The story of The Lorax has never felt right to me. Either the Once-ler is the most short-sighted whatsit in the world, next to the Lorax himself (or at least the forest creatures), or the entire tale is a buried parable on the importance of stable property rights. Given Seuss’s general lack of subtlety when making a political point, the latter probably isn’t the case. In any event, why does no one preserve the Truffula trees? If the Once-ler owns the forest, and his business is based on the Truffula trees, why on earth would he practice clear-cutting?

He, like pretty much every other private timber company that owns the forest they log, has an incentive to preserve the forest (unless he’s renting it from the creatures, but that doesn’t seem to be the case) – clearly the Once-ler needed to fire his business planner. Or, once the land had been deforested, should have sold it and the seed to another logging concern.

Heck, they’d probably seek him out, since Truffula trees are a hot commodity, and there’s a lot of Thneedians; we already know that one of the characters is a budding entrepreneur, it’d be a lot easier and a lot more profitable for him to replant the forest than find a way to sell air. Evidently the Thneedians don’t understand marginal utility, but that’s okay, what gets me is how Seuss (and the movie) stacks the odds in his favor.

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Last year didn’t have many major hits, but one film that managed to sneak past critics and turned out to be one of the highest grossing films of the year was the animated film Despicable Me. Bringing in both kids and adults alike, the film was able to prove that Pixar isn’t the only studio to produce quality CG-animated films.

Now, from the same studio, and the man who brought us The Cat in the Hat, comes The Lorax. For those who aren’t aware of this lesser known Seussian tale, here’s a breakdown.

From the creators of Despicable Me and the imagination of Dr. Seuss comes the 3D-CG feature Dr. Seuss’ The Lorax, an adaptation of the classic tale of a forest creature who shares the enduring power of hope. The animated adventure follows the journey of a 12-year-old as he searches for the one thing that will enable him to win the affection of the girl of his dreams. To find it he must discover the story of the Lorax, the grumpy yet charming creature who fights to protect his world.

The film has a pretty awesome cast, featuring Danny DeVito, Zac Eforn, Betty White, Taylor Swift, and Ed Helms. We’ve got a bit before the film hits theaters on March 2nd, but you can check out the trailer after the jump.

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Just when you thought NBC’s breakout show Community couldn’t get any better after such guest stars as LeVar Burton, Betty White, Josh Holloway, and Malcolm-Jamal Warner, but it looks like the ante is about to get upped.

Word is now coming in that John Goodman will have a whopping 6-episode stint on the upcoming third season of the show. Here’s the scoop from TV Line.

Goodman will recur in at least six episodes of NBC’s quirky comedy as Vice Dean Laybourne, the head of Greendale’s air conditioning repair school, and he will become a major foe for both Dean Pelton (played by newly promoted series regular Jim Rash) and our favorite study group.

That’s right, the man who has The Flintsontes, Speed Racer and The Big Lebowski on his resume will be coming to one of the best written and funniest shows currently on TV this season, predictivaly making this another stellar season for creator Dan Harmon and his cast.

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Welcome to this week’s On the Radar where we delve into all corners of the entertainment, tech and geek Internets for news, views and whatnot that may have escaped our regular coverage this week. Let is know if we missed something interesting. Otherwise, on to the links!

• Are you a Star Wars nerd? Do we need to ask? Here’s 19 Things You Didn’t Know about Star Wars.

• Here’s the opening to Transformers 3. Yeah, not impressed either.

• The Betty White conquest of Hollywood continues. Next stop: Community.

• Thinking about a DROID X? Here’s some first impressions on the device.

• See, Peter Jackson was just like you and made movies when he was a kid. Of course, his were way better.

• In case you missed it, the Harvey Award nominees were announced.

• Like hot chicks in leather with guns? Obviously, director Zack Snyder does.

• Here’s some photos from the vampire movie Priest. It doesn’t look all that great but at least there’s no Rpat.

• Like Star Wars? How about Princess Leia? How about hot models pretending to be Princess Leia in a modernized “Slave Leia” outfit? Yep.

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It’s nice to see when a classic-style sitcom still has a place in a world of shows like Community and The Office. It seems that there are still fans out there of timeless in-studio laughter as TV Land has given another 20 episodes to the new sitcom Hot in Cleveland starring Betty White and Valerie Bertinelli.

The premise surrounds a group of shallow, attractive women living in Los Angeles who get stranded in Cleveland, Ohio after a plane delay. They come to realize that they’re the best looking women in the small town, and are worshiped as such.

Whether it’s the ongoing popularity of Betty White or the continuous guest stars the show has brought in such as Carl Reiner and George Newbern, It’s hard to say what sparked the massive fan response, but the show debuted with an incredible 4.8 million viewers, making it the most-watched sitcom on cable history.

Beyond that, the following episodes have still landed numbers in the mid 3 million range, which is still quite impressive for a cable network. TV Land, which is hoping to use this as a springboard for much more original content, has given the series an amazing 20 episodes in the upcoming season, which is currently scheduled to air in January of next year.

Welcome to this week’s On the Radar where we delve into all corners of the entertainment, tech and geek Internets for news, views and whatnot that may have escaped our regular coverage this week. Let is know if we missed something.

• Yeah, we kinda feel the same way about Jonah Hex. Where did it all go so wrong? We know it isn’t Megan Fox’s fault, so what is is?

• Do you want a cool action figure featuring one of your favorite characters from Firefly Captain Malcolm Reynolds? If so, this isn’t it.

• You say you like Predators and can’t wait for Robert Rodriguez’s version to come out? Until then, check out these pics of the new/old Predators.

• A company has produced bars of soap in the shape of Han Solo in Carbonite. Sadly, more male users will buy this product than female.

• There’s something to be said about the originality of the newest wave of XXX parodies. At least, our inner teenager is excited for The Breakfast Club: A XXX Parody.

• Everybody loves True Blood. Even Snoop Dogg…for some reason. Oh, wait . . .

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Saturday Night Live has had fans of comedy split into groups since its first major cast change in 1980. Since then, dozens of factions have formed who believe solely that “SNL stopped being funny when [INSERT NAME HERE] left the show.” That statement has been said about just about every past cast member going as far back as Chevy Chase and as current as Amy Pohler.

Recently, the show has had a resurgence in popularity. With the weekly digital shorts of Andy Samberg and his band, The Lonely Island, to some of the more popular skits getting made into feature-length films, such as MacGruber, which is in theaters Friday.

Two weeks ago, Lorne Michaels and his team did something a bit off-beat, and took a cue from a grassroots campaign through Facebook to get Betty White to host. The show got enormous ratings, pulling in nearly 12 million viewers during the live broadcast, which is a rarity in the era of DVR’s and HULU.

It seems that they were able to keep the ball rolling, as the next episode, which was this past Saturday’s season finale, pulled in some of the highest ratings for the show in half of a decade. The finale, which featured host Alec Baldwin and musical guest Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers, averaged a 5.8 rating and a 14 share, which is the highest for a season finale since 2005 when Lindsay Lohan hosted.

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This week On the Radar bring a whole slew of new and interesting stuff. Let us know if we missed anything.

• The Flickcast’s own Elisabeth Rappe reports from the set of Jonah Hex (for another site but we don’t care, we love her).

• James Cameron says 3D will replace 2D soon. Yes, but when will substance replace style?

• True Blood gets a comic book. At least that’s better than a Lady Gaga comic. . . oh, wait.

• Heroes to get the axe? Isn’t it about time, really? The show has pretty much sucked sense Season One.

• Judge Dredd is returning to the big screen. He is the law, dammit!

• Some guys made a Mega Man movie. Why? Why the hell not?

• Hayden Christensen to help rip off The Da Vinci Code in The Genesis Code. But what about the younglings?

• Michael Bay says the Racist Robots will be banished from Transformers 3. On a related note, Michael Bay is a liar.

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This week on The Flickcast Chris is back and the duo get right to it with a whole bunch of new topics. Some of these topics include the success and relative merits of Iron Man 2, Captain America in 3D rumors, Logan Lermann potentially as the new Spider-Man, J.J. Abrams upcoming sci-fi thriller Super 8, other upcoming 3D titles and Betty White hosting Saturday Night Live.

The boys also made some picks again this week including Matt’s pick of the movie Legion and Chris pick of the Mel Gibson film Edge of Darkness.

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

It’s a grab bag of items on the radar this week. Wolverine and Sabretooth have dinner together, Bruno himself could be the next Man in Black, and in honor of The Flickcast crew attending SXSW some Predators love (of which they may get a taste).

Predators get dark and scary…finally!

Robert Rodriquez‘s Predator reboot, Predators, is starting to get some buzz.  While the first film of the series was a great sci-fi/action hybrid subsequent films have been less than stellar.  Predators star, Alice Braga talked a little about the new film and what we can expect:

“The new Predators are dark. They are really, really scary. So I think the fans are really going to be happy with it. I hope so. The director Nimród Antal, he’s a fan of the Predator films. So it’s like a fan directing this, [it was] like a kid on set, and having that energy was very special. I wish I could tell you more.”

Here’s hoping “dark” and “scary” means an R-rated film and not a watered down PG-13 movie.

Conan will square off against Avatar villain

As an update to our last ‘On The Radar’ article, it has now been confirmed that actor Stephen Lang will indeed play Conan’s villain, Khalar Singh.  Speaking with MTV, Lang stated:

“I have no idea how I’m going to do it,” Lang laughed. “First I’m going to find out how I’m going to sound. I’m going to get back on a Mongolian pony and ride like the wind. I’m going to flash my scimitar. I’m going to cut the nuts off Conan and his father.”

That last threat may seem really out there, but after seeing Lang’s bad ass side in Avatar I have no doubt he can make good on it.

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This week on The Flickcast, Matt is back home from his trip to sunny LA and he and Chris are back in action with a whole bunch of new topics. Some of what gets discussed in this episode includes Mark Strong as Sinestro in Green Lantern, Conan in 3D, Wal-Mart buying Vudu, Betty White on SNL, Call of Duty and its many incarnations, Ian McShane as Blackbeard, the sale of Action Comics #1 and a whole lot more.

They both also made some good picks again this week incuding Matt’s pick of the short film The Legacy and Chris’ pick of the classic 80′s TV series Tales of the Gold Monkey, featuring Stephen Collins and Roddy McDowall.

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

Not very long ago, some die hard fans of former Golden Girl Betty White put together a grassroots campaign through Facebook to get fans behind the idea of her hosting Saturday Night Live. The moderator put out a plea for people to protest and request NBC employees for her to get a chance to host. Practically over night, the fan group blew up, and is still running strong with over 430,000 members.

It was announced about a week ago that NBC is “this close” to booking White on the show, but she unfortunately comes with a caveat. From Entertainment Weekly:

White would not be hosting alone. Rather, I hear SNL is putting together a “Women of Comedy” episode that would team the former Rose Nylund with several of her younger contemporaries. Ex-SNL MVP Molly Shannon is on board, I hear, and feelers have also been put out to Tina Fey and Amy Poehler. (An NBC spokesperson insists no one has been confirmed at this time.)

While the prospect of White hosting all by her lonesome is kind of an awesome one, the thought of having a super show with names like Molly Shannon, Fey, and Pohler back is pretty cool too.

The show is on hiatus for the Olympics, but will return to a full schedule soon with Jennifer Lopez hosting and performing one week, and on of our favorite comedians, Zach Galifiniakis, hosting the following week.