Yeah. These were going to go up yesterday, but Starcraft 2. Also Batman Under the Red Hood. Yeah, i know it’s been available for weeks on the torrent sites, but i decided to wait for the blu-ray with the Red Hood action figure…only it turned out to be another faux, arm waving mini statue, like Owlman. Nice sculpt and all, but fool me once – shame on you, fool me twice – bonus chromosomes unlocked.

Anyway, here’s pics of Jessica dressed up as Power Girl, a superheroine with massively schizoid continuity: she was initially an Earth 2 analog to Supergirl, retconned into a magic Atlantean or something post-Crisis, then recently had her original origin as a boat person refugee from Krypton restored, making her basically Superman, plus better costume and bullet-proof cleavage.

All of this begs the question, though, how did comic book nerds back in the 80′s deal with the whole Crisis thing, with no internet to vent, and no access to free porn as an escape? Considering the wailing and gnashing of teeth that goes on today over costume changes and deaths that are nobody even pretends will be more than temporary, were there mass suicides over Crisis? I’d like to believe there were. “I just don’t want to live in a world where Alan Scott and Hal Jordan are somehow supposed to rationally coexist…please tell Mom this is not her fault.”

More pics after the jump…be all wondrous of spirit and shit, and click through.
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So there were 4 Green Lantern teaser movie posters at SDCC, featuring first looks at characters including a pink faced Mark Strong as Sinestro and Peter Sarsgaard as balloon-headed psychic Hector Hammond…who seems like an intensely lame choice for a franchise-launching villain. Imagine a drastically less cool M.O.D.O.K., and then cast the most bland actor you could find, not named Mark Ruffalo. I don’t get it.

I know nerd bitching and whining about unreleased movies is depressingly cliche, but it’s not as if i’m pretending i’m not going to see it 2 or 3x over the opening weekend, or worked into some frothing furor. It’s just from actors cast to the comic con presentation/promotions there’s just something really underwhelming about the whole affair, on almost every front. Especially in comparrison to what Disney/Marvel did, literally throwing down the Infinity Gauntlet…and DC/Warner’s response is fucking Peter Sarsgaard looking like a hemmoroid with a pedobear mustache.

I say almost every front because Green Lantern couldn’t have a more potentially perfect director. Martin Campbell made Casino Royale, the absolute best action movie ever shot. With all due respect to Kenneth Branagh and Joe Johnston, they’ve got nothing on him…and Joss Wheedon can choke on a bouquet of dicks.

Also in the film’s plus column: uninspired casting or no,  Mark Strong does look good as Sinestro…and Blake Lively kinda sorta managed to look like Jessica Biel in that poster.

Another year, another crushing realization that comic con virtually never lives up to expectations. Quick recap of my 3 favorite things to come out of the Con proper (so not counting the free drug buffet at the SyFy party.) #1 has to be the first images of Natalie Portman looking very White Violin in whiteface makeup for Darren Aronofsky’s Black Swan. Ever so thouroghly waiting for this on multiple levels: Aronofsky’s The Fountain might just be the most staggeringly beautiful film ever shot. Also, Natalie Portman / Mila Kunis sex scene.

I’m sure there’ll be a damn story to get in the way (Perfect Blue redux, by some accounts), but i would happily pay $2o to just watch 2 hours of that.

#2 is the aforementioned shot of Daniel Craig as a vortex manipulator-sporting Time Agent (well…looking like one, anyway) in Jon Favreau’s Cowboys and Aliens.

#3 is Mattel FINALLY doing an action figure of DC’s second greatest supervillain Prometheus, even if it is one of those tiny, superhero squad-esque, barely articulated mini figures. It’s gratifying and promising that they at least know who he is. (Pic stolen from AFI‘s outstanding coverage of all things toy at the con.)

Honorable mention for this.

The biggest disappointment? Probably a tie between Craig announcing there’s still no forward momentum on the next Bond movie, or this is your Star Sapphire.

Missed the panel at SDCC, but was ecstatic to see this gorgeous image of Daniel Craig in next summer’s Cowboys and Aliens. I’m  just going to operate on the assumption that he’s playing a Time Agent, like Captain Jack Harkness, and that’s his Vortex Manipulator on his forearm. Even if the movie ultimately ends up contradicting this, i don’t care, i’m sticking with that, and will do all the mental retconning necessary to believe it.

Still waiting to see what Olivia Wilde is doing in this, and how she’ll look. Cowboys and Aliens opens July 29, 2011.

Have i mentioned that i have 3 movies on my phone at the moment, and 2 of them are Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace? Because I do. Quantum has gotten exponentially better with age (the whole Bregenz Opera House sequence may just be the most artfully shot part of any Bond film), and it possess awe-inspiring balls for mocking the global warming movement before the East Anglia emails and Al Gore’s implosion.

Have to say I adore that poster. Was so afraid the season 5 posters would be all maudlin and morose, so glad somebody thought better of that…at least some of us were kind of euphoric over what happened to Rita.

Dexter panel at SDCC today debuted the teaser trailer promo for season 5, and borrows the “Conscience is a Killer” tag-line from the marketing materials from The Shield season 6. Dark times ahead for the Dark Passenger. Series does indeed appear to be picking up immediately after the close of season 4, exploring the reprecussions of the Trinity Killer’s parting gift. No reference to any season arc-ing big bad, yet, but Quinn appears to be picking up where Doakes left off…which could be interesting. Michael C. Hall looked quite strong onstage and in the clips, so fuck you cancer.

Knew about Julia Stiles, but Peter Weller joining the show this season as a troubled cop who had a history with Harry was news to me. Loved Weller on 24 and Fringe, can’t wait to see what he does. Too bad he couldn’t have been on last season for a Buckaroo Banzai reunion with Lithgow.

Dexter season 5 starts Sunday September 26, 2010 on Showtime.

I’ve loved pretty much everything Zack Snyder has done, Watchmen and 300 are on the short list of truly great films, and he’s exhibited impressive artistic growth with each new movie…so i’m very much looking to his Sucker Punch. Warner Bros released 6 character posters for his upcoming Sucker Punch, offering a first look what the film has in store…and judging by the posters, it’s Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow meets Moulin Rouge. Jamie Chung in her Amber outfit looks very much like an uber-fetishized version of Angelina Jolie’s Nick Fury Franky.

Still, if you’re going to borrow, bonus points for borrowing from the best. (By the way, Salt is f-u-c-k-i-n-g dope!!! Wish Kurt Wimmer had actually directed it, too, for bonus gunkata and color-changing Jolie, but as is it’s a brilliant action movie.)

Very much liking the look of Vanessa Hudgens as Blondie, and Jena Malone (Donnie Darko‘s girlfriend!!) as Rocket.

Sucker Punch is out March 25, 2011.

New Tron: Legacy trailer debuted simultaneously online and at a panel at SDCC, and while it looks utterly fantastic, all i can think of is maybe they picked the wrong band to score it. The great Daft Punk is composing and performing on the film’s soundtrack, but when i look at the digital, psuedo Jeff Bridges in the trailer, i can only think of Aphex Twin.

I say that as a compliment, btw…Windowlicker might be the 2nd or 3rd best music video ever shot. Fake Bridges is definitely from the good part of the Uncanny Valley. TRON: Legacy opens December 17, 2010.

I’ve mentioned on here before that former America’s Next Top Model winner Adrianne Curry and her geek-baiting random twitter pics come off more than a bit like a desperate attention whore (yes, we can smell our own…) But anyone who actually appreciates Aeon Flux, much less goes to the trouble of dressing like her, is good for a lifetime pass as far as i’m concerned. Generally reviled 2005 movie adaptation aside (i quite liked it, even if it failed as an adaptation), Peter Chung’s gorgeous animated series from the early/mid-90′s might just be the most brilliantly innovative post-human pop culture product released since Enki Bilal’s The Nikopol Trilogy or Blade Runner.

Also, proving that sometimes you can beat a dead horse,  Curry managed to find a pose that makes the Slave Leia bikini costume interesting again. Still, the two other slave leias in the background serve as testament to just how ubiquitous it’s become.

Also, also, i don’t know the story behind this pic of Kelly Brook in a very slave Leia-inspired one piece, but it’s also quite fetching as well. Sometimes all a cliche needs is a fresh take…

The point of all this? Fuck i don’t know. The point is i’ll be going back and forth to SD today, probably won’t even get to use my sweet hotel room, and all i want in the world right now is to put together a better Aeon Flux costume than Curry’s.

Was up ’til 4 watching Inception (Christ it’s dope!!!!!!!!! If Marion Cotillard really is Nolan’s Catwoman, i’m  very much okkk with this.), but here’s another superheroine cosplay set. This time it’s DC’s Black Canary. We did her Birds of Prey sorority sister Huntress last week, and figured it was about time we attempted Dinah Lance’s superhero alter-ego.

Black Canary is a highly skilled hand-to-hand combatant, has an ultrasonic scream power, and played key roles in various superteams including the JLA [i have no idea if she's still considered a founding member, but she was at one point (Wikipedia says that's been retconned since 52; thanks Wikipedia!)], JSA, and the aforementioned Birds of Prey. But her comic book career highlight has to be doing Batman on a rainslicked rooftop in Frank Miller’s brilliant, much maligned All-Star Batman and Robin.

See more pics after the jump. Or not. You decide your own level of involvement.

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Reaction seems all over the place, but mostly negative, to the first shot of Ryan Reynolds in the costume for the Green Lantern movie, on the cover of Entertainment Weekly. I quite like it, but what do i know. It’s unearthly, radiates power, and reminds me of the way they did Dr. Manhattan in the Watchmen movie…but then, the only things i really care about seeing in a Green Lantern movie are a staggeringly gorgeous Star Sapphire (unlikely, as they cast Blake Lively…but i’ll reserve judgment to see what the great Martin Campbell comes up with), Arisia, and a yellow painted Batman in a yellow painted room utterly owning Hal Jordan on every conceivable level.

Just for the record, i also dig the new Thor, Loki, and Odin costumes revealed in this still…they too look futuristic and otherworldly, which would seem reasonable for extradimensional gods, to a non-fan like me.