Benedict Cumberbatch says he was asked for an audition tape, to send to JJ Abrams during the Christmas holiday. With all the London casting directors on vacation, he ended up recording his audition for the still untitled Star Trek sequel film on his iPhone in his friend's kitchen. 

And he confirms, perhaps for the first time, that he's playing a quasi-villain.  


Read more at the New York Times here

Looks like 13 is the lucky number for Fringe fans, because that's the number of episodes the show has been renewed for! The producers just tweeted out the news that Fox's four-year-old critical fave and perpetual bubble-show was given the greenlight for a half-season order next fall which will presumably be designed to wrap up the ongoing, alternate-universe exploits of Agent Olivia Dunham and company. 

Read more at TVGuide.com

Some new casting news regarding of the long-delayed Mad Max: Fury Road leads us to believe that the movie is back on track.

Joining Tom Hardy and Charlize Theron for George Miller's sequel is Australian model Abbey Lee Kershaw—who is, according to Sydney Confidential, the world's fifth most in-demand model. 

Read more at Blastr

Peter Berg’s military versus aliens flick based on a board game Battleship is topping box office charts all over international markets, totaling in 24 out of 26 number one spots. Now, Deadline is reporting that after being in theaters for twelve days, the movie has officially surpassed the $100 million mark.  


More at ScienceFiction.com

From Trek Movie - Once again Bryan Fuller is talking about his goal of bringing Star Trek back to TV.  

The Trek writing and producing vet is currently busy launching  a reboot of the Munsters and a drama called Hannibal about the serial-killer for NBC, but in a new interview he expressed his hope for a new Star Trek series.  

While speaking to EW, Fuller mentioned how he and director Bryan Singer are hoping to collaborate with JJ Abrams, saying: "Bryan and I are big fans of Trek and have discussed a take on what we would do, and we would love to do it,” Fuller says. “I don’t think anything is going to happen in any official capacity until after the next movie comes out. And I’m sure it would be wisely under J.J. Abrams’ purview of what happens. He’s the guardian of Trek right now.”

From MTV - In a recent interview, director James Cameron revealed why we're going to have to wait for his film adaptation of the Japanese manga story Battle Angel Alita.

While making the rounds to promote the Titanic 3D re-release, Cameron emphasized that he's still very excited about making a film based on the post-apocalyptic series, but Avatar 2 and 3 have to happen first because they're more important.

"I see the good the Avatar franchise can do in terms of keeping a world audience cognizant of our relationship with nature, but doing it in an entertainment context," Cameron said. "Ultimately I think there's more good to be done there than with Battle Angel.  Battle Angel is just a great, kick-ass story."

So if Avatar starts taking too long would Cameron ever just produce Battle Angel and give the directing duties to someone else?  "It would have to be pried out of my cold dead fingers," he said. "But on the other hand, I don't want to take it to my grave either."

Battle Angel Alita focuses on a discarded cyborg named Alita who has lost all her memories except for the legendary cyborg martial art Panzer Kunst. A cybernetics doctor rebuilds and cares for Alita before she sets off on a journey as a bounty hunter in an attempt to rediscover her past and the players in it. 

From ScienceFiction.com - Paramount has released a teaser trailer and some concept art for the Star Trek video game that's being released early in 2013.  The other big news is that the game play will actually be considered as cannon in the Star Trek universe!

According to Forbes, the story was conceived by the writers/producers of the Star Trek reboot and sequel, Bob Orci, Alex Kurtzman and Damon Lindelof and was written by God of War game scribe Marianne Krawczyk. 

Last July Orci stated that the game will be a bridge between the 2009 film and it's sequel that's currently in production.  He also added that "I like to think of the game as a movie we’ve might have done. We treat the game with the same respect. I can say that the villains are very much in canon.” 

Along with the game being available in 3D, developer Digital Extremes has also enabled each player to have a unique experience in their game play by allowing them to switch characters. For example, once you finish playing as Kirk, you can go through the game again as Spock. The experience will be different as Spock’s actions and choice of weapons would be specific to a Vulcan as opposed to a human.

The currently untitled Star Trek video game is slated to ship for PC, Xbox 360, and PlayStation 3 sometime in the beginning of 2013.

From Sciencefiction.com - Producer Bob Orci has set up a Tumblr page for one of 2 current projects he's working on, which is Ender’s Game.  The other is that Star Trek sequel. 

The blog allows fans to follow the production through the filming process and Orci has posted photos of Ender’s chair, the door to the Battle Room, the cast during Space Camp, Ender’s room,  and now a photo of Ender himself… well, sort of.

This picture is of the back of Ender’s head with a device implanted in his neck. Here’s what the caption says:

Though Ender’s world is one worth saving, it sometimes comes with a price.  The novel was amazingly prescient about a great many things: remote controlled drone wars, the internet, the influence of blogging, hand held computing tablets like the I-Pad, and of course, electronic surveillance implants.  Implanted tracking and monitoring chips are no longer a science fiction concept.  They exist now.  And one day, they may be as advanced as the monitor implanted into Ender, which allows Colonel Graff to “see through his eyes” and know:  HE’S THE ONE.

Although production has already started, fans may have to wait a little longer to see the movie as the release date has been pushed back from March 15th to November 1st, 2013.  

From THR - According to reports, director Doug Liman and company are in negotiations with Emily Blunt to star opposite Tom Cruise in the alien war epic All You Need Is Kill.

The movie is about a soldier in a men-vs.-aliens war who dies each day, only to be reborn again for for more combat.  Cruise stars as the soldier in question, who begins training himself to fight better in an effort to change his fate. Blunt will also get a piece of the action as Valkyrie One, one of the best soldiers in humankind's army.

Blunt's history with sci-fi includes her work in The Adjustment Bureau and the upcoming time-travel film Looper.

From MTV - While director James Cameron won't be involved in the next Terminator film, (which is currently being shopped around by Arnold Schwarzenneger himself after director Justin Lin dropped out of the project last September,) he did have some advice to give to the former governor.

"I was talking to him back in fall about a new Terminator film and quietly advising on that, I suppose you could say," Cameron told MTV.

The Titanic and Avatar director also told his friend Arnold that he shouldn't do the fifth Terminator film unless it was about the T-800 model.

"I was trying to be as encouraging as possible. Frankly, at that time, I thought it needed to be more about him," Cameron said. "I told him he should not do it until it's focused on his character or he shouldn't do it. I think there are some great stories that can be told about that character that haven't even been thought of yet."