Nerdvana

IMAGE COURTESY OF WETA

It’s called “An Unexpected Party” and we’re all invited. The Hobbit director Guillermo del Toro and producer Peter Jackson have asked fans to participate in a Q&A session via live chat on the Internet to discuss the upcoming Lord of the Rings prequel.

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My teenage son came home from school yesterday with a lava lamp. Yes, a lava lamp. No, he wasn’t reeking of patchouli. He made it himself.

His science class was studying the densities of different liquids.

I dug up a video from About.com that shows how easy it is to do this project at home with your Little Einsteins. All you’ll need is a bottle, vegetable or mineral oil, food coloring, water and Alka Seltzer. And don’t forget to place the finished product near some light for a funky-cool effect. Groovy!

The Associated Press is reporting that in Wales “A man who dressed up as Darth Vader, wearing a garbage bag for a cape, and assaulted the founders of a group calling itself the Jedi church was given a suspended sentence Tuesday.” As far as I’m concerned, this is what they call a victimless crime. Read the rest of this entry »

Last weekend USA Network cracked the whip in anticipation of Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull by showing all three previous films. This weekend, sister network Sci Fi dons the fedora — with a dose of journalism. Raiders of the Lost Ark airs at 4 p.m. Saturday, followed by Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. They air again Sunday starting at 1 p.m., followed at 9 p.m. by the new special Mystery of the Crystal Skulls, hosted by NBC newsman Lester Holt.

IMAGES COURTESY OF MARVEL COMICS

Marvel fans rejoice! There are more super-hero movies coming our way in the next few years, including Iron Man 2 and the long-awaited Avengers. We all knew this was coming after seeing the end of Iron Man, when Nick Fury (played by Samuel L. Jackson) shows up to recruit Tony Stark for the “Avengers Initiative”, but we didn’t realize Marvel Studios would deliver so quickly.

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LOSTWINDS IMAGE COURTESY OF NINTENDO

Nintendo has launched its new version of Wii Ware, turning the download station for Wii features into an online outlet for smaller-scale game releases that could one day resemble Xbox Live Arcade and PlayStation Store.

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The trailer for The X-Files: I Want to Believe is now online:

The movie, starring David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson as former FBI special agents Fox Mulder and Dana Scully, opens July 25.

BIG DADDY FROM TAKE-TWO’S BIOSHOCK

It’s official. Take-Two’s critically acclaimed video game BioShock is being adapted into a live-action movie. Universal Pictures, director Gore Verbinski (Pirates of the Caribbean), and screenwriter John Logan (The Aviator, Gladiator) will bring the creepy, underwater thriller to life, complete with Big Daddies and Little Sisters of course.

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Go to Toys “R” Us online now through May 17 and you can help choose the Star Wars scene that will be turned into a Toys “R” Us exclusive LEGO set.

The choices are: “The Arrest of Palpatine” (Revenge of the Sith), “Slave I and Cloud City Landing Platform” (The Empire Strikes Back) and “Mon Calamari Cruiser Set” (Return of the Jedi).

The winning set will be announced at the New York International Toy Fair in February.

I’ve got visuals from these scenes after the jump. Read the rest of this entry »

The Clone Wars. It’s almost upon us (Aug. 15). And I find myself not really caring anymore.

The poster is cool, right? And a new trailer debuted this week on all the Turner networks. It’s shiny! You can watch it right now at StarWars.com.

But it’s just not what I consider Star Wars.

Now, I’m not a prequel-hater. I enjoyed all three of them, and thought Revenge of the Sith was the high point in the new trilogy. And I’ll watch The Clone Wars. But don’t expect me to camp out for this movie, or even to catch it in theaters (a breakthrough! I hear my wife shouting).

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