Our sister site Jalopnik has a stellar collection of movie cars — both official and replicas. These are mostly fan-made, drivable replicas of cars and bikes from science fiction.

Batmobiles

Some of the more ambitious projects are the Batmobiles. You can actually purchase kits to convert various car models into an Adam West-era Batmobile. But some fans prefer to make their Batmobiles the hard way.

It took Leif Garvin of Stockholm 20,000 hours and $1 million to convert a 1973 Lincoln Continental into the Tim Burton Batmobile. It may not be quite as hi-tech as Batman's car, but it does feature a voice recognition system and rear cameras. [via Toxel]

Bob Dullam attracted massive amounts of attention when he showed off his homemade Tumbler from Batman Begins. Dullam made the entire vehicle from scratch, and even made his own Batsuit and props to go with it. [via Superhero Hype]

And frequent builder Grant Hodgson made a Tumbler of his own. [via Jalopnik]

Bob Causey helped Dullam with his Tumbler and decided to create a Batmobile of his own. Causey took on the Batman Forever version, complete with a remote controlled top. [via /Film]

Kaneda's Bike

There are plenty of models of the iconic motorcycle from Akira, but many of those are non-working copies. Neo-Fukuoka, not a fan group but a professional garage, created multiple, working copies of Kaneda's bike, some offered for sale. [via Riding Sun]

But another fan, Matus, is also creating a replica of the bike from scratch, although he hasn't yet progressed to the exterior.

Mad Max Vehichles

Mad Max vehicles are a perennial favorite among vehicle modifiers. There are impressive lists of fan-made Interceptors at Last Interceptor and Mad Max Movies. But one fan stands out above them all. Adrian Bennett didn't just transform a Ford Falcon Coupe into the famous vehicle, he moved himself, his car, and his entire family from England to a tiny Australian town so he could live out his Mad Max fantasies. [via SCI FI Wire]

Other Mad Max vehicles have gotten the fan treatment as well, such as this Yellow Interceptor made by Grant Hodgson (who also did one of the Batman Tumblers):

And Goose's bike by Mike Acebo:

KITT

Knight Rider's KITT is another favorite, and again there are kits you can purchase to give your car KITT's Cylon eye. Of course, the best KITT mods don't just change the outside of the car, but are also incredibly detailed on the inside, such as this converted 1984 Firebird, which speaks in KITT's voice [via Jalopnik:

And this 1992 Firebird:

Frankenstein's Car

The Gator Car from the original Death Race 2000 would have been more fun, but some Russian fans of the Death Race remake took an impressive crack at Frankenstein's car, starting with a Chevy Camaro. [English Russia]

The DeLorean Time Machine

A DeLorean is already a DeLorean with those retrofuturistic gull-wing doors. But add a flux capacitor, a temporal display on the dashboard, and a liberal sprinkling of light-up buttons, and you've got yourself Doc Brown's time machine. [Auto Blog]

Ecto-1

George Barris, who famously designed the original Batmobile among other TV cars, famously made a replica of Ghostbusters' classic car, one that is perpetually for sale. But others have taken on the Ecto-1 challenge as well. Ghostbusters fanatic Joe Kerezman created an Ecto-1 of his very own.

And a fan calling himself "Venkman21" modified his from a Cadillac ambulance.

Luke Skywalker's Landspeeder

They may not hover, but fans can always pretend in their homespun landspeeders. [all via Interbent]

This puppy was made from a 1988 Ford Escort and is actually a licensed, street-legal vehicle.

This pre-distressed model, created by Daniel Deutsch, runs on batteries and can climb to 25 MPH — impressive, though not exactly putting the "speed" in "landspeeder."

Why the teeth and the clown's head on a pole? It's an art car from Burning Man.

And this last one — which is a bit heavier on the wheels — comes from Pawtucket, Rhode Island, and annual Star Wars Day.

Thor

Bad news for Brian Blessed fans: Anthony Hopkins is in negotiations to play Odin, Thor's father and the ruler of Asgard. [The Hollywood Reporter]

Avatar

We posted an international version of the official trailer the other night, but here is the high quality version:

The official Avatar website has launched with a set of high quality images. A few we've seen before, but most are new:

Mad Max: Fury Road

We told you earlier that Charlize Theron was being considered as the lead for the latest Mad Max movie. She'll be co-starring with Jean-Luc Picard's clone, Tom Hardy. [Cinema Blend]

New Moon

Tonight, MTV will air its special Ulalume: Howling at New Moon, which will include a new clip from New Moon. Naturally, MTV already has said clip and shared a few screen grabs from the clip. [MTV Movies Blog]

Doctor Who

The Tenth Doctor flees monsters with Super Soaker hands in the latest clip from Waters of Mars:

True Blood

Fans of the Sookie Stackhouse Mysteries have wondered whether the werewolf Alcide Herveaux would appear next season, and Alan Ball has finally answered them. Alcide will appear, probably by the third episode, although he hasn't been cast yet. Alcide will already come into the searies with a love interest, a very bad woman named Debbie Pelt. We won't be seeing a Sookie-Bill wedding this season, but, while the couple will have some rough patches, their connection won't disappear. As for Eric, he lost some hair last season and this season he'll lose his clothes. We'll see Eric nearly naked in the season premiere. Everyone else is exploring their identities this season. We already know Sam is seeking out his biological family, but we'll also see Sookie closer to understanding why she has supernatural abilities and Jason doesn't. Plus, Jessica will explore her vampirism and experiences a dangerous identity crisis. [E!]

Powers

Brian Bendis has an update on the live action adaptation of his comic about police detectives in a superpowered world:

"We're making a cop show with superhero elements to it, not a superhero show with other elements to it," he continued. "It's a cop show-a dark one, hopefully in the same vein as 'The Shield'-and it really seems to be shaping up that way. Fingers crossed for the green light!"

He also says that it will be akin to Dexter in terms of faithfulness to the source material (which is to say, there will be some deviations), but that the first arc will involve Christian Walker and Deena Pilgrim solving the murder of Retro Girl. And the first arc will also set up all the mysteries Walker and the other officers will be solving in the series. [MTV]

Lost

The new promo teaser is up, and, as promised, it contains no new footage. [via Lyly Ford]

Looks like Juliet is indeed dead. Damon Lindelof said the decision to kill her was "brutal," but she did go up with the hydrogen bomb. Of course, on Lost, dead doesn't necessarily mean gone, and we'll see Juliet in a few episodes this season. [NY Mag]

The producers are looking to cast the possibly recurring role of Kendall, a beautiful and intellectual woman in her mid-30s with a sharp wit. She gets caught committing corporate espionage and has to lie her way out. [EW]

Fringe

We get a glimpse of the Observer in the promo for the return of Fringe on November 5th (if the World Series doesn't go to Game Seven). [Fringe Television]

Stargate Universe

Water levels are low on the Destiny in tonight's episode, "Water."

V

With just a few days before the Vs arrive, ABC releases a new promo:

The Sarah Jane Adventures

We're going ghost hunting in these images from "The Eternity Trap." [The Doctor Who Image Archive]

And in the 11th and 12th episodes, the two-part serial "The Gift," the crew will face off against the green Slitheen once more. Once the Slitheen have been foiled, however, the Blathereen, rivals of the Slitheen, will appear on the scene to declare piece between the planets. They offer Sarah Jane a civilization-changing gift, one that quickly runs amok. Soon Sarah Jane will be battling for her own son, Luke. Clyde, Rani, and K9 become trapped in a school under siege, London is facing yet another alien threat, and there will be a final showdown in the attic, one that could end someone's life. [Blogtor Who]

Mad Max: Fury Road:

Director George Miller says the film's many vehicles are so intricate that it could take a year just to build all of them. The vehicles will be over-the-top but also need to be safe — because it sounds like there will be a lot of live action stunts. The film will be "shot at speed" and there will be "a huge number of stunts." [The Hollywood Reporter via MTV]

Avatar:

Rumor has it that if James Cameron gets to do Avatar 2, the sequel won't be set on the planet Pandora at all. The second movie will be totally different from the first, like Terminator 2 was to the original Terminator. Pandora "is not the be all and end all of the Consortium." (The source also claims that Cameron will produce the Alien prequel that Ridley Scott is directing, and it'll be in 3-D.) Remember, this is a rumor, and you should give it the same level of credence you give everything else you read on the Internet. [MarketSaw]

And here are a couple of new stills showcasing some blue archery action. [Movies-Spoilers]

2012:

A few new (I think) TV spots for this demolition derby:

Twilight: New Moon:

Here's a colorful new TV spot:

Lost:

Hurley was filming a scene at a new camp, which looks awfully ramshackle, and there was at least one Dharma logo amongst all the detritus. And Jack was also around, wearing a red sweater with "a red spot on his forehead." And judging from the signs on the trailers, Claire was also in the scene at some point. And there was talk of fires and explosions happening on the set later. [Lost-Spoiler-Over via SpoilersLost]

Also, Titus Welliver, who played the mysterious Man In Black in the season finale, says he's coming back to film some more episodes soon — meaning maybe the MIB will abandon his Locke suit, or maybe we'll see more of him in a flashback? [Boston Herald via Doc Arzt]

Chalk up another castaway who's returning to the island: Maggie Grace will return to film some new scenes as Shannon, after a delay caused by some other film projects she was doing. (Meaning, I think, that her scenes could be slotted into the early episodes of the season, already filmed.) [TV Guide Magazine]

Sarah Jane Adventures:

Here it is — the big one, coming in a couple days. I'm only sad that it's not being saved for the end of the season, because that means we know how it ends — Sarah Jane is almost certainly not getting married. But in any case, here's a new trailer, with the TARDIS materialization sound taking the place of "Here Comes The Bride," plus a new interview with the groom, Nigel Havers:

V:

Here's another new promo spot for this remake, showcasing some nifty camera work. It's encouraging that ABC is putting so much promotion into this series. Fingers crossed!

True Blood:

Alan Ball gave a huge interview to the Advocate, full of season three hints. Among other things: We will be seeing a lot more of Ryan Kwanten (physically) in the first few episodes of the season after his relatively modest stint at church camp. If you've read the books, certain developments will not surprise you. Sophie-Anne, the Vampire Queen, is fascinated with Sookie but it may or may not turn sexual. The vampire king of Mississippi has a long-term — and that means very, very long-term — companion. [The Advocate]

Chuck:

Hannah, Chuck's new love interest, is sort of a female version of Chuck, who meets Chuck on a plane and then winds up working at the Buy More after she's lost her job. She's directionless and drifting, like Chuck was before he became the Intersect. And Shaw, Sarah's new love interest, is the new team leader at Team Bartowski and an expert on the Ring. He's a mentor to Chuck and (we think, anyway) a good guy. [ChuckTV]

Smallville:

Here's the official synopsis for Nov. 13's Twin-tastic episode, "Idol":

DC COMICS THE WONDER TWINS SHOW UP TO HELP CLARK CLEAN UP METROPOLIS Superhero twins Zan (guest star David Gallagher) and Jayna (guest star Allison Scagliotti) show up in Metropolis to help The Blur fight crime but end up botching several rescues, landing Clark (Tom Welling) in hot water with the District Attorney's office. Clark decides to come forward as the Blur to clear his name.

[SpoilerTV]

The "Society" two-parter featuring the Justice Society also will feature the return of Phil Morris as the Martian Manhunter. [EW]

Additional reporting by Josh C. Snyder.

The Hollywood Reporter reported on the official announcement that the movie - to be called Fury Road - will be shot in Sydney and New South Wales next year, with a budget in the region of $100 million. In a television interview with reporters, director George Miller showed off the in-progress creation of the movie's vehicles, and talked about his aim for the movie:

We're trying to do stuff that I believe people haven't done before... We want to nudge the genre a little bit. The world has changed since then, it's been thirty years since we made the original ones and the world has changed since then, cinema has changed since then, and action movies have changed since then, so we're really trying to figure out the best way that we can really lift the bar a little bit.

He was a bit more tightlipped when it came to rumors of casting, however, saying "I'm still in the middle of casting, despite the stuff that's been on the net... No decision has been made yet." So maybe rumored stars Charlize Theron and Sam Worthington still have a chance.

The full interview is below:

(Via)

Eonline has broken the news that Theron is director George Miller's number-one pick for the female lead in Mad Max 4. And with end-of-the-world features being all the rage, he may score this Oscar-winning actress.

Tom Hardy, who was in Star Trek Nemisis and Black Hawk Down, is rumored to be taking on the role of "Mad" Max Rockatansk. We're happy that there will be a younger Max who won't get winded chasing down evil biker gangs, and Mel Gibson won't carry through on his threat to change his character's name to "Fat Max."

We just hope they can convince Mel to cameo somewhere. Maybe he can come back as Thunderdome's newest law-maker, replacing Aunty Entity.

But by casting such a well known actress to play the mysterious and female lead role, you have to wonder if this movie will be more of "from the eyes of a she-warrior" story, with Max along for the ride? Either way, if you pay for Theron, I'm sure you're going to want to get your money's worth of screentime. Sadly there are little to no details about the plot, as actors auditioning for the role haven't even been told their character's full names.

Thanks to S.J. Edwards, Elizabeth Bear, DJ Chaotica, Larry-Bob Roberts, Zack Stentz, Daphne Gottlieb, Paul McEnery, James McGirk, Jessy Randall, Kevin Schmidt, Morgan Johnson, Susie Kay, Kat Page and David Fraser for the suggestions!

The Mayor In City Of Ember
He's the textbook example of a corrupt mayor who's only interested in saving his own skin. He knows the underground city of Ember is on its way out, and soon it'll be uninhabitable due to power failures and dwindling supplies. But instead of trying to cope with the problem, the mayor tries to hoard as much stuff for himself as possible, in a secret room — and puts together meaningless commissions to study the problem. Here he is in this video, eating sardines in the grossest possible manner.

Lando Calrissian in Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back
Okay, so Lando is the kind of scoundrel we love to watch. And he's a perfect counterpart for Han Solo. But would you really want him in charge of your city? His Cloud City of Bespin seems like a pretty corrupt, messed-up place. And then he goes inviting Darth Vader and his crew there, which is not good city planning at all. And then after Vader has demolished half the city in his battle with Luke Skywalker, Lando takes off and leaves his city behind. Call that leadership?

Aunty Entity in Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome
She does keep the city of Bartertown humming along — except when she gets stuck into an idiotic power struggle with Master/Blaster, and everything grinds to a halt. Plus she rules with an iron fist, and forces people to fight to the death in a deadly arena. That's not the kind of leadership our post-apocalyptic cities need!

Mayor in RoboCop 2
He makes deals with drug dealers and criminals. And then he mismanages the city's finances and winds up handing the entire city over to the evil OCP. This clip pretty much says it all. And when he's in a tight corner, he just loses his shit.

Mayor Wilkins, in Buffy The Vampire Slayer, season 3
Your average terrible mayor may let the city fall apart, or make deals with drug lords, or bulldoze your house for no reason. But a really awful mayor, like Wilkins, makes cozy arrangements with vampires and tries to kill off the town's only protector. And then tries to turn into a demon so he can eat the high-school graduating class. Now that's bad leadership.

Vilos Cohaagen, in Total Recall.
He's an evil administrator of the Mars settlement, keeping the mutants down and ruling with an iron grip. He uses mind-control and brainwashing to keep his minions in line. And worst of all, he won't give the people air. WTF, Cohaagen?

Mayor Bentham Rudgutter, in Perdido Street Station by China Miéville.
He's always described as sitting "regally on his throne," or sitting "behind his desk with an air of utter command." He rules over New Crobuson, with its corruption and oppression — and he's not averse to making deals with the city's crime syndicates as well as its demons. He systematically rounds up dissidents and has them tortured, and he's not above imposing martial law if the situation gets out of hand.

Father in Equilibrium
Father rules over the city-state of Libria and outlaws all human emotion, even the love of a small puppy. To this end, he keeps the people doped up on a drug called Prozium, and keeps everyone under constant surveillance. (Similar to other figureheads like Big Brother in 1984, or Mustapha Mond in Brave New World — except that Father just rules over one city.) The only good thing "Father" has going for him is his kick-ass gun-centric martial art, gun-kata. Woo hoo!

Judge Cal, In Judge Dredd
This character, closely based on the Roman emperor Caligula, seized power after he had the Chief Judge of Mega-City One assassinated. In Mega-City One, the Chief Judge has absolute authority — an arrangement that's caused some problems on several occasions. So Judge Cal goes completely nuts, making it a crime to criticize him and appointing a goldfish as his deputy. He even shoots Judge Dredd! Dude!

Mayor Prentiss in The Knife Of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness.
Prentisstown is not a nice place to begin with — there are no women, and the males can all hear each other's thoughts all the time, whether they want to or not. But Mayor Prentiss makes matters worse, by figuring out a way to control men's minds. He declares himself President and invades the neighboring settlement of Haven, where there are some women. And that's just the beginning of his reign of terror. Runner up: The mayors in Truancy by Isamu Fukui.

The Dog from A Boy And His Dog

This movie, based on a story by Harlan Ellison, contains a heartwarming relationship between 18-year-old Vic (Don Johnson) and his telepathic, super-intelligent dog Blood. It's just like Peabody the time-traveling professor dog in those cartoons — except that Blood helps Vic find women to rape and food to eat. At the end of the movie, Vic has to choose between the love of a (not terribly) nice woman and keeping Blood from starving — and a shot of meat roasting while Blood talks about how the woman didn't have such great taste gives you a hint of what Vic chooses.

Wall-E

Okay sure, you expect robots to survive the death of the planet — it's what robots do. But you might not expect there to be only one robot left on an otherwise desolate world — and for it to be a cute trash-compacting bot that befriends a cockroach and is obsessed with Barbra Streisand. Admit it — you didn't see that one coming.

Pets, generally

Check out this amazing clip from Exterminators: After The Year 3000, the film with the best title ever. Scroll forward to around 1:00 in — the cute kid in the convoy fleeing from the evil punk-rockers has his pet hamster with him! It's the amazing post-apocalyptic survival hamster. A lion survives in Twelve Monkeys. There's also a lion, as well as Kevin Costner's mule, in The Postman. And the tough post-apocalyptic hunter Harry in the movie Hard Knuckle has a little rat dog in his front pocket, sort of like a post-apocalyptic purse dog. (See awesome picture at the link.) Why is there always a lovable pet after a disaster has wiped out most of humanity?

Kids, generally.

As random dissheveled guy points out in this clip from the upcoming The Road, you don't really expect to see kids surviving a disaster that kills most of the adults. And yet, lots of them do somehow. Including the kid narrator in Mad Max, the gang of children in Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome, Newt in Aliens, and Ed in Cowboy Bebop. Thanks to Madeline Ashby and JungleMonkey on Twitter for suggesting this one!

The mall girls in Night Of The Comet

The deadly radiation from the red comet passing over the Earth wipes out everybody — except for Sam and Regina, two valley girls, who just want to have fun. And go shopping, at the mall, even if it's full of zombies. (It's a well known fact that zombies love shopping malls.) Thanks to Misty S. and S.J. Edwards for suggesting this film!

The Book Of Dave by Will Self

Dave is an obnoxious, mentally ill cab driver in London, who scribbles in his notebook about the rules for surviving London traffic and his hatred of his ex-wife, who's keeping him from having custody of his son. He buries his book, and 500 years later, it's dug up after a flood destroys everything. And it becomes the foundation of a whole new misogynistic religion based on this crazy guy's ramblings. There have been plenty of other stories about bits of cultural flotsam surviving after everything else is gone — Mickey Mouse does it quite often — but this may be the weirdest.

Dinosaurs in Yor, The Hunter From The Future

You have to admit, you didn't expect dinosaurs to survive after the human race was all but wiped out, did you? Just like Planet of the Apes, Yor features a weird primitive world that appears to be the past at first, but which turns out to be our distant future. And somehow the dinosaurs have bounced back, maybe thanks to the radiation. They were only taking a siesta! There's also an android army, which makes a bit more sense.

Amazons in Warriors Of The Apocalypse

Nobody ever expects Amazon warriors to survive a global genocide. And even if you did, you wouldn't expect them to be amazons with eye-lasers, who get into an eye-laser-battle with some other dudes. Another runner up is the 1982 movie SHE, in which a giant in a tutu, a mummy in sunglasses, a Samurai, and bondage freaks all survive the end of the world.

Bob McKenzie in The Mutants of 2051 A.D., as featured in Strange Brew

Okay, so maybe you expected dinosaurs, purse dogs and Valley Girls to survive a planetary die-off. But Bob McKenzie? The co-host of Great White North, that recurring sketch on SCTV, eh? You really really didn't expect him to be the last human still alive. Check out his amazing technique for dealing with a post-apocalyptic mutant who's really not friendly. Thanks to Jeff Sparkman for suggesting this one! Another somewhat unlikely "last man" is Yorick in Y: The Last Man, who's just sort of a slacker escape artist — but he survives the disaster that kills all other men because he eats monkey poop.

Nuns

Nuns often seem to survive the death of humanity — maybe it's their religious faith, maybe it's the fact that they're sequestered from contagion and zombie outbreaks. Most awesomely, Donald G. Jackson's fantastic movie Rollerblade features a world where rollerblading nuns (with Nazi-esque emblems on their uniforms) keep the world safe from evil mutants — while rollerblading. (And they also use a switchblade to heal all wounds, causing a glowy smiley face to appear.) There are also some nuns holding out against the evil dolls-head-loving bikers in Survival Zone. And of course, who can forget Michelle Yeoh as a lone nun after the fall of civilization in Babylon A.D.? I'm sure Yeoh still has nightmares about it.

Thanks to S.J. Edwards, Madeline Ashby, Rory aka Cthul-who, Glamtasm, Jeff Sparkman, Luis Alberto Urrea and anyone else who helped.

Renner, who can currently be seen in The Hurt Locker, told the Modesto Bee that he's currently screen testing for the movie, and that it may shoot next summer, leading to some people wondering aloud whether or not he'll take Gibson's place in the new movie. We can't see it - We'd hope for someone a little less meek-looking, to be honest - but we've been wrong before...

Modesto actor on Oscar 'short list' for 'The Hurt Locker' [Modesto Bee]

Recently, sci-fi has come under fire in certain circles for its lack of innovation in costume design. But meanwhile, the fashion world is eating up scifi frills. Just the other night at the BET awards, I was struck by the sheer amount of crazy buckles and unnecessary straps of sparkle, metal and nylon gracing the red carpet. We've noted before that retro robots seem to be dominating the catwalks nowadays.



While current upscale fashion seems to have fully embraced its inner Mad Max, the Financial Times' Peter Gutierrez touched upon lack of visual appeal in one of the biggest genre films to come out this year: Star Trek. While one could easily argue that Star Trek was merely attempting to adhere to the fashion established by the original series how can one forget things like this?


Or this? It's pretty obvious that Trek has created some…interesting spacewear, so why is it so drab now? Even the green girls of today aren't as exciting as those of yesteryear.


In a lot of ways genre films have struggled to become a legitimate category, and in its pursuit, it seems to believe that one cannot be taken seriously when you look like this.



So, now we've thrown camp aside for the sake of mainstream acceptance and we want our realistic sci-fi. No more space babes with foil bikinis - it's all tank tops, business attire and military jumpsuits.

Scifi fashion has forgotten its roots, and now it's being taken up as irony chic by fashionistas who wouldn't touch your very favorite episode of Farscape with a ten-foot pole. While I love the recent trend of realism in my sci-fi, I miss the wacky colors and unique use of latex in the stuff of old. This new streak of science fiction (like most streaks) is merely a trend and will probably swing back sometime with the right film. I'm holding out hope for new Bruce Willis flick Surrogates . It looks cool and all, but Bruce - can you get back to the basics? No, not ‘Yippie kay yay' basics, but ‘Mila Jovovich wearing band aids and battling aliens' basics. You know Chris Tucker could use the work, and I'm always looking for Halloween costume ideas.

The Daily Telegraph is reporting that:

Scouting for locations is already happening, and specialized technicians have been approached.

This would be in Australia, naturally. Please, please, please let this be for something other than reference stills for animators. I would absolutely love to see some real life end-of-the world fights and chases. Does anyone know anything more about this? I'm desperately hoping for a Sam Worthington-starring flick, where he eventually runs into Mel Gibson, playing an Obi-Wan Kenobi-type character. But I'm not getting my hopes up until we hear more from Miller.

Miller plans to make the fourth Max as an R-rated, 3D animated movie, and not just because it'd be cheaper than hiring Gibson and paying for all the special effects; no, the director plans to use it as a chance to redefine anime altogether:

I've always loved anime, in particular the Japanese sensibility. It's something I've always wanted to do... The anime is an opportunity for me to shift a little bit about what anime is doing because anime is ripe for an adjustment or sea change. It's coming in games and I believe it's the same in anime. There's going to be a hybrid anime where it shifts more towards Western sensibilities. [Japanese filmmaker Akira] Kurosawa was able to bridge that gap between the Japanese sensibilities and the West and make those definitive films.

Some would say that we've had hybrid anime for years - If nothing else, projects mixing American and Japanese animators like The Animatrix and Batman: Gotham Knight would seem to fit the bill - but that doesn't mean that we're not interested to see what Miller has in mind. Not that we'll be seeing it for awhile yet; Miller says that the project has "a couple of years left" at least before we'll get to see exactly what he has in mind. Here's hoping it's more successful than his failed Justice League movie.

Fourth ‘Mad Max' In Development…As 3-D Anime Feature [MTV Movies Blog]

A few things have changed since we last saw the Apocalypsemobile. It runs now, which is nice (though the "door ajar" alarm sounds constantly whenever the battery is connected). A hole has been carved into the hood - the rules dictate this modification "to expose the carburetor for fire fighting," and we followed the rules even though this car has no carburetor. You may also note the fin on the roof, required by the rules because the numbers on the side of the car will be obscured by mud almost instantly.

Recent work on the car has been somewhat difficult due to it being really freaking cold out. The temperature was 18 degrees F when I took these photos, and it was colder than that when we mounted the fin and painted it (I know, the paint on the fin looks pretty bad - I'll fix it before the race). On the other hand, the Apocalypsemobile looks great in its natural environment, a frigid post-apocalyptic wasteland rimmed with monstrous snow drifts, echoing with the howls of cannibalistic mutants. Seriously, it's a rough neighborhood.

The Apocalypsemobile has come a long way since it was first introduced. On January 1, 2009 it will enter it's first (and probably only) competition, in the 4-cylinder division of the enduro Hangover 150, held each year at Ransomville Speedway in Ransomville, NY. Fans who attend are asked to bring a non-perishable food item. Typically, this race brings in several large truckloads of food for local pantries. This year, the food will go to the Niagara Community Action Program.

Now enjoy your last look at the Apocalypsemobile before it meets whatever fate awaits it (with me inside!). With just some minor tinkering left to get done, mostly involving the seat belts, we're ready to roll. A trailer has been reserved. The car has been registered. A helmet has been borrowed. Friends and family have charged the batteries in their digital cameras (we should have video footage, too).

The Interceptor is one seriously bad-ass looking ride, with that massive supercharger, aggressive stance and that paint scheme - who knew there were so many different shades of black? And yes, it really does come with a replica Dog and some Dink Di dog food. The only drawback is the cleanliness of the car. It's intended to replicate the version from Mad Max 2 (note the cut-off front spoiler and the rear deck fuel tanks), but in the movie, the car was dusty, dirty and beat to hell. This model is a bit too shiny. Experienced hobbyists can easily add some mud and a bit of weathering, but you might be hesitant to mark up a $140 collector's item like this. Although it's still a lot cheaper than creating your own full-size Interceptor replica. Images by: AUTOart.

"1/18th-scale Mad Max 2 Interceptor." [Hemmings Muscle Machines, Nov. 2008]

The event pictured above is called The Hangover 150, and it's held every New Year's Day at a dirt track near where I live in Western New York. It's a type of "race" called an enduro, in which dozens of stripped down street cars drive around the track for 50 laps with no caution flags. It becomes a survival race as the track becomes clogged with car corpses and the mud takes its toll. There is something utterly apocalyptic about all the burning cars and bleary-eyed spectators cheering on the carnage. At the same time, it's a charity event that contributes several truckloads of food to local pantries every year.

And without further ado, the Apocalypsemobile itself:
I have some work to do over the coming weeks to prep it for the race, so this is like seeing Rocky Balboa before the training montage. It's a '94 Saturn with the upgraded dual overhead cam engine, so it has some kick, especially for a car that only weighs about 2,600 pounds. As you can see, it suffered some war wounds in its prior life, but that's ok. I was just going to weld those doors shut anyway.

We'll keep you updated as the project progresses and the race nears. The car's number, of course, will be io9. We should have room on the body panels to paint on some other sponsors, so if you'd like to be a sponsor for the Apocalypsemobile, drop me a line. All sponsor money will go toward buying me crucial safety equipment, so I don't die.

Before we launch into our awesome list, let's just cop to something: We're not doing the Aristotelian definition of tragedy. We're just not. Aristotle is for wusses. We're going more with the basic definition: the person who has everything, and then loses it all, or just gets horribly fucked over. In a poetic or meaningful way. Okay?

Every scifi hero Charlton Heston played, ever.

The Charlton Heston science fiction oeuvre is splendid in its variety. But there are a few things you can count on in pretty much all of them. Heston will know better than everybody else around him. He'll be the last bastion of civilization, surrounded by dirty hippies or grandiloquent mutants in whiteface or apes or whatever. And in the end, he'll die because nobody ever listens to him when he's telling them how stupid they are. Why? Why won't they listen? Soylent green is people, you damn dirty whiteface cultists! (Okay, so he doesn't die in Planet Of The Apes, but then he does in the sequel.)

Sam Lowry

In Brazil, the fatal flaw that destroys Sam Lowry is his secret desire to escape the repressive system he's a cog in. (Yeah, okay, we're getting Aristotelean for a sec.) He dreams and fantasizes about being a flying hero in shining armor who fights monsters and soars away, but when he finally gets a chance to escape with the woman (literally) of his dreams, it all goes bad. And he winds up being tortured to death by his former best friend.

Dr. Frankenstein

He's obsessed with the idea of bringing inanimate matter to life, to the point where he drops out of school and spends years digging up corpses and sticking them together. But once he's created his monsterpiece (sorry), he rejects it and drives it away. His cruelty to his creation leads to the deaths of several of his friends, so Frankenstein vows to hunt it down. But Frankenstein doesn't even manage to die at the hands of his creation — instead, in the original novel, pneumonia claims his life after he pursues it to the Arctic. He doesn't even manage to die properly!

Henry Jekyll

Another guy who messes with science and gets messed with in return. Jekyll wants to separate his good side from his dark side, so he drinks a potion which turns him into the embodiment of his bad side, Edward Hyde. At first, it's all fun and games, until Hyde starts going buck wild and Jekyll is turning into him at night, even without the potion. But when Jekyll tries to repress Hyde, the monstrous side of him only comes back worse than ever, killing an old man. Finally, he becomes Hyde permanently, and decides to kill himself instead of paying for his crimes.

Winston Smith

He's another cog in the machine, helping to rewrite history in a future totalitarian state where everybody is watched. Because of his doubts about the machine, he gets lured into joining a resistance group — which turns out to be a set-up. He winds up tortured, and gives up his lover and accomplice. In the end, he doesn't die, but he does get utterly broken by the Party.

Jeff Brundle in The Fly

Annnd another hero who suffers due to his curiosity. Brundle invents the perfect teleportation machine, but a fly gets stuck in there with him. He and his little travel buddy get merged genetically, and they wind up as a half-human, half fly monster. So he decides the answer is to merge his body with his pregnant girlfriend, to add more human DNA to the mix. Sadly, the selfish girlfriend escapes and he ends up being merged with a machine instead, becoming a mangled heap.

Chet Kinsman in Ben Bova's Kinsman series.

It's the far-off year of 1999, and the Americans and Russians are sharing a base deep under the surface of the moon. Chet Kinsman is the chief of the American side, and he's got a plan to avert the war back on Earth. And it almost works, except that his best friend, Frank Colt, betrays him and he winds up dying as a result.

Mad Max

Poor old Max — he just wants to pursue justice as a police officer, but his uprightness gets him in the sights of an evil biker gang. And after they torch his best friend Goose, he becomes embittered and quits being a cop. Only to find that there's no safety in being a civilian, in the crumbling post-apocalyptic Australia. The thugs take out his family, leaving him a bitter loner who has no choice but to kill punks of all sizes, occasionally chaining them to their soon-to-explode bikes and giving them saws. He doesn't die, but he does end up getting smacked around by Tina Turner with really bad hair, and then suffers the indignity of getting rescued by a bunch of kids.

Londo Mollari

Lometa at Everything2 has a very passionate argument about why Londo Mollari is the ultimate tragic hero of Babylon 5:

Londo as a tragic hero went through more twists than a bag of pretzels. Born into a noble family Mollari had a good heart, but he was condemned at every turn by his own bad choices. His ascension to the throne as Emperor was bittersweet and in the end he surrendered himself to his greatest fear, death at the hands of a Narn.

Wolverine

We were arguing earlier about whether Wolverine is a tragic hero. He does lose his family and his memory, and then his girlfriend gets killed. He struggles with his berzerker nature and his bestial killing instinct, and people are always trying to make him wear a yellow leotard. Plus, if you believe Wolverine: The End, he's destined to end up a bitter, lonely old man in Canada, before dying in a fight with his evil mutant brother, whom he thought dead.

Hal Jordan

It's all been undone now, but the greatest Green Lantern had a tragic hero arc in the 1990s. Hal Jordan just couldn't stand to fail, so after the evil Mongul destroyed his home town, Hal went nuts and used his power ring to recreate the wrecked Coast City. Then he went berzerk and attacked the Green Lantern Corps and the Guardians. Finally, he renounced his prized Green Lantern-hood and became the villain Parallax. (Later, this was all revealed to be some form of alien possession, but that's a retcon.) Finally, he died, sacrificing himself to save the sun from being eaten.

Dr. Edward Morbius from Forbidden Planet

His curiosity is his downfall — he's determined to study the artifacts of the long-dead Krell race, so he uses the Krells' "Plastic Educator," not realizing that it shapes items from your mind into reality. The Krell wiped themselves out by unleashing monsters from their own ids, and Morbius wipes out his own expedition the same way, except for his daughter. His id-monster is born of his fatal desire to stay and explore the Krell remains, even after the rest of his expedition votes to go home. Finally, he learns the truth and lets the monster kill him, sparing his daughter's life.

Rick Deckard

He's a retired Blade Runner who has to come out of retirement to take up, once again, a job which he no longer really believes in, killing the artificial Replicants. (And if you believe director Ridley Scott, Deckard himself is one of the Replicants he's killing.) In the end, he's with Rachael, another Replicant, but their time together is going to be short and probably not all that pleasant.

Harvey Dent:

Spoilers for the Dark Knight ahead... So stop reading now if you really haven't seen it yet. (Really?) Harvey is another guy there's some debate over. But it's true that in The Dark Knight, he's pretty much one of the good guys, and his insistence on seeing the world in black and white is part of what helps the Joker break him. Even more than losing his fiancee and half his face, it's the realization that the Joker's right and everything is just random chaos that drives him over the edge and leads to his horrible (maybe) demise.

Additional reporting by Lauren Davis.

Mad Max 4 has been talked about for years, In 2002 according to First Magazine (an Asian movie mag), Gibson was attached to the 4th Max after heavy contract negotiations. Gibson also had big dreams of getting Robert Downey Jr. in the movie somewhere as well. Heath Ledger was also constantly getting linked to the 4th Max installment, but never confirmed these rumors.

There was a lot of talk about Mad Max 4, but not a lot of action. Now a press release from Omnilab Media is stating that Max is going to get some real funding, and will continue to work with original director George Miller.

Omnilab Media has also created a new digital film company with Kennedy Miller Mitchell to use groundbreaking digital storytelling, animation and visual effects. This will include HAPPY FEET 2, BABE 3 & MAD MAX 4 and a range of other blue-chip properties in development.

I'm all for the return of Mel Gibson, but only if he dons the leather jacket and kills evil biker gangs for my pleasure. This is Mel's chance to prove to the world that he isn't a psychotic pretentious nut-bag. Let the world laugh with you Mel, while you make Mad Max 4. Tom Cruise figured this out, and if you watched Tropic Thunder, you know why. Come on Mel, put on the old leather jacket again, it will be good for you.

[Slashfilm]

As we mentioned before, there have been a ton of young-adult postapocalyptic novels, many of them quite disturbing and hardcore. (And our list didn't even mention Uglies or Tripods.) And, Glenn adds:

I can think of a dozen post-apocalyptic movies that I saw as a teen, in the '80s, at the Harvard Square and Orson Welles theaters — including "Planet of the Apes" (1968) and sequels, "The Omega Man" (1971), "Sleeper" (1973), "Death Race 2000" (1975), "A Boy and His Dog" (1975), and of course "Road Warrior" (1981). As hard as it is to believe that adults would go to see "Death Race 2000," though, these movies weren't intended for teen audiences. So they don't count.

There have also been a couple of post-apocalyptic TV shows that seemed aimed at teens: the original "Battlestar Galactica," for example, not to mention "Planet of the Apes." I've never seen "Jericho," so I can't say whether it's aimed at teens. Oh yeah, in England, in the 1980s, there was a short-lived TV adaptation of John Christopher's excellent "Tripod" trilogy.

Gawker Media polls require Javascript; if you're viewing this in an RSS reader, click through to view in your Javascript-enabled web browser.

Will City of Ember be the first Post Apocalyptic Children's film? [Quiet Earth]
Post-Apocalyptic Kiddie Movies [Boston Globe]