WIRE Buzz: Bryce Dallas Howard teases Jurassic World 3; Batman visits troops; more

While at the U.K. premiere of the Elton John biopic Rocketman, Bryce Dallas Howard dropped a major tease about the third and final Jurassic World movie that arrives in the summer of 2021. When asked if we might see the return of Alan Grant (Sam Neill), Ellie Sattler (Laura Dern), and Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum) she said:

"I don't know what's been confirmed or whatever, but I'll blink if it's happening and maybe..."

Howard followed that statement up with a few rapid blinks of her eyes, so let's hope that's basically her screaming a confirmation before anything's officially announced.

If true, it would mark the first time Alan and Ellie returned to the franchise since Jurassic Park III in 2001. It would certainly fit a pattern set by the original trilogy with Ian Malcolm appearing in the second installment and Grant and Sattler appearing in the third/final one.

Goldblum briefly reprised his role in last summer's Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom.

Written by Colin Trevorrow and Emily Carmichael, Jurassic World 3 stomps into theaters June 11, 2021. Trevorrow is returning to direct.

To celebrate the 80th birthday of Batman, DC Comics brought the Caped Crusader to almost 12,000 military stations as part of a USO tour in Kuwait.

With exclusive screenings, cosplay contests, an illustration masterclass from Jim Lee, the physical "Tumbler" Batmobile, and a panel with Batman writer Tom King (a former CIA counterterrorism officer), the publisher was able to bring a little slice of home to the American troops serving overseas.

There were also guest appearances and autograph signings from Candice Patton (Iris West Allen in The Flash), Danielle Panabaker (Caitlin Snow/Killer Frost in The Flash) and Nafessa Williams (Anissa Pierce/Thunder in Black Lightning) 

Now entrenched in production, Denis Villeneuve's remake of Frank Herbert's seminal science fiction novel, Dune, has a one knockout of a cast: Timothee Chalamet, Stellan Skarsgård, Jason Momoa, Rebecca Ferguson, Zendaya, Oscar Isaac, Josh Brolin, Dave Bautista, Javier Bardem, and David Dastmalchian.

During a recent interview with Cinema Blend, Dastmalchian (The Dark Knight, Ant-Man and the Wasp) voiced his excitement over being part of the movie, which marks his third collaboration with the director after Prisoners and Blade Runner 2049. He also teased his character, Piter De Vries.

"The Piter De Vries that I’m playing I hope will resonate with and reflect the Piter de Vries that people who loved the books associate with," he said. "I can’t really discuss much about the script or the plot itself, but I can just tell you that that old phrase ‘true to the spirit’ or ‘honoring the spirit of’, and to be quite honest I haven’t even seen the most recent of the script, but in the way Denis has talked about the film and what I’ve seen, it’s absolutely true to and in honor of everything that Frank put into the novel. And translating something from novel form to cinema form requires a lot of mastery as storytellers go, and I think there’s no one better for that job than Denis. He’s just so fearless, man. He makes choices and then he goes into the places that we need right now as audiences."

Credit: Greg Doherty/Patrick McMullan via Getty Images

Herbert's book had been adapted once before in 1984 by David Lynch. Despite a cult following since its failure during release, many consider Lynch's film was a less-realized version of the ambitious film originally envisioned by Alejandro Jodorowsky. While preparing for his role as Piter De Vries, Dastmalchian said that he didn't revisit the '84 movie for inspiration.

"I’d read the book and I’d seen the film. I’m a very big David Lynch fan, so there was so much about the film that I had loved, but to be quite honest, I had not seen the film since probably college," he added. "It had been a long time since I’d seen the film. Once I got cast in [Dune], I decided not to revisit the film. But I did go back and revisited the book because like I said, I love it. I’ve only read the book once, but I’ve gone back to it many times just to dip in and out and pull quotes. It’s just a fun and very dense piece of philosophical writing… It’s so exciting the thought that this level of maturity and complexity in Herbert’s writing is going to be put on a giant screen by Denis Villeneuve. And the cast that he’s put together, it’s so awesome."

Dune blows into theaters Nov. 20, 2020.