Clash of the Titans
Blu-ray | DVD | Video On Demand
Directed by Louis Leterrier
Starring Sam Worthington, Gemma Arterton, Liam Neeson, Ralph Fiennes, Mads Mikkelsen
Release date: July 27, 2010

Hollowness is found at the center in director Louis Leterrier‘s Clash of the Titans. What should be a glorious and romantically fueled approach to the classical Greek myth succumbs to the travesties of CGI. It results into an unnatural depiction; one in which charts Man’s rebellion against the Gods. The 1981 film of the same name managed to depict the same premise so naturally by using special effects of the older Hollywood tradition (stop-motion effects). Greek myths are almost impossible to re-imagine. Their fluency and fantastical aura surrounding them makes such tales inadaptable to the big screen. Their qualities work best when they are intertwined within a contemporary story and setting, working successfully as metaphors and allegorical tales. Leterrier’s version doesn’t depend on adventure tactics and characters’ motives. Its reliance is on solely adhering to so much CGI.

Leterrier imposes upon himself the duties of mythic storyteller. So burdened with this task he tries to elude previous depictions of this myth and venture out on his own limb and recreate the myth from his own vision. He does not want to stay in accordance with the 1981 film. All the more respect for him. But most of the time an untidy representation of this mythical world pervades Leterrier’s entire picture. His picture suggests no orderly activity, offering sporadic moments of engaging action set-pieces and others that hit rock bottom. The 1981 film feasted on extravagant action sequences that felt real and looked plausible enough to represent a Greek myth. Most importantly that film cashed in on the romantic and emotional qualities that managed to drive the film toward recognizing the different uniforms of humanity. Deliberate attention was paid to the emotional aspect whereas the 2010 film shows no inquiry into this subject, resulting with characters that manifest no worthy sentiment. We find our lack of caring and emotional attachment towards the film’s characters deriving mainly from their inabilities, or the script’s (either one), to evoke the slightest notion of feeling.

Deadline is reporting that they’ve gotten word of a new deal that will see Lost creator, writer, and producer Damon Lindelof working on a rewrite of the script for Ridley Scott‘s horror classic prequel, Alien.

This doesn’t mean that Lindelof’s polished script will be the final one used for the movie, but he did meet with Ridley and the ideas shared were impressive enough to bring about the deal. Now Lindelof will get to it, submit his script, and see where things stand from that point.

Lindelof has become a much-recognized name over the past few years due to the incredible success of Lost, but has also quickly begun trying to solidify himself as a top screenwriting talent. In addition to this Alien prequel, the writer has also been collaborating with both Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci on the scripts for J.J. Abrams’ untitled Star Trek sequel and Jon Favreau’s comic book adaptation, Cowboys & Aliens.

There are changes coming to the world of the Amazing Spider-Man in November when the series cuts back from its current schedule of three issues a month and goes to just two issues a month. Each issue will feature 30 issues of the main story and then will have a 9-page back-up story. Another change coming to the series will see the end of the rotating cast of writers, as Dan Slott becomes the sole writer for the series, although others will be writing some of the back-up stories. One further change will see a rotating team of artists handling each story arc. The three rotating artists on the book will be Stafano Caselli (recently on Secret Warriors), Humberto Ramos, and Marcos Martin. Ramos will be drawing the first arc, starting with issue #648. Caselli will draw the next arc, with Martin drawing the third. The price for each issue will be $3.99.

The Brand New Day experiment has worked well for Marvel, making Spider-Man not only one of its best-selling titles, where it should be, but also making it one of its most consistently excellent titles. It will be interesting to see how the book differs with just one writer as opposed to the large group of writers. Marvel has decided to give the book a new subtitle, much as they did with the Brand New Day title. Now they’re subtitling it “Big Time.”

The first trailer and poster for the upcoming live-action/CGI cartoon adaptation Yogi Bear has shown up online. The movie will join Garfield, Alvin and the Chipmunks, Marmaduke, Scooby-Doo, and the upcoming release of The Smurfs as similar cartoon makeover movies we’ve seen made.

Yogi Bear features the voices of Dan Aykroyd as Yogi and Justin Timberlake as Boo-Boo. The live-action roles will be filled with Anna Faris as Rachel, Tom Cavanagh (TV’s Ed) as Ranger Smith, and Cloverfield‘s T.J. Miller as Ranger Jones.

Click the image to check out the poster and head over to the other side to take your first peek at the live-action Yogi Bear trailer. Does it look as bad as the others have, or is it set to become an exception?

Irish-born illustrator Dave McElfatrick of popular Explosm.net web comic Cyanide & Happiness is asking for help in obtaining a work visa to the United States so he can continue working on animated shorts with co-creators Matt Melvin and Rob DenBleyker.

The only problem is that the U.S. doesn’t think C&H is legitimately popular enough to merit the type of visa McElfatrick would need to work in the country, which just seems insane until you realize how ridiculous it would sound trying to explain the humor of some of their comics to your grandma and/or crochety old uncle.

A little background on C&H for all of you who might be unfamiliar with it right off the bat: According to Alexa, Explosm.net is ranked #2,773 most popular website globally and #1,358 most popular in the U.S. America accounts for over 40 percent of the site’s total traffic. Yet, this isn’t sufficient enough to prove that he’s worthy of the visa apparently.

McElfatrick is asking fans who want to help to sign a petition and spread the word about his plight.