What are going to be the biggest surprises at this year's ComicCon? Can McG and Christian Bale make us care about Terminator: Salvation? Will the movie adaptation of Twilight please fans, or alienate them? What's behind the venom being directed at Batman's detractors on-line? And does Meryl Streep's Mamma Mia! have a chance against The Dark Knight this weekend? Joining James this week to talk all things ComicCon is Cinematical's Editor-In-Chief Erik Davis. ... Cinematical's podcast is now available through iTunes; you can subscribe at this link. Also, you can listen directly here at Cinematical by clicking below:



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You know, sometimes it's like the universe wants to prove you wrong. No sooner did I make one little offhand comment that Zack Snyder had probably abandoned his follow-up to Dawn of The Dead when his wife and producing partner, Deborah Snyder, tells Shock Till You Drop that Army of the Dead is alive and well (sorry, I couldn't resist). The script was written by Snyder and Awake's Joby Harold. Deborah Snyder summed up the story to Shock as follows: "Basically, something happened in Vegas and there was this huge outbreak of these zombies that were killing people...So to contain it they basically contain Vegas. The city is this wasteland with walls around it and all of these zombies are inside" -- and it could just be me, but that sounds awfully similar to Resident Evil: Extinction.

As we all know, Zack Snyder is hard at work on his big-screen version of Watchmen, and he will only produce the 'sequel' to his 2004 remake of George Romero's zombie classic. Deborah Snyder tells Shock that they are currently on the hunt for a director for the project, but that it is "...a little hard [to do] because we're here [on set] and every day is killer. We want the right person for it. The script has been turned in to the studio and they're really happy with it, with pretty minimal notes back, so they said, 'Hey, let's get a director.'" As soon as they do find their director, we'll be here to let you know who it is. Any ideas?

[via Justpressplay.net]

After watching the new trailer for Awake, I can't say I'm any more likely to shell out my hard-earned dollars to go see this movie. But, I will give writer-director Joby Harold credit for coming up with a premise that is pretty disturbing if you think about it. I should tell you though, this is one of those trailers that makes the creative decision right up front to show you as much of the plot as possible -- I can't be alone in thinking it's a bad idea to give away any of your surprises if you can help it.

Awake stars Hayden Christensen as an affluent young man who has the unfortunate luck of being one in 700 people who stays 'awake' during a surgical procedure. As if that isn't bad enough, while paralyzed under the knife, he overhears his doctors discussing a conspiracy involving his own murder. Jessica Alba stars as his somewhat 'dazed' fiancée. I'm not really sure why she spends most of the trailer staring blankly. All I do know is that it probably won't help Christensen out in the chemistry department. Rounding out the cast are Terrance Howard as Christensen's friend and surgeon, and Lena Olin as his mother.

Both Alba and Christensen enjoyed other trailer releases this month with the US remake of The Eye and Doug Liman's Jumper. This is Harold's first feature film, although he had been attached to a Zack Snyder sequel to Dawn of The Dead. Snyder already has his hands full with his big screen version of The Watchmen, so it's doubtful we'll hear about the Dead project any time soon. Awake opens November 30th.

[via ComingSoon.net]

Well, we should probably just get used to sorting through the latest casting rumors for Zack Snyder's big-screen version of The Watchmen. Latino Review, who've scooped big news in the past to various success, has reported that Malin Akerman is set to play Laurie Juspeczyk (aka Silk Spectre) in the film. The last actress rumored to be up for the role was Kate Winslet, but if Latino Review's source can be trusted, it looks like Akerman has scored the part. Akerman is probably most familiar to fans of Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle, as the wife of "Freakshow". But lately Akerman has been landing some high profile roles in the upcoming remake of The Heartbreak Kid from the Farrelly brothers, and Nicole Kidman's The Invasion.

Last month, Warner Bros. had released a brief synopsis of the film, and while most of the original story seemed to remain intact, it looks like there will be a few minor changes on the way. As fans of The Watchmen graphic novel well know, the story is set in an alternate version of America; one that's on the verge of nuclear war with The Soviet Union. Superheroes are now outcasts, and when one of their own is murdered, a greater conspiracy is revealed. There have been rumblings that Jason Patric was also being considered for the role of Dr. Manhattan, but the latest buzz has Billy Crudup as the frontrunner for the part (that has yet to be confirmed). According to the source at Latino Review, WB will be making some casting announcements at this week's San Diego ComicCon. There is bound to be plenty of Watchmen talk at the convention, so stay tuned to Cinematical's upcoming coverage for any news that comes our way.

UPDATE: Latino Review also confirms that Jackie Earle Haley has officially been cast as Walter Kovacs (aka Rorschach). Look for formal announcements to come during this week's ComicCon.

Thanks to the enormous success of 300, director Zack Snyder can probably set up as many dream projects as he wants right now. He has already been able to get Watchmen up and running and he would certainly be offered the 300 sequel if it happens. Another project that he's just set up is a return to the zombie action-horror genre. It is called Army of the Dead and while it sounds like a sequel to his first big hit, Dawn of the Dead, the fact that this will be made by Warner Bros. instead of Universal makes me think it is definitely not related. Snyder wrote the story, which takes place in a quarantined Las Vegas, and he will co-produce with wife Deborah, but he hasn't announced whether or not he'll direct.

For now it is only known that a script is being written by Joby Harold and that Snyder wants the movie to be a sweeping epic with a style similar to that of 300. I am one of the few zombie movie fans that wasn't too crazy about Snyder's Dawn remake (it seemed to me more a scene-by-scene remake of Maximum Overdrive that substituted zombies for trucks), but because I will watch any movie with zombies, I'm willing to give him another shot. Plus, I love the idea of zombies in Vegas. Whenever I'm at a casino, I already think of the people around me as being like the living dead, and I can certainly imagine zombies blankly playing the slots. Of course, since I'm envisioning a campy movie closer in style to Romero's original Dawn of the Dead, I doubt I will be satisfied. Still, I can't completely dismiss it just because it is different than what I would do, and I'm excited to see what Snyder claims will be the biggest-scale zombie movie yet.