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With Zack Snyder pinned down by his obligations to a reboot of the "Superman" movie franchise, fans are rightly starting to lose hope in ever seeing the director's planned adaptation of Frank Miller's "300" follow-up, "Xerxes." You still might get to see "Xerxes" in film however, as another geek-friendly auteur may be easing into the director's chair.

UPDATE: A spokesperson for Warner Bros. has told EW that the report indicating that Guy Ritchie has been offered the "Xerxes" director's chair is "an erroneous rumor."

Warner Bros. has reportedly offered the gig to "Sherlock Holmes" director Guy Ritchie, according to Vulture. There's no official indication of why the studio is making the switch, though one theory suggests that Warner Bros. wants to keep Snyder's entire focus on the Man of Steel.

Anonymous "insiders" tell Vulture that the in-development reboot suffers from some major third-act woes. Add to that the fact that the studio loses the rights to Superman if a production isn't in front of cameras by 2013, and the scenario certainly seems feasible. Read more...

Tags 300, guy ritchie, superman, Xerxes, zack snyder

Interest in Watson's quest to dethrone humanity as Earth's trivia champions on "Jeopardy!" continued last night. Matt Fraction predicted how it all would end, Chip Zdarsky called for Alex Trebek to show some more emotion, and Brian Lynch hoped for an easy final challenge.

There's some movie tweetage awaiting you after the click as well. There, you'll find a wish for the "Axe Cop" adaptation and a wish for the "Ghost Rider" film that's not in theaters this year. It's all there along with a missed marketing opportunity for LL Cool J.

I'm @brianwarmoth, and this is your Twitter Report for February 16, 2011. Read more...

Tags brian lynch, brian michael bendis, chip zdarsky, chris hastings, ehtan nicolle, johnny ryan, matt fraction, Twitter Report

We're all still buzzing over the "X-Men: First Class" trailer, and the June 3-releasing mutant super-team origin story is really going to be here before you know it. Star January Jones, who plays the telepathic, diamond-skinned mutant Emma Frost in the film, spoke to MTV News during the press junket for "Unknown" (out this Friday) about the challenges of playing a character who spends at least part of her time thinking her words at people as opposed to speaking them aloud.

"Well, I'm telepathic too. So James [McAvoy] and I just had a lot of staring at each other, trying to out-think each other," she said, referring to McAvoy's role as X-Men founder and fellow telepath Charles Xavier. She added, "If someone has footage of that, the outtakes need to be released somewhere because it's retarded. Not in a bad way." Read more...

Tags January Jones, Video, x-men: first class

David E. Kelly's "Wonder Woman" TV series continues to gear up for its unveiling as part of NBC's next pilot season. The last report pegged "Friday Night Lights" producer Jeffrey Reiner to direct the inaugural episode and now a casting sheet has surfaced revealing a few new facts about Kelley's plans for the series.

Most notably, the Wonder Woman role is pegged for a character in her "late 20s to 30s," DC Women Kicking Ass reports. No ethnicity is specified, though the sheet specifically mentions blue eyes. The character is described as "a real woman who yearns to live a normal life." Read more...

Tags wonder woman

"Smallville" continues its march toward the grand finale of its 10-year run this weekend with a new episode titled "Masquerade" that looks to bring Clark Kent and his fellow heroes a little closer to their inevitable brawl with Darkseid.

This time around, the team clashes with one of Darkseid's minions, Desaad (Steve Byers), who kidnaps Chloe Sullivan (Allison Mack) and attempts to sway her to the side of evil. Given that we just got Chloe back, here's hoping the team manages to extricate her from danger.

The CW has released a pair of videos promoting this week's episode, including a preview trailer and a full clip from "Masquerade." Read more...

Tags smallville

Not everyone around Splash Page HQ is as obsessed with film and television composers as I am, but even if you only half-listen to the music in movies — particularly music in movies over the past few years — Hans Zimmer has made an impact on your filmgoing life.

Not only is the man responsible for the music of "Batman Begins" and "The Dark Knight" a brilliant composer, he's absolutely delightful in person, too — even when MTV News is constantly harassing him for "The Dark Knight Rises" scoops. And that's exactly what I did last night when I caught up with Zimmer at the premiere of yet another film he scored, the animated adventure "Rango."

Asked how many notes of "The Dark Knight Rises" score he has down now, Zimmer laughed, "Ugh. No, no, no, no." [Translation: I don't want to talk about that!] Read more...

Tags Hans Zimmer, the dark knight

This week, we've given you a peek at many of the upcoming toy lines based on the year's most anticipated comic book movies and television series, and that continues with yet another line that debuted at Toy Fair 2011 this weekend.

True believers, feast your eyes on the new line of "Captain America: The First Avenger" toys, courtesy of the good folks at Hasbro...

"Big with 'Captain America' and the action figure line is the super articulation and the likeness to the actors in the film," Hasbro rep Brian McMullan told MTV News. "Chris Evans plays Captain America in the film and it's Chris Evans' likeness in the action figures as Captain America." Read more...

Tags captain america, Captain America: The First Avenger, photo, Video

Last night, The Paley Center in New York City hosted the world premiere of "All Star Superman," the animated adaptation of the famous and critically-acclaimed, 12-issue series by Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely.

The direct-to-DVD feature was adapted to the screen by comic book creator and screenwriter Dwayne McDuffie, and stars James Denton ("Desperate Housewives") as Superman, Christina Hendricks ("Mad Men") as Lois Lane, and Anthony LaPaglia ("Without A Trace") as Lex Luthor.

In the film, a cosmic adventure leaves Superman with significantly greater powers, but with one big catch — they're slowly killing him. The Man of Steel is left wondering how much he can accomplish in his last days with his newfound power. Read more...

Tags all star superman, Andrea Romano, Christina Hendricks, Dwayne McDuffie

The official title for Marc Webb's upcoming reboot of the Spider-Man movie franchise was announced yesterday, and now the world will need to start referring to the project by its true name: "The Amazing Spider-Man."

But are you happy with the new title?

Around Splash Page HQ, we're pretty psyched about the obvious reference to the longest-running Spidey comic book series on the market, but there's some concern that mainstream audiences might not dig the adjective-friendly title. What do you think? Read more...

Tags Polls, spider-man, the amazing spider-man

Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson invaded the Twittersphere as a trending topic Monday night when he returned to professional wrestling and announced that he will be hosting Wrestlemania XXVII in April. Jeff Katz, Jill Thompson and Becky Cloonan all seemed excited about that, even as Jhonen Vasquez sounded a little aggravated about his Valentine's Day expenses.

The other big TV star of the night was a computer named Watson who competed against some simple human beings on "Jeopardy!" A call for the computer's destruction along with some evil plans for Moon Knight and a poetically minimalist summary of "Watchmen" can be see after the jump.

I'm @brianwarmoth, and this is your Twitter Report for February 15, 2011. Read more...

Tags andy diggle, becky cloonan, brian michael bendis, faith erin hicks, jeff katz, jhonen vasquez, jill thompson, marc bernardin, Twitter Report