In this episode of WTF Happened to This Celebrity, we look back at the turbulent life and times of a sci-fi icon, William Shatner!

Whether you know him as Captain James T. Kirk, Sgt. T.J. Hooker, Denny Crane, or General Mortars from National Lampoon’s Loaded Weapon 1, William Shatner is one of entertainment history’s most iconic figures. The Canadian actor is seven decades into his career as a celebrated actor, science-fiction legend, author, musician, and more. His career began in 1951 when he landed a small role in the Canadian comedic drama The Butler’s Night Off. Compared to actors like Steve McQueen, Paul Newman, and Robert Redford, Shatner continued building his credits on the Broadway stage and performing minor roles in television and film.

Shatner eventually entered the world of science-fiction with a part in two episodes of The Twilight Zone: “Nick of Time,” and “Nightmare at 20,000 Feet.” In 1966, Shatner beamed up as the captain of the USS Enterprise, James T. Kirk. When his history-making role ended after three seasons and seventy-nine episodes, Shatner hit a wall. He’d become a victim of typecasting, finding it impossible to shake the James T. Kirk persona from his shadow. He began haunting the sets of B-movies and returning to television for guest roles. When Star Trek fans organized a swell of enthusiasm for the series, the property returned significantly, with Shatner crowned a favorite of the enthusiastic Trekkies.

The resurgence of Star Trek helped get Shatner back on track after labeling him an integral part of science-fiction entertainment history. Taking note of his celebrity, Shatner rose like a mighty phoenix with cherry roles on shows like Boston Legal, TekWar, and T.J. Hooker.

With time marching on, Shatner’s reputation has had its ups and downs. Beyond agreeing to host the science documentary I Don’t Understand with William Shatner, a project that landed him in the hot seat in the political aisle, Shatner also went to space, joining a flight that took him 66 miles above planet Earth. When he returned, Shatner said his trip to space “felt like a funeral” for Earth, a sentiment many found depressing and fatalistic.

Join us as we look back on the life and times of William Shatner, investigating the twists and turns of his legacy with more scrutiny than Spock trying to navigate a modern-day smartphone.

WTF Happened to William Shatner is written by Brad Hamerly, with edits and narration by Taylor James Johnson.

Taika Waititi has not only turned in multiple drafts of his Star Wars script but he has another one due after the WGA strike settles.

Despite the rumor mill spitting out that Taika Waititi was no longer attached to a Star Wars movie, word has now come out that the writer/director is indeed still pressing forward with his script.

According to The Hot Mic’s Jeff Sneider (via The Bespin Bulletin), Taika Waititi had not only been putting a lot of focus on a Star Wars script but will be turning in yet another draft in the future. “It’s not dead. Taika has turned in multiple drafts at this point and other writers as well have touched it. Taika owes them [Lucasfilm] another draft after the [WGA] strike is over.”

The word that Taika Waititi had never actually finished a script for a Star Wars entry was no doubt brought on by Waititi himself, who made mention of it at the Toronto International Film Festival – where his latest movie, Next Goal Wins, premiered – while honoring Deadpool 3 director Shawn Levy with an award. “Once he’s had his way with that [Deadpool] franchise, like a cruel and indiscriminate virus, he’ll move on to another, and another, and another. And then eventually, probably Star Wars. And unlike me, there’s hope he actually manages to finish the script for that.”

Taika Waititi has been tied to a Star Wars outing for over three years, so it wouldn’t have been that far-fetched if his project had come to a standstill. That he has been working and the only apparent snag has been the Writers Guild of America strike is certainly promising. Hopefully, those of us looking forward to his spin will be getting a final draft soon enough, as many think the strike could be nearing its end due to multiple meetings between the WGA and the AMPTP.

Taika Waititi was a welcome addition to the Marvel Cinematic Universe when he took over the Thor movies with 2017’s Ragnarok, a clear fan favorite. But Star Wars is a different entity entirely and one false move could find the upcoming set of films – with entries from the likes of Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy, James Mangold, and Patty Jenkins – spoiled altogether.

Do you think Taika Waititi is good for the Star Wars universe? What do you think he could bring to the franchise?

The “Jason Statham vs. giant sharks” film Meg 2: The Trench will begin streaming on the Max service later this month

Meg 2: The Trench, director Ben Wheatley’s sequel to Jon Turteltaub’s 2018 “Jason Statham vs. a giant shark” adventure The Meg (watch it at THIS LINK), has racked up almost $400 million at the global box office since reaching theatres at the start of August. Now the film, which has been available on PVOD since the end of August, is ready to start streaming. Variety reports that Meg 2 will be available to watch on the Max streaming service as of next Friday, September 29th.

Variety notes that, “In order to stream the film, you’ll have to sign up for a Max account, with subscriptions starting at $9.99/Month. You can also access Max through Prime Video’s add-on, which offers a 7-day free trial.”

You can read our review of Meg 2: The Trench at THIS LINK and read our interview with Wheatley HERE.

The screenplay for Meg 2: The Trench was written by Dean Georgaris, Jon Hoeber, and Erich Hoeber, the same writing team that was on the first film. These films are inspired by a series of novels written by Steve Alten.

Jason Statham is back in the lead as rescue diver Jonas Taylor and is joined in the cast of the sequel by returning co-stars Cliff Curtis, Shuya Sophia Cai, and Page Kennedy, as well as Sienna Guillory (Resident Evil: Apocalypse), Skyler Samuels (The Gifted), Sergio Peris-Mencheta (Rambo: Last Blood), and Wu Jing (Wolf Warrior II).

Meg 2: The Trench will be receiving a 4K, Blu-ray, and DVD release on October 24th. If you buy the digital version, the 4K, or the Blu-ray, you’ll get to see the following bonus features:

The Making of Meg 2: The Trench – Cast and crew revisit the making of the film and working with new and returning cast members, then highlight the beauty and challenges of working with a Meg they can’t see!​

Up From the Depths: Even More Beasts – Director Ben Wheatley, cast, and producers guide fans through the creation and design of the new creatures seen in Meg 2: The Trench.

Have you seen Meg 2: The Trench? Will you be checking it out on Max? Let us know by leaving a comment below.

Check out the trailer for the UFO and alien sighting docu-series Encounters, coming from Amblin and Netflix next week

Last month, we learned that Steven Spielberg‘s Amblin Television is teaming up with Boardwalk Pictures and Vice Studios to bring the four-part docu-series Encounters to the Netflix streaming service on September 27th. With that date right around the corner, we’ve gotten our hands on a trailer for the series and you can check it out in the embed above.

Yon Motskin, creator of the Max series Generation Hustle, has directed the four episodes of Encounters, which will explore four extraordinary true stories of encounters with otherworldly phenomena. Each episode tells a single story: strange lights in the sky over small-town Texas; submersible space crafts haunting a coastal Welsh village; an alien encounter with schoolchildren in Zimbabwe and non-human intelligence reportedly interfering with a nuclear power plant in Japan. Told from the perspective of firsthand experiencers – in the places where the sightings occurred – and guided by scientists and military personnel, the series highlights the profoundly human impact of these encounters on lives, families, and communities.

Motskin also executive produced the series with Darryl Frank and Justin Falvey of Amblin Television, Andrew Fried, Jordan Wynn, and Dane Lillegard of Boardwalk Pictures, and Andrew Freston, Danny Gabai, Derek Mead, and Jason Koebler of Vice Studios. Patrick Altema served as co-executive producer for Boardwalk Pictures. That company previously made the four-part docu-series Pepsi, Where’s My Jet? for Netflix.

Of course, a show with this subject matter and the title Encounters coming from Amblin is a nod to Spielberg’s own Close Encounters of the Third Kind.

What did you think of the Encounters trailer? Are you interested in stories of UFO and alien sightings, and will you be watching this show when it starts streaming on Netflix next week? Let us know by leaving a comment below.

Encounters seems interesting enough to me, so I’ll probably check the docu-series out at some point. I would be terrified anytime something related to UFO and alien sightings (like Time-Life commercials) would show up on TV when I was a kid, so with this and their revival of the always bone-chilling Unsolved Mysteries it seems like Netflix is working to bring back my childhood nightmares.

The latest entry in Robert Rodriguez’s kid-friendly adventure franchise is as silly as the previous ones but lacks the celebrity cameos.

PLOT: When the children of the world’s greatest secret agents unwittingly help a powerful Game Developer unleash a computer virus that gives him control of all technology, they must become spies themselves to save their parents and the world.

REVIEW: Robert Rodriguez has always had two distinct film output: mature genre offerings aimed at adult audiences and family-friendly action flicks aimed at the youngest viewers. While Rodriguez’s Troublemaker Studios has used in-house special effects work to deliver pulpy flicks like Machete and the recent Hypnotic, the full-blown CGI worlds of the Spy Kids films have given the indie filmmaker a playground to make every childhood fantasy come to life. After four films centered on the Cortez family of spies, Rodriguez and his son Racer Max have written a franchise reboot centered on two new pint-sized agents as they use their knowledge of video games to save their parents and the world. Spy Kids: Armageddon is a decidedly low-budget affair that is bound to entertain only the youngest of viewers as it struggles to find the charm that the original cast brought to the first film in the series.

Spy Kids: Armageddon sticks very closely to the formula of the four prior entries in the franchise. The new multi-ethnic spy family here is the Tango-Torrez clan. Nora (Gina Rodriguez) and Terrence (Zachary Levi) are the parents and secret spies, taking over for Carla Gugino and Antonio Banderas, as well as Jessica Alba and Joel McHale. Nora and Terrence are parents to Patty (Everly Carganilla) and Tony (Connor Esterson), two precocious grade-schoolers who love video games and technology. Terrence has locked down their use of devices due to his fear of what technology can do in the wrong hands. Like their predecessors, Terrence and Nora work for OSS and report to Devlin (D.J. Cotrona taking over for George Clooney). Terrence invented the Armageddon Code, a powerful tool to hack any tech. That code is also what game designer Rey Kingston (Billy Magnussen) wants so that he can take over the world using his popular Lowscor and Hyscor video game franchise.

Once the Armageddon Code is stolen by Kingston, Patty and Tony become official OSS agents to rescue their parents as well as being way better at video games than the Boomers and Gen-Xers who run the spy agency. Conveniently, Terrence and Nora built a safe house full of training material, candy, and gadgets for the pint-sized kids to employ as master spies. From there, the film blends Robert Rodriguez’s prior films’ over-the-top action and pratfall comedy with the family-friendly CGI monsters of Kingston’s video game realm. Like the second and third films in the series, Spy Kids: Armageddon spends more than half of its running time inside a video game realm that looks cartoonish and not at all scary. If anything, the character design is a cross between the aesthetic of the prior movies mixed with an homage to Ray Harryhausen. The skeleton warriors were a highlight and reminded me of how fun old-school stop-motion was. While the skeletons are a fun and silly callback to Clash of the Titans, the CGI reminds me of just how silly the Spy Kids movies are.

The Spy Kids movies have always been aimed at a young audience and do not grow with their target viewers, meaning each sequel holds less nostalgia than the ones that came out when I was younger. Adults will groan at Zachary Levi and Billy Magnussen’s over-the-top performances, delivered so broadly that even the youngest watching can read the emotion on their faces. There is little subtext in movies like this, but Gina Rodriguez gives a solid performance that is easily the best in the whole movie. Unfortunately, the kids themselves are nowhere near the talent that Alexa Vega and Daryl Sabara brought to the first movies. I hate to knock child actors, but these kids shift wildly from scene to scene. At one moment, they believably exist in this fantastical adventure, and in others, they sound like they are reading recipe instructions with out-of-character enthusiasm. Little kids may relate to these youthful protagonists, but adults will be left groaning at the poor quality of the overall story.

The silliness of the Spy Kids movies was always front and center, but it was offset by tons of famous faces gracing the movies in ridiculous roles. The star power of the first films is virtually nonexistent here, with none of the signature cameos that made the first movies bearable. While Zachary Levi is known as Shazam by most audiences, when he is the biggest star in the movie, you have a problem. None of Robert Rodriguez’s repertory players even make a brief appearance here. Even Cheech Marin or Danny Trejo could have boosted this movie a bit. Instead, there is nothing for grown-ups to latch onto as this movie skews towards the pre-teen set. Co-written with his son, Racer Max, Robert Rodriguez made this project a family affair. Like The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lavagirl, based on an idea by Racer Max, Spy Kids: Armageddon is the most ridiculous movie that Rodriguez has made to date while still having credible production values, editing, and music.

Spy Kids: Armageddon is easily one of the weakest movies that Robert Rodriguez has directed and would never have warranted a big-screen release. Even as a Netflix original, Armageddon is less enjoyable than the prior entry to debut on the platform, Spy Kids: All the Time in the World. At least that movie tried something original by having only one of the parents be a spy. Here, the biggest twist is that one of the kids doesn’t want to be a spy because lying is wrong, but that conceit goes out the window once the action kicks into gear. Even at 97 minutes, this movie feels an hour too long and will not be fun for anyone but the youngest of viewers, and I think even they will be bored after half an hour. A weak movie in a franchise that should never have gone past one sequel, Spy Kids: Armageddon is not good at all.

4

The director of Arnold Schwarzenegger’s comeback movie promises an old school action flick with very little comedy.

This weekend sees the release of Expend4bles (read my review), and its director, Scott Waugh, is already planning a follow-up action movie. This time, instead of Sylvester Stallone, he’s tearing up with another action icon: Arnold Schwarzenegger. As previously reported, the film, Breakout, stars Arnold as “Terry Reynolds. When his stepson, Daniel, is framed and sentenced to 25 years in a foreign country, Reynolds makes a daring jailbreak to save him and must overcome an overzealous prison warden in a race against time to avoid capture and flee the country.”

Recently, we spoke to Waugh and asked him about making Arnold’s latest. While he admitted that the strikes have brought the film to a temporary stop, he seems excited about its possibilities: “I think Breakout’s gonna be a really cool movie for Arnold. It’s really gonna get back to real hard Arnold. There’s not much comedy in it at all and it’s still him whipping ass at 75.”

For hardcore Arnold fans, that definitely sounds like a breath of fresh air. While his latest project, Netflix’s Fubar, has been a solid hit, there’s a lot of comedy in it – too much, perhaps. Many of us miss the days when Arnold was making movies like Predator, Eraser or The Terminator. Breakout sounds like it could be a great last hurrah for the former governor of California, even if it likely won’t get finished until the strikes are done.

You can see Expend4bles in theaters this weekend, and you can also catch Waugh’s Hidden Strike starring another action icon, Jackie Chan (with John Cena) on Netflix, where it unexpectedly became a smash hit despite being buried for years.

Are you excited to see Arnold Schwarzenegger return to hardcore action? Let us know in the comments.

Brian Duffield talks his new Alien Invasion film, the inspiration for the alien design, and how incredible Kaitlyn Dever is in the lead role.

Hulu has been investing in the horror market lately, so it’s nice to see them getting outside the normal possession or curse stuff. And if there’s any type of film that we sorely need more of, it’s scale alien invasion films. These more personal tales always feel so much more real than the more bombastic and planet-shattering ones. No One Will Save You is more akin to A Quiet Place. We’re focusing on one person during what is clearly a planetwide event. While I wasn’t entirely totally sold on the film (check out my review), I had a great time talking to writer/director Brian Duffield. This was clearly a passion project for him; he knew the star he had in Kaitlyn Dever and how to utilize her properly. And she sounds like an absolute sweetheart. Check out the video above!

No One Will Save You plot: In this captivating sci-fi psychological thriller, a young woman (Kaitlyn Dever) who’s been alienated from her community finds herself in an action-packed face-off with a host of extraterrestrial beings who threaten her future while forcing her to deal with her past.

NO ONE WILL SAVE YOU IS STREAMING ON HULU ON SEPTEMBER 22ND, 2023.

No One Will Save You will be available to watch exclusively through Hulu in the U.S. It will be streaming on Star+ in Latin America and on Disney+ in all other territories.

The writer/director produced the film alongside Star Thrower Entertainment’s Tim White, Trevor White, and Allan Mandelbaum. Dever served as executive producer with Joshua Throne.