What is Movie News After Dark? It’s a nightly movie news column that has a bit of a fashion sense, a sometimes sexy side and perhaps even a creepy streak. It will use and abuse all of these facets of its game in tonight’s edition. This one, as they say, is a must-read. We begin tonight with an image of custom Attack the Block themed shoes made by Toni Taylor-Salisbury, whom you may know as Mrs. Junkfood Cinema. The lovely Kayla Kromer tweeted them earlier this evening, as yet another example of Mrs. Salisbury’s amazing work in the realm of geek footwear. You can check out her other work over on her Etsy store. Do it now. Then come back, because there’s more news.

I’m not generally a fan of the phrase “jumped the shark.” I think it’s presumptuous; as if I personally decided the standards with which a show should continue, and how it should be evaluated. I know what you’re saying “but… that’s exactly what you do.” Yes, yes it is. But that doesn’t mean I don’t oftentimes feel bad about it. So when it came time to think of what aspect of 2011’s television offerings I would break down for your perusal, a nagging feeling piqued in the back of my mind – a lot of what’s on television should no longer be on television. And I’m not just talking about shows like Grey’s Anatomy, Desperate Housewives, or any other number of programs that have worn out their proverbial welcome in the Neilsen households of America. No, I’m referring specifically to the handful of TV shows that chose 2011 as the year to hammer that final nail in the coffin of television irrelevancy. Just what, pray tell, are these shows that I’ve deemed no longer worthy of filling my DVR? Read on, and when preparing the hate mail, remember that Mikela has one A, not two.

I mooch Showtime off of family, friends, and strangers so it wasn’t until earlier this week that I was able to finagle my way into someone’s home to watch the Dexter finale. This is less of a personal confession and more of a warning. Yes, I will be breaking in to your house this Christmas/Hanukkah to jack cable TV from you but more importantly, if you don’t always watch Dexter finales when they originally air and still haven’t seen the shocking yet, in many ways, inevitable conclusion to season 6, then I suggest that you stop reading this right now. Though, before we address those last couple of minutes, let’s look at the season as a whole, which was the most ambitious, heavy-handed, and ultimately weirdest to date.

This Week in Blu-ray we take a late look at some of the best releases from four days ago, and eleven days ago. Okay, so it’s been a boring fortnight in Blu-ray, so were combining two weeks worth of coverage into one shot of high definition adrenaline. In this long list, however, you will find plenty of stuff worth your time and money. This includes a definitive release for The Dude, an adventure with Trolls, some time spent with everyone’s favorite serial killer and a few under-the-radar, direct-to-DVD films that are worth watching at least once. The Big Lebowski For The Dude shall get the release he so deserves. That’s how I would assume it is written in the Book of Lebowski. And that’s what we have here: the Blu-ray release — for the most part — The Dude has deserved all along. Not only is the Coen Brothers’ most popular cult hit presented in crisp, dynamically transferred and near-perfect HD, it is also presented with a few new special features. The packaging isn’t as impressive as the DVD edition I have on my display shelf that comes inside a bowling ball, but I’m willing to look past that for this particular release. It’s a great movie and this is a very good Blu-ray release. There is some HD-exclusive content, including a picture-in-picture commentary track and an interactive pop-up trivia track. It also comes with Digital Copy, because you never know when you might want to bust out Lebowski and [Due to Content Scraping and Theft, we have been forced to try abbreviated feeds. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause and woud very much appreciate you clicking through to view the full article on FilmSchoolRejects.com]

I used to love collecting TV seasons on DVD almost as much as collecting movies on DVD. But what the movie discs always added, things like commentary and behind the scenes docs, the TV discs completely lacked. After season 1, what’s left to say? We know how the show got made, why people got cast as they did, what a pain in the ass it was to get the pilot produced, the re-casting that occurred after the pilot. Extra content was hard to come by. For crying out loud, the most recent season of Dexter’s special features included episodes of other Showtime programs. Those are ads, not bonus features. A movie on DVD is easy. It’s a single thing, the story exists in that movie and that movie alone (usually). I don’t have to pop in the next five discs just to get to episode 22 where I find out that House is still a drug addict or that Jack is still really angry about something. In order to re-watch a TV series, especially a serialized one, I have to re-watch the entire thing. Very few shows exists that I enjoy watching single episodes of. I recently spent the last few weeks selling all my old TV on DVD sets, even the ones I had the complete series for, simply because I wasn’t watching them. As I packaged each one and put it into the mail box, I realized how much money I spent on the set, and how useless of a purchase it really was.

Welcome back to FSR’s weekly look at new DVD releases hitting shelves both real and virtual! It’s a relatively slow release week with nothing worth buying, but there’s still a minor theme involving three historically solid directors whose latest work shows them to be in major slumps. Luc Besson, John Carpenter and Robert Redford, I’m looking at you. Other releases this week aside from The Extraordinary Adventures of Adele Blanc-Sec, The Ward, and The Conspirator include Cary Fukunaga’s pretty but bland Jane Eyre, the hilarious clergy molestation comedy Priest, and the latest season of Showtime’s Dexter series. As always, if you see something you like, click on the image to buy it. The Bang Bang Club Four photographers in South Africa become fast friends as they cover the bloodshed and warfare accompanying the end of apartheid. The film, based on a memoir by two of them, highlights the daily dangers and moral struggles faced by photographers in a war zone. Of the many questions the film asks the one about helping your subjects instead of simply taking their picture and moving on is handled with tragic honesty. Ryan Phillippe and Taylor Kitsch both deliver strong, grounded performances, and the narrative never bores as it moves between drama and action.

Yup, it’s that time of the year again. That time of the year where we TV folk bitch and moan about what shows won’t be getting some golden Emmy love because the Academy is full of old people who think basic cable is what holds up the Brooklyn Bridge, which they also saw get built… I think… That said, this year’s Emmy Nominations are no more surprising than they were last year. Mad Men leads in the scripted drama series dept with nineteen nominations, but more interestingly, the HBO miniseries Mildred Pierce leads the overall with twenty one nominations. Before we get and further into this, let’s check out some of the shows that didn’t get nominated for anything in either overall, acting or technical categories (not that any of this matters, like usual).

After last Tuesday’s TV news bombshell that consisted of FOX obliterating pretty much every under-performing show on their schedule, many wondered what could be next from the networks in terms of picks-ups and cancellations. Well, NBC has decided to answer that question with a slew of pick-ups, none of which involve the words “wonder” or “woman.” At the moment the fourth place network has called for series orders from four pilots including Whitney a sitcom based on the stand-up comedy and starring Whitney Cummings. The Steven Spielberg produced, Gleeish musical-comedy Smash. The U.S. adaptation of the British series Prime Suspect and the Christina Applegate starring Up All Night. But that’s not all. It appears that NBC decided to have a little heart yet again as reports are filing in from all across the internet saying that spy-comedy CHUCK has indeed been renewed for a fifth season. This is by far the best news I’ve heard all day.

Gather ’round my friends for the column that never ends. You’ll be delighted by the insights, come inside, come inside… Alright fine. But I get points for trying. Another round of movie news is about to be in your face just after the break. This evening we explore the blood-splattering of everyone’s favorite blood-spatter analyst, Morgan Spurlock’s meta-movie, a Wicked show with no music, fiction from a movie blogger and the big bad guy from The Green Hornet, among other shenanigans. It’s Movie News After Dark!

With the ubiquity of crime scene investigation on television these days, odds are you’ve watched a few either out of interest, boredom, or just giving up on finding something on air that didn’t involve super smart, super attractive lab geeks. Whether you’re talking about Law & Order, CSI: Insert City, Dexter, or any number of others, the game remains the same: pretty people touching ugly things. When one touches ugly things, be it SVU styled semen-stained sheets or a room soaked in blood, you’ve got to protect your manicured hands: enter the rubber glove. Meant to keep all that nasty goo off of your hands for many reasons: cleanliness, sanitary reasons, disease protection, fetishism. From the Coroner in Castle to Dexter on Dexter, in any hour of television you’ll probably see someone slip on the glove. Then you’ll probably see them contaminate all sorts of shit.

The Taser, or stun gun, has become ubiquitous on our screens. Whether you’re watching YouTube videos, the nightly news, Dexter, Burn Notice, or Death Race, and any number of other shows and movies, you’re probably going to see someone get stunned. Maybe it’s hilarious, like in The Hangover or maybe it’s not. You’d think that with so many real videos of bros, grandmas, and the wheelchair bound being stunned almost nightly on the news and internet that Hollywood would have a pretty firm grasp of how a Taser works and what it does to a person. You would, of course, be wrong.

With premiere week over I’ve compiled a list of the week’s top premieres from each night. The winner of each night is based upon the quality of the writing, the shows entertainment value and if it’s a new series, the shows sustainability. This year had some extremely heavy hitters and some of the best performances we have seen on the small screen. So without further ado, here are the winners of the FSR Fall 2010 Watch List (please note that this list only applies to shows that started before or during the week of September 19th). Sunday: Boardwalk Empire In what should come as no surprise, Boardwalk Empire was top dog on Sunday. I’m not big into period pieces which is why I really never got into Mad Men, but Scorsese has made me fall in love with the 20′s and Atlantic City. Steve Buscemi is a great lead and a guy I can’t wait to watch every week. If only Scorsese could direct every episode and not just the pilot.

Today begins a week long TV feature on FSR, as this week is officially premiere week for all major networks. So we’re here to tell all the good stuff premiering (both new and returning), or in some cases what has already begun. So get your DVR remote ready because this is the first of six all new FSR WATCH LISTs. The first night on our list is Sunday. Sunday is notorious for being both a haven of creation, and a pit of downfall for many TV series. So let’s begin…

This weekend marked the ceremony for the 2010 Creative Arts Primetime Emmy Awards. This ceremony handles all the minor and technical awards for the The Academy of Television Arts & Sciences, with the Major Awards being announced next week at the 62nd Annual Primetime Emmy Awards. The two big network winners of the night were HBO and ABC, both walking away with 17 and 15 awards respectively.

Join us each week as Rob Hunter takes a look at new DVD releases and gives his highly unqualified opinion as to which titles are worth BUYing, which are better off as RENTals, and which should be AVOIDed at all costs. And remember, these listings and category placements are meant as informational conversation starters only. But you can still tell Hunter how wrong he is in the comment section below. The big news this week is the long overdue US release of the incredibly entertaining Korean western, The Good the Bad the Weird. Aside from that it’s a pretty ‘meh’ week with Temple Grandin, Skellig: The Owl Man, Cemetery Junction, Cougar Town, and more. See all of this week’s relevant DVD releases after the jump…

Showtime Networks has a big presence in San Diego this year, from gigantic banners to multiple panels to a button campaign and several buses toting fellow nerds around the city. The crux of their advertising campaign this year revolvers around the idea that Showtime’s ‘heroes’ have more fun. Specifically we’re talking about Weeds, Californication, Dexter, and Nurse Jackie, shows that prominently feature some rather messed up main characters who are dysfunctional on some level. While each of these shows was represented on a panel (Dexter was on two), most of the information that was revolved focused on Hank Moody’s furthered adventures and the future of Dexter Morgan, so that’s what we’ll be talking about here. Plus those two shows are super awesome.

In a three-way, melee attack of awesome that will leave you wondering how we removed your heart from your chest without breaking the skin, FSR is gearing up to head to sunny San Diego in order to stay indoors all weekend. Interviewer extraordinaire Jack Giroux, Robert “Fists of” Fure and I will be sharing the experience with you from Wednesday night through a hungover Sunday morning. Pack your bags, dear reader, because you’ll be coming along for the ride. Just don’t believe Fure when he tells you he’s a commercial airline pilot.

For a moment there was a part of my nerdy brain that wanted to a cross-over between RoboCop and the serial killer with the Dark Passenger, but it was fleeting. While it would be cool to see Peter Weller bring back his most famous cyborg crime-fighter, just having him as a member of the Dexter cast should be good enough. Throughout most of the upcoming season, Weller will play a “troubled Miami Metro police officer who gets caught up in an internal affairs investigation.” This investigation will no doubt have some effect on the world of Dexter Morgan (Michael C. Hall), as Dexter is now going to be looking for danger around every corner after the way season four ended. No spoilers here, but you probably know what I’m talking about. Weller should be a welcome addition to this solid and ever-growing cast. [Deadline]

Nominations for the 62nd annual Emmy Awards were announced today — and boy, are they a let-down. Plenty of great shows were snubbed while some usual suspects were treated to another round of nominations. In the end, it’s hard to argue with several nominations for Breaking Bad, some send-off noms for Lost and a round of names from the Mad Men cast on the list. But I can’t help but wonder why recognition wasn’t paid to some of television’s best drama, namely Sons of Anarchy, or its best and most overlooked comedies, shows like Community and the dearly departed Party Down. Then of course, there’s Conan O’Brien getting a nomination for The Tonight Show. That made me giggle.

Like some of you, I am yet to get all the way through Dexter season four. I do know this — some shocking stuff happens, stuff that might make this very news item rather spoilery.