Game:

Here's another new image from Game, the new movie about Gerard "300" Butler being trapped in a video game and forced to kill to survive. [First Showing]

Starship Troopers: Marauder:

The Starship Troopers 3 fansite got some new images from the direct-to-DVD movie, including what the new marauder armor will look like, some kind of lander vehicle, and Jolene Blalock looking awesome. More pics at the link. [Starship Troopers 3 via JoBlo]

Lost:

Lost producer Carlton Cuse spilled some new info. In Lost season five, Jack will become more of a man of faith, and Locke will become more of a man of science. We'll learn what happened to Locke (and the Others) after he embraced his destiny to be "in charge" of the island. Also, Locke's story isn't done yet, and there's a hint that he may have a Jesus-esque resurrection. Meanwhile, Kate will end up with either Jack or Sawyer eventually.

Also, people's theories about the show are wrong because you don't have enough information and the explanation for everything isn't simple. [Lost Spoilers]

Heroes:

The first four episodes of Heroes season one are called "The Butterfly Effect," "Dreamtime," "One Of Us, One Of Them," and "The Year Of Our Lord." ("Dreamtime" introduces that Aboriginal storyteller we've mentioned.) And the fifth episode introduces a mean SOB named Eric Doyle, a white guy in his thirties or forties, who's "hideous, horrible and big," and who "delights in controlling others." He'll also be in the sixth episode, and possibly beyond. [Spoilerfix]

And remember that spoiler we posted about a dark-haired Claire (from a future/alternate dimension) shooting her uncle Peter and saying she's always loved him? Well, here are a couple of pics of that scene being filmed. Also visible: Future Peter, complete with scar. (More pics at the link.) [Just Jared]

Eureka:

Eureka will introduce a new character this season: Lexi (Ever Carradine), the free-spirited sister of Sheriff Carter, who appears in at least four of this summer's eight episodes. [Hollywood Reporter]

Doctor Who:

As usual, Digital Spy has posted some spoilers for this Saturday's "Doctor Who episode, along with three fake spoilers. The one about K-9 rescuing the Doctor's daughter from a black hole seems obviously fake, although you never know. And it's definitely true that Wilf wields a cricket bat, since it's in the trailer. Here's the list:

• Wilf wields a cricket bat.
• Davros has been harvesting bees into a new army of Daleks.
• The Daleks know the identity of a certain former Prime Minister.
• Captain Jack becomes angry at Paul O'Grady's effect on Ianto Jones.
• A certain body part in a jar is bubbling.
• A Dalek exterminates the Torchwood pterodactyl.
• The fate of a character from 'Voyage Of The Damned' is revealed.
• Wilf was banned from using a webcam as there were suspicions over what he might use it for.
• Project Indigo holds the key to salvation.
• The Doctor's daughter Jenny is trapped near a black hole, but K-9 is sent to rescue her.
• A Dalek speaks to Mr. Smith.
• The Time War was 'time locked', or so thought The Doctor.

And here's a new teaser trailer featuring the sporty red Dalek. And another trailer, with Davros speaking! [TARDIS Base]

Also, the official cast list for Saturday's episode includes Martha's mother, Sarah Jane's computer "Mr. Smith," Sarah Jane's adoptive son Luke, plus Richard Dawkins and talk show host Paul O'Grady playing themselves. [Doctor Who Hideout]

[Twitch]

"I'm really glad to be back as Johnny Rico," says Van Dien. "It's 11 years later. I'm a little bit older and hopefully a little wiser. And ah yeah, he's killing bugs."

It has been ten years since the bug war has been going on. And Neumeier wants to use that time, and the effect it has on people, to show what a long war can do to government and society.

Clip 1: News Reel/Rico's Back

It's a Federal Network newsreel updating viewers on the Bug War. There are new bugs that the Federation wants to keep their troops updated on such as bombardier bugs which act like little kamakaze grenades. The reel then attempts to address the question "Are We Losing This War?" The answer, "Don't Bet On It." The next segment deals with the strict penalty the Federation is doling out for war protesters: execution. The announcer bellows, "People need to watch what they say." Quickly adding to the lists of things not to do while under the rule of The Federation is a segment on religious worship. Apparently that too, "will not be tolerated if it destabilizes our war efforts."

Moving on, the reel focuses on something more positive: music. The hottest ticket seems to be on military personnel who can also carry a tune. And not just any tune: the newscaster leads us in a sing-along to, "It's always a good day to die." Don't forget to support the war effort by purchasing a coffee mug, pen or knife with the Federation's logo and sponsored singer on the back.

The scene then cuts to a military base under attack. A bombardier bug has been launched in and explodes, impaling one soldier with a shovel. But out of the shadows comes a statuesque figure with the jaw line of a lumberjack. It's none other than Colonel Johnny Rico himself. He reaches over, pulls out the shovel and demands action. He turns to the wounded and says, "Can you walk soldier? Give us a hand and pick up that arm and find out who it belongs to." Seriously, sold.

Clip 2: Excessive Punishment

At a local canteen best buds Rico, Lola and another new character Dix Hauzer demonstrate the rift between Federation and the non-citizens. Dix waxes on politically about how more people need to sign up because it's all about the numbers. He has on glasses and talks about math, so he's obviously a geek. Dix then makes a toast to The Federation and only those in military dress salute, while others (who are all strangely wearing flannel) jeer at Dix and his attitude. Then a hush falls over the crowd as a newsreel airs and someone yells out, "Quiet! It's hangin' time." The whole bar goes silent as a group of criminals are fitted with nooses on television. The announcers says, 'They've said goodbye to their families. All that remains is their payment against their crimes against you, citizen." Then the newsreel actually shows them going through with the hanging. It's not super graphic (more on that to come) but just truly unpleasant. Of course this action insights the locals at the pub to yell out to Dix and other Federation types, "You'll pay, you'll pay."

Clip 3: Gore!

The bugs have overwhelmed a military base and are crawling all over the facility. No new bugs yet, just your standard CGI crawlies from the first and second movies. A group of men are attacked and the bugs overpower them, ripping them to shreds. One bug struts off with a human head still impaled on its leg. What happens next is hard to tell because blood gets smeared on the lens and all you can see are the silhouettes of the bugs running back and forth.

Clip 4: Newsreel and Scorpion

The scene begins at another military base and Dix is yelling on a walkie-talkie that he is in charge but gets hit by some sort of blast. Dix falls and loses his glasses. And by Starship Trooper rules, falling down usually equals death, so he's probably gone. You then witness a man sacrificing his life for others by throwing himself atop a bombardier which leads to a good scene of organ-like goo being tossed in the air. Finally back to Rico as he takes out a massive Scorpion bug. Which literally is a giant Scorpion that can shoot a white laser blast out of its tail that kills people.

It's interrupted by another newsreel and finally we get to find out what the "Crack a Planet" phrase means from the first trailer. The news covers the Q bomb debate. Apparently the Federation has concocted a bomb strong enough to blow up a planet. Next is a join-the-Fleet draft commercial: you just have to pass your H.E.D.'s and be of a certain age. It cuts to a young enlistee man giving the camera "the eyes" stating that, "people say boys don't give great H.E.D., but I do." Yikes.

More Spoilers:

While there were only two bugs revealed in the clips there is still one more bug yet to be discovered. Neumeier promises that this bug will be the biggest bug ever. Also during the question and answer segment a fan asked when they would start implementing Heinlein's mech suits or life suits, and Neumeirer suggested they watch the 3rd movie intently. But what about the destruction that Starship Troopers 2 wreaked, with the whole bugs impersonating humans, will audiences be seeing this in 3? Neumeier skirted this issue saying, "I think there is always room for that."

The formerly comics-focused Wondercon was much more about movies and TV this year, especially with DC being tight-lipped, Marvel skipping it and Image canceling at the last minute. And many of the most popular narratives had to do with war and political upheaval.

Conspiracy theories: Anti-establishment paranoia is back, and X-Files 2 is its harbinger. We still don't have a clear sense of what the new X-Files movie will be about, but writer/director Chris Carter said the show's conspiracy-mania had gone out of fashion after 9/11, but now it was making a comeback. We already know the movie won't be about the show's overarching "mythos," but that doesn't mean it won't feature government cover-ups and conspiracies. After all, it'll be competing with the new Indiana Jones movie, which apparently is about Area 51 and Roswell. Cover-ups are cool!
And then there was the Jericho panel, where producer Carol Barbee said the show's writers "don't talk politics" — and then proceeded to talk about politics for an hour. Besides the way Jericho's evil government contractor Ravenwood was a direct metaphor for Halliburton and Blackwater in Iraq, Barbee also talked about the ripped-from-the-headlines terrorism plots and Homeland Security paranoia on her show.
The war machine: And meanwhile, the direct-to-DVD Starship Troopers 3 turned out to be a satirical war movie, in which weird government propaganda for super-bombs jostled with Fleet recruiting ads, in a war that's gone on too long and lost public support. (Sound like anything in real life to you?) And speaking of war movies, the new Iron Man film keeps the comics' backstory about Tony Stark being a high-tech weapons merchant who has a crisis of conscience after he's taken prisoner. And Iron Man is serving as a metaphor for the military-industrial complex in the comics as well, according to Douglas Wolk, author of Reading Comics. Wolk dropped some science about how World War Hulk and Civil War are metaphors for the backlash against the government crackdown after 9/11.

So where were the right-wing narratives, about evil terrorists, weak left-wing governments and cultural elites repressing everybody else? We didn't run across them as much. My guess is, wait until year two or three of an Obama or Clinton presidency, and suddenly you'll have all the conservative space fantasies that you could ever want, from the likes of Frank Miller. We can't wait!

Van Dien is back, after skipping Troopers II, as Johnny Rico. And Blalock plays Capt. Lola Beck, a pilot. Here's how Blalock describes her character: "She's a no-nonsense staraight shooter, who shoots from the hip but also has a heart of gold." Neumeier, who also wrote the script for Troopers II, says Sony realized it skimped on the budget for the (fairly successful) second movie, so there's more money this time around.
Starship Troopers III is much truer to the original Heinlein book than the first two movies, Van Dien and Neumeier both stressed. We might actually get to see the power suits that Heinlein talks about in the book. "I feel a great debt to the fans of the novel," said Neumeier. "I adore the novel. I read it when i was 13."

Neumeier sees the Troopers trilogy as a sort of history of war movies. The first Starship Troopers is sort of a riff on World War II movies, partly motivated by Verhoeven's desire to deal with the experience of Germans in the mid-1930s, when the Nazis were rising to power. The second Troopers is more of a Korean war movie. And the third one is much more of a Vietnam war film, dealing with issues of religion and politics. It's also about "how the state can use religion both badly, and for good."
This time around, it's eleven years later and the war is not going so well. There's much less public support for the war effort than there was in the first movie, said Van Dien.

Also, there are three new types of bugs, two of which appeared in the clips we saw at Wondercon. One new bug is called a Bombadier, and it's a sort of ball that lands among a group of human soldiers and then explodes (one human throws himself onto it and sacrifices himself for the others), then grows into a big eyestalk that shoots white fire.

Another clip showcased Neumeier's trademark zany fake TV coverage, with a fake news segment about the new Q-bomb, which can destroy an entire planet. Some religious fanatics say humans shouldn't have the right to choose which planets live and which ones die, but others say the Q-bomb may finally help destroy the bugs once and for all. And then there's a recruiting segment for the Fleet, which parodies all those "Army of One" spots for the U.S. Army and emphasizes that 16-year-olds can join. It ends with someone saying, "See you in the Cockpit!"

Both Van Dien and Neumeier said they would like to make a Troopers TV series.

Neumeier said he got lots of advice from Verhoeven, who read the script and told him, "You look frightened, and you should be." He talks often to "Uncle Paul."

Someone asked Blalock why she gravitates toward so many science fiction roles. She said:

The reason I've done a lot of science fiction is because my first big job was Star Trek, [so] a lot of the offers i get are science fiction. The universe shines down on me, in a psychobabble way. That's what's inside me, and so that's what the universe offers me.