After teasing us with a shot of the Batmobile yesterday, Superman vs. Batman director Zack Snyder has just unveiled a black and white shot of Ben Affleck as Batman, standing next to the Batmobile. It’s hard to see all the detail in this monotone shot (even after I adjusted the brightness/contrast), but I love the direction they’re going.

The short ears are awesome, I was actually worried they were going to go with really long ears that would have looked strange. I love these. Also, Batman is huge. I love how thick he looks. I always felt that (even though he was buff) Christian Bale looked tiny in his batsuit.

I totally dig the big Dark Knight Returns bat-symbol, and I love the 90s utility belt filled with pouches. The big thing I’m waiting to see is the color(s) of the suit. I’m really hoping for some gray and not just all-black, but we’ll see.

What do you guys think?

I told myself I was going to go to Toy Fair this year, but it didn’t work out. Hopefully next year! I wish it could have happened because there is a metric shitton of cool stuff getting announced. I’ll be keeping tabs on all the cool stuff and rounding up a lot of links and photos this week.

First off, Playmates teased a ton of new TMNT toys and they all look great. I’m lagging behind with their current Nickelodeon line (I haven’t been hunting for new figures for a while), but I don’t know how much longer I’ll try to get every figure in that line. However, they announced a cutesy line of Turtles called Half-Shell Heroes and they are the cutest things ever, so I will be buying all of those up.

It looks like they’ll release Half Shell Heroes versions of just about every character, a few vehicles and playsets, and even some jumbo versions of the cutesy Turtles. I think I may actually like these more than the main figures in Playmates’ current line. They look so fun.

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Holy crap you guys, The LEGO Movie is amazing. This was probably one of the movies I was most excited about this year, and I’d be very surprised if anything comes out that tops it for me. Seriously, Captain America 2 could be the best Marvel movie ever and I’m pretty sure my top movie would still go to The LEGO Movie. It’s that good.

It has everything. Top-notch writing, an excellent cast, and great pacing and action. On top of that, it’s one of the most visually pleasing animated movies in a long, long time. Even during parts where there wasn’t a joke (which was rare), I was just sitting there smiling because of how the movie looks.

I think this is going to make a bzillion dollars because I went to a 10pm screening and the audience was half adults and half kids. These kids were PUMPED to see this movie, but the adults were laughing harder. Chris Miller and Phil Lord are great at turning mediocre concepts into great comedy. There are some insanely funny jokes in this movie.
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Man of Steel comes out on Blu-ray today, and during an event to promote the release, Kevin Smith raved about the new Batman costume in the upcoming sequel. Zack Snyder also made comments about Lex Luthor, seemingly confirming his role in the movie, but I think everyone expected that. The juicy part of this story is hearing Smith, a huge Batman geek, talk about the new costume.

I saw the costume, more than that I saw him [Ben Affleck] in the costume…I don’t want to give anything away cause that is up to them and stuff, but I am going to say this…I instantly bear hugged him. You have not seen this costume in a movie, on film before. For a comb book fan, it was mind-bending… Because every other movie has done this matrixy black armor thing…There wasn’t a single nipple on this fucking suit man… I think everyone is just gonna be like ‘Holy Shit!’ It’s its own thing, man. We haven’t been down this path before…. There’s a very [beep]-influence to it, I would say.

Fans that attended the event mentioned that the beeped part of his description was Jim Lee. Lee was responsible for the awesome grey/blue suit in the early 2000s, and if that’s the direction they’re taking it for this movie then I am on board. Earlier reports were that the suit would be inspired by the graphic novel Batman Noel, so signs are pointing to a more grey/black/blue/pouchy design.

I think this is great news. Even though I love the Nolan Batman movies, I’m ready for a new version of Bats on the big screen. I doubt Affleck will be running around in tights, but as long as it doesn’t look overly tactical and has some grey in it, I’ll be happy.

What do you think though?

Via SlashFilm

This post is part of The League of Extraordinary Bloggers, a weekly series of blog posts started by Brian over at Cool and Collected. Make sure to check out his site and join in the conversation if you run a blog!

It’s been a while since I’ve participated in The League of Extraordinary Bloggers, but this week’s assignment was pretty fitting. Like the green challenge last year, this week all we had to do was post something blue, and one look at my Instagram page will tell you why I decided to join in.

I’m not very good at taking photos, and when it comes to Instagram I’m usually too lazy to break out my big-boy camera, so I try to make the best of the iPhone’s camera. A couple weeks ago I picked up a big blue poster board and made a cheap little backdrop, and I’ve been taking some photos on it, mainly of toys and stuff.
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