Last night Cinematical's James Rocchi was a guest on G4's Attack of the Show, where he and Chris Hardwick spoke about all those crazy Batman rumors spreading like wildfire across the internet. Ya know, how Angelina Jolie supposedly wants to play Catwoman, Philip Seymour Hoffman as the Penguin and/or Johnny Depp as Riddler.

As James points out, these are all "just rumors" right now and there's no way of telling which characters Christopher Nolan and his screenwriter brother Jonathan Nolan have in mind without actually speaking to them. It should be noted that Cinematical has also confirmed that Chris Nolan currently does not have a deal to direct a third film, and if he does hop onboard, they'll have to negotiate something first. But enough of my babbling, check out James above, and much thanks to Attack of the Show for inviting us on.

Over the years, we've seen several lists that attempt to name the top movie villains of all time. From Hans Gruber (Alan Rickman) in Die Hard (my personal favorite) to Jack Nicholson's Joker, we could probably sit here, throw out a number of intimidating bad guys and debate all day long. But what about the least intimidating? Those baddies who were supposed to frighten us, but couldn't quite live up to their evil reputations?

Well, The Phat Phree has come up with a list of the 11 least intimidating movie villains of all time ... and I must say, they're pretty spot on ... except for two. Let's see, we have Mr. Glass (Samuel L. Jackson) in Unbreakable, Madison Lane (Demi Moore) in Charlie's Angels 2, Chucky in Child's Play (c'mon, it's a doll!), The Goblin King Jareth (David Bowie) in Labyrinth, Darth Vader (the Hayden Christensen version), Nuclear Man (Mark Pillow) in Superman IV and (perhaps their best pick) John Travolta in everything (Broken Arrow, Battlefield Earth, Face Off, The Punisher, Swordfish), among others. One of the villains I strongly disagree with is John Kreese (Martin Kove) in Karate Kid 1, 2 and 3. Talk about intimidating -- when I was growing up, that guy scared the crap out of me. I actually quit Karate lessons just so I didn't have to run into one of him down the line. Seriously.

Another bad pick (thrown in as an honorable mention) was Zod (Terrence Stamp) from Superman 2. No way! Zod was The Man! And certainly a very intimidating villain. Check out their list and let us know who should or shouldn't be on there. If you ask me, almost every Batman villain (Danny DeVito as The Penguin? Arnold Schwarzenegger as Mr. Freeze?) should've at least got a mention. What say you?

Does anyone else feel like we're playing the "how many consecutive days will we hear Dark Knight news from Christopher Nolan" game? If we are, I just scored again, because I'm back for another Nolan update, this one courtesy of an interview with Esquire. Apparently not content with denying various rumors about who could possibly play the part of Oswald Cobblepot (that's the Penguin, for you non-Bat types), Nolan has decided to once-and-for-all negate every possible Penguin rumor by denying the existence of the character in his movie. If this doesn't manage to quiet those pesky Penguin rumors I don't know what will -- but you and I both know it'll only be a few days before somebody is reporting a new cast move for the nonexistent part (and if they do, you can bet I'll be here to tell you about it).

Here's what Nolan told the mag: "'I'd be more excited to have Philip Seymour Hoffman in the film than to have the Penguin. There are certain characters that are easier to mesh with the more real take on Batman we're doing. The Penguin would be tricky." And while I'd love to see Nolan's vision of the Penguin, I'm glad he's not going villain overboard -- too many bad guys spoils the ... uh, broth.

Looks like a bunch of folks were able to sit in on an editing session with Christopher Nolan as he was wrapping up The Prestige and, subsequently, brought back some more info regarding that Batman sequel, The Dark Knight.

While Nolan is certainly not spilling the beans as far as plot goes, he did chime in on those rumors that had Ryan Phillippe up for the role of Harvey Dent/Two Face and Philip Seymour Hoffman playing the Penguin. When asked about the actors possible participation in the sequel, Nolan laughed and replied, "No truth, no truth to any of those rumors. All interesting ideas though." So, does that mean we're back to square one as far as Dent and Penguin go? Personally, I'd take Nolan's comments with a grain of salt -- I mean, Hollywood often works in mysterious ways.

Nolan also alluded to the fact that there may be a bit more action in The Dark Knight as the film will begin with Bruce Wayne as Batman, making it easier to jump right into the mayhem, rather than spend a ton of time on backstory. The Dark Knight is tentatively scheduled to hit theaters in June of 2008.

And the Bat-rumors continue to fly folks. Not long after Ryan Phillippe's name was being tossed around for the role of Harvey Dent/Two Face comes word from Batman-On-Film, via an inside spy, that yet another offer has gone out. This time, it's directed toward the Bat-sequel's other villain -- Penguin.

The spy confirms Christopher Nolan's Untitled Batman Begins Sequel will indeed feature two villains: The Joker and The Penguin. While, supposedly, an offer has been made to Heath Ledger for the former, the spy notes that Ledger has not signed yet and is reluctant to do so, for whatever reason.

Also, said spy is positive an offer has been made to Philip Seymour Hoffman for the role of Penguin. Hoffman had been rumored to be a front-runner for the role, but has also indicated he may not get involved. Personally, I think Hoffman would be a wonderful choice for Penguin and, I imagine, would sit much better with Bat-fans who have already been scarred by names like Heath Ledger and Ryan Phillippe.

[via JoBlo]