Do you consider yourself one of J.K. Rowling’s biggest fans? Have you read every last Harry Potter book and seen all of the movies? Have you wondered what it would be like to see some of the fantastical objects and special effects from the movie up close and in person?

Boy, do I have news for you, and it’s just this—next year, you can check out Harry Potter: The Exhibition:

Becker Group, in partnership with Warner Bros. Consumer Products, today announced it will bring worldwide audiences “Harry Potter: The Exhibition,” a state-of-the-art exhibition highlighting artifacts from the Warner Bros. films based on J.K. Rowling’s beloved book series. The 10,000 square foot experience will premiere in Spring 2009 in a major market, and will appear in ten or more cities around the world throughout a five-year span.

“Harry Potter: The Exhibition” will include elaborate displays of authentic costumes, props and artifacts from popular environments featured in the films such as those from Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, including the Gryffindor common room and Hagrid’s hut. During its run, the exhibit will also be updated to include artifacts from the final installments of the Harry Potter film series. The exhibition will be displayed in major cultural and entertainment venues, museums and institutions, and will be supported by a multimedia promotional effort and advance ticket sales worldwide.

You can read the entire release on the site, but this is pretty exciting news. What I’m looking forward to hearing about is how much security is required for each of these venues; Potter fans seem to me like a pretty rowdy bunch. There’s no telling who might take it into their heads to try to steal the invisibility cloak or the genuine sorting hat.

Why, I can picture touring such an event with my children, even now. “Don’t touch!” I’ll lovingly hiss, three or four hundred times….

Hi-5 fever is hardly limited to their native Australia and—after a while—here in the United States. Nope, Hi-5 has been a hot commodity in 118 different countries, with both Australian and American casts and legions of fans for both.

So the news that a U.K.-based version of Hi-5 has been commission by the Turner Network should come as a surprise to no one:

Set to air on Turner’s preschool channel Cartoonito, Hi-5 will be produced by BAFTA award-winning production company Darrall Macqueen.

Forty half-hour episodes of the U.K. local version will be produced, with casting to commence next month. Also partnering on the U.K. series is free-to-air broadcaster GMTV who will begin showing the series in 2009 following Cartoonito’s premier in 2008.

Cecilia Persson, Vice President of Programming, Acquisitions and Presentation, Turner Kids Channels said, “Hi-5 has enjoyed world renowned success and we’re delighted to commission a U.K.-produced version. Each week the series will focus on some of HI-5’s most notable themes such as music, friends, animals, family and outdoors. Underpinned with an ethos of exercise and dance, it also has positive messaging of encouraging kids to get active.

Cartoonito has already put up their dedicated Hi-5 site. I’ll confess that the cast looks odd to me—perhaps because I’m used to the “regulars” from the American cast—but I’m sure the U.K. gang will be great in their own right, too.

And don’t forget the added benefit for Hi-5 fans on this side of the pond: While these episodes are slated for Cartoonito, with Turner at the helm you have to figure that eventually they’ll make their way over here, as well. And that means even more Hi-5 goodness for us to enjoy, even though the American version of the series is no longer in production. (It’s still airing on TLC weekdays at 7:00 a.m., and of course the Ty’s Toy Box Hi-5 Store still has you covered with all the Hi-5 stuff your kids want, but this is forty brand-new episodes we’re talking about. Excellent!)

Here in my house we looked forward to the debut of Ben 10: Alien Force with something akin to reverence. “What do you think it’ll be like?” my son asked me, several hundred times.

“I don’t know, honey,” I would respond with infinite patience (ha!), “Why don’t we wait and see?” And then—right before I was going to have to duct tape his mouth shut or start wearing earplugs—the show debuted.

The verdict in our house? Well, now instead of asking what I think it’ll be, my son trails me wanting to fill me in on every last new alien and asking me which one is my favorite. (I’m supposed to have a favorite alien? This was not in the manual.) In other words, this newest incarnation of Ben 10 is an unmitigated success, so far as we’re concerned. But just to make sure, I went so far as to ask my son if he liked this better than the original.

“Oh yes!” he assured me. So I asked him why that was, and he said, “Because now Ben’s got more betterer aliens!” So, you know, there you go.

Unfortunately, not all Ben 10 fans have been quite as enthusiastic as my son. Newsarama’s Steve Fritz did a great interview with Ben 10 creator Glen Murakami because, as he put it:

In less than a half hour the first internet troll came out from under his bridge to start screaming how he hated, hated, hated Ben 10: Alien Force. Within the hour said bottom feeder was joined by a horde of others. They felt it their right to vent and mewl pitifully about the changes to the show. They called it a grand conspiracy by Cartoon Network to sell new lines of action figures. They accused all of even more heinous crimes.

Murakami does an admirable job of defending the series… not that you’d expect any less from the man behind an alien hero named Brainstorm. Go read it; you won’t be sorry.

Were you in New York City at Comic Con last weekend? I often wish I could be a fly on the wall at one of these things, just once. I imagine it to be a very special kind of nerd nirvana, and suspect that they have good snacks. Anyway.

ToonZone put up excellent coverage of the Avatar panel a few days ago, but just yesterday they added an in-depth interview with Avatar creators Bryan Konietzko and Mike DiMartino.

I’m not going to bore you with a lot of excerpts; if you’re an Avatar fan, you’re going to want to read the whole thing (probably several times). But seeing as how we were just discussing the live-action movie last week, I did want to draw your attention to this little tidbit buried at the end of the interview:

TZN: You said you have two weeks to finish off season 3. Do you know what’s next for you guys?

KONIETZKO: The one thing we weren’t joking about is that we really are helping on the movie quite a bit. Night has been very collaborative from the get-go, from the first time we ever met him. Very respectful of the project and of us. So we’re helping out a lot on that.

That should, at least, lay to rest any fears that collaboration on the project is somehow lacking or that the vision for the movie is far afield of what we fans have grown to know and love about Avatar.

(And I may not have made it to Comic Con, but I’ll admit to more than a little fangirl glee when reading all about how Bryan Konietzko hadn’t want Toph to be a girl but now she’s one of his favorite characters. Toph rocks!)

I imagine a team of crack marketers at Disney who mostly sit around a large table and talk about what’s hot at any given time, and how Disney can capitalize upon each of those trends. “We need more mo-cap!” insists one, while another rolls his eyes and said “CGI, people. CEE GEE EYE.” Still a third is shaking his head in disdain: “Live action is where it’s at.”

And Disney—being Disney, the industry giant—keeps churning out hits in every genre.

So yesterday’s news was not entirely unexpected; it seems that Disney’s latest brainchild is a film label dedicated to environmental documentaries:

The entertainment giant on Monday announced the launch of a new film label, Disneynature, dedicated to producing wildlife and environmental documentaries for the big screen, starting with a 2009 U.S. release titled “Earth.”

The new venture marks one of the most conspicuous moves by a major Hollywood studio to capitalize on growing public fondness for all things green since the 2006 success of Al Gore’s global warming documentary, “An Inconvenient Truth.”

My family loves animation as much as anyone else, but guess what we’re watching right now? (Well, not this very second, but what we’ve been viewing together as a family.) We’ve been putting aside some time every week to watch Planet Earth, and I think the kids are enjoying it just as much as the adults. Are we tree-hugging hippies who’ve “gone green?” Not really. We’re regular folks. And today’s “average people” are probably a little more aware of the earth’s fragility than the last few generations, I guess.

And lo and behold, it seems that Disney is set to leverage that awareness and Earth Day as much as possible:

The first U.S. release from the new venture, slated to debut on Earth Day, April 22, 2009, is titled “Earth,” adapted from popular BBC television series “Planet Earth.”

Narrated by actor James Earl Jones, it will explore animal migration patterns, focusing on the journeys of polar bears, elephants and humpback whales over the course of a single year.

We should be through our DVD set by then, so I sure hope their debut can stand up to the extremely high bar that the BBC series has set. Either way, it’s a fitting bit of news for Earth Day.

Now, go hug a tree. Go on, I won’t tell anyone.

If you were following the news this weekend you already know that Ty’s big merger news wasn’t the only exciting joint venture being cooked up last week. It turns out that a few little studios you may have heard of before (ha!) were working together, too—Viacom, Paramount, Lionsgate, and MGM will be launching a new television channel:

The venture, starting in fall 2009, will show movies and television series from Paramount, Paramount Vantage, MGM, United Artists and Lionsgate.

It could provide competition in both programming and viewers to Time Warner’s HBO and CBS Corp.’s Showtime.

“This venture has the potential to be a game changer for the industry,” Viacom president and CEO Philippe Dauman said in a statement. “We are building an innovative service that will use traditional and new digital distribution technologies to bring great film and television entertainment directly to the consumer.”

Viewers will have pay-per-view access to big-budget releases from the studios, such as “Cloverfield,” “Iron Man” and “Star Trek.” Movies from the companies’ archive libraries and new TV series created by the studios also will be featured.

How the details of this new channel will actually shake out remains to be seen, but already analysis of the players and impassioned pleas for specific programming have already begun.

It’s probably wrong that I’m just delighted to be anticipating what could be a genuine threat to HBO’s king-of-the-hill status. Competition is good all around—it makes the old giants get better and makes the new contenders raise the bar. Plus, I just love a good fight. Especially when it results in great television.

If you missed the big news earlier today, stop the presses and hold on to your hats: Ty’s Toy Box and All Aboard Toys are joining forces:

Ty’s Toy Box, LLC and All Aboard Toys, LLC today announced the merger of their two companies, creating the largest independent toy destination for licensed character merchandise available online. Ty Simpson, current CEO of Ty’s Toy Box, will be CEO of a newly-formed holding company which combines the businesses of both entities, while Dave Carlson, current CEO of All Aboard Toys, will serve as Chairman of the Board.

“Unifying the licensing relationships and online retail breadth of both AllAboardToys.com and TysToyBox.com creates one of the top-five online destinations for character-based toys and merchandise,” says Simpson. “With approximately $26 billion spent annually on character licensed product and the Internet being the fastest growing source of this revenue, combining our efforts will be advantageous to our licensing industry partners and provide our customers with an unprecedented assortment of character-related products, including exclusives they can’t find anywhere else.”

Everyone at Ty’s is very excited about the new partnership, and big doings are certainly afoot. Stay tuned for more information. (It’s not quite as suspenseful as a soap opera, but a lot more exciting than buying from a Big Box store, honest.) In the meantime, join us in saying “welcome aboard” to All Aboard Toys!

It’s been well over a year since I first reported that Avatar: The Last Airbender was slated to become a live-action film, and speculation about the project has been running rampant. I know it’s Hollywood’s way to give us a smidgen of information and then leave us to stew for… well… sometimes years on end, but back then all we knew was that M. Night Shyamalan would be directing, and also that James Cameron had a similarly-named project in the works.

This week we finally got the answers to a few of those burning questions about the much-anticipated cinema event. The news is that we’ll have to keep waiting:

Paramount Pictures and Nickelodeon Movies will release M. Night Shyamalan’s live-action bigscreen adaptation of the popular animated TV series “Avatar: The Last Airbender” on July 2, 2010.

I’m all for being forewarned, and all, but seriously? This movie was announced three and a half years before it would come to fruition. That’s… craziness. In three and a half years I’ll have a teenager. In three and a half years the Avatar saga might be complete. In three and a half years the cartoon might not even be on the air anymore. (Hey, I hope it will be, but you never do know with these things.) That just seems like… a long time.

As for the name issue, well, that’s been resolved as well:

Studio has dropped “Avatar” from the title of the action-adventure so as to avoid confusion with James Cameron’s 3-D epic “Avatar,” which 20th Century Fox opens Dec. 18, 2009.

To me, this was the best possible news. I actually think The Last Airbender is a great title, and more evocative of the story than the inclusion of the term “Avatar.” Even without Cameron’s project, I just think that word has a lot of pre-conceived ideas attached to it for those who don’t know the storyline.

Now I guess I’ll go mark my calendar for July of 2010, but I may need a few things to keep me busy in the meantime….

Get in gear for a complete Speed Racer experience this May, and feed your need for Speed.

You’re already primed for the May 9th premiere of the Speed Racer feature film, of course, because if you watched those trailers like I told you to, you’re now counting down the days (and looking for a local IMAX theater). You’re only human, after all.

But did you also know that May will be bringing a new cartoon series to Nicktoons? It’s true!

Nicktoons Network, the fastest growing kids’ network, is set to premiere Speed Racer: The Next Generation, a new animated series that builds on the legendary adventures of the iconic original series, on Friday, May 2, at 7:00 p.m. (ET). The 90-minute premiere will launch the Speed Racer: The Next Generation television series just prior to the Lionsgate DVD release on Tuesday, May 6, and the live-action Warner Bros. feature film, directed by The Wachowski Brothers, on Friday, May 9. The 26- episode, half-hour series will air regularly Fridays at 7:00 p.m. (ET) on Nicktoons Network.

Television and DVD and movies, oh my!

In the 90-minute premiere, “The Beginning,” Speed, a teenager who had been orphaned as a baby, arrives at the prestigious Racing Academy and tries to get acclimated as the new kid. He meets friends and enemies, finds out he is the son of the famous driver Speed Racer and begins to deal with his new brother, X, and uncle, Headmaster Spritle (voiced by Peter Fernandez, original voice of Speed Racer in the original U.S. version). After finding parts of Speed Racer’s car — the Mach-5 — in a junk yard, Speed, with help from his new friends Conor and Lucy, rebuilds the legendary vehicle, but wrecks it during an intense race. Dejected and in need of a new car, Speed discovers his father’s schematics for a revolutionary gasless engine and builds the Mach 6.

How cool is it that they’ve gotten Peter Fernandez back? Though I worry that every time I hear him, I’ll think back to the first series. Regardless, I think that’s a nice nod to the original.

I’ll be curious to see if all of these incarnations of Speed Racer hit pay dirt. Time will tell….

Fans of J.K. Rowling’s creations have a whole new reason to get excited—Amazon is sponsoring an amazing contest to give fans a shot at seeing one of the seven copies of The Tales of Beedle the Bard. Through April 22nd, 2008, you can take a shot at winning a very magical trip:

Amazon.com wants to send you and a friend to London, England to spend a weekend with the rare and delightful book of fairy tales (security guards included, of course), handwritten and illustrated by J.K. Rowling herself. Open to muggles ages 13 and older in 24 countries, the Beedle the Bard Ballad Writing Contest challenges you to creatively answer one of the following three questions in 100 words or less:

• What songs do wizards use to celebrate birthdays?
• What sports do wizards play besides Quidditch?
• What have you learned from the Harry Potter series that you use in everyday life?

English-language submissions will be accepted through 11:59 p.m. PDT April 22, 2008. An Amazon.com committee will select 10 semi-finalist submissions (based on creativity and writing style) from each of two age categories: 13-17 and 18-and-over. Amazon.com customers will determine the two finalists and Grand Prize winner by voting for their favorites. The Grand Prize includes round-trip airfare, two nights lodging at a London hotel, as well as an expense allowance. Plus, each of the finalists from the two age groups will receive an Amazon Gift Certificate in the amount of $1,000.

I can’t really think of a prize more fanciful than if they could offer you a weekend at Hogwarts. And really, if they could do that, then you’d have to worry about being turned into a teacup or having your soul sucked out by Dementors or something. The trip they’re offering sounds a lot safer, and still pretty exciting.

You’ve gotta love that it’s open to kids, too. The Harry Potter enterprise knows its fans, that’s for sure. May the best muggle win!