If it's the end of a decade, then it's time for multiple Best Of The Decade lists. This isn't exactly one of them, though, despite what it looks like; for one thing, even if it was, you'd all disagree with it and complain that we left off something essential - although anyone arguing for the inclusion of Ultimatum, we believe that can be disproven through the use of science and charts - and for another, we've not read every single thing published in the last decade, so for all we know, there's something really obvious that we'll have somehow overlooked through accident instead of malice. Instead of The Ten Best, then, these are Ten Of The Best (Click on the titles for our explanations why and, in some cases, runners-up to the list that we couldn't help but sneak in):

100% by Paul Pope (DC/Vertigo)
All Star Superman by Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely (DC Comics)
Black Hole by Charles Burns (Pantheon)
Casanova by Matt Fraction, Gabriel Ba and Fabio Moon (Image Comics)
Laika by Nick Abadzis (First Second Books)
Planetes by Makoto Yukimura (Tokyopop)
Pluto by Osamu Tazuka and Naoki Urasawa (Viz Media)
Scott Pilgrim by Bryan Lee O'Malley (Oni Press)
We3 by Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely (DC/Vertigo)
Y The Last Man by Brian K. Vaughan, Pia Guerra and many more (DC/Vertigo)

(Thanks to Lauren, David Brothers, Jeff Lester and all who offered advice and good reasons why we were entirely wrong in some original choices.)

On a similar reboot theme, Marvel's Ultimate line reinvigorated the publisher's core franchises at the start of the decade with varying degrees of success - I'm not sure anyone would really be able to argue that either Ultimate X-Men or Ultimate Fantastic Four were overly revolutionary, for example. Although Mark Millar and Bryan Hitch's The Ultimates was, at the time, the critical favorite, we've got a soft spot for Brian Michael Bendis' Ultimate Spider-Man, which rebuilt the character as the teen soap opera where great power means great amounts of confusion, bad decisions and all kinds of responsibility that we never even knew we wanted. With art by Mark Bagley, Stuart Immonen and now the wonderful David LaFuente, it's been consistently entertaining for the last ten years, and consistency is worth something, right?

Next: Scott Pilgrim

This review definitely contains spoilers, although it won't give away anything major, that you couldn't figure out from watching the trailers and looking at stills.

So you probably already know what Astro Boy is about: there's a scientist, Dr. Tenma, and his brilliant little boy, Toby, gets killed. So Dr. Tenma makes a robot replica of Toby, complete with Toby's memories, and gives him the most cutting-edge armaments and power source, so he can never be hurt again. But the robot version can't replace Toby, so Dr. Tenma ultimately rejects him — and he goes off to become Astro Boy.

I've grown to have a healthy appreciation for the manga of Osamu Tezuka — his medical thriller Ode To Kirihito is riveting and totally not what I expected — but writer/director David Bowers added to Tezuka's world-building in ways that totally enhanced the story for me. And a huge part of that was Bowers' vision of a world of enslaved robots, which is both funny and occasionally disturbing.

Bowers, an Aardman Animation veteran who worked on Chicken Run and Wallace And Gromit, lets his Aardman roots show most of all when he's dealing with some of the robots in the movie. From Dr. Tenma's robot servant to a flying a window-cleaning squirt bottle and squeegee, to a robot trash-can dog, the robots are always cute and silly, yet also can't help reminding you of their non-person status in the gleaming futuristic Metro City. A clever, retro-looking instructional film at the start of the movie serves to underscore this point, showing robots being used and then tossed aside, onto the giant scrap heap that Metro City floats over.

But don't worry — at no point does Astro Boy give you a dry lecture about robot rights, or the unfairness of enslaving other sentient beings. Instead, it contains tons of sly jokes and clever moments that make you sympathize and identify with the robots — even as we're rooting for Astro Boy's quest to be recognized as a human.

And that's where Astro Boy gets really interesting. Because, of course, the original story is all about Astro wanting to be a "real boy," like Pinocchio. By juxtaposing that quest with the constant reminders that all the other robots are just as aware as Astro Boy himself, the movie makes the standard "quest for humanity" a lot more complex.

Because Astro Boy is the only robot who actually appears human and is programmed with a real human's memories, he's the only bot with the option of blending in with human society. He's also almost the only bot who's not programmed with Asimov's Three Laws of Robotics, which force the other robots to be servile even when they don't want to be. The more we sympathize with the other robots, who don't have the same options Astro has, the less clear-cut Astro's quest for humanity begins to appear.

Some of the most fascinating scenes in Astro Boy deal with this question of "passing" as human — early on, after Astro Boy is created, he thinks he's a "real" boy — but the other robots can see the truth at a glance. Dr. Tenma's servant bot is instructed to treat the robot boy as if he were human, and this nearly causes a robo-conniption fit. "I'm so freaking out right now!" the robot says a few times. And then later, Astro Boy knows he's a robot, but he's trying to live among humans as one of them — except that he keeps having to worry that the other robots will "out" him.

It's not much of a spoiler to say that Astro Boy gets to be accepted as a real boy by the end of the movie — but that only leaves you with more questions, particularly about how this will affect all the other robots. The movie only offers the barest hints that Astro Boy's special status could end up benefiting all his robot brothers and sisters.

There are two things I love in children's movies: world-building and subversiveness. And Astro Boy has enough of both of them to build a thousand giant robots out of.

We already talked a lot about the movie's world-building in this exclusive interview with Bowers and designers Jake Rowell and Luis Grane: the movie takes place in a floating city, which includes an entire mountain levitated above the ground. And we get little glimpses of the history of the development of the robots in this society, especially when we meet a 100-year-old robot named Zog (voiced, rather laconically, by Samuel L. Jackson.)

As for the subversiveness — well, I already talked about the fact that the movie paints Astro Boy as a bit of a race traitor (in a gentle, sly way that will not make your kids bawl, I promise.) But then the film turns around and gives us a hilariously inept trio of robot liberationists — the Robot Revolution Front, three former appliances (including a refrigerator) who make grandiose speeches that remind me of the People's Front Of Judea in Monty Python's Life Of Brian.

Unfortunately, because the members of the Robot Revolution Front are still bound by the Three Laws of Robotics, their biggest plan for defeating the human hegemony is to attack one of the humans with a particularly large feather — and tickle him. A lot.

One of the biggest cheer-worthy moments in the movie is when we meet a second robot who isn't subject to the Three Laws, and who is willing to kick some ass.

Because we don't really want to see Astro Boy struggling against vague, nebulous anti-robot prejudice, the movie gives us two clear-cut villains: the President of Metro City, who wants Astro Boy's super-advanced power source to power a new war machine, and HamEgg, a roboticist who's fallen from grace and now organizes nasty robot gladitorial matches on the surface.

And it's the former villain, the President, who provides one of Astro Boy's few weak spots. He's so transparently a satire on George Bush and other leaders who want to start bogus wars to boost their approval ratings, that he becomes a bit painful to watch. The movie is fairly subtle about its other messages, but whenever the President comes on screen, we're suddenly assaulted by neon signs blaring "POLITICAL MESSAGE." Also, you'll cringe a bit when a scientist explains the difference between Astro Boy's power source (which is intrinsically good and morally pure) and a separate, evil power source, which creates negative vibes and aggression.

But those are minor quibbles, really — the spoon-feeding around the President only stands out because the rest of the movie is so determined to let you draw your own conclusions. There are no easy answers to Astro Boy's dilemma — he feels like a human boy, but he knows he really belongs to the subjugated robot class — and the movie doesn't really attempt to offer us any.

And that's what makes this such a great kids' movie. It's pure, engaging fun pretty much the whole way through, with a few bits of sadness, like when Astro Boy's flesh-and-blood model dies (there's no blood; he just vanishes.) But the movie takes the "kid caught between two worlds" plot you've seen a million times before and adds an extra layer of weirdness. Both you and your kid will be thrilled by all the zoomy flying-robot action, but you'll both be left debating exactly where Astro Boy should want to belong anyway. And that's definitely one of the hallmarks of a good movie.

Oh, and this post includes minor spoilers for Astro Boy, but doesn't give away any major plot twists. Mostly, it's about the world-building, which is unveiled at the start of the film.

We expected Astro Boy to be a fun ride, but we ended up liking it way more than we'd expected (full review coming Friday.) And a huge part of that was its fascinating world-building: we weren't prepared for how strange and vivid this world seemed. Astro Boy takes place in Metro City, which has been levitated a few miles above the ground — and they levitated the mountain it was built next to as well. The result is really cool-looking, and the city's buildings also don't look like your standard "city of the future" buildings, at all.

The movie's robot population also looked much weirder than we're used to. From the various types of slave robots to the thundering war-bots, they paid homage to their Japanese roots but also drew on influences as diverse as Wallace And Gromit and classic monster movies. Metro City also levitates over a ginormous trash heap, where the city has been depositing all of its used up robots, and we get to meet a few obsolete robots, including the ginormous Zog, who reminds me of a Hiyao Miyazaki character:

So we were eager to talk to writer/director David Bowers, plus art director Jake Rowell and character designer Luis Grane. They told us about all the thought processes behind crafting this weird future city, the various types of robots, and the rocking warships. Bowers says the production aimed to keep the fun of the original Osamu Tezuka cartoons, including the larger-than-life battles and crazy boot-jet adventures, while creating a fun new world.

The Robots

It's really different to make an original robot right now," says character designer Grane. "There are so many movies and comics and books about robots, and I think it's really difficult to make one that's unique or different than the rest." Obviously Astro Boy is the only robot in the movie who looks human, because he's designed to replace Dr. Tenma's dead son — every other robot looks utilitarian and yet weird.

Bowers adds that he went for "very unique looks" to the movie's robots, many of whom are supposed to be grunt workers — the audience immediately knows they're the underdogs, doing the jobs that we don't want to do. The movie features a Laurel-And-Hardy double act of a squirt bottle and squeegee who fly around the city cleaning windows... and complaining endlessly.

Like everything else in Astro Boy, the robots are frequently assymetrical and odd-looking, rather than the sleek bots you might have been expecting. Everyone we talked to cited the work of Japanese sculptor Isamu Noguchi as a huge influence on the movie's basic shapes. Noguchi was famous for his odd, organic-looking sculptures. Here are a few, courtesy of Getty Images:

"I brought a book about [Noguchi] to the production designer, and he said it would be cool to base our visual language on him," says Grane.

Grane says he tried to merge that Japanese sculpture with the work of pre-Columbian sculptors in Mexico — but not the Aztec or Mayan sculpture, but more Western Mexico, where "the figures are more like caricatures, and I love that."


Getting to mash up Japanese sculpture and pre-Columbian Mexican art made this a "dream project" for Grane. A lot of the robots moving around the city sort of blend in with the architecture, because they have friendly shapes with rounded edges. And Grane says you'll have to free-frame the DVD a fair bit to catch all of the weird little robots that pop up in the film, including one tiny cleaning robot that's dancing under the feet of the bystanders during the movie's climactic battle scene.

When we meet some of the older robots on the surface, they look clunkier and more mechanical, and more rusted and distressed. For example, we meet the hapless Robot Revolution Front, a trio of former servant bots who are fighting for robot freedom — but are completely useless, because they must abide by Asimov's Three Laws Of Robotics. It's in these characters, who include a robot refrigerator, that Bowers shows his roots — he worked at Aardman Animation, which put out the Wallace And Gromit films. The leader of the robot revolution, Sparks, is also based on Peter Sellers' union organizer character in I'm All Right Jack, plus other classic Sellers comedies.

And then there are fighting robots, including the cutting-edge, terrifying Peacekeeper. Rowell says some of the sequences of the Peacekeeper in Metro City were designed to look like old-school Japanese monster movies, with Peacekeeper peering around buildings and looking huge and fierce.

The movie starts off with a hilarious, old-school-looking instructional video that explains that robots are our friends, and narrates their helpful role in our future society. Grane crafted this segment towards the very end of the production process, with just a few other people involved. The "instructional video" has a very hand-drawn feeling, unlike the CG of the rest of the film, and that's because the drawings were animated, sort of by hand, in After Effects.

Grane says that despite the tight deadline and scant resources, this opening sequence gave him a chance to experiment — like in one bit, where you see nanobots crawling inside someone's heart to repair it. Instead of using the standard image of a heart, Grane reached for an image from abstract art, which looks like arteries and heart muscles in context, and the result is a lot splashier and more stylized.

The Wall-E Factor:

So obviously, this movie features weird, servant robots who do all the unpleasant chores for people. And there's a giant trash heap that stretches for miles — so I asked Bowers if he worried about comparisons to last year's Wall-E. Pre-production on Astro Boy was already quite a ways along when Wall-E came out, but Bowers and his crew did make some changes to try and avoid looking too similar.

Bowers says Astro Boy's trash-can robot dog was originally planned to be a trash-compacter who crushes scrap metal into "little bricks of trash" — but it was "just too similar" to Wall-E and had to be changed. And Astro Boy was still doing production design on its trash heaps, so Bowers worked with his designers, and "we went to great lengths to make sure the trash looked different than the trash-heaps in Wall-E." The trash in Astro Boy, he says, has more of an "organic" feel to it, plus it's all robot parts.

The City

Metro City floats high above the ground, and the city builders chose to levitate a mountain as well. The buildings look airy and spacious, and more organic than the sort of buildings you see in the standard Futurama future city. Bowers says he wanted Metro City to look like a great place to live, and he wanted the audience to be wondering just how much an apartment in one of those soaring towers would cost.

"I wanted to make sure the two worlds — the people who live on the surface, which first appears to be a trash heap... and Metro City, where Astro Boy is created, which is this gleaming futuristic beautiful utopian society," had as strong a contrast as possible. "It's very interesting to do worldbuilding. I love the original [Osamu] Tezuka look," adds Bowers. The city was designed to be retro-futuristic, but without any irony to it. And there was a huge Asian influence to the city's design.

Here's more exclusive concept art, showing the streets of Metro City:

Says Grane, "The buildings are weird shpes, they are not like typical buildings, sometimes they are very organic, but sometimes they are very unexpected."

The mountain sitting on one side of the floating city definitely helps it stand out — Bowers says he was influenced by Hokusai's famous woodcut prints of Mount Fuji, which are "iconically Japanese."

Rowell says when he and the production designer first heard that the floating city included a mountain, they were perplexed and not sure what to do with that. Finally, Bowers explained that the city's founders decided to raise up their oasis that had been on land, including excavating their nearby mountain and raising it up as well, and that gave the designers "something to build around."

In early design sketches, the mountain was in the center of the city, which was built around it on all sides, but Rowell decided to stick to the movie's visual theme of assymetry and avoid a circular shape. Instead, the mountain is over to one side, and the city is on the other, meaning the floating city has an odd toothy shape.

The principle of assymetry, borrowed from Noguchi, also applied when it came to the buildings in the city — they tend to be fat on one side and skinny on the other, with a slope on one side, says Rowell. "So looking at it from different angles, you get different design language," and the city looks like a much bigger world as a result. He was also influenced by some of the sloping, cool-looking buildings that China created for its recent Olympic Games.

The designers' first instinct was to go with the Jetsons/Futurama "city of the future" imagery, but instead they chose to make the buildings look more like what we have today, except two or three versions past our current iterations. The buildings also look very light and airy, and Rowell said he conceived of them as being made of lightweight carbon-fiber, which people are already using to create stuff — but this would be several generations along, and thus people would be able to use it for structural supports.

And Rowell says he and the production designer sketched out the layout of the entire city, so they knew where everything was in relation to each other. There were a few major landmarks — the penthouse apartment of Dr. Tenma, Astro Boy's creator, the Ministry of Science, where Astro Boy is created, and the mountain — and you always know where you stand in relation to them. Dr. Tenma's penthouse is at the very front of the city.

In that key scene where Astro Boy is realizing he's a robot, and then the soldiers in power suits come to grab him, he's sitting on top of Dr. Tenma's building, looking backwards at the Ministry of Science (thus, looking back at the place where he came into being) when those floodlights switch on:

This juxtaposition between his father's penthouse and the Ministry of Science lets you know that Astro Boy is torn between his identity as a boy, who seems to be human, and his origins as a robot.

The slanty, curvy "shape language" of the movie, borrowed heavily from Noguchi, shows up in Astro Boy's boots, in the "stinger" attack vehicles which chase him in that clip above, and in all the buildings and robots, says Rowell. And then when you go down to the surface and it looks more like our present-day world, it's a bit of a shock.

Astro Boy comes out this Friday.

We've seen some pretty brutal robot games in our time, but these might just take the cake:

Here are a ton of gorgeous, super high-res stills, showcasing some hot robot-on-robot action:

And here are some TV spots you might have missed, including one focusing on Astro Boy's relationship with Cora (Kristen Bell):

The Green Hornet

We get some action shots with Kato and a cement truck, while the Hornet just stands around in his pretty suit:

[Spoiler TV]

Astro Boy

New stills show off more of this movie's adorable (and sometimes intimidating) robots:

[IGN]

The Hobbit

Ian McKellen says the scripts for the two Hobbit movies will be delivered soon, and filming will probably start next March or April. At some point, Guillermo del Toro told McKellen they'd be filing for 383 days, a symptom of what McKellen affectionately terms del Toro's "artistic autism." [Empire]

Magneto

McKellen also said that, despite rumors he would appear in the X-Men prequel spinoff, he believes he won't be involved. [Empire]

New Moon

A couple more sepia-hued images of vamps, werewolves, and Volturi:

[IGN]

Eclipse

David Slade might be bringing the blood to Eclipse, but the first official photos still reeks of tortured romance:

[Spoiler TV]

The Fourth Kind

Two new TV spots try to make you believe in alien abductions:

[ShockTillYouDrop]

Supernatural

A new promo for "The Children Are Our Future" is lighter on the urban legends, heavier on the Antichrist:

[via Spoiler TV]

Lost

A set reporter snagged some pictures of the base camp for a scene from the new season's fourth episode. The pictures themselves aren't terribly spoilerish, but the reporter saw a scene between Locke (or someone currently wearing Locke's body) and Sawyer. Locke was wearing green cargo pants and a once-white (now green) shirt and Sawyer was in black jeans and a blue button down shirt.

[Lyly Ford]

In episode six, we'll see a couple of kids likely connected to Sayid:

[SAM] Middle Eastern, 9. Raised in America and has no accent. Typical boy: smart, eager, ready to tackle anything and watches out for his little sister. Happy to see an unexpected visitor but sad he can't stay longer...CO-STAR

[EVA] Middle Eastern, 6. Raised in America and has no accent. Shy and not as willing to plunge into new situations as her brother. Happy to see an unexpected visitor but sad he can't stay longer...CO-STAR

[Spoiler TV]

Stargate Universe

Here's a slew of appropriately ill-lit promo pics from this week's episode, "Darkness:"

[Spoiler TV]

V

A nicely ominous poster of Morena Baccarin and her alien eye:

[TV Guide]

FlashForward

Are flashforwards a good basis for making medical decisions? That's the question in a clip from this week's episode, "Black Swan:"

And it looks like Wedeck will be enjoying a glass of brandy in the Oval Office at some point during the episode:

[FlashForward.pl]

In the show's October 29th episode, "Scary Monsters and Super Creeps," Simon (Dominic Monaghan) contacts a reluctant acquaintance.

And you can see some stills from the episode:

[Spoiler TV]

The twelfth episode will introduce the recurring character Timothy, a charismatic everyman and natural leader. Other people look to him for empathetic counsel. The episode will also feature Marcus, an insect-loving man in his 20s with a perpetually sunny disposition, and Roz, a schizophrenic, emotionally distant woman in her 50s, who alternates between lucidity and breaks with reality. [Spoiler TV]

Additional reporting by Alexis Brown and Charlie Jane Anders.

The CG animated Astro Boy, coming Oct. 23, continues to impress, and this new glimpse of Metro City's space-age buildings and clean lines makes it feel like a universe you'll want to visit more than once. I love the attention to detail and energy in these images, too — check out the squirming robot that Kristen Bell's Cora is holding down.

With the exception of Image Comics' Dead Space: Extraction special issue (tying in with the upcoming videogame from EA) and Harris' latest revival of Vampirella (Called, somewhat incorrectly, Vampirella: The Second Coming), Marvel Comics really owns the single issue market this week when it comes to new launches of interest.

From Marvel, there are the latest special issues in the ongoing Dark Reign storyline (Dark Avengers/Uncanny X-Men: Exodus or Dark Reign: The List: The Avengers). And then there's the launch of Marvel's latest Orson Scott Card adaptation (Ender's Game: Command School). Or even the surprise launch of a new series starring the sidekick of an alternate Earth Captain America (Nomad: Girl Without A World).

Besides Marvel, there's not really that much else for superhero fans looking for a first issue this week (Okay, there is DC Comics' The Shield, which is gritty Captain America from an idea by J. Michael Straczynski... but still).

(Actually, if you're looking for something superhero-ish and none of the above sound promising, I'd direct your attention to the seventh issue of DC's Superman: World Of New Krypton, which begins its second half with what looks like the slow march to war between Earth and Superman's new adopted home planet, offering as much fun politicking as it does fisticuffs. But that's just me.)

In terms of collections, it's actually fairly evenly split: IDW has Astro Boy Movie Prequel: Underground, allowing you to catch up on your robot Pinocchio before next month's movie.

Meanwhile, DC's Gotham Central Vol. 2: Jokers and Madmen offers up easily the best Joker story in comics in the last decade alongside some other, equally good, stories about Batman's hometown police force.

Rebellion puts out Strontium Dog: Traitor To His Kind, which reboots the 2000AD franchise back into fine shape courtesy of the character's creators. (Short version: He's a time-traveling mutant bounty hunter in the far future. His partner is a Viking. Surely that's all you need to know.)

And Marvel again, may have grabbed the win with Marvel Superhero Team-Up, the disappointingly-renamed (It was originally Marvel Bromance) anthology of male bonding stories from the company's long and rich history. Mickey and Donald would be proud.

As ever, the complete list of comics reaching your local stores this week can be found here before you decide to purchase your picks at your local comic store. Look on the bright side: Such a light week this week just lets you save up for all the goodies still to come next week.

October 9th
Zombieland
Any movie that is used as an excuse by Woody Harrelson to attack paparazzi has to have something going for it, but director Ruben Fleischer's movie - which he calls a road movie, and likens to Midnight Run - has more going for it than just that, including Little Miss Sunshine's Abigail Breslin as one of the last humans alive.

October 16th
The Road
Delayed a year from its original release date, John Hillcoat's adaptation of Cormac McCarthy's Oprah-endorsed tale of a man and his son struggling to survive in a post-apocalyptic world finally gets a release, allowing audiences their chance to see Viggo Mortensen frown through what may just be the feel-bad movie of the year. Of course, in terms of "long-awaited adaptations of classic books," it's up against...

Where The Wild Things Are
...Dave Eggers and Spike Jonze's already-controversial (Why doesn't the bedroom turn into the forest? Why is there a subplot about the mom's divorce?) take on the wonderful Maurice Sendak book of our collective youth. We're as skeptical about the changes as many, but we have to admit: The trailer alone made us catch our breath, and we're hoping for the best.

October 23rd
Astro Boy
You'll believe a cartoon robot boy can fly as Summit's long-coming CGI version of Osamu Tezuka's classic manga and anime character reaches screens. We're hoping it's a hit if only because we'd really, really like to see them tackle Pluto as a sequel...

Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant
Get your fill of Carnie action in this version of Darren Shan's young adult novel, as John C. Reilly plays a vampire, Salma Hayek a bearded lady, 30Rock's Jane Krakowski a woman who can regenerate her limbs, and Chris Massoglia as the poor kid who ends up wrapped up in it all to save the life of his best friend.

October 30th
Gentlemen Broncos
Okay, so "from the director of Napoleon Dynamite" may seem like a bad thing in these weary hipster days, but no-one can deny the lure of Flight of The Conchords' Jermaine Clement as a washed-up writer who steals a kid's sci-fi contest idea and uses it to resurrect his career. Jared Hess, all is forgiven.

With September already underway, we're a little late in providing this guide, but try not to hold it too far against us. We've split everything up month-by-month, to help you fill your calendar without too much worry - Just click on the links below.

September
October
November
December

Doctor Who

A poster at Gallifrey Base claims to have gotten a good look inside the new TARDIS set, which we'll see in 2010. Supposedly, the interior of the TARDIS will have two different levels, joined by a spiral staircase, and we'll be seeing a console room, a lab area, a sitting room, a long corridor, and "numerous other little nooks and crannies." The set is designed to be modular, so that pieces of the set can be moved around and double as other parts of the ship, when we visit other rooms inside the TARDIS.

The console room itself is a shaped like a hexagon attached to a square rather than being circular, the color theme is mostly silver and gold, and the coral finish has been replaced with marble. The roundels decorating the walls are now inverted hemispheres, and while they appear throughout the set, they do not appear on every wall. The roundels have different color schemes for each room: gold in the console room, silver, gray, and blue in the lab, and brown in the sitting room.

You should, of course, take this with several truckloads of grains of salt. [Gallifrey Base, Thanks Bluehinter!]

Iron Man 2

As we've mentioned, Sam Rockwell's character, Justin Hammer, is actually a fan of Tony Stark, but doesn't get the attention he craves from Tony. But Rockwell tells Comic Book Resources that Hammer is also "in cahoots with a couple of people," and "kind of a shyster." And when Hammer feels deprived of Tony's attention, "that's where I think it starts to go wrong for Justin a little bit." He also says that Hammer is more insecure and ambitious than Tony Stark, which may be his downfall. [Comic Book Resources]

Zombieland

In the international trailer, we get a few more of Columbus's rules for surviving the zombie apocalypse and some hints of Jesse Eisenberg/Emma Stone romance:

The Lovely Bones

A new image shows another surreal image from Heaven as Susie Salmon looks out at a figure in the gazebo where she goes to watch the living world:

[MTV Movies Blog]

The Hobbit

Supposedly, the role of Bilbo Baggins has been cast, though just who will play the fur-footed protagonist hasn't been revealed. Some fans speculate it might be Martin Freeman, who played Tim in the UK version of The Office. [Cinema Blend]

Astro Boy

The final poster for Astro Boy has been released:

[CinemaBlend]

Gamer:

Gerard Butler explains the philosophy behind this living-video-game movie: Gamer is "a comment on science, technology, medicine and entertainment. ... How far away are we from people actually saying, 'We can create that. We can create a mini-war every day on our TVs and use people that are useless to us.'" And there's a scene where his character, Kable, confronts his nemesis (played by Terry Crews) stepping out of an elevator — and Kable pounces on him. [USA Today]

Paul:

Jason Batemen explains his character, federal agent Lorenzo Zoil:

He is the government agent that is sent to go out and grab Paul the alien and drag him back to Area 51. He's a very humorless and expressionless government agent, very similar to either Tommy Lee Jones in The Fugitive or even Men in Black and also Yaphet Kotto in Midnight Run. I've got a couple of ne'er-do-well deputies, Joe Lo Truglio and Bill Hader. It's just really, really fun. It's a road movie. These guys, Simon, Nick and Paul, are in a motor home, and I'm in a late-model black Crown Victoria in hot pursuit.

And he says they did one take of a scene where Zoil says his full name and suddenly realizes that his own name is a joke on "Lorenzo's Oil," and one take where he doesn't. [Sci Fi Wire]

Eclipse

Some blurry set photos have surfaced of Bryce Dallas Howard as Victoria seducing Xavier Samuel's Riley:

[Lainey Gossip]

Supernatural

The fifth episode, which will feature Paris Hilton, was known on audition and draft scripts as "Celebrity Skin," but has been officially titled "Fallen Idol." [Spoiler TV]

True Blood

A still from Sunday's episode shows Bill hanging by the pool with Evan Rachel Wood's character, Queen Sophie. But what's up with the sunglasses?

[True Blood Net]

Chuck

New Malibu-based set photos from the first two episodes of the season indicate that Zachary Levi does, eventually, lose the beard:

[Chuck TV]

Smallville

In the seventh episode "Crossfire," Clark accompanies Lois when she auditions to host a television show on WGBS, "Good Morning, Metropolis." The show's producer recognizes the chemistry between Lois and Clark, and decides he won't hire one without the other. As a bit for the show, Lois and Clark are each set up on dates with other people, with Lois talking into an earbud in Clark's ear on his date and vice versa. Although Lois teases Clark that his admission that he grew up on a farm will earn him either a country mouse or a cougar for a date, he actually ends up dining with a stunning blonde, who leaves Lois shocked and jealous. Lois is intent on making Clark just as jealous during her date, but apparently ends up tipsy as Clark at some point whispers in her ear "The last thing you need is a drink, Lois." At the end of Lois' date, Clark tells her date he's a lucky man, which pleases Lois.

At some point during the episode, Tess is in Zod's mansion, and Zod tells one of his people that if Tess won't reveal who the Blur is, he should kill her. Also, Oliver will meet Mia "Speedy" Dearden, who wears an awful lot of red and yellow. She also happens to be a hooker with a nasty tattooed pimp named Rick, and Oliver tells her he wants to help her. And when she takes Oliver out in his Lamborghini, he jokingly calls her "Speedy." Oliver will also briefly meet up with Lois and the Ace of Clubs. [KryptonSite]

Better Off Ted

In the sixth episode "What Lies Beneath," Veridian Dynamics decides to genetically match up employees with their perfect romantic partners, figuring that they will produce children that will cost the company less money. Ted is matched up with the beautiful and charming Danielle, and though he is initially resistant to Veridian's plan, he finds himself falling for her. Meanwhile, Linda is matched with Greg, who is also attractive and charming, but has one tiny little eccentricity. When working for Veridian makes him feel small and insecure (as it would anyone), he dresses in a bear suit and goes to the park to make himself feel mighty. And a receptionist at the Veridian health clinic has difficulty keeping Phil's medical records from Veronica. [Spoiler TV]

Heroes

The eighth episode of the new season will be called "Once Upon a Time in Texas" — perhaps the episode where Hiro goes back in time to save his sweetheart Charlie? [HeroSite]

Defying Gravity

It's Halloween in stills from the seventh episode, "Fear:"

[Spoiler TV]

Eastwick

In the fifth episode, Roxie will fill in for Bun, the Eastwick tour guide, when he suffers a bout of memory loss. She may not be the best choice, though, as the tourists question her historical accuracy, and at least one thinks she's an outright weirdo when she has a vision mid-tour. One of the tourists also asks about Eastwick's tradition of burning coffins at Halloween to symbolize the release of burdens.

Apparently, the tradition doesn't go well, because later Roxie screams that there is someone in the fire. She begs a fireman to put the fire out, but he misunderstands her because of the loud music playing at the Halloween celebration.

Also during this episode, Kat and Joanna have a fight after Kat kisses Will, which Mrs. Greenberg, an elderly patient at the hospital where Kat works, overhears. Mrs. Greenberg then steps in with her two cents. And Penny approaches a group of folks outside the Eastwick Cafe and asks them if they've seen Joanna recently. When one boy, looking at Joanna's picture, comments that he'd "tap" that, Penny retorts that he's never tapped anything other than himself. [Spoiler TV]

Additional reporting by Alexis Brown and Charlie Jane Anders.

From DC, there are two not-really-io9-but-still-worth-looking-into books in the new "Vertigo Crime" imprint: Brian Azzarello's Filthy Rich and novelist Ian Rankin's John Constantine story Dark Entries, although the latter isn't really a crime book per se.

But leaving those aside, DC's big releases of the week include Blackest Night: Superman, in which the Man of Steel has to come to terms with his daddy issues because, hey, his dad has risen from the dead (but which dad? That's why you have to buy it, people). And the first issue of the new Batgirl series, which will hopefully answer the question of who's taken on that name these days once and for all.

A week of new starts, then, but Marvel are taking the opposite tack with some great collections of old material. Okay, Astonishing X-Men: Ghost Boxes isn't really old - it's the start of Warren Ellis' run on the series. But for classic stuff, you can't really go wrong with Kurt Busiek's time-bending Avengers Forever. Or the Spider-Man/Mary Jane: You Just Hit The Jackpot collection, which brings together lots of stories of the comics couple that only Joe Quesada and a Satan analogue could tear apart. Less well-known but not less interesting, Black Widow: Sting Of The Widow offers a hardcover introduction to Scarlett Johannson's femme fatale before next year's Iron Man 2 hits theaters, collecting some of the character's earliest appearances.

Elsewhere, the idea of the Bad Girl gets two different hardcover takes. Image's exploitathon Bomb Queen gets her very own Omnibust (Get it? Because she has tits! Ah, subtlety...) And Boom!'s enjoyable Buffy with an attitude series Hexed gets a deluxe collection that's well worth picking up.

If you're looking for some movie action, IDW releases the first issue of its Astro Boy Movie Adaptation, while Dynamite brings Bruce and Barack together in the opener to Army of Darkness: Ash Saves Obama (Yes, really). Dynamite also has the first issue of Project Superpowers: Meet The Bad Guys, wherein Alex Ross' revamped Golden Age heroes meet their matches for the first time.

Most interesting book of the week has to be Days Missing, a new mini-series created by the production company owned by Gene Rodenberry's son, Rod. Pushing itself as being created "in the Roddenberry tradition of thoughtful, philosophical, and topical science fiction," the first issue boasts a good creative pedigree, with Phil Hester and Frazer Irving providing writing and art (Each issue will feature a different creative team), and a story about a mysterious figure who shows people their true potential... for a price. We'll have a review tomorrow, but it's definitely worth looking out for in the stores.

As always, you can find a list of all the books being released this week here, and then look for your local comic book store here. Just beware of mysterious figures offering to expose new sides to you that were unaware of; it never ends well.

The CG film comes out in October 23d.

[via Superpunch]

Astro Boy the movie about a robot boy who's rejected by his maker (Nic Cage) then turns tiny superhero, will open in theaters on October 23rd.

[via MSN]

Iron Man 2:

Even more trailer screenshots including War Machine and Whiplash, letting it all hang out. [Lyricis.FR via SpoilerTV-Movies]

G.I. Joe:

Director Stephen Sommers talks us through the anatomy of that crazy Paris chase scene, with the accelerator suits that everybody loves. [Superhero Hype]

Astro Boy:

The studio sent us some new stills from the picture, including your first look at President Stone, Dr. Elefun (Bill Nighy) and Dr. Tenma (Nic Cage). [Summit]

Repossession Mambo:

This organ-repo movie, starring Jude Law, Forest Whitaker and Alice Braga, changed its name to Repo Men. It's due out in the winter of 2010. [ShockTillYouDrop]

Doctor Who:

An incredibly migraine-inducing cameraphone copy of the "End Of Time" trailer. [Den Of Geek]

V:

So there's a casting call for episode 1x01, which I'm guessing is actually the second episode (counting the pilot). We'll meet Joannie Maddox, who's the wife of FBI agent Dale (Alan Tudyk). She's "upset and devastated" when Dale doesn't come home, and is presumed missing. (And of course, anyone who's seen the pilot will know why that is.) [SpoilerTV]

Fringe:

Some new set photos reveal a scene set in a bus/train/ferry station, where there's a bit of a scuffle. More pics at the link. [SpoilerTV]

Caprica:

Looks like we'll finally be meeting Tomas Vergis, the rival tech whiz who developed the all important A.I. processor that Daniel Graystone needed to make his Cylon prototype work. (He was originally supposed to be in the pilot TV movie, and Amanda Graystone was even going to have an affair with him at one point, but she was really only spying for Daniel.) Anyway, now when we meet him in episode six, "Know Thy Enemy," he'll be out for blood, according to the casting call:

A handsome, well-dressed man in his late 30s to mid 50s, Vergis is a Tauron, Daniel's rival and head of a computer technology engineering firm, the same one that Daniel stole the invaluable MCP from. Having lost family due to Daniel's actions, Vergis is out for blood, seeking revenge and driven to destroy everything Daniel holds dear, and he will do so in the most ruthless and publicly professional way possible. He exudes a confidence which is both chilling and powerful. He will let nothing stand in his way

[SpoilerTV]

Stargate Universe:

In one episode, "Time," the crew lands on a planet and discovers "alien balls." These balls are "some kind of temporal recording/playback device, and they allow the crew to witness their own deaths. Don't touch the alien balls, guys. [Cinemaspy]

Warehouse 13:

Last night we met Claudia, the punky hacker chick. Allison Scagliotti explains her role going forward:

Claudia is primarily the new techie/apprentice to Artie's curator. She likes to impress Artie with her new take on his steam-punk devices, [which is] a very important skill-set – very important to running interference during a mission. In some of the episodes towards the end of the season Claudia does get to go out and help Pete and Myka a lot, while Artie holds down the fort.

And she says she and Saul Rubinek got on like two old Jewish women.[TV Overmind]

Heroes:

Zachary Quinto says that even though Sylar thinks he's Nathan Petrelli, we'll still be seeing Quinto this season:

There's definitely going to be Sylar in the fourth season of the show. I actually feel incredibly challenged by the work that I'm doing on the show in a great way. I think they've found a really exciting and smart and innovative way to keep the character moving forward and evolving.

For one thing, Matt Parkman will be hallucinating that Sylar is tormenting him, giving Parkman a taste of his own medicine. And also, Quinto will get to explore new territories in an organic way, as Sylar. [Newsarama]

Robert Knepper, who plays charismatic carnival leader Samuel, has been upped to a series regular, instead of only appearing in six episodes of the new season. Apparently the ringleader has "Earth-moving" powers, and as we mentioned, he's recruiting super-powered people for a special purpose. [Hollywood Reporter]

Smallville:

Justin Hartley gives a bit more of a hint about what to expect from Ollie this year and Erica Durance talks Lois. [DaemonsTV via SpoilerTV]

Additional reporting by Alexis Brown.

Star Trek:

Zoe Saldana says you shouldn't believe protestations by Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman that they've barely even started talking about the next Trek script: She believes it's probably about half done. And she's sure the Spock/Uhura relationship will continue:

I am excited to see what they're going to do with their relationship in relation to what happened to Vulcan and what kind of responsibilities Spock is going to have in this next journey. Not only in his personal side but in terms of he's a race in extinction now.

[Sci Fi Wire]

Harry Potter:

Fans watched the filming of a stunt from the "Seven Potters" chapter of Deathly Hallows. Hagrid's stunt double (wearing a big coat and goggles) drove a motorcycle, weaving in and out of traffic. Meanwhile, Harry's stunt double (wearing a grey hoodie, and complete with burning scar) rode in the sidecar and brandished his wand to shoot a spell at someone chasing them. More pics at the link. [HP4U via Harry Potter's Page]

Iron Man:

Director Jon Favreau talks about the problems Tony Stark will face with the "Iron Man" technology, and how he'll introduce the film's new characters. [IGN]

Astro Boy:

Here's a new pic of the Peacekeeper robot, which may not be quite as peaceful as the name might suggest. Bigger version, plus another pic, at the link. [Wired]

Transformers 3:

Tyrese Gibson told an interviewer he'll be back for the third movie and he believes his character, Robert Epps, will have a larger role next time out. "My part is going to be bumped up." [Blast Magazine]

Zombieland:

Cinematical's Kevin Kelly talked to the film's star, Jesse Eisenberg, as well as its director, Ruben Fleischer. [Cinematical]

Dollhouse:

There was some concern whether Amy Acker would be able to return to this show, since she's signed up to star in the new drama Happytown. But she's inked a deal to appear in three episodes this season. [EW]

Also, there's a casting call for the second episode of the new season. We'll be meeting the sickly, strange Terry Karrens, aged 33 and the affluent, educated Bradley Karrens, in his late forties to early fifties. There's also the very respected — but very repressed — liberal arts college faculty member, Professor Gossen. There's a funny, odd guy named Franklin, a sexy, full-figured aunt in her thirties, a fit mom in her late forties, and two good-looking daughters, one 15-ish and one 22-ish. [SpoilerTV]

Battlestar Galactica:

If you're in the United States, you can view the trailer for "The Plan" which showed at Comic Con, and which has a spot of new footage. If you're not in the U.S... you're not part of the plan, I guess. [Syfy via Battlestar Blog]

FlashForward:

Producer David S. Goyer revealed the titles of the first three episodes: "No More Good Days," "White To Play" and "137 Sekunden." And here's an interview with Goyer and recurring co-star Dominic Monaghan. [TV Overmind]

And star Joseph Fiennes says the FBI agents' board, full of newspaper clippings and photos and scribbled clues will lead us to whoever is behind the worldwide future-vision — and Fiennes is convinced the cause is a "who," not a "what." Striking images in the show include a black swan, an intense man with a widow's peak, and paintings of serpents and "weird-headed animals." Goyer says Monaghan's character, Simon, is a genius who went to college when he was 14 years old, and the kanagaroo you see hopping around L.A. will reappear because it "has a story." And executive producer Marc Guggenheim says we'll meet Zoey, the lawyer fiancee of John Cho's character, in episode three. Wel'll deal with whether they can still marry in the wake of the "flash forward." We'll also meet the mother of Fiennes' character at some point. [TV Guide Magazine]

Stargate Universe:

Here are some awesome new posters showing this fresh-faced, haunted new crew. [SpoilerTV]

Heroes:

Here's a pretty terrible/inaudible video of the season four trailer that was shown at Comic Con. Looks like Claire is back to committing suicide as a cry for attention.

And the show is seeking two actors to play carnies in episode 4x06: Damian is a "rock'n' roll biker type," a true carnie with haunted eyes — he's similar, in terms of presence, to the Haitian. And Teddy is another "rock'n' roll biker type," who has an unforeseen talent. [SpoilerTV]

Chuck:

The first episode of season three will be called "Chuck Vs. The Pink Slip," and will feature three new characters: Javier, a muscular Latin assassin, Yuri, the scariest of Russian spies, and Gilles, an incredibly handsome Frenchman. [ChuckTV]

True Blood:

The twelfth episode of the season will be called "Before The Night Is Over." [SpoilerTV]

Additional reporting by Alexis Brown.