BUZZ: Worthington's "Dracula Year Zero" vs. Hunnam's "Vlad," Jason Momoa is "Conan the Barbarian," and more

• I love Sam Worthington. But I don't love that he's going to be in Alex Proyas's (I, Robot and Knowing) Dracula: Year Zero. With the resurgence of vampire shows and films, I guess I shouldn't be surprised that some of the plots will start to overlap. But I was already wary of Charlie Hunnam's ("Sons of Anarchy") screenwriting debut Vlad getting the brush-off, and now an Avatar actor is going to play the infamous character in a big-budget film. Granted, they do have different plots. Hunnam's is more historical than mystical, and Proyas' has Vlad searching for a dark magical power that turns him into a creature of the night, in order to beat the Turkish army. Either way, by 2011 there will be two Vlads. With any luck, having Brad Pitt as a producer will score Hunnam a big-name lead.

• The Coen brothers are gearing up for their next film, a remake of True Grit, due out this Christmas. They've already cast Jeff Bridges and Matt Damon to play a U.S. marshal and a lawman, who help a 14-year-old girl track her father's killer in hostile Indian territory, but they haven't cast the teenager yet. Maybe it might be overkill, but my vote's for Chloe Moretz (Kick-Ass and 500 Days of Summer). She's proven to be tough enough to hunt for a killer.

• One of Steven Soderbergh's (The Informant) next projects is the action spy thriller Knockout. A black ops super soldier (mixed martial arts fighter Gina Carano) seeks payback after she is betrayed and set up during a mission. Channing Tatum will play one of the guys on her team, who's sent to bring her back, and Michael Angarano (Lords of Dogtown) will play a teenager who ends up helping her. Michael Douglas, Antonio Banderas, Ewan McGregor, and Dennis Quaid also star. This sounds like a unique opportunity to watch him get his ass kicked by a professional fighter. lol

• For some unknown reason there's going to be a sequel to Four Brothers, and for an even more inexplicable reason it will be called Five Brothers. Since one of them died in the first film, there's speculation that there will be flashbacks of the deceased brother. However, that still doesn't explain who the fifth brother is. Did they adopt? Did he just get out of jail? Oooh, maybe it'll be the dead kid's biological brother. Now that might be interesting.

• Here's an unlikely pairing: Samuel L. Jackson and Josh Duhamel (When in Rome and Transformers) are teaming up for the supernatural thriller Sympathy for the Devil, where they play lawmen who are "caught in a cosmic confrontation between Heaven and Hell after stopping an assassination attempt of a charismatic preacher." Random!

• The Hawaiian Adonis Jason Momoa ("Baywatch Hawaii" and "Stargate: Atlantis") has been cast to play the lead in the Conan the Barbarian remake. (Hmm, I wonder if that means we'll finally be free of the dreds.) People keep saying he "beat out" Kellan Lutz, as if beating someone from Twilight is actually that difficult. Not to mention, Kellan's had like 6 lines in the entire franchise so far. Also rumored to be cast is Jared Padelicki ("Supernatural"). Can't wait to see how he factors in. lol

• For those of you who enjoyed the simplicity of Paranormal Activity, you'll be disappointed to learn that in the sequel There Will Be Blood!!! lol j/k Saw VI director Kevin Geutert has signed on to direct.

• I'm excited to see who gets cast for Jeff Morris's action-comedy True Memoirs of an International Assassin. "The story focuses on an accountant who writes a novel about the life he wishes he had, that of a fearless assassin. He sells the book, the publisher labels it a memoir, and the world comes to believe he is his alter ego. When he goes on vacation to Belize, he finds himself coerced into killing the country's prime minister and must now become the hero he's always written about but never dreamed he'd be." It'll have to be someone who looks geeky enough to be an accountant and that you'd never expect to do anything badass, like John Krasinski, Adam Brody, Demetri Martin, etc.

• What happens when you run out of quirky ways for people to meet in a romantic comedy? This: In 31 Days of Larry, a broke woman and a suicidal man agree to marry so that he can get help killing himself and she can collect on the life insurance. Awwww. Sounds like a Valentine's Day release to me!

• The priest at my church on Sunday delivered a sermon about how a lot of people have lost their way and how attendance is dwindling. Well, he'll be happy to know that there is in fact a solution. In Jeff Somers' sci-fi novel The Electric Church, a bodyguard-assassin is ordered to kill the founder of a church that converts people by transplanting their brains into pliant robotic bodies. It's unorthodox, but effective. I vote for Keanu Reeves to be one of the robots...for obvious reasons. ;)

TV NEWS
• Perhaps studios are expecting "Heroes" to get canned soon or they're attempting to capitalize off of their poor ratings. Either way, there are plans to adapt the sci-fi action film Push into a series. "The story centres on people with paranormal powers who band together to take down a corrupt government agency." Its one advantage is that David Hayter (Watchmen and X-Men) will be writing the pilot.

• AMC greenlit a new series, "The Walking Dead," an adaptation of Robert Kirkman's graphic novel. It follows a group of people who survive a zombie apocalypse. Led by a police officer they search for a safe home. I dunno. This kind of sounds like Zombieland, except not funny...which then defeats the purpose. lol