It’s the final countdown. Dunuh na naaaa. Less than two weeks to go until Christmas, so naturally now’s the time to start buying things. Who needs organizational skills when you can imbue that action-film frenzied spirit into your final rounds of festive gift buying? Since I’m the collectible fiend around these parts, I’ve been tasked with listing the essential holiday gifts from that world for every film fan. It hasn’t been easy, and I’ve mentally spent way too much money in compiling the list myself. But hey, occupational hazard. Anyway, here follows 15 of the must-have collectibles for this holiday season, some regulars of the Merch Hunter column will recognize, and some will be brand new. Either way, they’re what movie lovers want. As this is my handiwork, you can expect a general mix of the uber-expensive and ultra-collectible as well as the affordable and accessible, more charming options. No snob am I….

Disney’s limited engagement re-release of a 3D-ized The Lion King is poised to cross the $80m mark today, which means the latest news from the studio is essentially of the “what took you so long?” variety. Disney and Pixar have announced that they will give the 3D re-release treatment to (at least) four more titles over the next two years. You can start swinging your Nemo plushie around in a plastic bag right about now. And you want to put on your Ariel wig? Should I wait for you to sprout legs, too? Fine, I’ll wait. Disney and Pixar have picked Beauty and the Beast, Finding Nemo, Monsters Inc., and The Little Mermaid as their next titles to get an added dimension and a return to theaters. Beauty and the Beast will dance into theaters first (anthropomorphic tableware and all) on January 13, 2012. It will most likely demolish its mid-January competition, just like Simba snapped right through September. Pixar will join in on the re-release mayhem with Finding Nemo swimming back to theaters on September 14, 2012, followed by Monsters, Inc. on January 18, 2013. The long-awaited prequel to Monsters Inc., Monsters University, will open (in 3D!) later that year, on June 21. Disney will then re-release The Little Mermaid on September 13, 20123. As a kid, The Little Mermaid was tied with 101 Dalmatians as my favorite Disney flick, so the six-year-old in me is hysterically screaming on the heels of this news. All of the films will get [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]

What is Movie News After Dark? It’s hard to say, really. All we know for sure is that NASA is trying to cover it up. Chances are that you’ve seen tonight’s lead photo before — it’s one of many spy shots from the set of Man of Steel featuring Henry Cavill’s new look as Superman. But lets talk about this for a moment. What do we think about this? Is it the fanboy kryptonite as Hero Complex might suggest? I’m not convinced that anything is good or bad for the Superman franchise anymore. Perhaps staying dormant would have been a good idea. But then again, I’m the guy who liked Superman Returns. If Zack Snyder is going for different, he’s certainly found it.

It’s no surprise that Pixar is going into its bullpen to choose a director for their sequel to Monsters, Inc. Neil cast his vote for Angus MacLane (who directed the Wall-E short Burn-E), but we can now confirm that the job has gone to Dan Scanlon. This will be Scanlon’s first feature film, but he has a writing credit on Cars, a co-director credit on the short Mater and the Ghostlight, and he’s acted as a storyboard artist on several project. It’s difficult to say what kind of job Scanlon will do with Monsters University, but he’s got the benefit of the doubt when it comes to the Pixar team. The question really is, what will fans want to see in the sequel? What kind of partying does a young monster do while away at school?

This year is the first in a while that Pixar hasn’t had a movie on our Most Anticipated List, but that might change next year since they’ll be re-introducing the world to Mike and Sully from Monsters Inc Fortunately, they’ll be doing so by taking us all back in time to the rowdy college days at the University of Fear where the two became friends. They’ll most likely go on some epic, wacky adventure between rounds of fear pong and chasing one-eyed co-eds. Making Monsters Inc 2 a prequel is a potentially great idea because it opens up the world to more explanation and the kind of adventure that won’t seem quite as forced as seeing Mike and Sully take down another bad guy in the corporate structure. Plus, you know, all the raves. [Twitch]

Nine years after the hugely successful Pete Docter directed Monsters, Inc. hit theaters, new chairman of Walt Disney Studios Rich Ross announced a second installment slated for November 2012 at a media event on Thursday.

Hey kids, it’s time for a very special edition of This Week in Blu-ray dedicated to the three releases from Walt Disney Home Entertainment, a trifecta of beautiful Pixar movies coming at you in 1080p.

With today’s release of Up on DVD and Blu-ray, there is also some news from Pixar central about director Pete Docter and his next project.