Summer Flicks Take Center Stage on Super Bowl Sunday

Even though most expect this year’s Super Bowl matchup between the Arizona Cardinals and the Pittsburgh Steelers to be a fairly one-sided affair—my money’s on the Steel City winning by a lot—at least the commercials should be pretty entertaining. According to Variety, movie studios are capitalizing on the estimated 100 million U.S. viewers with an impressive lineup of teaser trailers airing during the game. Advertisements have been announced for high-profile summer releases including J.J. Abrams’ Star Trek reboot, Stephen Sommers’ G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra and Michael Bay’s Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. I could probably point out that the latter two are basically ads for two-hour Hasbro toy commercials, but that would just be downright cynical.

Which commercial am I most looking forward to? I’m gonna have to go with the Transformers sequel. Not much is known about Revenge of the Fallen, and it will be a lot of fun seeing the Autobots and Decepticons in action once again. Oh, and the sequel promises more Megan Fox, so that might have something to do with my excitement. Ahem.

Enjoy the game, Wortmaniacs!

A Star Wars Horror Novel?

While more than a few shrieks were heard around the world after The Phantom Menace hit theaters, Star Wars has never really been all that scary. Del Rey Books and author Joe Schreiber (No Windows, No Doors) hope to change all that later this year with Deathtroopers, a horror novel scheduled to hit bookshelves on October 27.

On January 26, StarWars.com unveiled the gruesome cover art for the forthcoming paperback. While little is known about the book itself, the image of a bloodied Imperial Stormtrooper helmet—with a head presumably still inside—hanging from an ominous hook already has my interest piqued. Will the book itself deliver with an equally-creepy premise? We’ll all find out this Halloween. Well, maybe not all of us, but I'm sure those of us who get thrown into a rage when people misspell Kashyyyk will be lining up for a copy.

I’m an admitted Star Wars fanatic, but I haven’t really gotten into the dozens of ancillary novels based in its universe. Aside from Timothy Zahn’s Thrawn trilogy (Heir to the Empire, Dark Force Rising, The Last Command), the X-Wing series and Shadows of the Empire, there aren’t many Star Wars novels that I can seriously recommend to casual fans. However, one can’t help but appreciate that this wealth of content does exist, providing other creative minds with the means to further explore George Lucas’ ever-expanding mythology.

Resident Evil 5 Hits Xbox Live

Yes, I’m aware that the headline rhymes, but when we’re talking about a playable demo for the sure-to-be-classic fifth installment in the Resident Evil franchise, you can probably forgive me. The Resident Evil 5 demo, which became available exclusively for Xbox Live Gold members today, includes three single- and two-player co-op levels to give fans a sense of what to expect when the game hits store shelves March 13. The demo will be made available to Xbox Live Silver members on February 29.

For those not in the know, this game marks the return of Resident Evil veteran Chris Redfield as he teams with a new partner, Sheva Alomar, to get to the bottom of a mysterious bioterrorist attack in sub-Saharan Africa.

In preparation for the game’s release, I’ve been getting reacquainted with the survival horror franchise by picking up Resident Evil 4: Wii Edition. I played through the GameCube version of the game multiple times when it was released in 2005, but I could hardly resist giving it another go with the Wii Remote motion controls. Granted, I apparently suck at aiming the controller at the things I want to stop living, but the twitchy gameplay adds a satisfying level of panic to an already nerve-racking experience.