept as theoretical concepts rather than visual ones.

Ned and Jeannie (Liev Schreiber and Helen Hunt) live in a nice home with their two sons Jonah and Ethan (Ezra Miller and Skyler Fortgang). Like just about any family, they're seemingly happy, but have some issues. Ned writes for a television show and his more restrained ideas clash with his boss' demand for concepts with extreme shock value. Jeannie is forced to ditch her career when she winds up taking care of her sickly father in addition to her two boys. Making matters worse, her father, Ernie (Brian Dennehy), is a bit of a handful and anything but thankful. Then there are the kids; Jonah has known he's gay since he was 12, but his father is still having a hard time accepting it. Meanwhile, Ethan is on the paranoid side constantly questioning his folks about the potential of home invaders and if his grandfather will walk into the light soon.

The gang certainly has troubles, but all of the calamities are fairly reasonable. The dialogue is natural and the characters’ thought processes believable leading to a series of events that play out in a manner that feels real. It also feels a bit like an elongated episode of a television drama. It never dulls, so it's not stretched to the point of feeling bloated and boring. Every Day isn't tending toward a grand conclusion; it flows more like a weekly show. The progressions are taken in stride and are significant but not overwhelmingly profound occurrences in a never-ending story, the story of a person's life.

It's a good thing the people we're spending the 97 minutes with are likable and even pretty funny. Jeannie is a little on the mopey side, but it's understandable considering the messes she’s stuck cleaning up. She spends most of her time with Ernie who, despite his dismal situation, garners a significant amount of laughs often at Jeannie’s expense. Ned's somewhat of a sad sack himself. He's the strong and silent type, never putting up a fight accept when it comes to Jonah's hope to attend a gay prom. Ned's situation gets interesting when his risqué live-life-for-the-moment coworker Robin (Carla Gugino) is assigned to help him fine tune a script. The word risqué pretty much says it all; sexual tension ensues.

Jonah's a typical teen packed with snarky remarks, but his involvement is secluded to tension created by his sexual preference. Ethan's quite the opposite. He lacks a storyline and acts as more of a spectator of the family affairs. He's a cute little boy with dialogue beyond his years, which is intrinsically funny.

Every Day is like any day; there's really nothing special about it, but it does emulate the value of seeing a nice movie for sheer enjoyment. There's no life lesson and it doesn't pass any judgment when it comes to dealing with family dysfunction, but it does leave you feeling pretty damn good in the end and there’s certainly nothing wrong with that. Check out Every Day to get out of your own head for a bit, have a giggle at another family's expense and put your own issues into perspective.

The first official trailer for Women in Trouble is out. Thought it features a wide variety of half-naked strippers, Carla Gugino as a naughty nun, and Josh Brolin attempting a strange British accent, and half the celebrities in Hollywood, it’s not nearly as fun as it sounds. Mostly it seems to be about women having sex with men and then regretting it. You can’t blame them really, I wouldn’t want to have sex with a man either. We’re gross.

Watch the Women in Trouble below, or in HD at Apple.

And just in case you missed it the first time around, here’s the red band promo clip for Women in Trouble which made it’s way on to Cinema Blend a few weeks ago: