First Look: Pics from G.I. Joe The Movie!

In case you haven't heard just yet, Paramount Pictures is coming up with the live-action adaptation of the G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero Hasbro action-figure toy franchise.

G.I. Joe: The Movie is due out on August 2009. The film is directed by Stephen Sommers (the dude who gave us The Mummy series of flicks and Van Helsing), and written by Stuart Beattie (who was involved in 30 Days of Night, The Messengers and Pirates of the Carribean: Curse of the Black Pearl).

Just last week, several movie blogs have posted pictures of G.I. Joe: The Movie's ensemble cast. Without further ado, let's get on with it.

Dennis Quaid is General Hawk. General Clayton Abernathy, or Hawk, is G.I. Joe's team leader. Quaid described Hawk as "a cross between Chuck Yeager and Sgt. Rock and maybe a naïve Hugh Hefner". News is, not only has he filmed all his scenes within the first two months of production, but Quaid is signed on for two sequels.

Collider.com has a larger picture of Hawk, which you can check out here.

Channing Tatum is Duke. First Sergeant Conrad Hauser, or Duke, is the team's field commander and second-in-command of the G.I. Joe Team after Hawk.

Duke was usually regarded as the G.I. Joe poster boy; he was at the top of his class at Fort Benning, has undergone Special Forces training and worked with South Vietnamese Tribesmen. He was also an instructor in four different Special Forces schools. Despite his accomplishments, he has repeatedly turned down any officer commissions offered to him. He believes a commander's place is with his troops, not behind the battle lines.

Trivia: the role of Duke was originally offered to Mark Wahlberg. Check out the high resolution picture of Duke on the MTV Movies Blog.

Rachel Nichols plays the role of Master Sergeant Shana O'Hara, or Scarlett, G.I. Joe's resident Counter-Intelligence Specialist. You probably best remember her playing the role of C.I.A. Special Agent Rachel Gibson on the later seasons of the ABC Television series Alias, as Sydney Bristow's (played by Jennifer Garner) protege.

Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje plays Heavy Ordnance Expert Lamont A. Morris, or Heavy Duty. You probably best remember him as Ecko on the ABC Television series Lost.

Heavy Duty's G.I. Joe file card says he also has a passion for classical guitars and Bach. He is described as being unafraid of any situation despite heavy enemy fire.

Check out the high resolution Heavy Duty pic here on ComingSoon.net.

Marlon Wayans is Wallace W. Weems, or Ripcord.

Marlon doesn't appear with brother Shawn on this movie. Some of his past projects included White Chicks, Little Man, and the first two Scary Movie flicks.

A fan of the franchise, Wayans was cast on the strength of his performance in Requiem for a Dream, according to Wikipedia.

Check out the exclusive high-res image of Ripcord on Chud.com.

Ray Park is the bad-ass G.I. Joe Commando, Snake Eyes. The mysterious Snake Eyes has always been a fan favorite. He's not only an expert in hand-to-hand combat and martial arts, according to the Marvel comic book, Snake Eyes is also a ninja master. His face was disfigured in a helicopter accident, which also left him completely mute.

Snake Eyes will be brought to life by Ray Park, who you probably best remember as the Sith Lord Darth Maul in Star Wars Episode I, and as Toad in the first X-Men movie. Ray Park has a second degree black belt in Northern Shaolin Kung Fu, and is also well-versed in wushu and gymnastics.

Saïd Taghmaoui is Alvin R. Kibbey, codenamed Breaker, the team's communications specialist. Breaker is supposedly familiar with practically every bit of communication gear on the planet, and has a habit of chewing gum in any situation.

You can probably remember Saïd from his previous projects Vantage Point, Hidalgo, and The Kite Runner.

Check out the exclusive high-res photo of Breaker on Dark Horizons.

Our main villain in the movie is weapons dealer and warmonger Destro, played by English stage, television and film actor, Christopher Eccleston, well-known for his roles in Shallow Grave, 28 Days Later, and the ninth incarnation of the Doctor in the most recent Doctor Who.

Yes, he still gets to wear the familiar Destro mask. This time, he is the man behind the Military Armaments Research System, or M.A.R.S., a global manufacturer of hi-tech weaponry.

Check out the write-up on Destro, as well as the high-resolution pic, here on IESB.net.

Siena Miller plays the European aristocrat Anastasia DeCobray, more notoriously known as The Baroness, Cobra's Intelligence Officer and supposedly, Destro's partner.

As the story goes, Siena Miller prepared with four months of weight training, boxing sessions and learned to fire live ammunition, in the end, gaining five pounds of muscle. Check out the high-resolution pic of The Baroness on IGN.com Movies.

Lastly, we have a shot of Snake-Eyes' arch-nemesis, the equally bad-ass ninja bodyguard Storm Shadow. Played by South Korean actor Lee Byung-hun.

Storm Shadow is supposedly Cobra Commander's yojimbo and assassin. In the comic book storyline, he and Snake-Eyes come from the same ninja clan.

You can see the full picture on LatinoReview.com.

G.I. Joe: The Movie also stars Joseph Gordon-Levitt (formerly of the TV comedy, Third Rock From The Sun) as Cobra Commander, supermodel Karolína Kurková as Cover Girl, Hawk's aide-de-camp, and the Mummy himself, Arnold Vosloo as the mercenary Zartan. Brendan Fraser supposedly makes a cameo in the movie, with a still un-named role.

Hope you enjoyed this post. Cheers, everyone!

Denny Duquette is The Comedian!

Forgive me for not getting the connection so much earlier, even if the photos had been out for almost a month already.

If you're a fan of Grey's Anatomy, you probably remember Denny Duquette, right? The dude who managed to snag Dr. Stevens' heart and left her with eight million dollars in Season Two/Three?

Well that dude is Jeffrey Dean Morgan, who incidentally, also plays John Winchester, demon-hunting dad of our two leads- Sam and Dean- on Supernatural. Yep, that's him on the right.

Right after I read Alan Moore's graphic novel all over again, I felt compelled to do some research about it online, and thus made the connection. Morgan plays the role of The Comedian in Zack Snyder's (same dude who directed "300") take on "The Watchmen". The movie is coming out about a year from now (in March 2009), but from what we heard, most of the footage has been shot, and the project is on post-production right now.

Now, as far as I know, The Comedian (the dude with the cigar in the pic to the left) doesn't really have super-powers- he's really a down-to-earth badass, almost like Marvel's Nick Fury. Even as superheroes had been outlawed in an alternate reality, The Comedian had continued to serve the US Government as a commando/special ops guy, touring global hot spots like Vietnam, Iran and pretty much wherever there was conflict- even helping quell some civilian riots at home.

Check out Morgan as The Comedian right here:

Now doesn't he look totally badass? Even if that just looks like regular Kevlar armor (I'm assuming) with a bandoleer of grenades + a standard army-issue grenade launcher, he looks rather menacing enough. Definitely worth watching out for.

According to FirstShowing.net, the movie arrives in theaters everywhere on March 6th, 2009. Stay tuned for even more Watchmen coverage, photos, and more exclusives on First Showing's official website.

Cheers, everyone!

This post originally came out in another blog of mine, "Renzie's Rants and Raves". I moved it to this blog shortly after creating it in March 2008.