You're familiar with the internet, right? I trust you generally know how this works by now, the whole new movie trailer thing. The studio unleashes the trailer for a big new franchise movie, and every pop culture site, blog, YouTube channel and whatever else jumps up to obsessively pore over every minute detail. The average person is left with questions after viewing the trailer, and the average geek is quick to volunteer a Wikipedia-esque explanation of comic book backstory, franchise mythology as well as an in-depth recap of any social media/Instagram/interview clues dropped by the film's director, producer(s), writer(s) and/or star(s). That's part of the fun of being a nerdy movie fan in 2016. Seemingly everywhere you turn there's someone just as excited as you about the next big movie, if not more, and it's easier than it's ever been before to get to the bottom of every question a trailer might purposefully leave you asking.
This is how we've been doing it for over a decade now. I've been on both sides of the divide, leaning on the internet to explain X-Men comic book mythology to me when The Last Stand came out in 2006 and paying it forward with my geeky ramblings about the trailers for a film like Thor: The Dark World. But, gosh, I've hit a bit of a wall with this, and it couldn't have come at a worst time.
As you've likely noticed, the freakin' internet is raining down geek trailers on us lately, whether it's a cool backwards Doctor Strange TV spot, the more optimistic (read: generic) Rogue One story trailer, a quick touch in with the Guardians of the Galaxy crew or the bleak-as-shit Logan trailer. That's without mentioning the Red Dead Redemption 2 teaser, or the stunning Nintendo Switch announcement trailer, neither of which are related to film but still exist to occupy our geeky time.
And man I tell ya', I've got nothing. I don't have any great insight for you on any of these films, at least nothing new to add to what I've already said about some of them in the past, such as these relatively recent articles about Rogue One or my " Huh. It looks like The Matrix meets Inception. That'll probably be pretty cool" take on Doctor Strange.
Maybe I'm just reacting against the seemingly endless cycle of the hype machine, or maybe I'm just being an old man yelling at the damn kids to get off his Gran Torino oldsmobile (hold on, that doesn't sound right. Man, I need to actually see the film Gran Torino, just so I can have my facts straight when I reference history's favorite "old man wants kids off his lawn" movie). But I don't want to wonder whether or not the little girl in the Logan trailer is X23. I don't want to face 8 months of Baby Groot GIFs rom the Guardians of the Galaxy 2 trailer. And I'm so tired of reading/writing about Rogue One 's reshoots.
I just want to watch a couple of trailers, stop for a second and think, "Damn, those look pretty good," and then merrily move on.
So, here are the most recent (or first ever in a couple of cases) trailers for Doctor Strange, Rogue One, Guardians and Logan. Guess what? Damn, they all look pretty good. Can't wait to see them, especially Logan, which looks like Mad Max: Fury Road and The Road screwed and popped out a comic book movie baby. Of course, as a defender of The Wolverine I was alwasy going to be in the bag for Hugh Jackman teaming back up with James Mangold, but even I didn't expect them to go from the Japanese western of The Wolverine into a Maggie/Mad Max/Road hybrid. I dig it.
Doctor Strange Time In Reverse Rogue One Story Trailer - aka Hey, Did You Know They're Rebels? Because They're Sure Fond of Reminding Us Of That Logan Slices and Dices to Johnny Cash, Forces Some to Ask, "Is That Mel Gibson?" and others to ask, "Is that Jean Valjean?" Nope, that's Old Man Logan Guardians of the Galaxy 2 Teaser Trailer - Aka, Here Are Those Characters You Already Love Just Hanging Out. Look How Cool They Are. They'll Be Even Cooler When You Get to See the Whole Movie.