• As we all know, the odious Proposition 8 regarding gay marriage was deemed unconstitutional and struck down in California. io9 gives us their opinion through a decidedly science fiction lens.

• I think I’ve made my opinion of the Lost finale quite clear on this site — it sucked as few things in the universe have sucked before it. So it almost hurts to read this collection of theories about Lost written during the run of the series, because each one is about a bajillion times better than the actual ending.

• Ah, geekdom. Some Avengers fan took it upon himself to create a trailer for a non-existent Avengers film from the 50’s using a smorgasbord of source material. See how many you can name!

• If there’s one project that rivals The Hobbit in being stuck in development hell, it’s the big-budget Broadway Spider-man musical. However, that hasn’t stopped them from naming an opening date. Now, as it happens, I’m the only member of TheTorchOnline.com’s staff that lives in New York. Normally, I don’t like to whine, but … Breeeennnnt, can you get me tickets?

• Remember when we called the end of the superhero craze? Well, guess what. Matthew Vaughn, who’s set to direct X-Men: First Class, agrees.

• So this is … a little weird. Turns out the superhero genre and the hand-held genre (think Cloverfield) are about to merge.

• I’m not a huge fan of H.P. Lovecraft, but I do know that he’s a god among horror fans. So kinda weird that his work is getting the cutesy anime treatment, don’t ya think?

• Alien abduction films are nothing new, but this trailer for the upcoming film Skyline looks fairly impressive for the little it shows us, particularly the disturbing last scene.

Summer’s a great time, isn’t it? Gone are the long overcoats, the big fuzzy sweaters, and the scarves.

That’s right, people. It’s sexy time again.

Last year, we began what is now officially our annual tradition of the sexiest characters of fantasy. This year, we’re doin’ ya one better — we’re going to let YOU, our readers, decide for yourselves.

The guidelines are simple. One, we are judging characters for their sex appeal, not actors, so even if you happen to find Cate Blanchett the sexiest lady around, I think we can all agree that her turn as Galadriel didn’t exactly turn up the heat.

Two, we are specifically dealing with fantasy characters and not sci-fi, which means that Trinity, Aeon Flux, etc. are out of the running. Superheroes are okay, but we’re mostly going for high fantasy or urban fantasy, a la Legend of the Seeker, True Blood, and the like.

Three, we’re looking for recent entries into the world of fantasy. Basically, the character has to have appeared in an entertainment project released from 2009 to 2010.

And now that the rules are out of the way, here are our nominees. You can vote below!

Lucretia

Though Lucy Lawless will always be remembered for playing Xena, she still brings the sexy (and then some!) almost ten years later as the wickedly seductive Lucretia on Spartacus: Blood and Sand.

Naevia

Speaking of Lucretia, most Spartacus fans first got a glimpse of the surprisingly plucky slave girl, Naevia, when she was essentially being used as a human sex toy to get her domina, Lucretia, going so she could have sex with her husband and not have to bother with all that pesky foreplay stuff. But who would have thought that she would  blossom into a strong-willed character of her own who catches not only the eye but the heart and soul of the toughest gladiator in the ludus, Crixus?

Mira

The last Spartacus entry on the list is another humble-at-first-then-proves-to-be-resourceful slave girl. Mira, who only appeared in about the last third of the season, managed to arouse the man himself, Spartacus, and almost make him forget his late wife. Now that’s a woman.

Kate Austin

Over the past few years, Lost became such a ridiculously complex torrent of red herrings (by which I mean, of course, that the writers had absolutely no idea what they were doing) that it almost made one forget how, in 2004, an unknown actress named Evangeline Lilly created the character of Kate who was tough, capable, and looked damn good in a tank top and baggy jeans. Though the show may have ended on a whimper, no one can deny that for six years, Kate looked damn sexy running around that island.

Jennifer

There’s classy sexy, and then there’s slutty sexy. Hey, I’m not judging. To each his own. Though she was more Mortal Kombat’s Baraka than prom queen, the titular heroine/villainess of Jennifer’s Body was certainly not lacking in the sexuality department … even if she was eating boys (literally).

Persephone

A few months back, I reviewed Percy Jackson and the Olympians, and I won’t split hairs — I did not like it. But near the end, just as I was about to nod off, was woken up a big jolt of sexy in the form of Rosario Dawson’s luscious death goddess, Persephone. If that’s what awaits us in the Underworld, kill me now.

Io

Clash of the Titans may have been a gods-awful flick, but at least it did take a few seconds away from the constant boss-fight-after-boss-fight to allow us to soak in the sexiness that was Gemma Arterton’s enigmatic Io. (Gemma Arterton fans? Careful you don’t split your votes by voting for Arterton’s Princess Tamina in Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time!)

Neytiri

Go ahead. I dare you to tell me you didn’t feel a little stirring of something for some of the Na’vi when watching Avatar. No need to feel pervy for wanting to mack on blue monkey-cat people: their bodies were clearly designed to be lithe, sexy, and pleasurable to behold. And few were more behold-able than Neytiri, as performed by the delicious Zoe Saldana. (And lest you protest that Avatar was sci-fi, Pandora itself was clearly a fantasy setting, with its blue inhabitants, floating mountains, and soul transferring.)

Morrigan

What’s that, you say? Morrigan isn’t “real,” but is, instead, a character in the video game Dragon Age: Origin? Clearly, you have yet to play Dragon Age: Origin! When it comes to sexy sorceresses, we prefer ours with a “bad girl” vibe and more than a touch of ‘tude — which is Morrigan all the way. Plus, we have it on good authority that things get, uh, interesting if you “gift” her enough necklaces, amulets, and broaches!

Kahlan

Cara

Legend of the Seeker may have been unjustly canceled, but its characters will live on in our memories and imaginations forever. And while the plots and dialogue were fantastic, it certainly didn’t hurt that its two main female leads were so breathtaking to gaze upon. And so we give you the gorgeous Kahlan and Cara.

So there are our nominees. We also have a “none of the above” option for any glaring omissions, but be sure to add the name in our “comments,” below!

THE POLL IS NOW CLOSED! SEE THE RESULTS HERE

Tune in soon for the men!

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• Andy Serkus (Gollum in The Lord of the Rings) is opening a motion-capture “academy” in the U.K., to be called The Imaginarium. I’m tempted to make fun of this, but the fact is, bringing state-of-the-art CGI to the U.K. is probably a brilliant business/career move on his part.

• It’s gotta be a bad sign when the network issues a “clarification” because people are confused by your show’s finale. In fairness, it sounds like ABC is saying that that final scene of the flight wreckage at the end of Lost was the network’s decision, not the show’s. Anyway, it didn’t have anything to do with the episode itself, and it didn’t mean all the characters in the series were really dead the whole time. Assuming you’re buying any of this, ABC regrets the error!
  

• Star Trek: The Next Generation’s Riker and Deanna have a great idea: a sitcom called The Rikers! (I’m actually really impressed by Marina Sirtis and Jonathan Frakes’ comic timing here — they have a great rapport! Too bad they didn’t get to do more of this on STTNG):

• This week over at Factpile.com: Elric vs. Drizzt Do’Urden (a Drow elf from the novels of R. A. Salvatore). Think you’d know who’d win? Chime in!

• How do you go about playing D&D if you live in a non-geek community? Good advice from GeekDad. (Hint: the internet is your friend.)

• How much of a geek am I when I’m really impressed and jealous that an actor has merely auditioned for a minor role in The Hobbit?

• Thirty percent of online gamers never pay — just rely on free games and demos. Can I confess I’m one of them? Which means that what surprises me is that seventy percent do pay! (I do buy games for my X-Box, which is where I do the majority of my gaming.)

• I guess the age of the “spec” screenplay is back: Disney just paid $3 1/2 million for Lightspeed, a “space race” story. Time to dig out my copy of Final Draft again!

• Okay, this one really surprises me: Brendan Fraser is likely out on the sequel to Journey to the Center of the Earth, which will be refashioned with co-star Josh Hutcherson as the lead. Apparently, Fraser would rather make movies like last week’s Furry Vengeance flop (in truth, he’s playing a game of chicken in order to get the producers to wait for the director of the original, who is busy with other films). It’s worth noting that Fraser also balked before The Mummy 3, but obviously eventually ended up doing it.

• I guess we’ve finally exhausted the pool of “cute” animals for animated movies, and now we have to move on to vicious predators like wolves. (I kid. I actually love wolves.) Here’s the trailer for this fall’s Alpha and Omega:

• Fox has made real their plans for Rise of the Apes, the Planet of the Apes prequel. They’ve set a June 24^th, 2011 release date, and WETA Digital, the people behind the motion-capture animation on Avatar are doing the work. Interestingly, it’s set in present-day San Francisco.

• In a true WTF? programming move, The CW has decided to put reruns of CBS’s canceled Moonlight on after reruns of Vampire Diaries for the summer viewing season. It’s probably to build off the buzz surrounding Moonlight’s Alex O’Laughlin what with The Backup Plan and upcoming Hawaii Five-O remake. But is anyone going to watch a canceled show?

• I really don’t know how this came to be, but the Muppets (personal favorites) invade the writers room for Lost and get to ask one question about the series. What would you have asked?

• Katie Sackhoff was offered the role of Debbie Pelt on the upcoming season of True Blood, but ultimately gambled that she could have more than a single season of work if her cop pilot Boston’s Finest was picked up. I think a little Starbuck guts would have worked for Debbie.

• Dragon Age: Darkspawn Chronicles is coming, but what the heck is it? It doesn’t cost enough to be a full expansion pack, but the pretentious description doesn’t sound like new avatars. What is it?

• I didn’t see the first Nanny McPhee, so I don’t know precisely how good or bad it was. Emma Thompson is a fantastic actress, and she’s teamed up with Maggie Gyllenhaal in this sequel, so I have hope. Magic abounds, but I might see it just for the synchronized swimming pigs.

• Now that Matthew Vaughan has agree to direct X-Men: First Class, it’s full steam ahead. Producer Bryan Singer is rumored to be using casting calls for his film Jack the Giant Killer (which kept Singer from directing) to ramp up production. And the script Singer produced is flying through a rework at the hands of Marvel’s ultimate script jockeys Zack Stentz and Ashley Edward Miller (Terminator: Sarah Conner Chronicles and Thor).

• I’m not terribly sure what The Furfangs is meant to be – this is a  short that seems a bit “Tribbles gone Gremlins” to me.

• The world’s foremost expert on mutants, Stan Lee, is going to host a documentary/reality series called Superhumans on The History Channel about individual people who have genetic mutations that give them an edge in the world. Probably nothing as wild as weather control or laser eyes, but still potentially cool.

• The producers of Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters have met with members of the Twilight cast about starring in the potential franchise. Adam McKay is shepherding the project that hopes to start shooting in the fall.

• I can’t figure out Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time – frankly it looks so overproduced as to be boring. Even the parkour scenes I’ve seen look sanitized. One thing that’s undeniable though is that Princess Tamina is beautiful, that she just exudes sex. That look comes at a cost though, as this featurette shows.

• Terry Pratchett is a man who knows a thing or two about narrative. His Discworld books are notoriously engrossing and easy to read. So when he says that Doctor Who isn’t science fiction but pure professionally-written entertainment, I tend to listen. He’s right – the Doctor is too godlike, too knowing, too powerful. He can jump start a starship by diving it into the atmosphere – when did he pop the clutch? The solution is almost always deus ex machina. That’s not stopping him from tuning in though. Take a look at “The Vampires of Venice” preview:

• Sam Rockwell has joined the cast of Cowboys and Aliens, making the comic book adaption the biggest collection of genre nerds ever assembled outside of a Joss Whedon production. Daniel Craig, Olivia Wilde and Harrison Ford were already on board.

• I found out two things in Charlie Stross’ diary entry about fanfic: some writers like it, some hate it. As for Charlie, he’s indifferent as long as you’re not selling it or asking him to read it. The second thing I learned is that the film rights to The Laundry novels are currently optioned, and I can hope the occult spy novels make it to the big screen.

• Avatar: The Last Airbender is coming. All the media in the world says the producers are dying for this thing to succeed, and they’ll spend what they have to in order to make it happen. Here’s the final poster:

• And here’s a featurette on the location-shooting they did for the film. I’d presumed a lot of green-screen was done, but they built much of the sets instead. I’m impressed.

• I don’t know much about John Carter of Mars, honestly. When I first heard about it, I thought they were doing the green guy from Justice League. Don’t hate me. But as more concept art and set photos emerge, I’m starting to get a sense of what I’d missed.

• Make-A-Wish Foundation normally takes a kid to Disney World. In Seattle, that just wasn’t going to work. Spider-Man was going to need help from another superhero, and only 13-year-old Erik Martin aka Electron Boy could help. It took 20 cops, a closed interstate, and Qwest Field to capture the bad guy, but good prevailed over evil. Very touching.

• Almost all superhero movies include a power ballad that no one likes. Gary Mitchell thinks his “In Brightest Day” fits the bill for Green Lantern, and he’s recorded a demo to sell the point, rather painfully.

• Anyone who’s been keeping up with the Buffy Season 8 comics knows that the last issue was pretty intense, as Buffy and Angel, who had been masquerading as Twilight, once again got all groiny with each other. But this time it has something to do with the nature of the universe. Uh-huh. You can read all about it in this interview with writer Brad Meltzer.

• Here’s a pretty funny list about the the things that Hollywood thinks computers can do. All you need to do is watch one episode of any primetime procedural to know it’s true.

• Not too long ago, I made up a Fantasy Casting list for The Hobbit, and chose Brian Cox as Thorin Oakenshield. Often those lists are wishful thinking, but I really thought Cox had a good shot. However, he might have been beaten out by Australian actor Jack Thompson, who certainly does have a dwarvish appeal. Here’s a pic:

• Well, Lost fans, it’s been quite a run, hasn’t it? Soon we’re going to be leaving the island for good, but before that happens, check out this cool interview with Daniel Dae Kim about his character Jin and his love for his wife Sun. Made me all sorts of sentimental.

• Cracked has a pretty awesome list of the 7 Most Soul-Crushing Series Finales. Did you know that Alf got caught by the government?! Turns out it was supposed to be a cliffhanger to set up the next season, but the show got canceled and so it never resolved (except for in a weird TV movie). Please, please, don’t let something similar happen to Legend of the Seeker. That show deserves closure and dignity.

• It looks it’s really happening: X-Men: First Class will be released in June of next year. Be still my geeky heart …

• Finally, this caught my eye as being really cool. As we all know, the two feature films based on Street Fighter … what’s the word I’m looking for … sucked. So actor/stuntman Joey Ansah, who had one of the best fight scenes in the Bourne movies (and how’s that for street cred?) took it upon himself to create his own fan film. You can find out more on his website, but to whet your appetite, here’s a trailer.

• It’s well established that I don’t watch Lost, but I think I’ve discovered the mystery that even I want an answer to from the show: How is every single actor/actress on the show the exact same height?

• Stan Lee and Avi Arad sat down to talk about the future of the Marvel catalog, and they seem to think that the next major Marvel hero we’ll see is Doctor Strange.

• The same interview had Stan expressing significant reservations about Chris Evans playing both the Human Torch and Captain America. He’s really glad he’s not the producer.

• In this featurette for Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time, we spend some time meeting the Hassansins, the mystical assassins that populate this world, each with their own unique weapon.

• Artist Ryan Mauskopf wonders what happens when you bring the Greek myths into the modern world – Icarus vs. a 747, or Medusa trying to see the dentist. Here we have Hermes getting pulled over for speeding.

• In the fourth week of release, How to Train Your Dragon regained the top spot with $20 million, edging out raunchy super hero comedy Kick-Ass with $19.8 million in preliminary returns. Kick-Ass had been anticipating a $30 million opening, so any sequels may be out the window.

• Torchwood’s Ianto Jones is coming back to life – at least for a comic in the latest Torchwood Magazine. Gareth David-Lloyd penned the story, saying he felt who knew the character best.

• Trading on some old myths, Colin Farrell stars in Ondine about a sailor who catches a beautiful woman in his fishing net, believing her to be dead. When she comes to life before his eyes, they begin an adventure that changes his life – at least until her Selkie husband comes from the sea to reclaim her.

• Remember that insane picture by Andrew Zubko, with Batman with the lightsaber fighting the giant shark? Well, the Portland Mercury paper ran a contest to have the readers say what they wanted Andrew to draw for the cover. The winning entry simply said “Betty White holding a flaming chainsaw riding John Ritter” but the execution is so much more than that.

• For those of you out there who, like me, are children of the ’90s, it’s possible that Baywatch holds a very special place in your memories … but let’s keep the memories to ourselves for now, okay? Anyway, the often-genius folks over at CollegeHumor.com created a pretty hilarious version of Lost’s opening credits done in Baywatch style, and it’s well worth a look.

• Syfy is apparently so pleased with Caprica that they’re looking to start another series within the Battlestar Galactica universe. May I suggest a CSI of some kind? (Kidding.) Also interesting to note in the article is talk of a show called Three Inches, about a less-than-stellar group of superheroes. Not sure how promising that sounds to me, but hey, I’ve been wrong before. You know, that one time.

• I want to toss my name in the hat to play Captain America, since everybody else is. (Think they’ll go against type and cast a skinny writer?) Apparently, Channing Tatum is now up for the role, which really burns me, because I had such high hopes for my boy John Krasinski.

• Interestingly, another contender for Cap is Ryan Phillipe, who co-starred with Tatum in Stop Loss. Who would I pick? Let me put it this way. I walked out of Stop Loss thinking two things. One: “My god, Ryan Phillipe can really, really act. He was amazing. I had written him off as just some blond pretty-boy, but man, he really impressed me.” Two: “Channing Tatum was also in this movie.”

• The good folks at Slashfilm know how to make even the lamest seeming movies look a bajillion times better. If this were the actual poster, I would totally see The Bounty Hunter.

• Robert Downey, Jr. is in talks to appear in the new Alfonso Cuaron-helmed 3D space thriller, titled Gravity. Now, let’s recap everything that’s awesome in the previous sentence: Robert Downey, Jr. Alfonso Cuaron. 3D. Space. Thriller. This has the makings of a geek’s delight.

• Cinematical has a pretty hefty preview of the new Predators film. I know that the Predator and Alien films are wildly uneven, ranging from sublimely awesometacular to the dismally unwatchable, but for some reason I salivate at even the mention of a new movie whenever one is on the horizon.

• An interview with the Big Lebowski himself, Jeff Bridges, from the set of Tron Legacy. It sounds like Bridges really is that cool.

• It seems that Matthew Vaughn would love to make an epic series based on Neil Gaiman’s Sandman comics, since he finds the world of that graphic novel series far too vast for a single movie. That would be sweet, even though we’d have to deal with all the emo/goth fanboys inevitably storming the internets and talking about how they got it all wrong.

• Just in case True Blood wasn’t racy enough for ya, series shapeshifter Sam Trammell pretty much confirmed that he and Vampire Bill (Stephen Moyer) are going to get all freaky with each other in the upcoming season. I bet that’ll confuse poor old Sookie.

• I doubt I’m alone when I say I’m relieved to hear that Watchmen star Patrick Wilson shot down the rumors of a movie sequel. The best way to ruin such a rich tapestry of story is to turn it into yet another superhero movie franchise.

• Finally, do you think Paul Bettany will ever play a suburban soccer dad? He’s got the best career right now, playing supernatural ass-whooper after supernatural ass-whooper. Currently he’s starring as the vampire-killing lead in Priest. Here’s a preview:

And you convinced yet that Dominic Monaghan is one terrific actor?

The Englishman, of course, became internationally famous as the lovable hobbit Merry Brandybuck in the Lord of the Rings movies.

A year after the last of those movies, he topped that with a break-out performance as the heroin-addicted musician Charlie Pace on Lost.

Then last year, he shook things up yet again with a turn as the mysterious and menacing Dr. Simon Campos on Flash Forward.

If you’re not convinced yet what a terrific, versatile actor he is, what in the world is it going to take?

Since Dominic is so often featured in genre-themed projects, we were eager to talk to him one-on-one. At a recent press event, along with several other reporters, we finally got a chance:

Question: Do you have theories about your character on Flash Forward? How much do you yourself know?

DM: I know some things. I know his motivation, I know where he’s going, where he’s headed. Then there’s other things that I don’t know.

I feel like if Simon doesn’t know, then I — Dom — doesn’t want to know. If Simon knows, then I want to know. So those are the questions that I’m asking [producers] David [Goyer] and Jessika [Goyer] in the writers’ room.

Q: Do you pay attention to what the fans say about you?

DM: Some stuff. I’ve been [to some sites] a couple of times and read a couple of things, what people think about the character and the show. I don’t tend to dive into too much, I don’t want to get too dangerous.

But I’m online, and I search around, and I go to forums.

Q: Do you ever see conspiracies on the online boards and think, “Oh, wow, you’re so wrong.”

DM: Or you’re so right! I saw a lot of stuff with Lost, and I saw a lot with Flash Forward where I think, “Wow, these guys are on it. These guys know what’s going on! These guys sound like they’re in the writers’ room, because they’re predicting things that are actually happening.”

Q: Between Lord of the Rings, Lost, and now Flash Forward, you seem to be doing a lot of fantasy and science fiction. Is that something you personally enjoy, or is that just a coincidence?

DM: I don’t necessarily know if it’s purely coincidental. I became an actor because of Star Wars. I watched Han Solo when I was seven or eight, and I thought, “That’s what I want to do.”

I have a large collection of fantasy in my film library, from Dark Star to Dark Crystal to Star Wars to Star Trek to 2001. Lots of sci-fi.

But I probably have more comedy, [more] America gangster movies than anything else.

It’s just good projects more than anything else. If you look at those three things, I don’t necessarily see the link being fan-based, ComicCon wet dreams. It’s more that they’re good projects. Lord of the Rings was a great script, Lost was a great project, Flash Forward was a great project.

I go where there’s good writing and a great chance to do something new.

Q: You mentioned Star Wars, which reminds me of Mark Hamill and the problems he had breaking away from the role that made him so famous. You made such an indelible impression in Lord of the Rings. Were you ever worried about being typecast?

DM: Yeah, and I had a year or so where I wasn’t working and felt as if I in danger of being locked into those movies and never get out of them again. I got very lucky with Lost. That was a very adorable character to play, and I think the audience very quickly leapfrogged with me from the character I played in Lord of the Rings to Charlie.

You’ve got work out your challenges in your job and set your mind on that goal. I know I can act, I know that I’m capable of acting, so really that as a challenge isn’t as complicated for me as navigating my way through the pigeonholes that people want to put me in.

I stopped worrying [too much] about learning my lines or being present on the set or giving a good performance, and I started concentrating my thoughts on how do I navigate my way through this business when I don’t look necessarily look like Paul Newman and I’m not built like Hugh Jackman. How do I do that?

Q: Was there anything you turned down?

A: Sure! I turned down a lot of pixie-like, elf-like [characters], guys who live under toadstools and bridges. And I turned down a lot of adorable best-friends-to-the-lead-guy, who’s just kind of a nice guy. I was like, “I don’t wanna do that.”

I still hold back. When I was younger, roles I played were much more comedic-based. I love comedy, and that’s something I ultimately I want to do. But I said to my agent going into my career in America, “I don’t want to do comedy until I’ve proven that I can do drama to a large audience.” Because then when I do comedy, they’ll say, “Oh, yeah, but he is a dramatic actor.” If you just do comedy, then you’re going to have a very hard time breaking into drama.

Q: Did you have to convince the producers of Flash Forward you could do “dark”?

DM: No, I don’t think so. They’re big fans of Lost. I think they saw something in Charlie that was dark enough. He had some dark moments. He can be a bad-ass when he feels like that.

I think David and Jessica wanted that. They were like, “We watch the show and we watched Charlie, and we liked it was he’s f***ing bad and not nice. And we want you to play that character all the time. So if you’ll let us, that’s what we want to write.”

I was like, yeah, that’s what I need now.

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• The new season of Lost is alive and kicking, and gearing up for its big series finale this spring. In honor of the end to this six-year cultural phenomenon, take a look at these four videos. (Warning: one of the videos is mildly spoilerish.)

• Captain America is probably the superhero movie that I’m the least excited about (I’m an X-men guy myself), but this article has pretty much all the information you could ask for right now. And, okay, I’ll admit it … I am kind of salivating over the way Marvel is going to weave all these movies together into the upcoming Avengers film.

• Speaking of superhero movies, Tim Robbins has just been cast in The Green Lantern as the father to Peter Sarsgaard’s villainous Hector Hammond.

• Can good directors save bad movies? Cinematical takes a look at a few tepid franchises that are about to get a makeover from reputable directors.

• It may or may not be “the next Harry Potter,” but The Lighting Thief looks like it has the potential to be a pretty awesome film. At the helm is Chris Columbus (who also directed the first two Potter films), and he talks about the new film here.

• There’s been talk about Ghostbusters 3 for ages, and while I’m sure it will be made, I’m starting to doubt if it will be any good. At any rate, there’s a decent amount of information about the story here, but who’s to say if this will change before cameras start rolling.

• Chris Nolan made history when he rebooted the dead-in-the-water Batman franchise, and now he may do it again … for Superman?

• Whoa! Real-life Avatar.

• Did you know that in the upcoming The Wolfman, Benicio del Toro is actually reprising a role he played years earlier?

• Those of you out there as nerdy as I am will be excited by the new comic series Kill Shakespeare, called an “epic adventure that pits Shakespeare’s greatest heroes against his most frightening villains.”

• After Terminator: Salvation (which I actually thought was a good movie), many thought the franchise was dead in the water. However, that didn’t stop a bunch of people from bidding on the rights, with a hedge fund leaving victorious. Wait, what?

• Finally, here’s a pretty cool video compilation of one of the most over-used horror cliches in movies: the mirror scare. (Cliche, sure, but I’m still scared to open and close the mirror cabinet when I’m alone in my apartment.)

Looking to buy any of the projects mentioned in this article (or any other media)? Support TheTorchOnline.com by purchasing it through this link.

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• The Hubble Telescope has found a spiral galaxy living by the “live fast, die young” philosophy. NGC-2976 (they need to employ a better naming scheme if NASA wants their budget back) got a little frisky with a bigger galaxy sometime in the past and went nuts making stars to the point that it just doesn’t have it left in it anymore.

• We mentioned before that Daniel Craig was putting on the spurs in the lead role in Cowboys vs. Aliens, but every cowboy needs a cowgirl, and Olivia Wilde is ready to mount up. The John Favreau project is the second sci-fi/fantasy piece in a row for the House actress, who has been hard at work on Tron: Legacy.

• In news I could live without, the change at the top of DC Comics is clearing the way for Watchmen 2. Nobody that was associated with Watchmen being the best-selling graphic novel in DC history will touch the project, but the suits are already counting their money.

• The Palantir (that would be me) once had to go to the bathroom during season two of Lost. He hasn’t understood a thing since. That’s why this parody from TV Wasteland makes him laugh.

• Catching up with John Wagner, the creater of Judge Dredd, we find that he’s read the script and seen some of the visuals for the new movie, and likes what he sees. He also dishes on Dredd aging, how 70 is the new 40.

• Last month we showed you the Star Wars Burlesque show, now io9.com has pictures of the more generalized Sci-Fi Burlesque show, adding Leeloo and Silk Spectre, among others.

• Sam Raimi may have walked away (or been pushed) from  Spider-Man, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t want to do a genre film. He’s planning to remake The Shadow. Is there not a new comic book character to exploit?

• SyFy has announced a development slate of original SyFy movies based around dark retellings of fairy tales. Hansel will be an imagining where twenty years after the original woods trip, Hansel returns to the woods for revenge. But the twist is he finds Gretel has become the witch’s apprentice. Just one of SyFy’s many ideas to get into making something other than tornado movies.

• You’ve probably heard that there’s a new live-action/CGI Smurfs movie under development. The producers of said project occasionally leak concept art that people pray to be fake. This is another such piece of art. But it comes with a story that the movie will be set in New York City because Smurf Village is in Central Park. Mayor Bloomberg has summoned Papa Smurf to his office to discuss back taxes.

• Dragon Age: Origins Expansion has got a glittery version of the Ghost Dragon, and the new DLC content Return to Ostagar has finally hit the Xbox 360 and PC.

• Alice In Wonderland continues to release new trailers and featurettes. The latest marketing assault is to give us slightly different trailers across all of Disney’s major networks, ABC, ESPN, and ABC Family. We’ll start with ABC Family, and then move to ABC. Play them together and note the not-so-subtle, but fascinating differences:

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• Tor.com has a piece on why the Oscars don’t respect genre films, and hints that if the Best Picture category wasn’t expanded to 10 films this year, none of the genre films would have been nominated.

• Universal Studios Orlando isn’t the only park getting a cool new attraction. Well, depending on how you define “new,” they are. But King Kong is coming back to Universal Studios Hollywood, and it’s in 3-D.

• Locus Online has come out with their consensus Recommended Reading List 2009, and there are a few books on there I really enjoyed, like Transition and Ark. But we can all use more books in our life, so I’m going to try something else I haven’t read. What about you – what looks tasty?

• On April 6, 2010, we can go back to The Shire. No, no – they’re still going nowhere with Peter Jackson’s The Hobbit, but that’s when Ralph Bakshi classic animated Lord of the Rings movie comes out on DVD and Blu-Ray.

• Speaking of The Hobbit, Elijah Wood wants James McAvoy as Bilbo Baggins. For some reason, that seems like it should count for something.

• Going in the other direction from LoTR, we have Andy Serkis, who voiced Gollum, trying to get someone to make a biopic of Bono, and he wants to play the rocker. No word on why Bono wouldn’t just play Bono, because Bono seems to be pretty good at playing Bono.

• Remember that Ollivander’s Wand Shop video we had? Well, Universal shelled out $2.6 million to promote The Wizarding World of Harry Potter on the Super Bowl this Sunday. The park addition itself seems fairly amazing — this multi-million dollar spot, notsomuch.

• Reaper was a quirky, fun show that died too soon. It had a delightful mix of comedy and action, and promised an intriguing story arc that never got finished. Since it died quietly, we never heard that story, but if you talk to the creators, they’ll tell it all, including the mystery of Sam’s father.

Warning: This article contains spoilers for the “LAX” episode of LOST.

For seemingly a bajillion months now, LOST fans have clamoring away, throwing theories out into the vast interwebs about what exactly went down after that mysterious fade-to-white that ended last season. Did Juliet successfully set off the hydrogen bomb? Will the timeline be changed, with the original crash survivors landing safely in Los Angeles? Will they ever address the biggest mystery, that of Jack’s vanishing and reappearing chest hair?

For the first three seasons, LOST’s biggest gimmick was its split personality. In almost every episode, we witnessed two different storylines: one set in the present on the island, and one featuring one of the survivors’ lives pre-crash (and the fun being, of course, seeing which other survivors they unknowingly came across). The game-changing fourth season brought us flash-forwards, where we learn six passengers actually got off the island and went back to the real world, only to return, and the fifth season had all sorts of time-jumping shenanigans.

And what of the sixth season? Well, it turns out the bomb did go off, resetting the timeline just as Jack predicted.

Also, it did not.

Apparently reality has splintered somehow, because we’re now witnessing two different timelines, one in which the survivors are still on the island, dealing with the aftermath of their misadventures. In this timeline we’re told a bit more about one of the show’s longest standing mysteries: the Monster. It turns out the Monster is one in the same with Jacob’s mysterious nemesis glimpsed last season, who has taken on the form of the now-deceased John Locke.

In the other reality, everything happens the same as before the crash, and when they hit that turbulence, they fly right through it and land safely in LAX. But we know right away not everything is the same. In a show that pays painstaking attention to minor detail, sharp-eyed fans will have noticed that, kidding aside, Jack’s hair is longer and Charlie’s hair is shorter.

Those really paying attention noticed that flight attendant Cindy previously slipped Jack two bottles of vodka — one of which he used to sterilize his wound later on — but in this new reality gave him only one, which went right into his drink.

And of course, the most obvious difference, Boone was unsuccessful in bringing Shannon back to the states with him.

This is the season that all the LOST fans have been waiting for, when the answers to the questions that have been eating away at us for six years will finally be answered. While I’m sad to see such a fun show make its swan song, there’s also a little relief in the mix, as well.

Watch the season premiere: