Starting Wednesday, fanboys and fangirls from around the country will descend on the cozy town of San Diego for the annual geek extravaganza officially known as Comic-Con: International (it'll always be San Diego Comic-Con to us). As always, the line-up is jam-packed with movie, television and even the occasional comic-book company promoting their products and properties at panels and presentations. The big news this year though, is that fewer major Hollywood studios are making a stop at SDCC -- Marvel Studios (which introduced the cast of The Avengers there last year) is taking a pass, as is Warner Bros. and Disney. (The Mouse House is instead organizing its own fan gathering, the D23 Expo, which will be held in Anaheim on August 19-21.) Still, movie buffs shouldn't worry too much; there are still plenty of panels and premieres to consume during your four days in San Diego. Here's a look at some of this year's most prominent film-related programming, along with recommendations for how to preserve your most valuable commodity at Comic-Con: time.

I get that Thor is a classic Marvel character, going back to the 1960s, but how many people do you know who love Thor? I'm not talking that one friend who's a mythology nerd, I'm talking fans of the comic book Thor. I have a ton of friends who grew up reading comics, and still read them -- many of them do it for a living -- and most of them (myself included) can count the number of Thor issues they've read on one hand. But now that the first footage from the upcoming Thor movie has been shown at Comic-Con -- and leaked online -- expect a lot more people to get Thor tattoos, because it looks pretty damn cool. Here's a guide to the trailer's awesomeness.

Just when I think I can't get any more excited for Tron Legacy, I do. A new trailer for the 30-years-in-the-making sequel to Tron was unveiled at the San Diego Comic-Con, and it's got a bunch of mind-blowing new imagery that makes the film look even more kick-ass, plus some more plot details get teased! It's getting to the point where I have to play Daft Punk on a loop just to keep myself from trying to climb inside my computer looking for adventure. Read on to see the trailer and read what stood out to me in it.

There is very little that could be done to make me (or most people) worry about Iron Man 2. The first movie was so good, and so fun, that the second would have to be good, right? Unfortunately, it has to be good. It has to be better than the first, in fact, or people will be disappointed. It has to bring something new to the table. Luckily, director Jon Favreau and star Robert Downey Jr. seem to realize that, and they brought their A-game to the San Diego Comic-Con this past weekend. The footage they showed isn't online yet, but the descriptions of it dazzle the imagination. Here are ten things I learned from the Iron Man panel at SDCC that have gotten me even more excited to see it.

Last summer, a teaser trailer for Tron 2, spelled "TR2N," was shown at the San Diego Comic-Con. Shaky footage leaked onto the Web, showing an older, bearded Kevin Flynn (Jeff Bridges) watching a deadly lightcycle race from his monklike home inside a mountain in cyberspace. (A fictional Website searching for the missing Flynn may be closer to his location than it realizes.) At this year's SDCC, an expanded version of that same clip was shown, and this time, the title was revealed as Tron Legacy. While the footage is certainly impressive, thanks to famed commercial director Joseph Kosinski, the new title, Tron Legacy, is not.

It's been a little while since I've talked about the Watchmen movie, but I thought it would be a good idea to take another look at it, since I'm feeling depressed. The next Harry Potter movie has been pushed back until summer, which means my wife and I won't get to see it before our baby is born -- and which means Watchmen will actually come out first! March doesn't seem quite so far away anymore! And since I'm pretty excited about it (perhaps more excited than I am about Harry Potter -- blasphemy!), I thought I'd share a few links to recent multi-media elements from the film.

Just a few days ago at Comic-Con, the video-game-turned-movie Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time was being talked up as a June 2009 release. Note the date on the promotional poster which, without a picture of princely star Jake Gyllenhaal, might as well be an ad for a Pier 1 sale. Variety is now reporting that Walt Disney Pictures has pushed back the release date nearly a full year to Memorial Day weekend 2010. Hey, maybe next year at the con Disney will hand out little "10"s you can stick to the posters they gave you this year!

I swear to God that this is my last blog post about vampires, werewolves or Witchblade for a while. I know, I talk about one or the other pretty much every day in the Moviefile, but they're all pretty awesome, and we just happen to be living at the right time to be fans of these things. And since I just happened to stumble across a couple of news items involving werewolves and vampires, I thought I'd clue you all in. If you're not interested, scroll down and read about Jennifer Lopez; if you are, then read on...if you dare!

Geeks everywhere are freaking out because director Sam Raimi, who has somehow not lost a drop of geek cred after the musical dance extravaganza that was Spider-Man 3, mentioned Burn Notice darling Bruce Campbell and "another Evil Dead" in the same sentence at Comic-Con. Now, as a result, geeks are reporting that Evil Dead 4 is in the works. Well, let's take a step back now.

Right after I learned that Robert Rodriguez would be producing a Red Sonja movie starring his live-in starlet Rose McGowan, I heard that the two had split up, and immediately panicked. What would become of the film? Would there be a new actress? Or a new producer? Or a new, dead film in the gutters of Hollywood? Well, apparently, nothing has changed; furthermore, my prediction that this movie would be worth it just for the chain-mail-bikini promotional artwork has totally come true.