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The X-Files is currently finished, but it could always return, especially given the popularity of "reboots" in today's culture and that, back in 2002, longtime fans of this genre-defining television series thought the story was already over. After nine seasons and well over a hundred episodes, The X-Files concluded its initial run on Fox only to be revived fourteen years later for a six-episode tenth season.

That revival was a giant hit, premiering to a massive audience of 21.4 million viewers. So, two years later, Fox naturally brought The X-Files back again, this time for a ten-episode eleventh season. Despite many critics thinking this was a more robust offering than the last, audiences didn't respond to this stretch of episodes in quite the same way, making this offering of supernatural monsters the last the franchise would ever produce, at least for now. Even with that being said, those last two seasons of...

The other day, one of our writers sat down with Mario Van Peebles to talk about his upcoming spiritual sequel to Posse, Outlaw Posse. In the pretty awesome conversation, we asked Mario about what we consider a pretty underrated movie of his, Gunmen. This 1994 action flick paired him with Christopher Lambert, with an all-star cast that included Denis Leary as the film’s villain, Patrick Stewart, and nineties dream girl Brenda Bakke, as well as 90s rappers like Big Daddy Kane, Eric B, Rakim, Doctor Dre and Ed Lover – who all played themselves. It’s a tough movie to find these days, but Peebles had fond memories of what they were trying to accomplish with it.

“Gunmen tips a hat to The Good, The Bad and the Ugly. My character, Christophe’s character, and the other character have a piece of the puzzle as to where the cachet of gold is.

Plot: 1908. Chief (Mario Van Peebles) returns from years of hiding in Mexico to claim stolen reparations gold hidden in the hills of Montana but is chased by Angel (William Mapother), whose rationale to the gold leaves a trail of dead bodies.

Review: Mario Van Peebles is in the enviable position of being a writer, director and actor who can make the kinds of movies he wants with the people he wants. He was able to gain recognition on his own merit, outside of his father’s work, as he appeared in films like Heartbreak Ridge with Clint Eastwood, Ali with Will Smith, as well as cult classics like Gunmen which co-stars Christopher Lambert. He would work with him again in Lambert’s franchise sequel, Highlander: The Final Dimension. Plus, Van Peebles would gain acclaim as a director with the films he’s pulled double duty on — such titles as New Jack City...

Lately, we at JoBlo have been championing the collection of physical media in the face of certain movies that have been getting somewhat lost due to extremely limited availability. This is especially an issue for those who partake in a digital collection of movies, which has the potential of disappearing despite purchasing them. However, there are great distributors like Vinegar Syndrome and Arrow Video that have done a fantastic job remastering rare movies for Blu-ray releases. The Mvp Rewind Collection has recently announced that the Albert Pyun action-thriller, Mean Guns, starring Christopher Lambert, Ice-t, Michael Halsey, Deborah Van Valkenburgh and Tina Cote is set for a Blu-ray release on April 9.

The plot description, courtesy of Blu-ray.com, reads,

“The world’s most dangerous criminals are summoned to a new prison on the eve before its grand opening by Moon, the ruthless leader of the world’s most powerful crime syndicate.

Usually, when we think of holiday movies, we picture feel-good family comedies filled with light-hearted shenanigans and bittersweet life lessons. Okay, and the occasional violent slasher. While we love plenty of those movies, they’re often missing crucial elements of the holidays we experience in real life: sordid disagreements, petty bickering, and, in the words of the great Frank Costanza, the airing of grievances. Well, there’s at least one-holiday dramedy that accurately depicts how the most wonderful time of the year can bring out the worst in us: Ted Demme’s 1994 film The Ref, which tells the story of a cynical cat burglar who makes the biggest mistake of his life when he takes the wrong couple as hostages. Because these two would wear down even the most composed of criminals. It’s a snarky, acid-tongued little gem of a movie, although not necessarily one you’d want to watch with grandma and grandpa.

1990 was a peak year for Van Damage. The Muscles from Brussels was on the way to the big time after Bloodsport and Kickboxer (which made our list of the Best Fighting Movies) proved to be huge moneymakers at the box office. But, Jean-Claude Van Damme was different from some of his contemporaries because he was a hearthrob and a prime butt-kicker. His 1990 movie Lionheart was bought for distribution by Universal, paving the way to his breaking into mainstream studio work. But, before he could jump on that gravy train, he had one more movie left to make on his Cannon movie deal – but ironically, the company itself would not release the film theatrically due to its waning fortunes, with this being Van Damme’s first major studio release after MGM opted to distribute it. The movie? Death Warrant!

In this one, Jcvd plays a cop named Burke, who, after putting...

TV drama writers obsess over audience engagement, with a huge emphasis on personal stakes for their characters. The biggest of these is the prospect of death. But 70+ years of TV have taught us that mortality is rare for characters played by a show's stars. So, when actors leave a show or the decision is made to cut a character, writers see a golden opportunity to play the ultimate stakes game by going terminal.

It's safe to say character departures always upset a segment of a show's audience, however small. But not all such deaths are created equal. Some generate a wave of complaints, others a tsunami of outrage. It's the deaths of characters we love or love to hate, and those especially shocking or egregious, that drive fans to write all-caps messages, accompanied by many exclamation points, in fanzines, letter columns, and social media.

Here are 14 of the most controversial of the controversial.

The Story: In a dystopian, ultra-futuristic 2017 (!) the population is kept under control by a strict one child per couple rule. With abortion now illegal, parents who violate this rule are imprisoned for life, while their children become the property of the Men-Tel Corporation. Enter John (Christopher Lambert) and Karen (Loryn Locklin) Brennick, whose first child died and are now pregnant with their second. Caught at the border as they try to escape into Canada, the two are sent to an underground super-max prison run by the genetically altered Poe (Kurtwood Smith), who has designs on Karen, while John plots an escape.

The Players: Starring: Christopher Lambert, Loryn Locklin, Kurtwood Smith, Clifton Collins, Jr., Vernon Wells, Lincoln Kilpatrick, and Jeffrey Combs. Directed by Stuart Gordon.

“…it was Arnold Schwarzenegger that got me the job and it was because of Re-Animator. We used Arnold’s body-double in Re-Animator. The first reanimated corpse...

As many of you Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul fans know, before Vince Gilligan became a demi-God of modern television in the late aughts, he was learning the ropes under the hands of Chris Carter, the father of The X-Files. Gilligan wrote or co-wrote 30 episodes of the classic sci-fi series, which undoubtedly played a key part in his success many years later. Carter gave Gilligan enough creative freedom that allowed him to play out the full scope of his ideas ranging from suspenseful to touchingly dramatic to campy and downright hilarious. As a result, he’s written some of the most gripping and beloved episodes in the show’s history.

Gilligan had great talent to begin with, but it was the versatility of The X-Files that permitted his creativity to flourish in numerous ways. Now, we’re here to highlight some of the finest work he’s done for the series through nine seasons.

Several weeks ago, Sony Pictures invited us to attend the press junket The Amazing Spider-Man. The reboot takes a grittier, more realistic approach to Peter Parker's journey to becoming your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man, and sees the wall-crawler struggling to come to grips with the mysterious of disappearance of his parents. For more on the film, click here for all of our previous coverage. During my on-camera interview with Denis Leary, who plays Police Captain George Stacy, we talked about how director Marc Webb made working on a blockbuster film feel like an indie feature, if he's seen any merchandise he's liked, playing Armor O' Malley in Gunmen, and the response to the Detroit firefighters documentary, Burn, which he executive produced. Hit the jump to check out the interview, and click on the corresponding links for my interviews with co-stars Andrew Garfield, Emma Stone, and Rhys Ifans. The Amazing Spider-Man opens in 3D on July 3rd.

After weathering the contagious cinematic disease known amongst hardcore film fanatics as “Highlander 3: The Sorcerer” (aka “Highlander: The Final Dimension”), it’s anyone’s guess why I decided to investigate the dodgy 1994 Christopher Lambert/Mario Van Peebles action extravaganza “Gunmen.” Am I a glutton for punishment, you ask, a miserable beast of a man who enjoys mindlessly tossing his precious free time to the proverbial winds? Perhaps. Or maybe, just maybe, I’m an unapologetic sucker for buddy flicks involving big guns, bad jokes, Sally Kirkland in the nude, Dr. Dre and Ed lover, Big Daddy Kane, Denis Leary, Kadeem Hardison, and a lots of people jumping from elevated surfaces. “Death Warrant” director Deran Sarafian understands the need for an abundance of goofy action and rapid fire humor when your script appears to have been written by someone who’s watched the “Lethal Weapon” series one too many times.