Archive for the ‘Movies/TV’ Category

Neil Gaiman’s children novel The Graveyard Book has been optioned by Disney, following the previous success of their adaptation of his darker-your-typical-children’s-story Coraline. The story revolves around a boy who lives in a cemetery and is looked after by the spirits within. Now if only HBO would step up and get American Gods out already!

Speaking of boys raised by non-humans, Harry Potter screenwriter Steve Kloves intends to adapt Rudyard Kipling’s classic, The Jungle Book, for Warner Bros. Kloves will write and direct the film about Mowgli, the man-cub with wolves for parents and a panther and bear for best friends. Not sure yet if it’s going to be live action or animated.

Meet Hyman Strachman. He’s a 92-year-old World War II veteran. Following his wife’s passing he became a rather prolific DVD bootlegger. He copies movies, sends them to troops overseas (at his own expense) and they’re distributed to Read the rest of this entry »

Dethklok, the heavy metal band of Adult Swim’s Metalocalypse, returns in the wee hours of this Sunday morning.

In their first episode back, looks like Nathan Explosion, Murderface, Skwisgaar, Toki and Pickles are going to a Comic-Con-esque fan convention dedicated just to them – complete with cosplayers, furries, overly exaggerated, homoerotic fan art and overweight fans getting around the con in their Rascals. You can almost catch the fanboy BO.

Read the rest of this entry »

It’s like Christmas on YouTube today with new videos from Freddie Wong, the League of Steam, My Damn Channel’s You Suck at Photoshop and How It Should Have Ended (with a bonus scene to their “How The Hunger Games Should Have Ended” video released last week).

Freddie Wong, who brought us Time Crisis with the sadly now-departed Andy Whitfield and other great video game-inspired shorts now brings us Skyrim (just a warning to the squeamish: it’s violent. In a funny way).

Read the rest of this entry »

Peter Jackson debuted 10 minutes of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey to surprisingly negative reviews. Jackson had shot The Hobbit at a faster frame rate (48 frames per second, as opposed to the usual 24). While aerial shots looked majestic, according to critics the clarity only worked to make the scenery, make-up and other effects appear far less grand.

The first images of Quentin Tarantino’s upcoming western Django Unchained have been released. The film, set to release Christmas, stars Jamie Foxx, Christoph Waltz, Samuel L. Jackson, Sacha Baron Cohen and Leonardo DiCaprio in more an Antebellum than Old West tale of a former slave and the plantation owner holding his wife. Thankfully, the story sounds like the cheesy/awful (though it had its moments of awesome) Takashi Miike-made western Tarantino cameoed in, Sukiyaki Western Django.

Read the rest of this entry »

With The Hunger Games going strong in theaters and with Pixar’s Brave having a new trailer out and ready to pounce June 22, it’s refreshing to see strong bow and arrow-wielding female characters, hunting bears and other prey, getting thrown into American pop culture. Katniss and Merida are so different from all the other heroines we’ve been seeing in past.

Merida is Pixar’s first princess, and the only one of Disney’s who would rather ride and hunt than get married. And Katniss, well, page 1 of The Hunger Read the rest of this entry »

Petyr Baelish from Game of Thrones is something of a guilty pleasure character for me. I just can’t help but like the rascal (but dammit, Catelyn, if you buy into his bluff this last episode I’mma be mad).

Anyway, I finally bought into the hype and started reading The Hunger Games, and for some reason, Katniss’ stylist, Cinna, just keeps evoking the image of Petyr Baelish (played by Aiden Gillen) in my head.

I know he’s played by Lenny Kravitz in the film, but I just keep picturing Baelish as the one who’s dressing Katniss and doing her hair, being her confidant and so on (it doesn’t help that Baelish’s made-up sigil is the mockingbird and Cinna is the one who pins the mockingjay to Katniss).

I mean, hey, it’s my imagination. If I want to lazily visualize a different, already-existing person in place of another, that’s my business.

About halfway through the book, I decided to surf through IMDb archives to look up pictures of Gillen and had a head-on collision with this trainload of cuteness.

Read the rest of this entry »

Long before Don Hertzfeldt gifted the world with his animated short Rejected, featuring a series of bizarre, fictitiously declined cartoon ads (which has kept fanboys screaming, “My anus is bleeding!” for over a decade now), we had Jim Henson.

From 1957 to 1961, predating both Sesame Street and The Muppet Show (even cult short Time Piece), Henson did a series of 10-second ads for Wilkins Coffee.

These quick TV spots had two puppets, Wilkins and Wontkins, briefly discussing the coffee – Wilkins (whose voice sounds an awful lot like Kermit’s) Read the rest of this entry »

San-Diego-public-access-TV-show-turned-YouTube-phenomenon Mega64 uploaded a new video satirizing the much criticized game controls of Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword. Check out their video after the jump.

Shawn Chatfield once again dons the green tunic to play Link for a skit, while Rocco Botte controls Chatfield’s every movement (have they had a player in the video before? Does holding a SingStar mic count?), Wii nunchuck in hand. Gotta love the Zelda II game over screen.

Yet again a video of theirs could pass for a study in sociology as adults make faces and snide comments about the Read the rest of this entry »

Looks like DC Comics’ leather-studded, hog-ridin’ outer space bounty hunter might be getting a movie after all. Brad Peyton, director of such films as Cats & Dogs: Revenge of Kitty Galore and Journey 2: The Mysterious Island wants to try his hand at re-writing the script (which was dropped by director Guy Ritchie) and directing it himself. Interesting choice of project to helm with two kids’ movies under his belt and a few shorts, but then again if Robert Rodriguez can make Spy Kids movies while doing features like Sin City, Grindhouse and the El Mariachi films, eh, why not Peyton?

Writer Bryan Fuller (responsible for the greatness of Heroes’ first season) wants to get together with director Bryan Singer (X-Men, The Usual Suspects) and put together a new Star Trek series. In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, Fuller said he had contacted Singer about doing a Trek show, but they realize it would be difficult to launch the project while J.J. Abrams is putting out movies within the franchise. “I don’t think anything is Read the rest of this entry »

Halo 4‘s release date has been announced. Microsoft brings back Master Chief on the Xbox 360 on Nov. 6, 2012.

House M.D.‘s series finale may have a title that gives away the ending. The show, which debuted with the episode entitled “Everybody Lies,” is reportedly coming to a close with an episode called “Everybody Dies.” Considering how long time fans have followed the philosophy that once House is happy the show is over, coupled with the fact that when House and Cuddy finally hooked up, the show’s ratings were lower than ever, it’s not entirely implausible that House might perish this season putting it at an all-time high.

Read the rest of this entry »

So last night we got a pretty nice spread – everyone’s gearing up to invade various parts of Westeros in Game of Thrones, Pete Campbell and Lane Pryce came to blows on Mad Men, and it was the season finale of Eastbound & Down.

On top of that Bill Plympton, known for his unique animated shorts that’s appeared in film festivals around the world including the Spike & Mike Sick and Twisted Festival of Animation, did a Simpsons couch gag.

CAUTION: Spoilers for Eastbound & Down, Game of Thrones and Mad Men under the jump!

Read the rest of this entry »

New Nickelodeon series Legend of Korra, a sequel to the ever-popular Avatar: The Last Airbender, debuted yesterday introducing old and new audiences to the next in line in the Avatar Cycle for the four nations – Korra.

While Aang was mostly calm, collected, wise beyond his years (granted he was technically over 100 years old), playful and shied away from the notion of absolute power, Korra’s first words on the show are, “I’m the avatar! You gotta deal with it!”

Read the rest of this entry »

Forget Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark. There are a few thespians with more geek cred stealing the spotlight.

The award-winning Re-Animator: The Musical returns to the stage with Cheers actor George Wendt as Dean Halsey. Re-Animator, adapted from an H.P. Lovecraft story, features scientist Herbert West (Graham Skipper) testing his ability to resurrect the dead with his life-giving reagent, with gruesome results. The show also stars Jesse Merlin as Dr. Hill, a rival to Herbert (Merlin can be seen as werewolf Hitler alongside Rocky Horror legend Barry Bostwick in the upcoming FDR: American Badass!). Read the rest of this entry »

After years of waiting and stalls that may or may not have been due to the now scrapped Red Sonja project, director Robert Rodriguez has finally announced that Sin City 2 (dubbed Sin City: A Dame To Kill For) will begin filming this summer.

Comic creator Frank Miller will once again co-direct.

“I have wanted to re-team with Frank Miller and return to the world he created since the day we wrapped the original … A Dame To Kill For will certainly be worth the wait,” Rodriguez said in a press release (full release posted below).

Though the press release states the details of the film are hush-hush, going off the name of the project, it would cover the origin story for Dwight (played in the first movie by actor Clive Owen) and his dealings with Ava Lord, who seems to spend the majority of Sin City volume 2 buck naked.

With any luck we’ll see a match-up with Marv (who was so perfectly portrayed by Mickey Rourke). Read the rest of this entry »

The League of Steam, known briefly during at their inception as the Steampunk Ghostbusters, are a group of paranormal investigators who capture, study, and fend off supernatural forces with often comedic results.

In the past they’ve faced vampires, werewolves, ghost monkeys, Twilight fans, the dreaded kraken, and MythBusters‘ Grant Imahara. In real life, the LoS are incredible artists and downright awesome folks. I got shot with their netgun once. Most fun I’ve EVER had falling on my face. Read the rest of this entry »