After Hours: Ice Cube Joins 21 Jump Street, Sucker Punch Tests Poorly, Superman Suffers Third Act Problems, And Ridiculous Horror Adversaries

After Hours. What is After Hours? Well it is a movie column named after one of my favorite Martin Scorsese films. After Hours will feature any movie news we might have missed during the day. After all we are human.

Normally Tuesdays are good days for movie news, but this particular Tuesday was a bit on the quiet side as it was a relatively slow news day. But alas we still missed a couple of tidbits and that is what After Hours is here for. So here we… GO

Channing Tatum and Jonah Hill may be the big leads in the big screen adaptation of 21 Jump Street, but the film is looking to add a little more muscle. Enter Ice Cube. Deadline reports that the rapper/actor is in talks to join the cast of the film adpatation based on the 1987 television series that had undercover cops infiltrate high schools and bring youthful criminals to justice. If talks are successful, Ice Cube would reportedly be playing the precinct’s captain.

Earlier today Vulture reported that Guy Ritchie possibly taking on the director’s role for Xerxes, the 300 prequel, meaning Zack Snyder would be out of the picture as acting director for the prequel to his own film. One of the possible reasons the trade suggests is that he needs to have his full attention on the untitled Superman project. Vulture reports that the film suffers from third act problems and that Warner Brothers needs to have this project finished by 2013 or risk losing the rights to Superman and would have to re-license it from its original creators — the estates of Detective Comics writers Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster — at great if not prohibitive expense.

Another reason why WB may be handing off the director’s role to Ritchie instead of Snyder is because Sucker Punch tested poorly. In addition to the third act problems and the poor testing, Snyder’s last two films, Watchmen and Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga’Hoole have under performed at the box office. If Sucker Punch does indeed fail to live up to its expectations and bomb at the box office, what does that say about the upcoming Superman flick?

Justin Lin may be getting out of the Fast and Furious driver’s seat and stepping foot into a whole new ride. Deadline is reporting that Universal has attached Lin to direct the famous apocalyptic franchise. However, the studio would have to acquire the rights from Pacificor before anything could actually happen.