It's the lovely Leona Lewis singing the Avatar music single I See You.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

From the man who brought us Jay and Silent Strike Back, Dogma, Clerks II and Zack and Miri Make a Porno. Kevin Smith directs brings his first studio film to the big screen with a script by the hilarous Cullen Brothers, Cop Out (originally A Couple of Dicks).

Two longtime NYPD partners on the trail of a stolen, rare, mint-condition baseball card find themselves up against a merciless, memorabilia-obsessed gangster. Jimmy (Bruce Willis) is the veteran detective whose missing collectible is his only hope to pay for his daughter's upcoming wedding, and Paul (Tracy Morgan) is his "partner-against-crime" whose preoccupation with his wife's alleged infidelity makes it hard for him to keep his eye on the ball.

Part One was an excellent build up. It read like the Bat-Family do Die Hard. Part Three deflated towards the end, but this was sheer brilliance. Never before have the characters of Tim Drake and Jason Todd been contrasted so effectively.

Tim really is the true heir to Bruce's Dark Knight legacy, but is still far to young to take on such a mantle. Their showdown towards the end of the issue was great and ends tragically for the young Drake.

It's just a shame that Part Three wasn't as good. So well done Tony Daniel!

You're my comic of the year.

He directed Terminator I &II, Aliens True Lies, wrote Rambo First Blood: Part Two and was responsible for the Titanic.

After that successful period he fell from the spotlight for most of the 2000s as he began a fifteen year journey into producing the decade's most beautiful film.

Starring Sam Worthington and Sigourney Weaver, Avatar tells the story of wheelchair bound ex-marine Jake Sully and his adventures as a Navi throughout the tropical world of Pandora.

Jake digitally controls his Navi - a cross between a cat, monkey and zebra, blue and three times the size of human - through the Avatar computer programme from a pod in the marine base on Pandora.

Sully soon becomes part of a corporate plot to exploit Pandora's natural resources and works to gain the Navi's trust. He soon finds himself in a struggle between his duty as a marine and his love for his new life as a Navi.

The world of Pandora took the CGI team a reported two years to get out from the drawing board and onto the big screen. And it shows.

The planetary jungle is absolute eye candy. Everywhere on screen you'll find at least a dozen different flower designs, countless animals and thousands of different colours.

The story is interesting, although it is nothing that hasn't been done before. It bares strong similarities to Dances with Wolves, The Last Samurai and even the Matrix but bringing a disabled main character really helps it stand out.

Worthington is fine, as is Weaver but stand out performance mentions go to Stephen Lang as the grizzled Colonel Quaritch and Michelle Rodriguez as Zoe Saldana as the proud Navi, Neytiri.

If you like the sound of it, see it in 3D or in an IMAX Theatre to fully appreciate it.

Despite the 12A rating, some of the film is very violent and even includes a questionable inter-species sex scene. It also runs in a 163 minutes, so it's probably best to leave the restless kids at home for this one.

Was it worth the estimated half a billion dollar price tag? Well that remains to be seen. As of this article going live it has internationally pulled in somewhere over 230 million dollars.

Avatar is out now in theatres across the country.

The piece also mentions the potential in Europe for manga books. While the continent is a lucrative market for comic book publishers, it is all difficult to break into with alll the translation work that goes into each release.

Manga has been around here for a little over 20 years now. My first experience was the brilliant Guyver and then I fell in love with Dragonball Z as a youngsters. Other favourites of my own included Samurai Pizza Cats which ran on Channel Four.

Ahh the good old days...

-R

Action packed or what eh?

Check out Google News for the latest.

And come back next week for a preview and more news!

- R

But what's interesting is that there's a poster of Uncle Sam, with his face toren off.....a indication of Two-Face perhaps? This would be surely a good way to pick up from the last game, as we hear the villain referenced on the radio at the end of the last game.

And the Joker himself returns, looking very much like the Heath-Joker...dark eyes and all.

Check out www.arkhamhasmoved.com for all you bat-related info.

Teaming up with IDW Publishing and Marvel/Disney, gamers can now download old favourites such as Astonishing X-Men, G.I Joe, The Amazing Spider-Man, World War Hulk, Transformers and even Wallace and Gromit.

I've got a PSP myself and will be giving this a blast. Only thing is that you need the latest version of PSP firmware to read the comics.

Books are typically 20-30 pages long and are priced between one and two dollars (60p and £1.20).

Head on over to PSP.us to see the full catalogue.

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Teaming up with IDW Publishing and Marvel/Disney, gamers can now download old favourites such as Astonishing X-Men, G.I Joe, The Amazing Spider-Man, World War Hulk, Transformers and even Wallace and Gromit.

I've got a PSP myself and will be giving this a blast. Only thing is that you need the latest version of PSP firmware to read the comics.

Books are typically 20-30 pages long and are priced between one and two dollars (60p and £1.20).

Head on over to PSP.us to see the full catalogue.

Penned by Michael Straczynski, Superman:Earth One will be an all new take on Big Blue's early days in a whole new continuity free from constraints of current DC comics.

Head on over to the Source blog for DC's line on the upcoming super book.

Marvel announced today that they will be reprinting popular comic books - both old and new - and selling them for one dollar (about 61p).

First of the bat is a reprinting of Invincible Iron Man #1, due in March 2010 which will be availible free at all good comic book outlets.

Following that there will be a weekly schedule that looks like this.

March 3: Invincible Iron Man # 1
March 10: Captain America #1
March 17: Wonderful Wizard of Oz #1
March 24: Thor #1
March 31: Punisher Max #1

David Gabriel, Marvel Senior Vice-President of Sales & Circulation said: "We're proud of the books Marvel publishes and now not only are we giving retailers a great way to promote our top collections, but also giving consumers a chance to sample some of our top comics, maybe for the first time and at an unbeatable price."

Head on over to Marvel.com to see the entire press line.

But what's your thoughts? It's all good and well re-publishing these books, but there is literally thousands of Marvel comics which deserve to be re-published.

Some I'd like to see would be Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely's run on X-Men, or how about some gems like Spiderman: India?

Final Fantasy XII was a bittersweet disappointment to me. It had the graphics and a decent gameplay system, but the story, the most important part of any FF game, was very uninvolving - I never once found myself caring for any of the characters.

XII also lacked those magical Square Enix moments that pulled you into a story. Like the time when Cloud jumps from the train in VII and your're thrust straight into a battle with the security gaurds, or the moment Faye Wong's Eyes on Me kicks in when Rinoa finds Squall or even the time you first meet Vivi as Zidane in FFIX.

But this blog isn't about how bad FFXII was, it's about the legions of Final Fantasy fans lashing out at Leona Lewis and Square Enix.

For those of you who don't know, Final Fantasy XIII's western release date was announced last Friday and so was the fact that the western versions would be be using the Leona Lewis track, My Hands as the game's main theme instead of the Japanese track Kimi ga iru kara, performed by Sugawara Sayuri.

Traditionally Square Enix will use the same Japanese track for all versions of a Final Fantasy game, however this time they're obviously going for the moneyspinner and that's what seems to be hacking these fans of.

There's even 341 signatures on a petition demanding the removal of the track from the game.

Most are complaining that the modification of the original to suit a new audience will totally derive from the quality of the game. Others reckon that this move will alienate diehard fans of the series. And some warn that they'll boycott the series because of this.

Why though? This can only be a great thing for Final Fantasy. I'm not the biggest fan of Leona but if there's anything the series needed was a breath of fresh air after the bitter dissappointment that FFXII was. She has a very mainstream appeal and is hugely talented. Listen to her version of Run or Bleedin' Love and you'll see what I mean.

Plus they're probably going to use the track in their ads and marketing campaign and this'll only attract more gamers than ever before to the Final Fantasy series.... we may even get more female FF gamers.

And by the amount of dudes at current Otaku/Videogame/Comic book conventions that's never a bad thing!

- R

Universal Designs recently got the rights to produce a replica Batman motor cycle suit and the boys certainly didn't disappoint.

If you'd like it for Halloween though you're unfortunately out-of-luck as first deliveries aren't until 2010.

It's almost one thousand dollars for the outfit and has no cape/cowl....not that you need those on a motorbike anyway.

Head on over to Universal Designs to have a look yourself.

Now all we need is Harley Davidson to re-produce the Batpod and we're good to go. Imagine the cost for a spare tyre on one of those though....

"The Grail" part 4 of 4! In this explosive conclusion to the debut arc, Red Robin's search leads him to the deserts of the Middle East with the League of Assassins by his side. How many lines will he cross to prove that Bruce Wayne is alive? One journey ends, but a far deadlier one begins as Red Robin learns the truth - although he may not survive to tell anyone, because back in Gotham City, Red Robin faces off with the one man who could stop his quest: Batman!"

Story by Christopher Yost Art by Ramon Bachs Cover by Francis Manapul

The first arc of Tim Wayne's (Drake) new solo adventure comes to a close in Red Robin #4 and I'm sad to say it's a mixed bag of brilliance and bad scripting.

Being a fan and collector of the original Robin series - before DC brought it to a swift end earlier this year - I have massive hopes, and as such, great expectations for this book but so far it's been frustrating.

The core concept of the series is Tim's search for Bruce Wayne and his staunch belief that the former Batman is still alive somewhere out there. It's the only batbook dealing with this right now and when it does deal with the Bruce Wayne search, it does so brilliantly, as you'll see by reading Red Robin #4, which ties in with the shots of Bruce at the end of Final Crisis.

There's also a flashback sequence also between Drake and Grayson. This works well and reveals a bit more about why Tim left Gotham. It is an interesting read.

It's at this point the debut arc should have ended. Next we're faced with a mysterious villain from the council who easily disperses of the Red Robin and the league of assassins setting up the next arc, the Council of Spiders..

All in all, a horrid ending to what should have been a quality comic. This could have been so much better.

Let's just hope DC get their fingers out in the next arc. - R

And it's a general feeling of good, but could have been better.

Swank-mo-tron at Big Shiny Robot commented that the the "action, adventure, and animation, were all" done right whereas the 67 minute running time was "paltry" in comparison to some other DCAU movies.

A reviewer over at Comic Book Movie movie said "the story is simple,if not obvious, and a little bit all over the place. In parts you don't really feel like bats and supes are public enemies. It just seems like it's all villains wanting to whoop their butts--which I think is boring to be honest." But also wrote that go betweens Bats and Supes was "classic."

Adam Tyner at DVD Talk believes the movie to be rent worthy and a cut above the Superman: Doomsday and the "unwatchable" Gotham Knight. He does note though "that even the size and scope of the superpowered slugfests never really manage to get my pulse racing. It's okay, but considering how phenomenal so many of these animated DC flicks have been, "okay" just doesn't seem good enough."

Most of the reviews also seemed to suggest that it was worth buying the Blu-Ray version over the normal DVD, as it seems this was animated for HD sets.

Check out this preview clip below

And for those of you who haven't seen it yet, here's the trailer

batman, superman, super hero movies, kevin conroy, tim daly,

So there you go, but remember more reviews will follow including one on here next week! - R