The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena (Xbox 360)
Developer: Starbreeze Studios
Atari
Release: April 7, 2009

More often than not, video games based on movies are, to put it gently, awful. Fortunately, some decent film-based games do slip trough, and I’m happy to say that The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena is a decent enough game. It does suffer from a few problems, but the overall game play, eye catching graphics and outstanding sound design make this a worthwhile purchase. Certainly, one of the great things about this game is that you get not one, but two games. Not only do you get the new Assault on Dark Athena game, but you also get a remake of 2004’s Escape from Butcher Bay (which was release for the original X-Box). Butcher Bay is apparently regarded as a bit of a classic, and it’s nice to see it brought up to date for the PS3 and 360. It’s too bad that the follow-up is just a mediocre shooter that doesn’t make good use of its central game play element, namely, Riddick’s ability to see in the dark.

Escape from Butcher Bay serves as a prequel to Pitch Black, and shows how Riddick got his most unique feature, his glow in the dark eyes. It also serves to fill in the back story between Riddick and William Johns, his jailer from Pitch Black. In the game, Riddick is sent to the titular prison of Butcher Bay, and immediately plans to make his escape, while fighting his fellow inmates. Assault on Dark Athena follows that story up with a similar one as Riddick is captured by mercenaries and again has to escape, this time from a space ship. Butcher Bay has a fun story, as you see how Riddick got those amazing eyes, and how he makes his eventual escape. Dark Athena also has a decent story, but feels more like a retread, although they do use it to explain some of Riddick’s softness for kids.

A couple of days ago, Collider got the scoop from an inside source that Comedy Central had ordered 13 new episodes of the ultra-popular sci-fi cartoon, Futurama. This was huge news that everyone had been anxiously waiting to hear about after we found out that Fox was pondering what to do with the show after a successful four-movie direct-to-DVD run. While I too was buzzing with excitement, I must admit, I was also incredibly skeptical due to the fact that this was the exact same order that Comedy Central made in 2006 before the four movies came out, and because when we last heard news, Futurama was waiting on Fox, not Comedy Central. Who was I to know they could tag team.

As it turns out, Collider’s insider was on the scent, and we can all now rejoice: Futurama is OFFICIALLY coming back to the air on Comedy Central, who have ordered not 13 episodes, but 26 new episodes!

20th Century Fox has put out a press release stating that due to the success of the four movies and the popularity of the show’s reruns on Comedy Central, they have made an initial order of 26 half-hour episodes that will also air on Comedy Central. Fox also retains the rights to air these episodes on a broadcast network, if they so choose.

God bless the Internet.

Avid Twitter-user Jon Favreau has been keeping his fans well up-to-date on the happenings of his Iron Man 2. Over the past couple of days, he has been dropping mini Tweet-sized hints that something new was coming very soon. Well, the man wasn’t lying, and via his latest message, he offered up a link to the first picture of Mickey Rourke as the dreaded Whiplash over at USA Today.

The image shows Rourke’s Whiplash at a race track sporting a makeshift suit of his own, which bears similarities to Iron Man’s suits. The suit will include two whips which are powered by that rascally glowing chest piece and will surely do some heavy damage. Favreau says that the matching glowing chest-pieces and technologies are “definitely related,” but no guarantees that Whiplash works as a designer for Justin Hammer (Sam Rockwell) as he does in the comics.

In an unexpected turn-of-events, it appears that actor Shia LaBeouf is going to pass on starring in the feature film adaptation of Brian K. Vaughan‘s brilliant graphic novel, Y: The Last Man, as Yorick Brown — a role that he had long been rumored to be a lock for.

It seems like an eternity ago that we heard that a movie based on Y was on the way. Then it was announced that Disturbia director D.J. Caruso would be directing the movie, and that the then-budding superstar LaBeouf would be starring. All was good in the world then.

Since that time, LaBeouf has become one of the top young faces of Hollywood, starring in blockbuster franchises with Transformers, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, and Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. This explosion of popularity has ultimately left a bitter taste in many a mouths and the once-perfect fit for Y: The Last Man suddenly didn’t seem so appealing anymore.

Bruce Campbell. The man, the myth, the mighty chin.

In the realm of cult cinema there is no greater name than his. Bruce embodies all the great qualities we look for in our cinematic icons: talent, personality, wit, charisma, humility, grace, and honesty. He may never be accepted in the Hollywood circles like so many before him who got their start in B-movies and then forgot about where they came from, because Bruce will never betray his roots or his massive, well-deserved international fanbase. Any movie he’s part of, be it a clever cameo (the Spider-Man movies) or a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it bit part (the last shot of Darkman, The Demolitionist, several recent Coen Brothers flicks), is all the better for his presence alone, but Bruce has more acting talent than his extensive resume of Sci-Fi channel flicks, failed television shows, and countless convention appearances would reveal to the uninitiated.

Here’s a list of Bruce’s 10 best performances in film and television, in the humble opinion of this writer.