JIMMY KIMMEL'S REVENGE... What better way to get back at your girlfriend for getting laid by Matt Damon than getting all homoerotic with Damon's Good Will Hunting co-writer? Haha. Seriously though, this video is hilarious:

F**KIN' OSCARS... IT’S 2006 ALL OVER AGAIN! What I mean by that is that Revenge of the Sith got robbed of a Best Visual FX nomination that year, and this time around, Transformers got robbed of the Academy Award by freakin’ The Golden Compass...whose effects looked like nothing that we hadn’t already seen in other fantasy flicks such as The Chronicles of Narnia and Hairy Pothead (a.k.a. Harry Potter). And Transformers also went empty-handed in the Sound Design and Editing categories as well. Screw you, Academy. And I’m also peeved that There Will Be Blood didn’t win the top award...since that’s the only Best Picture nominee I saw, haha. Seriously though, screw you Academy. Granted, I obviously had no kind of involvement in the making of Transformers, but still...screw you— Ahh, nevermind. Here’s hoping Transformers 2 makes up for this outrage. Of course, if you hate Michael Bay and his latest film, then this was a very good night for you. Screw you too.


UPDATE (February 25): Last night's ceremony got horrible TV ratings, according to Nielsen. Take THAT, Academy.

UPDATE #2 (February 25): The Calendar section in today's Los Angeles Times newspaper mentions how The Bourne Ultimatum is the one film (actually seen by a mass audience) that won three Oscars...trailing only the four that was won by No Country for Old Men. Thanks for rubbing it in, bastards. Transformers could've won at least two with Visual Effects and Sound Design. God, the Oscars blow.

Also, how ironic that The Bourne Ultimatum won Best Film Editing...when the fast-paced cuts that helped it win the award is the one thing that most critics attack Michael Bay for. That's hypocrisy for ya.

IRON MAN... ScreenRant.com revealed this cool new poster from the upcoming film that was given out at the WonderCon expo in San Francisco. It features all three armors--Mark I, II and III—that scientist Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) wears in the movie. Pretty awesome. Also... I’m almost a month late, but here are screencaptures from the 30-second spot that was aired during this year’s Super Bowl:




Images courtesy of Marvel Characters, Inc. / Paramount

What if HALO became a movie... A totally awesome video clip. Also, this is a good example of why Steve Jablonsky's music from Transformers kicks ass. Particularly the "Skorponok" theme.

THE 'SHUTTLE SURGE' CONTINUES... About a quarter before 2 AM, Pacific Standard Time today, space shuttle Endeavour arrived at its Kennedy Space Center launch pad, in preparation for its March 10 launch to the International Space Station (ISS). Endeavour will embark on flight STS-123, which involves her crew installing the first section of Japan’s Kibo science laboratory to the orbiting outpost. The main component of Kibo will be launched onboard Discovery on STS-124, now targeted for liftoff in late May. In regards to other science labs at the ISS, Atlantis undocked from the outpost earlier this morning, after her astronauts spent last week installing Europe’s Columbus module to the station. Atlantis will land on Wednesday—either in Florida or at California’s Edwards Air Force Base—to give the U.S. military more time to attempt shooting down an errant spy satellite (which failed shortly after launch in December of 2006, and is expected to enter Earth’s atmosphere sometime next month).


USAF / TSgt. Justin D. Pyle

In commemoration of NASA’s 50th anniversary this year, the U.S. Air Force’s Thunderbirds flew over Endeavour after it arrived at the launch pad. The flyby took place around 7:15 AM, PST today.


NASA - Amanda Diller & Jack Pfaller

2008 SLAM DUNK CONTEST... The Orlando Magic’s Dwight Howard came up with some pretty awesome dunks tonight. One dunk involved him lightly tapping the ball against the backboard as if it was a volleyball before catching and slamming it in, and the most memorable one is shown in the photo below: Dressing up like the Man of Steel and getting an alley-oop pass from teammate Jameer Nelson, Howard threw—not dunked—the ball into the net with authority. Pretty crazy. I haven’t seen a dunk contest this exciting since Vince Carter tomahawked and windmilled his way to the slam dunk championship in 2000.


Ronald Martinez / Getty Images

AS A LAKERS FAN, I naturally despise the Sacramento Kings, but you gotta hand it to their cheerleaders to pull off antics that’d make someone here in Los Angeles cheer for them as much as they would when Pau Gasol effortlessly makes a 15-foot jumper during a Lakers game. Now if only the Laker Girls or the Dallas Cowboy cheerleaders could be just as reckless... (I’m pretty sure they are—but they have enough sense not to get caught in the act. Unfortunately.)

Type ‘Sacramento Kings Dancers’ on Google to see more photographic goodness by these gals from Cow Town.


WithLeather.com

STAR WARS: THE CLONE WARS... Just found out through ComingSoon.net that George Lucas will release the feature film version of the long-awaited television series in North American theaters on August 15. The movie, along with the TV show, take place in the time period between Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith. Unlike the 6 live-action Star Wars films, however, The Clone Wars will be distributed at the cinema by Warner Brothers, and not Twentieth Century Fox. The TV show itself will premiere on the Cartoon Network [which aired 25 "minisodes" of The Clone Wars (hand-drawn) animated series from 2003 to 2005...before Revenge of the Sith came out in theaters], and then followed by airings on TNT.

Of course, unlike the Star Wars prequels, I don’t intend on looking up spoilers for the film and TV show...since they take place during events already conveyed in Episodes' II and III. That, and they’re animated. A CGI version of Padme will not look as sexy as the live-action Padme. Though the CGI version could possibly act better than Natalie Portman did in the prequels. Just kidding. You’re hot, Natalie.


All images courtesy of Lucasfilm Animation

ATLANTIS HEADS FOR SPACE... At 11:45 AM, Pacific Standard Time today, the space shuttle Atlantis rocketed away from Florida’s east coast on a journey towards the International Space Station (ISS). Atlantis will dock with the orbital outpost this Saturday, February 9. A day later, astronauts will install the European Space Agency’s Columbus science module to the ISS, where it will stay for the remainder of the station’s life. Columbus is expected to stay in operation for at least 10 years.

Moments before liftoff, CNN reporter Miles O’Brien made an interesting analogy about Atlantis’ launch in his SciTechBlog. He compares the shuttle’s launch to throwing a football:

"If only they could launch now, they (Atlantis’ astronauts) would be on their way. Problem is – the shuttle does not have enough gas to make it to the space station unless it leaves the pad when the station is overhead.

It is kind of like a quarterback throwing a pass to his receiver. If he doesn’t toss the football at just the right moment – the pass will be incomplete – or intercepted.

Think of the shuttle as the football, the station is the receiver, and the launch control team as the quarterback."

Interesting stuff. Atlantis will return to Earth on February 18.


NASA / Sandra Joseph, Tony Gray, Robert Murray

Lynne Sladky / AP

SHAQ AND THE PHOENIX SUNS... One of two things can come out of this:

1.) Shaq being waaay out of his prime and that hip injury actually making him a liability to Steve Nash and Co...

Or-

2.) Shaq is still so dominant and proves to be a pain in the arse when L.A. plays Phoenix one more time in the regular season (and in the playoffs) that Lakers fans wish ill-thoughts on him (i.e., he falls and breaks a leg).

...

I'm hoping for #1. Leave the whole breaking-a-leg thing for Boris Diaw and Leandro Barbosa. As you can tell, I'm a Lakers fan.

ACROSS THE UNIVERSE: At 4:00 PM, Pacific Standard Time today, NASA sent a transmission of the old Beatle’s song, Across the Universe, to Polaris, the North Star. The reasons why NASA did this were nostalgia-driven; the transmission celebrated the 40th anniversary since the Beatles created this classic song, the 45th anniversary of NASA’s Deep Space Network (a series of large radio dishes in California, Australia and Spain that are used to maintain communication with all the space probes scattered throughout our solar system) and the 50th anniversary since the founding of NASA itself.

The Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California was responsible for beaming the transmission, since JPL runs the Deep Space Network. It took 6 minutes for the song to be radioed up into space, and it’s gonna take 430 years for it to reach Polaris (that's because it's 430 light years, or 4 quadrillion miles, from Earth). And another 430 years for us to get a peaceful or hostile response by whatever alien civilization may be lurking near the North Star. Unless they respond by sending a fleet of spacecraft (a la the 1996 film Independence Day) to Earth first. Just being facetious. That’s all.


NASA JPL

18-1... So we didn’t witness history in the making, oh well. I guess the Patriots need to obtain video footage of the Giants’ hand signals in preparation for next season then, haha. Just kidding. If there’s one thing momentous that happened tonight, it's that this is the second Manning in two years to win a championship. Archie Manning must be proud. Though I will root for Peyton and the Colts to go all the way again next year. By the way, Alicia Keys looked extremely gorgeous during the pre-game show. And Jordin Sparks isn’t too bad herself. Doug Pensinger / Getty Images