The final season of Spartacus: War of the Damned begins January 25^th on Starz.  That’s tonight! We left off last season with Spartacus and his merry band of rebels facing the full might of the Roman legion, which are not against pulling shenanigans.

I was more than happy to sit down with Manu Bennett, who plays the undefeated Gaul and Spartacus BFF, Crixus.  Manu was passionate, assured, and especially candid as he spoke about his former co-star Andy Whitfield and what awaits Crixus in the new season. Generous to a fault, he also shared some spoils of war. (Note: This interview contains spoilers.)

The Flickcast: “Be Here Now” is emblazoned on your shirt.  Can you talk about why the phrase “Be Here Now” is important to you?

Manu Bennett: “Be Here Now” was a tattoo Andy [Whitfield] had on his forearm when he was going through his cancer treatment.  There’s a documentary that’s going to be coming out soon.

Rather than not being in the know about what happened to Andy, this documentary is for people who are really interested in the show and really fell in love with Andy and I know there’s so many people out there who did. I’m sure Andy would have liked everyone to go and watch this documentary to see what cancer can destroy in this life.

Despite what the weather might indicate around most of the country right now, we are knee-deep into October, the month where all the things that go bump in the night get their time to shine. Most people are probably well aware of some of the bigger horror releases taking advantage of this time of year, but there are other independent features that are hitting select theaters soon that your horror fans might want to know about.

One such upcoming film is The Cohasset Snuff film from up and coming filmmaker Edward Payson. For those who have no idea what this film is yet, lets begin with a synopsis:

In 2009, the small town of Cohasset, Massachusetts was rocked with tragedy. A 17-year-old high school senior named Collin Mason murdered three classmates. All the murders were videotaped and uploaded to the Internet via bit torrent sites and for three days, the world viewed the murders of these three innocent teens. 

Through legal action, the parents of the victims were able to remove all footage from the Internet and the town tried to save face by pretending it never happened. Bootleg copies of this footage are still passed around and downloaded through illegal means. The impact of this video is still being felt in Cohasset today. The video has become infamous, and is now referred to as The Cohasset Snuff Film.

It seems an easy leap to take the found footage sub-genre and focus on an infamous snuff film. Hopefully this will work to the film’s advantage as it can heighten the voyeuristic qualities of found footage and could really play with the audience’s sense of morality as they are entertained by horrific acts on-screen.

Check out an exclusive clip, the trailer and more after the jump.

The floor this year at PAX East included a section indie developers dubbed the Indie Megabooth- 16 independent developers showing off twenty of the latest and greatest indie games on all sorts of platforms. One of those titles was Tales from Space: Mutant Blobs Attack, the follow up to PSN title Tales from Space: About a Blob, now available for the Playstation Vita. I decided to pick up the title to play during my free time at PAX East, and I’m really glad I did.

Much like the Katamari games, Mutant Blobs Attack  requires you to eat everything in sight to proceed through the level, as long as it’s not bigger than you. But, while Katamari is a 3rd person perspective three dimensional game, Mutant Blobs Attack is a 2D sidescrolling platformer, more like Loco Roco.  As a blob, you’ll also gain powerups to allow you to fly, float, and magnetize yourself to walls.

The game utilizes the Vita’s controls without overdoing it and becoming cumbersome to play. You control the blob throughout the levels using the analog stick, but there are also a few random levels that require you to tilt the Vita around like a ball maze to try to move the blob to the goal. The back touchscreen don’t come into play at all, but the front is used to manipulate the environment to proceed.

Some are calling it Escape From New York in space, while others are calling it not worth making a pop culture reference, but that isn’t stopping the upcoming FilmDistrict/Open Road film from Luc Besson, Lockout from hitting screens this coming Friday.

With that, and an overall panic that the film isn’t going to play as well as the studio is anticipating, Besson’s banner studio EuropaCorp has released the first five minutes of the film for free on YouTube, for those who may need more convincing to see the flick.

Sure, there are some pretty campy moments before the title card even pops up, like why they felt the need to give Guy Pierce a “futuristic” haircut, or why they thought an effective way of giving backstory to the film’s hero would be through flashbacks in an interrogation.

Regardless, the film certainly looks pretty cool, and it’s nice to see LOST star Maggie Grace and Misfits star Joseph Gilgun get some solid work in a big budget sci-fi picture. Take a look at the first five minutes of the film after the jump, and catch Lockout in theaters this Friday.

There’s a lot at PAX East, which takes place this upcoming weekend, to be excited for- the show floor will be jam packed with tons of exciting games, the concerts at night will be rockin’, and there’s endless free play areas for console, PC, tabletop, and card games.

But one other thing you should definitely make some time for is the panels- they’re a chance to catch up with some of your favorite people in the industry, learn more about making videogames a career, or ask your favorite developer or community manager a question. Here’s some of the panels I’m most excited for this weekend.

Another WonderCon has come and gone. This year was slightly different than any year previous as this was the first time that WonderCon was held in Anaheim, CA and not its typical home of San Francisco.

Many people I spoke to enjoyed the change in venue, and liked the added space that the Anaheim Convention center seemed to provide.

One of the best things coming away from a comic book convention is the chance to look at pictures of the costumes, ruffle through your free swag, and watch fun videos captured around the convention. Enjoy them all after the jump.

You may not know her name, but I bet you have seen one of her videos.

Jessica Mill is the star and creator of Awkward Embraces, a web series about three nerdy girls working their way though the dating world of Los Angeles. The series has become popular among the “nerd” culture. Jessica herself has become a “nerd” icon on Twitter and Tumblr due to her frequent posts and nerdy sense of humor.

It was at WonderCon 2012 in Anaheim that I talked to Jessica. She reveals the details about three new web series she is working on including Damsels and Dragons. A new web series about a girl LARP (live action role playing) group that she is creating with Greg Aronowitz, designer of The Guild.

Watch my full interview with Jessica Mills below.

The Flickcast returned to Toy Fair on Monday to check out the newest figures, games and collectibles coming out in the next year. (Just in case you didn’t see last year’s gallery, check it out here)

Like the announcement last year of a new Thundercats reboot, this year was graced with a new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles line which we will talk more about in the coming days. We also got to take a look at the newest assortment of Skylanders coming out for this year’s Skylanders Giants. We also had the privilege to talk to the master scribe and artist Todd McFarlane about the latest lines he has coming out this year for Halo and the Walking Dead. Stay tuned for that later this week too.

There was tons of licensing going on this year, see the Dark Knight Returns Mr. Potato Head if you don’t believe us. LEGO also expanded on their licensing of the DC and Marvel franchises with life sized Hulk, Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman pieces as well as further expansion of their Star Wars line.

Surprisingly, Portal 2 had a huge presence on the show floor as well with Companion Cubes, Portal Gun replicas and even Cave Johnson Portraits.

Take a peek below at all this plus way more with our look at the show floor of Toy Fair 2012.

We had already heard that Cole from Infamous and PlayStation Japan’s anthropomorphic cat duo of Toro and Kuro were coming to the PlayStation 3 and PS Vita version’s of Street Fighter X Tekken. But now in their latest trailer, the team at Capcom may have put the final two nails in the coffin of the argument over which version of the game to buy.

Exclusive to the two Sony consoles will be two gaming classics. First, making his return to the fighting games arena after being left out of Marvel vs. Capcom 3 is Mega Man. But, this isn’t the same Mega Man that people have become accustomed to over the past twenty years. This Mega Man is returning all the way back to his old school gaming box cover roots from the very first Mega Man release. With his classic gritty costume in all its yellow and blue glory, this Mega Man even holds a gun as opposed to his arm equipped Mega Buster.

In another surpisingly wacky move, Pac Man has been added to the roster as well. That’s right. Pac Man. Now, we were as skeptical about how this would work when we first read it too. But if you check out the trailer below and see him in action, it almost begins to make some sense. Pac Man isn’t just going in by himself. Instead he will be operating some crazy wooden mech in combat. Think of it as a low tech version of Tron Bon’s robot from Marvel vs. Capcom.

Take a peek after the jump of the latest trailer featuring Pac Man, Mega Man, Cole, Toro and Kuro all in action. Stick to the Flickcast for more information on Street Fighter X Tekken as it becomes available.

The Flickcast recently got the chance to speak with Marshall Cook, whose new film Division III: Football’s Finest is now on Blu-Ray and DVD. Cook co-wrote, directed, edited, and starred in the film, which stars Andy Dick as an insane college football coach.

The Flickcast:  Congratulations on the movie; it’s hilariously funny. You clearly have a good sense of comic timing.

Marshall Cook:  Well, a lot of the supporting cast are writers, and it was a culmination of everyone’s work that went into this. I don’t have the ego to say I’m the funniest person here.

TF:  Did you write it with the actors you got in mind?

MC:  Yeah, pretty much all of them, except for a couple. Alison Haislip, who plays my love interest, auditioned and she was very similar to the girl it was based on; she had that guy’s girl personality.  Also, she’s just a solid actor. I’m really glad we got her.