Yesterday no less an authority than President Camacho himself, Terry freakin’ Crews, promised us that a new trailer for The Expendables 2 would be arriving online today to put a blood-and-skull-splattered boot in our collective ass. Sure enough as I sit here with The Dirty Dozen, the original (and still best) of the all-star superteam action-adventures, playing in the background I sit here writing this: Today Crews’ loud and awful snarly promise was fulfilled.

You can watch the mighty new trailer here below.

I’m a huge fan of the first Expendables, but having re-watched it on Blu-ray recently it’s clear that the movie has serious problems when it comes to the narrative structure and the staging of the action sequences. Don’t get me wrong, Sylvester Stallone did a fine job directing the movie overall, especially when you take into account that he was also writing and starring in the movie at the same time (and taking some near-paralyzing injuries in the process). But when the aging but still active action hero announced that a new director would take the helm of The Expendables 2 while he stuck to acting duties I took a great amount of relief in that news.

The first teaser trailer for Lionsgate’s summer 2012 testosterone-fiesta The Expendables 2 has been released. You can watch the trailer and read the official plot synopsis here below.

The trailer is little more than Bruce Willis‘ menacing Mr. Church (the character he played in the single scene he shared with Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger in the original) confronting Stallone’s Barney Ross about a deal they made and how it’s time to pay up, followed by a roll call of the movie’s cast. Eleven actors, and not one neck between them.

The first poster for The Expendables 2 (or EX2, as it’s dubbed here) has arrived, and it’s a surreal thing to lay eyes on.

Explosions and gunfire act only as a border to the multi-headed beast that is this movie’s cast. The poster features a veritable who’s who of 1980s action movie stars including Sylvester Stallone, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Bruce Willis, Chuck Norris, Jean-Clause Van Damme, and Dolph Lundgren. They’re joined by returning stars Jason Statham and Terry Crewes, as well as who I’m assuming is either Nan Yu or Amanda Ooms, who must be an important character as she beat out other stars Jet Li, Randy Couture, and Liam Hemsworth for a spot on the one-sheet.

Head on over to the other side now to check out the poster for The Expendables 2 now!

The Expendables
Directed by Sylvester Stallone
Starring Sylvester Stallone, Dolph Lundgren, Mickey Rourke, Jet Li, Jason Statham, Terry Crews, Randy Couture, Steve Austin
Rated R
Release date: August 13, 2010

Since The Expendables was first announced in 2008 the idea of bringing together some of the finest cinematic tough guys and badass motherfuckers of the past three decades for one big blood, bullets, and bombs brouhaha sounded like the wet dream of millions of action movie geeks brought to life in booze-and-steroid-infused flesh. I was raised on a steady diet of badass from the moment I was born. When I was a child my celluloid heroes were Han Solo and Superman. My mother didn’t think I was ready for R-rated movies, the threshold you had to cross to truly be a man. When I turned ten the time had come. During my summer vacation I caught the HBO premiere of the immortal Die Hard and my mind was promptly blown by the glorious on-screen action and the awesome presence of the one and only Bruce Willis in his signature role as badass New York cop John McClane. My exposure to such large scale chaos until then came chiefly in the form of cartoons like Transformers and G.I. Joe (which one day would ironically become big screen cartoons only with flesh-and-blood folks playing one-dimensional characters), but watching Willis bury bullets in the heads and asses of a bunch of heavily armed German thieves was a serious cultural awakening nothing could’ve prepared me for. By the time I was eleven and my parents allowed me to watch Lethal Weapon for the first time, the doors on a brave new world were forever opened for me. I may have still inhabited the body of a shy, snot-nosed kid who grew up dirt poor and never had many friends, but from that moment on I was a man, in my heart at any rate.

A panel for Sylvester Stallone‘s action overdrive movie, The Expendables was held early on at Comic Con 2010. This is one of the movies that you’ve likely seen a ton of times via TV spots and trailers that have been released over the past few months. The Expendables brings together a who’s who of action stars in an attempt to reclaim the beauty and brutality that were the action films of the ’80s, and nothing could sound more exciting.

The panel — moderated by Ain’t It Cools’ own head geek, Harry Knowles — featured Stallone, who wrote, directed, and starred in the movie. He was joined by Terry Crews, who offered up a little Old Spice P-P-P-P-P-P-POWER! by ripping his shirt open when he came out, Dolph Lundgren, UFC legend Randy Couture, Stone Cold Steve Austin, and Bruce Willis, who peeked in for a few minutes having been there already for the RED panel. A cameo by a cameo actor — how perfectly fitting.

Because the movie has been known for so long, not a lot needed to be said. The panel was really just a chance to get an awesome collection of action stars out there to chat a bit about the movie, making it, and other things.