Twelve months ago, when we asked Ricky Gervais what the reaction had been to his hosting of the Golden Globes, he told us that "Well, I don't know what people around the world thought of it. But in the room it was great, and afterwards everyone seemed to like it. And I went over to New York last week, and I've never had a reaction like it. People on the street coming up and saying they loved it. It was like I was a returning war hero! It was heart-warming."

You can read that interview here.

In his 2010 stint as host, Gervais made jokes about Mel Gibson's drinking, about Angelina Jolie adopting children, and one about if you want to buy a Golden Globe, go and talk to Philip Berk (whom we're coming to in the next paragraph). The difference between Gervais doing these jokes and any other stand-up is that he's doing material to a room full of egos, superstars, and some of the people he's making blistering remarks about.

This week, when he hosted the Globes again, for some reason it doesn't seem to have gone down quite as well. In fact, we have the president of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association (HFPA), Philip Berk, saying of Gervais that "some of the things he said were totally unacceptable". (For me, the HFPA crossed the line when it put forward films such as Burlesque and The Tourist in a Best Motion Picture category.) That's one of the kinder things that appears to have been said.

Can I just say it, then: what did people expect? What did the people who sat through Gervais' performance in 2010, that was in pretty much the same style, think they were going to get when they booked him again to host the Golden Globes?

If they wanted another drab-a-thon host, who wouldn't even think of causing a squeak of trouble, then get one. If you want someone who's going to cut through the veneer of bullshit that pervades the Golden Globes, then Gervais is your man.

Whether you thought his performance hosting the Globes was funny or not, you have to admit there's a lot of truth in what he was saying. The Sex And The City 2 poster? It was airbrushed to death. The Tourist was terrible. How did it get nominated? And then there's his comment on Jennifer Lopez: "She's just Jenny from the block. If the block in question is that one on Rodeo Drive between Cartier and Prada."

I'm not saying every joke was a winner and every one hit the mark, but I'm puzzled by the controversy. Rumours are abounding that the HFPA is furious with Gervais, although it's released a statement to the contrary. Gervais himself has released a statement too, after speculation that he left the stage for the best part of an hour, to be admonished by HFPA flunkies. The statement read:

"I did every single introduction I was meant to. There just happened to be a long gap. This is because I was allowed to choose who I would introduce in advance. I obviously chose presenters who I had the best jokes for. (And who I knew had a good sense of humour.) Everyone took it well and the atmosphere backstage and at the after show was great."

It's unlikely that Ricky Gervais will be invited to host the Golden Globes for a third year running, and I'd suggest that if that's the case, then in twelve months' time, following a much tamer show, we'll instead be left focusing on an organisation that nominates such a high proportion of shitty films for high honour.

As it is, Gervais' performance has neatly taken the focus away from that, and for that at least, the HFPA should be grateful.

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Many rolled their eyes when Universal announced they would be making a movie adaptation of the popular Hasbro board game, Battleship. You could imagine it in your mind: two naval fleets beating the shit out of each other until our hero yells, "You sunk my battleship," and delivers a winning salvo, or something equally shit.

Howeve,r director Peter Berg threw us a curve ball when he said the enemy force would be alien in nature. In December 2009 (yes, the film has been in production that long and won't be released till mid-2012), Berg said of the aliens:

"They are known as The Regents, and will be portrayed by a combination of live actors with CG. They come from a world similar to ours, and aren't actually looking to take over humanity or the planet Earth. Instead, they're on a mission to build a power source in the ocean, which is where they come in contact with a navy fleet. The film will also show us both sides of the story, from the aliens' perspective, as well as the humans."

He also explained away the ridiculousness of having aliens come to Earth just to fight on the ocean by saying that while they do fly, "once they've come through the atmosphere they lose that capability." The aliens will also have ballistic-based weaponry to even up any naval battles, it would seem.

It's an interesting enough, yet ridiculous concept, but the one thing holding it back is the fact it's based on a board game and Avatar director James Cameron agrees.

Not one to be shy in his opinions, Cameron said of the upcoming adaptation, "We have a story crisis... Now they want to make the 'Battleship' game into a film. This is pure desperation."

Everyone in Hollywood knows how important it is that a film is a brand before it hits theaters. If a brand has been around, Harry Potter for example, or Spider-Man, you are lightyears ahead."

And there lies the problem. Because, unfortunately, these franchises are becoming more ridiculous. Battleship. This degrades the cinema."

The man has a point. Perhaps if the film wasn't called Battleship, the online community would be more psyched for it. As it stands, the film is deemed to be a ‘turkey walking' before any footage or photos are revealed, which is a pity.

Currently, the film is doing reshoots (which were planned) and when it is released on May 18, 2012 will star Taylor Kitsch, Tom Arnold, Alexander Skarsgård, Rihanna and Liam Neeson.

Reelz Channel

See Also:

• 10 upcoming movies based on unlikely licenses

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We've taken a look at the first episode of the BBC's new science fiction drama, Outcasts, and while it has problems, there are reasons to be optimistic for the show.

It tells the story of a group of survivors of Earth, who step onto a newly-discovered, life-sustaining planet. As you might expect, this group of survivors is a fractious one, and things don't always go quite as well as hoped.

But that's as much as we'll tell you here. We've got a spoiler-free review for you coming shortly.

In the meantime, though, the BBC has released the first trailer from the show, and you can see it below these very words...

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Hot on the heels of the Golden Globes, and a week before the Oscar nominations are announced, the British Academy of Film and Television Art has just announced this year’s contenders for the BAFTA movie awards.

Without further ado…

BEST FILM

Black Swan
Inception
The King’s Speech
The Social Network
True Grit

OUTSTANDING BRITISH FILM

127 Hours
Another Year
Four Lions
The King’s Speech
Made In Dagenham

OUTSTANDING DEBUT BY A BRITISH WRITER, DIRECTOR OR PRODUCER

The Arbor - Director, Producer - Clio Barnard, Tracy O’Riordan
Exit Through The Gift Shop - _Director, Producer – Banksy, Jaimie D’Cruz
Four Lions - Director/Writer - Chris Morris
Monsters - Director/Writer – Gareth Edwards (yay!)
Skeletons - Director/Writer – Nick Whitfield

DIRECTOR

127 Hours - Danny Boyle
Black Swan - Darren Aronofsky
Inception - Christopher Nolan
The King’s Speech - Tom Hooper
The Social Network - David Fincher

ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY

Black Swan - Mark Heyman, Andrés Heinz, John McLaughlin
The Fighter - Scott Silver, Paul Tamasy, Eric Johnson
Inception - Christopher Nolan
The Kids Are All Right - Lisa Cholodenko, Stuart Blumberg
The King’s Speech - David Seidler

ADAPTED SCREENPLAY

127 Hours - Danny Boyle, Simon Beaufoy
The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo - Rasmus Heisterberg, Nikolaj Arcel
The Social Network - Aaron Sorkin
Toy Story 3 - Michael Arndt (out of interest, what’s it adapted from?)
True Grit - Joel Coen, Ethan Coen

FILM NOT IN THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE

Biutiful - Alejandro González Iñárritu, Jon Kilik, Fernando Bovaira
The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo - Søren Stærmose, Niels Arden Oplev
I Am Love - Luca Guadagnino, Francesco Melzi D’Eril, Marco Morabito, Massimiliano Violante
Of Gods And Men - Xavier Beauvois
The Secret In Their Eyes - Mariela Besuievsky, Juan José Campanella

ANIMATED FILM

Despicable Me
How To Train Your Dragon
Toy Story 3

LEADING ACTOR

Javier Bardem - Biutiful
Jeff Bridges - True Grit
Jesse Eisenberg - The Social Network
Colin Firth - The King’s Speech
James Franco - 127 Hours

LEADING ACTRESS

Annette Bening - The Kids Are All Right
Julianne Moore - The Kids Are All Right
Natalie Portman - Black Swan
Noomi Rapace - The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo
Hailee Steinfeld - True Grit

SUPPORTING ACTOR

Christian Bale - The Fighter
Andrew Garfield - The Social Network
Pete Postlethwaite - The Town
Mark Ruffalo - The Kids Are All Right
Geoffrey Rush - The King’s Speech

SUPPORTING ACTRESS

Amy Adams - The Fighter
Helena Bonham Carter - The King’s Speech
Barbara Hershey - Black Swan
Lesley Manville - Another Year
Miranda Richardson - Made In Dagenham

ORIGINAL MUSIC

127 Hours - AR Rahman
Alice In Wonderland - Danny Elfman
How To Train Your Dragon - John Powell
Inception - Hans Zimmer
The King’s Speech - Alexandre Desplat

CINEMATOGRAPHY

127 Hours - Anthony Dod Mantle, Enrique Chediak
Black Swan - Matthew Libatique
Inception - Wally Pfister
The King’s Speech - Danny Cohen
True Grit - Roger Deakins

EDITING

127 Hours - Jon Harris
Black Swan - Andrew Weisblum
Inception - Lee Smith
The King’s Speech - Tariq Anwar
The Social Network - Angus Wall, Kirk Baxter

PRODUCTION DESIGN

Alice In Wonderland - Robert Stromberg, Karen O’Hara
Black Swan - Thérèse DePrez, Tora Peterson
Inception - Guy Hendrix Dyas, Larry Dias, Doug Mowat
The King’s Speech - Eve Stewart, Judy Farr
True Grit - Jess Gonchor, Nancy Haigh

COSTUME DESIGN

Alice In Wonderland - Colleen Atwood
Black Swan - Amy Westcott
The King’s Speech - Jenny Beavan
Made In Dagenham - Louise Stjernsward
True Grit - Mary Zophres

SOUND

127 Hours - Glenn Freemantle, Ian Tapp, Richard Pryke, Steven C Laneri, Douglas Cameron
Black Swan - Ken Ishii, Craig Henighan, Dominick Tavella
Inception - Richard King, Lora Hirschberg, Gary A Rizzo, Ed Novick
The King’s Speech - John Midgley, Lee Walpole, Paul Hamblin
True Grit - Skip Lievsay, Craig Berkey, Greg Orloff, Peter F Kurland, Douglas Axtell

SPECIAL VISUAL EFFECTS

Alice In Wonderland
Black Swan
Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows Part 1
Inception
Toy Story 3

MAKE UP & HAIR

Alice In Wonderland
Black Swan
Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows Part 1
The King’s Speech
Made In Dagenham

SHORT ANIMATION

The Eagleman Stag - Michael Please
Matter Fisher - David Prosser
Thursday - Matthias Hoegg

SHORT FILM

Connect - Samuel Abrahams, Beau Gordon
Lin - Piers Thompson, Simon Hessel
Rite - Michael Pearce, Ross McKenzie
Turning - Karni Arieli, Saul Freed, Alison Sterling, Kat Armour-Brown
Until The River Runs Red - Paul Wright, Poss Kondeatis

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This review may contain spoilers.

3. Kozmo

With the world of The Cape becoming ever-more fleshed out, episode 3 sees the show turn its attention to the titular cape itself. Who else wore it, and why? The answers hint at an interesting backstory, even though it does it in heavy-handed ways. "Some say it was Merlin's cape. Others say Jack the Ripper's."

Ah yes, that would be Merlin, that famous non-fictional character, and Jack the Ripper, noted cape-wearer. Well, in The Cape's universe, at least.

Nonetheless, the ideas that the cape's previous owners might be interested in regaining it, and that the cape itself might exert some influence over those who wear it, are both solid ones that can definitely carry a story.

If there's any problem with basing an episode on such assertions, it's that even after seeing it in action, the cape simply doesn't feel worthy of the importance it's being assigned. If it had some supernatural powers, rather than the extra-normal properties (like, er, high tensile strength), you could understand it. But, so far, the show has avoided introducing any outright sci-fi/fantasy elements. The cape doesn't actually seem to have any tricks left under its hood.

Luckily, this week's guest villain, Gregor, was perhaps the most interesting the series has presented yet. We saw a glimpse of another dimension to Chess, as he mentioned his missing daughter, but the charismatic (and in many ways, legitimately wronged) Gregor was far more compelling even after a single episode.

Sure, it fell apart a little when he decided to stage an elaborate circus act to kill his enemies rather than just, you know, do it. But the series' use of such set pieces has already danced on a knife edge so finely cut between 'genuinely stupid' and 'legitimate homage' that it's hard to tell whether the show itself even knows what it's doing. Once again, it scrapes by simply because it fails to show even a hint of self-aware irony.

After a couple of episodes as a convenient cypher, we also get a little exploration of Orwell (Summer Glau). It was a smart idea to have Faraday ask her the same questions the audience should also have right now (Who are you? Where did you come from? Why are you so skilled at everything?) and similarly, to advance her story without making it too obvious a focus. Quite why she chose to join up with Max and the carnival after her initial hesitance is hard to understand, but that she did it at all suggests a little more depth to her than we have previously seen.

Faraday's wife, Diana, also had a little time to signpost exactly how she's going to be important to the ongoing plot, and for the first time, we have a reason to believe that Faraday's one man war has achievable goals. Maybe she'll end up being fridged, maybe not, but right now it's at least possible that Faraday might clear his name and be reunited with his wife and son. We believe it, not just because he does, but because we can see the events being set in motion already.

There are still some elements of The Cape that are hopelessly cheesy. The dialogue, for example, is so poor that one can only hope that it's being deliberately trite and melodramatic as an homage to the pulps it emulates: "Either you wear the cape, or the cape wears you". Ouch. When you're used to genre TV written by Whedon and his associates, seeing how the other half live is a rather brutal comedown.

On the other hand, one thing The Cape is good at doing is not treating its audience like total idiots. As soon as Chess started talking about his missing daughter, it didn't take much of a leap to put two and two together and realise who he was talking about. And rather than string it out, the show made it clear by the end of the episode so that everyone was on the same page. Commendable stuff.

Praise aside, there's still a lot of room for improvement, but the series hasn't lost me yet. Building a universe from scratch isn't easy, and The Cape has the potential to become something much better if given the chance. Let's hope it makes it that far.

Read our review of the series opener here.

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The one thing that worries me about this unrelenting influx of comic/graphic novel adaptations to film (besides the idea of authors writing books with the movie in mind, which makes me cringe), is the missteps that have and will take place in the casting of iconic and beloved characters.

Avid bookworms are no strangers to the celluloid bitch slap of seeing portrayals of their favorite characters destroyed by the It Girl of the moment, the teen heartthrob vying for big screen fame, or the universally recognizable star straining to master a foreign accent.

Looking at comic book films from 2010 and many that are in development, however, there appears to be a shift in the way movies are bringing these characters to a new medium.

There has often been a great disconnect from how studios are casting these films and how fans, especially those of the original material, would envision their favorite heroes and villains on screen. Movies like The Fantastic Four (and its sequel), Spider-Man (and its sequels), and some of the early Batman adaptations suffered from many things. Many, many things.

But the common thread throughout all of them was inappropriate casting. Because producers and filmmakers want the movies to grab the interest of a general audience rather than just comic book readers, they cast actors that have mass appeal. It would make sense if the aforementioned movies actually garnered those desired results.

The films that achieve enduring critical and financial success like Iron Man, Batman Begins, and The Dark Knight, take risks in their choice of actors for the sake of the material, not just box office numbers.

It is unfortunate that many filmmakers shy away from the alternative to big-name casting, creating new movie stars. It might be a lot riskier to sell a movie without a name, but it allows undiscovered or lesser known actors to showcase their talent and become stars through these larger than life characters.

Not many people knew who Chloe Moretz was before she put on a purple wig and threw knives into mobsters as Hit Girl, but now it would be impossible to think of Kick-Ass existing without her in that role.

When I hear fans discuss what made Edgar Wright's Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World so fantastic, I am surprised that the unbelievably spot-on cast is often overlooked. Wright populated his movie with young actors who play off of each other's strengths and work seamlessly as an ensemble. Every time I try to pick a favorite, I fail miserably.

Even Michael Cera, who plays the titular character and is arguably the most well known of the cast, captured the mannerisms and personality of Scott Pilgrim (despite claims that he played it like he did many of his other roles, which are not as substantial as one might think). Many of their contemporaries are more famous and recognizable in a tabloid-ish 'I've outgrown Disney', kind of way, and thankfully, they were not in this movie.

It is unfair to pass on a talented actor for a part because he or she is a 'name', but when casting decisions become more about the actor than the role, that's when a movie starts to suffer.

Movies like Kick-Ass and Scott Pilgrim illustrated a more prominent shift in 2010 in terms of casting. Certainly unconventional casting is nothing new, but comic and graphic novel films are being seen less and less as risky endeavors, so filmmakers are exercising more creativity.

Just compare the Spider-Man franchise reboot to its predecessor. Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone? Both of them are just now finding success in movies, more often as character actors than leads (Stone's turn in Easy A being the only exception).

It would be premature to conclude that this new Spider-Man will be a total success simply because he's not Tobey Maguire, but with more and more superheroes leaping to the screen, some for the third or fourth time (still waiting to hear the identity of Zack Snyder's Superman), competent casting choices are usually the first hurdle towards a film that even the comic book fans might love. Might. 

What are your thoughts and opinions on the subject? Add them to the comments section below.

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Best known for her long-term roles in Family Guy and That 70s Show, and turning heads in films such as Max Payne and Forgetting Sarah Marshall, Mila Kunis' appearance in Black Swan has opened her up to a new kind of attention.

Her performance as Lily, the extroverted, ambiguously-drawn rival to Natalie Portman's ballerina, bagged her the Marcello Mastroianni Award at the Venice Film Festival, as well as a Supporting Actress nomination at the Golden Globes.

Back at the London Film Festival, we sat in on a roundtable interview with Kunis, chatting about the odd circumstances which led her to Black Swan, the enduring appeal of Family Guy, and where she sees her career going in the future.

Was Mr. Aronofsky someone you particularly wanted to work with?

Yeah, I think Darren's a brilliant director. I've been a fan of his since I saw Pi and then Requiem, so I was looking forward to working with him, for sure.

What attracted you to this particular script?

Darren did. Before I'd even read the script, I knew Darren and Nat were a part of it, and I would have loved to work with the both of them. So, reading the script and then having the script be as great as it was was not even a question for me.

Weren't you in or LA or New York with Natalie at some kind of flea market when she told you she was doing this role, and they were looking for somebody else who looked similar and could dance?

Kind of, I mean - Did Nat tell you this story? I guess I don't remember this, and I'm going to get in trouble with Nat. Yes, Nat and I like to go to flea markets. And we were in LA and we were flea market shopping for bargains, because that's what we did on a Sunday morning.

I have a different version. I remember her telling me, I said, "What do you have to do this after this?" And she said, "I have to go to my ballet lesson." And I was like, "Okay!" I didn't even think about it. And she goes, "Yeah, I'm doing a movie about a ballerina." And that's all I remember from it. But I guess it makes sense, because this movie came about.

Was it the most physically demanding movie you've done so far?

By far. Because aesthetically I had to look like a ballerina and hold myself like a ballerina. I think, by the end of it, I was 95 pounds. So, 20 pounds was lost. It was gained back like that. I had no problem gaining it back.

So, I guess you were comparing war wounds with Natalie?

We didn't have to compare. We saw them happening right before our very own eyes.

An opportunity like this very rarely comes about, so in order to complain, you kind of feel like a baby, so you choose not to complain.

In terms of your recognition from fans, how much does Family Guy count towards that?

For its fanbase? Family Guy's got a strong fanbase, man, like no other. It's great. Everywhere around the world, it's pretty amazing. It's amazing that people love Family Guy as much as they do. It's great.

Is that something you want to carry on doing?

For the rest of my life! I hope it lives on forever and ever and ever. The greatest job, ever.

Why? Because you can turn up in your pyjamas?

[Nods enthusiastically] And I can do it from anywhere in the world.

Could you tell us something about the transition from television to film, because you started with American Psycho 2.

Well, let's just be specific. That was not transition into film. That was exactly the same time as I was doing television. So, the transition didn't happen until I was 21, 22. Because up until then it was never a career.

I went to school, I graduated high school, and went to college, [then] dropped out of college. But it was never a career choice of mine. I always assumed that this was going to be something I did short-term, and inevitably did something as a career, like an adult.

And when I decided that I didn't have any other skills in life, that this is all I knew how to do, and this is what I loved to do, and when I made this my career is when all these decisions started happening.

But American Psycho I did when I was 16. Twenty-two was when 70s Show ended.

Do you think Black Swan will be a transitional film for your career?

I don't think you ever know. I stand by every movie that I did. I don't regret any decision I made.

Whatever I did, I always learn from. Whether it was what to do, what not to do, it was always a learning experience. But you never know what movie's going to open what door for you, and it's always the one that you least expected.

Forgetting Sarah Marshall got me Black Swan. I didn't audition for Black Swan. I would have auditioned. I would have flown to New York and read for it, and for one reason or another, he trusted in me due to what he saw in Sarah Marshall.

To me, it couldn't have been two more different characters. I never asked him why. I didn't want him to second guess himself. I just went with it.

We chit-chatted once, then I was sent the script, then I read the script. Then we chit-chatted again about the script and about the character, and how I viewed the character. And then the third time, he literally gets on iChat and I open my computer, and he's like, "Hey! So, are you ready to do this?", and I was like, "What are we doing?" And then he was like, "The movie!" And then I went, "Did you just offer me the movie?", and then I made him get on video chat to offer it to me, semi-in person, so I could see his face saying it. And then I had to call my agentsand tell them that I'd just got Black Swan. So, it was very backwards.

But, how strategic are you with your career?

As strategic as one can be. You know, in this industry, it's not a game of chess. It's a game of checkers, as I like to say. So, you can't think four or five steps ahead, because it's impossible.

I am in the position where I don't have to work for the sake of working, so I'm very lucky, in a sense. So, I can always sit back and wait for a project that I respond to, that I want to do.

But it's not anything to do with genres. It's not like I particularly look and say, "Next project I do, I want to be a drama." It's just a matter of finding a project you're drawn to.

Ms. Kunis, thank you for your time.

Black Swan is released this week.

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You want to know the future? I can't tell you what your lucky lottery numbers will be, but I have seen what befalls mankind. A time of terrible turmoil. Nothing is as you remember. Cities are gone. Humans are scarce and beasts of all kinds walk and talk the Earth.

There is but one saviour in the form of a man named Nick Stone, but he doesn't belong there. He is out of time, but this man from the past will save our future from the tyranny of Leeshar, one his own kind, and the shadow of the serpent. It will be a terrible price that will be paid. Lives will be lost and there will be plenty of furry bloodshed. In the end, though, I can predict that the legends will talk of the bravery of the Meltdown Man.

Whenever we think of classic 2000AD, it's characters such as Dredd, Strontium Dog and Rogue Trooper that come to mind, whose adventures and popularity have continued through the mag's long run. The self-contained stories are often overlooked and Alan Hebden's post nuclear drama holds together surprisingly well since it was published in 1980. 

There's a real sense of cohesion to the story as a whole, which advances at a fair pace over its full 49 episode year run. At first glance, it seems to be simply a bunch of talking animals with man caught in the middle. But this is more than an Animal Farm in Space, or a Galactic Noah's Ark in Space or a multi-species Planet Of The Apes.

There's a social structure to this savage world that is far from cutesy. It's also a dystopian vision of mankind's future that can stand as a survivor alongside such films as The Last Man On Earth, Mad Max and even Tank Girl, with her talking kanga partner, Booga.

Our hero, Nick Stone, is an SAS agent who's caught in a nuclear blast during a Gulf conflict, and the explosion sends him seemingly into the far-flung future of a distant planet overrun with talking animals. These eugenetically-modified creatures are known as Yujees, and whilst they have established their own caste system according to species, they are still answerable to humans.

On this world, it's the tyrannical Leeshar who rules with the assistance of his loyal Predators and the cobra, Lord Seth. Stone is determined to end his reign and befriends a whole menagerie of allies, amongst them Liana the catgirl, T-Bone the ox and Gruff the wolfman. However, as he travels through this strange land confronting alligator men and savage polar bears, he discovers the sickening secret of where the explosion has sent him.

Hebden, whose other work includes Battle's Major Eazy and 2000AD's Death Planet, never lets Stone or his readers rest, keeping him and the narrative moving continuously. And he also lights an unpredictable fuse which offers explosive surprises en route and that includes the characterisation.

Frequently, seeming villains change their colours and become allies. On other occasions, the heroes don't always survive every situation and many fall in battle brutally or nobly.

However, the greatest joy with Meltdown Man is the sheer inventive relish with which Belardinelli gives flesh, fur and feathers to the Yujee armies.

In Ace Trucking Co, he was let loose on a galaxy of beings, but here he draws a menagerie of creatures that enables him to scamper through the whole animal kingdom with breathless imagination. The pages are overrun with bears, tigers, ferrets, wolves, cheetahs, cats, camels, bloodhounds, walruses, rhinos, gorillas and bats.

Meltdown Man is an overlooked classic that still fights tooth and claw for futuristic adventure.

Meltdown Man is out now and available from the Den Of Geek Store.

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I'd be surprised if anyone sent to prison at the cinema this January was actually guilty. Following in the footsteps of Elizabeth Banks in The Next Three Days and Sam Rockwell in Conviction, Keanu Reeves is Henry, who accidentally becomes an accessory to armed robbery in Henry's Crime.

While the actual robbers go free, Henry is sentenced to three years in prison. During his sentence, his wife leaves him for the guy he stood in for as unwitting getaway driver, and he spends a miserable time doing porridge, enlivened only by a friendship with veteran prisoner Max, played by James Caan.

He makes parole after one year behind bars, with a plan in mind. If he did the time, he might as well have done the crime, and so he resolves to rob the same bank he just spent time in prison for not robbing. Slight moral fuzziness there, but hey, it's an interesting enough premise for an unorthodox revenge caper.

The mildness of touch actually works in favour of Henry's Crime, except in the casting of Keanu Reeves. I've heard it said that there's no Keanu Reeves film that wouldn't be better if Keanu Reeves wasn't in it. I'd make an exception for his two most iconic characters, Theodore Logan from Bill And Ted and Neo from The Matrix, but otherwise, that does pretty much hold up.

Reeves, in this film, is so mild that it's impossible to really connect with Henry as much as you might if anyone else were playing that role. What it calls for is an everyman along the lines of Tom Hanks or James Stewart, but obviously younger and still alive. The problem is, what Hollywood thinks when you say every-man these days is Shia LaBeouf, and that would be a lot worse.

What Reeves brings to the role is kind of disaffecting, though. The mildness of touch turns into an actual distance from what's going on. An everyman could pull off the early scenes in which Henry gives his estranged wife his blessing to carry on with someone else, as long as she's happy. With Reeves, it just seems like he was never really interested in her at all.

Vera Farmiga fares slightly better as the new love interest for Henry, who's presumably won over by his lack of any real expression when she meets him by accidentally running him over in her car. However, although she's not miscast like Reeves, she is channelling Joan Cusack, which kind of embellishes the notion that director Malcolm Venville, who last gave us the hyper-sweary British drama, 44 Inch Chest, was on a different page to everyone else.

Look at the other credits on the film. Sacha Gervasi co-wrote the script, and previously directed Anvil! The Story Of Anvil, which told an arresting story about an unusual subject, and whose heavy metal output I like less than I like the people themselves. But Gervasi also co-wrote The Terminal, a latter-day guilty pleasure from Steven Spielberg that starred, oh look, Tom Hanks.

Quibbles about the casting aside, kudos must be given for the best performance in the film, which comes from James Caan. The guy's a master of his trade, and with this, he strikes just the right balance between taking it seriously and having fun. He plays Max as a confidence man who's skilled in performance, which only shows up Reeves even more.

Not that the script itself doesn't do that enough on its own, because at one point, the entire climax of the film becomes contingent on Henry's ability to act. So, just to give you an overview of that Jenga tower of circumstance, that means we have to watch Keanu Reeves trying to act as a character who's trying to act.

Credit where it's due, calling Reeves a wooden block means that he fits into that Jenga construction pretty well, and Henry's Crime doesn't fall down, even with that seemingly major problem at its heart. It's perfectly serviceable, and even though there's more than a passing hint of what might have been with a stronger and more likeable lead, it's still an enjoyable watch.

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Arriving courtesy of Filmonic is this first look at the cast of X-Men: First Class, Matthew Vaughn's forthcoming adaptation of the 60s-set comic book series.

The image shows, from left to right, Michael Fassbender as Magneto, Rose Byrne as Dr Moira MacTaggert, January Jones as Emma Frost, Jason Flemyng as Azazel, Nicholas Hoult as Beast, Lucas Till as Havok, Zoë Kravitz as Angel Salvadore, Jennifer Lawrence as Mystique, and finally, James McAvoy as Xavier.

That's a lengthy cast list by any standard, and we're looking forward to seeing just how Vaughan tells all these characters' backstories while keeping everything knitted together in one tidy narrative.

The costumes are perhaps a little less 60s-looking than we were expecting, but we can only see their heads and upper torsos, to be fair. It's just possible they're all actually wearing bell-bottomed trousers, or maybe even mini skirts.

X-Men: First Class is due for release in UK cinemas on 2 June.

Filmonic

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This review may contain spoilers.

4.11 Chuck Versus The Balcony

Very often on Chuck they have a special guest star who is allowed to ham it up or be exceptionally silly, but this week's star doesn't even act. That's because the unaccredited supporting role in Chuck Versus The Balcony goes to Greenacres, an elegant property built in the twenties by silent star Harold Lloyd. If it seems vaguely familiar, it's the same place that Ah-nuld assaulted in Commando, and a zillion other productions.

Here it's playing a winery in the Loire Valley, France, although they CGIed some rolling vineyards to make it seem slightly more plausible. Except they did that in such an obvious way, that you'd have to be on medication to accept that they were in France.

How this location is woven into this adventure isn't important, but they clearly wanted this to be the place where Chuck would finally pop the question to Sarah, in that overly mushy way that the show often deals with their romantic relationship.

The way this is presented throughout the story is built around the concept of a mission-within-a-mission, where they have a job to do, but Chuck also needs to deploy the ring and knee at an appropriate point. The 'fun', as is usually the case with this show, is, as simple as that seems, it proves to be an exceptionally elusive act to perform.

That part of the show has its highs, and lows, but the exceptionally funny parts are all back at the Buy More, where Lester has been informed that he's had a marriage arranged for him, and is waiting to meet his future bride.

Having initially rejected the idea, he then embraces it once he sees her. How he manages to mess this up and the welcome return to the stage of Jeffster was probably the highlight of the show for me.

The parts with Chuck and Sarah were less satisfying, and there was a change of direction at the end that came over as painfully forced, and entirely out of sync with the rest of proceedings. Having started exceptionally well, with a sideways salute to the 'Santa' story from Gremlins, it sort of went downhill and became exceptionally fragmented in places.

I've also started to notice that it's better when Morgan is centre stage, as he's a much more interesting character than Chuck. The scenes that Morgan and Sarah had together flowed better than the ones she had with Chuck, but then I guess they were meant to be awkward.

In short, I'm still waiting for a knock-out Chuck episode in season 4, and we've crossed the halfway point in what is probably its final year. It's about time Chuck manned up, and started delivering the sort of craziness we know it can.

Next week, both Linda Hamilton and Timothy Dalton are back when Sarah tries to infiltrate Alexei Volkoff's organisation, while Ellie and Awesome argue over what to name their baby! It's got possibilities, I hope.

Read our review of episode 10, Chuck Versus The Leftovers, here.

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One of the highlights of Sam Raimi's Spider-Man trilogy, at least for me, was the character of J Jonah Jameson, who was so brilliantly brought to life by J.K. Simmons. Far more than shouting "Parker!" from time to time, Simmons' take gave the three films real comic relief, and the actor gave a masterclass in how to make a real impact with not much screen time.

IGN has discovered, however, that with the forthcoming reboot of Spider-Man, nobody will have a chance to step into his shoes. For while the Daily Bugle will feature in the new film, the character of Jameson won't.

Given that we're getting a genesis story here, set in high school, we simply wonder if the narrative won't take things as far as Peter Parker getting his job at the Bugle. But that's our usual idle speculation at work.

We'd imagine that Jameson will appear in later films in this rebooted line, but for now, check out the story at IGN here.

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"Did you enjoy it?"

That's the question I asked Kevin Smith, back when I had the pleasure of interviewing him back in October 2009. I was referring to him directing the film that became known as Cop Out (but was then still known as A Couple Of Dicks), a picture that saw him work with a full-on movie star for the first time. Thing is about his answer, and it had been a terrific, flowing conversation, was that he paused for just a short moment before his answer.

"You know, when all was said and done, I did," he replied.

There's no reason to disbelieve that, but it'd also clearly been a production with some quite pronounced challenges. And now, we might just have found out what those challenges were.

In a new podcast released over at WTFPod, Marc Maron chats with Kevin Smith, and the pair of them got on to talking about Cop Out. Maron asks, in particular, about the billboard poster for the film, and his dislike of it. And, after chatting about the poster, Smith added, "Look, I know the real story. One guy wouldn't even sit for a fuckin' poster shoot."

When pressed to identity the name of the person concerned, he replied that "Everyone knows who it is. Put it this way, remember the really funny guy in the movie? It ain't him. He's a fucking dream. Tracy Morgan, I would lay down in traffic for. Were it not for Tracy, I might've killed myself or someone else in the making of that movie."

It becomes clear that Smith is talking about Bruce Willis.

He went on to add that "It was difficult. I've never been involved in a situation like that where, one component is not in the box at all. It was fucking soul crushing. I mean, a lot of people are gonna be like, oh, you're just trying to blame the movie on him. No, but I had no fucking help from this dude whatsoever."

When I heard the podcast, I went back to re-read the aforementioned interview we did with him after Cop Out had wrapped, and while I'm not trying to get pieces to fit a story, there are a couple of things that stand out in a slightly different context.

For instance, I asked him about working with a movie star for the first time. To which Smith replied: "A fucking movie star! Now that's a different beast altogether, because you're dealing with someone else who's just as powerful, if not more powerful than you, on the set. And for me it's not power games, but you learn very quickly when it's just like I've got a shotgun director on the movie!"

He went on to add, "So it took us like a week for us to figure out what it was we were doing together. I was going at it like, 'Bruce, do it like this.' I was directing Bruce the way I direct everybody else. And Bruce was like 'I've been acting like Bruce Willis for 25 years, do you really think there's anything you're going to tell me that I don't know?' So he was very much the author of his own performance."

Finally, a little later, Smith said of Bruce Willis, "What he needs to do more than anything else in his life, though, right now is direct. He's ready. He's absolutely ready. After 25 years of watching everyone else do it. He said that at one point on the movie. 'I've been watching everyone else direct for 25 years.' And I'm like, ‘My god, you have seen it all'..."

Now, to be clear on this, in the interview, Smith was positive about working with Bruce Willis, and you can read our chat here to see that. But, it appears, all was not well on the film. And a lot of what Smith was talking about seems quite similar to the Bruce Willis tales described by Julie Salamon in her book, The Devil's Candy, which discusses the making of the movie The Bonfire Of The Vanities.

In other Kevin Smith news, while we've got you, he's confirmed on his Twitter page that the March release date he's targeting for his new film, Red State, is just for the US. As you'd expect on a smaller budget picture, the international rollout is likely to take a little longer.

And finally, in his latest podcast, Smith has confirmed a piece of casting news for his upcoming hockey movie, Hit Somebody. In that film, Kyle Gallner has been cast as a Wayne Gretzky-like character. To find out more, you should check out the podcast, here.

Finally, the WTF Podcast can be found here. It's well worth a listen.

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Following the success of The Princess And The Frog, Disney is continuing with its support for hand-drawn animated films, and the latest will be arriving on the big screen later this year. Thus, for its 51st full-length animated feature, Winnie The Pooh will be arriving.

The film is due out on 15th July in the US, but interestingly, it's currently listed as down for 15th April in the UK.

Given that Disney usually staggers its releases the other way round, and that we're waiting months for films to arrive in the UK (case in point: the excellent Tangled, which arrives next week over here), it'd be a surprise if those release dates hold. But not an unpleasant one.

Anyway, the reason we're here: here's the new poster for Winnie The Pooh. Enjoy!

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As you might expect, this isn't radically different from what we've seen thus far (main difference: it's shorter). But in the interests of completeness for one of the most interesting looking upcoming movies on our radar, here's the new UK trailer for Battle: Los Angeles.

Aliens are still invading, the fusion of shakycam and effects is still looking like it's working, and we're still keen to see the final movie.

We've not got long to wait, either. Battle: Los Angeles arrives in the UK on 11th March. Here's the trailer...

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Infernal Affairs is a member of the elitist ‘Haven't you seen the original?' club. This 2002 Hong Kong cop thriller was remade by Martin Scorsese and his A-list chums as The Departed four years later. It bagged the bespeckled director an Oscar for Best 'Shit, We Haven't Given Him One Yet' Picture and garnered both critical praise and public approval for its convoluted depiction of Boston crime politics.

Meanwhile, Asian cinema devotees spluttered in the corner, declaiming the Hollywood rip-off as a worthless bastardisation of a modern classic.

Playing Top Trumps with police flicks isn't the point of this review, but there's an elephant in the room who keeps nudging me with his trunk, stamping his feet impatiently and eyeing a copy of each film. It seems best to feed the beast some definitive peanuts before we really get going, so we can put to bed both the dilemma and this bloated metaphor.  

The best film is: a matter of opinion. The difference between them is marginal and too close to call objectively. Whichever you prefer will come down to cinematic preferences or, most likely, which one you saw first.

Infernal Affairs is a snappier picture with a more cohesive and coherent story, while The Departed features stronger acting and polished direction. And that, is that.

The duelling lead rolls in Infernal Affairs are filled by Chinese mega-star, Andy Lau, and experienced Hong Kong grafter, Tony Leung. The former is a police inspector and informant for Triad boss, Sam, while the latter plays his opposite, a police mole who has wheedled his way into the upper echelon of Sam's gang.

It's a really fantastic premise that forces two men bound by deceit to spiral inexorably towards each other. The film asks profound questions about morality. Can a person, so mired in corruption, turn his life into something positive, and will a man necessarily become evil in trying to do good?

The film undermines this conundrum a little by making it perfectly clear that you should root for Chen Wing Yan, the police mole. Leung's performance is so doe-eyed that you can't help but sympathise with his predicament. Even when he's charming the Ph.D. off his psychiatrist, there's a naivety to his expression that is extremely endearing.

Lau, on the other hand, is more of a schemer. A cold calculated professional who is conflicted, but values self-preservation over all else. That is the crux of their endearment. Yang will sacrifice himself for justice and his own beliefs, while Inspector Lau isn't even sure what his beliefs are.

Regardless, both leads put in excellent performances, bringing the full force of their experience to bear on two complete and engrossing creations. Many films can't even manage one interesting character, so it seems almost unfair that Infernal Affairs gets two. The supporting cast are noticeably poorer by comparison. There are no standout duds, but the raft of bit part players seem buffeted by the wake of Leung and Lau passing through. Many of these actors get their chance to shine or flop in the two sequels.

Speaking of which, how would you like to see the continuation of Infernal Affairs' gripping narrative in a second instalment? Well, you'll have to wait for number III, because Infernal Affairs II is a prequel. Lau and Leung are conspicuous by their absence, replaced by Edison Chen and Shawn Yue, respectively. These two young actors played the policemen in flashback scenes during the first film and return to pick up the roles fulltime.

The law of diminishing returns in movie sequels, coupled with the absence of the best two things about Infernal Affairs, may give you justifiable cause for concern, but directors Andrew Lau and Alan Mak are one step ahead.

To avoid leaning on their rookie charges too greatly, Infernal Affairs II is as much about mob boss Sam (Eric Tsang) and his cop counterpart, Inspector Wong Chi Sing (Anthony Wong), who featured in the first film as mentor and handler to Chen, as it is the origin story of Yan and Ming.

While the young bucks testosterone their way around the streets of Hong Kong, we gain insight into the burgeoning relationship between a low evel mob boss and an up and coming police inspector. Given each other to bounce off, the bubbly Sam and cynical Wong are dramatically improved from the first film. Learning more of what lead to the prickly pivotal scene they share in Infernal Affairs is as intriguing as Ming and Yan's evolution.

The four major players are strung together by Triad tensions in the city, with crisp mob doyen, Ngai Wing Hau (Francis Ng), playing his underlings off against each other in a dangerous power gambit. It's not nearly as gripping as the plot that preceded it, suffering from a surfeit of names and places that can become difficult to follow.

Still, Chen and Yue convert their inexperience into rawness and the two director's benefit from having mastered their tone in the first film. Predictably, it doesn't live up to its predecessor, but Infernal Affairs II is still an exciting thriller with plenty for fans of the original to enjoy.

Last and least is Infernal Affairs III, which marks the semi-triumphant return of Andy Lau and Tony Leung. To squeeze in enough screentime for both characters, the film flashes wildly between time periods. If that weren't hard enough to follow, the action slips without warning into delusional psychotic episodes, as Inspector Ming's sanity unravels.

It's admirable that writer's Alan Mak & Felix Chong chose to take this third outing in such a different direction. Gone is the grand intrigue of criminal politics and in come the very personal stories of two men, one beginning his suffering and the other bringing his to a close.

Daoming Chen arrives as new antagonist, Inspector Shen Chen, who Lau suspects is another informant. His knowing smirk seems pantomime in the early going, but as Lau becomes increasingly irrational and erratic, Chen's bearing begins to mesh with the tone.

Kelly Chen gets her turn in the limelight as Yan's former psychiatrist, but puts in undoubtedly the weakest performance of the entire trilogy. Her prominence, coupled with a story that is interesting, but not enthralling, conspire to make Infernal Affairs III a little worse than II, and a noticeable step down from I.

The Discs

Unless you're a major fan, there's no real reason to plump for these Blu-rays over your existing DVDs. The transfers are perfectly fine, but don't have enough sharpness to warrant an HD upgrade.

The extras are limited to short ‘making of' docs and a few other behind-the-scenes snippets. The first film features a commentary with both directors.

It's fair to say that there are no bad films in this trio, which seems like an almost impossible success for a series completed in under two years.

Whether you're curious about the origins of the Hollywood remake or a devoted Hong Kong cineaste, immersing yourself in the Infernal Affairs trilogy is a very worthwhile way to spend sixhours of your life.

Films:
Discs:

Infernal Affairs: The Complete Trilogy is out now on Blu-ray and available from the Den Of Geek Store.

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I feel like I'm stuck in a no win situation. For several months now, I've been submitting interviews to the Den Of Geek editors and for several months they've refused to publish any of them.

At first I assumed that it was because I was interviewing random people on the street and asking them questions that could, in the right circumstances, be used to have me convicted of a surprisingly wide variety of crimes. I blame the times. What, these days, isn't considered saucily haranguing an old lady?

Sensing that this could be the problem, I started submitting interviews with famous actors, writers and directors and they featured nothing but appropriate questions for the site. I had some big names, too, and we would have been able to break some pretty incredible stories.

For example, in my interview with Will Ferrell, he told me that, "If my career ends up like Jack Black's, I will genuinely murder my agent." In my interview with Michael Bay, he apologised to me for his entire career and admitted that most of it had just been a mean-spirited prank. "We wanted to wind you up and we took things too far. I really am sorry for that," he admitted. It was actually quite an emotionally touching conversation.

Again, the site refused to publish anything I submitted, suggesting that I had written up interviews that had never taken place. Although I was outraged by the accusation and have secretly sworn a violent revenge, it seemed futile to argue with them, particularly as they were correct.

If I'm honest, I think I may have given myself away by having Danny Dyer out himself as a lizard-person and by having Scarlett Johansson describing a fairly graphic sexual encounter she had recently had with Natalie Portman. Still, I maintain that both pieces would have drawn a lot of attention to Den Of Geek.

So, how am I supposed to become an internationally renowned interviewer? Well, I decided that a good start would be to conduct some interviews. I mentioned to the editors that I wanted to interview Rob Zombie. I've been a big Zombie fan for years, even going so far as to scoff at the Internet when it got together to hysterically cry that his face should be murdered off for daring to remake Halloween. The Devil's Rejects is one of my favourites and his Halloween sequel was massively underrated.

The editors said that, if the opportunity came up, they would let me know. I responded as anyone would, by screaming, "Bullshit! Why are doing this to me?" directly into their surprised faces.

You would think that would be enough to get me, the man Scarlett Johansson described in a currently unpublished interview as "dreadfully sexy, like a thin, pale slither of erotic delight", exactly what I wanted. However, contrary to the mental image you've conjured of rummy toothless cave-nerds, the people that run this site are all backbone and propriety. These are the five ways I've failed to blackmail them into giving me something that they don't have to give me

1. I will murder your enemies and bring you their heads.

What was offered:

You don't run a site like Den Of Geek without making a few enemies. Look in the comments section of just about any article on here and you'll notice that, no matter what we say, someone wants us dead for it. Probably you.

Then there are disgruntled interview subjects threatening people with court injunctions over ‘false allegations regarding Natalie Portman's personal life'. Some people just like to give us a bumload of guff for no reason at all. That's not how things need to be.

I asked the editors to write down a list of names, either real or user, and offered to bring their decapitated heads into the DoG offices.

Given that this is aimed at achieving an interview with Rob Zombie, I had planned on each murder being a tribute to a different kill from one of his films. Without wishing to name names, someone quite famous would have become The Fishboy, had my offer been accepted.

I also suggested, but like a gentleman did not insist, that they impale the decapitated heads on spikes and display them proudly in the windows of the offices as a warning to others.

The ridiculous reason they gave for refusing to accept my offer:

"Under no circumstances do we advocate murder. Please do not kill anyone, Matt. If you kill someone and bring us their head, we will contact the police and you will be arrested. As you know from experience, very few juries are willing to acquit you of a charge based on the defence ‘I was trying to get an interview with Rob Zombie'.  

Also, most of our enemies are only enemies because of things that you have said or written. It would be better for us if they brought us your head. It would be a great temptation to us to kick your decapitated noggin around our office like a football. At half time, we would drink pints of your blood for refreshment."

2. Sexual favours

What was offered:

I will be discreet and I will do anything.

The ridiculous reason they gave for refusing to accept my offer:

"This is not interesting or appealing to us. We've made this clear to you before. Our lawyers have made this clear to you before. Other people's lawyers have made this clear to you before.

There is going to have to come a point in your life when you accept that attempting to bribe people with sex is just not going to work out for you. "

3. I will clean up my act.

What was offered:

I do know that most of the other writers don't submit articles that look like a transcription of a serial killer's internal monologue. In exchange for an interview with Rob Zombie, I promised to stop writing like I'm a character in one of his films. That includes no swearing.

Appreciating that I scam a quarter of all of my word counts by adding a massive flumping lot of unnecessary swear words, I would now have to put extra mother-hugging work in to write full articles, without the skipload of filler words. That would prove to be a fucking piss bowl full of inconvenience for me.

Furthermore, I offered to fix my whole style. It'll be all proper film analysis and considered opinions that are relevant to the site. I'll stop referencing disturbing sex acts in similes where I could just reference another film. And by ‘another film', I mean a non-pornographic one.

I'll try so hard and I will be so good.

The ridiculous reason they gave for refusing to accept my offer:

"No more filthy comments, no more referencing adult films and no more swearing?

While we do find these elements of your articles troubling, we're also very aware that there's nothing else to what you write.

We've already got real journalists who write proper articles for us. Stripped of your very limited novelty value, what do you have left to offer us? Nothing. Absolutely nothing."

4. I will stop hanging around outside your offices in a threatening manner.

What was offered:

I know that, sometimes, it might appear to the editors of this site that I'm stalking the corridors of their office building wielding a weapon and making violent gestures. However, this is just a big misunderstanding. Their offices just happen to be right near somewhere I like to hang out.

What's the knife for? To protect me from bears. Millions of people die every year as a result of bear attacks in urbanised cities. That also explains the bear traps I carry in my backpack.

As for the 'cutthroat' gestures I sometimes make whilst gurning at them through the windows? They were a joke. I'd have thought that my manic howls of laughter would have tipped them off to that.

And the time I attempted to gain entry whilst dressed as a pizza delivery man? That I actually can't explain.

Either way, if I get this interview it stops forever.

The ridiculous reason they gave for refusing to accept my offer:

"We're calling the police if you ever come here, regardless. Especially if you're wearing nothing but leather chaps and a swimming cap again. I still have nightmares and haven't been able to watch a western or visit my local pool since.

What's particularly bothersome is that I know you have to travel on the tube to get here."

5. I will review any old tat. 

What was offered:

Far from being a team player, I am very, very selfish. Some people have suggested that this is because I have a massive ego, but the truth is that I'm just too good to review some things.

However, even the man that Natalie Portman's lawyer describes as "...a liar whose disregard for facts would be dangerous were he not so stupid" has a price.

Much like a terrified victim trembling below the lurching, knife thrusting form of Michael Myers, this is the point where I'm ready to beg.

I will review anything. If you find you get sent a disc and no one is willing to watch it, I will review it for you. There is no film that I am above. I will do ‘The Ultimate Uwe Boll Collection' and I will smile while doing it, even if my eyes do start bleeding.

The ridiculous reason they gave for refusing to accept my offer:

"We know. In your time writing here you've reviewed Vanilla Ice in Cool As Ice, Snoop Dogg's Hood Of Horror, 2001 Maniacs 2, Bikini Girls On Ice, Michael Jackson's This Is It and The Best Of Dog The Bounty Hunter. You're already doing that.

This isn't a bargaining point. This is just what you do.

This may be the worst attempt at bribery since a columnist we'd sooner not name (although as you know, it was you) offered us revenge killings, sexual favours and more suitable contributions for the website in exchange for giving one of his articles a star rating.

Articles don't get star ratings, Matt. They give them.

It would probably be better for everyone if you just let this go. At this point you're just embarrassing yourself and, to be honest, we're starting to feel that we have an obligation to Rob Zombie to protect him from you."

• See all the Confused Views

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Jonathan Ross hosted the unveiling of Nintendo's eagerly awaited wonder gadget, the 3DS, at its official launch in Amsterdam. As you'll no doubt know by now, the console uses what we presume is some form of witchcraft to display 3D without the need for cumbersome glasses.

In a curiously muted, subdued ceremony, Laurent Fischer (described by Capcom's Yoshinori Ono as "a boring George Clooney") took to the stage to talk about the genesis of the device, and explained that Nintendo originally wanted to include some sort of 3D feature on the GameCube, but the technology would have been too expensive at the time of the machine's release.

As for the 3DS itself, a video detailed some of the device's numerous features, including its ability to take 3D pictures, ability to stream video (Nintendo has already struck deals with EuroSport and Aardman Animations to stream their content, with a deal with Sky 3D apparently on the way over the next few months). Always-on Wifi will connect automatically to the net and will download content and updates even when it's asleep.

Then there's something called StreetPass, which automatically exchanges data from your 3DS with people you pass in the street. "No such transfer occurs unless you want it to" Fischer pointed out.

Representatives from Ubisoft, Capcom and Konami then came out to introduce some of their titles, which include Street Fighter IV 3D. Yoshinori Ono explained that SFIV will use the console's Street Pass to engage passers by in combat.

Other games highlighted included Kid Icarus: Uprising, Animal Crossing, Pilot Wings Resort, Rabbids, Splinter Cell, Driver, Rayman 3D and an updated remake of Ocarina Of Time.

Nintendo Europe's president Saturo Shibata then outlined some of the 3DS' pre-loaded software, which includes an activity log, which no doubt uses the console's built-in pedometer to track how much walking you've done. Then there's Face Raiders, which allows the user to take pictures of themselves and place them in a shooting gallery. "So you can shoot yourself in the face," Jonathan Ross dryly explained.

The most interesting pre-loaded feature is perhaps Nintendo's eShop - in Shibata's presentation, one of the games shown on the screen was the classic Super Mario Land from the original Gameboy.

Finally, the piece of information we'd been impatiently waiting for arrived. The 3DS will be available in Europe on March 25th, though the device's RRP wasn't confirmed. Shibata did, however, confirm that "More than 25 games will be available" between launch date and June.

We can't wait.

Well, 2010, that finished a while back. Dragged a bit towards the end, too. Here are some games you should have played last year, and some you should have avoided like people holding clipboards in city centres.

Should – Super Mario Galaxy 2 (Wii)

There were rumblings when Super Mario Galaxy 2 was announced. Hardcore gamers thought it was a concession, a bone thrown in their general direction by a Nintendo that didn't care about them any more. Got that a bit wrong, didn't you? Super Mario Galaxy 2 was a triumph, a game that sparkled with the Nintendo glitter of old. It built on everything that the original had offered, as well as decades of accumulated platforming experience. Hardcore games don't have to be soaked in blood and swear words and breasts, but they do have to be really bloody good, which Super Mario Galaxy 2 is.

Shouldn't – Fighters Uncaged (Xbox 360)

A Kinect launch title that was all gritty violence, streetwise cool and sweaty men wearing hoodies. The control mechanism was floppy and unresponsive, the content was lacking and what was a reasonably good idea was lost underneath a mess of a game, in desperate need of another six months testing before release. A bandwagon jumper that attempted to ensnare gamers who weren't interested in cartoony adventures, dancing or looking after virtual tigers. It didn't work.

Should – Red Dead Redemption (multi)

Rockstar's nun wrangling, great Western adventure is everything you'd expect it to be and more. A vast, bristling, changing world for you to play in, and a sweeping, epic story to lose yourself in. Much more than GTA: Sergio Leone, RDR showed the world that videogames can have the same scope and beauty as films, whilst still being engaging and enjoyable. It may have had its share of bugs and problems, but boiled down to its simplest parts, it's a real joy.

Shouldn't – Quantum Theory (multi)

Quantum Theory is less of a Gears Of War clone and more of a Gears Of War paint by numbers. The game lifts the main roll-hide-shoot mechanic from Epic's modern gem, adds nothing to it save for a few curves in the architecture and thinks that that's enough. It's not. The game feels muddy and incomplete, ugly and lacking the polish you'd expect from a triple A title. The fact that it's the most cynical rip off of the year is the putrid icing on the rotten cake.

Should – Limbo (XBLA)

One of the bleakest games of the year turns out to be one of the best. A download-only platformer with a jarring art style, creepy music, terrifying giant spiders and some of the most excruciating death animations you'll have ever seen. Limbo is almost as grim as it is enjoyable, a gruelling experience wrapped in a monochrome shell and topped with the sort of puzzling only 2D platformers can offer. A joy and a trial, and worth every point you spend on it.

Shouldn't – Dead Space Ignition (multi)

A cynical, cash sucking downloadable title that primarily exists to unlock extras for the forthcoming Dead Space 2. So devoid of content that it could be seen as a metaphor for the vast emptiness of space, Ignition is neither particularly interactive or slightly entertaining. Much like Fable 2's Pub Games from 2008, this is a marketing ploy wrapped in the promise of DLC. No extra unlockables can be worth the mind numbing tedium you'd have to endure to get them.


Should – Bayonetta (multi)

Bayonetta is a spectacularly camp masterpiece. Hilarious and fiendishly difficult, it's the illegitimate daughter of a bawdy 60s sex romp and Devil May Cry. A crazed, cheeky hack and slasher with all the presentational subtlety of a Vegas strip show and a combat system so intricate and layered it deserves an award on its own. Platinum Studios are one of the most exciting development houses out there at the moment, and Bayonetta is their crowning achievement.

Shouldn't – Star Wars: The Force Unleashed 2 (multi)

The first Force Unleashed was flawed but enjoyable, losing its way after the first three hours or so and stumbling to a conclusion that was at least satisfactory. Unfortunately, Lucas Arts decided that to rectify this problem, they'd make a sequel that only lasted three hours and that lacked any of the original game's charm, excitement or fun. Strangely enough, the plan didn't work, and The Force Unleashed 2 in an execrable mess.

Should – Enslaved: Odyssey To The West (multi)

Enslaved is the forgotten gem of 2010, a magnificent, beautiful, epic game that was criminally ignored by the buying public. A retelling of Journey To The West set in a distant future where robots rule the world, Enslaved was a cerebral blockbuster, eschewing bombastic explodey combat for a more measured, narrative led approach. Critically lauded, colourful and home to some of the best acting seen on any console for a long time, Enslaved deserved to sell far more units than it did.

Shouldn't – Final Fantasy XIV (PC)

Final Fantasy XIV may one day turn into a decent MMO, but at the moment it's a cobbled together mess. People have resigned over how buggy and incomplete the game is. Trading on its title, the game is an update of the grind heavy FFXI, and on release was, in places, unplayable. Cue complaints, team restructuring, and a payment suspension for anyone who bought the game. FFXIV should be a lesson to anyone planning on releasing a game that isn't ready: don't. Maybe in 2011 the game will reach a position where it's as enjoyable as it promised, but in 2010 it was one to avoid.

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As Christopher Nolan prepares to commence shooting on his third and final Batman movie, The Dark Knight Rises, news has arrived (courtesy of Deadline), of a particularly significant bit of casting.

Anne Hathaway has reportedly beaten Keira Knightley, Rachel Weisz, Naomi Watts, Blake Lively and Natalie Portman to the role of Selina Kyle, also known as the slinky Catwoman.

Hathaway joins the esteemed company of Julie Newmar, Lee Meriwether, Eartha Kitt, Michelle Pfieffer and Halle Berry as the latest screen incarnation of Catwoman.

"I am thrilled to have the opportunity to work with Anne Hathaway, who will be a fantastic addition to our ensemble as we complete our story," Nolan enthused in a statement.

Meanwhile, Warner has confirmed last year's rumours that Tom Hardy will indeed be playing Bane.

Anne Hathaway is Catwoman - hear her roar. The Dark Knight Rises is due for release in July.

Deadline

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