A round-up of the best from San Diego Comic-Con 2017

MARVEL, DC, Stranger Things, Westworld and more were on hand to announce secrets and reveal shiny trailers at Comic-Con. Here’s a round-up of the best.

FOR pop culture nerds, Comic-Con is like Mecca. It’s where massive TV shows and movies roll out the red carpet for the fans.

And this weekend’s San Diego Comic-Con did not disappoint. Stars including Will Smith, Cate Blanchett, Mark Ruffalo, Seth Rogen, Sigourney Weaver, the casts of Game of Thrones, Stranger Things, The Walking Dead and The Defenders were on hand to wave shiny videos in front of us.

Oh, and Chris Hemsworth, Steven Spielberg, Chadwick Boseman, Ed Harris, Ben Affleck, Gal Gadot, Seth MacFarlane and, anyway, you get the point. It’s a lot of star-gawping.

Over the weekend, studios and networks such as Marvel, DC, Netflix, HBO and more use the opportunity to make big announcements about their biggest franchises. So here’s a round-up of all the best news from Comic-Con.

Stranger Things: Netflix premiered the Stranger Things season two trailer which, among other things, was set to the Michael Jackson “Thriller” track and promises a lot spooky goings-on and 80s mania. It also gave us a glimpse of Eleven’s return from The Upside Down.

Westworld: HBO’s twisty, sci-fi Western hit of 2016 brought along its cast and a teaser trailer for what we should expect in season two — hint: as with all things Westworld, it’s a puzzler. We now also have a date, of sorts. Fans will have to wait until 2018 for the next chapter. Co-creator Jonathan Nolan also teased the show may not have an extended life.

Justice League: The Justice League movie will be out later this year and Warner Bros. debuted the second trailer, now with loads more Wonder Woman (!) at Comic-Con. The trailer revealed that the film’s villain will be Steppenwolf and also hinted at the return of a beloved superhero. Ben Affleck used his panel time to refute rumours the studio is thinking of replacing him as Batman.

DC: The comic powerhouse teased some Aquaman footage and revealed the upcoming Flash movie will incorporate Flashpoint, the comic story which split off into an alternate timeline. It confirmed the worst kept secret, which is that there will be a second Wonder Woman movie. Also confirmed/reconfirmed are Suicide Squad 2, Green Lantern Corps, Shazam, The Batgirl and The Batman.

Star Trek: Discovery: The anticipated upcoming Star Trek series, created by Bryan Fuller (Hannibal, American Gods) and Alex Kurtzman, showcased its first official trailer which told us the Federation is on the verge of a war with the Klingons. The cast — Jason Isaacs, Sonequa Martin-Green — were on hand to pump up the excitement ahead of the show’s September debut.

Thor: Ragnarok: Marvel’s next superhero epic will premiere in just over three months but anyone itching for more footage was treated to a second trailer, one that’s much clearer on the kind of battle we should expect between the God of Lightning and the Goddess of Death. Director Taika Waititi and core cast laughed and joked their way through the panel.

Marvel: The studio also announced Michelle Pfeiffer’s casting as Janet Van Dyne, Hope’s mother, in the upcoming Ant-Man and the Wasp sequel and that Captain Marvel will be set in the 1990s with a two-eyed Nick Fury.

Ready Player One: Steven Spielberg revealed the first footage from Ready Player One, a movie in which the uber-director combines his two best themes — the future and the 1980s. Set in 2045, the hero lives in a stack of trailers in the real world, but escapes to the virtual one at every opportunity. The trailer was jam-packed with pop cultural references from Nightmare on Elm Street to Back to the Future. Can you find them all?

The Defenders: Not only were fans treated to a brand new trailer, the 6500 present in Comic-Con’s biggest hall also had screened for them, the entire first episode of The Defenders, out on August 18. Critically panned Iron Fist was confirmed for a second season but the series is getting a new showrunner with Raven Metzner replacing Scott Buck and Simone Missick’s Misty Knight will join the cast.

The Walking Dead: After paying tribute to the stuntman who died two weeks ago, The Walking Dead peeps debuted a five-minute-long season eight trailer which ended with a huge time-shift of a much older Rick Grimes. What the what?!

Black Panther: Director Ryan Coogler, Chadwick Boseman, Michael B. Jordan, Daniel Kaluuya, Forest Whitaker, Lupita Nyong’o and the rest of the Black Panther gang received a thundering, standing ovation when the crowd inside Hall H got to see the first footage from the upcoming Marvel film. The bad news? It won’t be released online so you’ll have to wait for the real deal in February.

DC TV universe: DC Comic’s five interconnected TV shows — Arrow, The Flash, Supergirl, Legends of Tomorrow and now Black Lightning — all turned up at Comic-Con with plenty of news for fans. Supergirl announced new characters in Worldkiller Reign, Morgan Edge, M’yrnn J’onzz, Psi and Ruby. Legends of Tomorrow revealed Wentworth Miller and Arthur Darville will reprise their roles as Captain Cold and Rip Hunter respectively while newbie characters include Damien Darkh and Zari Adrianna Tomaz. The Flash announced its main villain next season will be The Thinker while Arrow has added Michael Emerson to its cast as a mystery character. It also debuted the first look at Black Lightning.

Legion: FX’s smart and peculiar series set in the X-Men universe, Legion was a break-out hit this year. The Noah Hawley-created series will return in 2018 with a new face, of sorts. The Shadow King, played with creepy aplomb by Audrey Plaza in one of his guises, will be fronted by Said Taghmaoui (Wonder Woman) in season two. We’re also set to learn a lot more about Oliver Bird’s background, especially now that The Shadow King has taken over his body.

The Orville: Seth MacFarlane’s live-action Star Trek/Galaxy Quest parody, The Orville, debuted a new trailer. The show stars Adrianne Palicki, Penny Johnson Jerald and Peter Macon and will premiere in September.

Rocko’s Modern Life: Nickelodeon classic Rocko’s Modern Life is coming back in a revival and “modern life” has changed somewhat since the nineties, which Rocko finds out to his chagrin in this terrifying trailer.

Duck Tales: Not content to let Nickelodeon have all the nineties nostalgia, Disney gave us a sneak peek of the upcoming Duck Tales reboot. As Scrooge McDuck declares, “I’m back!”.

Bright: Bright is Netflix’s most expensive movie yet at $90 million and Will Smith and director David Ayer (Suicide Squad) was on hand to give everyone the first look at where all that money went. Set up as a gritty modern day fairy tale, Bright is set in an Los Angeles where orcs and elves are real. Sure, why not?

The Kingsman: Golden Circle: The Matthew Vaughn-directed action spy romp sequel — the original was a fun surprise — showed fans the opening footage of the new film but that isn’t online. What can be seen by everyone who wasn’t in the room in San Diego is a new, kick-arse trailer (pun intended).

Inhumans: It started life as a movie on the Marvel slate but then eventually found its home on American TV network ABC. The series that’s set to debut in September is based on the comic books and will feature Black Bolt, Medusa and the villainous Maximus, played by none other than Ramsay Bolton actor Iwan Rheon who may run the risk of getting typecast if he keeps this up.

The Gifted: Over in the X-Men universe, another group of super-powered characters will be hitting TV screens later this year. The Gifted is set in a world where the Brotherhood of Mutants and Professor X’s X-Men aren’t around and the mutants are a hated minority living in fear.

Death Note: Based on the awesome Japanese manga, the English-language version of Death Note will drop on Netflix later this year as an original movie. The high-concept story involves a young man who finds a magical book and every time he writes someone’s name in it, that person dies. Dun dun dun. The title premiered a clip and a new trailer at Comic Con.

Doctor Who: Fresh off the announcement of the 13th Doctor, the BBC series gave the 12th Doctor a fitting send-off with a teaser trailer of the upcoming Christmas Special, Peter Capaldi’s last adventure in the Tardis.

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Originally published as A round-up of the best from San Diego Comic-Con 2017