I know. It’s not super-exciting breaking news or anything, but Paramount has updated the coverart to the highly anticipated DVD and Blu-ray release of JJ Abrams’ Star Trek. Above, you’ll find the new artwork for the single-disc DVD edition as well as the two-disc special edition -which will be used for both DVD and Blu-ray. Star Trek will be hitting DVD and Blu-ray on November 17 and you can pre-order your copy over at Amazon.com!

If you care to see the comparison to the old artwork, you can jump on over to Examiner.com.

Big Shiny Robot! will be giving away a set of Volume 3 and 4 of the animated X-Men cartoon series.  In order to win, all you need to do is add Big Shiny Robot! to your facebook and update your status to read, “Big Shiny Robot! (www.bigshinyrobot.com) is where I get all of my geek news!”

Then just comment here or on facebook and let us know that the deed is done.

If you’re the winner, we’ll send you an email or a facebook message asking for your address. If you don’t have a facebook profile and don’t want to start one, send us an email and we’ll enter you in the contest anyway. But just be sure to tell your friends about us. (Click the contact us link above for our email address.)  Hurry though, the contest ends September 15th!

Volume Three includes the ever excellent Dark Phoenix Saga and Volume Four features an epic showdown with Apocolypse.  This set is a must have for any X-Men fan.  For those of you too eager to see if you’ve won the contest, they’re released on September 15th and you can preorder them from Amazon here.

Warner Bros. have been kind enough to provide yet another Q&A for the forthcoming Superman/Batman: Public Enemies which is coming to DVD and Blu-ray on September 29! This time Clancy Brown, who plays Lex Luthor in the film, sits down to talk about his role in the next DCAU feature film -and the man knows what he’s talking about… he’s voiced nearly 500 animated episodes and films!

About the Film:

The film may be called Superman/Batman: Public Enemies, but this is a tour de force for Lex Luthor – and Brown’s intonations captivate during every moment Luthor is on screen. In the film, Luthor has been elected President of the United States, and he uses the oncoming trajectory of a Kryptonite asteroid to frame Superman and declare a $1 billion bounty on the heads of the Man of Steel and his “partner in crime,” Batman. Superman and Batman must unite to stave off the pursuit of heroes and villains alike, stop the asteroid, and uncover Luthor’s devious plot to take command of far more than North America.

About Clancy Brown:

Voicing Lex isn’t Brown’s only upcoming starring role. Fans will get a healthy dose of Brown on large and small screens in the coming months as he appears in both the remake of A Nightmare on Elm Street and in the Matt Damon vehicle The Informant!, as well as starring in ABC’s primetime law office drama, The Deep End.

Brown was cast as a villain in his very first theatrical role opposite Sean Penn in Bad Boys, and then forever sealed his place in fantasy villainy as The Kurgan in Highlander. Before playing an immortal, though, Brown etched his name in cult classic history as Rawhide in The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension.

Beyond Highlander, Brown is regularly recognized from his standout performance as Captain Hadley in The Shawshank Redemption, as the centerpiece of HBO’s Carnivale as Brother Justin Crowe, and to fanboys across the planet as gung-ho Sgt. Zim in Starship Troopers.

While he has voiced nearly 500 animated episodes and films, Brown is best known by the younger audience as Mr. Krabs in SpongeBob SquarePants. He is widely recognized as the quintessential Lex Luthor in Superman: The Animated Series and Justice League/Justice League Unlimited, and he has scored kudos for his voicing of Mr. Freeze in The Batman, George Stacy/Rhino in The Spectacular Spider-Man, Long Feng in Avatar: The Last Airbender, Captain Black in Jackie Chan Adventures, and Mister Sinister in Wolverine and the X-Men. His voice credits, to list just a few, include roles in Phineaus and Ferb, Ben 10: Alien Force, Kim Possible, Duck Dodgers, Teen Titans, Buzz Lightyear of Star Command and Gargoyles.

Brown made his TV debut in an episode of the The Dukes of Hazzard, and has since been seen in primetime guest appearances and recurring roles on series as varied as Law & Order, ER, Lost, Star Trek: Enterprise, The Practice, The Outer Limits, Tales from the Crypt and China Beach.

Q&A

QUESTION:
After nearly two decades voicing Lex Luthor, are there any challenges to creating this character?

CLANCY BROWN:
I’m pretty comfortable doing the voice of Lex, so the only challenges come from the script – and the Public Enemies script is tremendous. I think it suits everybody involved. It suits Kevin (Conroy). It suits Tim (Daly). It suits me and the voice characterizations that we created, you know, back right before the Civil War. I think that was when we started doing this. So there’s not really much challenge to it anymore – it’s just a lot of fun now, and especially when you get to do it with Kevin and Tim and Andrea (Romano) and Bruce (Timm).
QUESTION:
Can you remember your initial audition for the role of Lex Luthor?

CLANCY BROWN:
Warner Bros. had been doing Batman and it was very successful, so they were gearing up this new iteration of Superman. They decided to sort of go outside the box as far as talent was concerned, and I had made it known that I wanted to do more voice work. I wasn’t very good at it, but I wanted to get better. I enjoy cartoons and animation, and comic books were part of my life growing up. So they said “Come on in, We’re trying to cast Superman.” So I went in and just blew them all away with my Superman. And then they said “Here’s an idea (he laughs) nobody has ever thought of: What if Clancy played the bad guy?” (he laughs harder) So I rolled my eyes and said, “Can I, just one time, play the good guy?” And Andrea said, “No, you can play Lex.” So I said, “Fine, I’ll play Lex.” Honestly, Lex is fun. I’m very happy to be Lex. It’s a lot more interesting than Superman to me.
QUESTION:
Your counterparts in this film both say you have the glory role with Lex. How do you respond?

CLANCY BROWN:
That’s because they always play good guys! They always play the heroes. Nobody knows what it’s like to be the bad man … behind blue eyes (he laughs). But I know. All too well.
QUESTION:
What exactly is it that makes you the definitive voice of the character for the fans?

CLANCY BROWN:
What I do with Lex, to me, is no different than how I always viewed Lex. I thought the early Super Friends animation of Lex was kind of lacking in many aspects. It’s fun to watch – it’s campy and all – but Lex wasn’t quite what I thought Lex should be. So when this started, you had this accident of everybody kind of being on the same page about what the story was and who the characters were. I just went in and did what I’ve thought Lex always should sound like. I totally enjoyed Gene Hackman’s portrayal of Lex Luthor, but it wasn’t a Lex that I was ever afraid of. I enjoyed Kevin Spacey in the newest film, but again, that wasn’t the Lex that I thought made a good opposition to Superman. Lex is the bad guy. He’s the archetype. He’s everything that’s ugly about who we are as people. But he is also what is seductive about that side, which is the wealth and the power. He’s Darth Vader. Oh man, there’s the one I should’ve played – Darth Vader. Darn. Missed opportunity. Okay, so what do I bring to Lex? I don’t know. I’m just lucky enough to have a low voice and the highfalutin idea to play Lex where I think he should be. After that, it’s all about the quality of the scripts.
QUESTION:
Where did you get that idea of what Lex should be?

CLANCY BROWN:
The vision was so clear in the original comic books and throughout the ’40s and ’50s and ’60s, as you saw him develop and become what is frightening about all the things that we want, and the sins that we have to commit in order to achieve that money and power. Of course, Lex has no problem with any of those sins – he’s quite at ease with running a corporation that has no conscience. What is seductive about Lex is that he is unremorseful. He is simply doing what he thinks is best. Does he think he’s a bad guy? No, of course not. But he doesn’t pretend to be a good guy. To him, it’s an immoral world anyway, and that people try to lay morality and ethics over the human action is just foolish. You can’t accomplish anything that way. The only way you accomplish something is to jettison all of that spirituality, all of those morals and ethics, and get on with business.
QUESTION:
Like Bruce Wayne, Lex is wealthy beyond means, has unparalleled intelligence, and no superpowers. Does that make Lex the anti-Batman?

CLANCY BROWN:
What does Kevin (Conroy) always say about the duality of Batman? There’s a real dark side of the Dark Knight. Maybe Lex is a day bat. It would be more interesting to have Lex in Batman’s world, wouldn’t it? I hadn’t actually put that together because I don’t care about the bat world – it’s all Metropolis for me (he laughs). Boy, when you think about it, super powers are kind of a cop out. They’re not real. What’s real is what Batman does, although he dresses funny. So what’s really real is what Lex does, thought he doesn’t go to the gym as much, you know? That’s probably why both of them are attractive – because you can conceivably become Batman or Lex Luthor, but you can’t really be from Krypton.

QUESTION:
The title is Superman/Batman: Public Enemies, but that’s not what this film is all about, is it?

CLANCY BROWN:
It’s the Lex Luthor story. It’s always the Lex Luthor story. Superman would have nothing to do if Lex wasn’t out there stirring it up. And you never know what Lex is up to – he doesn’t ever really go through a character arc. You can depend on the fact that he’s self-serving, that he’s got his own agenda, and you really can’t trust anything he says. It’s always interesting to see how he manipulates everybody around him and how he’s reinvented himself this next time. He’s benevolent, he’s a humanitarian or, like in this film, he’s an experienced politician and the right man for the right job. He tends to fool most of the people most of the time, but he doesn’t ever fool Superman … (he laughs) or me.
QUESTION:
Tell us about this voice cast reunion.

CLANCY BROWN:
Working with Tim and Kevin is so much fun. Tim’s got a day job (ABC’s Private Practice) and so he couldn’t be there when we started recording. I don’t think I’ve seen Kevin for 10 years because he lives in New York and Lex and Batman didn’t do much together anyway. But I always enjoyed it when Kevin was in town because I kind of knew him from even before Batman. He’s a great guy and I love him, so I’m always glad to see him. Kevin has a terrific energy, and I always loved what he did with Batman. I always enjoyed the times that we’ve actually been able to mix the worlds. Tim is a different story. We had a few years together doing this material, and there was a rapport there that kind of instantaneously came back.

What was interesting is that Kevin and I were there early and we recorded most of the script. And then Tim came in later, and we ran through the script for some filmed publicity materials. We sort of pretended to do a rehearsal for the camera. And as I’m sitting there listening to Tim and Kevin, I’m thinking, “Wow, they’re better. (he laughs) Kevin’s actually doing it even better. And I’m listening to myself and I’m thinking, “Wow, I’m actually better because Tim’s in the room.” The energy of having everybody there from so long ago was tremendous – we had this wonderful performance rapport with each other. So we ended up staying and recording the whole thing again. And I’ll tell you what – anytime Tim Daly or Kevin Conroy wants to join me for any job, I’ll be happy to have them on the set, behind the mic, whatever. I’ve got to read some stories to my son’s kindergarten class and I’m thinking I may have to call up Tim or Kevin and see if they want to come in because I know, just because they’re in the room, that I’ll do a better job than if I tried to do it alone.
QUESTION:
What does Tim Daly bring to Superman?

CLANCY BROWN:
I don’t want to imply anything about the other guys that have played Superman, but for me, Tim was the guy that started it. So he’s always the voice of Superman. I know George (Newbern) well, and I love George and I think he did a terrific job. But Tim’s Superman sort of set the standard for this generation.

What I get from Tim’s performance is that it’s very grounded. It’s very real. We can imagine ourselves as Batman or, in an absurd world, we could be Batman or Lex. But even in an absurd world, nobody can be Superman. So you need somebody that’s actually going to humanize Superman, and Tim manages to do that. Maybe it’s in the timber of his voice or the choices he makes in inflecting, or the intelligence that comes across or just the ease of his delivery. It’s probably a combination of all of that and a lot of stuff I haven’t mentioned. But he was a real good choice from the get-go, and he still has it. He still carries it with him. Plus, I think he’s still only about 28 years old – he hasn’t aged a bit. He said he has a 19-year-old son, but I don’t believe it.
QUESTION:
And what makes Kevin Conroy the definitive voice of Batman?

CLANCY BROWN:
It’s hard to imagine any other voice coming out of that cowl. The live action guys sounded like who they are. They didn’t sound like Batman. What’s interesting is that Kevin is not like this personally at all, so I don’t really know where it comes from. But his voice carries this dryness and sadness and, I would say, humorlessness. But it’s not humorless. It’s like it’s been ripped out of him. There’s kind of a fatalistic thing that’s communicated just in the sound of his voice. That’s why it’s always is a little weird when this Batman says anything that has humor or is pithy. Kevin’s voice actually manages to take the pith out of the pithy. Kevin has the same thing in his voice that William Holden had on screen. It’s this kind of don’t-mess-with-me gravitas, I’ve been there, I’ve seen it, I’ve been happy-go-lucky, I’ve been drunk in the streets, and I’ve seen it all. So when I talk, you listen. Kevin just holds you that way, and he does it with his voice. I never heard anybody like that. It’s like the perfect match of voice to character with Kevin in Batman. You can’t get better than that.
QUESTION:
Can you explain the genius of Bruce Timm?

CLANCY BROWN:
I can’t explain the genius of Bruce Timm. I can’t explain the genius of Steve Hillenburg (creator of SpongeBob SquarePants). I can’t explain how these guys just seem to create and continue to refine and then recreate and build and define a cultural icon and these worlds that capture the imagination. They’re just completely in their head. There’s not a lot of ego – or it’s not offensive ego. That’s one thing I know for sure. And it isn’t an ugly obsession. There’s an ease with it. They dig it. And they have the talent and brainpower to pull it off. I don’t know how Bruce does it. He always astounds me. He’s one of the real deals. It’s great that he’s with Andrea (Romano) because they enable and support each other. That’s greater than the sum of its parts every single time.
QUESTION:
The fans call you the quintessential voice of Lex Luthor. Do you feel some sense of ownership for the role?

CLANCY BROWN:
I respect it, but I think it goes like this: when I was growing up, the greatest basketball player was Julius Erving or Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. For my daughter, it was Michael Jordan. And now, for my son, it’s going to be Kobe Bryant or Lebron James. Whatever comes next for this generation, that’s going to be the greatest voice. I think it’s the greatest iteration of this cartoon, and I’m immensely grateful and feel very fortunate that I’m part of it. I think it’s going to be tough to top this version of Superman, even by any other medium. I don’t think you’ll get a live action version that could be as good as this world.
QUESTION:
How did comics fit into your childhood?

CLANCY BROWN:
I would go down to Main News and flip through the comic book rack. It was always fun — a nice little escape. Because I could never bring them home. I would buy them, and actually sit there and read them until Mr. Miller would say, “You know, (he laughs) I don’t run a library.” I’d try to figure out if I wanted to spend my nickel on a candy bar or a comic. And I would be a rich man today if I had all those comics. I read Superman. I didn’t read Batman. I liked DC Action Comics. I read Marvel, too, but I was not a Spider-Man guy. I did like Iron Man a lot.
QUESTION:
Why couldn’t you bring comics home?

CLANCY BROWN:
Because serious people didn’t read that stuff. (he laughs) I had homework to do. I had piano to practice. I had chores around the house. I couldn’t waste my brainpower reading that stuff. It would rot my brain. Everybody knows that (he laughs hard).
QUESTION:
How do you get into voice acting, and what made you stay?

CLANCY BROWN:
Getting into voice acting was a completely practical decision on my part. My daughter had just been born. I wanted to stay in town. It was something that I hadn’t done before and I had a little bit of a presence in film and television that I could actually use as leverage to break through some of the barriers to doing voices. So I did that.

What I love about voice acting is really that the people involved are just so much fun. They’re all good guys – there’s nobody I don’t like. Whenever I walk into a room, I’m happy to see whoever is directing, whoever is producing, whoever’s acting. And it’s usually a lot of fun. I remember when I was the new person in the cast, I was just overwhelmed by the talent that was in the room and all I could think was “Man, I hope they invite me back because this is just too much fun.” And so they kept inviting me back. I can’t imagine every getting tired of it.

For more information, images and updates, please visit the film’s official website at www.SupermanBatmanDVD.com.

Two epic battle-royal sorts of movies are hitting Blu-ray today and both of them are must-buys in the format. First is Mel Gibson’s classic Braveheart and the other is Ridley Scott’s Gladiator. While I like both films, I think Braveheart stands up far better of the two.

Disney Nature has released Disney Nature earth,and it is quite a spectacle to see, particularly in the Blu-ray format. Nature documentaries seem to be the perfect films for the Blu-ray format. There is a crispness to the picture couple with the majesty of the nature that makes it truly an amazing thing to witness. This one is worth the price of the Blu-ray twice over. And it’s narrated by James Earl Jones, which makes it even better. A nature documentary plus Darth Vader equals a good time.

Turner Classic Movies but out their Classic Films Collection: Murder Mysteries disc. This set is a steal. It has four films for the price of one. When you consider that the four films are The Maltese Falcon, The Big Sleep, The Postman Always Rings Twice and Alfred Hitchcock’s masterpiece Dial M For Murder, you’ve got quite a nice incentive to pick this up. Sure it’s light on special features, but if you need a primer into the classic noirish murder mystery genre (or need a primer for a friend) there is no better introduction than these four films.

The guys from Spinal Tap (Christopher Guest, Harry Shearer and Michael McKean) put out a concert DVD of their recent acoustic tour with: Unwigged and Unplugged Live Concert DVD. These guys are funny and this disc is a charm to watch. Sure they aren’t in their Spinal Tap personas, but this is great. And as much as I like Spinal Tap, I almost think this act is more entertaining. It makes me sad I didn’t get out to see it when they were touring.

Oh, and Heroes: Season 3 comes out. Haven’t watched it yet. Not sure I’m going to.

Be sure to check out Arse-bot’s highlights and lowlights over at Examiner.com!

Dark Rising is a movie that attempts to be one of those B-movies that’s awesomely bad on purpose in attempt to be funny, and/or to become a cult hit. However, this is a tough thing to acheive and usually doesn’t happen intentionally, and when a film does try intentionally it tends to fial miserably. This is exactly where Dark Rising ends up -it’s a movie that is just… awful. Proletaria-Tron reviewed this movie over at Examiner and you can check out his full thoughts on the movie there!

The male lead character of Jason (Landy Cannon) is introduced to us as a guy whining to a little girl about his ex-fiancé, Jasmine (Vanessa James), not wanting to marry him. Turns out she’s a lesbian and throughout the movie this is shoved down our throats, to the point of a lesbian sex scene that doesn’t fit the movie at all. Jason isn’t likeable at all. I was hoping he would die from the start. He’s awkward, whiny, and unfunny and never really redeems himself in any way. He’s also dressed like 1994 and looks like he’s around 40 years old. Jason’s buddy Ricky (Jason Reso or Christian Cage in the wrestling world) is along for the camping trip too, he’s slightly better than Jason at acting but I think that’s due to his long career as a professional wrestler (a 6 sided cage match of his is a special feature). He’s mostly around to be funny -but isn’t- and is mostly just creepy and also looks to be about 40 years old. The problem with that is all the girls look like they are in their 20’s. Jasmine and Jason are supposed to be high school sweethearts, and they aren’t even close to the same age. Marlene (Haley Shannon) is Jasmines lesbian girlfriend and basically is only around to take her shirt off and then die.

Three years after acquiring the rights to fifty old-school Shaw Brothers releases, Dragon Dynasty finally rolls out the big one, director Chang Cheh’s kung-fu classic, Five Deadly Venoms. Originally released in 1978, it is arguably the best-known Shaw Brothers movie in the world, having influenced everyone from the Wu-Tang Clan to the World of Warcraft, and even making Entertainment Weekly’s Top 50 Cult Films list.

As great as this move is, it’s hard not to see it as a sign of desperation on the part of Dragon Dynasty, who had been sitting on their rights to all these films since their initial wave of Shaw Brothers releases a year ago failed to meet the company’s financial expectations. Which is a terrible shame, in my opinion, because it consisted of six excellently put-together editions of equally choice films (The 36th Chamber of Shaolin, Come Drink With Me, Heroes of the East, My Young Auntie, The One-Armed Swordsman, and my personal favorite, Five Fingers of Death, aka King Boxer), and because it was probably the only thing that the company had managed to do right.

Founded by the Weinstein brothers, and featuring active involvement by Hong Kong cinema expert Bey Logan, as well as fans like RZA and Quentin Tarantino, Dragon Dynasty was initially hailed as the savior of martial arts cinema in the United States, where it has historically been subject to unnecessary cuts and dubs, often in a misguided effort to make the films more accessible to American audiences (and often at the hands of Weinsteins’ own Dimension Films label). And for a while, it seemed like the company was really trying to treat the material with respect, and provide the consumer with the highest quality product, even though they kept the annoying habit of re-titling films in order to make them sound more appealing to the masses (the Shakespearean martial arts drama The Banquet, for example, became The Legend of the Black Scorpion under Dragon Dynasty, despite having fuck-all to do with scorpions, of any color).

However, due to reasons about which I can only speculate (Bad economy? Poor sales?), Harvey and co. soon went back to business as usual, dumping the same incomplete Dimension cuts of classic Jet Li and Jackie Chan films onto their DVDs, sometimes even without an original language audio option, and expecting consumers to not purchase better editions available overseas. Fortunately, this did not seem to affect their first wave of Shaw Brothers releases, all of which came from recently remastered prints from Celestial Pictures, and offered a plethora of special features, which matched or even upstaged the DVDs from the extensive Shaw Brothers catalog offered by the Hong Kong-based distribution company IVL

Anyway, the Region 1 faithful can rejoice now, because the wait for this one is finally over, and it was more than worth it: the picture quality is even better than on the IVL release, with more vibrant colors and a generally crisper image, and features none of the distortion and ghosting that plagued that edition, which was interlaced and PAL-sourced. The 5.1 stereo surround remaster of the IVL release is gone, making way for the old-school English dub (which those with fond memories of the film’s initial run in the US will undoubtedly appreciate), in addition to the original Mandarin mono and a Bey Logan audio commentary track, which, as usual, is a real revelation. The man really knows his shit, and his enthusiasm and insider knowledge of martial arts and martial arts cinema always make for an exceptionally entertaining commentary.

For those of you wondering about the plot, it’s simple: the master of the Five Venoms House is dying, and his final wish is for his final student (Chiang Sheng) to seek out five mysterious former pupils, each trained in a different style modeled after a venomous animal whose name he has adopted (the Centipede, the Gecko, the Scorpion, the Snake, and the Toad). He is to team-up with the righteous ones and kill the ones who have been operating against the clan’s best interests. The problem is, since they all wore masks during their training, he has no idea what they look like, and having only been trained in a little of each style, he is no match for any of them by himself. A lot of kicking and punching ensues.

The kung-fu is a bit slow, even by Shaw Brothers standards, but the movie makes up for it in camp value (those Mexican wrestling-style masks are hilarious) and a surprisingly suspenseful plot. This is the movie that established actors Chiang Sheng, Lo Meng, Philip Kwok, Lu Feng, Sun Chien, and Wai Pak as the so-called Venom Mob, who, together with director Chang Cheh, went on to make many more movies featuring better-choreographed fighting, but rarely one this entertaining. If anything, in addition to becoming increasingly more gory, subsequent Venom films only underlined Chang’s obsessions with bare-chested heroics and male bonding, which I personally find rather tiresome. His work is therefore a bit of a mixed bag for me: while his focus on camaraderie and heroic bloodshed, not to mention his latent misogyny (women are often virtually non-existent in his films, and when they are, they are usually either harbingers of doom, or total bitches), can be a detriment to my enjoyment of his movies, the absurdity and glee of some of his more outrageous concepts often manage to make up for it. As a rule, when Chang is playing it straight (as in, say, The Boxer from Shantung), chances are I won’t like it. But the campy, gloriously outlandish stuff (dig Crippled Avengers) totally flips my shit, and I would love to see more of it.

Which is exactly why you guys need to buy this. For $15 you won’t just be getting a fine piece of entertainment, but also encouraging the folks at Dragon Dynasty to keep up the good work they have done with their Shaw Brothers releases, and, most importantly, to keep releasing what they have. American fans of Asian cinema in general, and kung-fu films in particular, have learned the hard way that once Harvey Weinstein gets comfortable sitting on something, it’s pretty fucking hard to get him to move.

Greg Mottola’s indy comedy hit Adventureland comes out on DVD and Blu-ray today. Jesse Eisenberg heads the cast (though it features Ryan Reynolds, Bill Hader, and Kristen Wiig) and I quite liked him a lot in Noah Baumbach’s The Squid and the Whale and I’m glad to see that he’s getting more work. I’m excited to see this movie and you should expect a review in the next week.

One thing I’d like to point out today that deserves some support is the documentary Second Skin. It’s about the virtual worlds that more and more of our population spend so much time in. I’ve been keen to see it for a long time and am happy to see that it’s getting a DVD release. They cover everything from Everquest widows to Chinese gold farms. It should be an interesting look into the worlds of World of Warcraft, Second Life, and all the rest.

My family DVD pick of the day is: Batman: The Brave and the Bold, Vol. 1. True there are only four episodes on this disc and the serious collector is probably going to wait until the full season release. In the meantime, this is a great way to get acclimated to the series and a great couple of hours to spend with the kids.

Be sure to check out Arse-bot’s highlights and lowlights over at his Examiner page!

The Wild Man of the Navidad is a film by two students who studied with the writer/producer of the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre from 1974, Kim Henkel. Duane Graves and Justin Meeks recreate in great detail the feel of a creature-based horror movie from the 1970’s. From the way the movie was filmed, to the acting, to the “special effects” – everything about this film screams retro.

This is a really fun film, but I wouldn’t go into it expecting to be scared – at all. It’s funny at times, and maybe a little bit “thrilling”, but at no point during the course of this film was I scared or “creeped out” by any stretch of the imagination. But short-comings or not, Meeks and Graves have done a fantastic job recreating this genre and is worth checking out to anyone that’s a fan of campy b-movies, or the horror genre who appreciates its roots.

You can check out the full review of this film over at Arse-bot’s alter ego on Examiner.com.

The film is mostly based on the journals of Dale S. Rogers (played by Meeks), who lived along the Navidad River near Sublime, Texas in the 1970’s. The film focuses on Dale, his wheelchair-bound wife, and their Mexican care-taker, Mario. After losing his welding job, Dale needs to find a way to make ends meet. After some persuasion from the locals, he opens up his land -that has been closed off for years by his father before him- to the hunters. Dale knows that there is some sort of man-beast out there that’s hungry for blood, but still allows people to go hunting on his property, for the right price. The hunters intruding on it’s land angers the Wild Man and he starts to become increasingly more violent and bold in his attacks. After Dale and the town folk have had enough of the murderous beast, a hunting party is put together to try to rid the area of the beast, permanently.

Fox Home Entertainment has released the details about the follow up to the Family Guy Star Wars spoof, Blue Harvest called Something, Something, Something, Dark Side, which will spoof The Empire Strikes Back.

The DVD and Blu-ray, which sees all of the Family Guy cast reprising their same roles from the previous hour-long episode, will be hitting shelves on December 22. In addition to Peter playing Han Solo, Chris playing Luke Skywalker, etc. we will also see (Spoiler Alert?!) a black Mort Goldman playing Lando, Joe playing a probe droid, and Peter’s arch-nemesis, The Giant Chicken, playing the part of Boba Fett!

I’m a big Family Guy fan and I thought Blue Harvest was very creative. It was an unapologetic, funny spoof on A New Hope while I thought still be respectful of the source material and the love that people have for these movies. I’m sure this comes from the fact that I highly doubt Seth MacFarlane could have gotten away with this without absolute consent from George Lucas himself.

Special Features are to include:

• “Something Something Something” Pop Up Video
• The Dark Side of Poster Art
• Animatic version of the episode
• Deleted scenes

I’m looking forward to seeing this latest installment of the Family Guy/Star Wars saga and luckily, we will all only have to wait until December 22 to own it, not to see it. The new season of Family Guy starts on September 27 and from what I can see, this special is set to air as the second episode of the season, so set your DVR’s!

In the meantime, you can check out the trailer for Something, Something, Something, Dark Side over at Yahoo! and if you’re interested, it is available now for pre-order over at Amazon.com!

Audience of One is a documentary that follows Pastor Richard Gazowsky -of the Voice of Pentecost Church based out of San Francisco- as he attempts to produce a movie based on the Biblical story of Joseph.

Wait. Let me back up.

Pastor Gazowsky saw his first movie at the age of 40. Shortly after that he claims that he received a message from God telling him he needs to make a movie about the biblical story of Joseph -told as a sci-fi epic. Charged with this task, Pastor Gazowsky creates the production company What You See Is What You Get (WYSIWYG for short) out of his congregation and begins production on Gravity: The Shadow of Joseph. This film documents Gazowsky as his attempts to make his vision come to fruition despite not knowing a thing about making movies. What starts out as story about a seemingly misguided Pastor and his congregation who simply want to make a movie slowly turns into a portrait of a dillusional man who borderlines on religious fanaticism and those who follow his word relentlessly.

This really is a great documentary and is interesting as hell. You can check out a more in-depth review of this film over at Examiner.com.

Audience of One is available now on DVD.