• True Blood fans (ie, me and middle aged women) got more than they expected when the cast and crew spilled the beans on what next season will be about. Namely, Sookie is going to be more and more attracted to Eric (I’m not sure why, besides being a badass and all) and that the Mississippi vamps and werewolves are going to stir some shit up.
• Chuck details! Apparently he won’t know karate all the time, which is a relief, and Awesome gets more action, which is, err, awesome.

What is also of note is just how much attention the Twilight sequel is getting. That movie is going to make a fucking fortune and my head will fall off due to prolonged periods of long, drawn out head shakes of disapproval.

Emmerich will not do Hari Seldon justice.

The Foundation books were some of my very first forays into the wide yonder of operatic space melodrama. And hell, I loved the shit out of it (ummm…I’m gonna say that line made sense). It gave me everything I wanted in sci-fi: a sprawling space empire, wars, aliens, and best of all, legitimately smart and engaging characters. And here it is, finally about to be realized on the big screen by none other than…

Roland fucking Emmerich?

Roland “going where even Michael Bay fears” Emmerich?

Roland “welcome to ‘errf’” Emmerich?

Okay, I’ll admit I dug Independence Day, but 10,000 BC and The Day After Tomorrow were fucking awful and maddeningly mediocre, respectively. 2012 looks like one stinking pile of donkey balls, covered in its own feces. The Patriot was his last good movie, and that was more brainless violence and excess entertaining than it was introspective and meaningful. And now one of my most beloved series is going into his hands? Well fuck me sideways, I think I’ve died and went to heaven, only to have my nuts kicked in. Repeatedly. For eternity.

See, I want a Foundation film to be made. Hell, I want the entire series to make the cut. But unless Emmerich becomes an entirely different kind of director for this movie, and you know he won’t, this will be an unmitigated disaster. The books need someone who can cut away sentimentality and overbearing heroism, both of which defines Emmerich’s career.

On the bright side, this will probably bring a how new generation into reading the books, which is something.

At least the writer Emmerich hired, Robert Rodat Saving (Private Ryan and The Patriot, bot I enjoy immensely), looks to have a head on his shoulders and shows some understanding of the series.

Wsn't there already a live act...oh, yeah.

Are you seriously telling me this is happening? I mean, “serious” serious? Not a “hah, I got you you stupid douchebag! This can’t be serous!” serious?

Well, it’s happening. All official like, too.

It seems Sam Raimi and Legendary Pictures are going ahead with plans for a Warcraft movie. It’s being mega produced by mega-producer Charles Roven who helped The Dark Knight make more money than many small nations last year. The Comingsoon article (linked previously on this paragraph because I felt like it) goes on to give a congratulatory handjob detailing how successful Blizzard (fuck Activision. They had no hand in this) has become because of WoW’s logic defying, life changing, near religious status amongst millions of nerds and non-nerds alike. And girls.

“At its core, ‘Warcraft’ is a fantastic, action-packed story,” said Raimi. “I am thrilled to work with such a dynamite production team to bring this project to the big screen.”

I won’t deny that, but does anybody really want to watch 2 to 3 hours of high fallutin’, serious as nails in the scrotum, fantasy? Because the Warcraft storyline isn’t exactly the type of cheap escapist fare most look for in a summer flick. On top of that, most pf the millions playing WoW probably don’t give two shits about the underlying storyline. They play for the social aspects and the never ending array of loot.

Unless the end result is some earth rending sword or another, I don’t think a single WoW players cares if an NPC dies or not.

But who cares about my opinion, right? The movie, as of now, is being made. It’ll probably cost the GDP of Niger to make and a mildly acned geek somewhere probably just creamed his pants.

I’m just not that confident the demand is there to justify this grossly expensive endeavour. At least we’ll get a solid movie because of Raimi.

The Hardened Edition is $80 already so I get depressed thinking what “diehard” (aka mentally challenged) fans will be paying for this. And I doubt these goggles are anything but rubbish seeing the ones used by actual killers run in the thousands.

Jaden "Welcome to Earff" Smith

…and I kind of want to hurl.

It’s not that I’m against remakes, it’s just that everything about this remake makes me nauseous. From a bottoming out of Jackie Chan’s Hollywood career to having the title character be a ten year old kidthat looks like a gentle zephyr could tear his ligaments apart.

I mean, sure the original Karate Kid had a LOT of things that don’t really stand the test of time (like that entire tournement and, y’know, the karate kid), but at least it was about a teenager that could conceivably fight anouther teenager.

Can anybody, with a straight face, possibly see Jaden Smith go up against the Cobra Kai or, well, anyone? I swear to god if he takes down a secret ninja (or secret kung fu fighter) training compound despite being 4 feet tall and 60 pounds I will buy 3 Ninjas and fornicate the DVD.

That is not a lie. I will violate a used copy of 3 Ninjas if that happens, and give 3 Ninjas Knuckle Up a nice handjob while I’m at it.

I don’t know when I’ve wanted another movie to fail this badly. Okay, I kind of want Halloween 2 (the remake) to fail worse, but not by that much.

You can nurse me anytime.

Earlier today Marvel extravagantly announced Natalie Preteen Assassin Portman will be playing Thor’s human love interest Jane Foster, which is weird because I had thought this was going to be a more Norse-centric story.

I guess I was wrong.

I’m a fan of Portman’s earlier work. Well, I was a fan of her in Leon The Professional. Well, I liked Jean Reno. And she was standing next to him a lot, so I guess I liked her second hand. Don’t much like her work elsewhere (Star Wars prequels and whatever the hell else she’s been in), but she sure is pretty and nurse-like, I guess.

Portman’s starring opposite Chris Hemsworth, who many won’t know as Kirk’s suiciding father in Star Trek. I guess that first five minutes was strong enough to land him a role in a $100+ (BIG ‘+’) million potential blockbuster. I’m still not quite sure if the movie has the same legs as Marvel’s Iron Man or X-Men, what with it being about Asgardian gods dressed in fancy outfits saying “thee” and “thou” and “wiggeshnicker” (okay, maybe not that one).

Writes Marvel of the story – “At the center of the story is The Mighty Thor, a powerful but arrogant warrior whose reckless actions reignite an ancient war. Thor is cast down to Earth and forced to live among humans as punishment. Once here, Thor learns what it takes to be a true hero when the most dangerous villain of his world sends the darkest forces of Asgard to invade Earth.”

Sounds very…iffy. Still, I love the character in the comics and at the very least diehard fans will come out in droves to see this.

Also iffy is Kenneth Branagh directing the movie. I hate the guy, mainly because I was forced to watch every fucking movie he’s made during high school English classes. I can’t equate him with anything other than Shakespeare and I despise him uncompromisingly and unjustifiably.

The movie comes out May 20th, 2011 which is only a few scant months before Marvel’s other summer tentpole, Captain America.

Eh, close enough.

Well, it seems the dust finally settled and my third favourite comic hero (behind Batman and Booster Gold) is…Ryan Reynolds! What? Variety reports it’s a done deal and that I should fucking get over it.

In not so many personally targeted words.

I thought for sure the studio had settled on Cooper, especially after weeks of news tidbits all but having him name his first born Hal. I guess this is less shocking, and more of a “wuh?” moment. But what’s done is done, and Van Wilder is our next (well, first) big screen Green Lantern.

It’s not all bad. It could’ve been Justin Trimberlake, the other front runner, after all. At least in Reynolds you have someone who likes being in comic book movies (he was Hannibal King in Blade…III- sorry, just threw up there – and Deadpool in Wolverine Or…oh god. At least Deapool will be good, right? Man, this bracketed aside just got too long). He’s definitely got the body for playing the all American superstud (despite being all Canadian), and hey, I think he’s funny despite what seems to be copious amounts of naysayers out there.

The movie starts shooting in January near Oa, for a 2011 release.

All in all, I still want Nathan Fillion or David Boreanez. But I’ll settle.

Do you honestly think he isn't Hal Jordan by now?

I had thought Bradley Cooper had things wrapped up, but apparently he’s only one of three finalists. THR reports that director Martin Campbell (the guy who saved Bond with Casino Royale before the series fucked up again with Quantum), producer Donald De Line and the studio executives each had differing favourites.

But really, I don’t have a doubt in my mind that Bradley Cooper has it at this point. He just came off of the huge Hangover and he’s going to be in Joe Carnahan’s A-Team. He’s one of the “it” guys in Hollywood right now, without the massive salary.

I mean, the other options are Ryan Reynolds and Justin fucking Timberlake. Reynolds has his own superhero (Deadpool. Or is it antihero?) to look after, though if he somehow get’s the role he at least already looks like a superhero physically.

Timberlake, though, is so wrong for the role it’s sickening. I like the guy whenever he’s on SNL but he doesn’t have the physical components, gravitas and, well, age to play Hal Jordan.

Another point of contention is that the movie could easily cross the $200 million budget, seeing that it’s a superhero movie on a cosmic level. But damnit, if there’s any good in the world this movie deserves the same budget as the brain dead Revenge of the Fallen.

PS, I still want the studios to hire Nathan Fillion for this, but fuck them they’re too stupid to do it. Or David Boreanez, but fuck them again for similar reasons.

Okay, that headline was purely sensationalistic and I’m probably a pig for doing it, but it is sort of apt. In an agreement with the Taiwanese Ministry of Economic Affairs, Sony was able to settle into a deal so that the government would subsidize 40% (!) of all PS3-centric development in the region. In return, Sony is shipping in Japanese and Western technical support, and it’ll be 40% cheaper than shipping them anywhere else!

This is apparently a play at having a foothold in mainland China, but don’t they realize the best way to do that is to create free-to-play MMOs for the PC? The Chinese love their relatively free, time wasting, RPGs. I think, as an Asian, I can speak on behalf of China stereotypically.

Also, doesn’t Sony realize that most anyone who has a PS3 in China is probably (or, er, most likely) playing their games pirated? Hasn’t China always been the centre of the piracy issue? All this is doing is creating Chinese focused games to be pirated by the Chinese.

Now just replace golf club with William Wallace sword!

What might be construed (if you were conspiracy-minded) as a pre-emptive strike at Microsoft’s Project Natal, Siliconera reports Sony’s gone ahead and patented a new Eye Toy technology to use any everyday object as a controller. This was one of those things gamers had expected Natal to introduce into the gaming fray with its stereoscopic set of cameras. Describing the technology, Siliconera describes it as “a system where a camera can dynamically map an object — any real world object — for use in a video game.”

Personally, I think this is just Sony covering ground in case gamers like what they see with Natal. It’s not like Sony is using the same camera technology or software, so obviously Microsoft has nothing to worry about if someone wants to use a claymore to play Tiger Woods on the 360 (er, not that I was thinking of doing that. Nor do I entertain such a notion). Now everyone (except Wii owners it seems) can enjoy swinging around random objects in front of their televisions.

Also, who the fuck uses their Eye Toy?

Anyways, it’s like we’re in the fucking holodeck! Well, the poor man’s holodeck. With no holo-ing. Or deck.

But are still poor.