SuperheroHype recently spoke with Zack Snyder, who had several things to say about the extra features (25 additional minutes!) on the theatrical release of the Director's Cut of Watchmen, and more. Here are the highlights:

On The Director's Cut Getting a Theatrical Release: It is, actually. The weekend before Comic-Con which, I think we determined, is the (July) 17th. It will be at a theater in L.A., one in New York, one in Dallas and one in Minneapolis. It's a Friday, Saturday, Sunday.

On the Release of The Ultimate Edition In December: I don't know. There's this version that's coming out that's my cut and then the version that comes out at Christmas is basically "The Black Freighter" version which is probably a much-simpler giant movie release but without the walk-ons and everything. It'll be the only way to see that version of the movie. So if you're a fan of the complete experience, you'll have a chance to see it.

On How Involved The Blu-Ray Production Was: We knew. We were constantly having meeting and planning, "Oh, this is going to be on the Blu-ray. Because when we did "300," we asked, "Can the Blu-ray do this?" and they were like, "Yeesh. Not yet." Because they were still developing the technology to make the Blu-ray. Like on the "300" one, they couldn't go between the different threads. All that craziness. They couldn't really do that. Now they're like, "We've got this thing where you basically walk into the movie and the movie shrinks back and you start talking about all these aspects of it." We were like, "Wow, really? That seems kind of impossible." They said, "No, no. I think we can do it." Sure enough, they showed us a little animatic they did and we all thought it would be cool. For me it's really cool because it's not like there's any aspect of "Watchmen" that I haven't gone over. For instance, in the Comedian's apartment, everything is designed. I talk about the things that are happening, but there's a whole other level of stuff I could talk about. It's kind of the perfect movie for saying, "Oh, we built that Kleenex box" or "We built that table" or "The symbol for whatever was based on the original Crimebusters or the original Minutemen." It's cool on a movie like this to be given the format and platform to really go, "If you want to come on and come go and get it in there, you can just put in this thing and you won't hit the bottom." It's kind of fun.

- You can check out the full interview here.

Screenwriter Zak Penn, who has been attached to Marvel's Avengers movie for a long time, appeared on a panel as part of the Los Angeles Film Festival last week, and SciFi Wire has a report on some of the things he said about the 2012 Marvel film. He's meeting with Marvel and the screenwriters of the other big upcoming movies to "piece together the storylines."

"They're doing Captain American and Thor first, and then Avengers is coming out," Penn said. "They want to see that they're all connected, not like the Fantastic Four can't come into the X-Men world, like I was told. I'm taking a meeting next week with the Thor and Captain America people, and we are all going to get together, and I will see what is going to happen. I'll see where they are leaving the characters; it's pretty complicated. There's a board that is tracking what is happening. [We'll see] how this movie overlaps in that movie… Marvel is autonomous now. It is night and day: Everyone has read every comic. They know how to make a cool movie."

This is getting exciting....

 Alice in Wonderland is still unfinished, but Johnny Depp's already looking forward to other projects. In a recent conversation with Collider, the superstar actor revealed that his next project will most likely be the adaptation of gothic soap opera Dark Shadows. 

"Dark Shadows is happening," Depp said. "Tim [Burton] is working on Alice in Wonderland which is obviously quite a large piece of work there. So when Tim is done with Alice and we get the script, which is very, very close, in order we'll probably attack it next year. It's exciting, very exciting. It's like a lifelong dream for me."

Depp has been pining to play Barnabas Collins from Dark Shadows for a long while now ("I loved the show when I was a kid. I was obsessed with Barnabas Collins. I have photographs of me holding Barnabas Collins posters when I was five or six. I'm very excited to do it."). Dark Shadows ran on ABC from 1966 to 1971, and was a low-rent affair filled with ghosts, ghouls, vampires, zombies, werewolves, parallel universes and time paradoxes. Great fun with terrible acting all around.

Tim Burton, of course, is set to direct. John August is writing the screenplay, and Johnny Depp will do everything else. Just kidding - I'm sure Burton's wife will be in there somewhere.

Next year's Oscars will be fresh! Ad new! And by fresh and new I mean they'll have 10 films in contention for Best Picture, rather than the previous standard of 5. The decision to have 10 Best Picture nominees is a throwback to the old days when the Academy Awards had a wider field of nominees. Back  in 1931 there were eight nominees for Best Picture, and in 1934 and 1935, there were twelve.  Those crazy Golden Agers.

The 82nd Academy Awards are scheduled for March 7th, 2010. Nominations will be announced on February 2nd. Hold your breath.

The sequel to 300 is set to feature all-new material from Frank Miller, who's actually writing an entirely new graphic novel for it. In a new update over on ComingSoon, director Zack Snyder says that "I know for a fact that Frank [Miller] is writing right now, drawing away and seems to be knee-deep in it. I think he's going to head back to Greece again and do another reconnaissance."

Ready for more details?

"I think we would use the same technology," Snyder said. "I don't want it to look too Star Wars-ian… Just from what [Miller] told me, it would be bigger as far as landscape and terrain. We're going to see Athens and the Aegean and other places. There would be an opportunity for bigger visions, though I'd hope for the same aesthetic. The tech we used for 300 was not a revolution. It's basically what the weatherman has. Look, instead of Accuweather it's Sparta… It's going to be the same way, but on crazier steroids."

Snyder explained last year that this sequel would take place between the Battle of Thermopylae and the legendary Battle of Plataea, that we saw at the very end of 300.