In the fourth episode of Arrested Development‘s third (and what initially seemed to be its final) season, Michael Bluth wakes up to find the handlebars of his bike in his bed, placed there by GOB, his sheets stained with bike grease. The moment is a clear reference to one of the most iconic scenes from The Godfather, where studio executive Jack Woltz awakes to find the severed head of his prized horse in his bed after refusing to give Johnny Fontaine a prize role in the film. But Arrested Development‘s relationship to The Godfather trilogy isn’t isolated to occasional references or sly parodies. Instead, the underlying structure of the series seems to be modeled off Francis Ford Coppola’s canonized adaptation of Mario Puzo’s crime saga. Here are a few connections between the three existing seasons of Arrested Development and the three Godfather films. Perhaps there will be more to look for when Arrested Development pulls us back in on May 26th.

Somebody somewhere just blue himself. Probably millions of people, really. With the return of a beloved show like Arrested Development, there’s always that small voice in that back of your head worried that it won’t be as good. Or worse, that it will be a disaster which abjectly ruins all the warm memories you had and proves that cancelled passions should stay dormant. The trailer for AD‘s Netflix-powered season 4 should help slap that little voice for doubting. Check it out for yourself:

Tonight on Movie News After Dark, we go back to the 1960s for a NASA series (squee!), get a behind the scenes look at how Transformers are made, talk TV controversy, make fun of Zach Braff, look at a few great summer movie previews and go rapid-fire with a ton of character posters.

While it’s still hard to believe that we’re finally getting new episodes of the brilliant Arrested Development (thanks, Netflix!), it’s not hard to believe that the show has started rolling out funny and clever bits of marketing that make something like “getting excited about character posters” not seem insane. Instead of unveiling a set of stills featuring each member of the Bluth family in all their glory, the series has instead crafted a series of posters that use recognizable props that apply to each individual Bluth, so fans of the show will instantly be able to recognize their favorite star with ease (the one we want on our walls ASAP? Lucille’s classic pill bottle). Season 4 of Arrested Development arrives on Netflix in its entirety at 12:01 AM Pacific Time on Sunday, May 26th, so set your alarms now. Check out the rest of the “character” posters after the break. [Vulture, TV Line, IGN]

You’ve known that it was coming, you’ve planned for it, you’ve reupholstered your sofa for it, so this is merely a public service announcement to inform you that the new 15-episode season of Arrested Development is hitting Netflix on Sunday, May 26th. That gives you a month and a half to figure out how much hot ham water you’ll need to muscle through all 15 without a break as well as a good excuse for calling in sick to work that Monday. Maybe hot ham water poisoning. And, seriously, what boss makes you work on Memorial Day anyway? Oh, and here’s an anticipation-filled poster too:

Tonight on America’s #1 nightly entertainment news column, the Bluth family changes television forever, Harvey Weinstein is a playa, Hollywood is done with sex and Damon Lindelof explains himself (or Prometheus 2). Also, Terrence Malick jokes.

I’m guessing you just blue yourself, because I did. Deadline Hollywood is reporting that Mitch Hurwitz made too much footage when filming the new Netflix-ordered Arrested Development, so they’re just going to make Netflix buy more and extend the season from 10 episodes to 12-15. That’s right. They had so much good material, that they’re going to weave in new stories and work it all into a larger-than-anticipated block. Production has suspended so that Hurwitz can review and re-plan for renewed filming in January. So far, the change does not seem like it will alter the release in March of all the episodes. Feel free to celebrate by endlessly quoting the show in the comments section.

Are you willing to put down your hot ham water and do a ton of work for the chance to win a small part in the new season of Arrested Development? That’s unsurprising. After all, you’re messing around on our site instead of researching how to save your employer another few thousand dollars a year by switching copier machine companies or whatever. Why not take a little extra time to achieve a life goal? The production is hosting the You’re Gonna Get Some Walk-Ons contest, and the rules are simple.

Will there ever be an Arrested Development movie? If you’re anything like those of us around Reject HQ, you may have lost sleep over the question in the years following the exit of Mitch Hurwitz’s comedy series from the airwaves. Blame Joss Whedon, who turned the loss of Firefly into a pretty entertaining big screen experiment with Serenity. Now every TV show we love that gets cancelled will suffer the fate of unending rumors about a cinematic adaptation. In the case of Arrested Development, rumors have come and gone and come again. And until Netflix announced that it would be bringing the series back for another season on its streaming platform, none of us really thought we’d ever get to spend time with the Bluthes again. Even as we were writing articles like 8 Things We Need to See in the Arrested Development Movie, we didn’t seriously think it would happen. We were simply delusional. Playful, even. But now, things might actually be different.

If you’ve never seen Jonathan Ames’s recently cancelled HBO show Bored to Death, you might want to brush up on the premium cable mystery/comedy show, for costar Ted Danson recently suggested in an interview with French journalist Pierre Lenglas (according to Lenglas’s Twitter account) that a feature-length Bored to Death movie might be in the works. To be fair, nothing official has been announced and, according to Vulture, HBO qualified Danson’s statement my stating that the creators and talent of the show are only in the early stages of conversation. But with Jason Schwartzman and Zack Galifianakis rounding out the show’s cast, a Bored to Death movie might make quite a bit of sense. Bored to Death ran for three seasons from 2009-2011, and chronicled the misadventures of Jonathan Ames (Schwartzman), a struggling writer who becomes an amateur detective in order to get over being dumped by his girlfriend Suzanne (Olivia Thirlby). His best friend Ray (Galifianakis) is a deeply insecure comic book artist who struggles to maintain power in his relationship with his on-again, off-again girlfriend Leah (Heather Burns). Danson plays Ames’s boss, George Christopher, the editor of a New Yorker-style magazine and a ginormous pothead. While the show lost steam for me in its third season, Bored to Death was a clever and surprisingly warm show about the difficulties of commitment, the changes in New York City’s boroughs, the death of the printed word, and narcissism. It’s the type of show that could only have aired on HBO.

What is Movie News After Dark? A lot of nightly movie news columns are about life, this one is like a slice of cake. We begin tonight with the master himself, Alfred Hitchcock. More appropriately, we begin with Anthony Hopkins as Alfred Hitchcock in Sacha Gervasi’s Hitchcock, the story of the making of Psycho. He’s got a bit of the look, in so much as he had the Nixon look. But as we know, even if he looks like Don Rickles playing Alfred Hitchcock, he’s likely to bring the thunda.

What is Movie News After Dark? It’s a nightly movie news column that never got to go to Motherboy, as it’s not human and does not, as it turns out, have a mother. It will have to take to watching old episodes of Arrested Development to fuel its disfunction. Or perhaps it can watch some new episodes… Tonight’s top story, Arrested Development is coming back. And we have Netflix to thank for it. The DVD rental service turned confused corporate buffoon turned hero to all in the kingdom of nerddom has inked a deal, along with 20th Century Fox, to bring back AD for 10 episodes that will stream exclusively to Netflix subscribers in early 2013. And there’s still a rumor about a movie, but lets not get ahead of ourselves. Editor’s Note: There’s also more news this evening, so keep reading…

What is Movie News After Dark? This is a question that I am almost never asked, but I will answer it for you anyway. Movie News After Dark is FSR’s newest late-night secretion, a column dedicated to all of the news stories that slip past our daytime editorial staff and make it into my curiously chubby RSS ‘flagged’ box. It will (but is not guaranteed to) include relevant movie news, links to insightful commentary and other film-related shenanigans. I may also throw in a link to something TV-related here or there. It will also serve as my place of record for being both charming and sharp-witted, but most likely I will be neither of the two. I write this stuff late at night, what do you expect?

What is Movie News After Dark? This is a question that I am almost never asked, but I will answer it for you anyway. Movie News After Dark is FSR’s newest late-night secretion, a column dedicated to all of the news stories that slip past our daytime editorial staff and make it into my curiously chubby RSS ‘flagged’ box. It will (but is not guaranteed to) include relevant movie news, links to insightful commentary and other film-related shenanigans. I may also throw in a link to something TV-related here or there. It will also serve as my place of record for being both charming and sharp-witted, but most likely I will be neither of the two. I write this stuff late at night, what do you expect?

What is Movie News After Dark? This is a question that I am almost never asked, but I will answer it for you anyway. Movie News After Dark is FSR’s newest late-night secretion, a column dedicated to all of the news stories that slip past our daytime editorial staff and make it into my curiously chubby RSS ‘flagged’ box. It will (but is not guaranteed to) include relevant movie news, links to insightful commentary and other film-related shenanigans. I may also throw in a link to something TV-related here or there. It will also serve as my place of record for being both charming and sharp-witted, but most likely I will be neither of the two. I write this stuff late at night, what do you expect?

With this entry, we will have made it an entire week with my new-fangled column, known to you as Movie News After Dark. Congratulations to the seven (or so) of you who have been following along. It’s been a blast. It seems fitting that on a day when I spent more than the necessary amount of time on Twitter bemoaning the fact that most movie blogs don’t care about real movie discussions (they only — I argued — want to republish the top ten lists of filmmakers who saw 11 movies in 2010), that I bring you several news stories that are rather silly. It may be hypocritical in your minds, but what makes it okay is the fact that I really love you, dear readers. And those other sites don’t love you. Trust me, I heard them say it.

Your daily recommended allowance of random movie stuff, stories that fell through the cracks, and news you can’t use.

It pains me to report such news, but if actor and comedian David Cross is to be believed — and we have no reason not to believe him at this point — the Arrested Development movie is dead in the water.

Ever wondered if Kate from Lost would still be hot as a Simpsons character? (Spoiler alert: she totally does).

In the last ten years, practices of storytelling and spectatorship in television have changed drastically, and, most likely, for good.