They MAY have lost SPIDER-MAN! But never fear: TOM HIDDLESTON and KAVANAGH QC are here to save MARVEL and DISNEY!
This has been kept top secret but we managed to nail an exclusive. Fearful of the possible fallout from probable loss of SPIDER-MAN, Kevin Feige, Marvel and Disney had a back-up plan. They purchased the rights to the super-heroic Barrister, Kavanagh QC. And there was only one man fit for the role: star of BBC’s Casualty, Cranford and Wallander (with his very good friend, KEN BRANAGH)..Yes, of course..the one, the only..TOM HIDDLESTON!
Granted, it’s a BIT of a left field move. Risky, even. Riskier than say, picking an obscure property like ETERNALS as your next big thing; or asking SONY for too much cash to retain SPIDER-MAN? But there’s method in the madness. Kavanagh was a beloved property, back in the 1990s. Devised for John Thaw at his Inspector Morse peak era power, it was a weekly legal drama with occasional soap operatic / romantic / comedic / thrilling sub-plots.
Jim Kavanagh was portrayed as the ultimate Barrister: known everywhere, feared in the Courtroom and desired in the bedroom by women everywhere, despite his being faithful to a WIFE for at least 2 or 3 series..before they kill her off so he can be available to the ladies everywhere yet strangely unattainable too.
This was brilliant television. IN NO WAY AT ALL was Kavanagh a poor man’s Rumpole of the Bailey or a vanity project for Thaw, breaking from Inspector Morse yet trading on similar good-will by being cast as yet another ‘professional of the week’ maverick yet amazing hero, who makes all women swoon, despite being a respectful gentleman as a character himself.
AT NO STAGE AT ALL does Thaw simply phone it in by SHOUTING or letting his RADA quasi Northern accent slip: ‘baastard’ (see also: Sean Bean, Tim Dalton, Judi Dench..etc..). The family set-up is in no way at all contrived or sanitised: you totally believe this! NONE of the characters are cut and paste caricatures; all have life, substance.
So it was a natural fit for MARVEL!
John Thaw sadly died in 2002: much missed as a man, a talent, an entertainer and a consummate, charismatic actor, fusing machismo to refinement. But the IP in Kavanagh remains strong. So it is thought that Hiddleston will pick up where the last season ended, with our hero contemplating life as a Judge. In deciding whether or not to take that step, he visits an old friend /rival: JUDGE JOHN DEED! Yes: Marvel has also purchased THAT property, in plans for an epic shared universe. It is thought that, in an experimental piece of acting craft, Hiddleston will play BOTH characters, even as they talk to each other.
If successful, it is hoped to spin-off into a shared universe of legal drama, with other possibilities including YOUNG KAVANAGH, YOUNG JOHN DEED and JEREMY ALDERMARTEN, QC. Hiddleston is thought to be up for all those roles, though MARTIN SHAW may cameo and NICHOLAS JONES and DAISY BATES have all been approached.
This makes sense: maximum nostalgia kick, whilst building on old IP to move forward! Hiddleston is a natural fit. He completed a law degree recently (first class honours, naturally), on lunch breaks and managed to fit in a full pupillage at a top Chambers for fun / research /completion. In Birmingham.
He speaks fluent Latin and ancient Greek, so the obscure legalise is no problem for him. Tom is known to have memorised most of Roman and English statute, so no matter how obscure or forensic the idea, he would pick it up in Court. He was also the best in Balloon Debates at school.
Above all, women LOVE him. They admire his machismo, action hero credentials + ‘toight’ body and they realise NO man will EVER look THAT good in slippers. Ever. Not even Cumberbatch.
So, this should go some way to abating fears on the SPIDER-MAN situation. I know that Marvel/Disney seemed keen to sign Tom Holland again before his balls dropped once and for all and before he turns 16. But you cannot have everything. Hey: Sony can now pair him with..VENOM, whose success at the Box Office was IN NO WAY AT ALL down to people assuming it had something to do with the MCU? So, great move here by BOTH Disney AND Sony. REALLY clever! Clever, clever, clever..
In other D23 news? Well, There is a service coming called Disney +. And yes it will be great and yes we will all buy into it. All those movies on tap: of course! Parents and families, especially, getting access to the whole library of titles is a great business model. The television content that is ‘original’ will range from the fascinating and genuinely charming (World according to Jeff Goldblum) to the curious (WandaVision) and cinematic quality sublime (MANDALORIAN!!!).
Obi Wan Kenobi IS getting his own show (played by a man you may recognise from..KAVANAGH QC, Ewan McGregor!): GREAT! I maintain that the Marvel movie line-up is, however, missing something (DOWNEY! or someone of that level star power?) or big post Fox takeover revelations: sod the five year plans and just give us Fantastic 4 and X men!
And The Rise of Skywalker footage just looks..meh, upstaged by its own television counterparts and resorting to a return of the Emperor because they desperately want this to feel like a saga concluding, when in fact, it..isn’t. But hey..looking forward, in some regard, to all of this. So well done, Disney! But putting poor Tom Holland in the spotlight like that to announce a cartoon voice-over..when you KNOW everyone is pressurising him about SPIDER-MAN? Unforgivable. Poor kid: I don’t care how much he earns, there was no excuse for that. Not all of us can be as STRONG as..
..TOM HIDDLESTON 😉
nb, trolls: note the filing / hashtag buzzwords etc.
