Last night, luminaries from the world of sci fi and horror were honored at the 35th Annual Saturn Awards. The awards are given out by The Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror Films for work in film, TV and on DVD. This years winners will join an illustrious list of former honorees including Vincent Price, Rod Serling, Dan Curtis, Ray Bradbury, Gene Roddenberry, Robert Wise and Lon Chaney Jr. just to name a few.

The Dark Knight was the evening’s biggest winner, taking home five awards including Best Action Film, Best Writing, Music, Special Effects and Best Supporting Actor for Heath Ledger.

On the television side, it was Battlestar Galactica that took home the most awards winning Best Syndicated/Cable Television Series, Best Actor on Television: Edward James Olmos, and Best Actress on Television: Mary McDonnell. Lost received the Saturn Award for Best Network Series, beating out Supernatural, Fringe, Heroes, Life on Mars, and Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles.

Battlestar was up against an odd mix of shows for Best Syndicated / Cable including The Closer, Dexter, Leverage and more predictable, Star Wars: The Clone Wars and True Blood.

Moonlight took the award for the best modern DVD with Invaders winning for retro DVD.

Several special awards were presented throughout the evening, Lance Henriksen took the Life Career Award, Jeffrey Katzenberg received the Visionary Award and Leonard Nimoy was handed the Lifetime Achievement Award.

You’ll find a full list of winners after the jump. You can find the list of nominees here at the Saturn Awards Website.

Photos by Newscom

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This just in: it seems someone at Warner Bros. has realized well done comic book movies can make money. Writer/director David Goyer, who penned the script for The Dark Knight, told Inland Empire Strikes Back Warner has placed all DC Comics movie projects on hold.

Goyer said the company is taking time to figure out a better plan for the development of these movies. They are, after all, cash cows with huge potential. The year 2008 will be remembered as a landmark year for comic book projects. Marvel Comics became the first comic company to have its own studio and came charging out of the gate with summer blockbuster Iron Man. A Samuel L. Jackson cameo at the end of that movie set up the storyline for an Avengers film. Marvel carried it on as Tony Stark showed up in The Incredible Hulk to talk about the team they’re getting together.

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Photo by Stephen Vaughan

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As one of the biggest movies of the year, Warner Bros. expected big DVD returns with The Dark Knight and hasn’t been disappointed.The New York Times reports that 3 million DVD and Blu-Rays of the hit Batman sequel were sold on Tuesday.

Warner hopes the strong sales fuel the Oscar buzz the studio is trying to stoke for the movie. Not only is Heath Ledger a potential posthumous nominee for Best Supporting Actor, there’s also some talk of a Best Picture nomination. That would be uncharted territory for a film with mainstream comic book source material.

I can’t wait to see the nominations. Knight works on multiple levels and to call it simply a “comic book” movie would do it a huge disservice. The bar has been raised and I don’t envy anyone else adapting comic book material. I’m not even sure the next Batman movie can top this, even if all the key players like Christian Bale and Christopher Nolan return.

Image: The Dark Knight, Warner Bros., 2008

This past weekend’s big sci-fi release -  wasn’t so big. While the truth may still be out there, not a lot of moviegoers were interested in finding it. The X-Files: I Want to Believe bowed in fourth place with only $10.2 million. It garnered mixed reviews and Fox execs are still trying to put a positive spin on things and say it will turn a profit. But considering it got trounced by the likes of Step Brothers and Mamma Mia, that’s not very likely.

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The Dark Knight is still a juggernaut, mowing down any box office record standing in its path. The Batman sequel has raked in $300 million in 10 days. That passed the record set by Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest which made $300 million in 16 days.

The movie is benefiting from strong word-of-mouth, great reviews and repeat viewings. Experts are now giving it a shot at the $600 million record set by Titanic. No movie in the past decade has come remotely close to that mark. If any film can, Dark Knight looks to be the one.

To shatter the record held by Titanic, you need to be an event picture. This one certainly is. You need breakout performances and Heath Ledger, Christian Bale and Aaron Eckhart deliver them. Publicity is needed and boy do we have that going. Ledger’s getting posthumous Oscar buzz. Bale is the lead story on every entertainment news show because of his ill-timed legal trouble. This may be the perfect Bat-storm, comic book flick fans.

TM & © DC Comics.
Photo by Stephen Vaughan

Sorry Spidey, another one of your records just fell to the Caped Crusader. The Dark Knight hit the $200 million mark in just five days, surpassing the eight days it took Spider-Man 2 to get there.

Now experts are speculating it could make as much as $500 million and might even have a shot at finishing just behind Titanic in all-time gross. Titanic pulled in $600.8 million domestically and $1.84 billion overall during its record run.

There is some concern that the negative publicity surrounding Christian Bale’s arrest could have a bad effect on the movie’s box office. But as the old saying goes, there’s no such thing as bad publicity.

In The Dark Knight, Chin Han keeps a step ahead of the Gotham mob as Lau, a Hong Kong crime lord who launders the crooks’ money. In addition to snagging a role in the biggest film of the year, Han will also play a pivotal part in Roland Emmerich’s apocalyptic 2012. SF Universe got to talk with him about The Dark Knight, 2012 and the hot streak he’s on right now.

This is the biggest role of Han’s career and he’s ecstatic to have worked with an incredible cast including the likes of Christian Bale, Morgan Freeman and Heath Ledger.

“I was thrilled to find out I was going to be a part of this movie,” Han said. “I could never have expected something like this, it exceeds anything I could have imagined.”

Han is an integral part of Gotham’s mob dynamic in this one and he enjoyed playing in this group. There’s no honor among these thieves.

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The recent events surrounding Dark Knight star Christian Bale are tinged with quite a bit of irony. After all, many folks in Gotham want the police to bring Batman in for his vigilante acts. Then, the actor gets arrested in a family dispute. Between Bale’s arrest and Heath Ledger’s death, the word curse is going to start being thrown around in connection with this movie.

I’m not about to pass judgment here, I’ve got a few family members I’m surprised I haven’t hit yet. I’m not thinking this will do anything to the movie’s second weekend take. I am a little worried about Warner Bros. overreacting because as we know, they’ll recast Batman at the drop of a cowl. At the rate the franchise was deteriorating I think Vin Diesel was in line to play Batman.

As most anticipated, Spider-Man 3’s record opening weekend fell at the hands of The Dark Knight. The long awaited Batman sequel took in an estimated $155 million over the weekend. It also had the biggest opening day ever with $66.4 million and the most money from midnight showings, $18.5 million.

Bat-mania reached an all-time high due to the untimely passing of Heath Ledger and his critically-acclaimed performance as The Joker. His dark, twisted villain is drawing some of the best reviews of any bad guy in cinema history.

With this being the last big film of the summer, it’s expected to have a good long run at or near the top. It’s of course the type of movie that lends itself to repeat viewings, so these numbers are only going to grow.

TM & © DC Comics.
Photo by Stephen Vaughan

Image details: World Premiere Of "The Dark Knight" Presented by Belstaff - Inside Arrivals served by picapp.com

No less of a critical luminary than Roger Ebert has noted there’s something special going on with the comic book movie. Beginning with Spider-Man 2 and culminating (at least so far) with Dark Knight, Hollywood is being turned upside down by this movement.

It’s not a coincidence that every book anyone’s ever heard of (Captain America, Flash) is at some level of production as well as a few books most folks haven’t heard of (Caliber, Afterburn). One thing that hasn’t changed: most of these movies will probably suck. But the bar for how good they can be has gone through the stratosphere.

There really isn’t a good excuse for the likes of Elektra anymore. Remember how far the Bat franchise had fallen? Even George Clooney thought he and Joel Schumacher had killed it. To be honest, they did put it on life support.

But those bad works have been forgotten, if not undone. I’m torn. I want a Bat sequel because the first two Nolan films have been incredible. But I don’t know how Nolan can top himself. There aren’t enough superlatives to heap on The Dark Knight. I was a little sad as I left the theater. I was sure before going in nothing this summer would top Dark Knight. I left the movie wondering if anything I see this year will top it.