I know opinion is pretty split on Timur Bekmambetov’s Wanted: I personally found it to be a boatload of fun from start to finish with its ridiculous action sequences, over-the-top violence and knife sharp (often sarcastic) dialogue particularly from the main character played by James McAvoy. But I know there are those who didn’t find enjoyment in it or at least were disappointed (Screen Rant head honcho Vic Holtreman to name one) and that’s fair enough.

But whatever you thought of Wanted, a sequel was pretty much inevitable considering the film made about $340 million worldwide on a budget of $75 million. If you’re interested in Wanted 2, you’re in luck as creator of the original graphic novel and fellow Scotsman, Mark Millar, recently spoke to IGN about what he thought of the first movie, in particular how he felt about the changes that were made in the adaptation from page to screen, and what direction the sequel is going to go in.

Rather than repeating what Millar says you can just watch the 4-plus minute video interview for yourself. Here it is, courtesy of IGN:

(BTW, if you’ve been reading Screen Rant for a while and ever wanted to know what any of the writers sound like – Millar’s accent is pretty much the same as mine )

Wanted is one of those films I don’t think NEEDS a sequel – if they left it at one I would be absolutely fine with that, because it works well as a standalone story. But at the same time, I wouldn’t mind a sequel either, simply because there’s a lot of stuff there to play with. I like the idea of bringing in other fraternities from around the world (a story point of the graphic novel) because it gives the film a chance to take the Bourne route and travel the world, as well as the potential for lots of new kick-ass assassin characters. The latter makes me think it could be some sort of globe-trotting version of Smokin’ Aces where they’re all after James McAvoy’s character.

What I can’t really understand right now is how they’re going to bring back Angelina Jolie’s character after [SPOILER ALERT!] she took a bullet to the head at the end of the first one. Director Timur Bekmambetov spoke about that last year and hinted her resurrection may have something to do with the wax baths we saw heal McAvoy’s wounds. Even for Wanted that’s stretching things just a bit, no?

Thoughts on a sequel to Wanted? Does it need one? Do you like the direction Millar says the second one is going in?

As Millar stated in the video, Wanted 2 should start filming quite soon. We’ll keep you updated as to exactly when and when we will see it hit theaters.

Source: IGN

Scottish comic book writer Mark Millar has been getting awfully cozy in Hollywood over the past couple of years. In addition to seeing the film version of his graphic novel Wanted bank for more than $340 million worldwide,  Millar has been able to work closely with director Matthew Vaughn on the film adaptation of his comic series, Kick-Ass, which comes out in April 2010. Now, according to the man himself, Millar is planning on getting behind the camera for his very own directorial debut. According to Millar’s personal website, principal photography on the project begins in March 2010.

Ah, but you must be saying to yourself, “Rob! You didn’t tell else what movie Millar is directing. Are you some kind of incompetent fool?” Friends, if I knew I would tell you, I promise. Unfortunately, Millar is keeping his lips sealed until February when more release details will be coming out.

From Millar’s website:

What is it? Who is it about? Well, that’s all a secret for now, but I learned a lot from Kick-Ass and love having the same creative freedom I have with comics when I work in cinema. I never want to be a studio bitch and go in there pitching for them to love me. The closest I came to this was a couple of calls regarding Superman, but pretty much none of my plans ever revealed as I didn’t like the idea of anyone nicking them.

Similarly, I don’t like the idea of asking for funding and justifying scenes with the money-men so I’m doing what Matthew Vaughn did with Kick-Ass and just making it outside the system with private investors. The financing is all secured and the movie stands or falls on how good I can make it, doing what Matthew did and just selling it once completed.

As you can imagine, I couldn’t be more excited. More as it happens, but this might just beat out War Heroes and American Jesus as my follow-ups to the Wanted and Kick-Ass movies. Have two other pictures about to go into development (and Wanted and Kick-Ass 2, of course), but I think you need to scare the Hell out of yourself every once in a while and something totally new like directing should do the trick.

Let me put this out there: I’m a Mark Millar fan. I know that some people aren’t into his style, but I think his early work in the Ultimate Marvel universe and Wanted more than demonstrate his ability to tell crisp and exciting stories. The thing is, directing a movie is an entirely different animal than writing a comic. We’ve seen other famous names in comics make the leap to directing without success, most notably Frank Miller, so Millar’s move certainly isn’t unprecedented. Will Millar’s experience working so closely with Matthew Vaughn on Kick-Ass help him bring his own project to fruition?

What do you think? Are you excited to hear Mark Millar will be making his directorial debut, or do you think he should stick to what he knows?

Source: MillarWorld.tv

There wasn’t a ton of news to report or snark on this week, so I had to dig up enough to make this yet another interesting read. Well, at least I think it is! I do have a few snippets that might be spoilers for The Office (Guest appearance) and Lost (Possible finale shoot notes).

Shall we get on with it?

Big Reminder:

The DVD movie, Stargate Ark of Truth will be on Friday night on The Sci-Fi Channel!  Don’t forget!

Viewer Numbers From Last Week

As of Wednesday, these are some of the viewer estimates from some shows we like, and some we think you may follow.

The top performing show of the week was Wednesday’s American Idol which brought in just over 23 million viewers. After that, are some of the shows we’d be more interested in how they’re doing.

Show (Network): Number of viewers in the millions

• 60 Minutes (CBS): 17.04 (Would you look at that! People like the news!)
• NCIS (CBS): 15.84
• The Mentalist (CBS): 15.49
• Desperate Housewives (ABC): 14.75
• Grey’s Anatomy (ABC): 14.61
  
• Two and a Half Men (CBS): 14.12
• Criminal Minds (CBS): 13.74
• CSI: Miami (CBS): 13.61
• House (Fox): 13.13
• CSI: NY (CBS): 12.79
• Without a Trace (CBS): 11.87
• Rules of Engagement (CBS): 11.42
• Cold Case (CBS): 11.41
• 24 (Fox): 11.36
• Castle (ABC): 10.97
• Law & Order: SVU (NBC): 10.74
• Bones (Fox): 10.52
• Lie to Me (Fox): 10.26
• Brothers & Sisters (ABC): 10.15
• The Big Bang Theory (CBS): 9.69
• ER (NBC): 9.47
• Lost (ABC): 8.82
• The Office (NBC): 7.95
• Burn Notice (USA): 7.31
• 30 Rock (NBC): 7.02
• Ugly Betty (CBS): 7
• Heroes (NBC): 6.48
• My Name Is Earl (NBC): 6.42
• Better Off Ted (ABC): 5.50
• Kings (NBC): 4.60
• Dollhouse (Fox): 4.14
• Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles (Fox): 3.65
• Smallville (CW): 3.29
• Supernatural (CW): 3.15
• Battlestar Galactica (SciFi): 2.4

Better Off Ted

As you can see the premiere of Better Off Ted wasn’t as big as ABC might have hoped for. Maybe things will pick up after basketball.

Some Of Our Faves

Though the Fox network had its usual low set of numbers for a Friday with Dollhouse and The Sarah Connor Chronicles, both shows had a small improvement from the week before. Supernatural also had some increase in viewers but Smallville had a slight drop.

Word on the street is that despite the numbers, Dollhouse may return next season. No promises Though.

Battlestar Galactice Finale

The highly debated two-hour series-finale of Battlestar Galactica brought in 2.4 million viewers last Friday. No, not big on the numbers compared to network, but good enough for cable networks. That number made it the most-watched episode since Jan. 6, 2006 and it outperformed the season three-finale by 56%.

Burn Notice

The second season-finale of the USA drama Burn Notice hit a record 7.31 million viewers in its Friday 10 p.m. time slot. Go Michael Westin!!

Sources: Media Week, TV By The Numbers, TV Guide

Nothing Says Canceled Like…

This is pure conjecture on my part, but from what I’m seeing, I feel that The Sarah Connor Chronicles is not coming back next season. I say that because Stephanie Jacobsen, (Jesse from The Sarah Connor Chronicles), has joined the cast of the Melrose Place pilot in the role of Lauren. Lauren is a med student who is a high-end call girl by night. (Now let’s see if you can get her accent out of your head now!)

On top of that, Brian Austin Green, is being reported as lining up a role in another CW pilot called Body Politic.

Granted, these two are not main characters and these shows are only pilots, but I’m guessing some contracts either allow for this, or have ended on TSCC. My feel is that the execs at FOX aren’t holding their breath for an additional season and specific characters are not going to be needed. I actually got that feel from the panel at WonderCon in ‘Frisco anyway.

TSCC did get their 2nd season from the advertisers, and again – my conjecture – because of the upcoming Terminator Salvation movie. With that movie fast approaching release date, the curiosity seekers have dwindled and the tie-ins that could be, are no longer.

Last weeks episode carried quite a bit of drama with it and I am enjoying it. Yet there’s only so far they can go with it.

In case you have the hots for additional news on the desperate reboot attempt of Melrose Place, other cast members reporting in are Colin Egglesfield, (All My Children), Michael Rady (Greek), Katie Cassidy (Supernatural), Ashlee Simpson (7th Heaven) and Jessica Lucas (90210).

Source: TV Guide

Speaking of Brian Austin Green

Brian Austin Green’s role as Derek Reese on TSCC may not be the only thing he’s possibly leaving behind! This is just shameless gossip, and a great excuse to add a nice picture to my post, but it’s been reported that Megan Fox moved out of the house she was sharing with Brian.

You know those moments that we look back on and reference about the “One that got away”? I think Green just took the cake on this one!

Guys, the line forms to the right!

Source: E Online

The Sopranos Creator Returns To HBO

David Chase, the creator behind The Sopranos, is coming back to HBO with a new idea in mind.

A Ribbon of Dreams is a mini-series that is set in 1913 and follows two very different men — one a college-educated mechanical engineer and the other, a cowboy with a violent past.

They form a partnership and become motion picture pioneers. Their journey is followed as the Hollywood film industry evolves from silent westerns to talking pictures and into the studio system of present day.

The premise initially seems kind of ‘meh’, but if you dwell on this, it may have a ton of potential with the various eras and lots of different people that may come and go through the series.

Source: TV Guide

No Heather Locklear Here

Even though the CW landed many of the veteran stars back on set for the 90210 reboot, they are having no luck getting Heather Locklear for their new version of Melrose Place. I think it might have been a matter of who is employed and who is not. Locklear has a few projects in the making.

The CW has tried to cover their tracks with this thinly disguised cop out press release:

“There wasn’t a way to bring her back that made sense.”

Riiight. I love PR. But some days it seems like it really is their job to get blood out of a turnip. (Have you figured out this was just another excuse to post a pretty face?)

Source: EW

Back Gets More Cast

CBS has two more stars for their new pilot titled Back. The CBS pilot will star Skeet Ulrich (Jericho) and the two new cast members are Sherry Stringfield (ER) and D.B. Woodside (24).

Back is about a man (Skeet Ulrich) who returns home after eight years. The catch? Everyone thought he died in the 9/11 tragedies, so he was reported as missing.

Sherry Stringfield is Ulrich’s wife. Upon his return, he discovers she’s moved on with a new hubby, which is classic Cast Away. (Man I hurt for him when Hanks returned home to find his wife off with a new hubby and kids.) With Ulrich’s return to this depressing scenario, he’s going to need a shrink. That’s where Woodside comes in. He will be playing that shrink.

Dang, I’m depressed for him already!

PS: Before you ask, no, I don’t know why he went away.

Source: TV Guide

The Office Guest Star

(Mild actor / story line Spoiler)

If I’m not mistaken, Idris Elba (The Wire, Rocknrolla), has started his 6 week guest stint on The Office.

Amy Ryan (The Wire, Gone Baby Gone), is also scheduled to show up as the H.R. goddess Holly Flax for the final episode of the season.

Source: E Online

Lost Season Finale Conjecture

(May be a mild finale spoiler)

It seems that ABC was advertising or seeking extras in Hawaii to play the parts of guests at a wedding on Lost. The timing of such an inquiry is not lost on a few. If schedules are on track, this is the time frame that they would be shooting the season-finale.

Now what would a wedding pertain to? Who knows. It could be a past wedding, or a future wedding. Or a future wedding from their past that is really the present yesterday? I think I just hurt my brain.

Eh, just thought I’d toss this snippet out.

Source: E Online

SOME FUN STUFF:

Next Top Model Gone Bad

Last week 4 people were injured and 2 hospitalized after a stampede of high heel cuties erupted in New York during a casting call for America’s Next Top Model.

At first I thought there was an impromptu makeup sale on the street corner.

It turned out that while hundreds of fashion model wannabe’s were lingering around in line to audition for the show, an argument had ensued. During or after the spat, a BMW either drove by or broke down near the mascara smeared mob and when it spewed some smoke, someone in the automotive-challenged hoard had yelled bomb, and the surge for pseudo safety was on!

The three that were arguing were arrested.

I really enjoyed the reference to this whole thing from the source article over on E Online:

“Fashion Week meets Thunderdome.”

I can’t imagine what a herd of spiked heels running might sound like.

Universal Pictures Has Some !!!!’s

The Advertising Standards Authority, (ASA) a London-based watchdog group, is asking British broadcasters to not air a commercial regarding the DVD release of the 2008 Angelina Jolie flick, Wanted. They’re saying that the movie glorifies and glamorizes gun violence.

Being that the ASA doesn’t get that people are not that stupid, Clearcast, the approving agencies for TV advertisements feels confident that viewers just might be able to distinguish the difference between the fantasy shooting action in Wanted vs. real life. What? You can’t curve bullets? Crap.

Per BBC News, Universal Pictures has replied with the most humorous statement:

“Maybe the ASA, which also banned the ‘Wanted’ posters last year, objects to a female lead handling the big guns, rather than the guns themselves.”

Though I have a hard time believing that was their official company line on the issue, I think Universal Pictures just made a fan out of me anyway.

Source: E Online

It’s almost September and that means that the big summer movie season of 2008 is finally over – but what a summer it’s been!

2008 delivered the kind of summer that superhero and action movie geeks dream of – this is the year that brought us three bonafide superhero movies: Iron Man, The Incredible Hulk and what was that third one… oh yeah: The Dark Knight.

We also had the chance to see the long awaited Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, the latest Pixar flick Wall-E, Will Smith as a superhero in Hancock, Angelina Jolie as an assassin in Wanted, Hellboy II: The Golden Army. To keep us laughing we had Tropic Thunder, The Pineapple Express (which I haven’t seen) and Get Smart.

Heath Ledger in The Dark Knight: Summer 2008 box office winner

The Dark Knight was this summer’s box office juggernaut, and no doubt will be the year’s biggest earner. The big surprise of the summer (and the film that kicked it all off) is Iron Man, which came in second and actually beat Indy 4 in the US! That speaks to both how great Iron Man was and how poor an addition the latest Indiana Jones movie was to the original trilogy.

Iron Man: Surprise hit of the 2008 Summer movie season

Here are the top ten movies this summer based on US box office:

1. The Dark Knight – $493.7MM
2. Iron Man – $317.6MM
3. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull – $315.3MM
4. Hancock – $226.5MM
5. Wall-E – $216.8MM
6. Kung Fu Panda – $213MM
7. Sex and the City (yeah, I know) – $152.4MM
8. The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian – $141.6MM
9. The Incredible Hulk – $134.4MM
10. Wanted – $133.8MM

One big suprise in the above list is Pixar’s Wall-E: I’m really shocked that the R-rating-pushing, PG-13 and mediocre (according to most critics) Hancock actually beat the family friendly Pixar film. Also surprising is that Kung Fu Panda made almost as much as the Wall-E. It looks like despite the universally rave reviews for Wall-E, that the overly message-heavy plot of the movie wasn’t as much of a winner with families as other of their films like The Incredibles and Finding Nemo. Heck, even Cars (considered by many to be Pixar’s weakest film) made more money than Wall-E at the box office.

Wall-E: Below Summer box office expectations?

I’ll take a moment to toot my own horn and point out that I was one of the lone voices pointing out the fact that Wall-E was too heavy handed with its messages.

Also, despite the “cool factor,” Wanted didn’t manage to beat underdog summer flick The Incredible Hulk. I guess more people thought it was ridiculous (as I did) than thought it was “awesome, dude!”. However superhero movie fans across the land can weep in unison at the fact that Hulk was not able to defeat three hip, New York City powershopping babes on the prowl for true love.

Summer 2008: The Incredible Hulk did not go down without a fight

How the heck Sex in the City made into that list is beyond me.

Movies worth noting that are missing from that top 10 list include The Happening (huge stinker for Shyamalan), The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor (couldn’t bring myself to watch it), 10,000 B.C. (do I even need to comment on this one?), Speed Racer (LSD trip for kids), and Hellboy II: The Golden Army (too niche, I suppose).

In the “bombed at the box office” category I guess I’d add X-Files: I Want to Believe ($20.7MM) and at only $27MM since opening, for a Star Wars movie, I’d say The Clone Wars didn’t do too well.

All in all I’d say it’s been a pretty damned awesome summer for movie fans, and it’ll be a tough one to top in 2009.

“Easily done” I hear you say.

Not quite. There’s a problem or two.

Beware there are major Wanted Spoilers below.

Don’t say that I didn’t warn you!

In the new film version of Mark Millar’s comic book, the two major stars Angelina Jolie and Morgan Freeman… die. Yes – they bite the big one, leaving only McAvoy’s Wesley Gibson standing to kick ass in the follow-up.

While the film clearly has sequel written all over it – it will be quite difficult to match the box office gross because McAvoy is hardly a big draw when it comes to selling tickets. That said, a lot of women went to see McAvoy in the film following his recent starring role in Atonement.

Director Timur Bekmambetove and writers Michael Brandt and Derek Haas are already hammering out ideas for a potential continuation.

Producer Mark Platt said:

“The writers are at work already, and those creative discussions are taking place”

What direction this new film will take is anybody’s guess. Heck that might even bring Angelina Jolie’s twin into the film. What – you think that’s too far fetched?

Man – you’ve never seen Dallas.

They’ve got a 300 sequel in development and they spent years writing a follow up to Gladiator.

I’ll even bet that someone, somewhere also tried to get a Sixth Sense sequel made – The Seventh Sense – anyone?

Whatever happens you can bet they get a sequel out in three years at the very most. I don’t see the Wanted franchise having a very long shelf life.

Soon it could be Unwanted.

Source: Variety

Screen Rant’s Wanted review

No doubt I’ll be taking a lot of heat for this since it seems that across the board, Wanted reviews are glowing and effusive in praise. I’ve seen many comments to the effect of “it was trash, but I loved it anyway.” While I certainly wouldn’t call it trash, it also failed to win me over.

Now don’t get me wrong… Pardon the pun, but going in I really wanted to love this movie. I didn’t go in with any thoughts that it would be high art or deep drama – just a cool popcorn flick. But even in popcorn action movies I can only suspend my disbelief so much.

There are minor spoilers related to the very first scene in the film below.

The film opens with a very cool sequence, which had me quite excited to see the rest of the film – an assassin arrives at an office about 20 or so stories high, and commences to have a gunfight with some other guys on the rooftop of a building across the street. It’s a really cool scene which demonstrates the assassin’s proficiency as he starts taking them out one by one. Suddenly they get the upper hand and he heads back down the hall and launches himself forward apparently at superhuman speed. From there we go from cool to ridiculous.

This is the scene where he breaks through a plate glass window face-first as seen in the trailer, and this is where I started scratching my head – instead of falling, he continues to fly forward, apparently on momentum. Then while still moving forward with no drop in elevation, starts shooting at his enemies. Really, I thought this was going to be some sacrificial scene as he eventually starts to drop, especially from the reverse force of firing his guns… but no. He seems to drop and them magically appears on the rooftop behind the baddies.

This left me wondering: Am I watching a superhero movie or a movie about incredibly ninja-level skilled assassins? This was a question that was never fully answered, and the fact that Wanted takes place in the real word made much of what happens in the movie hard to swallow.

From there we meet anxiety-ridden, cubicle-dwelling Wesley Gibson (played by James McAvoy). His life is in a rut – he’s in a dead end job, broke, has a foul-mouthed, overweight harpy for a boss, and his best friend is having sex with his girlfriend. How such a loser managed to score such a good looking girlfriend is beyond me. Anyway he runs into “Fox” (Angelina Jolie) at a mini-mart, where she tells him his father just died and was a master assassin, right before saving his life from another assassin who seems to be out to get Wesley.

(continued…)

The more I see of the upcoming action flick Wanted, the more I look forward to it.

There’s a brand new trailer out which you can watch below and it has lots of new scenes we haven’t seen before. My pre-viewing opinion on this is that if you can get past the incredibly over the top absurdities in the film, it ought to be a heck of a wild ride.

About the only thing that I think may get old is the curving bullet thing that seems to play such a big part in the movie. That gag shows up three times in the two minute trailer below and I know it’s used at least one other time from a scene I’ve seen elsewhere.

Gotta say the “shooting the wings off a fly” was just about laugh out loud funny, and if you do a Google search on Wesley Gibson you’ll get 456,000 hits and not zero – but beyond that I say: bring it!

BTW, an interesting bit of info came up during this past weekend’s Wizard World Philadephia according to Sci-Fi Wire. For fans of Mark Millar’s graphic novel upon which the movie is based, there’s been some complaining that there are no super-powered villains in the movie (although I’d argue they seem pretty much super-powered to me) although there are in the book. It seems that the movie is based on the original idea for the book, was optioned before the book was complete and the Millar took the story in a different direction in his graphic novel.

Mel Caylo, a spokeman for Top Cow Productions stated:

“At that time, Mark had an idea based around a society of assassins that worked underground or behind the scenes, and that’s what the producers bought. Mark then decided to go in the direction that Earth was once populated by superheroes, but they have been vanquished, … and supervillains now run the Earth [in] five major cabals that run the whole world. They went with the original concept and based the film on that.”

Wanted opens on June 27, 2008.

Source: MySpace and thanks to AICN for pointing it out.

I’ll be damned – I just found out that the summer actioner Wanted which stars Angelina Jolie and James McAvoy will be rated R. I’m really surprised at that – I was quite sure they were going to make it a PG-13 bloodless version of The Matrix to bring the kiddies into the theater. Suddenly I’ve got a bit more respect for this thing and it’s looking more like a movie for grown ups.

So… having a “red band” trailer for it makes sense. The trailer below is an international trailer, in Russian, but it’s all about the visuals anyway. While the U.S. trailer makes it look like kind of a hokey PG-13 popcorn movie, the trailer below makes it look much more serious (curving bullet trajectories notwithstanding) and gritty.

Again, this is an R-rated trailer with both explicit violence and some sexual content, so you’ve been warned.

After seeing that I’ve got a whole different feeling about this movie – for the better.

Thanks to /Film for the heads up and find way HUGER versions of the trailer over at the Russian site Filmz.ru (man those guys get a lot of cool stuff…)

Wanted opens on June 27th

The first Tomb Raider would have made bank… even if I was the star, and Mr and Mrs Smith was a hit because of the tabloid stories about Miss Jolie and Brad Pitt.

Jolie should have more luck with Wanted. The comic book adaptation (what else) is directed by Russian helmer Timur Bekmambetov, the man behind Day Watch, Night Watch and the forthcoming Twilight Watch (do you see what he’s doing here?).

Wanted looks bizarre in a sort of crazy Matrix way. let’s just hope that it doesn’t take itself as seriously – however from what I’ve seen that shouldn’t be an issue. The film has a pretty cool cast lined up alongside Jolie: James McAvoy, Morgan Freeman and the fantastic Terence Stamp.

A new poster for the film has now been released and we can tell that the film stars Jolie with a gun, tattoos and a scary skeletal arm.

To see the poster- continue reading.

This movie looks like a crazy piece of summer entertainment. Let’s hope it’s good.

Wanted opens on June 27.

Source: AICN

Now you have the opportunity to see for yourselves with the release of the latest trailer right here.

It’s not as obvious due to the fact that you can’t see an extended sequence, but I think it’s crazy enough for you to get the point. This is the wildest reality-bending movie since The Matrix as far as I’m concerned.

Whether that’s good or bad remains to be seen.

For larger versions of the trailer head on over to the awful Myspace Trailer Park.

So whaddaya think? Uber-cool or hard to swallow?

Wanted opens on June 27th.

You’d better brace yourselves for this one, folks.

The action in Wanted is going to be ultra-over-the-top. Basically I felt like I was watching a superhero movie, even though it’s actually about an elite group of assassins with no super-powers.

The sequence was not quite complete in regards to music (Danny Elfman is scoring) and visual effects, but it definitely gave us the tone of the film.

The scene that was shown was the one we see in the trailer that starts out at the mini-mart where Jolie introduces herself to James McAvoy’s character. An assassin is there to kill McAvoy and she saves him in an extended gunfight sequence that is very effective at showing her skill and experience.

Unfortunately, McAvoy’s character freaks out (as I’m sure any of us would) and takes off running, which removes him from Jolie’s protection. As he’s about to be run down by the bad guy in a delivery truck (with cute puppy or kitten on the side), she swoops in with a Dodge Viper and does the most amazing “scoop” of a passenger I’ve ever seen.

That was extremely cool. However…

From there I started to get more than a bit annoyed at McAvoy’s character continually screaming, whining, etc. I understand that he is playing the “relatable” character, but damn… don’t be that much of a wuss.

For the record, I found James McAvoy to be extremely polite and charming and polite, so that’s no reflection on him personally.

Jolie in this scene leaves you with your jaw on the floor from the stunts her character is performing, including smashing out the windshield so she can lie on the hood and shoot back at the bad guy while still semi-driving with her foot. There was humor in the scene as McAvoy even in his terror was distracted by the fact that he was able to look up Jolie’s skirt.

All this was great (despite the whining) but the finale of the scene in my opinion took the “curving bullet trajectory” thing we’ve seen in the trailer WAY too far, and then the way they escape is so over the top as to strain even movie-physics credulity.

I’ll be interested to see how audiences react to Wanted, which opens on June 27.

I understand this is based on a comic book/graphic novel. Perhaps one of my learned visitors can enlighten me.

In any case, check out the trailer which is pretty damned cool in my opinion…

For higher res versions of the trailer you can go to Yahoo! Movies.

Wanted opens on March 28, 2008