First, a new image of Alina Puscau in the costume she wears in the film:

Alina has been featured in the Pepe Jeans and Victoria Secret campaigns as well as in magazines like Harper’s Bazaar and Allure. In 2009 she was featured on the cover of Playboy magazine in a shoot by Hollywood director Brett Ratner. Alina is signed with Elite Model Management.

On August 11th Alina will make her acting debut in the upcoming summer blockbuster Conan the barbarian in which she plays one of the slaves who rebels against oppression.

For more news, click onwards.

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There is still quite a bit of confusion about the upcoming Conan the Barbarian film. Some think it’s a remake of the 1982 film; others think it’s a sequel or re-imagining of it; still others have wildly different expectations and myriad misunderstandings of the character, his creation, and the film itself.

Well, I figured it’s time to put everything of importance into a short as possible, easy-to-read, plain English document for those who don’t know Conan. Think of this as a primer for anyone not closely versed in Conan, the Hyborian Age, or Robert E. Howard, whose only experience of Conan may be a late night talk-show host or a plucky little detective anime.

But they can’t remake Conan the Barbarian! Arnold was Conan! Milius was a Genius! This is an outrage!

A great man once said “Everybody has opinions: I have them, you have them. And we are all told from the moment we open our eyes, that everyone is entitled to his or her opinion. Well, that’s horsepuckey, of course. We are not entitled to our opinions; we are entitled to our informed opinions. Without research, without background, without understanding, it’s nothing.”

With that in mind, let me be perfectly blunt: if your only experience of Conan is previous adaptations, then you are not entitled to an opinion on the 2011 film’s fidelity to the Conan character. You can judge it on its own cinematic merits, as a moviegoing experience, or whatever. But without research, without background, without understanding, your opinion is nothing. If something in the 2011 film is different from something in the 1982 film, that does not make it unfaithful to the Conan character. Full stop. End of. Fin.

I’m not saying you have to read all of Robert E. Howard’s stories before going to see the film (though that would be awesome), I’m just saying you really should know that Conan existed for 50 years before 1982. I have spent too much time trying to explain to people that Conan existed for 20 years before Arnold Schwarzenegger was even born to have much patience left, and in this age of the internet, there is no excuse for ignorance. And this particular sort of ignorance is annoying, because it is so easily remedied with a simple, 5-second Google or Wikipedia search.

With that out of the way, onward.

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Being a dweller in the proud nation of Alba, I’d been precluded from viewing the latest edition of The Tonight Show, and thus stewed at my American fellows for being able to see the new footage of the upcoming Conan seen on the show. However, NBC has deigned to allow access on their own site, where we can see it:

Not as long as “When Blood is Spilled,” but we see more main characters, including adult Conan and more.

EDIT: I’ve been getting reports that the clip cuts off before the footage, so I tried looking again and… it cuts off before the footage. Now I’m very annoyed. NBC, you made a liar out of me! I’d be very grateful if someone could direct me to a version of the video not under the draconian region-specific software that makes things such a preposterous pain for people who don’t live in the United States.

In somewhat surprising news, we’ve found someone else has thrown their sweet hat into the arena to come up with a sequel for the upcoming Conan – Jason Momoa himself. In an interview with CraveOnline.com, Jason revealed that he’s come up with his own script for the sequel:

Conan himself has big plans for the next Conan movie, and he’s writing the script to prove it.

We’ve got some great interviews with the cast and crew of Conan the Barbarian coming up for you in the next week or so, but we couldn’t wait to drop this little bit of news from Conan himself, Jason Momoa, who says he’s writing a script for the sequel, provided of course that audiences come out for the first one. Time will tell if Momoa’s story or script are actually utilized for Conan 2 - whatever it may be called – but until then he dropped some hints of what’s coming next if he has his way.

Believe me, I have a lot to say about this, which I’ll add later. For the interview, the show must click on.

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You thought you were rid of that beardy Scotsman? Well, he was sighted at Glasgow Central Station, where he managed to persuade his assistant to take a quick snap with her camera phone. Now we can really tell the advertising’s in full swing.

Onwards for more news!

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A couple of neat new snippets for your perusal today, the most interesting being a brand new image of Jason as Conan, as well as a new poster!

First, though, a Vanity Fair interview (via Limelife, since I can’t seem to find it on Vanity Fair’s own bloody website) as the reporter seems utterly smitten with Jason. Interesting note: Jason had hair extensions for Conan. But… his own hair was a pretty decent length. Why extensions? Weird.

The eclectically named Gordon and the Whale also have an interview, this time with Jason and Rachel Nichols, but you’ll have to click on to read more!

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One of the pressing concerns about the upcoming Conan the Barbarian film was the score.  How can you follow up on what’s considered one of the greatest fantasy film scores ever committed to film? Obviously there was little hope Bates’ score would match up to Basil Poledouris’ opus, but now we can hear a taster of his compositions for the new film at Amazon.com, so we can at least compare parts of it.

	1. Prologue	Tyler Bates	2:08	Not Available
	2. His Name Is Conan	Tyler Bates	3:35	Not Available
	3. Egg Race	Tyler Bates	2:52	Not Available
	4. Fire And Ice	Tyler Bates	3:15	Not Available
	5. Cimmerian Battle	Tyler Bates	3:19	Not Available
	6. The Mill	Tyler Bates	1:55	Not Available
	7. The Mask/12 Years Later	Tyler Bates	3:06	Not Available
	8. Freeing Slaves	Tyler Bates	2:38	Not Available
	9. Prison Interrogation	Tyler Bates	3:35	Not Available
	10. Monastery Approach	Tyler Bates	1:44	Not Available
	11. Off With Their Heads	Tyler Bates	1:09	Not Available
	12. Horse Chase	Tyler Bates	3:11	Not Available
	13. Death Of A Priest	Tyler Bates	2:48	Not Available
	14. One Way Ride	Tyler Bates	2:35	Not Available
	15. Outpost	Tyler Bates	7:57	Not Available
	16. Fever	Tyler Bates	4:47	Not Available
	17. Victory	Tyler Bates	0:36	Not Available
	18. A Kiss	Tyler Bates	2:41	Not Available
	19. The Temple	Tyler Bates	1:55	Not Available
	20. Oceans Of Blood	Tyler Bates	2:41	Not Available
	21. The Dweller	Tyler Bates	2:36	Not Available
	22. Skull Mountain	Tyler Bates	1:21	Not Available
	23. Wheel Of Torture	Tyler Bates	2:07	Not Available
	24. Zym’s Demise	Tyler Bates	2:30	Not Available
	25. Conan Returns Home	Tyler Bates	3:42	Not Available

There you go.

I won’t offer my impressions just yet, but I will say it’s certainly different from Poledouris’ score, and that it’s certainly a Tyler Bates score. And I’ll leave it at that.

Our first is an interview with Jason Momoa, both in video and text form. I’ll provide the video below, and the text in the rest of the article after the click.

SAN DIEGO – I really tried to get Jason Momoa to talk about his new role as the iconic fantasy hero “Conan the Barbarian.” I really did. However, after the euphoric reaction Momoa and his former cast members of “Game of Thrones” had received the day before our interview at the series Comic-Con 2011 panel, it was clear his breakout role as Khal Drogo was still on his mind.

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Now, the final part of the puzzle. In the past number of days, some leaked scripts for the upcoming Conan film have appeared on the internet. While suspecting them to be mislabelled copies of the Donnelly/Oppenheimer scripts, or even just some old unproduced ones, I figured I may as well have a look. After checking with a few sources, it turned out they were indeed genuine. I now had, in my figurative hands, the shooting script for Conan the Barbarian. And, as I’ll discuss after the break, the final script for Conan the Barbarian was by far the best iteration of the screenplay.

However, something else happened at the same time: I received reviews of the films by anonymous sources which corresponded with plot elements in the scripts – but with several differences. So, it seems that alterations, additions and subtractions were made to the film after this script was printed, and it is my understanding that there are some documents with reshoot instructions (thus far not on the ‘net). The more worrisome aspect is that one review was decidedly critical of the new film, and that many of their complaints in regards to story, characterisation and plot development were actually addressed in the shooting script. By the same token, the more positive review seemed to coincide with the better aspects of the script. So, just how much of the shooting script ended up on the film?

Well, we won’t truly know until the film sees a general release. So until then, I’ll offer my thoughts on the script – and I truly hope the film is closer to it than to previous versions.

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I’m awfully late to the party on this one, but there’s still just under a week left, so all you artists out there get your pencils, pens, paints, and graphic tablets ready for Empire’s big competition!

Hi mash-up peeps,

We’re partnered with Lionsgate to give you the chance to design an official, studio-endorsed poster for Conan. The winning entry will be picked by a member of the movie’s cast and crew – possibly even Jason Momoa himself – and displayed pride of place at next month’s Big Screen.

All you have to do is head over here for Conan assets/logo/pics, design something awesome in one-sheet format and post it here by Friday, August 5.

Feel free to make it as much (or as little) Robert Howard/Frank Frazetta inspired as you like, just make sure it’s high-res as the poster will be printed 27×40. Probably best to avoid puns this time, as much as we’d like to see ‘Conan For All Seasons’ or ‘Barbarian Of Green Gables’.

Go forth and bring it!

Oh boy. I really hope there’s some speedy artist out there who wants to give Conan the Esteban Marato, Drew Strewzan or John Alvin treatment. Maybe go with some old-school stuff in the style of Bill Gold, Frank McCarthy or Howard Terpning, or try something unusual like Saul Bass. And, of course, lest we forget Frank Frazetta did movie posters too?

There have already been some impressive pictures, which I’ve put after the break, but my money’s on this one:

Masterpiece.

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