The end of the week brings you updates on your favorite (and maybe not-so-favorite) superheroes and what they're up to these days. First up to bat, so to speak, is The Dark Knight. Word just came down from Warner Brothers that the megahit will be re-released in theaters and IMAX on January 23. So if you're one of the handful of Amish people who didn't see it, or you just wanted to watch it for the second or twenty-second time on the big screen, this will be your chance. This will allow The Dark Knight to gain entry into the very exclusive billion-dollar club where the only other members are Titanic, The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, and Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest. That ought to make Batman happy. Relatively speaking, of course. Not coincidentally, the re-release happens the day after the Academy Awards nominations are announced.

Tags: Bryan Singer, Hancock, Superman, The Dark Knight, Will Smith

Although in many parts of the country it's still sweatier than a sumo wrestler in a sauna, the U.S. summer box office will be wrapping up the season as we head into Labor Day weekend. How did things go over the last few months? Better than expected, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Going into this weekend, "Nielsen EDI data showed domestic tallies of $3.96 billion that are sure to rise to beyond $4 billion by the Monday holiday." The box office was surprisingly strong "thanks to unsurprisingly robust sequels and a shockingly lucrative performance by the latest installment in a 19-year-old superhero franchise." The latter refers, of course, to The Dark Knight, although I have to wonder why its success is considered so shocking. Was anyone expecting, say, Meet Dave to siphon off some of the Bat's profits?

Tags: Batman, box office, comic books, Hancock, Hulk, Incredible Hulk, Iron Man, summer movies, superhero movies, superheroes, The Dark Knight

The Dark Knight surprised no one by performing impressively at the box office. We all knew it would win the weekend. It had everything working toward that end: a talented star who died too soon in his final full performance; film number two in a hot franchise; and the adulation of pretty much every critic out there. There was no way this movie was going to open at anything but number one at the box office.

Tags: Get Smart, Hancock, Hellboy II: The Golden Army, Kung Fu Panda, Mamma Mia!, Space Chimps, The Dark Knight, WALL-E, Wanted

A handful of trailers and other filmic appetizers have come out for the holiday weekend, hoping to grab their share of movie-goers' attention some time between the third round of hotdogs and passing out on the sofa. You could hoist yourself up and head out to see a new release in the theater, during which you might see some of these new trailers, but sit back and relax. I've got them right here, within easy reach of your antacids and favorite pillow.

Tags: Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, Keanu Reeves, The Dark Knight, The Day The Earth Stood Still, The Moment of Truth

There's nothing new about summer blockbusters getting a little leeway when it comes to the basics of movie-making. Be it an extra burp of action in Act III or more than one MacGuffin, most movie-goers are so jazzed for the flick after the months of hype and marketing they don't even notice. But one trend that movie-goers can't miss seems to be on the rise--what I like to call the summer buttbuster, and more than one of the movies you're dying to see this summer fit the description.

Dark Horizons is reporting that both Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull and The Dark Knight have run times of well over two hours. Indy looks to be coming in at around 140 minutes (that's two hours and twenty minutes for you non-math types) and the new Batman at a whopping 165, four trailers shy of three hours.

Now, I'm as excited for both of these films as the next gal--despite rumors that Indy 4 may not be worth the 19 year wait--but my ass can only take so much. You factor in the hour you'll have to wait in line for a good seat and the slow almost-as-bad-as-deplaning crawl out of the theater and most people are looking at nearly 5 hours of cinema pleasure. And while the studio sounds like it wouldn't mind cutting down Chris Nolan's The Dark Knight to around 150 minutes, reports are that it seems unlikely to do so. To which I say, grow a pair, Warner Brothers. Not only do people need to eat food other than suspect hotdogs and butter-drenched popcorn, but they need to be able to pee and not worry that they'll miss the one part of the movie worth the 12 bucks they spent on it. A bladder-bursting epidemic is not what 2008 needs.

Tags: dark horizons, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, the dark knight

November 4 has come and gone, but the voting isn't over yet. Voting for the People's Choice Awards started yesterday and continues through December 7. You don't get many choices, though. Looking at the just-announced list of nominees, you might think only a handful of movies came out in 2008. Iron Man, The Dark Knight, and the new Indiana Jones will vie for top honors in both the favorite movie and favorite action movie categories. It's not surprising that in an award system based on popular opinion the highest grossing films would rise to the top of the list. Statistically speaking, chances are pretty good that even if you only saw three movies this year, those were the three you saw. Other not-unexpected movie nominees include Wall-E, Sex and the City, and Mamma Mia!

Tags: Brad Pitt, Eagle Eye, Indiana Jones, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, Iron Man, Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, People's Choice Awards, The Dark Knight

Are you sitting at work, watching the minutes tick by until you're finally free for the weekend, wondering how you'll occupy yourself for the next two days of work-free bliss? Are you thinking about risking the wrath of your significant other to go see The Dark Knight for the fifteenth time? There's not a lot new coming out this week in theaters. No new comic book hero movies, no new sci-fi epics, and no new horror villains to make you scream... unless you count Nicolas Cage's scary-ass hairdo in Bangkok Dangerous. Screw it. You might as well be a slacker and waste away the weekend on the Internet.

Here are a few things to help your eyes glaze over as you stare at the computer screen:

Tags: Bangkok Dangerous, Clive Barker, Keira Knightley, Michael Moore, Milk, Ralph Fiennes, The Dark Knight, The Duchess, Transformers, Wal Mart

Comic book fight! And I don't mean of the POW! CRACK! variety. I mean that Marvel Comics' own Iron Man, Robert Downey Jr., totally slammed the locker door in the face of Dark Knight helmer Christopher Nolan, and pretty much everyone else on that film and at DC Comics. I'm totally ducking out of Biology to stand in the hallway and watch, because the gauntlet has been thrown, y'all. Apparently, RDJ didn't get The Dark Knight. In an interview with Moviehole for his role in Tropic Thunder, the big screen's Tony Stark railed against the critically acclaimed Dark Knight, saying he didn't get what was so brilliant about the film and eventually working up enough of a lather to drop the F-bomb on the entire DC Comics empire.

Tags: Batman, Christopher Nolan, comics, DC, fight, Iron Man, Marvel, Robert Downey Jr., superhero, The Dark Knight