According to the Huffington Post, we finally have some concrete proof on who Andrew Garfield’s Spider-Man will be facing in the upcoming franchise reboot The Amazing Spider-Man. C. Thomas Howell, who has been cast for the movie, spilled the beans on some of the movie’s plot on the Retro Radio podcast. If you want to avoid potential plot spoilers, skip this part, in a nutshell, he revealed the Lizard to be appearing in the movie as one of the villains, though it is unknown if he’s the only villain. Regardless, here’s what Howell had to say:

“There is not a whole lot to talk about. Sony wants us to be hush-hush right now. I play a relatively small role. I play a construction worker who’s son is caught in the middle of a battle between the Lizard and Spider-Man on the Manhattan bridge. Spider-Man helps me get my son back from this perilous situation. There is some payback there at the end of the movie. Spider-man is kind of hurting. I help him when all of the other people won’t. Part of the story is, the nation thinks he might be a bad guy. They don’t know what to think. Because of my experience on the bridge with my kid, I know he is a good guy. I pitch in and help out at the end. That is the best way.”

So there you have it. It seems they’re really going to play up the “Spider-Man: Hero or Menace” angle, which is pretty refreshing to me. In the Raimi movies, that kind of went on the back burner, what with Spidey being New York’s hero and getting the key to the city and all that. As to what the movie Lizard will look like, no news on that front yet, but here’s a concept from DeviantArt member MalottPro to whet your appetite.

PAUL – the newest film written by Nick Frost and Simon Pegg (Shawn of the Dead, Hot Fuzz ) and directed by Greg Mottola (Superbad) is basically nerd brain candy. Not to say it is elitist, or unapproachable to the non-nerd public. It isn’t. Not by a long shot. In fact it probably drops fewer inside nerd jokes than a single episode of Big Bang Theory. But Paul isn’t trying to be some ambassador of nerd culture. It is just a great buddy film/ road trip adventure that happens to take place between two ubber nerds and a little green alien.

Frost and Pegg play Clive and Graeme, two long time friends and hard core nerds making a long awaited pilgrimage to the San Diego Comic book convention. On a road trip through America’s UFO hot spots of the south west – they meet Paul; a small, green, frank, rude Alien. Paul ( who is PERFECTLY voiced by Seth Rogen) is on the run from the US Government after years of captivity. Clive and Graeme agree to help the fugitive extraterrestrial and much hilarity ensues. Along their way they meet one eyed christian fundamentalist Ruth played by Kristen Wiig, and catch a great deal of heat from a team of bungling Men in black played by Jason Bateman, Bill Hader, and Joe Lo Truglio.

To be completely frank – I don’t think I have much journalistic objectivity in regards to Paul. If there is a demographic this film is assured to win the hearts of – I am in it. I would be greatly surprised if any self described nerd doesn’t like this film. Paul is a wonderful combination of nerd literate cinema and just plain solid story telling. Did I forget to mention that it is funny? It’s REALLY FUNNY, that AND they didn’t show all the funny parts in the trailers! Which, lets be honest – seems to be a rare thing now-a-days in Hollywood. While some nerd centric films try to explain nerdisms to the general public some of the best references in Paul are not even overt references; they are wonderfully subtle insertions of things that nerds will recognize. Be it lines of dialog, or the blue grass band in the back ground playing a twangy rendition of the Star Wars Cantina Song. The non nerd public probably won’t notice these things, but not noticing won’t hurt their appreciation of the film because the story telling is so well done, and they blend seamlessly into the story. Paul is overwhelmingly worth the price of a movie ticket. But like I said – I really don’t have any objectivity with this film. I am not a critic in any regard at this point – I am that nerd friend who loved a movie and is going to nag you to go see it. SO GO SEE IT!!!

In an interview with the LA Times, director Zack Snyder talked a little about how he’s approaching his Superman film – and that included acknowledging that this will truly be a reboot, essentially disgregarding all of the previous Superman films to date.

“Literally, the one thing that everyone can start to think about is that we’re making a movie that finally goes with the approach that there’s been no other Superman movies,” Snyder said. “If you look at ‘Batman Begins,’ there’s that structure: there’s the canon that we know about and respect, but on other hand there’s this approach that pre-supposes that there haven’t been any other movies. In every aspect of design and of story, the whole thing is very much from that perspective of ‘Respect the canon but don’t be a slave to the movies.’”

In the piece, Snyder also notes that the film will most likely be titled, Man of Steel, but no final decisions have been made on that yet. Snyder also touches on how it is working with his wife, Christopher Nolan, and why it’s so exciting for him to be working on such an iconic superhero – all of which you can read about in the LA Times piece, which I encourage you to do.

From the day that this was announced I have been excited to see what Zack Snyder is going to give us with regards to the Man of Steel, and from what he has to say about the project before they’ve even started filming it makes me think that this guy knows exactly what he wants to do with Superman, the Metropolis he wants to portray, and the story he wants to tell. How well this will all translate into a great Superman film, well, we will all just have to wait and see.

Zack Snyder’s Superman film starring Henry Cavill is aiming for a December 2012 release.

We’re back with another episode of The Big Movie Mouth-Off podcast!

The podcast features the stars and producers of The Big Movie Mouth-Off film review show, which appears here at Big Shiny Robot! and on Xfinity (Utah On Demand and Channel 6). That lineup is: Jeff Vice from MSN Entertainment, Jimmy Martin from SLUG Magazine, and Bryan Young (me) and Elias Pate from Big Shiny Robot! and ShineBox Media Productions.

To download the latest episode from iTunes, follow this link.

There, you should rate and subscribe to the podcast.

This week, we talked about:

• The Three Stooges
• X-Men First Class Posters
• Schwarzenegger’s Career
• Shane Black and Iron Man 3
• Steven Soderbergh
• Alien Invasion Movies

Listen! Let us know what you think! Spread the word!

For those of you who don’t like iTunes, you can get a direct .mp3 here. And you can add the BSR! podcast RSS feed by right clicking this link.

As for the reviews: First up is The Adjustment Bureau:

Next is Cedar Rapids:

And finally Hall Pass:

The Hollywood Reporter broke the story that Darren Aronofsky is bowing out of directing duties for The Wolverine mere minutes ago.

It seems as though Aronofsky isn’t comfortable with the time away from his family and out of the country it would take to shoot this film. I wonder, though, if there are other more insidious reasons for it and this is just a really nice white-washed way of saying Fox was too hard to deal with creatively. It’s no secret Fox seems to force their own bizarre horridness onto what should be good movies (like the last Wolverine movies) and Aronofsky is certainly big enough now to call his own shots and that could cause plenty of friction.

I’m not saying this is the case, I’m just saying I wouldn’t be surprised if it was the case. Fox is allegedly aggresively moving forward to find another director because the “script is great.”

From the Hollywood Reporter piece:

Stated Fox: “While we are of course disappointed that Darren can’t do The Wolverine, we also understand and respect his reasons. Having done both The Wrestler and Black Swan with Darren, we know he is an extraordinary talent and we look forward to working with him on other projects in the future. Hugh Jackman and Fox both remain fully committed to making The Wolverine. We will regroup and move forward aggressively.”

What do you guys think? Is this picture doomed? Who should they get to replace him?

Hey BSR readers! Arse-bot here with a quick little update to yesterday’s Daredevil story. THR has updated their original story with sources saying that this new story line will follow the “Born Again” story line!

Sources say the new story line will be the adaptation of the critically acclaimed Frank Miller-written and David Mazzucchelli-illustrated Born Again run of the comic series, which saw the Kingpin of Crime learn the identity of the superhero and begin to systematically destroy his life.

“Born Again” is one of my favorite DD story lines, one that I have read and re-read nearly a dozen times. While I’m quite excited to see this played out, it seems a bit like a story line that should come later in the franchise being that we have just barely established the character in one movie – a movie that is several years old now. That all being said though, I understand this has been a difficult franchise to get off the ground and who knows if we will even get more films beyond this, so I’d rather see it early (in my opinion) than not at all!

Daredevil is one my top three favorite superheroes, and I know he doesn’t have as much fan clout as Spider-Man and the X-Men, but neither does Iron Man and look how well that turned out in the right hands. I’m excited to see another DD film finally go into the works, and hopefully this time around it won’t be so underappreciated!

According to The Hollywood Reporter and Variety, 20th Century Fox has tapped a fellow named David Slade to bring a new Daredevil film to life.

Word has it that it will be a continuation of Ben Affleck’s not perfect but certainly under-appreciated Daredevil film as opposed to a reboot. Which is good news since the last thing we need is a rehash of his origin story.

Slade has at least one other movie in production between now and Daredevil. He’s no stranger to comics adaptations or genre pictures, he directed the adaptation of 30 Days of Night and Twilight: Eclipse. He’s a music video director, so Daredevil might at least look cool.

There’s no word about Affleck’s involvement, but I thought he was a great Daredevil and I would love to see him take another crack at ol’ Hornhead.

And if Jerk-Bot’s sources are correct, this film needs to be in production by next year for Fox to retain the rights, so expect it to happen.

UPDATE 03/16/11, 3:45PM MT:

Hey BSR readers! Arse-bot here with a quick little update. THR has updated their original story with sources saying that this new story line will follow the “Born Again” story line!

Sources say the new story line will be the adaptation of the critically acclaimed Frank Miller-written and David Mazzucchelli-illustrated Born Again run of the comic series, which saw the Kingpin of Crime learn the identity of the superhero and begin to systematically destroy his life.

“Born Again” is one of my favorite DD story lines, one that I have read and re-read nearly a dozen times. While I’m quite excited to see this played out, it seems a bit like a story line that should come later in the franchise being that we have just barely established the character in one movie – a movie that is several years old now. That all being said though, I understand this has been a difficult franchise to get off the ground and who knows if we will even get more films beyond this, so I’d rather see it early (in my opinion) than not at all!

Daredevil is one my top three favorite superheroes, and I know he doesn’t have as much fan clout as Spider-Man and the X-Men, but neither does Iron Man and look how well that turned out in the right hands. I’m excited to see another DD film finally go into the works, and hopefully this time around it won’t be so underappreciated!

I caught this over at ClubJade.Net and I would be remiss if I didn’t share it with you.

Simon Pegg and Nick Frost recreating a classic scene from Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope. This makes me twice as excited to see Paul tonight.

It’s no secret that Simon Pegg is at least half a huge Star Wars fan as his twitter feed indicates he only likes half of the movies. We’ll have more Paul coverage this week as well, since I was able to interview the cast at Comic-Con last year and we’ll finally dust that all off.

A Brief History of Title Design from Ian Albinson on Vimeo.

I’ve always been in love with good title design. It’s something that most good movies have and it’s something that might seem so disposable to a regular audience member.

Opening titles are important, though. They help set the tone for your film and a well-conceived title sequence can make or break the momentum of your film.

Ian Albinson put this film together for a SXSW showcase and it’s an incredible look at the history of good title design. Sure, there are some glaring omissions, but it’s only a couple of minutes long, what did you expect?

I would implore all of you to pay more attention to good title design and appreciate it when you see it. And see how many of the movies in this video you’ve seen and try to seek them out if you haven’t.

This came from a website called “The Art of the Title” and I would implore you to check it out. They have a pretty stunning database of film titles that you can watch in glorious Quicktime.

About a month and a half ago we reported that Derek Luke’s name appeared on a Captain America: The First Avenger poster and ran through a little speculation as to what his role would be – the general consensus being that he would portray the Howling Commando, Gabe Jones.

Well, the official word is in, and it looks like Derek Luke will in fact be playing Gabe Jones!

Since there are only a few African American comic book characters from the Marvel universe during that time period, Blackfilm.com exclusively confirmed through a reliable source that Luke will playing Gabe Jones, an original member of the elite Howling Commandos combat squad of World War II.

As the first African-American to serve in an integrated unit, Jones, who was also known for carrying his trumpet into battle, is one of the close confidantes to Sergeant Nick Fury, who would later become the head of the organization S.H.I.E.L.D. Jones would later join him as an agent. -BlackFilm

So there it is! Looks like Mr. Vice’s tingling geek-sense was dead on on this one!

Captain America: The First Avenger is set to open on July 22 and is directed by Joe Johnston