Just over 24 hours before G.I. Joe hits screens nationwide, there are still plenty of rumors and whispers on how good or bad this movie will be. Critics seem to be torn as well, as RottenTomatoes gives it a 93% while Empire says the film is “Bond without the style and Team America without the bellylaughs“. Before the rest of the world gets to weigh in on the subject, it looks like director Stephen Sommers is already planning a return to the franchise.

In a recent interview with Sommers, he talked about some of his new projects coming up, including a retro-style Tarzan film, and yes, a sequel to G.I. Joe. From Super Hero Hype:

There’s a couple [projects], but mainly I’m getting very excited about doing “G.I. Joe 2.” I’m working on “Tarzan” at Warner Brothers and they’re a bunch of great people. (It will be) live action but we’ll contemporize it. It’ll still be a period movie, but it’s almost like “The Mummy,” it took place in Ancient Egypt and the ’20s and ’30s, but it felt more contemporary, that sort of deal.

Sommers continues to say that if Paramount wants it, he’d be ready to start work on G.I. Joe 2 as early as September. While we’re still clambering for details on this Joe movie, Sommers released a new concept image of Destro’s mask, and to say the least, it looks more promising than Cobra Commander’s helmet. Paramount’s G.I. Joe hits theaters this Thursday night at midnight at select theaters. Check out a bigger version of the helmet after the jump.

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We cover a lot of video games from publisher Activision here at The Flickcast. Of course, there’s also many other companies producing or distributing cool video games that we’re fans of. One such company is the powerhouse Electronic Arts. They make a lot of games and we try to play them all. They also produce games based on movies and one such game is the upcoming G.I. Joe: the Rise of Cobra, based on the movie of the same name.

I got a chance to take a look at the game and its trailer during the recent E3 event in Los Angeles. And now, thanks to the the magic of the Internets, I can bring that trailer to you right here. In the trailer you can see that the game tries to capture all the action, explosions, gunplay and spirit of the movie and, if this trailer is any indication, seems to do a pretty good job at it. Games based on movies have gotten a lot better lately and this one looks like its no exception.

The game hits store shelves on August 8 and the movie on August 7. Check out the trailer after the Jump.

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At the San Diego Comic-Con, IDW Publishing revealed several major digital comic book expansions for the iPhone and iPod Touch. IDW’s newest offerings include the G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra prequel comics, Transformers and CSI. An expanded electronic catalog of the G.I. Joe and Transformers tales, as well as Danger Girl, Astro Boy, Groom Lake, John Sable Freelance and GrimJack will also be available in the weeks ahead.

“The digital medium represents a huge opportunity for the comics industry, and we’re proud to be leading the way,” states IDW CEO, Ted Adams. “Through e-publishing, we can introduce an entire new audience to comics and the joys of comic books.”

IDW launched the first digital Transformers comics in May, and rapidly became a popular paid iTunes application. The Transformer catalogue also includes the prequel and adaptation graphic novels for the original movie. IDW’s entire G.I.Joe: The Rise of the Cobra prequel comics are now available, with the movie adaptations coming soon. The fan-favorite series G.I. Joe: Origins and the CSI comic series are now available for download on iTunes.

In addition to new material and story lines, IDW will also bring the classic 1980s Transformers and G.I. Joe series to the iPhone, iPod Touch and the Internet, beginning with Classic Transformers, which can be found online at classic-transformers.com.

IDW’s classic comic expansion will begin J. Scott Campbell and Andy Hartnell’s sexy spy comic, Danger Girl. Danger Girl #0 is currently available as a free application on iTunes, and features an eight-page preview of the comic.

In anticipation of the soon-to-be-released G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra, Paramount has dropped a bunch of new images from the film on us. Although we still haven’t seen much of Joseph Gordon-Levitt as Cobra Commander, these new images do give us a better sense of the size, scale and scope of the film. To be honest, several of these images look like stills taken directly from some of the recent trailers for the film.

Still, and I’m sure I’m pretty much the only one out there who feels this way, these new pictures do make me even more excited for this movie, even if I’ve seen  some of them before. I know, you’ve seen the trailers or whatever and you think the film looks lame, corny, campy or “insert negative adjective here.” But I, on the other hand, think it looks pretty much exactly how a movie based on a line of toys should look. Don’t agree? Take a look at Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen.

Are you going to tell me that Transformers looks serious or is a series movie? Nope. It looks exactly like its supposed to look — and so does this one. Its a movie based on a line of toys people, its not Shakespeare. Get over it and just go see the movie for what it is: a fun Summer ride where you check most of your brain at the door and go for the fun.

Don’t expect much in the way of meaning or deep substance and you won’t be disappointed. G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra hits theaters August 7. Check out the larger pics after the jump.

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According to a recent TV Guide interview, one of my favorite characters from Lost who, sadly, got eaten by the smoke monster, would like to return to the show. Like most fans of Lost, I was pretty disappointed when Mr. Eko, played by the awesome Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje (previously seen on Oz),  seemed to die in season three. Eko was a very interesting character who helped Locke discover new ways of looking at things. Plus, he was just cool.

Adewale, who will guest star in the Aug 7 episode of Monk and appears in G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra, now says, according to the interview, that he wants to go back to the island. The actor says he left the show after his parents died in 2006, but he’d like to return to give his character some closure.

“To be able to give that rich character some completion would be nice,” he told TV Guide.

Agreed. It would be great to see him return to Lost. The show is still going well and I’m enjoying it very much, but his character, of all the ones who’ve died so far, is the one I miss the most. If there’s a choice between bringing him, or one of the other characters like Charlie or Boone back, I hope Lost‘s producers decide on Eko. Let the rest stay dead. They weren’t that interesting anyway.

To take a look at yesterday’s Pull List Reviews, click here.

Captain Britain and MI13 #14 – Marvel – $2.99
Score: 8.5

This is one of the times where the vocal minority needs to help save a book. If Spider-Girl could be saved, this book most certainly deserves it. Unless something happens in the final issue #15 that prevents the characters from being able to appear in future issues like the entire nation of England being nuked off the map, there is no reason the series shouldn’t continue.

At the New York Comic Con this past February, Paul Cornell was praised for his work on the series. Now months later, it is being brought to an end far too soon. The past few months, the book has fallen just short of the top 100 comics in terms of sales which may be why Marvel is giving it the axe despite being the best Captain Britain series in recent memory, especially after the dismal storytelling of New Excalibur.

By the end of the previous issue, the war between Dracula and his vampire army and the nation of Britain had taken a huge toll. Captain Britain had been expelled from his country as Spitfire had turned on her own team, resulting in the deaths of Pete Wisdom, the Black Knight and Fauza. Blade also turned his back on the battle and walked away. The hardest part of this issue is to describe the events that happen within because of the sheer volume of spoilers it would contain. Most of the enjoyment of the issue comes from the surprises that come up that would only be ruined if I tried to describe the plot in detail here.

Usually comics lend themselves to the “holy crap” moments with a stunning final panel setting up for the next issue. This issue bucks that trend in its first few pages. What follows is a great example of Leonard Kirk’s fantastic pencils of action scenes combined with the dry British dialogue that Paul Cornell has mastered so well, probably since he hails from Britain it gives him an unfair advantage writing it. Kirk also does a great job with the way he draws blood in the issue. Often times, gory battles can come across as gratuitous.

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Last week on The Flickcast, the team discussed and debated a slew of new topics including Apple announcements from the World Wide Developer Conference, the recent E3 gaming convention, The Hangover, Kirsten Dunst joining Spider-Man 4, movies in 3D and a whole lot more.

This week, Chris and Matt have to go on without Christina but are joined by special guest Rick Marshall of MTV’s Splashpage and Movie’s Blog to talk comics, movies and all things geek. Some of the topics discussed this time around include John Carter of Mars casting, the rebirth of Captain America, why Tim Burton should return to the Batman franchise.

They also talked about Rick’s favorite comic book-to-film adaptations (including Iron Man and Man-Thing), the disappointment of Spider-Man 3, the power of Twitter in movie marketing and upcoming comic-book-to-film adaptations including Whiteout, Scott Pilgrim and Iron Man 2.

Chris, Matt and Rick also made some picks this week including one of Rick’s favorite comics, Sleeper, Matt’s pick of one of his favorite movies called Fortress, featuring Christopher Lambert and Loryn Locklin, and Chris’ pick of John Carpenter’s Escape from New York.

As always, if you have comments, questions, critiques or offers of sponsorship, feel free to hit us up in the comments, on Twitter and at Facebook, MySpace or via email.

For yesterday’s Pull List Comic Reviews, go here. Otherwise, read on for today’s.

Wolverine #74 – Marvel – $2.99

Score: 7.0

Wolverine #74, the final issue before the series becomes Dark Wolverine and focuses on Wolverine’s son Daken, concludes the two stories started in the previous issue. The first is a story about an old biker friend of Wolverine’s by the name of Horrorshow who has asked a favor of Wolverine, to find and help his son who is believed to have killed members of Horrorshow’s biker club and set the wheels in motion for a war between two gangs. While other leaders of the gang pressure Horrorshow in to declaring war, Wolverine appears back at the bar to let his friend know that his son is dead.

Obviously not happy about this news, Horrorshow takes his anger out on Wolverine. As Wolverine is knocked unconscious from the attack which he doesn’t defend himself, a flashback ensues showing what happened between Wolverine and Horrorshow’s son. Though not a critical tale to Wolverine’s mythos, this story has some very interesting aspects as it lets the reader in on so much of his emotional state. While he has fought tooth and nail with his son Daken in Wolverine: Origins, this is the first time that Wolverine has ever really be able to voice his feelings about the situation.

Specifically, his thoughts on the redemption of others are covered rather bluntly in the issue. Daniel Way does a good job in this aside story for Wolverine. It’s nice to see him somewhat out of his “normal” element as he now appears in so many books where he is always surrounded by cataclysmic confrontations with megalomaniac super villains. Here, Wolverine gets to act human and have real emotions and reactions.

He doesn’t need to act on his animalistic instincts. He gets to actually be Logan. Tommy Lee Edwards’ art is something that can go either way for the reader. The same style as the Marvel: 1985 miniseries, it comes across in a very sketch-like style, very similar to what you’d see in courtroom sketches. It’s not something that does it for me but it is also not something that detracts from the story either. The dark theme of the story is actually helped by the shadowy lack of detail at times.

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Over at Latino Review they’ve got a story up about G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra director Stephen Sommers being locked out of the editing room and fired from the film. This story is based on an internet message board post at producer Don Murphy’s website claiming to be from an “insider” who talks about how bad the film was testing with audiences and that in an attempt to save the film, Sommers was fired and a new “fixer” editor was brought on board.

Latino Review has also updated the story recently with an interview with the film’s producer, Lorenzo di Bonaventura, who denies everything and says of the story: “It’s very unfair to Steve, it’s completely untrue he was never asked to leave or been fired or any of that. That’s ridiculous. The movie tested very well.” He goes on to say that: “Everybody was happy, the studio was happy, the filmmakers were happy, the audience was happy with the movie. We had three test screenings, three different times and tested it and each time it just got better and better. We started off in a good place and we ended up in even in a better place, which is what you hope on a film from testing it.”

Whatever your personal feelings about the upcoming film, its easy to understand why the producer of it would want to immediately squash any and all rumors about a troubled production. However, and this is something people probably don’t realize, especially if they’ve never worked on a film before, most productions have problems. You can’t have that much money and that many people working together on that kind of schedule with so many balls in the air and not have problems. It’s just the nature of filmmaking. So, he may not just be trying to save face.

Although, test screenings and their results are usually an internal matter and not info studios like to have circulating, especially if the news is not so good. So sadly, if this info is actually true, this may indeed be a case of damage control and the film may be as bad as people seem to think it is. That said, I’m actually looking forward to the movie.

I had all the G.I. Joe stuff as a kid and seeing it all on the big screen will hopefully be a real treat. Of course, as with most movies coming out of Hollywood these days, it could also be a loud, explosive mess emphasizing style over substance and not be good at all. You pay your money, you take your chances. Either way, we’ll find out when the film hit theaters on August 7th.

UPDATE: Today in Variety, the trade has a story which completely refutes the entire thing and says Sommers was never fired or anything like it. So, there you go. Just another day in Hollywood.

Last night during the MTV Movie Awards, which we highlighted for you here, they debuted a few new clips from some of the most anticipated movie releases coming up this Summer. One of those clips was this new one from G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra, which we’ve brought you some details about before and are pretty excited about. What can I say, the movie looks cool.

And now, the full length of the footage is available online. In fact, its right there below for you to watch and enjoy. I think it looks kinda cool and maybe you will too. The footage features some of the main characters from the film doing their “Real American Hero” thing including Duke (Channing Tatum), Baroness (Sienna Miller), Storm Shadow (Byung-hun Lee) and Ripcord (Marlon Wayans).

The action looks great and all the actors seem to be taking their roles very seriously — which is a good thing. This could have easily devolved into camp. But so far, it looks like its just a fun, straight up action movie. Thank goodness.

Check out the footage after the jump. The Stephen Summers directed G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra hits theaters on August 7th.

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We’ve been covering this one for a bit now and are pretty darn excited for it to come out. Well, at least some of us are. Now, over at Empire Online, they’ve got the first look at the brand new international poster for G.I.Joe: Rise of Cobra.

The film, based on the hugely successful line of toys, features Sienna Miller, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Dennis Quaid and Channing Tatum as Duke, the hero who is part of an elite military force that must take down an evil organization bent on world domination: the sinister and mysterious Cobra.

The Stephen Sommers directed film hits theaters on on August 7, 2009. Until then, be sure to check out the full poster after the jump.

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For last week’s Pull of the Week and more, click here and here!

Pull of the Week:

Captain America #50 – Marvel – $3.99
Score: 7.5

Talk about promotional timing. This month, Captain America gets it’s 50th issue. Next month, Marvel lets the series go back to its original numbering and gives Cap his 600th issue. So what does writer Ed Brubaker bring to the 50th issue of Marvel’s Sentinel of Liberty? A birthday issue. The pages open with a dramatic action sequence from Penciler Luke Ross with Bucky being chased down the street by three heavily armed high-tech equipped villains. Bucky talks about how this birthday for him is just any other as he is doing what he has seemingly done on every birthday he can remember… fight.

As Bucky continues his confrontation, he takes the reader back to his memories of various birthdays like the bar-room brawl he encountered at sixteen, fighting alongside the Invaders at eighteen and interrogating a Nazi with Steve Rogers, his idol and partner, on his twentieth birthday. He even fades back to a few brief memories as his time as the Winter Soldier where he didn’t even experience his birthdays anymore.

As Bucky remembers his past while dealing with his present danger, he must contend with something that will forever haunt him, something he cannot argue. Bucky knows he is not the real Captain America. No matter how much good he does for the world or how many people he helps to make up for his past, he will never be Steve Rogers.

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