The Official will.i.am/John Wraith Discussion Thread

[Pauluz]

Funny guy. Sounds like he knows his stuff. I hope he does a good job.

It only shows he saw the films.

 

[danoyse]

It only shows he saw the films.

And that he really enjoys the films and is psyched to be part of one now.

I take that as a positive.

 

[GL1]

Root-a-toot-toot, guys... root-a-toot-toot.
(I need that in parenthesis in the thread title... that would make my day)

 

[Super_Ludacris]

And the baseless ignorant prejudice (against Hip Hop) keeps coming:



Who says it's not? Baseless ignorant judgement.



Hoping because... ????



Well if he were headlining the movie, that would be a relevant question. We're talking about a supporting role, guys, and small supporting roles, like Will's been doing, lead to larger supporting roles. The size of the franchise has ZERO relevance when it comes to his ability to be a supporting character.

And let's not forget that both Latifah and Smith went straight into hit sitcoms from their rap careers with how much "relevant experience?" None that I can find... except rapping. So either rapping indicates acting experience as people play out their hip hop personas or there is nothing stopping a rapper from going straight into a successful acting career.



You know, if I hadn't read so much literature on how rap is becoming a big musical theatre, that wouldn't be so funny.

Let's put it this way: How many other musical genres have generated as many headlining movie stars? As many cameos even? I mean gone from selling hundreds of thousands of records to selling millions of dollars of tickets. Madonna... she counts right, from Evita? Mandy Moore's pretty talented. Dogstar, anyone?

Rappers act, man. They've been doing it for years. They do it on MTV. They do it on BET. They do it every time they're in public. They are character actors through and through, playing the part of the uberconfident hardcore super-suave hip hop icon their managers and labels make them out to be. When they get a chance to do it on the silver screen they virtually always do their part. This is in addition to those who have uncanny talent anyway.

But perhaps you're right. Perhaps Will.i.am is a Snoop Dogg or a Puff Daddy in the acting department as opposed to a Will or a Latifah. But there's no reason to make this conclusion a certainty outside of ignorant baseless prejudice.

Based on the track record of previous rapper-actors, it's pretty likely that he'll do a good job.

True indeed. I dont get these nerds who throw a ****-fit every time a rapper/non-actor is cast in a small role.

I still remember them getting there panites in a bunch over Ghostface's cameo in Iron Man.

 

[Roaring_Hulk!]

I still remember them getting there panites in a bunch over Ghostface's cameo in Iron Man.

What's the killer from Scream doing in Iron Man?

 

[Super_Ludacris]

What's the killer from Scream doing in Iron Man?

smh....

 

[Blade X]

Is Kestrel or Wraith even a significant comic book character?

-TNC

When Larry Hama (Wraith's creator) was writing WOLVERINE in the 90's, Wraith played an important part in the comic. Hama had planned to do a 2 year storyline in which the WOLVERINE comic would become a buddy book and focus on Logan and Wraith traveling around together and getting into all sorts of adventures. Of course, Marvel apparently rejected that idea.

Once Hama left the book, Wraith went into limbo and only returned to be killed off in the most asinine and pathetic (not to mention, the whole cliche "kill the black man" movie scene) manner in an issue of WOLVERINE written by Frank Tieri. For some reason, Marvel seems to downplay the importance of the character in the Wolverine/Weapon X mythos.

John Wraith is a cool character that has unfortunately fallen victim to Marvel's current policy of get rid of all of their black mutant (and non mutant) superhero characters.

 

[Blade X]

Right. And he was killed by Sabretooth. That could make for an interesting scene.

His death at the hands of Sabretooth was both asinine and cliche. Not to mention, Wraith was completely written out of character in that issue.

 

[Blade X]

Looks just like him. Hopefully he'll just be stryker's henchman.

Wraith, as ORIGINALLY written by his creator Larry Hama, would NOT be one of Stryker's henchmen. Wraith was a heroic secret agent type character who would defy his bosses in order to do the right thing.

 

[chamber-music]

Wraith joined the likes of synch, jesse bedlam, Maggott and Tag

 

[Blade X]

I don't know what to make of this - while it's great that John Wraith is in this movie (one of the best and most under-rated characters to come out of the '90s) and it's the black mutant version from 616, Will.i.am is hardly a safe choice. Personally, I always wanted Samuel L. Jackson for Wraith. I can just imagine Jackson speaking Wraith's dialogue.

THUG: Ya threw a bullet at me?
WRAITH: Not just ANY bullet. That's a hot-load .45 ACP with an alloy jacket around a depleted uranium core swimming in mercury. It makes an EXIT WOUND the size of a deep dish chicken pot pie... and the NEXT one comes at you a lot FASTER.

I agree with everything you said. Wraith is one of the most underrated characters created in the 90's.

I said it before, and I'll say it again, Wraith (as originally created and written by Larry Hama) was doing the whole Sam Jackson thing before it became the "cool" thing to do with character's like Ultimate Nick Fury. Of Marvel and MOST comic fans either won't acknowledge or don't know about this little fact. And unlike ULTIMATES writer Mark Millar, Hama didn't tell the artist to make Wraith look exactly like Sam Jackson as a shameless attempt to pander to Hollywood.

 

[Congo Jack]

When Larry Hama (Wraith's creator) was writing WOLVERINE in the 90's, Wraith played an important part in the comic. Hama had planned to do a 2 year storyline in which the WOLVERINE comic would become a buddy book and focus on Logan and Wraith traveling around together and getting into all sorts of adventures. Of course, Marvel apparently rejected that idea.
...
Wraith, as ORIGINALLY written by his creator Larry Hama, would NOT be one of Stryker's henchmen. Wraith was a heroic secret agent type character who would defy his bosses in order to do the right thing.

Exactly. It's hard to see where the hell Tieri got Wraith's 'company man' personality from.

Blade X, where did you hear that Hama was gonna do a Logan/Wraith buddy book? I try to read a lot of Hama's interviews but have never heard this before. That would have been great.

I'd love to see Hama come back to WOLVERINE, ignore Tieri's Wraith and make that book consistantly readable again.

 

[Blade X]

Exactly. It's hard to see where the hell Tieri got Wraith's 'company man' personality from.

Blade X, where did you hear that Hama was gonna do a Logan/Wraith buddy book? I try to read a lot of Hama's interviews but have never heard this before. That would have been great.

I'd love to see Hama come back to WOLVERINE, ignore Tieri's Wraith and make that book consistantly readable again.

I think Tieri got Wraith's "company man" personality from that WEAPON X novel written by (I think) Chris Golden. IMO, Tieri is a hack who gets story ideas from B movies and rehash them as comic story's. The guy also has a tendency to kill off the 2nd and 3rd string black characters that he DID NOT create. He killed off Maggot during his WEAPON X series.

I read about Hama's plans for Logan and Wraith many years ago (back in the 90's) in an interview in either the MARVEL AGE magazine or WIZARD MAGAZINE (I can't recall which magazine it was). This was shortly after Logan had his adamantium skeleton ripped from his body by Magneto.

I would also love to see Hama return to writing WOLVERINE and ignore Tieri's cliche B movie treatment of Wraith. Of course, this MOST LIKELY will not happen, because TPTB at Marvel have little or no interest in giving Hama any work.

 

[Savage]

I must have missed something because Tieri's run on Wolverine was what got me reading his comics in the first place. In fact I'm a big fan of his depiction of Sabretooth. Then again I'd never heard of Wraith before reading that story arc so what do I know?

 

[Blade X]

Wraith joined the likes of synch, jesse bedlam, Maggott and Tag

Sad, but true.

It's funny how most of the people working in the comic book industry consider themselves to be self proclaimed "enlightened liberals", but they continue to either kill off,depower,cripple/maim,or toss in limbo the few black and other non-white minority characters that exist.

 

[tamron]

I must have missed something because Tieri's run on Wolverine was what got me reading his comics in the first place. In fact I'm a big fan of his depiction of Sabretooth. Then again I'd never heard of Wraith before reading that story arc so what do I know?

Tieri wasn't all bad, IMHO. His Weapon X was a spotty, but entertaining run. I loved his Sabretooth (intelligent and crafty, not just a mindless killer out to sate his bloodlust) and he made my man David North a player again by making him Agent Zero (North was basically forgotten after Maverick#12), but his treatment of certain characters, like John Wraith and Maggott showed a fundamental lack of knowledge of these characters' histories, or at the very least a lack of storyline development, so that his changes to the characters made sense.

 

[the a1ant]

Wraith joined the likes of synch, jesse bedlam, Maggott and Tag

Dont' forget Rem-Ram (Marcus Andrews)

 

[RonStoppablefan]

Guess will see what this guy can do. I'll say it agian, we just need to give some of these guy's a shot. I'll be hontest I've never heard of him before till now. But maybe he just needs his chance, he might just be one of the best never before seen actors.

 

[JaD]

im sure this guys in the movie for good reason

maybe he breaks out into song

 

[Gotham]

Guess will see what this guy can do. I'll say it agian, we just need to give some of these guy's a shot. I'll be hontest I've never heard of him before till now. But maybe he just needs his chance, he might just be one of the best never before seen actors.

I hadn't heard of him either before this announcement. I remember a rapper or two (I don't remember their names, unfortunately) in American Gangster and they were excellent.

 

[Congo Jack]

You guys know that Mike Carey has plans to resurrect Maggott?

I also liked Tieri's Sabretooth. I can't forgive what he done to both Wraith and Maggott, but a couple of his arcs were decent though - the initial arc with Mr. X, STAY ALIVE and CHASERS (which reads so much better as a stand-alone story than rather than as part of the awful mafia follow-up). A lot of the time I thought Sean Chen's artwork saved the book, but as an overall read it was pretty poor.

 

[chamber-music]

I hadn't heard of him either before this announcement. I remember a rapper or two (I don't remember their names, unfortunately) in American Gangster and they were excellent.

Probabley Common and T.I

Common was rumoured to have had the role of Green Lantern in the JLA movie thats on hold.

His also in Wanted, Smoking Aces an Street Kings.

 

[Crowforge]

I imagine he won't be dressing himself.

 

[Leenie]

All that matters is Hugh Jackman anyway. They could throw in Fergie and that wouldn't get in his way.

-TL

Despite the fact that I ADORE Hugh Jackman ... If Fergie were to be casted, I would flat-out boycott this movie.

 

[Advanced Dark]

http://illroots.com/dubfloyd/?p=194

New video interview regarding Wolverine. At least I think it's new.