Sci-Fi Saturday: Superman, Star Wars, Iron Man, Wolverine, Battlestar, Heroes, Batman & Terminators

This week in SciFi news we celebrate Superman’s birthday (with some help from Captain Kirk) and bring news on a director for Star Wars TV, Indy 4 at Cannes, Terminator taking on Trek, plus news and images from Iron Man, Batman, Battlestar, Wall-E, Heroes, Avatar, and even a possible sequel to The Last Starfighter! so check all that and more below.

Superman’s 70th Birthday
1938 was the year the first issue of Action Comics #1 was released, postmarked June 1938, but February 29th is always considered the unofficial birthday of Clark Kent and Superman. In honor of the characters birth, here’s a quote from Star Trek’s own William Shatner about the characters death in 1993 (from DC "Newstime:):

When I was six, I thought I could fly. I mean, why not, Superman could. So I took my towel and tucked it in the back of my T-shirt – that was my cape – stood atop the dresser in my parents’ bedroom and leapt for the skies. When I returned from the hospital, reality had crash-landed. I’m sorry to hear that reality crash-landed on Superman as well

More on Supes’ 70th at SupermanHomePage.com and CapedWonder.com

MOVIE NEWS

Director Announced For Next Star Wars
Jim Marquand, son of "Return of the Jedi" director Richard Marquand, has been asked by George Lucas to direct episodes of the "Star Wars" live-action television series. From TheForce.net: "It [Marquand’s directorial debut "Dead Man’s Cards"] so impressed legendary Star Wars creator George Lucas, that he asked Jim to direct episodes of the eagerly-anticipated Star Wars television show next year." Lucas is writing and producing the first season of the series. Speaking of Lucas, the LATimes has a nice feature on the director’s Skywalker Ranch.

‘Indy 4’ Cannes Debut
Negotiations are going on to have "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull" debut at the Cannes Film Festival, according to Variety and FOXNews: A source is quoted: "I’m told that Spielberg, perhaps producer George Lucas and stars Harrison Ford, Cate Blanchett, Shia LaBeouf, Karen Allen and others would make the walk up the fabled red carpet at the Palais." In other Indy news, LaBeouf revealed a  recent official photo is indeed from a scene set at the government warehouse from “Raiders of the Lost Ark.”, and apparently Shia took some souvenirs…see MTV video

WB’s ‘Terminator’ to open May 2009
Warner Bros. has announced that "Terminator Salvation: The Future Begins" from McG will hit theaters on May 22, 2009, pitting the film directly against Fox’s "Night at the Museum II: Escape from the Smithsonian", and also two weeks after the expected release of "Star Trek". Production on the film begins on May 5th. The first of a three film story arc, ‘Terminator Salvation’ stars Christian Bale as John Connor alongside Sam Worthington. Variety

Dark Knight: New Viral Campaign, Plus Aaron Eckhart Discusses The Two-Faces Of Crime
The viral site IBelieveInHarveyDent.com has been updated. Upon signing up to "Join the Fight For Gotham" you’re greeted with the following message:

Citizens of Gotham! The future of our city rests in your hands! Alone, we are helpless against the thugs and killers menacing our city. Together, we have the power to take back Gotham. In just a few days, you’ll find out how. Please click … to verify your e-mail address. Keep an eye on http://www.ibelieveinharveydent.com and get ready to join a movement that will transform our city!

Asked about the differences between the characters of Bruce Wayne and Harvey Dent, Aaron Eckhart offered the following to MTVNews: “Well, they’re both crime fighters,” he said. “They both care about law and order. They both care about Gotham City. Although they come from different backgrounds, they share certain things. Pausing, he added, “[Things that] I cannot tell you about.”

Jon Favreau: Iron Man is for everybody
While at WonderCon, director Jon Favreau spoke with the gathered press about "Iron Man". Here’s a brief bit of what was said:

“[The film] has to attract people who don’t know anything about the comics, or who don’t know anything about the character,” Favreau said. “So we sort of walk everybody through everything that happened. I think we also limit things a bit, make things a little bit more plausible, so that people don’t look at it and say, oh it’s just a comic book movie anyway, anything could happen.

NEW IMAGES (click to bigify)

X-Men Origins: Wolverine pics

The Incredible Hulk pics and art

Batman: Gotham Knight pics

WALL•E Poster

NEW TRAILERS

X-Files 2 (cam footage from Wondercon)

Get Smart


(opens window to Apple videos)

Iron Man

Pathology

Superhero Movie (featuring Brent Spiner)

Starship Troopers 3 (featuring Jolene Blalock)

QUICK MOVIE BITES

  • There’s not much substance to this, but Michael Rosenbaum may be the next Freddy Krueger. According to CinemaBlend, the actor was spotted in Hollywood this past week with director Michael Bay, who’s production arm is responsible for the upcoming remake.
  • Hank Azaria revealed to MTVNews that Owen Wilson, Steve Coogan and Ricky Gervais are returning for "Night at the Museum 2: Escape from the Smithsonian".
  • "TRON 3D", "Cars 2", "National Treasure 3", "Pirates 4". Intrigued? Those four Walt Disney films could be on tap for 2011. Ain’t It Cool News
  • Sigourney Weaver told MTVNews that her character in "Avatar" is still "a big secret", teasing: “Jim wrote such a terrific part for me, and it has a lot of different aspects, [but] it reminded me of him, actually – very driven and very idealistic. So it was a lot of fun.”
  • After having to place the film on the back-burner in January because of the writers strike, Warner Bros. is now moving forward with its plans to release "Justice League of America", preparing the film for a 2009 release.Variety
  • Guillermo del Toro has selected legendary poster artist Drew Struzan to create a poster for "Hellboy II: The Golden Army". CHUD
  • Kevin Conroy has been tapped to voice Batman in the upcoming straight-to-DVD original animated film "Batman: Gotham Knight". World’s Finest
  • CinemaBlend is reporting a rumor that a sequel to "The Last Starfighter" is currently in production: “It involves original director Nick Castle, writer Jonathan Betuel and actor Lance Guest. It’s your basic Son of the Starfighter storyline and actually sounds pretty cool.”


did someone say sequel?

TV NEWS

Battlestar Galactica Season 4 Sneak-Peak Video
This one’s for the the spoiler hounds. Several clips for the upcoming season of "Battlestar Galactica" have found their way online. i09 assembled them together into one video segment which you can view below:

Heroes To Begin Shooting In June, Kristen Bell Not Yet Signed
James Kyson Lee (Ando) told SCI FI Wire that "Heroes" will probably return to production on new episodes this June, or even as early as May. Lee told a crowd of reporters at WonderCon that "NBC is going to do another big push again, right after the Olympics, and we’ll premiere season three in September." The third season will be subtitled "Villains". In other "Heroes" news, TVGuide is reporting that Kristen Bell, who played Elle in the show, has not yet been signed for the new season.

Will the Terminator on TV ‘be back’?
Sarah Connor is fighting the future and fighting for a future. In a conference call with reporters, "Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles" executive producer Josh Friedman said that he hoped that FOX would make their decision soon so he can get to writing the second season. He also lamented how the writers strike kind of screwed up the current season which now stands at only nine episodes. Of the planned tenth Friedman noted " it was a fantastic for being Episode 10, but is a horrible season premiere for Season 2." Head to SyFyPortal for more. Let’s hope FOX’s track record of axing SciFi shows (Firefly, Space Above and Beyond, etc) does not continue with the Terminator, but this comic from reallifecomics.com shows that with FOX you never know.


(click to enlarge)

The two-hour season finale airs Monday night from 8:00-10:00, TrekMovie.com recommends you watch it.

QUICK TV BITES

  • Still racking your brain over last Thursday’s "The Constant"? Tune into the "Lost" Podcast at ABC, which features producers Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse discussing the episode and their plans for the rest of the season.

SCI-FI RATINGS

Top 10 SF&F Broadcast Shows HH Rating/Share
1) Lost 8.8/14
2) Eli Stone 5.7/10
3) ‘Terminator’ 5.5/8
4) Ghost Whisperer (R) 4.3/8 (6.60M)
5) Lost ("Enhanced" Repeat) 4.3/7 (6.44M)
6) Moonlight (R) 3.6/6
7) Smallville 2.7/4
8) Supernatural 1.9/3
9) Reaper (R) 1.2/2

2/4/2008 to 2/10/2008 – Source: Nielsen Media Research

Top 10 SF&F Syndicated Shows Rating
1) Stargate SG-1 0.9
2) Star Trek 0.9
3) Dead Zone 0.8
4) Stargate Atlantis 0.7

2/4/2008 to 2/10/2008 – Source: Nielsen Galaxy Report via SCI FI Wire

Top 10 SCI FI CHANNEL Shows Rating
1) Ghost Hunters International 1.6
2) The Bone Eater 1.5
3) ECW 1.3
4) Stargate Atlantis 1.1
5) Ghost Hunters 1.0
6) Skeleton Man 1.0
7) Jeepers Creepers 2 0.9
8) Pumpkinhead 0.9
9) Beneath Still Waters 0.9
10) Pumpkinhead 2 0.9

2/4/2008 to 2/10/2008 – Source: Nielsen Galaxy Report via SCI FI Wire

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I highly recommend this BSG recap. It’s eight minutes long, informative and hi-frakkin’-larious:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I4DUraGnEMk

Hal Jordan better be in the Justice League movie. I heard a rumor that Common will be playing GL. I’ve got nothing against John Stewart, but come on! Hal has always been the BEST GL.

Thanks for the Superhero Movie clip.

I’ll apply that 10 bucks to an additional STXI viewing.

BSG looks like it’ll go out with a bang. Awesome! I’ll miss it, but it’s great to see it finish strong.

Great collection, Rosario!!!!!

Amen, brother. Hal Jordan rules!

ety3 — too frakking funny!

WTF?! A Sequel to the Last Starfighter??? Hrm…well..I guess…as long as it’s not a remake…..

Cars 2 and National Treasure 3 is no surprise. Pirates 4…eh I dunno…Never even seen Tron 1 let alone Tron 2

Lance Guest was fine, but the late great Robert Preston and the late Dan O’Herlihy is what allowed “Starfighter” to be more than a glorified B-movie.

It will be difficult to replace the charm and charisma that Preston brought to that film.

Don’t think of it as a remake – think of it as a “re-imagining”! A “re-interpretation”! A “reinvigoration”! That way its the same thing, but everyone feels good about it.

I’d gaurantee it will not be Hal. For one, adding John keeps the group racially diverse. Also, Hal hasn’t been portrayed at all in media for years. And Flash is Wally, that’s already been stated… even though supposedly he’ll be married to Iris.

But again, it’s way way too early in the game.

Happy Birthday Clark!! I thought I was the only one who remembered :)
(Batman’s was Feb 19th!)

The Last Starfighter , i love that movie ! it was pure cheese but great to watch , and one of the first sci fi movies with 3d graphic ( can you say ploygon without texture lol ) ,

Space. Above and was a great show and was cut before its time, less than one season, maybe if premiered in the last of years and or on the sci fi channel, it might of had a chance. For those of you who didn’t see it, check it out on netflix. The show was written by one of the top writers of xfiles at its peak, and its not hard to say that it was far superior to alot of its sci fi contemporaries.

Another bad example of a show not given a chance, now I read that Terminator: Sarah chronicles could be axed. Its tough to invest time in these show only to find out they might not return. At the age of 46, I have only been contacted by neilsons ratings. I have read the networks r trying to figure out a better way to rate these shows.
h
Another example of fans reviving a show is Jerico, its a pretty good show, and I never watched it until I found it on UHD and then picked up season 2 on CBS. But unfortunatly, Americans like survivor or idol yuch, and like they say “the masses are for the asses”

I hope terminator SCF makes it for a second season it needs a chance and certianlly better than the new bionic woman.

But my vote for the best vote for the best sci fi show or any genre of the last 5 years or so is BSG, it awsome and I know its good because I can watch it multiple times, like all our fav ST in whatever flavor you like, but mine is TOS, because it stands up for multiple viewings.

sorry for the typos, but its hard viewing large postings and then making changes on my iPhone.

Can’t wait for BSG Season 4, like Adama said, alot of balls are going to drop. (this is really well written sci fi and well worth watching from the mini series to Pegasus and now season 4, good sci fi tv and movies will cushon the wait until May of 09.

>> Never even seen Tron 1 let alone Tron 2

There was no Tron 2 movie, but the Tron 2.0 game was sort of a sequel to the movie… :)

CLASSY MOVE OF GEORGE LUCAS’S PART…

I think George Lucas is the new “Emperor Who Has No Clothes” after those god-awful STAR WARS Prequels, and RETURN OF THE JEDI was the least impressive of the Original Trilogy films, but offering a directing job to the son of Richard Marquand is a very classy move on his part.

Having said that, I think both TV series (live-action and CGI “Clone Wars”) will not live up to expectations. I lost faith in Lucas and STAR WARS a long time ago.

…AND “THE LAST STARFIGHTER” WIPES THE FLOOR WITH “TRON.”

Unlike, say, TRANSFORMERS, THE LAST STARFIGHTER is an example of a dumb sci-fi summer movie done right. Nothing but good memories of that one, and INFINITELY better than that perennially over-rated geek icon, TRON, a truly beautiful-to-look-at but alternately horrible-to-watch movie.

Good movie overload………. The next year is going to rock so damn hard!!!!

Good lord, why McG for a Terminator film?? They just lower the bar for every sequel. At this rate, they’ll have Milla Jovovich’s husband for Terminator 5 and Uwe Boll for Terminator 6.

Yay! Superman is 70. My favorite incarnation of the man of steel is still the Max Fleischer cartoons from the 1940’s. If you haven’t them you really need to check them out. Very impressive stuff. Even by today’s standards.

Dark Knight: Eager, pretty confident.

Iron Man: Eager, pretty confident.

Get Smart: I love the TV show. But if the trailers are true, this new Max is more like Mister Bean goofy than Maxwell Smart goofy. Maybe it’s a fine line, but it’s one worth observing. Likely to skip it.

Directors for SW TV Show: As long as it ain’t Lucas, I’m there. Lucas is a genius who helped define my childhood daydreams … but he didn’t do that because of his directorial skills. Or his writing, come to that …

Incredible Hulk: No reaction yet. No sense of it either way. Faintly hopeful. Not really invested sufficiently in the character to pay attention.

Indy 4: I consider myself a “true fan” of almost nothing. Indiana Jones is one of the exceptions. Even if it sucks (and as far as I’m concerned, there’s only been one really good Jones film so far) I’ll still probably see it three times :/ I get goosebumps just thinking about it.

Wolverine Movie: Concerned about quality. I like the character, I think Jackman is great in the role, and … I still can’t shake this concern. If the reviews scare me, I’ll skip it. Still too early to have anything but vague concern.

Wall-E: I’m permanently stoked and ready to love it. No worries at all. If tickets went on sale right now I’d snap ’em right up.

and 7

I too loved Robert Preston. He, along with Shirley Jones (always loved her), was great in The Music Man.
Pick a little
talk a little
cheap cheap cheap
talk a lot
pick a little
talk

Technically if Superman’s birthday is Feb 29th then that means it’s only celebrated every 4 years and he’s not 70…he’s um…*calculates* Roughly 18. They probably just round it off to March 1st tho. So he shares the same birthday as my great-grandmother (who turned 101 today!)

Batman’s birthday is Feb 19th??? Good to know…

Over a sequel, I’d like to see someone remaster “The Last Starfighter” with new FX sequences. True, it was one of the first films to use CGI instead of physical models for the FX, but even when it was in theaters, the quality of the FX often took me right out of the movie. The scenes of the dogfight through the caverns of an asteroid show explicitly how limited CGI was back then. Today’s CGI technology is far more capable of being integrated into the live-action scenes.

Even so, “The Last Starfighter” is one of my all-time favorites. A wonderful, often overlooked gem from the 1980s.

I always knew Bill has what it takes. :)

Happy Birthday, Clark and Superman!

TRON 3D, so TRON 2.0 is canon even tho’ it was only a game, okay.

Guss Disney couldn’t be bothered with actually making TRON 2.0 an actual film and go right to a third one, seems rather pointless as not everyone played TRON 2.0 so the 3rd one will fail because people will be lost in the storyline, that is if it picks up where the storyline from where 2.0 left off.

Meh, oh well, not my money being spent on making TRON 3D so no big deal.

Lucas is doing the writing and producing for the new Star Wars series? That could spell trouble for the series. i think it would have been far wiser to let someone else, someone with experience of writing and producing scifi or drama to handle those particular chores. I needn’t remind anyone of how dreadful the last 3 Star wars films were, does anybody seriously believe that Lucas will magically morph into good writer? With his recent track record somehow I think not. Believe me I would like to be wrong on this one. If done right a Star wars tv show would actually be fun to watch.

Who is that girl standing next to Shia LaBoeuf in the MTV Indy interview? She’s absolutely gorgeous.

I am hyped for the new X-Files movie. I think I officially bacame a fan of the show during the episode where Mulder is watching ST TOS in his apartment. He was such a nerd, albeit a nerd who worked for the FBI.

I think too much water has flowed under the bridge for anyone to care about either a Tron or Last Starfighter sequel…

Tron 3D will only be worth seeing if Richard Taylor, Syd Mead and Steven Lisberger are back on board.

The Last Starfighter is getting a sequel? oh now that is cool. This movie should have gotten a sequel a lot soon .i Like Walter Koenings Movie Moontrap this one was sadly under rated and unappreciated. It was I believe the first scifi movie to us CGI For Space fighter battles , True by todays standards they look crude , but back in 1984 they were state of the art. It will be wonderful to see the Gunstar Spaceships rendered in modern 3d. Let the second battle with Kodan Armada Comence!

BSG-cool fx..old fashioned sci-fi mentality…80s are gone…

#30 are you talking about the new BSG? I don’t think you’ve ever seen an episode if you think it’s “old fashioned sci-fi mentality”. Far from it. FAR.

# 25 as to “I needn’t remind anyone of how dreadful the last 3 Star wars films were,” I wish I could have been cut in on the profits of that billion-dollar disaster. If it had been such a trainwreck, they sure wouldn’t be making two new TV series to continue the disaster.

#31 Jorg i think it was Mark Twain that said ” I know of no one who ever went broke betting on the tastes of the American public” . I think the success of the last 3 star wars film proves Twain correct. As bad as they were they made billions. But movies are only in theaters for brief times . In the case of television over a longer span it has to be good otherwise the audience might tune it out., though that is not alway the case because there are plenty of bad bad shows that have proven that wrong. I would like to see someone else besides Lucas run the show. As for the new BSG I agree there is nothing old fasioned about this one.

Have any of you heard anything about Spielberg’s proposed remake of “When Worlds Collide?”

I assume that Indiana Jones has kept his attention (though I don’t think he is directing WWC).

star wars cant work on tv- like star trek never really did in film.
I-IV worked as they were the only new trek at the time and so far from the original series like star wars they were only an occasional big screen event- once star trek was back on tv they lost their relevance as the show was of equel quality and the films were never big enough- budget & promotion to really stand out like star wars did.
star wars will never be able to do on tv week to week what people got on the big screen- anything close to the production values would cost so much they would have to garuntee a huge audience for four years straight if george is getting a 100 episode run.
as for audience- i think its a misconception that that the star wars prequels were big cause everyone loves it- i think its more a case of a big fan base repeatedly viewing the films like 10 times each!- but george might get a shock- the nielson people only count heads once each!!!
ha ha ha!

Sorry the sith in me wants to see it fail- this war, this star trek vs star wars thing- it has to end…

Hell maybe the new trek film will blow out the box office and spawn a billion doller high concept franchise of epic sequels and star wars will be a hit on tv for an extended run of depth and intellectual exploration of scence fiction through the star wars universe…

in science fiction “there are always possibilities”

#33 yes doug its happening god help us, after the travesty that was Warof the worlds I have no faith in Steven Spielberg, and i just don’t want this calssic to be remade, i would like them to do something else, Oh while Im on the subject of Remakes They are remaking The Day the Earth Stood Still, staring Keanu Reeves as Klaatu. Mind you I would have more confidence if Keau had been cast in the role of Gort the Robot, because at least that has the virtue of being a non speaking role.

Re: Hal Jordan in the Justice League movie…don’t count on it. However, all Hal Jordan fans (myself included) have something even better to look forward to. A big budget Green Lantern film featuring our favorite GL. As far as I know, the film is still in the very early stages. A script is in the works.

Hal Jordan’s not in the Justice League movie. They’ve cast Common (a rapper) to play Green Lantern/John Stewart.

Mark Twain was right, but he never encountered the Japanese love of bad American films… When studios talk about counting on the international box office, they’re saying “When Japan bails our sorry butts out”.

If they do Star Wars on TV as Lucas originally envisioned doing the films, it will make daytime soaps look like one-shot episodes. He’s always loved the Saturday matinee cliff-hanger. Expect that in the TV series.

And Boba Fett.

#38 Jorg having seen my share of bad japanese movies and tv shows , you raise a very valid point, especially with their love for annoying cutsie poo movie characters. Jar Jar Binks must be a popular character over there. I still have misgivings about this Star Wars tv show, but we’ll see.

See here is my problem with you Tony. You censor people that use the word the starts with the letter “C” and rhyms with runt but you promote piracy with the X-Files bootleg YouTube link.

36-Nice! I hope Ollie makes a cameo or something. I love Green Arrow, too.

#35: If the remake to “the Day the Earth Stood Still” is a bit more faithful to its root story “Farewell to the Master” by Harry Bates, Gort will have a speaking role.

I love the original movie! A lot! It is in my top ten, but I wish the ending had some semblance to its original short story. Gort’s words in the conclusion was perhaps the most chilling ending I have EVER read anywhere (and no, I am not going to tell what it is– you all will have go read the story for yourself– so there!) :-)

Be prepared to be entertained.

I DO want to see “When Worlds Collide” remade. Again, I liked the original 1950s film, but it did not compare to the 1932 book. Perhaps this time Hollywood can get it right (I liked Spielberg’s “War of the Worlds… but it didn’t quite match my expectations… but it came darned close, in spite of Tom Cruise’s flakiness).