by Sebastian Suchecki, Dec 7 2010 // 9:00 AM
Not many people snynomize Neil Patrick Harris with video games. They do, however, consider him one of the greats when it comes to awards show hosts. Which is why Spike TV’s decision to hire him as the host of this Saturday’s Video Game Awards.
G4 may have their own version of the awards, but Spike’s show is considered the be-all, end-all of video game award shows. You can expect to see guests like the cast of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, Guillermo Del Toro, Nathan Fillion, Chris Hemsworth, Olivia Munn, and a musical performance by My Chemical Romance.
You can check out the full awards show live on Saturday, December 11th at 8pm ET/ 5pm PST. Here’s the full press release announcing the new host.
New York, NY, December 6, 2010 – Acclaimed television, film, stage and video game star Neil Patrick Harris has been handed over the controller and will host Spike TV’s 2010 “Video Game Awards.” Broadcasting in over 175 territories worldwide from Los Angeles, the “VGAs” will celebrate the best in gaming on Saturday, December 11 at 8 p.m. ET/5 p.m. PT.
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Posted in: Announcements · Awards · Comedy · Games · Geek · News · Sci-Fi · Spike TV · Video Games
Tagged: Chris Hemsworth, Guillermo del Toro, How I Met Your Monther, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, Nathan Fillion, Neil Patrick Harris, Olivia Munn, Spider-Man: Shattered Dimensions, Spike TV, Video Game Awards, Video Games
by John Carle, Dec 7 2010 // 8:00 AM
Back at New York Comic Con, we got the chance to get an exclusive interview with some of the developers of Sega’s upcoming Thor: God of Thunder. In the interview, one of the topics that could not yet be touched upon was bringing on the actors from the film to do the voice work in the Thor: God of Thunder video game.
Now, Sega has formally announced that this will be the case as Chris Hemsworth and Tom Hiddleston will lending their voices to the digital adaptations of Thor and Loki respectively. In addition to their voices, the on screen likenesses will be based off of both Hemsworth’s and Hiddleston’s appearances in the Thor movie.
“Bringing in Chris and Tom to star in Thor: God of Thunder gives us AAA talent that will create a truly cinematic interactive experience,” said Gary Knight, Senior Vice President of Marketing at Sega Europe and Segaof America. “Mighty Thor and the trickster Loki will face off with real emotion while giving fans visual and vocal continuity between the video game and film adaptations of the Marvel franchise.”
Thor: God of Thunder is being penned by current Uncanny X-Men scribe Matt Fraction in a story that is totally different from the movie as Sega has told us. Fraction was recruited early on in the project as his story lead to much of the associated gameplay and villains that needed to be created for Thor: God of Thunder.
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Posted in: Announcements · Games · Marvel · News · NYCC · Playstation 3 · Video Games · Wii · Xbox 360
Tagged: Chris Hemsworth, Marvel, Marvel Studios, Matt Fraction, Mjohnir, Nintendo DS, NYCC, Playstation 3, Sega, Thor, Thor: God of Thunder, Tom Hiddleston, Video Games, Wii, Xbox 360
by Matt Raub, Dec 7 2010 // 7:00 AM
There you have it. Sunday night’s finale of AMC’s The Walking Dead may have had us in a tight little ball of tension for an hour, but it was one of the highest rated cable programs in history. This can only mean great things for Frank Darabont, Robert Kirkman, and the whole team at AMC. Here’s the breakdown:
Six million viewers tuned in for the show’s sixth episode, including four million adults 18-49. That’s up 9% from last week — which was also a series high.
If you include the show’s 11 p.m. encore, the finale delivered a whopping 8.1 million viewers.
All told, Walking Dead has become, according to AMC, the most-watched basic cable series of all time in the young adult demo.
Who would’ve thought that zombies in Atlanta would be the one uniting factor for people across the country? Apparently AMC did, as they’re already excited for a new 14-episode season to pick back up in October of next year.
The Blu-Ray and DVD release is currently set to hit shelves on March 8th of next year, so be prepared.
Posted in: Action · AMC · Comics · Drama · Horror · News · TV · TV Ratings
Tagged: AMC, Andrew Lincoln, Gale Ann Hurd, Robert Kirkman, The Walking Dead
by Erik Jensen, Dec 6 2010 // 3:30 PM
Coming as no surprise to the millions of iPhone users whose calls just got dropped, Consumer Reports announced today that AT&T is the lowest-scoring cell-phone carrier in the U.S., according to a satisfaction survey of 58,000 ConsumerReports.org readers.
Of all of the carriers reviewed in the survey, only AT&T suffered a statistically meaningful drop in satisfaction among its customers over the past year. Surprisingly, at least to me, was the fact that U.S. Cellular beat out every major provider, including Verizon Wireless.

The survey covered a total of nine categories, asking respondents to rate their carrier on overall value, voice and data service, phone support, staff knowledge, and resolution of issues, among others. AT&T scored an overall 60 out of a possible 100 points across the various categories; a full 9 points below the nearest competitor, T-Mobile.
Sprint also made an amazing turnaround this year, leaping ahead of T-Mobile and virtually tying Verizon. Consumer Reports claims that Sprint even scored better than Verizon in some aspects of customer service.
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Posted in: Apple · News · Tech
Tagged: AT&T, Cell Phone Satisfaction, Consumer Reports, iPhone, Mobile Carrier Satisfaction, Sprint, T-Mobile, U.S. Cellular, Verizon
by Douglas Barnett, Dec 6 2010 // 2:15 PM
Greetings War Movie Monday fans. This week’s pick is the 1970 20th Century Fox classic Tora! Tora! Tora! which depicts the attack on Pearl Harbor on Sunday December 7, 1941 as seen through the eyes of both the American and Japanese Forces. The attack on Pearl Harbor was what hurtled a shocked and outraged America into the chaos of World War II.
The film was made at a time in which a lot of the information was becoming available to the general public who were still unaware of the political back story which led up to the attack. The film was primarily casted with B-list talent as to not draw attention away from the story.
The cast includes Martin Balsam (Adm. Husband E. Kimmel, Cmd-in-Chief, U.S. Pacific Fleet), Joseph Cotten (Sec. of War Henry L. Stimson), E.G. Marshall (Col. Rufus Bratton), Soh Yamamura (Adm. Isoroku Yamamoto, Cmd-in-Chief, Imperial Navy), James Whitmore (Vice Adm. William “Bull” Halsey), George Macready (Sec. of State Cordell Hull), and Jason Robards (Lt. Gen. Walter Short, Cmd-in-Chief, U.S. Army Forces Hawaii).
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Posted in: 20th Century Fox · Academy Awards · Classics · Drama · DVD · DVD Reviews · Editorial · Reviews · War · War Movie Mondays
Tagged: Akira Kurosawa, DVD, E.G. Marshall, George Macready, James Whitmore, Jason Robards, Joseph Cotten, Kinji Fukasaku, Martin Balsam, Netflix, Richard Fleischer, Soh Yamamura, Toshio Masuda
by Chris Ullrich, Dec 6 2010 // 1:15 PM
We don’t always take rumors very seriously around here. When you’ve been in the news game as long as many of us have you tend to take most rumors with a Gibraltar-sized chuck of salt. So, it is with that caveat that we bring you news of the new Mac App store and its rumored launch date.
According to one of those infamous and anonymous “inside” sources, Apple plans to launch the Mac App Store one week from today, on December 13th. Why then? Well, as the source indicates, Apple CEO Steve Jobs actually wanted to launch the new store today but those pesky “delays” pushed the launch back to next week. I’m sure Jobs took that well.
In case you’re not familiar with the forthcoming App Store for the Mac, it will be OS X’s equivalent to the iTunes App Store for iOS devices. It won’t be the only place to get Apps for the Mac it will just make it more convenient and better for developers. . . hopefully.
Posted in: Apple · News · Software · Tech
Tagged: Apple, Apple Mac App Store, iOS4, iTunes, iTunes Store, Mac, Mac Applications, Macintosh, Software, Steve Jobs
by Chris Ullrich, Dec 6 2010 // 12:15 PM
In what could be definitely be considered a bad news/good news situation there’s been some developments among shows that we like here at The Flickcast. First off, FX has decided not to give freshmen series Terriers a second season due to, it would seem, the show’s continued mediocre ratings.
But with every cloud often comes a silver lining. This time that lining comes in the form of Showtime’s announcement that it will be renewing Dexter for a sixth season given that the show remains very popular and series star Michael C. Hall continues to be healthy.
While I’m happy about Dexter, I’m pretty disappointed in FX and their decision about Terriers. The show as very well done and told an interesting story with compelling characters you actually cared about. Obviously, that’s not something FX was interested in. Of course, the low ratings didn’t help either.
When considering the show I have to wonder why it never found and audience. Was the story too much of a downer? Were people not interested in a flawed protagonist who worked at the fringes of the law? Was the name confusing or off-putting in some way? Or do people just not like Donal Logue?
If you watched the show and are disappointed at its cancellation what do you think was the reason? Sound off in the comments.
Posted in: FX · News · Showtime · TV · TV Ratings
Tagged: Dexter, Donal Logue, FX, Michael C. Hall, Michael Raymond James, Showtime, Terriers, TV, TV Ratings
by Shannon Hood, Dec 6 2010 // 11:00 AM
Well, this season of The Walking Dead certainly went out with a bang, didn’t it? Sorry, I never met a bad pun I didn’t like. Once again, we don’t see many zombies, but there was tension running rampant throughout the entire episode as members of the group find themselves in one predicament after another.
I thought it was a stellar episode to cap off the season, and thankfully, the writers took a little mercy on us. They didn’t leave us with a gigantic cliffhanger that we have to wait a whole year to resolve.
Well, except for what the heck did Dr. Jenner whisper in Rick’s ear? Are you going to be obsessed as I am over the answer to that?
The episode, entitled “TS-19,” begins with a flashback of Shane back at the hospital. It is revealed that he actually did make a valiant attempt to save Rick, but became overwhelmed by the military (who were indiscriminately shooting anyone they saw) and Rick’s medical fragility.
Rick was hooked up to lots of equipment, and Shane simply didn’t know what to do. Add to that the walkers lurching about, and Shane did what any sane person would -he left (but not before placing a rudimentary barricade in front of Rick’s door).
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Posted in: Adaptation · AMC · TV · TV Recaps
Tagged: Andrew Lincoln, Frank Darabont, Graphic Novels, Laurie Holden, Recaps, Robert Kirkman, The Walking Dead, The Walking Dead season finale, The Walking Dead: TS-19, Zombies
by Sebastian Suchecki, Dec 6 2010 // 10:00 AM
While Skyline may not have turned too many heads in theaters last month, Sony is hoping that won’t effect the turnout for their big alien invasion film set to hit theaters next year: Battle: Los Angeles.
The last trailer we got gave us a bit more of the titular Battle, but this new trailer to hit the web now gives us history of this world where aliens have been invading for years. Here’s the synopsis.
For years, there have been documented cases of UFO sightings around the world – Buenos Aires, Seoul, France, Germany, China. But in 2011, what were once just sightings will become a terrifying reality when Earth is attacked by unknown forces. As people everywhere watch the world’s great cities fall, Los Angeles becomes the last stand for mankind in a battle no one expected. It’s up to a Marine staff sergeant (Aaron Eckhart) and his new platoon to draw a line in the sand as they take on an enemy unlike any they’ve ever encountered.
Not only does this new spot show us more, but it spills the beans in a possible franchising plan by calling this film World Invasion: Battle Los Angeles. Does this mean we could get more Battles after this one? We’ll have to see how LA fairs against the extra terrestrials on March 11th.
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Posted in: Action · Movies · News · Sci-Fi · Sony · Trailers · Video · Viral Marketing
Tagged: Aaron Eckhart, Battle: Los Angeles, Bridget Moynahan, Chris Bertolini, Jonathan Liebesman, Michael Peña, Michelle Rodriguez, Ne-Yo, Ramon Rodriguez, Sony Pictures
by John Carle, Dec 6 2010 // 9:00 AM
Not to toot our own horn but the second internally we heard about a new project being announced from Twisted Pixel that we were told we wouldn’t want to “miss”, we knew Ms. ‘Splosion Man was on her way and we couldn’t be happier.
Twisted Pixel has shown they have what it takes to produce top rate games on the XBLA platform including the original ‘Splosion Man, the Maw and Comic Jumper. Now, it seems fitting that they finally jump into the world of sequels with their highest rated and arguably most successful title.
Taking a page from the classic Pac-Man formula, Ms. ‘Splosion Man adds a bow and some pink to the original star to create an entirely new experience. Actually, the experience isn’t that different but it becomes more polished and hopefully adds more ours of fun to the original formula.
Make sure to check out the full press release below, written in Twisted Pixel’s unique and only slightly disturbed sense of humor detailing the “inadvertent creation” of Ms. ‘Splosion Man and look at the first teaser trailer as well.
Stick to the Flickcast for more on Ms. Splosion Man as details become available.
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Posted in: Announcements · Games · Video Games · XBLA · Xbox 360
Tagged: 'Splosion Man, Announcements, Michael Wilford, Ms. 'Splosion Man, TwistedPixel, Video Game Announcements, Video Games, XBLA, Xbox 360
by Matt Raub, Dec 6 2010 // 8:00 AM
Finally, some more believable casting news for the upcoming Spider-Man reboot. Lately, we’ve been fielding news about names like Sally Field (now playing Aunt May), Martin Sheen (Uncle Ben) and Denis Leary (Capt. Stacey) joining the film, but now we have some more grounded information, as four new names have been added to the film.
Campbell Scott (The Exorcism of Emily Rose), Julianne Nicholson (Kinsey), Irrfan Khan (Slumdog Millionaire), and Annie Parisse (Rubicon) are all now joining the cast. Here’s the scoop from THR.
Scott and Nicholson will be Parker’s parents, who leave their son an orphan. Parker’s parents have rarely been seen in the various Marvel comic book series and have never appeared on-screen. It is unclear if they will appear in flashbacks, in a prologue or during the course of the movie.
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Posted in: Action · Announcements · Columbia Pictures · Comics · Marvel · Movies · News · Reboots and Remakes · Sci-Fi · Sony
Tagged: Andrew Lincoln, Annie Parisse, Campbell Scott, Denis Leary, emma stone, Irrfan Khan, Julianne Nicholson, Marc Webb, Martin Sheen, Proto Goblin, Rhys Ifans, Sally Field, Spider-Man, Van Atter
by Shannon Hood, Dec 6 2010 // 7:00 AM
Seems that everyone got their fill of turkey and movies last week, as the overall box office was down 54% from last weekend. Don’t worry, that’s normal. Despite the box office being fairly slow, Tangled managed to best Harry Potter and finished the weekend in first place with $21.5M. That brings its total to just over $96M.
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 took a comfortable second place finish with $16.7M. It dropped off about 65% in its third weekend. The film is still playing on over 4,000 screens.
Burlesque and Unstoppable tied for third place, earning $6.1 each. Love and Other Drugs nabbed the fifth spot, making $5.7M.
The Warrior’s Way opened to little fanfare, and no screenings for critics. The film failed to make any sort of impact at the box office, placing in 9th place for the weekend, barely clearing $3M.
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Posted in: 3-D · Box Office · Disney · Movies · News
Tagged: Black Swan, Box Office, Burlesque, Due Date, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1, Love and Other Drugs, Movie News, News, Tangled, Unstoppable