This week marked the start of the shooting of the game/movie franchise that keeps coming back from the dead. Yes, I’m talking about Resident Evil: Afterlife.

After the  train wreck that was Apocalypse and their lame attempt at forcing a sequel with the ending you’d think they’d let it die and be forgotten but evidently that wasn’t the case. The movie made money and now we’re getting a 4th one.

What we know: Takes place in LA, with Alice trying to unite the few survivors in a single place. The film will be shot in 3D (hurray for 3D Milla?). Wentworth Miller (Prison Break) and Ali Larter (Heroes) have joined the cast. There are really strong rumors about Leon S. Kennedy joining the story, despite early marketing materials for previous films where it was mentioned that Leon was killed. And to top it off? Well, it appears that it will by no means be the last Resident Evil movie. Earlier this summer Paul W.S. Anderson, the producer of the series, stated that Afterlife would mark a “rebirth of the entire franchise”.

The film’s planned release is set for August 2010 and I’m going to go out on a limb here and say it will suck. Will I see it? You bet. But if the previous two movies are any indication of the next, Resident Evil: Afterlife will consist of Alice getting more mental magical powers and killing everything in a thousand mile radius by blinking.

After not hearing about it for quite some time, we’re finally getting news on the live action Hollywood adaptation of Akira. No longer is it under the production of Appian Way, DiCaprio’s production company, but under the watchful eye of Warner Bros. The old preliminary script has also been scrapped and a new one is in the works by Hawk Ostby and Mark Fergus, better known for their work on the immensely thrilling and tense Children of Men.

At least now it feels like the franchise is under more expert hands. Maybe it wont be turned into a half-assed teenage angst flick with a Linkin Park soundtrack, which months ago we explained in the above picture. Children of Men had a fantastic script, mature and sensible, we can only hope some of that makes it through here. If said script ends up getting the green light we’d see the film produced next year and hitting the big screen as early as 2011. I’m confident by 2011 our CGI technology will be capable of photorealistic giant mutant babies, otherwise why bother?

Yet another trailer for the live action movie adaptation of Blood: The Last Vampire and the movie just keeps looking better each time. This trailer delves a bit more into the plot of the movie and while there are significant differences with the manga, the OVA and the anime series, there’s also quite a bit of reference to these original works. In fact there’s quite a few shots taken directly from the OVA.

The general public will most likely find it cheesy and juvenile but it also might just be the most faithful Hollywood anime adaptation in quite a while.

[TrailerAddict]

With the Shadow of the Colossus movie still far into the future the very idea is already moot as the usually hilarious guys of Mega64 have released their very own version of the epic tale. It has it all and asks nothing from Hollywood. Colossus? Check. Guy climbing the colossus? Check. Dramatic music? Check. Overacted death? Check. Plot twist at the end? Check.

See Hollywood? It doesn’t take much to stay true to the source material. Just 2 guys and a fursuit… which is all the Dragonball movie needed, honestly.

[Mega64]

So Dragonball Evolution came out, and as horrible as the movie was, it could have been much much worse. We survived and now there’s only about a dozen more anime movies in the making to go through, right? Wrong, it doesn’t end here! With Dragonball Evolution having been a moderate success worldwide and the movie already turning profits, the Hollywood tycoons aren’t going to give up. That’s right, there’s a sequel, and its already written.

When talking to MTV news, Justin Chatwin revealed that a sequel for the movie has already been written and its only awaiting a green light depending on the success of the Evolution. Furthermore Spike the Vampire… I mean Piccolo himself, James Masters, has stated that:

“We’re going to get to ‘Dragonball Z’ later, where Piccolo becomes youthful and he’s going to become the Piccolo that most people recognize.”

So are we looking at a second part based on Dragonball Z’s first act? Will we get to see Vegeta and Napa? Will its profit level be over 9000?!

Whenever we learn something more about Dragon Ball Evolution 2 we’ll be posting it on our homepage, so be sure to subscribe to our site for updates on Dragon Ball Evolution 2. You can get our updates via email or RSS, it’s free and easy!

[MTV]

The Astro Boy movie adaptation is said to be one of the better adaptations of manga/anime into film. A newly released trailer finally places a voice on Astro Boy, Freddy Highmore. Several big time actors will be in the supporting line-up: Nick Cage, Donald Sutherland, Nathan Lane, and Eugene Levy to name a few. However, the real proof is in the pudding. The film is looking very impressive, but I don’t want to get my hopes up quite yet.

*Crosses Fingers*

[MTV]

An anime adaptation of Twilight? Could it be? The adaptation that could potentially reach fangirl-ism critical mass and engulf us all in a black hole of glomps and gleeful screeches? Apparently its more likely than you’d think!

On the DVD director’s commentary of Twilight there’s a small conversation between director Catherine Hardwicke and male lead Robert Pattinson. Pattinson jokes that on one scene he looks ”like an anime character”, to which Hardwicke replies "Hey, I think there’s going to be an anime version of this in Japan. So you will bean anime character."

Oh god, I can see it now, the bishonen look, the yaoi fanart, the doujins, OH GOD THE DOUJINS! I guess this is Japan’s revenge of Hollywood adapting their stuff into shitty movies and you know what? It’s working.

[Sci Fi Wire]

As if we weren’t under heavy siege by Hollywood, a new production company by the name of Cerenzie-Peters Productions is looking to invest in getting more videogame and “asian manga books” into the silver screen. In fact, they’ve already raised $200 million dollars in capital with which they plan to go shopping for juicy franchises. This does not bode well.

Furthermore, the company only plans to spend $20 – $30 million per movie which means 2 things: First, that we’ll get 8 or 10 of these films. EIGHT OR TEN! Second, that this movies will have a humorously tiny budget, so the end result is bound to to look cheap.

So lets recap, we’ve got Dragon Ball Evolution coming out soon, then there’s the Akira project, Cowboy Beebop with Keanu Reeves, James Cameron’s Alita, and that Ghost in the Shell project as well. That’s 5 movies that already have us teeming with rage. Now we’re getting double that.

Brace yourselves, friends, cuz its about to get ugly…er.

EDIT: Woa! I messed up my movie names, although Keanu in GITS would be hilarious. I’d cast him as a Tachikoma.

[ANN]

You thought video games had it bad when Hollywood tried to turn them into movies? Think again. Now Hollywood seems to have their eye on board games. A movie based on Monopoly is on the works, with the screenplay being written by Pamela Pettler, who wrote Corpse Bride. They apparently want to make it into a futuristic and dystopic movie about greed and real estate drama. Or as I like to call it: “the present”.

[THR]

As if to add insult to injury for anime fans worldwide, Hollywood is going to turn Cowboy Bebop into a live action movie. Producer  Erwin Stoff talked to IF Magazine to discuss a separate project but when asked about what he’s doing next Erwin replied:

“I’m developing COWBOY BEBOP for Fox, but doing it as a live-action film, so I’m working on that at the moment,” … “I’m really excited to be working on it, and it’s in the really early stages. We just signed it the other day.”

Holy mother of Spike! Now before anyone throws a fit lets remember this is FOX, doing Sci-Fi. The project has a 50% chance of getting axed before it sees the light of day! On the other hand Mr. Stoff went out of his way to reassure fans that sticking with the original material is high on his priorities list. On this he added:

“I have such an enormous admiration for its creators, that our first and foremost concern is going to be a real degree of faithfulness to the tone of the movie, to the mix of genres, and so on and so forth,” … “When I met with them in Japan, one of the first things that I brought up was the experience that we had on A SCANNER DARKLY, and how hard we worked to remain faithful to Philip K. Dick, and that was our big concern here.”

Comparing it to A Scanner Darkly? Now that does shine a little hope for the project, hey if they sign Yoko Kanno up for the music then I might even be hopeful! Then again you’ll have to think about the cast… So lets see, produced by Erwin Stoff, who also did The Matrix, Constantine, The Devils Advocate and A Scanner Darkly. Hmm what do all of these movies have in common? They all star Keanu Reeves.

That’s right, just savor the possibility, Keanu Reeves as Spike Spiegel. That’s it, let it sink in, like a swift kick to the nuts! ENJOY the pain because it just might be less painful than the movie.

[iF Magazine]