In the US, "Jurassic World" has been the big box-office story of the summer.

But on the other side of the globe, Chinese moviegoers are turning out in droves to see a new movie called "Monster Hunt."

In fact, "Monster Hunt" broke China's record for first-day gross this past weekend, netting roughly $27.7 million in one day, according to Variety.

The film — directed by Raman Hui, a co-director on "Shrek the Third" and several other short films from DreamWorks Animation — is a blend of live action and 3D.

It's set in a fantasy world where monsters and humans fight for supremacy, but the trailer also shows off some pretty strange, quirky humor.

The movie features monsters disguised as humans ...

... and some interesting dialogue.

This man is... pregnant? With a baby monster?

There are a lot of strange-looking monsters here, too. They look pretty cartoonish for the most part.

According to one moviegoer who saw the film and reviewed it on IMDB, the name "Monster Hunt" is a bit misleading. Here's how that reviewer described the plot with spoilers:

The obviously pregnant queen in the monster kingdom finds herself on the losing side of a power struggle and escapes into the forbidden human kingdom, hotly pursued by her enemies from back home. We never see the monster kingdom again as the story takes on a culinary flavor. A monster baby of royal lineage, you see is considered by humans to be multi-star Michelin fare.

The story is essentially about a guy and a girl who kind of adopt the newborn royal monster Bupa. ... Eventually, they end up saving him from the fate of being the ultimate highlight of a lavish 'monster feast.' The little twist is that Bupa is physically born by the innocent nerdish guy, having been implanted into him by the dying pregnant monster mother. The girl eventually gets emotionally attached to the guy and the monster baby, in that order.

According to reviews, the movie is somewhat of a romantic comedy, with a lot of action sequences, excellent animation, and special effects, and tons of celebrity cameos.

All in all, "Monster Hunt" looks like a pretty crazy family-friendly movie.

If you want a better idea of what kinds of movies make waves in China these days, check out the "Monster Hunt" trailer in all its goofy glory below. 

SEE ALSO: Marvel will soon release an insane $250 movie box set — Here's what you get

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NOW WATCH: This new Leonardo DiCaprio movie from the 'Birdman' director looks incredible

After a heated bidding war, Sony Pictures Animation has been given the thumbs up emoji to produce a movie about everyone's favorite pictographs. 

Two other studios, Warner Brothers and Paramount, reportedly bid on the project, but it was Sony who sealed the deal for a near seven-figure deal, Deadline reported earlier on Tuesday. 

The emoji movie will be co-written by Eric Siegel and Anthony Leondis. Leondis is also reported to be directing the film, Deadline noted.

If emoji popularity in real life is any indication, the movie should be a smashing success. Everyone from professional athletes, to brands, to President Obama has become obsessed with the tiny graphics.

Sony's latest film, "Pixels," opens in theaters on Friday. The movie features another beloved animated character, Pac-Man. 

SEE ALSO: Roger Federer's tweets prove he's secretly an emoji pro

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NOW WATCH: Adam Sandler may finally have a hit with 'Pixels' — watch the awesome trailer

The trailer for the late summer release of "American Ultra" just dropped today.

The comedy about a stoner (Jesse Eisenberg) who gets tangled up in a government conspiracy also stars Kristen Stewart, Topher Grace, and Connie Britton. It looks to be in vain of such comedy classics as "The Big Lebowski" and "Pineapple Express."

"American Ultra" will be out in theaters on August 21.

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I really wanted to like "Trainwreck."

It's directed by one of my favorite filmmakers (Judd Apatow), it stars one of the best comedians in the business right now (Amy Schumer), and it features an incredible cast of comics like Bill Hader and Colin Quinn, actors like Tilda Swinton and Brie Larson, and even sports stars like Lebron James and John Cena.

And yet, "Trainwreck" is a major disappointment. If you're looking for some great jokes, you could honestly save yourself from buying a $15 movie ticket just by watching the film's red-band trailer, which was released back in February. It's embedded below here.

The moments from the above trailer were easily the funniest scenes in the entire movie:

• Amy and her sister, as little girls, reciting back to their father, "Monogamy isn't realistic."
• Comedian Dave Attell as the homeless guy who hangs outside Amy's place, remarking on Amy's scandalous attire: "What's the matter, did church let out early?"
• Amy to her sister Kim (played by Brie Larson), criticizing how she dresses her husband: "You dress him like that so no one wants to have sex with him?"
• Amy's date Steven (played by John Cena), getting angry at a guy who calls him "Mark Wahlberg" in a movie theatre: "Mark Wahlberg? Mark Wahlberg's like 150 pounds. I look like Mark Wahlberg ate Mark Wahlberg!"
• NBA superstar Lebron James interrupting Amy's first meeting with Aaron (played by Bill Hader): "We watching 'Downton Abbey later? Listen I'm watching it tonight because I'm not going to go to practice and all the guys are talking about it and I'm left out."
• Aaron asks Amy, who hates sports, what her favorite sports team is: "The Orlando... Blooms?"
• Aaron tells Lebron at brunch that he slept with Amy. Lebron's response: "My boy got intimate! Sexual intercourse! Ohhhhh!"

Between these lines from a trailer, and a few memorable others — Kim's husband Tom (played by Mike Birbiglia) talking about having a baby soon, "Not all sex ends with a flush and a cry!"— that's the extent of the comedy in "Trainwreck."

Unfortunately for Apatow, Schumer and co., the real trainwreck here is the script. It is literally all over the place. This movie hopes to be something for everyone: a romantic comedy for couples, a movie for single women, a non-stop cameo-a-thon for sports lovers, and finally, a touching drama about families, sisterhood, and taking control of one's life. But in trying to be something for everyone, "Trainwreck" ends up falling short in every single category.

Some of my own problems with the movie (minor spoilers ahead):

• Lebron James feels underutilized, and could have owned more screen time, particularly towards the end. He has some of the funniest lines in the movie, and he steals every scene. It's not often you get the world's best basketball player to take a lead role in your movie. I wanted to see more scenes with he and Amy, as they played off each other extremely well. (There's a memorable stare-down between the two.)

• The romance between Amy and Aaron is fun but far too predictable, even when it temporarily breaks apart. Even their separation feels forced by the script, and Amy barely returns to her "trainwreck" behavior even after it happens.
• By the way, Amy is not much of a "trainwreck" in this movie, quite honestly. She's at her best early on in the movie where her debauchery leads to some funny dialogue with some awful one-night stands, but later in the movie, she feels complacent in her relationship, which was frankly boring to watch.

• Lebron James stages an intervention for Aaron, a scene that feels completely out of place and made worse by terribly unfunny dialogue. This is Apatow and Schumer trying to return to the moment in "The 40-Year-Old Virgin" where the three main friends of the protagonist, played by Steve Carell, come to his aid and encourage him to go get his girlfriend back. In "Trainwreck," it doesn't work.
• The cameo by NBA announcer Marv Albert felt totally out of place: We don't meet him until the intervention scene, which he narrates as an announcer, and later says in his famous tenor, "Marv Albert is sorry." Why does he suddenly talk in the third-person? (It felt like a "Family Guy" moment, and not in a good way.) Who is this person in the first place (assuming you don't watch televised NBA games)? The movie doesn't help you answer these questions. After this scene, however, Marv Albert introduces an NBA game on TV; it baffles me why these scenes weren't switched so we could meet Marv before (what would have been) his funny lines.

• The movie is excessively long at 2+ hours. Apatow could have trimmed off 30 minutes and it would've been a better film. There were too many scenes with bad dialogue, or a moment meant to be "touching," but wasn't. Many scenes could have been removed altogether to help the film be more succinct and punchier: The film starts out with lots of laughs, but roughly two-thirds of the way in, the laughs start becoming few and far between.
• The end of the movie felt very "Hollywood"— everyone has a happy ending, yay! — but it also felt untrue to the rest of the script and very cliché. As much as I want to complain about the ridiculous, unoriginal ending, I shouldn't ruin the conclusion of this movie like I did to my poor editor.

"Trainwreck" was billed as being Amy Schumer's coming out party: As this film is meant to very closely mirror her own life, I'd hoped she and Apatow put together a killer script that would finally match "The 40-Year-Old Virgin," which is still Apatow's best work, in my opinion. Unfortunately the final product came up short across the board. "Trainwreck" is over-long, not very funny, and not very good at being romantic or emotionally gripping, either. It's extremely difficult to care about any of these characters, despite how much I love the actors who play them.

Judd Apatow and Amy Schumer are two of the best minds in comedy today. So it's a shame that they couldn't produce a film that was funnier than its two-minute trailer.

SEE ALSO: 'Ant-Man' might be Marvel's best superhero movie yet

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NOW WATCH: Amy Schumer gives a brutally honest interview about her sex life

The first full trailer for "Spectre" has been released, and it gives us our best look yet at the 24th installment in the Bond franchise.

The next 007 film will send James Bond (Daniel Craig) to Mexico City and then Rome on a mysterious mission involving an organization called Spectre before he goes face to face with a villain played by two-time Academy Award winner Christoph Waltz. 

Like "Skyfall" before it, "Spectre" is directed by Sam Mendes. Mendes claims that this is the last Bond film he will direct. However, he also said that about "Skyfall." 

The film also stars Monica Belluci, Léa Seydoux, Ben Whishaw, Ralph Fiennes, and Dave Bautista.

"Spectre" will be released in theaters November 6, 2015.

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The first full trailer for the next James Bond movie, "Spectre,"was released early Wednesday.

​While we got our first good look at Christoph Waltz's mysterious villain, we also got a better look at the four Bond women who will be featured in the 24th ​installment of the series this fall.

The new film will have Bond end up in Rome, where he'll infiltrate a meeting only to discover a mysterious, evil organization named Spectre.

It looks like 007 will have to use all the women at his disposal to get to the heart of the group.

Naomie Harris will return as Moneypenny to aid Bond in his quest to track down the mysterious Spectre organization.

Monica Bellucci will play Lucia Sciarra, described as a "forbidden" widow of "an infamous" criminal.

It doesn't look like Bond pays that much attention to the rules.

NOW WATCH: Get ready to root for the bad guys — your first look at 'Suicide Squad' is here

Known best as the co-anchor of Weekend Update on “Saturday Night Live,” Colin Jost is part of the new cast of comics taking over the show.

Since Seth Meyers left in 2014, “SNL” creator Lorne Michaels promoted Jost to not only the Weekend Update chair, but also the show’s head writer.

Jost has also been thrust into Michaels' inner circle, as he’s producing Jost’s first feature-length script, “Staten Island Summer.”

The comedy, which opens in select theaters on Friday and then available on Netflix July 30 (currently available on iTunes), looks at the antics of lifeguards working at a swim club in Staten Island as they try to pull off an end of summer party. The cast includes “SNL” current and former talents Bobby Moynihan, Cecily Strong, Kate McKinnon, Fred Armisen, and Will Forte.

Though Michaels is constantly executive producing movies and TV shows, he hasn’t had a producer credit on a film since 2012’s “The Guilt Trip.” His past producing credits aren’t too shabby, including projects of such "SNL" greats as Mike Meyers (“Wayne’s World”), Chris Farely (“Tommy Boy,” “Black Sheep”) and Tina Fey (“Mean Girls”).

Jost says his film being made wouldn’t have been possible without Michaels taking interest. But the comic admits the pitch process for “Staten Island Summer” was a hectic ordeal.
 The idea behind the film came about a few years ago when a conversation between Jost and Michaels led to Jost bringing up his interest in doing a comedy around lifeguards at a swim club, which was his job during summers as a teen in Staten Island.

What Jost thought was a casual conversation suddenly become a real pitch.

“I told him that’s what I really wanted to write next,” Jost told Business Insider, “and I think when he was at Paramount next he kind of told them vaguely about the idea and they were interested.”

Jost said he had to come up with a pitch for the studio in a week.

“So what was a vague idea in my mind that I thought would be a fun topic became a tense week of coming up with the characters in the movie, the plot structure, it was a crazy scramble,” Jost said.

He locked himself in a hotel room in L.A. for the week leading up to the pitch at Paramount.

Though Jost said he’s no stranger to pitching projects to studios, this one was a little different. Before talking to the Paramount suits, he had to go through Michaels and his executives first. After honing the pitch with them, it was time to do it for real in front of Michaels and Paramount’s head of production.

“It was a very intimidating situation because it’s just the three of us in a quite private dining room,” Jost said. “You’re hearing clinking of table wear on china and then small talk and then a pause followed by, ‘Well, what’s this idea you have, Colin?’”

Jost said the pressure of doing the pitch was elevated because Lorne Michaels is sitting right there, too.

“You feel if it doesn’t work you’re also failing him,” said Jost.

Luckily for Jost, Paramount bought the idea for “Staten Island Summer” right then and there. Jost spent the rest of 2013 writing the script and director Rhys Thomas shot the film last summer in Staten Island.

Looking back on the pitch process, Jost credits the break-neck speed in which "Saturday Night Live" is done every week to pulling it off. He also believes using familiar things from his childhood helped flesh things out.

“When you’re pitching movies sometimes you know what the idea is but you fully don’t know the dimensions of it,” he said. “But this felt a little more concrete because I’d lived it.”

Check out the trailer for “Staten Island Summer” below:

SEE ALSO: Here's what it's like to watch "Saturday Night Live" in person

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To bring one of DC Comics’ most complex franchises “Suicide Squad” to the screen, Warner Brothers needed a director who was as intense as the diabolical characters that make up the group.

The choice was David Ayer, a writer-director known for his unsympathetic look at the harsh realities in the world like police patrolling South Central LA in “End of Watch” and a doomed World War II tank platoon in “Fury.”

Here’s how this talent went from humble beginnings to directing one of the most anticipated movies of 2016.

SEE ALSO: We just got a ton of hints about what exactly the "Suicide Squad" movie will be about

Ayer was born in Champaign, Illinois, in January 1968, but it would be his time living with his cousin as a teenager in South Central Los Angeles that would come to shape the intense material he would be known to write in Hollywood.

His first credited screenplay was 2000’s “U-571,” a war drama set inside a submarine starring Matthew McConaughey, Bill Paxton, and Harvey Keitel. Ayer used his experience as a submariner for the Navy to bring an authentic feel to the story.

He followed that with a screenwriting credit on “The Fast and the Furious.” The film that would launch the franchise starring Vin Diesel and Paul Walker.

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Move aside superheroes.

"Jurassic World" has now surpassed "The Avengers" to become the third highest-grossing movie of all time.

We first saw this on The Wrap.

Since its release in June, Universal's "Jurassic World" has grossed an incredible $1.52 billion worldwide.

Over $612 million of that has been stateside.

2012's "The Avengers" grossed approximately $1,519,557,910 at theaters.

This year's sequel, "Avengers: Age of Ultron," has made $1.39 billion worldwide to date.

Here's a look at the top five highest-grossing movies of all time, according to Box Office Mojo:

Take a close look at that list and you'll see Universal is topping the list with another addition from this year — April's runaway hit "Furious 7." It actually could very well pass "Avengers" as well.

The studio recently crossed $5 billion worldwide at the box office for the year.

That's faster than any other studio has ever hit that mark. 

While "Jurassic World" sits pretty in that top 3 spot for now, we're sure the dinos won't stay at third place for long. 

Come December 18 when "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" is released, we may have a new king of the box office, which could even topple director James Cameron's reign at the top.

Early estimates from Citi and Morgan Stanley are tracking the film to make around $2 billion — and we're still MONTHS away.

One lesson's clear from the performance of "Jurassic World": Audiences certainly love nostalgia when it's done right.

SEE ALSO: Here are the brands that appear the most in "Jurassic World"

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NOW WATCH: Here's the moment Harrison Ford surprised fans during the 'Star Wars' Comic-Con panel

SpringHill Entertainment, the production company owned by LeBron James and his longtime business partner Maverick Carter, has entered into a parternship with Warner Bros., the Wall Street Journal reports. 

It's an intriguing move that advances LeBron's plan to build an entertainment business. It also comes a week after "Trainwreck"— the Amy Schumer movie in which LeBron co-starred and drew positive reviews — made an impressive $30 million at the box office.

But for a lot of people born sometime between 1980 and 1990, this is a big deal for one reason: Space Jam 2.

In 2012 LeBron tweeted at a fan saying he wanted to make a sequel to the 1996 classic — which stars Michael Jordan and tells the story of a team of Warner Bros. characters who have to save themselves from enslavement by beating a team of monsters that have recently stolen the powers of NBA players.

That sounded like wishful thinking at the time, but in the years since, "Space Jam 2" has seemingly come closer and closer to reality. In 2014 Deadline reported that a LeBron-starring sequel was in the works, though LeBron denied it:

There's still an IMBD page for it though, for whatever that's worth. 

Since Warner Bros. owns "Space Jam," the SpringHill partnership has reignited the rumors. ESPN's best LeBron reporter Brian Windhorst says Hollywood execs want to do the movie:

In addition, Warner Bros. has filed for new Space Jam trademarks:

The original Space Jam made $90 million at the box office. It's still the highest grossing basketball movie ever.

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NOW WATCH: REVEALED: The science behind the super-powerful T-shirt cannon

Warning: spoilers ahead

“Sharknado 3: Oh Hill No!” is filled with outlandish moments and countless cameos.

But one of our favorites was the film’s opening sequence in which Mark Cuban comes out as the President of the United States.

Let’s just say Cuban as POTUS is just as intense and in charge as he is in any episode of “Shark Tank.”

In the opening of “Sharknado 3,” the franchise’s hero Fin (Ian Ziering) is at the White House to be given a medal for saving New York City from the sharknado in the last movie. Cuban, as the president, presents Fin with the award.

But it just so happens that a sharknado is forming in D.C. during the awards presentation. Before everyone knows it, sharks are raining down on the White House.

The president and Fin are taken by the secret service to a secure bunker only to find that the sharks have already taken it over. As the secret servicemen begin to get taken out by the sharks, Fin is the only one left to protect the president. But as you can imagine, Cuban as the president needs no protection.

The president leads Fin to the armory and the two load up and begin to take out every shark in sight.

The scene concludes with the two jumping out of a window of the White House before it explodes.

“I was fired up,” Cuban told Business Insider via email about being offered the role of the president. “I had seen the previous two and knew it would be a blast.”

Thunder Levin, who has written the script for all three Sharknado films, told BI he came up with the White House sequence for “Sharknado 2” but they couldn’t fit it in as Syfy wanted it to take place in New York. The idea came back around for part 3 and Levin said they wanted the sequence to be “Die Hard” meets “White House Down.” For that, they needed a tough POTUS.

“I thought Mark Cuban was inspired casting,” said Levin. “He had a blast doing it and was really committed to it. So it was great fun to watch.”

Cuban said doing all the action was a lot of fun, but what he really loved was playing a character, as he’s often asked to play himself in movies and TV shows. He admits that he wants to do more acting.

“It’s so different than business,” the owner of the Dallas Mavericks said about acting. “In business, I know what I want to do. In acting, you just have to be there and see what happens. You have to let go. Got a movie to cast, I’m your guy!”

But did playing a gun-toting president give him any aspirations of getting into politics?

“Hell no,” said Cuban. “Unless sharks in a tornado were attacking the White House. Then I would do it for America, baby!”

SEE ALSO: Mark Cuban's most powerful piece of career advice

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NOW WATCH: This is what 'Shark Tank' investor Mark Cuban looks for in the perfect pitch

The “Sharknado” movies have not just become a guilty pleasure because of the insane things that happen in them, but also the countless celebrity cameos.
 
“Sharknado 3: Oh Hell No!” is no exception with the likes of Mark Cuban, Ann Coulter, Chris Jericho, Jerry Springer, and Chris Kirkpatrick (to just name a few) popping up. But according to the screenwriter of the franchise, Thunder Levin, getting celebrities to agree to make cameos can be a challenge.
 
“Most of the time we don’t know who is going to be in it until well into the process,” Levin told Business Insider.
 
In fact, before production begins Levin writes a bunch of characters with one scene roles in the hopes to give them to the famous people signed on to most likely be killed by a flying shark. However, it’s not often those roles get used.
 
“I usually get notices that so-and-so needs a part created,” said Levin. “I’ll say, ‘We have a bunch of parts written already,’ and I’m told, ‘We have to create something special.’”
 
In some cases he’ll get word that they need a role written for a cameo a few days ahead of the celebrity’s shoot date. That was the case with famous illusionists Penn & Teller in “Sharknado 3,” who play retired astronauts. That gave Levin enough time to write up a joke they tell about Buzz Aldrin. 

Then Levin said there’s the instance where he doesn’t find out about the cameo until the morning of shooting.
 
Levin recalls a day shooting “Sharknado 3” when they had two actors scheduled to play the same part. Tim Russ and Lorenzo Lamas had been cast for the role of a general.
 
“We split that role into two parts,” said Levin.
 
But the only way for it to work was for Levin to quickly write some added dialogue. With the day's shoot at a secluded location, Levin had no computer or writing area to do his magic, so he had to get creative.
 
“The sun was going down and we had a lot more shots to get, we needed to get it done,” Levin recalls. “My dog was on set that day because we had used him in an earlier scene, so I borrowed some paper and a pen, brought over my dog and literally started writing the dialogue on my dog’s back using him as a desk.”
 
“That’s the kind of things we have to do on ‘Sharknado,’” Levin said. 

SEE ALSO: "Sharknado" writer says the film's success was "surreal" and "overwhelming"

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Warning: spoilers ahead

“Sharknado 3: Oh Hell No!” screenwriter Thunder Levin has been taking about having a sequence where sharks are in space since the end of the first film.

In the third edition of this unlikely franchise, he finally got his wish.

For the conclusion of “Sharknado 3,” the franchise hero Fin (Ian Ziering), his pregnant wife April (Tara Reid), and his father (David Hasselhoff) rocket off to space to stop the latest sharknado. But of course, sharks are up there too.

While Fin fights off sharks, one swallows April. Fin is also swallowed by a shark.

We follow Fin while he’s inside the shark as it reenters the Earth’s atmosphere.

Fin punches a hole in the shark and deploys his parachute out of the hole so he can safely land back on Earth.

While he searches for the shark April is in...

He see her chainsaw hand (long story if you've never seen the previous films) opening the shark she’s in. Then a newborn baby come out of the shark.

Yes, April gave birth in a shark on reentry (only in "Sharknado").

But according to Levin, the original ending was a little different.

“Fin and April are trapped in space and April gives birth,” Levin said. “The baby shoots out and a shark comes along and swallows it. April dives in after it, and Fin is swallowed by another shark. They then plummet to Earth.”

The birth idea was devised by Levin and “Sharknado” franchise director Anthony C. Ferrante backstage at Comic-Con last year.

Both scenarios were shot, but in post production the April-giving-birth-inside-shark version was chosen.

“That sequence of the baby being born in space you’ll see in the DVD version,” said Levin.

SEE ALSO: Mark Cuban is actually amazing in 'Sharknado 3' as the US president

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NOW WATCH: HBO's 'The Leftovers' looks like it's going to be an entirely different show next season

The trailer for "The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part 2" which debuted at San Diego Comic-Con is finally here!

"Part 2" is the second part of the final "Hunger Games" movie, following the release of "Part 1" in 2014. After a slow build over the course of three movies, Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence) will finally lead the people in an intense and violent revolution against President Snow (Donald Sutherland) and the rest of the Capitol.

"The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part 2" will be out in theaters on November 20, 2015.

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NOW WATCH: WHERE ARE THEY NOW? The original 1993 'Jurassic Park' cast today

Outside of a few behind-the-scenes photos tweeted out by director Bryan Singer and a teaser shown off at San Diego Comic-Con,  very little of "X-Men: Apocalypse" has been shown to the general public. However, details are finally starting to trickle out.

Thursday, 20th Century Fox finally released a small bundle of high-resolution images of the film's cast, focusing mostly on the new heroes we'll be meeting when the movie comes out next summer. 

Given that they're teens in the '80s, it's not a big surprise that a bunch of these photos are at the mall. 

"X-Men: Apocalypse" is scheduled to release on May 27, 2016.

Let's take a look at the cast!

SEE ALSO: 'Ant-Man' review

Tye Sheridan will step in as a younger Scott Summers aka Cyclops.

Picking up  James Marsden's ruby quartz sunglasses is Tye Sheridan, a young actor who previously worked on critically acclaimed films like "The Tree of Life" and "Mud".

If you need a refresher, Scott Summers has the mutant power to project uncontrollable concussive red energy from his eyes whenever they're open. Those red shades are the only thing keeping them in check. 

"Game of Thrones" star Sophie Turner will play Jean Grey.

The actress famous for playing Sansa Stark makes the leap to comic-book blockbusters as telepath Jean Grey, one of the original comic book team members previously portrayed by Famke Janssen in the first "X-Men" trilogy.

Alexandra Shipp plays Ororo Munroe, aka Storm.

Previously portrayed by Halle Berry, Ororo Munroe/Storm is a mutant with the power to control the weather. While the previous movies didn't do much with her character, the Storm of the comics is one of the series' most important characters, serving as the team's leader for a number of years. However, in "Apocalypse", it looks like she starts out on the titular bad guy's team.

The greatest thing about this photo? Storm is rocking her famous mohawk from the comics. Mohawked Storm is the best Storm. 

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If you watch the trailer for the new Adam Sandler comedy “Pixels,” you'll find the usual antics from the funny man and eye popping 8-bit graphics developed from the backing of a major movie studio.

But what’s more remarkable is the short film that inspired it.

French filmmaker/artist Patrick Jean created the two-and-a-half minute short, also titled “Pixels,” five years ago for $5,000. In it, the classic arcade games of the 1980s travel to New York City and begin to devour it into 8-bit blocks.

The short became an instant sensation on the web, getting over a million views in its first 24 hours online, according to Jean’s website. And, as Jean told Business Insider, within two weeks he began hearing from movie studios about making it into a feature-length film that he’d direct.
 “I came up with the idea of what the feature film became,” said Jean in a phone conversation from L.A. “I pitched it to about five companies that really wanted it and we ended up going with Adam Sandler and Sony.”

For the next four years, Jean went from directing a modest-budgeted movie about ex-gamers trying to save the world from its destruction by classic video game characters, to stepping aside as major players in Hollywood took it over.

He said he’s grateful for what has happened, but he has some critiques about the finished product.

According to Jean, he sold the film rights for $1 million. He was to direct the film with Sandler producing it and perhaps star. Jean teamed with a screenwriter hired by Sandler’s Happy Madison production company to write the script, which he said went through many drafts over a few years.

But when the script got to a point when the project got a green light, the budget increased, which led to Jean’s exit as director.

“They asked me to come up with a list of directors [to make the movie] and we got Chris Columbus,” said Jean.

Columbus is known for the fantastical films he wrote in the 1980s ("Gremlins" and "The Goonies") and the classics he went on to direct ("Home Alone,""Mrs Doubtfire," and the first two "Harry Potter" movies).

Jean became an executive producer on the film and made an arrangement with Sony that he would shadow Columbus on set.

“It wasn’t easy because it was my baby at one point,” said Jean of having to relinquish the director reigns. “But I still wanted to be attached to the project, so I learned to watch and not interfere with what Chris wanted.”

When asked what he thinks about the film, Jean doesn’t give the usual Hollywood spin.

“I think the movie is not perfect, but I like it,” he said. “I feel the second half of the movie could have been better. But I know they had budget issues, they had to cut some stuff.”

One bit in particular is a scene at the end where the heroes (played by Sandler, Kevin James, Josh Gad, and Peter Dinklage) meet their younger selves (who we meet in the beginning of the movie) while battling the mothership that’s releasing the video game characters onto Earth.

“They did shoot it,” said Jean. “But sadly it didn’t make it in the film.”

Overall, Jean said he loves the humor of the film, and the visual effects. “It’s a light action comedy movie and that’s what we wanted to do in the first place,” he said.

But he’s now ready to direct one of his projects.

He says he’s shooting a live-action film for a French company next summer and is in talks with Sony to direct an animated feature.

“Pixels” opens in theaters on Friday.

Watch Jean’s “Pixels” short below:

SEE ALSO: Here's when you'll be able to see Adam Sandler's first original Netflix movie

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NOW WATCH: Peter Dinklage is a Donkey Kong champ in new 'Pixels' trailer

Numerous reports have come out confirming that Universal will be releasing the sequel to "Jurassic World," on Friday, June 22, 2018. 

Star Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard will return.

"World" director Colin Trevorrow will pen the script with his writing partner Derek Connolly. However, Trevorrow will not direct. Currently, Universal has not announced a director for the sequel. 

Since "Jurassic World" opened June 12, the film has grossed over $1.5 billion worldwide. 

This week, it became the third highest-grossing movie of all time behind "Avatar" ($2.79 billion) and "Titanic" ($2.18 billion).

SEE ALSO: 14 "Jurassic Park" references made in "Jurassic World"

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NOW WATCH: WHERE ARE THEY NOW? The original 1993 'Jurassic Park' cast today

"Pixels" looks like one of the worst movies to come out in awhile. With a rancid 13% rating on RottenTomatoes, critics are calling it "moronic," a "disaster," and a "movie I wanted to run over with my car, repeatedly."

So it's a bit baffling when you consider Nintendo, one of the most beloved gaming companies that's notoriously protective of its games and characters, allowed its most cherished creations be vandalized by Adam Sandler and company.

Chris Columbus, the director of "Pixels," reportedly spent months negotiating with Nintendo to let its classic characters, particularly Donkey Kong, be used in this film. Columbus explained the challenges to Wired:

I was excited because the script had a Centipede sequence and a Pac-Man sequence, but what the first draft of the script did not have was Donkey Kong. After months and months of meeting with the board of Nintendo they agreed that we were going to treat Donkey Kong with respect and the proper gameplay, which was very important, and bringing Donkey Kong into the film was a slam-dunk for us.

Nintendo obviously cares a great deal about how its characters are used outside of its games, particularly since the early 1990s when the "Super Mario Bros." movie was universally panned by critics and even later condemned by the film's stars and Shigeru Miyamoto, the creator of Mario.

Since that 1993 film, Nintendo swore off involvement with Hollywood for a period of time. The most recent exception was the 2012 animated comedy "Wreck-It Ralph," which featured Bowser, the main villain from the "Super Mario" series (not the recently hired Nintendo exec).

But for some reason, Nintendo got involved with "Pixels," which is incredibly unfortunate as critics seem to loathe this movie. The main critique, at least according to one extremely popular online review floating around YouTube (warning: graphic language), is that it tries to pay homage to classic arcade games but actually demonstrates zero love or understanding of the games themselves, and only pretends to appreciate them. Here's one particularly scathing passage from the popular video review by "MovieBob":

It's so oppressively endlessly bald-faced cynical about the disingenuous appropriation of its own supposed reason for existing. There's not a single interesting joke or visual gag making use of the presence of all the classic gaming iconography Sandler and his goon squad have been allowed to f--k around with. The supposed humorous use of every single pixelated creature in the movie never once rises beyond the level of "ha ha ha, I recognize that," which for some reason qualifies as a joke now. This isn't just keeping great art in a bad frame, this is using original Monets to wallpaper the port-a-potty at an IBS symposium.

This above all else is what's so irrationally infuriating about this maggot-oozing head wound of a movie. It plays at being this sentimental ode to the glory days of classic video games but clearly doesn't have a drop of sincere interest in what's made these characters and imagery so enduring, or even what made the game so compelling for all these years. ... There's a germ of an interesting idea — i.e. so much of our popular culture grounded in the mythologizing of warfare, competition, and the arbitrary winner/loser binary; why wouldn't someone mistake it for a declaration of war? — but that might have been interesting and insightful, and "Pixels" is clearly aiming for an advanced scrotal cancer kind of vibe.

"Pixels" features several Nintendo characters, including Mario, Donkey Kong, and the dog from "Duck Hunt," which most recently appeared in the last "Super Smash Bros." game. Hopefully Nintendo was compensated well for its involvement. You can check out the full trailer for "Pixels" below.

SEE ALSO: Female gamers have it bad: Study suggests women are targets for 'low-status, low-performing' male gamers

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NOW WATCH: This is what a ridiculously souped-up $500 Nintendo looks like

When he's not writing "The Winds of Winter", George R.R. Martin likes to update the world on his various musings and what he's been up to via his LiveJournal page. This week, it's all about "Ant-Man", a movie he really liked — although, like me, he was a bit worried at first. 

While this in and of itself might not be news per se, it's worth noting that Martin has some very cogent thoughts on what makes Ant-Man such a special character in the Marvel Universe, and why it's such a shame that The Wasp doesn't have a prominent role in the film:

"I loved his [Ant-Man's] partnership with the Wasp. At a time when every other comic was playing the endless "romantic tension" card, or the older and hoarier "I must hide my secret from my girlfriend" trope, here was a man and a woman who adventured together, who loved each other without question, who even helped found the Avengers together... that was revolutionary in the early 1960s, like much of what Stan Lee did... (and sad to say, it would even be sort of revolutionary today)."

He also brings up an oft-repeated criticism of Marvel movies: They have a villain problem. Martin's take, however, is a bit different than most — he's just tired of all the villains that have the same powers as the heroes.

I am tired of this Marvel movie trope where the bad guy has the same powers as the hero. The Hulk fought the Abomination, who is just a bad Hulk. Spider-Man fights Venom, who is just a bad Spider-Man. Iron Man fights Ironmonger, a bad Iron Man. Yawn. I want more films where the hero and the villain have wildly different powers. That makes the action much more interesting

This is a really good point! Change things up some more, Marvel. 

While no one knows when "The Winds of Winter" will come out, the next George R. R. Martin appearance will be at a baseball game in Staten Island, New York — where two local baseball teams will change their names for one day only to become the Staten Island Direwolves and the Hudson Valley Lannisters.

Martin also mentions a meeting with his publisher so who knows, maybe we will get some news about that book soon after.

Don't count on it, though. 

SEE ALSO: It's kind of a miracle that 'Ant-Man' makes sense

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NOW WATCH: One of the world's most popular games is getting a huge addition

Some things tend to get lost in translation when making their way from one country to another. Luckily for Pixar, they had the technology to fix a very small, but important, cultural gap. 

According to David Lally, a tech artist at Pixar, all the broccoli from "Inside Out" was swapped out with green peppers for the Japanese version.

This small change has been making the rounds on Reddit, but it was first posted to Lally's Twitter account:

In the American version, Riley's dad attempts to feed her broccoli. This causes Disgust (Mindy Kaling), and later Anger (Lewis Black), to go off once Riley finds out there will be no dessert until she finishes her vegetables.

In the Japanese version, they tweaked this slightly to green peppers. According to Laska, it is green peppers, not broccoli, that are more universally disliked by Japanese children.

It might seem like a minor detail, but it makes a big difference, given that this film is all about what drives our emotions.

This isn't the first time Disney has altered one of its films for international release. Disney made a few tweaks to the China release of "Iron Man 3". Meanwhile, in the U.K. version of "Captain America: Winter Soldier," Steve Rogers had a much different to-do list.

"Inside Out" has grossed a total of $493.7 million worldwide. The film was released in Japan on July 18.

SEE ALSO: Pixar’s imaginative ‘Inside Out’ was so powerful that it changed the way I understand my own emotions

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NOW WATCH: Pixar's next movie shows what would have happened if dinosaurs never went extinct and it looks gorgeous