Sequel rumblings: Indy 5 and Star Trek

While talking to MTV News, Harrsion Ford dished up a little talk about the fifth Indiana Jones film, but doesn’t elaborate much on George Lucas’ “crazy but good” idea for a new adventure, and concedes that his Extraordinary Measures co-star Brendan Fraser would probably have his Rick O’Connell character from The Mummy franchise beat Indiana Jones to the treasure nowadays.

Variety reports that Paramount released that the next Star Trek film will have its release on June 29, 2012. While J. J. Abrams will be producing, no word yet on whether he will be directing, or just adding lens flare effects. John Cho reports to IGN Movies that he’s hoping for some Khaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaan in the sequel, which could either be Star Trek 2, or Star Trek 12 depending on how you count. Meanwhile SciFiWire finds some Trek fans in Seattle use body paint to make Trek uniforms (warning: NSFW). Maybe they could wear some Star Trek wetsuits.

LucasArts opening up vault for direct download of ‘classic’ game titles

Something something BattlefrontLucasArts announced via Twitter that they are going to be releasing many of their older PC game titles for direct download. The first batch of ten classic games, including Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis, LOOM, Star Wars: Battlefront II and The Dig will be re-released on July 8 via Steam, the online delivery system from Valve Entertainment. Steam will also be the download system for the PC version for the upcoming Monkey Island remake The Secret of Monkey Island: Special Edition, coming out July 15.

The full list of games being released on July 8 contains some classic graphic adventures, and some more recent action titles:

  • Armed and Dangerous
  • Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis
  • Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade: The Graphic Adventure
  • LEGO Indiana Jones: The Original Adventure
  • LOOM
  • Star Wars Battlefront II
  • Star Wars Republic Commando
  • Star Wars Starfighter
  • The Dig
  • Thrillville: Off the Rails

This is only the first batch of classic LucasArts games to be released – and noticeably some popular game franchises are absent, possibly to be re-released in future batches: Maniac Mansion, X-Wing, Dark Forces, and Grim Fandango. No pricing information is yet available.

Meanwhile, the new Monkey Island game from Telltale Games, has its first episode coming out tomorrow, Tales of Monkey Island – Chapter 1: Launch of the Screaming Narwhal for PC. The Wii version will be released in the coming weeks.

Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis was also included as a bonus game in the Wii version of Indiana Jones and the Staff of Kings, released in June 2009.

Drive-by movie news: Wolverine, Star Trek, Kyle Newman and more

Wolverine rules the box office. Naked Hugh Jackman and friends brought in a whooping $160M worldwide this weekend. Also interesting? 47% of the U.S. audience was female. (Hey, look: It had issues, but it was better than X3. Plus, naked Jackman.) Looks like there may be a sequel in the offing after all.

Next week’s shiny. Wolvie faces his first real competition with the release of the new Star Trek on Friday. Anticipation is high, and the reviews are almost ridiculously positive – 100% on Rotten Tomatoes at the moment. And if you must know, Geoff Boucher has the skinny on the film’s homage to ESB.

And on that note… Stephen King’s Dark Tower series may be next for J.J. Abrams.

Let’s not forget Fanboys. With the DVD out in a few weeks, Lightsabre talks to director Kyle Newman.

Only because I am obliged to post it. Pretty much nothing going on with Indy 5.

Your final comic book tidbit. The first picture from Iron Man 2.

Hey man, nice shot: Han Solo on EW’s ‘cool’ list

Entertainment Weekly has placed Han Solo at #7 on their list of the 20 all-time coolest heroes in pop culture. And he’s not even the only Harrison Ford character on it; Indiana Jones makes #2, beat out only by James Bond. The ladies are no slouches, either: Ellen Ripley is #5 and Buffy is #8, with Foxy Brown, Nancy Drew, and Sydney Bristow also making appearances.

UPDATE: Jezebel is annoyed that there weren’t more women on the list. Can’t really blame them there!

Miller’s Wild Space and Rollin’s Crystal Skull novelization up for tie-in awards

The Clone Wars: Wild Space by Karen MillerThe International Association of Media Tie-In Writers has announced their nominees for the 2009 Scribe Awards, and two Lucasfilm works are on it. Karen Miller’s The Clone Wars: Wild Space got a nod for Best Speculative Fiction Adapted, while James Rollins’ adaption of Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull is up for Best General Fiction Adapted. Miller is “massively chuffed!”

This is the first Scribe nomination for any Star Wars (or Indy, though that pool is considerably smaller) work, though Alan Dean Foster was named last year’s Grandmaster.