Never mind the fact that my school just let out for spring break. It’s a beautiful 77 degrees in New York City today, the outdoor bars are open and I’m wearing shorts for the first time this year. Plus, the Entertainment Weekly Summer Movie Preview just arrived in my mailbox, giving me the signal that it is officially the blockbuster season. Sure, May 2nd isn’t for two more weeks, when technically Iron Man begins the summer movie stretch (can’t we just pretend The Forbidden Kingdom is the first summer action flick?), but nothing says, “break out the beach ball,” like the bible of blockbuster buzz.

Yet there’s something strange about this year’s issue. There’s a little less marketing-agency-fueled promotion and a little more reality checking. Maybe it’s because these days, thanks to the web, most moviegoers have already heard about the big releases. That would explain why EW devotes most of its two-page spread on The Incredible Hulk to describing its troubles:

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I keep forgetting that Kung Fu Panda is a real movie. I mostly relate the computer-animated panda character with his cross-promotional spots for AMC Theatres (memory escapes me again: is it for silencing your cellphone or anti-piracy or something entirely different?). But now that we have this full trailer for the DreamWorks Animation movie, I’m reminded that it is in fact a feature release. Unfortunately, it arrived a few days after the new trailer for The Forbidden Kingdom, and I’ve already laid dibs on my most anticipated martial arts film of 2008. Sure, Kung Fu Panda also features Jackie Chan (or his voice, anyway), here as “Master Monkey”, but when it comes to kung fu beginners, I’ll take Michael Angarano over the voice of Jack Black any day.

I shouldn’t be too harsh on Black (especially after yesterday’s unnecessarily mean-spirited trailer-of-the-day), though I couldn’t help but notice his own personal shtick making its way into the anthropomorphic actions of the cartoon bear when I saw that AMC spot (by the way, AMC, National CineMedia scored Martin Scorsese for a better promo — jealous?). And I simply can’t stand it when any animated film character is made to sound and look and behave like the Hollywood star providing its voice. Nothing will ever be as distracting as Robin William’s overcooked performance as the Genie in Aladdin, but it’s still always annoying. It’s odd that Black ever disliked the idea of Kung Fu Panda. What hammy actor would ever dislike an idea that permitted for such scene-chewing? …Read more

I just realized that Michael Angarano is not the same person as Shia LaBeouf. No, just kidding, but I did just realize that he is to LaBeouf as Brian Cox is to Albert Finney, as Gary Busey is to Nick Nolte, as Skeet Ulrich is to Johnny Depp, etc. (for others see the Daily Doppel). Perhaps one day the two young actors will even get to star in a film together and it will be anticipated with the same excitement as The Forbidden Kingdom, which teams up for the first time Hong Kong superstars Jackie Chan and Jet Li. Of course, I hope nobody has ever confused these two martial artists and do not mean to insinuate they are anything like each other’s doppelganger. In fact, they are such distinct and amazing performers in their own right, it’s almost too much to feature them both in this movie.

The last teaser trailer for The Forbidden Kingdom was pretty much a disappointment, as it focused almost entirely on Angarano’s character, an American teenager who magically winds up in ancient China. Sure, it’s alright for the little guy to be in the movie — he’s probably needed to water down the movie’s awesomeness, which is so extreme, what with Jackie Chan, Jet Li and action choreographer Yuen Woo-ping on board, that it would probably make us all explode otherwise. With this new trailer, though, we get the whole story and a lot more of the real stars. Sure, it leads us to believe that Angarano is to become the next great kung fu master, and there’s a little more CGI than I like in a Jackie Chan movie (might as well get Chow Yun-Fat and Seann William Scott), but it still looks hot.

The Forbidden Kingdom arrives in theaters April 18.