Nazis by numbers: Your guide to the greatest cast ever?

In the current race to produce World War II flicks, I'd have to puy my money behind Spike Lee's being the best, if he ever gets around to making it, but it certainly seems Bryan Singer will at least be first with "Valkyrie." And his flick should be pretty darn good too, especially with the cast assembled above.

That photo, swiped directly from London's Daily Mail, has those big red numbers on it for a reason (you may have to click on the photo to make them out.) The Mail was kind enough to provide a breakdown of exactly who's who, in case you couldn't make them out. Here goes:

1. Carl Goerdeler
Kevin McNally plays Carl Goerdeler, the former mayor of Leipzig.

2. Albrecht Riter Merz von Quirnheim
Christian Berkel plays von Quirnheim, once a committed Nazi officer who became disillusioned with Hitler's conduct of the war in 1943.

3. General Friedrich Olbricht
Bill Nighy (huge huzzah!) plays the general who was one of the main architects of the Valkyrie operation.

4. Count Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg
Tom Cruise (yes, he's in this too) plays the leading role of the nobleman who planted a briefcase containing two pounds of explosives in Hitler's conference room at his headquarters.

5. General Ludwig Beck
Terence Stamp plays one of the only officers to stand up to Hitler in the early days of his regime.

6. Field Marshal Erwin von Witzleben
David Schofield plays one of the conquerors of France in the Blitzkrieg of 1940.

7. Henning von Tresckow
Kenneth Branagh plays Stauffenberg's closest accomplice in the Valkyrie plot.

It feels more than a little weird getting geeked up about Nazis, but I just can't help it. To read more about the historical figures these actors will be portraying, you can read the entire Daily Mail article here.

Faith hits comic book shelves!

And that's something that, despite my advancing age, I can get fully geeky about with no apologies. With Vol. 6 of Season 8 of "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" hitting comic book stores today, the attention does indeed turn to Cleveland's baddest broad, and thankfully she still looks a lot like Eliza Dushku (at least on the cover.)

As the second arc of the first season begins, Joss Whedon hands over the writing duties to Brian E. Vaughn (Y: The Last Man, Pride of Baghdad.) Dark Horse's marketing folks offer this simple but effective teaser: " The fugitive slayer is given the assignment that could change her life ... if Giles's specialized training doesn't make her want to end it first."

I'm definitely in for that. Artist Georges Jeanty continues his great work with the series, and Whedon will remain as executive producer. These have been selling out on the first day they hit shelves, so I'd recommend you act fast or maybe order a copy at TFAW.com (though you'll pay for delivery, of course.)

To see four or five pages beyond the cover, you can catch Dark Horse's preview here.

Could it possibly have been a mob hit?

Well, it doesn't seem so, but when you're talking about something like this it's only seems responsible to be as sensational as possible.

It seems that an explosive device, originally thought to be a pipe bomb, detonated outside the studio Dante, owned by "Sopranos" star Michael Imperioli. It's located two blocks south of Madison Square Garden. Given the times we live in, I guess it's not surprising that Mayor Michael Bloomberg was called in to diffuse the situation.

"There was an explosion in the street, it blew out windows of a van parked in front of the building, and thankfully no one was injured. While there certainly is no evidence that this was terrorism, we are taking this and every act of violence extremely seriously."

Well, for the good people of New York City, I'm glad someone is, and that it doesn't have to be me. That leaves me free to fantasize that, even though Christoper Moltasanti is dead, some of the gangsters he maligned in "Cleaver" are still out for revenge. That's so much more fun than the reality of bombs in NYC, isn't it?

"The Wachowski Brothers are no more"

Though folks like me might hope that means they're gonna stop making movies, it's a whole lot weirder than that.

It seems that, and if you haven't heard this already be assured that I'm not making it up, Larry Wachowski is well on is way to becoming (or indeed may already be) Lana. Apparently, and I'm not going to hazard any psychosexual guess as to why, he had a sex change operation about a year ago.

I wanted to post a photo of his rather oddly evolving appearance, but I can't get it to work, so instead you can go and read all about it at the source, Rated-M.com.

Into the "Golden Age" with Elizabeth

OK, it's been awfully goofy here today, so I'll try and class things up just a bit with this new trailer for the upcoming Oscar-magnet "Elizabeth: The Golden Age." Starring Cate Blanchett, Clive Owen, Geoffrey Rush and, though you only get glimpses of her in the trailer, la bella Samantha Morton, this one promises to be both a sumptuous period piece and pretty darn good action flick to boot. Enjoy, and have an entirely suckfree Wednesday.