Emmerich told MTV that he's planning a two-film arc following the events of Independence Day. He doesn't have a script yet, but the idea is to continue the story of the original. He wouldn't elaborate on exactly what sort of foe humanity would face this time around, but it sounds like we'll be seeing an invasion of some kind:

It's always about earth and that earth gets invaded.

He also reiterated that the idea involves Will Smith and that the sequels would, like the original, focus on a "king who leads his troops into battle against an evil force, and that stays like that." So what title has Emmerich suggested for this opus?

'ID4-ever,' Part I and II maybe?

We'll have to wait and see if he's joking.

'Independence Day' Sequel To Be Two Movies, Possibly Called 'ID4-Ever' [MTV]

After Independence Day brought us Bill Pullman as the inspirational President Whitmore, Emmerich didn't feel the spirit of the film was compatible with the times of the Bush administration:

"In Independence Day, it was about a king who leads his country into a fight against an outside invader. I didn't want to make that movie during the Bush years. It was not thought that George W. Bush would have made a great king. Now with Obama, it's another story."

The sequel would, in fact, focus on the US President, but it's still plagued by funding woes and disagreements between Emmerich and Fox as to whether to bring back Will Smith. But Emmerich seems determined to return to the universe of what he calls his "defining film."

Roland Emmerich Wants To Make Independence Day 2 Because Of Obama [Cinema Blend]

Talking to Latino Review, the 2012 director said that he's ready to make a follow-up to the 1996 alien invasion epic as soon as Fox seals a deal with star Will Smith:

Dean Devlin and I are still set to make a sequel likely because we've found some sort of idea and we approached FOX and FOX has not quite figured out how to incorporate Dean's and my deal, and Will's (Smith) deal. Will wants to do it in some sort of a package they can live with. So it's just been in negations now since forever, and naturally FOX says "Why don't you do it without Will Smith?" I said Will is essential for us, for this movie and actually for the audience too. And, so, it's in limbo and lately the studios are fighting. Like gross players, and Will is a gross player and is probably the only gross player right now who's worth his gross. So we'll see what happens. I would love to do it.

Independence Day Sequel Stalled By Fox [Latino Review]

Compared to the Civil War or World War II, the American Revolution has, for whatever reason, been largely neglected by alternate history writers. While books like Bring the Jubilee and The Man in the High Castle stand as iconic works that imagine Confederate and Nazi victories respectively, there is no such defining work detailing the particulars of the British maintaining control of their wayward colonies. Still, there are a number of more obscure short stories and essays (plus a couple of novels) that do consider just such a scenario, and they generally take one of the four following forms...

1. Different historical circumstances prevented the American Revolution completely.

Technically speaking, I could include in this category almost any alternate history where the divergence occurs long before July 4, 1776. For instance, a story about the Roman Empire surviving into the present day would undoubtedly mean European contact with and subsequent colonization of the Americas would have happened far, far differently. Instead, let's just focus on stories that explicitly explain how changing history would avert the Revolution.

J.C.D. Clark's essay "British America: What if there had been no American Revolution?" argues that increased representation for the colonists, much like the Scottish and Irish parliaments prior to the Act of Union in 1707, might well have given the Americans a satisfactory level of self-government and made rebellion unnecessary. The short story "Cops and Robbers" by S.M. Stirling is set in modern times, but it uses as its setup a world where Prime Minister William Pitt the Elder led Britain to a far more decisive victory in the French and Indian War (also known as the Seven Years War). This then allowed the British to maintain control over their colonies for a considerably longer period.

Writing just over a hundred years ago, Joseph Edgar Chamberlain imagined a plethora of alternate scenarios in his book The Ifs of History. He imagined a French colonization of Plymouth Bay that would have allowed the Dutch settlements of New Holland to survive, preventing the colonial unity that made the success of the Revolution possible. He wondered what might have happened if Columbus had not slightly altered course while crossing the Atlantic in 1492, which would have led to landfall on what is now Florida, likely shifting Spanish colonial interest towards North America.

He also looked at the possibility of Elizabeth I marrying and giving birth to an heir, which he believed would have prevented the rise of Puritanism and thus likely averted the Revolution. Not all of the changes he described would have appeared quite so momentous at the time, as he considered the tale of a colonial mother deciding in 1746 whether or not to enlist her son in the British navy. The mother was Mary Washington, the son was George Washington, and if the decision had been "yes" then the rest would have been a very different history than what we know.

2. Diplomacy prevailed.

This category focuses on situations where the colonies were on the brink of war, but ultimately were pacified thanks to brilliant diplomacy. Caleb Carr's essay "William Pitt the Elder and the Avoidance of the American Revolution" argues Pitt could have prevented the American Revolution if he had refused his ennoblement as the Earl of Chatham in 1766, which would have allowed him to stay in the House of Commons. Carr feels Pitt stood the best chance of preventing the various oppressive acts and exorbitant taxes that so angered the colonists, and in doing so might have prevented the rebellion.

In a similar vein, Roger Thompson imagined in his essay what might have happened "If I had been…the Earl of Shelburne in 1762-5." The crux of Thompson's argument holds that, if the Earl of Shelburne had been in charge of the peace negotiations following the Seven Years' War, he might have allowed France to regain control of Canada, which would have in turn removed the need for much of the taxation of the colonies.

One of the few full-fledged novels to tackle the subject, The Two Georges was cowritten by alternate history grandmaster Harry Turtledove and, for some awesome reason, Jaws actor Richard Dreyfuss. The titular Georges are, naturally enough, King George III and George Washington, who managed to negotiate a peaceful redress to American grievances that allowed the colonies to remain part of the British Empire. The theft two centuries later of a painting recording their legendary meeting sets the book's plot in motion, which takes the detective protagonist from New Liverpool (or, as we would call it, Los Angeles) on a winding tour throughout the North American Union all the way to their version of Washington D.C., the colonial capital Victoria.

3. The British won the war.

This really should be the easiest kind of alternate American Revolution story to write, considering just how unlikely the colonial victory arguably was. Beyond the superior military might of the British Empire, there was also the fact that not all Americans supported the cause of independence (although a majority of them did), and even then not all of the patriots were properly trained to fight. But beyond these general advantages the British had, there were several specific instances where the British could have triumphed and, in the process, likely ended the rebellion.

A major turning point recognized by multiple alternate history authors is the Battle of Saratoga in 1777. The month-long series of skirmishes, bookended by two bloody battles, saw the decisive defeat of British General John Burgoyne's army. Burgoyne had previously boasted that his troops would be able to split the colonies in half and effectively end the revolt. He was defeated largely due to the tactical brilliance and bold action of a brilliant young general by the name of Benedict Arnold. In H. Beam Piper's "He Walked Around the Horses", Burgoyne's victory at Saratoga is credited at the effective end of the American Revolution. A similar result is seen in Robert Sobel's For Want of a Nail…; If Burgoyne Had Won at Saratoga, which takes the form of an alternate history textbook detailing the duel histories of the Confederation of North America and the United States of Mexico.

Speaking of Benedict Arnold, Robert Cowley looked at how Arnold might have acted differently slightly later in his notorious career, as he detailed in his essay "Benedict Arnold Wins the Revolutionary War for Britain." Paul Park's "The Blood of Peter Francisco" takes place in the early 20th century in a world where the British routed the Continental Army at Yorktown in 1781, which in our history was the battle that signaled the inevitability of American victory.

Thomas Fleming is even more ambitious in his piece "Unlikely Victory: Thirteen Ways the Americans Could have Lost the Revolution", which examines the entire chain of events that made American success possible and then pulls out thirteen of the weakest links. This includes how the Patriots expertly turned the Boston Massacre into a rallying cry for anti-British sentiment, how a fortunate fog covered the American retreat from the Battle of Long Island and prevented their capture at the hands of the British, and how George Washington's charisma was all that stopped the disgruntled Continental Army from marching on Congress to demand their pay, all of which Fleming considers the results if these had played out differently.

Perhaps the most interesting sub-sub-sub-genre in this category concerns the ultimate fate of George Washington. In 1974, Robert Wallace Russell wrote and staged the play Washington Shall Hang: A Drama of Lost Revolution, which imagines the general being put on trial for treason. Roland J. Green's vignette "Exile's Greeting" looks at the HMS Bellerophon as it prepares to transport an important political prisoner to the infamous island of St. Helena, which in our history was the final home of the defeated Napoleon Bonaparte. I suppose my inclusion of that story in this particular paragraph pretty much gives away the big twist as to which mysterious general is being exiled to St. Helena.

4. Something utterly crazy happened.

Let's be honest here. (And, by "honest", I of course mean "borderline jingoistic in a tongue-in-cheek manner.") The American Revolution was a historical inevitability and no amount of expert political maneuvering by Pitt the Elder or brilliant strategizing by General Burgoyne could have prevented or defeated it. So how, exactly, could you plausibly write a story where the Revolution turned out differently? With magic and dragons, that's how!

Orson Scott Card preferred the former option in his Tales of Alvin Maker series, in which almost everybody has a "knack", or ability to do at least one thing absolutely perfectly, and a few people have particularly powerful knacks, including the title character. The existence of such powers has greatly altered the course of human history, and what would have been the United States is divided into a colonial New England controlled by the heirs of Oliver Cromwell's English Republic, a monarchy on the east coast ruled by the exiled House of Stuart, and a much smaller independent America where Native Americans play a far greater role.

Mike Resnick upped the ante considerably in terms of awesomeness when he titled his alternate history book Dragon America: Revolution. The book is set in a world where the ecology of the Americas is greatly different from that of the Old World, as it is dominated by, well, dragons. For some reason, the Revolution is close to failure in this universe, which forces George Washington to send Daniel Boone westward in search of the legendary dragons that could be their last hope for victory against the British.

I'll admit I'm probably cheating a little bit by including this book, as the American Revolution does ultimately succeed thanks to the dragons, but I have one very simple rule in life - I will never pass up an opportunity to talk about team-ups between George Washington and dragons to defeat the British. I can't think of anything that better encapsulates the American way.

For almost as long as there have been superheroes, there have been superheroes who were intended to be patriotic figures representing American values by offering up inspirational speeches, standing up for the little guy and socking Hitler in the jaw whenever possible. Considering the popularity of the medium during the Second World War, it's easy to see why Real American Heroes became so prevalent, even if they've failed to find so easy a purpose ever since (Although trying to do so has produced such great stories - and such sly commentary as Captain America's 1970s villains, the Committee to Regain America's Principles... or CRAP, for short). But this isn't a day to think about troubled times... so let's salute the brave, bold and... others... of America's Fictional Finest.

The Classics
Captain America
Still the best of all of America's superheroes - or, at least, the only one who's really weathered the years and stayed in print the longest. Sure, there was that whole period he disappeared after the War, but that's because he was frozen in a block of ice. Who would've wanted to have read that month after month?

Uncle Sam
Who could be more patriotic than Captain America? Well, how about Uncle Sam himself? Oh, alright; this character, created by The Spirit's Will Eisner, wasn't the Uncle Sam, but instead the resurrected spirit of a Revolutionary War-era soldier who mystically returns in America's various hours of need, but still. Look at that beard and wonder just who could argue?

The Shield
Created more than a year before Captain America, Archie Comics' super soldier patriot may not have the name recognition of Marvel's counterpart, but DC Comics is doubtlessly hoping that J. Michael Straczynski's upcoming revival of the superpowered military man will change all of that.

The Fighting Yank
A character so wonderfully named, he's been revived not once but twice in recent years, and by no less than Alan Moore (in a 2001 issue of his America's Best Comics series Tom Strong) and Alex Ross (in his ongoing Project Superpowers series). But who could resist the lure of a man haunted by the ghost of his War of Independence-era ancestor who fights for his country's honor?

Liberty Belle
What are the odds that a woman could have a spiritual connection with the Liberty Bell so strong that it gives her superpowers and the ability to fight Nazis? if you're a comic book character from the 1940s, apparently they'd be good enough for that character's daughter to take on the same costumed identity and fight crime with the Justice Society today.

The Forgotten Heroes
Mr. America/Americommando
Reason #1 to love this 1941 superhero: His secret identity is a Texan oilman out for revenge against the Nazis. Reason #2: His sidekick's name was "Fatman." Reason #3: His Nazi-fighting technique? Dying his hair black and whipping his enemies until they surrender. Why is this character not getting multiple movies and fan worship as we speak?

Miss America
Sadly unrelated to the above, Miss America gained her powers from a dream where the Statue of Liberty came to life and gave them to her, and thankfully kept up that level of weirdness all the way through her career, whether it was faking her own aging process in order to live a quiet life or making a new body for herself from space debris and renaming herself Miss Cosmos. There's something admirable about that kind of ingenuity, wouldn't you agree?

USAgent
A much more recent patriotic hero than most, John Walker hails from the 1980s and an unsuccessful stint as a replacement for Captain America that accidentally led to his parents' death. His success as a character is perhaps best defined by the fact that he - an American-themed hero with a very American name - was transplanted to Canada by Marvel in a desperate attempt to make him a success. It failed.

American Eagle
Marvel Comics' 1981 attempt at inclusiveness resulted in this Native American hero, Jason Strongbow, whose generic origin story (Gained powers in accident caused by supervillain, seeking revenge for a dead brother) and lazy stereotypical costume didn't hint at the potential that's slowly being unlocked by more recent creators in series like Thunderbolts and War Machine.

Star-Spangled Kid
DC Comics keep trying with this name, even if the characters keep getting popular enough to outgrow it; the first SSK became Infinity Inc.'s Skyman in the 1980s, and the second became the Justice Society of America's Stargirl. Luckily, we now apparently have a third in the Teen Titans franchise, even if she does happen to be martian. Does an alien really count as star-spangled?

The Crazy Ones
The Comedian
Sure, there may be nothing particularly American about his name - or even his outfit, most of the time - but there's no doubting that Alan Moore's Watchmen character served his country - or more accurately, his country's government - better than most superheroes. Not enough to stop himself getting thrown out a window, sure, but them's the breaks.

Nuke
Frank Miller's intentionally-failed attempt to repeat the Captain America experiment may have seemed slightly out of place in the classic "Born Again" Daredevil storyline, but there's no denying that his drug-fueled, crazed Vietnam-flashback rantings made him a memorable indictment of mindless patriotism in Reagan's America.

Superpatriot
An old-school superhero captured, made into a cyborg and going insane and murderous in the process? Erik Larsen's quasi-parody may have a history that's as ridiculous as it is eventful - and that's before you've gotten to the kids he didn't remember having and his half-martian grandchild - but we're choosing to look at him as a man who's just made a few mistakes, is all.

Major Victory
Leader of conservative supergroup the Force of July - Get it? - this DC Comics character was everything some would want in a true American hero: Charismatic, attractive, arrogant and racist as all get out. Never given to complex characterization, the character's descent into political parody continued when he joined a new corporate superteam called the Captains of Industry - Get it? - before, thankfully, dying.

Captain America
Yeah, I know; Steve Rogers isn't crazy, right? But his retconned 1950s replacement most definitely was. After all, how else would you describe a man whose take on American values was deemed acceptable by Nazi supervillain the Red Skull on more than one occasion? Yes, he may think he was a patriot - and, thanks to cosmetic surgery, he even looks exactly identical to the original Cap - but this guy is not the kind of hero you want in your corner.

WTF?
Yank & Doodle
Yes, it's a crime-fighting duo called Yank and Doodle. Even during their heyday of the 1940s, there's no way that kids didn't find these two America-loving teenagers more than a little dumb. Surprisingly, they've just been revived in Dynamite's Project Superpowers series... Here's hoping that new names are forthcoming.

Yankee Poodle
Well, what else would you call the world's most patriotic crime-fighting dog? Part of DC Comics' Zoo Crew, Poodle isn't even the most America-centric of the team... That'd be American Eagle. Who, you guessed it, is an actual Eagle. Stunningly, thanks to Final Crisis, these characters are officially part of DC's main continuity these days.

American Maid
Armed with a boomerang tiara and her quick wits, The Tick's occasional partner in crimefighting stands out as being probably the most capable of all the characters in the comic/show - Dressed like Lady Liberty and working for the US government more often than not, evil will never get away with it as long as she's around.

The First American and US Angel
Alan Moore's turn of the millennium take on the idea of patriotic comic characters was this unusual duo - An overweight, incompetent superhero (The latest in a long line of First Americans) and the former stripper who dreams of taking his place. Social satire, or serious commentary on the impotence of American masculinity in the face of an increasingly revelatory society obsessed with surface glamor above all? You be the judge. But it's not the latter.

US 1
If a trucker who can pick up CB transmissions thanks to the metal plate in his head, and then gets kidnapped by aliens before opening an intergalactic diner in space doesn't sound like the very personification of the American Dream to you, then there's only one explanation: You're not an American in the first place. But even that doesn't stop us from wishing you a happy Independence Day... even if it was independence from you that's being celebrated in the first place.

The satellite achieved orbit around the Moon in late June, and will be mapping its surface extensively. The image you see above is of the lunar highlands south of Mare Nubium, and it's the first image NASA has released from the orbiter.

A release from NASA explains what you're seeing:

"Our first images were taken along the moon's terminator — the dividing line between day and night — making us initially unsure of how they would turn out," said LROC Principal Investigator Mark Robinson of Arizona State University in Tempe. "Because of the deep shadowing, subtle topography is exaggerated, suggesting a craggy and inhospitable surface. In reality, the area is similar to the region where the Apollo 16 astronauts safely explored in 1972.". . . Impact craters feature prominently in both images. Older craters have softened edges, while younger craters appear crisp.

Many more images will be coming from the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter.

Also, if you want to dig the Moon even more today, here is one of the original movies made of astronauts landing on the Moon in 1969. Apparently it was long believed lost, and has just now been recovered. (UPDATE: A NASA rep denies that the movie below is real, so enjoy it only as a fiction.)

Happy Independence Day!

Moon photograph via: NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center/Arizona State University

BEST:

Spot, Data's Orange Tabby Cat from Star Trek: The Next Generation
Who: Data's number 1 friend that didn't wear a Devo-esque visor on his face.
Why he's awesome: He's probably one of the only cats in the universe that has an infinitely advanced AI at his beck and call.
Bonus points: Anything that pisses Riker off is a big plus in my book.

Willis the Bouncer from Robert Heinlein's Red Planet
Who: A sound mimicking furry ball that every kid should have as a friend.
Why he's awesome: In a 1960's era future, when a dog just won't cut it, the only way to really impress the kids at school is with an alien that doubles as a soccer ball. And here's a clip from the Fox miniseries adaptation.

R2D2, Star Wars
Who: The yin to C3PO's (annoying) yang that brings logic and light to any situation through a series of flickering lights and bleeps.
Why he's awesome: He's a moving trashcan that manages to be more likeable than most of the Star Wars palz extended cast.

Porthos, Captain Archer's Beagle from Enterprise
Who: Easily one of the more tolerable characters on Enterprise. Mostly because he didn't talk.
Why he's awesome: He's a beagle! How can beagles not be cute? Also, I feel like after the unfortunate Scotty related transporter incident, he deserves a nice memorial.

Ampersand, Y the Last man
Who: The world's ending, every man is dead, you're an aspiring escape artist pining away for your lost girlfriend and you're all alone. What do you do? Have crazy monkey antics with your favorite jungle friend with a punctuation mark as a name.
Why he's awesome: Not to spoil too much, but he may or may not be humanity's key to getting the XY's back in action.

Lockjaw
Who: Marvel's own alien bulldog and member of the non-human branch of the Avengers.
Why he's awesome: He's super strong, can eat anything and once latched onto the Thing.

Dog the Robot from Half Life 2
Who: Alyx Vance's No.1 go to robotic buddy who helps when your path is blocked by other dimensional beings or just wants to play fetch with your grav gun.
Why he's awesome: He's a giant robot with the personality of a dog. Do you need more?

Pen Pen, from Neon Genesis Evangelion
Who: A genetically altered super smart penguin that lives with Misato Katsuragi during the Angel apocalypse.
Why he's awesome: While the series has moments of intense despair and darkness, you can always count on jerky, anime humor involving naked people and penguins to brighten your day.

K-9 from Doctor Who
Who: Dr Who's multi-generational robotic canine companion.
Why he's awesome: He's gotten a series of spinoff stories and was even parodied on South Park.

Nibbler from Futurama
Who: Nibbler is part of an ancient race of Nibblonians who protect the universe from giant glowing brains that make everyone stupid. Er, Stupid-er.
Why he's awesome: He can eat about 1,000 times his body mass to, uh, produce dark matter.

Gaspode, from Terry Prachett's Discworld series
Who: A talking dog with human intelligence that attempts to bring "Hollywood" to Discworld.
Why he's awesome: He's an endless source of snarky remarks and regularly uses his speech to manipulate humans when he needs food.

CJ-7
Who: A puff ball with a body that guaranteed to produce family friendly fun times.
Why he's awesome: CJ-7 can help you repair torn relationships with certain parental figures and bring people back from the dead.

Einstein, Doc Brown's dog from Back to the Future
Who: You might be under the impression that a certain Family Ties alum might be the Doc's best time traveling friend in this series, but you'd be wrong. This adorable little terrier follows Doc whenever her goes.
Why he's awesome: As long as you ignore the craptacular animated television series, Einstein is always cute, helpful and never obnoxious.

Ein, Cowboy Bebop
Who: A super brained corgie that gets stranded on the Bebop.
Why he's awesome: Although they never really get into it in the series, Ein is a "data dog" that possesses super intelligence that allows him to answer phones and steer cars.

Bubastis, Ozymandias' lynx from Watchmen
Who: When you're a super genius David Bowie impersonator with the world at your fingertips what do you do next? You create a genetically engineered psychedelic colored lynx as a companion.
Why he's awesome: He takes one for the team for the sake of furthering an evil plan for his master.

Gizmo, Gremlins
Who: The main furry faced protagonist of the Gremlins series.
Why he's awesome: While I'm pretty much a fan of all the gremlins, I can't deny the greatness that is Gizmo channeling his inner Rambo.

Seymour from Futurama
Who: Seymour is a part of one of the most tear jerking episodes of Futurama involving Fry recounting the story of the most loyal dog that ever lived.
Why he's awesome: Did you see the last scene? He's the most loyal dog that ever lived! Also, we can rest easy knowing that alternate timeline Fry gave Seymour a great life.

Bronx from Gargoyles
Who: Bronx is the dog version of the Manhattan gargoyle clan. During the whole series you only see one other gargoyle beast, but unlike Budeka, Bronx gets a whole episode devoted to him befriending an Amish kid.
Why he's awesome: Gargoyles are already pretty high on the cool supercreatures scale, but add a dog personality to the mix, and you've got gold.

Roach from WALL-E
Who: They weren't lying when they said that after the world ended there would be nothing left but cockroaches. Fortunately, the end of the world also gave them charming personalities!
Why he's awesome: Making me want a roach as a pet is an epic win in my book.

Kevin and Dug from Up
Who: Kevin is a rare, brilliantly colored giant bird that Carl and Russell accidentally find in Paradise Falls. Dug is sweet golden retriever with a collar that allows him to talk.
Why they're awesome: It takes a lot to make slapstick giant birds funny, but Pixar does a magnificent job. And Dug? He's exactly what I imagine an actual talking dog to sound like. SQUIRREL!

WORST:

Tribbles from Star Trek
Who: Fuzzy, purring little meat pets that take over the original Enterprise.
Why they suck: Pets rocks were bad enough, why would they think that a massively multiplying furry pet rock would be better?

ALF
Who: Alien puppet that takes over a really lame sitcom in the 80's. If ever you want to torture someone without the use of waterboarding, show them and episode of ALF… or Small Wonder.
Why he sucks: Look me straight in the eye and tell me you didn't scream in horror when you saw that clip.

Snarf, Thundercats
Who: A fat alien cat that ends every sentence with an annoying "snarf!" sound.
Why he sucks: Is he a lizard or a cat? I'm going to go with meth induced demonic lovechild.

Teddy from A.I.
Who: An animatronic intelligent Teddy Rucksbin from the future that accompanies David in a search for the Blue Fairy.
Why he sucks: Ok, now I understand that some people might take issue with Teddy's position on the worst list but he's a toy that's alive. That's pretty much the worst nightmare of most 8-year-old kids. And me.

Slimer from Ghostbusters
Who: A green ghost that terrorizes the Ghostbusters team by covering everything in slime.
Why he sucks: For those of us born in the mid 80's and watched the Ghostbusters cartoon first, we expected to see cool ghost antics when we finally saw the movie. Instead, we were greeted with a grotesque blob that was pretty evil.

Div-x from Penny Arcade
Who: You might remember the Sony Dix-X player, an ahead of its time technical marvel.
Why he sucks: According to Penny Arcade Comics, he's a foul-mouthed drunk that's teetering on the edge of killing us all.

Pets from Children of Men
Who: When the world's gone infertile, people turn to animals to provide comfort in the end of humanity.
Why they suck: I have nothing against the animals in Children of Men, personally, but seeing all the dogs, cats and birds cluttering people's homes can be an ominous image.

Selacious Crumb from Star Wars
Who: He's a little fox-lizard thing that hangs out with Jabba the Hut and laughs at all his lame jokes.
Why he sucks: Everybody hates the skinny jerk in the corner with the stupid laugh.

Gleek from Superfriends
Who: The alien monkey pet of the Wondertwins.
Why he sucks: Usually if he was featured in Superfriends, you could count on him popping out to end the episode on a lame joke.

Independence Day Dog from Independence Day
Who: If you're like me then you probably laughed at the idea of a ball of flame chasing a golden retriever down a tunnel.
Why he sucks: Was it really necessary to have a slow motion explosion behind a dog? And wouldn't all that heat ultimately cook them all in that storage locker?
Then Again:...he's immune to explosions. And that's pretty cool. Dodging fire like that, he's like a canine Neo. Maybe he should have been best?

Space Buddies
Why they suck: I'll just point you in the direction of this.

Queequeg, X-files
Who: A Pomeranian adopted by Dana Scully and eaten shortly after by the legendary Big Blue.
Why he sucks: He was found snacking on his previous owner.

Krypto
Who: Superman's dog. Enough said.
Why he sucks: I hate pet versions of superheroes. Also, why does he need a cape?

Muffit from the original Battlestar Gallactica
Who: Caprica used to have a variety of tracker dogs but sadly, none of them survived the Cylon attack. Instead a group robotic dogs are created to replace them.
Why he sucks: Is he an ewok? A fuzzy, metallic gremlin on meth? You decide.

MAD Cat from Inspector Gadget
Who: Dr. Claw's chortling fat feline.
Why he sucks: He's the quintessential evil cat meant to taunt the hero. Plus Dr. Claw regularly beat the crap out of him and he seemed to be ok with that.

Frank the Dog from Men in Black
Who: An alien stool pigeon using the guise of a small pug.
Why he sucks: He made me remember "Who Let the Dogs Out" existed.

Gir, Invader Zim
Who: Invader Zim's mentally disturbed robot helper that was given to him as either a joke or sabotage. Probably both.
Why he sucks: Yeah, yeah Gir is really cute, but he's amoral, evil and would gladly watch you die a fiery death while bursting into a fit of giggles.

Astro, The Jetsons
Who: The Scooby Doo knockoff of the 21st century.
Why he sucks: It might have worked with the Scooby Gang, but there's only room for one charismatic dog with a speech impediment ‘round these parts.

Lamar, Half Life 2
Who: The neutered headcrab that resides in Dr. Isaac Kleiner's laboratory.
Why he sucks: Crabs are rarely a good thing. Head crabs are a double whammy of bad.

Joshua from Dark Angel
Who: A transgenic dog-man with an affinity for painting and crappy comedic timing.
Why he sucks: There was only one good thing that came out of season two of Dark Angel and that rhymes with Smensen Shackles.

Honorable Mention: Blarp from the Lost in Space remake.

An auction on Thursday evening ended with Columbia Studios owning the rights to Asimov's Foundation trilogy (Foundation, Foundation And Empire and Second Foundation), with the intention of the books being adapted into a movie franchise to be produced and directed by Roland Emmerich.

While I've enjoyed certain movies from Mr. Emmerich in the past (especially Godzilla, which I had the benefit of seeing in Germany, dubbed and without any idea what anyone was actually saying, thereby increasing my enjoyment considerably), I remain unconvinced that he's necessarily the man to bring Asimov's epic series to the masses... Or, at least, to do so without dumbing it down considerably and increasing the number of scenes requiring large explosions and/or people screaming. Here's hoping that I'm happily surprised.

Roland Emmerich finds 'Foundation' [Variety]

Openly Aggressive Alien Invaders
You know the type; they come with their guns and their bombs, to quote Dolores O'Riordan, and just try to blow shit up until we surrender. We've seen their kind in War Of The Worlds (whichever version you want), any Dalek-themed episode of Doctor Who, Independence Day or even Transformers, and they're the kind of alien invaders that the world expects - Straight, to the point, and despite their superior firepower, ultimately prepared to fall to our superior intellect, pluck and whatever contagious diseases may be going around at the time.

Passively Aggressive Alien Invaders
These aliens are much sneakier and more difficult to deal with. Oh, they come with promises of all manner of intergalactic treats and peaceful transactions, but behind their oddly perfect grins, they're really lizard people who eat mice whole. I speak, of course, of the aliens from V, but we've seen similar tactics from Secret Invasion's Skrulls ("Embrace change," indeed. The only change they want for us is the one from breathing to six feet under) and, memorably, Mars Attacks's big-brained psuedo-pacifists:

Secret Invaders
Where the Skrulls went wrong, of course, was coming out of the alien closet. If they'd just stuck to their original plan of being undetectably undercover, then world domination could've been theirs much more easily - if less profitably for Marvel Comics. Think of how successful the 1970s Invasion of The Body Snatchers was (and try to ignore Nicole Kidman's shameful The Invasion, while you're at it), or the fact that poor David Vincent never quite managed to completely save the day in The Invaders. Particularly popular in times of American foreign affair paranoia, secret invaders can also generally be identified by the nearby presence of a title that includes some variation on the word "invasion."

Accidental Invaders
It's not just The Day The Earth Stood Still's Klaatu who found himself mistaken for a hostile force; poor ET almost got himself dissected by an overzealous government with cell-phone handguns, as well, and don't get me started on those poor musical bastards from Close Encounters Of The Third Kind. Call it the human disease: seeing something different and just expecting the worst without provocation. I mean, sometimes, even those who do intend to cause destruction aren't really entirely bad guys: think about the Vogons in The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy, who destroy the Earth only because it's in the way, or Star Trek: The Next Generation's Borg, who only want us all to be brothers and sisters and share the same interests, likes and dislikes, and hive mind. Is it that wrong to condemn them?

Well, yes. After all, if we don't condemn them before they destroy our planet, how are we supposed to do it afterwards? If there's another thing that science fiction has taught us, after all, it's that whichever aliens are going to make contact with the human race, there's a very high percentage that their language's version of the words "widespread destruction and/or subjugation of the native population" are going to appear somewhere on their list of things to do. It may seem cruel and overly suspicious, but in this dog-obliterates-dog-with-raygun universe, the case can always be made that it's worth cutting open a couple of friendly aliens who just want to phone home if it means that we don't end up under the extra-terrestrial boot heel of some inhuman Space Hitler. Take my word for it, people: hope for the best all you want, but if you happen to make first contact with an alien, make sure that you do so with at least a knife handly, just in case. And whatever you do, remember: Don't cover your mouth when you sneeze.

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Blank Slate will air on two consecutive days of the week (Tuesdays and Wednesdays). The tentative air date is in September, 2008. This show may also be the first of its kind: Devlin has devised a new way to limit commercials and infuse product placement into this scifi movie, battling the Tivo and DVR fast forwarding problem for advertisers.

[Slice of Scifi]

You can blame EW's Chris Nashawaty for starting the whole thing off with his essay, subtly titled "Superheroes: How They Ruined Summer Movies":

Looking back now, I can pinpoint the exact moment I fell out of love with summer movies: May 3, 2002. I ducked out of work early that afternoon to wait in line for the first screening of the first blockbuster movie of the summer. I remember looking around at the swarm of hooky-playing droolers and fanboys and knowing I was precisely where I was meant to be. I would've taken a bullet for these people. After all, we'd shared some indelible event-movie moments over the years. July 3, 1991: Opening day for Terminator 2. June 11, 1993: Jurassic Park. July 3, 1996: Independence Day. Hell, I'd even saved the ticket stubs. Now it was Spider-Man's turn.

Sitting in the darkness of the theater, beaten numb by the whining adolescent angst of Peter Parker, fighting back a yawn during his schmaltzy rain-soaked smooch with Mary Jane Watson, nearly going into diabetic shock from all of the sugar-spun F/X eye candy that honestly couldn't have looked more bogus, I felt...well, I felt really bored. At some point during those endless 121 minutes, I'd changed. And when the audience started whooping as the end credits rolled, I realized that my beloved summer movies were changing too.

Yes, he's really arguing that Spider-Man ruined the good name of Jurassic Park and Terminator 2. But wait — it gets better:

Just 10 years ago, summer had real movies — the kind without genetic mutants whose tortured origin stories are shamelessly cribbed from Freud 101. In the summer of '98, you could go to a multiplex and see Out of Sight, The Truman Show, or Saving Private Ryan. And if you wanted ear-shattering bombast, there was Armageddon. Don't laugh, Michael Bay's starting to look more and more like Antonioni these days.

Apparently, someone's forgotten to tell Chris that there are actually some other movies coming out this summer besides Iron Man, The Dark Knight and The Incredible Hulk. Either that, or he thinks that Sex and The City was originally created by Stan Lee (Chris, if it helps, here's a list of what's being released this summer).

Television Without Pity's Zach Oat speaks up for sanity:

I feel for you, Chris, I really do, because you seem to have gone to see every terrible superhero movie ever made. I presume it's because of your job as a writer at EW and not out of some assumption of quality, but I'm a long-time comic book fan, and even I knew not to go see Catwoman or Ghost Rider or The Punisher in theatres... My advice? "Just walk away," as the great Humungus said in the summer of 1981. Stay away from the movies that are clearly causing you grief. Don't buy that ticket to Hellboy II (the original made $100 million globally, by the way); instead, go see Eddie Murphy in Meet Dave.

Nashawaty's essay is a strange piece (especially for Entertainment Weekly to run), and it feels like he hasn't thought through his argument, but does he have something resembling a point amongst his bitter ramblings? There are a lot of comic-book related movies this year (Besides the three mentioned above, add Hellboy II and Wanted to the list, and you could potentially throw Speed Racer on there if you squint hard enough as well). Maybe it's not "when did comic movies kill summer," but instead "how many comic movies are too many?"

Superheroes: How They Ruined Summer Movies [Entertainment Weekly]

How Chris Nashawaty Ruined My Summer [Television Without Pity]

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1. Double mouth, or double-wide mouth. (See: Alien)

As the Alien series taught us, there's nothing scarier than a really long, giant toothy mouth — especially if there's a second long, toothy mouth inside it. But the long, toothy mouth rule shows up in a lot of alien movies. In Slither, for example, a guy is taken over by an alien and one of the first things it does is elongate his mouth so that it practically stretches to his ears on one side. (Lopsided elongated mouths are a bonus — lopsided is always scary.)

Corollary: Drool

A scary alien must drool. Again, we know this from the Alien series where the drool flows like water. But since Ridley Scott first gave us full frontal drool in the first Alien flick, drool has been the sign of scary for all aliens. It says "out of control." Now, of course, we cannot imagine any monster without drool. See, for instance, Beowulf, where the monster's drool is one of the first 3D effects. And there's 3D drool coming up in Journey to the Center of the Earth, too. Dinosaur drool!

2. Collective Consciousness (See: Borg from Star Trek)

One of the scariest and most alien things we can imagine is a species that has collective consciousness, or group think. All their minds are connected together like a bunch of little networked Linux boxes, rapidly churning through all that knowledge to figure out exactly how to kill you. Plus, collectively conscious creatures can more easily coordinate an attack, because they are all in mental communication with each other all the time. And they might absorb you — think how scary it was the first time you saw the Borg chanting: "You will be assimilated."

3. Looks Exactly Like a Human (See: Invasion of the Body Snatchers)

Somehow it's scarier when an alien looks exactly like a human, or is camouflaged as one. Even though Men in Black wasn't exactly scary, there was something uncanny when the alien took off its human skin and revealed its true face. And of course one of the reasons Hollywood has remade Invasion of the Body Snatchers four times in the past 50 years (Invasion was the most recent one) is that it's so freakin creepy that the aliens look perfectly human — except for the fact that they have no emotion. We will not, however, speak of the human-camo farting aliens from Doctor Who.

4. Treats Humans the Way Humans Treat Animals (See: Predator)

The infamous Twilight Zone tale "To Serve Man" packs all its punch into one single idea: the aliens have a cookbook ALL ABOUT EATING HUMANS! They look at us the way we look at chickens! The same idea lurks at the heart of popular franchise Predator, where the whole conceit is that the alien has just come to Earth on a safari to hunt human game. Where's the respect? 5. Polymorphous (See: The Thing)

If there's anything scarier than an alien that looks just like a human, it's an alien that can look like whatever it wants. Although the shiny, pretty aliens in Abyss wind up being our friends, they are super scary at first because they can morph into any shape they want. And of course what makes the thing in John Carpenter's version of The Thing so scary is that it can turn any body part into chunks of alien — human heads sprout legs, blood jumps up and runs around the room, people grow dog heads. Whoa. Same goes for the aliens in my personal favorite alien movie, Society, where a bunch of rich Beverly Hills types turn out to be polymorphous creatures who love to have giant orgies where they merge into a big room full of goo and eat humans.

6. Wants to Mate With Humans to Produce Scary Hybrid Offspring (See: Species)

The fear of an alien being who wants to mate with you probably goes back thousands of years, but in terms of current pop culture we can probably trace it back to H.P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu stories of the 1920s. Remember, one of the scariest things about Cthulhu's spawn is that they are mating with humans, producing strange, fishy-looking humans who eventually go back to the sea. Combining this rule with rule 3 (looks human) is the Species franchise, where a super-hot alien lady goes around humping unsuspecting men for their seed and then killing them in flagrante delicto.

7. Buglike (See: Independence Day, Starship Troopers)

Buglike aliens are a staple of the genre. Even the aliens of Alien are buglike, with their hard carapaces. Bugs are so scary-looking already, and we suspect they may also participate in rule 2, having collective consciousness. In fact, "buglike" has become shorthand (sometimes lazy shorthand) for "scary alien," which is why you see so many depictions of aliens with feelers or antennae on their heads. Bug aliens show up in some of the most generic scifi flicks like Independence Day and Starship Troopers. But there are buggy aliens in more highbrow places too, like the Ender's Game series, where Earth is battling (and ultimately genociding) a buglike race.

It's important to note, of course, that number of SFX shots is not the same as complexity of effects. It's also possible that different movie directors define the term "special effects shot" differently. But still, the raw number of special effects shots in a movie is often used as a proxy for how effects-heavy it is, and how fancy it looks. So here's a ranking of SFX shots per movie, starting with the original Star Wars:

Star Wars: 380 special effects shots, according to Harrison Ford: The Films. Other sources just say "around 300".

Lord of the Rings: Return of the King: 400 special effects shots.

The Matrix: 414 special effects sequences.

End of Days, directed by Peter Hyams: 450 special effects shots.

Minority Report: 477 special effects shots.

Starship Troopers: Around 500 SFX shots.

The Frighteners, directed by Peter Jackson: 570 special effects shots, according to the book Stalking The Beast.

Star Wars: Empire Strikes Back: 414 special effects shots (same book), or 605, according to Skywalking: The Life and Films of George Lucas. The ballpark figure of 600 gets tossed around a lot, along with the meme that this movie had twice as many effects shots as the original Star Wars.

Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers: 800 special effects shots, plus another 160 on the DVD.

The Matrix Revolutions: 804 special effects shots.

Star Wars: Return Of The Jedi: 900 special effects shots, according to this book.

Spider-Man 3: "over 900" special effects shots.

The Matrix Reloaded: over 1000 special effects shots.

Spy Kids II, directed by Robert Rodriguez: 1050 special effects shots.

Tron: 1100 special effects shots, according to director Steve Lisberger.

Lord of the Rings: Return of the King: 1500 SFX shots.

Star Wars: The Phantom Menace: 2000 special effects shots, according to George Lucas.

Star Wars: Attack of the Clones: 2000 special effects.

Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow: over 2000 special effects shots.

Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith: 2000 special effects shots, or 2151 according to this article.

Independence Day: 3000 special effects shots.

King Kong, directed by Peter Jackson: 3,000 special effects shots.

• Alien: Blowing up the Nostromo in order to kill one single Alien was one of the biggest (and best) sacrifices in movie history, and the resulting explosion as Ripley flees in the shuttle still stands alone as a perfect example of why you don't need 40 billion rendered polygons showing you just how the ship would look as it broke up into its component atoms. (You can see video of it above.) Plus, you have the audible countdown over the ship's PA system literally beating a ticking clock against Sigourney's ass every step of the way. It worked so good that they decided to repeat it in Aliens.
• Battlestar Galactica — "Exodus Part 2": Lee Adama's emotional outbursts might not win him another command anytime soon, because when he took over as the helmer of the Pegasus he got complacent and fat. However, he redeemed himself by sacrificing his superior ship (with its fighter-building ability) in order to save the Galactica, his pop, and everyone on the planet below. This still stands as one of the most powerful moments in the show. Just when you think everything is hopeless, the camera pulls extremely far back, and... boom. Pegasus to the short-lived rescue.

  
  

• Star Trek III: The Search for Spock: Captains of the Enterprise sure have been careless with their ships. What are they on, Enterprise-Q by now? However, the first time the Enterprise was sacrificed was probably the best. Faced with insurmountable odds, Kirk proves he's best at surviving by activating the ship's self-destruct sequence and letting it take out some nosy Klingons. As he watched it burn to cinders from the planet below, he asks Bones "My god, what have I done." Nothing that Starfleet will court martial him for, apparently.

  

• The Fifth Element: Even cruise ships aren't safe in this film, especially when carrying blue-skinned singing divas with stones buried in their stomachs. The poor luxury spaceliner Fhloston Paradise survives an attempt by Zorg to blow it to smithereens, only to find itself blown up moments later by someone with the sense to use a very short timer and not a wonky thing that you deactivate with a hotel cardkey. Cool escape pods, though.

• Tron: While fleeing Sark and his troops, Tron and his girlriend Yori narrowly escape on a Syd Mead designed Solar Sailer, which rides beams of light around Tronworld. Sark's massive carrier eventually catches up with it and opens up a ship-chomping hole, reducing it to pieces. The best comparison would be if a modern-day aircraft carrier chewed up a catamaran. Sark and the others leave the ship, and he orders it to be derezzed, which is what is really cool about Tron. If you need something, the system can rez it up, and when you're done, you just recycle it.

  

• Lost in Space: Bonehead Joey, er... Major West uses remote control to ignite the engines on the superior Proteus, full of futuretech and possibly life-saving equipment in order to get hull-burning space spiders off the Jupiter 2. However, not content to just let them burn up in the engine's wake, he also makes the ship self-destruct. Even though his ship has had its systems majorly trashed by the malfunctioning Robot, he still blows up the first sweet ride they find. Oh, and it manages to make their own ship crash. Genius.

• The Last Starfighter: When video game expert turned space pilot Alex keys the "Death Blossom" onboard his Gunstar, it turns into a hypersonic laser death machine. However, once it's in the post-orgasmic glow it's rendered dead and useless. They can't even steer out of the way of Xur's approaching ship, which shipicides itself into a moon. However, that bastard Xur got away, never to be caught since the movie didn't get a sequel.

  

• Independence Day: This is more of a shipicide from within, but when Jeff Goldblum and Will Smith fly up to the alien mothership and plant the virus, they're basically giving the thing a huge case of indigestion, which it doesn't quite recover from. Sadly (or maybe gladly) I couldn't get a clip from this since three of the Blockbuster stores I visited in Los Angeles don't carry ID4. Lame. But as a bonus, enjoy this clip mashing up Star Wars with Independence Day. Randy Quaid uses the Force.

  

• Return of the Jedi: While this one wasn't done on purpose, it's sort of a hilarious "Oops" moment as a rebel A-Wing pilot banzais into the bridge of the Imperial Flagship Super Star Destroyer Executor. This causes the ship to veer out of control and crash right into the the new and improved Death Star. Either that was one extremely lucky hit on the bridge, or whoever built the windshield of that thing needs to be fired. It can withstand the rigors of laser fire and hyperspeed, but can't take the impact of a measly A-Wing? I wonder if that have a transportation safety board that investigates these things.

  

• Vanilla Sky: Cameron Diaz gets an honorable mention in this film for tanking her "ship" (okay, a Buick Skylark) off a bridge in an effort to die in a warped suicide love pact with Tom Cruise. Let this be a note to you love 'em and leave 'em types out there: if you scorn someone, they may seek revenge, fuck up your face, and force you to go into a bizarre cryogenic freeze / lucid dreaming / virtual reality state of existence. Just so you know.

  

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• Planet of the Apes: Probably the most famous image from this film is ol' Chuck Heston riding up the beach and finding the Statue of Liberty buried in the sand, which means New York City is buried under a ton of coastline. "You blew it all up. You really did it. Damn you... goddamn you all to hell!" Sorry, Charlie.
• Escape From New York: While there's still a few people kicking it around New York, Manhattan has been turned into a maximum security prison, and of course they haven't been kind to the Statue of Liberty either. Director John Carpenter shot the film in St. Louis, Missouri and was able to convince city officials to turn off the power to ten city blocks each night to simulate the desolate city.
• Independence Day: New York City is bustling and full of life... until a giant flying saucer comes and zaps the place to hell. As expected, the Statue of Liberty buys it in this one, although it just looks like she might be taking a nap in the Hudson River, but the city didn't look fare quite so well.
• Deep Impact: New York City gets taken out by chunks of a comet that has been split in two in this 1998 movie. Several other U.S. cities supposedly get decimated as well, but it's Manhattan that we see getting blasted. A tidal wave created by the impact also takes out the Statue of Liberty, and pushes her head through the streets like a giant pinball.
• Armageddon: Two months after Deep Impact, Armageddon slammed into theaters, taking a good sized chunk of New York City with it. While the Statue of Liberty's plight isn't shown, we do get to witness the top of the Empire State Building coming off and slamming into the streets and bringing the observation level down to the ground floor. What a view.
• Artificial Intelligence: A.I.: Even the combined might of Stanley Kubrick and Steven Spielberg couldn't manage to put any intelligence into this film about artificial intelligence, nor could they save New York City from being flooded and smashed up like some child's Lego toyset. Although bonus points for having the Statue of Liberty survive, even though she's buried underwater up to her torch.
• Vanilla Sky: Tom Cruise wakes up to a bad day where he's the last person in New York City, resulting in a pretty spectacular shot in a desolate Times Square. The production was given unprecedented access to the location for filming, and the city let them shut everything down and empty it out one early Sunday morning just for this scene.
• The Day After Tomorrow: Director Roland Emmerich wasn't satisfied with blowing New York City to smithereens in Independence Day, so he decided to give the place a good going over in this film. New York gets battered by tidal waves, flooded, and then frozen to absolute zero in order to show you the dangers of global warming. Even the Statue of Liberty gets iced with sideways icicles.
• Cloverfield: All we know about this J.J. Abrams-produced movie is that some sort of giant creature starts tearing the city apart, and the Army tries to fight back. Plus, the thing whacks the heads off of Lady Liberty, and it goes sliding down a city street taking out cabs. For a thing built in 1886, she sure is pretty damned resilient.

Famous Names: Will Smith, Jeff Goldblum, Bill Pullman, Vivica A. Fox, Brent Spiner (Cast).

Crunchy Goodness: 1

Most Painfully Dated Moment: Jeff Goldblum uploads a computer virus into an alien starcraft ... with his MacBook.

Stunt Casting: Brent 'Data' Spiner as the scientist in charge of Area 51.

Life Lesson: Electing a jet fighter pilot president works out just fine in the end.

James Berardinelli's Review