Tom Hardy's Splinter Cell Will Be A Younger, Fresher Take There's an August start date for Splinter Cell, the Tom Clancy adaptation based on a series of games featuring CIA-turned-black ops agent Sam Fisher. The 36-year-old Tom Hardy will be stepping into the boots of the character, who has long been considered older and more seasoned in the games. The mythology has him in the neighborhood of 40, and he's been voiced many times by brass-throated Michael Ironside. But Splinter Cell the movie is taking a different point of view. Director Doug Liman is currently on the Edge Of Tomorrow promotional tour when he chatted with IGN about Splinter Cell, revealing that the film would depict a younger, less-seasoned Fisher. "I’m working on the script with Tom Hardy. I think we have a great take on how to make an awesome film out of that. Everything about Splinter Cell will be younger. It’s a chance to come up with a new franchise that is fresher and newer and younger, and Tom Hardy is such an incredible actor." Obviously this means it's ostensibly the start of a new franchise. There were rumors of a shared universe with Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit, but that film's box office failure suggests Splinter Cell would attempt to distance itself from that series, which isn't difficult considering the lack of interaction between Fisher and Ryan in Clancy's work. There are seven games and seven accompanying novels from which to pick Fisher's adventures from, and Ubisoft's game franchise has moved more than 22 million units since its inception. Clearly, there's a Splinter Cell fanbase, just as there is for a product listed under Tom Clancy's name: the late author had more than 100 million copies of his books in print all over the world before his death last October. Like Michael Fassbender, who is producing and starring in Assassins Creed, Tom Hardy is looking to a video game to launch him onto the A-list and getting actively involved in the development process. Doug Liman recently shared a similar collaborative experience with Tom Cruise on Edge Of Tomorrow, as that film was originally written for a much younger actor. Though the project had a lauded script by Eric Warren Singer (American Hustle), it recently gained a re-write by Shelton Turner (Up In The Air) to probably align itself more with Hardy and Liman's take. And that involves less gizmos, as Liman says, "Some of the tropes of the game will for sure be in the film, but also the fun of that is when you lose them. To strip that stuff away and really make the character have to operate without it. "

anks to the appearances of Sam Jones, Ryan Reynolds and Ted Danson in Ted, not to mention the hundreds of celebrity voices who have done guest spots on Family Guy, American Dad and The Cleveland Show, we fully expected that Seth MacFarlane’s A Million Ways To Die In The West would feature some interesting cameos, and we were not disappointed. Some of the best moments in the movie came as a result of a bizarre special appearance that made for a good laugh. What may surprise you, however, is that one of the funniest in the film was neither in the script nor Seth MacFarlane’s idea. WARNING: The rest of this article contains minor spoilers for A Million Ways To Die In The West. If you haven’t seen the film, read on at your own risk! At a recent press conference held in Los Angeles for A Million Ways To Die In The West, Charlize Theron revealed that she was the one responsible for the random appearance of Ewan McGregor in the comedy. As the story goes, the Scottish star was in the neighborhood during the production of MacFarlane’s movie, starring in Gavin O’Connor’s Jane Got A Gun. He stopped by the Million Ways To Die In The West set just to make an appearance, and it was then that Theron decided to offer him a part. "He just came to say hello and I was like, ‘Do you want to be in our movie?’" Theron said. "He was doing a Western, so he had the face. He was already in hair and makeup for his movie, so we just threw him in." MacFarlane was somewhat blindsided by the news ("Shit, you already offered him...? Alright, so..."), but found that McGregor and his grown facial hair fit right in with the townspeople of Stump. He fits in so well, in fact, that the director says he doesn’t expect many people will actually catch it. Said MacFarlane, "The gag is so quick, I don’t think a lot of people know it’s him, but that’s good." Of course, Ewan McGregor wasn’t the only cameo in the film, and one of the other great ones was the quick appearance by Ryan Reynolds. The actor previously had a funny, silent small role in Ted, and when MacFarlane ran into a scene that required a bit of levity, he found the perfect way to bring Reynolds back. Explained the director, "We needed Liam’s character to kill a guy in the saloon to scare everybody and we thought, well this Ryan Reynolds thing in Ted went over so well. Let’s just get a laugh here where it would normally play as a straight moment." A Million Ways To Die In The West is in theaters now.

When the first major casting announcement for Star Wars: Episode VII dropped, more than a few people started to question whether the diversity of the cast was as reflective of the modern film scene as it could have been. I've never been worried about J.J. Abrams' casting, simply because he tends to cast his projects the way they should be cast and uses everyone to their full advantage, regardless of race, gender, or even species. The fact that he's reverent to the original style and look of Star Wars, while starting to assemble a diverse cast of younger actors to take their places alongside the series' stalwarts, is something that was readily apparent since day one – if you knew where to look. To some, the casting of Lupita Nyong'o and Gwendoline Christie is Mr. Abrams' attempt to answer his criticisms with action. But looking back on his career, I'd say they fit a pattern he established a long time ago. It all started with Sydney Bristow, the super spy played by Jennifer Garner on Abrams' hit TV show Alias. Right from the first episode, Sydney displays attitude under pressure, while flipping the gender trope of avenging a slain loved one. With the surprise death of her fiancee, Ms. Bristow would embark on a five year long journey of personal development, familial crisis, and her on again/off again relationship with her handler at the CIA. While the series did focus heavily on the "will they or won't they" nature of Sydney and CIA agent Michael Vaughn, Abrams never took the teeth out of his lead heroine. When your main character can still kick ass after getting married and revealing she's pregnant, you're already head and shoulders above most romantic comedies. When J.J. Abrams made his jump to feature films with Mission: Impossible 3, his balance of romantic subplots and action-capable female leads followed with him. Not only did the IMF team have Maggie Q's Zhen Lei to break up the manpower John Woo had reduced the team to in Mission: Impossible 2, but Abrams was able to have a romantic lead in Michelle Monaghan's character of Julia. The romantic lead and the action lead didn't have to mix for a change, and as an added (and most impressive) bonus, we got to see Keri Russell reunite with the man who co-created Felicity -- the show that gave her the big break her career needed to sustain itself. That reunion lead to a short, but memorable role where Ms. Russell showed us what she'd been up to since then. Of course, this list would be severely incomplete if I were to leave off Zoe Saldana's portrayal of Lt. Nyota Uhura. While she was console bound in the first Star Trek film, she was allowed to play a more central role in Star Trek Into Darkness. Particularly in the scene where she acts as a negotiator between Federation forces and a Klingon "delegation." With her chosen skill of linguistic sensitivity, as well as a personal demeanor that showed Kirk and Spock both that she was to be taken seriously, she doesn't cry for help when she's overpowered. She waits for a tactical advantage, and then when the moment is right, she attacks her Klingon aggressor with his own blade. Lupita Nyong'o and Gwendoline Christie are huge assets to the Star Wars: Episode VII cast, and I'm excited that the two of them have been brought on to make this cast an even more well rounded bunch. Of course, this could all change depending on how J.J. Abrams uses his new lead actresses. Judging by his career though, I'd say his willingness to overturn traditionally white male heavy genres and include more gender and ethnically diverse characters in his projects has been more than readily apparent. We can breathe a little easier after today, guys.

Kevin Smith is primarily known as a comedy director, with titles like Clerks., Dogma, and Zack and Miri Make A Porno all coming out over the last 20 years. In 2011, however, he changed things up in a major way and brought us the R-rated horror film Red State. For his next feature, Tusk, Smith is once again sticking with blood and guts over laughs, and as you can see in the photo above, it's going to be pretty disgusting. In celebration of star Justin Long's birthday, Smith sent out the image over his Instagram account. The picture came with the message, "Happy bloody Birthday to the bravest actor I've ever worked with: Mr. TUSK himself, JUSTIN LONG! #WalrusYes." So exactly what the hell is going on in this picture? Well, in Tusk Justin Long stars as Wallace Bryton, a podcast host who goes missing after going to interview a mysterious seafarer named Mr. Howe (Michael Parks). As you can see, Long doesn't end up being the kind of kidnapping victim who is tied up and locked in a closet. Instead, it would seem that Mr. Howe is determined to transform Wallace into some kind of human walrus. This involves stitching Wallace's arms to his chest and knocking out all of his teeth (where else are the tusks going to go?). Tusk also stars Haley Joel Osment as Teddy Craft, Wallace's co-podcast host who goes searching for his friend along with his girlfriend, played by Genesis Rodriguez. This image doesn't really give us any kind of bigger grasp on the story or how Kevin Smith plans on shooting the film, but there is definitely a lot to like here for horror fans. Great practical effects work is always welcome, and this movie looks epically gruesome in all the right ways. Tusk went into production last November and has been in post since then. The distribution company A24 has signed on for the movie, and while no release date has been announced yet, the film is expected to get a conventional theater release sometime in the third quarter of this year. Hopefully it will end up right in the weeks leading up to Halloween, which would mean getting a first trailer in the next couple of months. Does this image of Justin Long on a surgery table get you excited to see the film? Answer our poll and tell us what you think in the comments below.