‘Castle’: Are Beckett and Castle Finally Getting Together?

On ABC’s lighthearted murder mystery series Castle, Nathan Fillion’s (Firefly, Serenity) titular author and Stana Katic’s Detective Beckett have been circling each other since the very first episode. Many fans are tired of the song and dance, but their patience may soon be rewarded.

Recently, Katic teased that the January 10th episode would bring the two characters “closer than they’ve ever gotten before.” Considering the steamy conclusion to the second season last Spring, that doesn’t leave a whole lot of room for speculation.

When Entertainment Weekly spoke to Katic before the American Music Awards last weekend, she was eager to spill some plot details – but before doing so, Katic wanted to reassure Castle fans that having the two leads in a close personal relationship wouldn’t ruin the fast, chatty dynamic the show has enjoyed so far.

“They are meant to be. I think they can be a couple and still be spicy and funny. Everyone else is like, ‘Oh no we can’t do that. That will ruin it. That will kill the show.’ [A Moonlighting] curse has come up. But no way, man. Don’t believe in it at all.”

Despite Katic’s protestations, it’s hard to believe that a monogamous relationship between Castle and Beckett wouldn’t fundamentally change the show. The banter between the talky manchild and the hard-boiled detective has helped differentiate the series from the crowded space of procedural crime shows, and a dynamic-shifting love story can spell doom for a young series. That said, the sexual tension between the two characters has gotten pretty extreme, especially after the second season’s revealing finale. Fans may not care about the long-term implications if Castle and Beckett can just get a freakin’ room.

Some writers and producers have been reluctant to pair off tentpole characters ever since Moonlighting in the ’80s, when a steamy relationship between Bruce Willis and Cybil Shepherd’s characters destroyed the successful show in its third season. Many have speculated that this stigma is what kept the leads on the competing Fox series Bones apart for so long.

It’s not as if such a move has never worked, and the writers should be comfortable and confident enough in their characters to give it a try – assuming Stana Katic isn’t just toying with us. The coming addition of Laura Prepon may play out in the arc surrounding movie versions of Castle’s novels next year.

The answers to your burning questions will be revealed on Castle in January.

Castle airs Mondays @10pm on ABC

Source: Entertainment Weekly
Footer Image Source: michygeary on DeviantArt

View the original article here

Motorola Droid 2 Global finally gets official, Droid X Global rumor officially starts brewing

November 23 2010 by admin in Gadgets |

Gather round, world travelers of Verizon. Big Red has finally unleashed the worst kept secret in smartphones upon you. That’s right, the Motorola Droid 2 Global has finally become official.

Oddly enough and quite possibly a sign of the times, they made the announcement on Facebook which you can view with your own eyes here. Here’s Verizon’s message to the world:

Now make calls, text, email and browse the web in more than 220 countries with Droid 2 Global. Get it now for $199.99. $299.99 2yr price less $100 mail-in rebate debit card. New 2yr activation and data pak required.

So, standard $199.99 for a two year contract. Nothing that we didn’t know already, so let’s move onto something we know nothing about, sound good?

A tweet from notorious Verizon tweeter @black_man_x indicates that Motorola might have something else of the Global flavor brewing. The tweet doesn’t reveal much but says:

@Justinaadu scrapped for the moment. There maybe a “world” edition coming though.. DX global:::…. hmmm

His response was to a question about the Droid X SE edition that swirled around in rumor circles awhile back. While the Droid X Global sounds like a neat idea, it would join a crowded field which includes the Droid 2 Global and the Motorola Droid Pro. However, if it had some other capabilities to distinguish itself, say LTE, then it certainly would be something to celebrate.

For now though, the only thing we know for sure is that the Droid 2 is finally a go.

View the original article here

‘Battle Royale’ Finally Getting U.S. Release (In 3D)

Have you seen the Japanese cult classic film Battle Royale? If you answered “No” to that question then do yourself a favor: open a new tab to your Netflix account right now and bump the movie to the top of your que.

For those of you who HAVE seen Battle Royale and truly appreciate it for the savage fun it is, we have good news for you: after nearly a decade the film may finally be released on American soil – and in 3D, no less.

In honor of its ten year anniversary, Battle Royale undergone a 3D conversion for a Japanese theatrical re-release. Nippon Cinema reports that Anchor Bay has snagged the rights to the film, the 3D version and the sequel film, Battle Royale 2, and could release them stateside at long last.

For those who don’t know, Battle Royale is based on the novel by Koushun Takami, about a future in which the Japanese government has collapsed and the youth have become disenfranchised and hostile. A disgruntled ex-teacher working for the government kidnaps a class of ninth graders and deposits them on an island to wage war against one another in a last-man-standing battle to the death. The students are fitted with explosive collars and, like any good video game, a variety of weapons (ranging from bats to guns)  are distributed across the battlefield. If the students don’t kill each other off in the allotted time, the explosives in their collars will detonate, killing them all.

Battle Royale was a simple, savage, unapologetic premise that worked very effectively as a genre film – hence why the movie is now considered a cult-classic and has spawned any number of imitators (The Condemned, I’m looking at you!). However, Battle Royale was released in 2000 – just on the heels of Columbine murders – needless to say, a movie about school children killing each other was not something America was looking for at the time. There are several conspiracy theories about why the film has been kept out of U.S. theaters (was it the will of Japanese production house, Toei, or U.S. distributors?) but the bottom line is that only a small portion of American moviegoers are aware of the flick.

Hopefully Anchor Bay is planning to release the film in America sooner before later. The thought of seeing Battle Royale in an actual theater is very appealing – though I’m not 100% sold on the idea that a 3D release  is necessary (though that’s the more likely scenario for a U.S. theatrical release).

If Battle Royale is released in American theaters, would you go see it? Do you think enough time has passed for a movie like this to be released in the U.S. without controversy? After all, if The Hungers Games can get the Hollywood movie treatment, why can’t this film?

Battle Royale 3D hits theaters in Japan on November 20th; a U.S. release is being planned for sometime in 2011.

Source: Nippon Cinema via Twitch Film

View the original article here