The franchise reboots may never end. According to ComingSoon.net (who spotted it on TrackingB.com), Shane Black has written a spec script for Lethal Weapon 5 without really telling anyone but Joel Silver.

The story would center around Riggs' impending retirement (and his, undoubtedly, being too old for ... well, you know). But before he leaves the force, he has to tackle one last case, and as there are no other police officers in Los Angeles, he hauls Murtaugh out of retirement to help him. Allegedly, both Mel Gibson and Danny Glover are interested, though no deals have been signed.

Now, I name drop Lethal Weapon enough that you undoubtedly know that the series ranks much higher in my life than it probably should. Watching it in my pre-teens not only taught me a choice vocabulary, it rocked my world with glimpses at a naked Mel Gibson. My problems with men probably stem from the pedestal I have placed Martin Riggs upon.

But, that doesn't mean I want a fifth movie -- I already sat through the fourth installment, and it wasn't that good. Black has penned some fantastic scripts in his time -- and I firmly believe A Long Kiss Goodnight is insanely underrated -- and I'd love to see him churning out action-comedies again. But not ones with Riggs and Murtaugh. Let Lethal Weapon lie, and write a franchise that can give us a new badass or two. Check out the video below of Seth Rogen and James Franco discussing Shane Black's movies from Moviefone's latest Unscripted chat...

I figure I'm about 20 years older, at least, than the target demographic for The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2. I understand that there are some movies where I'll always feel a little old or out of touch, because they're just not made with me in mind, no matter how good or bad those movies are. Fortunately, I had no trouble empathizing with the four young women who are bound to friendship through their magical bifurcated nether garment -- more so than I did with the Sex and the City gang, who are much closer to my age.

Like Sex and the City, Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2 works better if you know the characters already through their previous appearances, because you're already emotionally invested in them. I hadn't read the young-adult novels by Ann Brashares, but my sister, who is a big fan, filled me in and we determined that this movie is based mostly on the fourth book in the series, with a few changes, so even if you've read the books you get some surprises.

As Hollywood is not an industry known for letting chick-lit properties slip through its proverbial fingertips, it should come as little surprise that the yay-for-life bestseller "Eat, Pray, Love" -- a memoir by Elizabeth Gilbert about her quest for peace in those three forms following her divorce -- is being indeed developed into a movie by Paramount, with Julia Roberts attached to star and a 2010 release date as rumored by the good ol' IMDb.

What's of arguably greater interest in this Hollywood Reporter piece is the fact that Warner Bros. has already snatched up rights to comedian Andrew Gottlieb's riff on the memoir, titled "Eat, Play, F*ck". The novel, to be published early next year, follows a man from Ireland to Vegas to Thailand as he seeks similar solace once his wife leaves him.

On the one hand, I'm all for snark, especially in response to such pre-programmed feel-good fare. On the other, this seems like a flash-in-the-pan proposition, unless "Love" hits it big and "F*ck" follows fairly soon after (ain't that usually how it goes?).

What say you, readers, about either project? I fully expect the typical fan defenses to crop up, but did any woman out there read that book and happen to be unimpressed? How about any guys who picked it up and couldn't put it down? Let's mix things up here, people!

Back in May, our Eric D. Snider made clear a common complaint regarding the latest Narnia offering, in that it was far too violent -- with or without blood -- for its given PG rating. The film went on to under-perform at the box office, for a litany of other reasons, but it was hard to ignore the potentially dominating influence of family-friendly Disney and their little Christian parable/looming blockbuster sequel on the decision.

Now, after stateside concerns along the same lines, come reports from the UK that box office behemoth The Dark Knight has merited a record number of seventy complaints in its first week of opening regarding the 12A equivalent from the British Board of Film Classification, which itself admitted to facing a modicum of pressure from studios who want lower ratings that in turn draw younger and wider audiences.

As someone who has seen that film more than once, in audiences that more than once had a parent shielding their child's eyes from the very badly burnt likes of Two-Face (um, spoiler?), it's obvious that the caution of a PG-13 (and the relative intensity of predecessor Batman Begins) failed to steer them away from the draw of the Caped Crusader.

So let's play the old-fashioned game of Point the Finger:

• Are we to blame the MPAA and BBFC for their lenient judgments?
• How about the parents who so willingly dismiss the ratings that actually are appropriate?
• For our more responsible readers, what measures do you take before allowing your children to see certain films? Do you see a film before they do and determine what's A-OK? Do you rely on reviews or websites tailored to providing custom criteria regarding a film's content?
• Sex, violence, or language: which of these factors will most likely send your child and the world at large on a moral decline from which we may never recover?

First, the obvious news: There will soon be a third live-action Scooby-Doo movie.

Now, three additional pieces of bad news:

1. It will be a direct-to-video production from Warner Premiere, which means we can probably expect it to be the kids' version of Lost Boys: The Tribe -- and I don't know any kids who deserve that sort of punishment.

2. It will be a prequel called Scooby Doo: The Beginning. Because the world just has to know how a normal dog becomes a pot-smoking food addict who can solve crimes and TALK.

3. The film will be directed by Brian Levant, who I'm sure is a very decent person, but just look at the films he's directed: Jingle All the Way, Problem Child 2, Snow Dogs, The Flintstones 2, and Are We There Yet? So ... yeah, I guess if WB is intent on going forward with this flick, they've found the right man for the job. The screenplay comes from a pair of brothers who are also turning the video game Spyro into a movie -- plus they just penned a film called Gym Teacher: The Movie.

According to Variety, Scooby Doo: The Beginning will premiere on DVD and Cartoon Network in late in 2009. (A live-action movie premiering on Cartoon Network? That's just crazy!) The IMDb has an early cast list up, but it could be erroneous at this early date -- but since I don't know who these actors are, I guess it doesn't really matter.

Behold my 1000-plus words way of asking you this simple question: how many times have you seen The Dark Knight?

Here's a little story I probably tell too often (it's even in my "Meet the Team" bio): Long ago, at an art school that should remain nameless (I hated the place too much to give it any kind of credit), I studied film production, with the crazy notion that I would be the one to bridge the gap between Steven Spielberg and Quentin Tarantino (this was in the mid-90s, when all film students just wanted to be the latter). And while I wasn't any good at being the kind of leader necessary to be a great director, I thought I was on track to (at the very least) become an Oscar-winning screenwriter.

Then, in the middle of my freshman year, I went to see 12 Monkeys. And when it was over, I stayed in the theater and I watched it again. I believe this to be the moment when I decided that I no longer wanted to be a filmmaker and wanted to be a film watcher. But it would take me another year of school -- during which I changed the names in my dream from Spielberg and Tarantino to Gilliam and Hartley -- to realize that I could be a ... professional movie theater employee!

Years more would go by before I actually realized that I was better off writing about the movies than attempting to write for the movies, and fortunately all that time managing multiplexes gave me an extra niche to write about, as well. This week's column, however, despite its long-winded introduction, is not about how I came to write "The Exhibitionist." It's actually more specifically about that repeat screening of 12 Monkeys 12 years ago. Because thanks to The Dark Knight's box office success reportedly linked in part to repeat business, I've been thinking about the few movies that I've actually seen in the theater more than once.

It's now the United Kingdom's turn to get a dose of Watchmen goodness. Empire has just premiered two different covers with new shots of our costumed adventurers. They also have three exclusive new character stills: Rorschach, the Comedian, and Nite Owl. Click on the image above (or right here) to be taken directly to the new photos, and come back to chat with me. They're definitely worth a look. The Rorschach image is close enough that you can see the fuzz on the mask. If only it was animated so you could see the ink blots shift. (I wonder if his mask will be the subject of the next video journal? I hope so.)

If there was a contest as to who is getting the best photographs, the Comedian is winning by a mile. Although thanks to the good looks of Jeffery Dean Morgan, I'm becoming disturbingly attracted to the character. That's not supposed to happen! Or is it? Oh, Watchmen, you're just full of ambiguity.

If I have one criticism of all the peeks thus far, it's that I'm really bored with seeing Nite Owl posing in front of the Owlship. I really want you guys to see the brow-beaten Dan Dreiberg that we saw in San Diego. My copy of the book was finally returned to me, and as I flipped through it, I was impressed all over again with how much Patrick Wilson resembled the panels. I hope some of these quiet moments leak onto the web, soon, and win over a few more fans.

Watchmen comes to theaters March 6, 2009.

The highly-anticipated Watchmen panel is just about to get underway. Elisabeth will be back later with a complete, detailed report on the panel, but for now here's the early recap straight from the floor:

• Hall H is absolutely bonkers right now; thousands of people have packed in for this one. Apparently you can win an X-Box 360 by texting the word 'Watchmen' to 58671.
• Zack Snider is present with his entire cast: Malin Akerman, Carla Gugino, Billy Crudup, Jackie Earle Haley, Matthew Goode, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Patrick Wilson and Dave Gibbons.
• A brief history on the project, last year's Con and the recently-released trailer. Dave Gibbons talks about what it was like to see their vision come to life. Impressed by the attention to detail throughout.
• Clip showing the non-PG aspect of the film; ridiculous extended trailer -- some of which included Dr. Manhattan kicking lots of ass in Vietnam. Elisabeth texts me to say, "Wow, that was awesome!"
  
• And now the fan questions have begun ...
• Who's your favorite Watchmen character to Snyder (surprise! he likes them all!), what's it like to play so and so, etc ...
• More questions on the mature tone and whether that's what we should expect from the future of comic book movies. Is the movie too dark? That's up to you ...
• Random Unrelated Update: Joss Whedon is in our hotel lobby right now -- Cinematical's Scott Weinberg introduces himself by saying, "Excuse me sir, I don't know if you know this, but you're Joss Whedon." Whedon replies, "That's right, I am!" Love it! Scott then asks for a photo with Joss fast, so Joss turns around and says, "Hey Nate, can you take this for us." Yup, it's Nathan Fillion. Weinberg just had his geek moment of the day.
• More Watchmen in a bit ... folks are still asking questions (what inspired that, how hard was it to do this, etc ...)
• Panel's over -- they showed the footage one more time -- and now Weinberg is heading over to the Watchmen interviews. Elisabeth will be back later with much more ...

As pleasantly surprised as I was by last summer's musical remake of Hairspray, I can't say that the prospect of sequel potential ever once came to mind. Thankfully, that's why we have Hollywood bean counters and the like, who see the success of that film, Mamma Mia! and High School Musical (including a fair amount of CD and DVD sales for each) as reason enough to have John Waters -- who wrote the 1988 original -- whip up a treatment for a Hairspray sequel.

According to Variety, returning for the project is director Adam Shankman and ... um, no one else at the moment. There isn't a writer attached, nor are any of the original stars lined up to return, although I have little reason to think that most of the young cast wouldn't be down for another one (just what is Nikki Blonsky up to now, anyway?).

Warner Bros. hopes to have Hairspray 2 (Hairspray-ier?) in theaters by July of 2010.