Once all the Imax-induced vertigo had passed, the common consensus round these here parts was that mega-blockbuster Avatar was..well, yeah, it was all right I suppose, if you like Dances With wolves and exploding helicopter gunships.

With that in mind it’s fair to say that the upcoming DVD extended cut had better be going some if it wants to stop audiences topping themselves half way through, especially given the three hour-plus running time and feature spread across three seperate disks. Amazingly though, this sounds like it might actually be worth getting.

Not only is it (of course) a piece of cinematic history (whether it’s a good or a bad one remains to be seen), but the film itself has some pretty groovy additions, including a screwed-up future planet Earth (looking an awful lot like Las Vegas for some reason) full of neon and breath masks, which gives a good insight into exactly a marine might prefer the deadly jungles of Pandora to returning home.

Anyhho, Big Jimbo’s latest is out on November 16th in the US, and will be available to steal on Pirate Bay four hours later.

There’s only really one question lurking in every geeky fanboy mind – how well does this stack up against an original version as semi-legendary as Sam Worthington’s protagonist. The answer – pretty well actually!
There’s definitely a sense of campy lunacy about things as Worthington’s Perseus is found and raised by an over-acting and bizarrely accented (for ancient Greece) Pete Postlethwaite, who decides to chuck in a nuanced, emotionally charged performance for some reason, despite being in a world where most of the second act is taken up by giant scorpions attacks…

He’s easily the best thing here, but there’s definitely a suspicion that he just doesn’t get the joke, so it’s no great shame when he’s offed in time for things to shift up a gear, Perseus embracing his heritage and going on an almighty rampage that takes in Titans and assorted hangers-on of all shapes and sizes, and it’s here that former Incredible Hulk director Louis Leterrier really comes into his own, his grasp of creature CGI providing some fantastically exciting battles.

Unfortunately the attention paid to the digital terrors doesn’t quite extend to their backdrops, the renderings of the city of Argos and the barren deserts taking to many cues from 300 to truly involve you, and the 3D is frankly shocking -unsurprising given the sheer number of last-minute reshoots involved.

Once we travel to Olympus however, it’s as if we’re entering an entirely different movie – one not too far removed from 80’s cheeseathon Flash Gordon. Disney columns spring from overloading dry ice machines, while Liam Neeson’s oddly compassionate Zeus looks like he’s about to embark on a Starlight Express tour of Francis Ford Coppola’s Dracula, his gleaming mirrored armour highlighting the pounds of ham dripping from his ridiculously bearded lips, and bringing back more than a few memories of his performance in John Boorman’s lunatic Excaliber.

Meanwhile on the villain roster, Ralph Fiennes makes good use of his Voldemort training to stand out as an oily Hades, swirling and oozing across the screen and clearly relishing the chance to belt out some pantomime malevolence as he decides it’s time to put the fear of the Gods into the uppity mortals by releasing The Kraken unless the city sacrifices it’s princess Andromeda before an upcoming eclipse, while Jason Flemying recalls his part in The League of extraordinary gentlemen, packing on pounds of prosthetics as the monstrous Calibos.

So far, so bloody mental – as are all the best ancient myths. It’s this willingness to run with the sheer insanity of the plot that saves the movie. Despite some dodgy CGI window dressing, it does a good job of portraying legends the way they should be – massive, pumped up heroes swinging bloody great magic swords at mad gods and eventually the fearsome Medusa – a titan we may be over-familiar with but who’s appearance is still enough to provide some good old-fashioned edge-of-seat chills. We may know how it ends, but that doesn’t mean we’re not worried for the various Argonauts as they creep towards imminent enforced retirement as garden statues -until she actually appears on screen. Then we’re left stifling giggles as what appears to be a badly animated sex doll with third degree burns wobbles across the screen.

In the end The Kraken itself is also underwhelming, it’s appearance shot in needless, confusing close-ups that rob the thing of it’s Cthonic magnitude and suck any genuine terror into a mire of gloopy 3D rendering, and it’s a shame that technical shortcuts rob the film of much of it’s would-be grandeur, leaving us with an odd mix that plays like a $100Million 70’s school play, strong performances by bit-parting Danny Huston and Gemma Arterton being needlessly and badly cut, rendering much of the romance null and void and stealing the film’s heart. Worthington fares better, lacking the acting chops to bring any sense of gravitas to the edam-o-riffic dialogue, but looking good and clearly enjoying himself.

Overall then this is no classic, but if you’re after a shiny 90 minute blockbuster with plenty of shouting and the odd scary harpy then you cant go wrong.

Ho-de-ho-ho, if it isn’t being Saint Patrick’s day ya bloody bollocks, and as a special service to our ‘Of-Irish-Descent’ readers, its time for a patronising article that has bugger all to do with Ireland (and in no way increase our readership by being blatantly confrontational and obnoxious obviously).

Time to pick up a green plastic bowler hat (just like they had in the old country that neither you nor anyone you know has ever been to), fill it with dyed green cheap whiskey (because that’s what a true Irishman would obviously do) and check out the best, definitely, positively, Of-Irish-Descent oh-yes-sir-honestly actors!

Ya feckin’ eejit.

Christian Bale

There’s nothing more Of-Irish-Descent than Batman is there? He’s a cop, working in a New York/Chicago analogue and helping out a flatfoot named Gordon. It’s to Bale’s credit that despite a penchant for growling like a bulldog a lot recently, he never once let’s the comedy accent slip. Well, Hollywood is certainly a step up from Bournemouth- top work Bale, you Of-Irish-Descent Psycho you!

Of-Irish-Descent analogue: Sam Worthington

Grunt. Roar. I am a machiiiiiinnnneeee!!!It isn’t often you see someone out-acted by their own leg muscles, But Worthington pulls it of with aplomb. We’d tell him, but he’s not allowed out of his cage between scenes. Also happens to be English, but we’ll ignore that for now…

Mel Gibson

In Lethal Weapon, Gibbo cemented his status as Hollywood’s go-to Of-Irish-descent action man, chain smoking his way through a million glorious mullet-waving action scenes, even going so far as to become violently and visibly anti-Semitic in later life- top o’ the mornin’ to ya Mel!

Of-Irish-Descent version: Bruce Willis

Wow, some one who may actually, just about, have a relative who once lived near Kilkenny! And even though McClain is actually a Scottish name rather than an Irish one, who cares, it’s all the same country outside Poughkeepsie ain’t it? Da noive a’ some peoples!

Robert Pattinson

Ah, those dark eyes, that swoon-inducing giant beehive-quiff of doom, he could only be an of-Irish-Descent rogue.Or the product of a warped imagination that had been reading too many back issues of Preacher when vampire casting week came around. Whatever, the thing they call R-Patz will be clogging up your screens in Remember Me this week, so why not heas down with a bag of green popcorn and enjoy his unique brand o’ bollicks.

Of-Irish-Descent Analogue – Taylor Lautner

He’s got the smouldering good looks down for sure. What a shame they’re buried in the tiny plastic face of a Ken doll, and married to the kind of acting skills last seen on MTV’s The Hills- A bright, Oscar-filled future awaits!

Hugh Jackman

Fist seen playing Curly in Oklahoma, it doesn’t get much more Of-Irish-Descent than a real live cowboy does it?? Jackman then hammered home his all-Of-Irish-Descent status by appearing as..erm..the Canadian Wolverine! And Leopold, Duke of Westminster! Erm…to be fair, we haven’t really thought this one through properly have we…

Of-Irish-Descent analogue: Eric Bana

Yep, this one is absolutely Of-Irish-Descent! 100% positive. Except in ‘Chopper’ obviously. And ‘The Beast’. Shite, we’re going to have to go with Treat Williams instead aren’t we?

Gary Oldman

One of the lesser species of Of-Irish-Descent thespians, Gary covers up his blatantly cockney drawl with squawking southern warblings at every available opportunity, only reverting to type as Syrius Black, but hey, that can be explained away by magic right? As Of-Irish_descent as a dyed green apple pie.

Of-Irish-Descent analogue: James Woods

Almost as adept at whispering and looking vaguely inscrutable, Woods never quite manages the ‘explosive shouting and Scotch drinking’ combo required of the true Of-Irish-Descent acting experience. Although he did once manage to shag a TV set after doing the sex with an ex-Playboy bunny, which is pretty darned close!

Well, a pretty good turn out for the Of-Irish-Descent actors today, with a massive 1 of them them actually having some measure of Blarney floating near their family to be sure! To mis-quote Phil Lynott: Is there anyone in the audience with any Irish in them tonight?

No. No there isn’t.

It seems that director Joe Johnston has been using his post-Wolfman time wisely, bypassing regional premieres in favour of homing in on a lead for The First Avenger: Captain America.
Chatting to Marvel.com, Johnston says he expects to announce a lead in the next fortnight.

“We need to cast it soon,” said Johnston. “We have a very short list, but we’re still juggling actors here. I’d say within the next couple of weeks we’ll have ourselves a Captain America, I hope.”

Sam Worthington was most recently linked to the star-spangled spandexer, but it’s unclear whether the grunting half-wall half SHOUTING ACTOR has made the shortlist. Tyrese still appears to be in the running for the role of proto-super soldier Isaiah Bradley.

Despite some shouting from fanboys – and speculation that the plot may include Marvel’s dodgy Brit-hero Union Jack – Johnston is still set on filming in the UK, which given the WWII period piece that’s been mooted, makes perfect sense, with Marvel’s head honcho Kevin Fiege claiming it will be
“One of the most international films we’ve done”. So Europe-wide Nazi-crushing super-carnage then – this can only be a good thing.

An Expertly-rendered preview of Worthington as Dracula...

It may finally be time for vampire-kind to shake of f the blousy Twilight romantic image –with MTV reporting that big bad Sam Worthington is in talks to don cape and widow’s peak in the Batmaningly titled Dracula: Year Zero.

Worthington’s been enjoying a skyrocketing profile this year despite his appearance as a half-man-half-convoluted-storyline in the ailing Terminator franchise, while popping up as demi-god Perseus in the ‘not-testing-well-apparently’ Clash of the Titans doesn’t seem to have hurt his cred either. Oh..and of course, there’s a certain animated biggest movie ever as well…

Variety first let slip that a new movie was on the cards detailing the exploits of Transylvania’s most famous export (Cheeky Girls notwithstanding), with Alex Proyas behind the lens. Rather more worryingly, the script comes from the haunted pens of Matt Sazama and aptly-named Burk Sharpless, famous for the intergalactic shit-fest that was the Flash Gordon reboot, and details Vlad Tepes.Esq’s fist steps towards virgin-eating immortality.

Do you think Vlad needs another do-over after the appalling Dracula 200? Or are Vampires passé –is it all about Werewolves and Ghost-Ninjas this year? Let us know!

A brave new decade awaits us, and what better time for Hollywood to face the future and bring us a bright movie going tomorrow?

Not that it’ll happen of course. Yep, Back To The Future part II predicted that this will be the decade when Max Spielberg steps up to the plate with his 3D Jaws XX, but the STS magic 8-Ball tells us there’s far, far worse than that to come.

Strap on your blinkers and pretend it’s all ok – over the next week we’ll bring you a comprehensive guide to all the ‘fun’ heading your way in 2010 – duck and cover for part one of our cut-out-and-break-your-computer guide!

1: Green Hornet.

Or: Who F***ing Cares? Learning absolutely shit-all from The Spirit, Seth Rogen decides that not only is he all serious and stuff after the awful Funny People, he’s an action hero too! Yep, he sure looks the part, the tubby f***er. Nothing says exciting crime fighter like a gut in a two-piece with a lone ranger mask does it? Add to this the fact that the original series was a load of ill-plotted, rambling, unfunny oh-so-wacky-hey-kids-it’s-the-ker-azy-60’s-man garbage, and Green Hornet is all set to be the biggest turd of the summer. People who think Pineapple Express is good will love it, but that’s because they’re a bunch of morons.

2: The Hardy Men.

Apparently this has been fermenting in the brains of Tom Cruise and Ben Stiller for a while, but frankly we couldn’t even be bothered to find out what it’s about. From the title I’m going with a wacky update on the Hardy Boys, those perennial Nancy Drew pokers, but updated as a hilarious, SNL style sketch a la Starsky and Hutch. That was funny wasn’t it? Is it me or has SNL never, ever, ever produced anything even approaching an amusing sketch? We’re not saying Skit either, because only a c**t would do that.

Proof positive – if it were needed that Stiller should stick to being really, really, ridiculously good looking, and Cruise should go back to planet Mongo and fulfil L.Ron’s mighty plan. No video was available at time of press. And if there was, it would be shit.

3: Clash of The Titans.

That Terminator geezer, in a skirt, with a robot owl for company. Oh, and Greek girls in short skirts, and a bloody great monster or two. This looks like it may be acceptable.

As an aside, every ship ever named Titan, Titanic or Titania has sunk. Every single one – wooooooo spoooooky. Don’t say STS isn’t tops for movie related news!

4: A Nightmare on Elm Street.

Apparently some people are terrified by the thought of someone with quite long arms hanging around outside their house, so this was a natural for the remake treatment.

Unfortunately Jonny Depp won’t be getting his bits chopped off this time round, but it does at least leave the floor open for a remake of Part II in 2011, possibly the most homoerotic movie ever produced. Seriously, check out the clip.

This will be rubbish, and anyone who’s scared of it is a spaz.

5: Black Hole.

Alas, not a remake of the Disney thing with the robots n’ that, this Black Hole instead refers to a graphic novel featuring a sexual disease that gives those infected horrible deformities. So, severe physical handicap combined with the wit of an Ace Frehley solo album – should be a laugh riot eh? Apparently David Fincher is directing, which means he’s taking time out from his other project Heavy Metal to bring us this gumph. Bad David!

Oh – did we mention there’s worse to come? Stay tuned for part 2…