Director J.J. Abrams is still in the process of casting Star Wars: Episode VII. I'm actually surprised that there have been no official casting announcements yet, but I imagine they are coming soon. 

There's a rumor that an actor named Jack O'Connell is up for a "key role" in the film. I'm not really familiar with the actor, but he's been in films such as Tower Block, Harry Brown, and Skins. According to sources at Bleeding Cool, the actor has "met with Abrams and the signs I’m getting are that this meeting went very well."

Up to this point, some of the names we've heard that are up for parts in the film are Chiwetel Ejiofor, Benedict Cumberbatch, Matt Smith, Rachel Hurd Wood, and Jason Flemyng. 

I'm excited to see who actually ends up being cast in the movie. In the meantime, all we have to go on are a bunch or short lists and rumors. 

Check out these phenomenal pictures drawn by MichaelThePure in which he reimagined Doctors 4-11 from Doctor Who in the style of Tim Burton! The work looks spot on for the style of the well-known director and screams to be put on a t-shirt at Hot Topic. Follow his page for updates upon his completion of 1-3, as well as 12!

Warner Bros. has released yet another TV spot for The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug. There's some new footage along with a bunch of quotes from critics telling us how epic the movie is. It comes out this Friday, and I'm so excited to see this story continue on the big screen! 

Via: THR

Paramount Pictures is officially moving forward with a sequel to Brad Pitt's World War Z, and they've hired Juan Antonio Bayona to direct it. For those of you not familiar with the name, he directed the ghost story horror film The Orphanage, as well as the tsunami survival drama The Impossible. He honestly seems like the perfect director to take on the zombie project. 

I thought the first movie was great regardless of it really having nothing to do with the Max Brooks book that it was supposed to be based on. The movie actually ended up getting decent reviews as well. I was really surprised by how it turned out. 

The first film ended with kind of a temporary fix to the zombie plague. Basically, it was a way to fool the zombies in not wanting to bite into your flesh. Pitt was reunited with his family and all was well. It will be interesting to see where they take the sequel. The original ending to the film included Pitt's wife being left in the hands of a "cold-hearted army officer and Pitt storming the shores of America, cutting through a zombie horde as his reunification journey really begins." It was more of a sequel ready ending, but maybe the studio thought the movie was going to bomb so they didn't want to take the risk of leaving it open for a sequel. 

As of right now there are no writers attached to the project, but Pitt is back to produce and star in the sequel as well. I'm really looking forward to seeing what story they tell with these characters in the sequel.

With The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug being released in theaters this weekend, Screen Junkies has released an Honest Trailer for the The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. As a fan of J.R.R. Tolkien's novels, I'm happy that Jackson decided to make three more films. I don't have a problem with how long the movies are, but it's sure fun to make fun of. This was a pretty funny Honest Trailer, so I hope you enjoy it. 

Strap in for The Hobbit, the only movie trilogy that takes longer to watch than to read.

Thanks to USA Today we have two more official photos from Tom Cruise's sci-fi action thriller Edge of Tomorrow. The trailer is set to come out tomorrow and having already seen it, I think you are going to love what you see! The photos feature Cruise and his co-star Emily Blunt. While talking about the film Blunt had this to say,

"I've discarded the bonnet and corset for an exosuit and a huge sword, it seems. I was looking for something very different from anything I have done before. This was definitely that.

"I even learned Krav Maga, a lethal martial arts using pretty much everything including your teeth to destroy. That was pretty fun."

The movie also stars Bill Paxton, Kick Gurry, Dragomir Mrsic, Charlotte Riley, Jonas Armstrong, and Franz Drameh. The trailer will be released tomorrow, so stay tuned! 

Edge of Tomorrow is set to hit theaters June 6th, 2014, and here's the synopsis! 

The epic action of Edge of Tomorrow unfolds in a near future in which an alien race has hit the Earth in an unrelenting assault, unbeatable by any military unit in the world. Lt. Col. Bill Cage is an officer who has never seen a day of combat when he is unceremoniously dropped into what amounts to little more than a suicide mission. Killed within minutes, Cage now finds himself inexplicably thrown into a time loop—forcing him to live out the same brutal combat over and over, fighting and dying again…and again. 

But with each battle, Cage becomes able to engage the adversaries with increasing skill, alongside Special Forces warrior Rita Vrataski. And, as Cage and Rita take the fight to the aliens, each repeated encounter gets them one step closer to defeating the enemy.

Abura-sumashi Assassin God

Check out this beautifully crafted set of fantasy warrior art by artist David Seguin, who previously did this Dragon's Den piece. This guy has such a cool illustration style. I'm excited to see what he brings us next. 

Sahara

Fallen

Dune Sea

Wedding Crashers and The Change-Up director David Dobkin has teamed up with Robert Downey Jr. and Robert Duvall to bring us a drama called The Judge. We have the first photo from the film featuring the two lead actors. 

The story follows Hank Palmer (Downey Jr.), "who returns to his childhood home where his estranged father, the town’s judge (Duvall), is suspected of murder. He sets out to discover the truth and along the way reconnects with the family he walked away from years before."

The movie also stars Leighton Meester, Vera Farmiga, and Billy Bob Thornton. The script was written by David Seidler (King’s Speech). The movie is set to open on October 10th, 2014.

The screenwriter currently working on Disney's sequel to Tron: Legacy, Jesse Wigutow, has just been hired by Universal Pictures to script a feature film version of the graphic novel Fire. The story comes from Brian Michael Bendis and was published by Icon Comics. It's about a college student who is recruited by the CIA only to find out he is being trained for a program that churns out expendable spies.

This is a project that Zac Efron has been trying to get off the ground, and he will play the college student in the story. Efron and Bendis sold the project to Universal during Sundance three years ago, and it's still slowly moving forward. 

Wigutow has also worked on a Disney project called Parallel and a remake of The Crow. This sounds like it will make for a good film project, and here's a more detailed story description.

Imagine that you are a shy, quiet college student. Just an average guy trying to get through each day as best he can. Then your government contacts you. They want you to be part of an experiment in the art of human covert operations. Instead of creating an agent from someone within their own ranks, they want to create an agent from nobody, from scratch, from you! Loosely based on events in the American intelligence community during the Reagan administration, Fire tells the unique and powerful story of a young man's journey through the complex world of international intelligence. Fire was Bendis' first major work and helped him attract and develop a new audience for crime graphic novels that he would further challenge in later works such as Jinx, Goldfish, Torso, and Powers.

Via: Deadline

No offense to everyone involved with this Freddie Mercury biopic being developed, but it just keeps getting less and less likely that it will be a good movie. 

British actor-turned-director Dexter Fletcher has been hired to helm the movie that will focus on the Queen frontman, who is set to be played Ben Whishaw (Skyfall, Cloud Atlas). When the project was first announced we had the talented team of director Tom Hooper (Les Miserables) and Sacha Baron Cohen attached to the bring the film to life. Those were the days that the movie felt promising. The band is still attached to the project, and apparently Cohen left because he wanted to make a hardcore, R-rated tell-all film, while the band wanted to tell a more watered down version. It's kind of a shame, as the watered down versions of things are always less interesting. 

According to Deadline, "Fletcher has been meeting the band and getting a feel for the Queen story, and that the intention is for the movie to get up and running next year regardless of whether Sony steps up. With the band’s songs part of the package, the pic will tell the formative coming-of-age story of the group, culminating in Queen headlining Live Aid in 1985. Queen’s performance is considered one of rock’s all-time great concert appearances. Mercury died November 24, 1991, of complications from AIDS, and while his death helped to remove the stigma of AIDS sufferers prevalent at that time and particularly in the rock music industry, Mercury’s last days won’t be the subject of the film."

Fletcher has had roles in films such as Misfits, Stardust, and Kick-Ass. He also directed films such as Wild Bill and Sunshine on Leith. I haven't seen either of those films, so I have no idea how good of a director he is. Maybe the film will turn out better than I think, I was just more interested in Cohen's version. 

An official synopsis has been released for Johnny Depp's upcoming sci-fi film project, Transcendence. It's being produced by Christopher Nolan and directed by his cinematographer Wally Pfister.

The plot synopsis basically confirms all of the story information and rumors that we've previously seen up until this point. It also offers up a few new details on where the story is going.

The movie also stars Rebecca Hall, Paul Bettany, Morgan Freeman, Cillian Murphy, and Kate Mara. Here's the synopsis thanks to Collider.  

Dr. Will Caster (Johnny Depp) is the foremost researcher in the field of Artificial Intelligence, working to create a sentient machine that combines the collective intelligence of everything ever known with the full range of human emotions. His highly controversial experiments have made him famous, but they have also made him the prime target of anti-technology extremists who will do whatever it takes to stop him. However, in their attempt to destroy Will, they inadvertently become the catalyst for him to succeed—to be a participant in his own transcendence. For his wife Evelyn (Rebecca Hall) and best friend Max Waters (Paul Bettany), both fellow researchers, the question is not if they can…but if they should. Their worst fears are realized as Will’s thirst for knowledge evolves into a seemingly omnipresent quest for power, to what end is unknown. The only thing that is becoming terrifyingly clear is there may be no way to stop him.

Transcendence comes out on April 18th, 2014, and it's sure to make for a really great film! 

Here's a really bizarre sci-fi short film called "Invaders From Space." It features the classic alien character designs from the old school Space Invaders arcade game invading our world. It's kind of a surreal, dark, and gritty take on the whole thing. 

The short comes from French indie filmmaker Thomas Lesourd, It's got some fun action that is also mixed together with a very European artsy feel. The director calls it "a photoreal experience of a war movie with real people fighting Invaders." Check it out! Thanks to io9.

This is the trailer for an Israeli revenge thriller called Big Bad Wolves. Quentin Tarantino called it the best movie of 2013, and it looks insanely intense! The story centers on a father who is tortures his little girl's killer for information on where he buried her head. This is the first U.S. trailer for the film, and I'm definitely looking forward to seeing it. 

In BIG BAD WOLVES a series of brutal murders puts the lives of three men on a collision course: The father of the latest victim now out for revenge, a vigilante police detective operating outside the boundaries of law, and the main suspect in the killings – a religious studies teacher arrested and released due to a police blunder.

The movie was directed by Aharon Keshales and Navot Papushado, and it opens in theaters and On Demand on January 17th, 2014. 

Director Alan Taylor's Terminator: Genesis seems to be gaining a lot of momentum! This film development is actually on a roll! It seems everyone is now referring to the new Terminator films as a reboot, so I'll start referring to it as a reboot as well. There's a bit of really interesting casting news on the film that we have today. According to Deadline, Zero Dark Thirty star Jason Clarke is in early talks to play the iconic role of John Connor in the film. 

You all know who John Connor is right? Just in case you don't or can't remember, he is the leader of the rebellion that fights against the Skynet artificial intelligence system that is hell-bent on wiping out the human race. You know what? If you don't remember, maybe it's time you watch the first two movies again. 

Clarke is a solid actor who also stars in the upcoming Dawn of the Planet of the Apes movie and had roles in The Great Gatsby and White House Down. It's looking like he and Game of Thrones star Emilia Clarke could end up starring alongside each other in the movie. If this casting all goes through it would be a great start to casting the film.

According the report, the expectation is that they will be able to make at least two Terminator films before certain copyrights revert back to the property’s creator, James Cameron. 

Via: Deadline

Fox has released four ape character posters for Matt Reeves' Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, and they've moved the released date to July 11th, 2014. Reeves also announced that the first trailer for the film will hit on December 18th at 6am PT. 

The movie stars Andy Serkis, Jason Clarke (Zero Dark Thirty), Gary Oldman (The Dark Knight Rises), Keri Russell (Mission Impossible III), Toby Kebbell (The Prince of Persia), Kodi Smit-McPhee (Let Me In, ParaNorman), Enrique Murciano (Traffic, Black Hawk Down), Kirk Acevedo (The Thin Red Line), and Judy Greer (The Descendants). 

Here's the synopsis:

A growing nation of genetically evolved apes led by Caesar is threatened by a band of human survivors of the devastating virus unleashed a decade earlier. They reach a fragile peace, but it proves short-lived, as both sides are brought to the brink of a war that will determine who will emerge as Earth's dominant species. 

I'm excited to see how this movie turns out. I really enjoyed the first one. 

Here's the first incredibly awesome trailer for Tom Cruise's sci-fi action thriller Edge of Tomorrow! The movie is based on the Hiroshi Sakurazaka book All You Need Is Kill, and it was directed by Doug Liman. This just looks like such a fun and exciting film, and I think it's going to deliver some solidly badass entertainment! I love the style and tone of the movie, and it looks like Liman did a hell of job bringing it to life. 

Lt. Col. Bill Cage (Tom Cruise) is an officer who has never seen a day of combat when he is unceremoniously dropped into what amounts to little more than a suicide mission. Killed within minutes, Cage now finds himself inexplicably thrown into a time loop—forcing him to live out the same brutal combat over and over, fighting and dying again…and again.

But with each battle, Cage becomes able to engage the adversaries with increasing skill, alongside Special Forces warrior Rita Vrataski (Emily Blunt). And, as Cage and Rita take the fight to the aliens, each repeated encounter gets them one step closer to defeating the enemy.

The movie also stars Emily Blunt, Bill Paxton, Kick Gurry, Dragomir Mrsic, Charlotte Riley, Jonas Armstrong, and Franz Drameh. It's set to be released on June 6th, 2014.

It looks like Peter Jackson's The Adventures of Tintin sequel is still on! Steven Spielberg directed the first movie, which ended up being a fantastic adventure film! The plan was to have Jackson direct the sequel, and that's exactly what he still intends to do. While speaking with BadTaste.it, the director confirmed that he will start work on Tintin as soon as he's finished with his Hobbit trilogy.

"As soon as I'm free of The Hobbit, I'll be going back into doing Tintin. It was held up by The Hobbit, but we have every intention of doing another Tintin movie and it's just waiting on me to be done with these Hobbit movies."

There have been rumors that the sequel will be based on a two-part story from the series, Seven Crystal Balls and Prisoners of the Sun, and that it would be called The Adventures Of Tintin: Prisoners of the Sun. There is also a chance there would be a third film, maybe even more possibly based on the Tintin book Destination Moon and Explorers on the Moon. 

The script for the sequel has been completed, and it was written by Anthony Horowitz. The plot of the film apparently involves Tintin and Captain Haddock investigating a strange illness that has befallen seven explorers who have discovered an Incan tomb, before traveling to Peru to get to the bottom of the mystery.

I'm looking forward to seeing Jackson's Tintin sequel! 

Here's another great piece of Minion mashup art. It places the Despicable Me characters in the classic trash compactor scene from Star Wars. This was actually a t-shirt design from TeeFury that was created by DJKopet. It seems like people really love these Minion mashups, and this one turned out pretty great. 

The BBC has released a new trailer for the Doctor Who Christmas special, The Time of the Doctor! It includes even more footage from the final episode of Matt Smith. It also features Daleks, Cybermen, Weeping Angels, and more! This looks like it's going to be a good one! 

Orbiting a quiet backwater planet, the massed forces of the universe's deadliest species gather, drawn to a mysterious message that echoes out to the stars - and amongst them, the Doctor. Rescuing Clara from a family Christmas dinner, the Time Lord and his best friend must learn what this enigmatic signal means for his own fate and that of the universe.

The special airs on Christmas Day.

We've seen a few cool end-of-the-year video compilations for movies already, but here's one from Malcolm Klock that focuses on video games. I had a lot going on this year and didn't get to play as much as I would have liked, but with the new year upon us, and the new systems in place, 2014 is looking like it's going to be a lot of fun for gamers. Here's a note from the creator of the video:

2013 has been a landmark year for gaming. New consoles have been released and the older ones have made a fantastic last impression with an incredible line-up of intense and innovative titles. Both mainstream and indie developers have pushed the boundaries of interactive entertainment in 2013, delivering experiences we'll be talking about for years to come.

These are by no means the only great games from 2013. Your favorite game isn't missing because I don't think it is worthy... more likely it just didn't edit together well with the rest or had to go to keep it under 2 minutes. I also attempted to give some screen time to overachieving indies that deserve the attention, rather than trying to cram in every major release.

What were some of you favorite games of 2013?