I originally passed on this news today, because it seemed like a no-story. Julie Newmar, the number two Catwoman in my books (second to Michelle Pfeiffer), decided that not only did she think Angelina Jolie would be a great Catwoman, but that the actress has in fact made inquiries about such a role.

It’s a great story, sure: Julie Newmar, an icon in her own right, suggesting that one of the planet’s sexiest women could be the next Catwoman.

The 74-year-old Newmar, who played Catwoman in the 1960s Batman television series, reportedly told the NY Daily News, “My industry friends tell me [she] has made inquiries about the role.”

But that’s pretty much as far as the story goes really.

Luckily, we have overzealous reporters jumping in to ensure that this is much more of a story than it really should be. Sadly for me, these reporters seem to be jumping straight out of Australia, with News.com.au suggesting that Jolie “is said to be in final negotiations with studio bosses to play the feline villain who first appeared in the Batman comics.”

Last weekend, some of the geeks of Geeks of Doom made their way to San Diego for the annual International Comic-Con, the place to be.

There were tons of attendees dressed up as everything from Star Wars,G.I. JOE, and Watchmen (a big one this year), to anime, comic book, and video game characters. They definitely made this Con something special.

Below is set of pics, just a small sampling really, we took of people, events, and exhibits on the showroom floor — definitely a crazy place to be. Oh, it was mass insanity alright, but really not all that much different than walking the streets of NYC or riding the NYC transit system (something we NYC-based GoDs do every day). But it was also fun as hell.

The Mummy, which hit multiplexes a while back in 1999 with a dazzling array of CGI effects, is a movie that if you saw as a child, chances are that you loved it, and if by chance it is airing on the fifth Starz movie channel at 2:30 in the morning you won’t switch stations. It is the kind of film that offers ‘fun’ first, that you just want to abandon the sense of all reality and immerse yourself in the presence of death defying stunts that are sure to excite.

The Mummy recalls a magnificent time I had the last time my eyes laid upon it. That was some time ago. Now, with my knowledge of film and the respect that I have for it and the much more enhanced CGI work that has passed us the recent years, I was a tad hesitant to enter the movie at an older age. But what’s not to love about mummies that are thousands of years old, flying swarms of killing locusts, evil curses, love stories, good sidekicks, enemies, and those battles between corpses and archaeological human beings?

What saves The Mummy from falling into the waters of mediocrity is its loving, funny, and down-to-earth characters.

The lucky dogs over at Empire have managed to get four brand-spankin’ new images from the 2009 movie, Watchmen. These image are presumably to go into their next issue, which will with the two variant cover. See the covers and images here below.

Having finally finished the Watchmen graphic novel myself, I am getting more and more excited by what I am seeing here. Though it is awesome to see Rorschach and the Comedian, and seeing Archie is just amazing, for me it’s the glimpses of scenes pretty much directly out of the book which have me most excited.

This scene in the first image is definitely one of my favorites from the book, as I really like the characters of Dan and Laurie. And it seems to me a certain measure of intelligence has gone into crafting Laurie’s Silk Spectre costume. Instead of just a leather thong (yes, I’m sure you would have enjoyed that boys), it looks like she’s got some boy-panties going. Hopefully that will deal with any chafing issues she might have had.

Have you ever had a movie marathon? You know, like watching all the extended versions of Lord of the Rings in one sitting, and then realising your legs have atrophy and you’re unable to walk, so you invariably have to use an empty Coke bottle because you can’t get to the bathroom…. ok, I overstepped the mark a bit there, but you know what I mean.

Well, imagine playing a whole series of games, and not stopping until you’ve completed every game in that series. Now, depending on the game series… you could be there a while.

This was a feat completed recently by The Mario Marathon Team, who took it upon themselves to complete all 7 Mario games in one arse-numbing 57-hour session. What was the point? Well, the 3 friends raised over $11,000 for the Child’s Play Charity — a worthy cause in anyone’s book.

Not content with that sole venture, the MMT are doing it again, but this time with all the Zelda games. Now remembering what Zelda: A Link To The Past was like… the broadcast could last a very long time!

One of the more interesting projects that is being developed to capitalize on the superhero flavor of late is David S. Goyer’s project, Super Max. We first encountered it as a weird twist on the superhero movie, with Green Arrow’s alter ego, Oliver Green, being sent to prison and having to escape. There was to be no tights, no capes; just Green Arrow and his wits in a prison of people he had put there.

However, according to Goyer, it looks as if it had started out not as a DC property, but as a “Marvel or DC” property.

Speaking in an interview at San Diego Comic Con over the weekend, Goyer noted that that, “It started out as a supervillain-escape idea, and the idea was, well, we can either go Marvel or DC.”

With August just around the corner, the premiere of Star Wars: The Clone Wars will follow close at hand, and LucasFilm is dropping all manner of clips and news on us. San Diego Comic Con saw a clip from the movie, plus a clip from the continuing TV series, and now MTV has got an exclusive snippet from the film.

The clip once again focuses on the new character, Anakin Skywalker’s Padawan, Ahsoka Tano. Together with Anakin, and some clonetroopers (maybe from the 501st?), they head into battle.

Watch the clip here below. And make sure to check out our Countdown to Clone Wars series every Thursday morning.

Popular radio shockjock Howard Stern will produce a remake of Rock ‘n’ Roll High School, the 1979 cult classic which starred the iconic punk band The Ramones.

Alex Winter, who we know and love as the excellent Bill S. Preston, Esq. in Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure, will pen the script.

Stern, who has interviewed The Ramones many times over the years on his radio show, said he got involved with teh remake because he is a fan of the original Roger Corman-produced musical comedy.

The original film starred PJ Soles as Riff Randell, a rebellious punk rock-loving teenager who would do anything to go see her favorite band, The Ramones, in concert. But her music-hating oppressive high school principal Miss Togar has other plans for her. With the help of The Ramones, Riff and her friends prepare to take over the school and oust the evil Togar.

Yes, I know it’s been a while since I did a weekly review column, and for that I apologize. It’s been a pretty crazy and hectic last month, but I’m back on the clock, so it’s time to get down to business. I’ll be tossing in some older books as well, just to catch everyone up to date. Let’s see what we’ve got!

PULL LIST 07-2008

* Avengers Initiative #15
* New Avengers #43
* Secret Invasion #4
* Dan Dare #7
* Black Summer #7
* Glamourpuss #2
* War Heroes #1
* Final Crisis: Requiem
* Final Crisis: Rogues’ Revenge #1
* Booster Gold #1,000,000

Avengers Initiative #15
After reading the last few issues I’ve come to realize Initiative is the best Avengers book being published, and is one of the best Marvel books around. I’ve been wildly entertained by basically every issue of the series, and it somehow finds a way to stay interesting and entertaining. Writers Dan Slott and Cristos Gage have presented us with a nice rotating cast of characters with a basis of a few interesting leads, while still maintaining the action. This issue is no different, as the new 3-D Man (formerly Triathlon) thinks that the whole Initiative base has been overrun by Skrulls, thanks to his special goggles that allow him to see disguised Skrulls for what they are. The only problem is one of two actual Skrulls on the base, Crusader, has reversed the polarity on the goggles, so he is seeing humans as Skrulls, and vice-versa.

To coincide with the release of the third Mummy film in theaters this Friday, we here at Geeks of Doom are giving away two (2) The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor prize packs!

The upcoming third Mummy film stars Brendan Fraser, Jet Li, and Maria Bello. For more about The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor, check out the “About” section below.

The blockbuster global Mummy franchise takes a spellbinding turn as the action shifts to Asia for the next chapter in the adventure series, The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor. Brendan Fraser returns as explorer Rick O’Connell to combat the resurrected Han Emperor (Jet Li) in an epic that races from the catacombs of ancient China high into the frigid Himalayas. Rick is joined in this all-new adventure by son Alex (newcomer Luke Ford), wife Evelyn (Maria Bello) and her brother, Jonathan (John Hannah). And this time, the O’Connells must stop a mummy awoken from a 2,000-year-old curse who threatens to plunge the world into his merciless, unending service.

Not long ago, we reported that Darren Aronofsky would be directing the much-talked about Robocop reboot. Some of the big rumors surrounding this project are that it would be PG-13 — which is the “in” thing these days — and that it might be filmed in 3D. Everyone also wanted to know whether it was a remake, a sequel, a re-imagining, or what. Well, MTV has a couple articles that seem to have most of the answers for inquiring minds.

Most importantly, it looks like our prayers are answered and that the movie could very well be heading toward the R-rating is so definitely deserves. Producer Mike Medavoy (who also worked on the original movie) said that it was likely to get its R rating unless the director decided to cut some of it back, which, knowing Aronofsky, isn’t something that will happen unless it has to.

Together Tim Burton and Johnny Depp make up a dream team of cinematic collaboration and have made some of the greatest movies of the past several decades. Now Tim Burton is working on a new version of the Lewis Carroll classic Alice in Wonderland for Disney and it seems like Johnny Depp might be by his side on this one.

The news is that Depp is to be playing the Mad Hatter, a role I cannot wait to see him pull off. His past Burton-esque roles have been baffling and brilliant, and an iconic character such as the Mad Hatter must be an absolute dream for Depp.

A source close to the film has said of Burton that he “has had designs on ‘Alice in Wonderland’ since before he was famous. He has a knack for turning what seems like stories for just kids into gripping, spooky fables loved just as much by adults. He’s held out on doing ‘Alice’ until he got a big enough budget. Now this film is financed by Disney so money won’t be a problem.”

As a young boy, one of the better impersonations I could do consisted of speaking from the back of my throat in a semi-high pitched voice, and saying “I do believe you are right.” Marvin the Martian was one of my favorite animated characters at the time, and still is. His exploits on Planet X versus Duck Dodgers in the 24½th Century still make me laugh today.

But that the popular Looney Tunes character is coming to a big screen near me sometime soon does not necessarily bode well. Warner Bros. plans, after seeing the success of such movies as Alvin and the Chipmunks, have decided to bring one of their beloved characters to the big screen.

In this original Mummy film, Boris Karloff plays the Egyptian mummy Im-Ho-Tep, who’s accidentally brought to life by British archaeologists 3,700 years after being buried alive. Once revived, Im-Ho-Tep sheds his funeral wrapping and takes on the persona of Egyptologist Ardath Bay with the intent to reunite with the reincarnation of his long lost love, Princess Anck-es-en-Amon, the young Helen Grosvenor. Unfortunately, in this lifetime, Helen’s in love with someone else, and while she is mesmerized by Ardath Bay, in order for the lovers to reunite in their ancient roles, Helen will have to die and be reborn as Im-Ho-Tep was.

This 1932 black and white Universal horror classic was greatly inspired by the discovery a decade prior of King Tutankhamun’s tomb and the supposed curse it contained. Universal was making a name for itself in the horror/monster genre and thought that The Mummy would be the perfect follow-up vehicle for Karloff, who had at the time just gained recognition playing the iconic Frankenstein’s Monster in Frankenstein.

As we all know, The Dark Knight is tearing through box-office records like a lightsaber through some Skywalker limb, but what you’re not so aware of is that all of this success is completely thanks to the MPAA and their anti-piracy mission.

OK, well, not really, but they are doing their part for the greater good! Fine organization those MPAA peoples.

It’s no big secret that piracy is a huge thing out there. People from all over — like Seinfeld’s Kramer, for instance — slip into an early showing of a film, set up a video camera, and a few hours later it’s available to the world in all its shaky, blurry, off-center, muffled, horrid glory.

While everyone is aware of this, measures are taken to cut it down as often as possible, according in an article in the LA Times. Warner Bros. took many steps to protect its own interest (understandably) by sending out the film in multiple parts so it couldn’t be stolen as a whole, checking in randomly at theaters, and using night-vision to spot camcorders. As the studio behind TDK, you can understand their efforts.

IDW Publishing is planning a 4-issue comic book series that will serve as a prequel to events in McG’s upcoming Terminator Salvation.

The events of in the comic book series will take place in the year 2017, which is one year prior to the scene of the fourth Terminator film. The first issue will be release in January 2009, with the final issue coming out right as the movie hits theaters in May 2009.

The series, written by Dara Naraghi with art by Alan Robinson, will show what life was like once the machines took over, but before John Conner becomes the leader of the resistance.

McG was in attendance at the 2008 San Diego Comic Con for Terminator Salvation and he brought Sam Worthington, Anton Yelchin, Bryce Dallas Howard, Common, and Moon Bloodgood with him. Christian Bale, who plays the adult John Conner in the upcoming film, obviously has some other things going on at the moment with this little film he’s in this summer, so he was in Japan promoting that.

I have to say, this was certainly the most informative group I’ve heard from the Con. They definitely buckled down and offered a lot of good, solid answers to good questions. Some were funny, but for the most part, we learned a lot, like McG has the go-ahead from the studio to make this movie rated R (see SDCC 08: McG Gets Blessing For R Rating For ‘Terminator Salvation’).

McG started off by sharing that this all started off by listening to the fans and they wanted to see the future of the Terminator world. They weren’t excited about making Terminator 4, but they were excited about re-inventing the franchise. He even told people that he spoke to a few gentlemen about the project whom you may have heard of, like James Cameron, Arnold Schwarzenegger and the late, great Stan Winston whose studio did the designs, as it should be.

Last Saturday a horrible rumor starting spreading regarding Lexi Alexander, the director on the upcoming Punisher: War Zone movie being put out of the film by Lionsgate and Marvel. Apparently, sometime prior to the San Diego Comic Con this past weekend, Alexander was fired, even after principal photography had finished.

At the Punisher: War Zone panel at SDCC last Thursday, Gale Anne Hurd, producer on the film, told people that Alexander was away on her honeymoon. According to Harry Knowles at AICN, this was nothing but a “cover” or, as Knowles described it, a “bald face lie.”

It seems that multiple sources are confirming that Alexander has indeed been fired from the movie, as has Christopher Franke the film’s composer, and replacing his work with heavy metal music. Needless to say, no one is happy about this, after hearing the attached music to the movie’s trailer at the panel.

Hot on the heels of some new images revealed today, the teaser trailer for Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince has been posted on Moviefone.

You can watch the teaser trailer here below!

The teaser is very dark and we’re guaranteed to be venturing into a new layer of the world of Harry Potter — a not so friendly world. Also, I’m pretty sure I saw Gandalf in there fighting the Balrog, it might have been Dumbledore and a lot of fire, though.

Why they used that worthless one-line, no-image teaser for The Dark Knight in IMAX and not this one is completely beyond me, but none-the-less, here it is.

As Peter Jackson and Co. did with The Lord of the Rings, New Line founders Bob Shaye and Michael Lynne, under their new Unique Features banner, are looking to bring Isaac Asimov’s Foundation series to the big screen.
An epic science fiction series, spanning literally hundreds of years and cataloguing the rise and fall of civilizations, [...]