Summertime, summertime, sum-sum-summertime: sunny days, baseball games, and movies, movies, movies. Summer 2008 has been and will be a veritable cornucopia of Hollywood glitz, glamour, explosions, popcorn, nachos, and jujubes … the sweet smells of summer at a theater near you. Yeah, there’ll be a whole lot of super heroism, super villainy, and things blowing up real good.

Enjoy it while ya' can. Before you know it, the summer will be over, the days will be shorter, and the movies will be tamer. In some cases, the word "tame" is a synonym for lame. Sure, we've still got Hellboy II, The Dark Knight, and the X-Files movie to look forward to, plus a little Tropical Thunder, but after that, what? So live! Live for me! Take this summer by the toes and hold on for all it's worth. It matters not that Alyssa Milano doesn't have a starring role in any of these flicks!

So July looks good, and we know how entertaining May and June were, but what trends are the movie folks going to be looking to set to get a piece of your money? Well, it seemed that the documentary had hit a high a while back, but the powers that be think they can squeeze a little more worthwhile reality onto your local silver screen. Penguins? Been there. The people that set the high score on Donkey Kong^® and PAC-MAN^®? Taken care of. Global warming? Done and done. So what is it that we need to know about? Evolution? Creationism?

Documentaries are all lined up to cover grub worms of the South American rain forest. Warner Brothers is pouring in $100 million to cover this one. Not content to be outdone, Universal Studios will be spending $125 million for a wide release of their three-hour-long, in-depth look at the cannibals of the Belgian Congo. It could be interesting. It could be boring as hell.

Ah, the cinematic documentary. It was reality TV before there was TV.

Hey, if you've picked up a recent copy of Entertainment Weekly, you may have noticed an article that stated the upcoming TV season will be decidedly pale. There won't be a single, new TV show focused around an Asian, Hispanic, African-American, or any other kind of minority premiering this fall.

At this news, some of the major networks scrambled to get a little more color on the tube. FOX will be spinning off the Family Guy character Cleveland into his own animated show (granted, he is voiced by a white actor, but we'll take what we can get). The CW may or may not be whipping up a sitcom based in the Star Trek universe, featuring a house of diverse humans in a subdivision with Klingons and Vulcans. The next-door neighbor will be a Borg looking to rediscover his humanity. Raucous laughter will no doubt ensue. I can't wait for the requisite “welcome to the neighborhood” barbecue scene. The Borg will say something like "Try the chicken wings; resistance is futile."

In the world of gossip, there's a rumor that Jessica Alba's baby is actually mine. At least there will be that rumor, once you start telling people that. C'mon, help me out here.

In other news, it seems like Guitar Hero™ has caught on like gangbusters, literally. It came to light recently in a prominent Los Angeles newspaper that a couple of L.A. gangs decided to settle a turf dispute by using the popular, rhythm-based video game instead of more conventional means. The two rival gangs each picked their best shredder, and whoever got the highest score on "Devil Went Down to Georgia" got to dictate terms for the meeting. I think the times, they are a-changing. And they say video games cause violence. Quite the opposite, it would seem. Quite the opposite.

Now, if only I could get a video game that will get me into Janet Jackson's pants … Happy Bastille Day!