This week On the Radar we’re talking about how Michael Bay simply isn’t impressed with 3D conversions, Harold and Kumar are set to return for a Christmas movie, Big Bang Theory‘s resident babe takes on a big screen role and will Two and a Half Men lose its star actor?

Kenneth Branagh talks Thor

With all the news of Iron Man and Captain America sweeping the Internet we haven’t heard a lot about Thor lately.  Well, director Kenneth Branagh has offered up some information about the production this week:

“Inspired by the comic book world both pictorially and compositionally at once, we’ve tried to find a way to make a virtue and a celebration of the distinction between the worlds that exist in the film but absolutely make them live in the same world,” Branagh said. “It’s about finding the framing style, the color palette, finding the texture and the amount of camera movement that helps celebrate and express the differences and the distinctions in those worlds. If it succeeds, it will mark this film as different…. The combination of the primitive and the sophisticated, the ancient and the modern, I think that potentially is the exciting fusion, the exciting tension in the film.”

Holy cow!  That update reads as though it was being delivered as a Shakespearean monologue.  Here’s hoping Branagh still remembers we’re comic book fans at heart and want to see some series action as well as crafty dialogue. Bring the thunder, Branagh, not the theater.

Big Bang Theory’s Cuoco heads to the big screen

While not Kaley Cuoco’s first film role it is her first big debut project since the explosion of popularity around The Big Bang Theory.  Cuoco is set to star in I Hop, a film by Alvin and the Chipmunksdirector Tim Hall:

“[Cuoco] will be playing the sister of James Marsden’s slacker loser Fred, taking him in after their parents kick him out and finding herself also saddled with Brand’s Easter Bunny Jnr, following his accidental injury by Fred.”

With James Marsden and Russell Brand already signed on it’s hard to decide just what this film will be like.  Mind you, is anyone going to say “no” to more Kaley?  I’m definitely not.

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The Director’s Guild of America Awards were held over the weekend, and Kathryn Bigelow became the first woman ever to win for feature film direction in the guild’s 62 year history. She won for directing The Hurt Locker, and beat out some stiff competition, including Quentin Tarantino, James Cameron, Jason Reitman, and Lee Daniels.

This could be a momentum changer going into the Academy Award nominations tomorrow morning. There have only been six times in its history that the DGAs have not correctly predicted the eventual Oscar winner. Incidentally, a woman has never won an Academy Award for best director, either.

Other highlighted winners from Saturday night included:

Movies for Television/Mini-Series Ross Katz, Taking Chance

Documentary Louie Psihoyos The Cove

Dramatic Series  Leslie Linka Glatter Mad Men “Guy Walks Into An Advertising Agency”

Comedy Series Jason Winer Modern Family “Pilot”

For a complete list of all the winners, visit the DGA site.

Photo courtesy of the DGA.

We’ve been following this one closely here at The Flickcast because we’re big fans of Hulu and think it’s a great way to watch TV shows and movies you missed when they originally aired or to discover new shows. The service has many things going for it but one of its main attractions is that, at the moment, its free. You only have to watch a few commercials during a normal episode of a TV program, for example, and other than that, the service costs you nothing.

As we’ve discussed before, that may change in the near future. And now, Hulu is talking about yet another pricing model: charging users to watch episodes of 30 Rock, Modern Family and House. The move would mark a significant change for the site, which was launched nearly two years ago by a group of studios to distribute TV shows and movies via the Internet without charge.

According to reports, Hulu has spent the last several months trying to figure out how to balance what users expect to see for free with what they would be willing to pay for. Another plan being considered would allow users to view the five most recent episodes of TV shows for free but would require a subscription of $4.99 a month to watch older episodes.

Hulu believes it will need at least 20 TV series — both current ones and those no longer on the air — to make such a pay service attractive to users. A firm pricing model could emerge within six months. Well, at least they seem to be taking their time to figure out the right way to screw serve us.

Comedy is king, at least at ABC, as the network has renewed three of its freshmen comedies, giving them the much-coveted second season pickup. The announcement came Tuesday and was given by ABC’s Steve McPherson who said he had given early second-season orders to Wednesday night comedies Modern Family, Cougar Town and The Middle. The network also gave the green light to another comedy pilot called Mr. Sunshine, starring Friends alum Matthew Perry.

ABC also announced the pickup of Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution, which follows the celeb U.K. chef as he travels to Huntington, W.Va., in order to launch a new healthy cooking initiative. The show, from Ryan Seacrest Prods. and Fresh One Prods., will air Fridays at 9 p.m. starting March 26.

And McPherson confirmed the network is at work on a spinoff for The Bachelor. The new show, Bachelor Pad, will run in late summer as a bridge between The Bachelorette and the fall schedule. The show, hosted by Chris Harrison, features former Bachelor contestants keeping it sexy in a house. ABC’s other big reality franchise, Dancing With the Stars, is back Monday, March 22. McPherson said the show would include fewer contestants this season.

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As hard as it may be to believe sometimes, someone (or someones) actually sits down and writes a movie or TV show before you end up seeing it at your local multiplex or on your favorite TV network. The people who do the sitting and the writing are, surprisingly, called writers and, like the Directors, the Golden Globes and the Oscars, they have their own awards show.

This week, the Writers Guild of America, which is the trade group and advocate for writers, announced its nominations for outstanding achievement in feature film and television, radio, news, promotional writing, and graphic animation during the 2009 season to be honored at the upcoming 2010 Writers Guild Awards on February 20, 2010, in Los Angeles and New York.

We realize that these nominations may not be as glamorous as the Golden Globes or the Oscars, but we kinda like writers around here and think they do a pretty important job. So, with that in mind, here’s a complete list of nominees.

Check out these names, these people are pretty important. Without them you wouldn’t get to enjoy your favorite TV show, movie or pretty much any other form of entertainment. The 2010 Writers Guild Awards will be held on Saturday, February 20, 2010, simultaneously at the Hyatt Regency Century Plaza Hotel in Los Angeles and the Hudson Theatre at the Millennium Broadway Hotel in New York City.

FILM NOMINEES

ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY

(500) Days of Summer, Written by Scott Neustadter & Michael H. Weber

Avatar, Written by James Cameron

The Hangover, Written by Jon Lucas & Scott Moore

The Hurt Locker, Written by Mark Boal

A Serious Man, Written by Joel Coen & Ethan Coen

ADAPTED SCREENPLAY

Crazy Heart, Screenplay by Scott Cooper

Based on the novel by Thomas Cobb

Julie & Julia, Screenplay by Nora Ephron Based on the books Julie & Julia by Julie Powell and My Life in France by Julia Child with Alex Prud’homme

Precious: Based on the novel Push by Sapphire, Screenplay by Geoffrey Fletcher Based on the novel Push by Sapphire

Star Trek, Written by Roberto Orci & Alex Kurtzman Based upon Star Trek, Created by Gene Roddenberry

Up in the Air, Screenplay by Jason Reitman and Sheldon TurnerBased upon the novel by Walter Kirn

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The DGA, which unveiled the small-screen nominations in eight categories last Friday, will announce the winners Jan. 30 at its 62nd annual awards ceremonies at the Century Plaza Hotel. AMC’s Mad Men received three Directors Guild of America TV nominations for drama series and HBO’s Curb Your Enthusiasm and Fox’s Glee each got a pair for comedy. The nominations included a trio of season finales in Mad Men, Curb and ABC’s Lost. In the comedy category, two shows — the pilot for ABC’s Modern Family and Glee — also received nominations.

Thomas Carter scored a nomination in the TV movie-miniseries category for TNT’s Gifted Hands — The Ben Carson Story along with Bob Balaban for Liftetime’s George O’Keefe, John Kent Harrison for CBS’s The Courageous Heart of Irene Sandler, Ross Katz for HBO’s Taking Chance and Michael Sucsy for HBO’s Grey Gardens.

Here’s the complete list of nominations:

MOVIES FOR TELEVISION/MINISERIES

The nominees for the Directors Guild of America Award for Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Movies for Television/Miniseries for 2009 are (in alphabetical order):

BOB BALABAN

“Georgia O’Keeffe” (Lifetime)

THOMAS CARTER

“Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story” (TNT)

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The last few years of television have shown us that the ratings darlings were either reality/competition shows, vast plots and casts where a suspension of belief were necessary, or the use of a microscope was employed… every week. Don’t call it a comeback, but times are a-changin’.

According to Variety, ABC has given full-season orders to Modern Family and Cougar Town, both sitcoms – “situation comedies” in case you’ve forgotten – revolving around normal, every-day characters and families dipped in abnormal circumstances. Even The Middle has scored enough viewership to convince the network to re-up and fortify its Wednesday comedy block, which has so far outperformed the same time slot from last year when the now-canceled Pushing Daisies and relocated Private Practice used to reside.

Is this a sign that sitcoms will once again return to prominence and dominate the airwaves? Possibly, however a case can be made for established television stars going back to the well and finding success with a new vehicle. Both Cougar Town and The Middle have comedic veterans as their centerpiece – Courteney Cox Arquette and Patricia Heaton, respectively – while Modern Family provides a good mixture of new talent with familiar faces that has been agreeable with viewers. As with anything television-related, stay tuned.