Spider-Man 4 will always be one of those great “What if?” films.  What if Sam Raimi had a chance to redeem himself from Spider-Man 3?  What if we had gotten to see John Malkovich as Vulture and Anne Hathaway as Black Cat?  We’ll never know, but the artifacts remain.  Storyboard artist Jefrey Henderson has released storyboard he did for Spider-Man 4, and while they’re far from anything official (the script was still being worked on when Sony pulled the plug), I am curious about the demon/goblin thing being tossed by Spidey.  The three boards are the only thing Henderson felt he could post without upsetting Raimi, so they’re pretty innocuous (Peter kissing a woman, and using a web to stop falling debris), but perhaps there’s more exciting stuff out there and one day we’ll get to see it.

Hit the jump to check out the storyboards.

One mainstay of being a Doctor Who fan is making fun of, lovingly, the low budgets the show has often suffered from, though it’s also part of the series’ endearing charm.  But one way to make the Time Lord and companions unencumbered on their journeys would be to animate them — so why hasn’t this happened yet?

Well, there have a been animated incarnations, though in very small doses.  But Dan Norton, who has done work on DC and WildStorm comics, revealed recently that there was a very cool animated Doctor Who series in the works, though it was shelved so as not to distract from the live-action series.  Hit the jump for more on the project, some of the really cool concept art and what Norton had to say about it all.

New concept art has been released from Guillermo Del Toro’s Pacific Rim.  The story is kicked off by the rise of monsters (known as Kaiju) from the sea who start a war that devastates humanity.  To fight back, the humans build giant robots (known as Jaegers) that are controlled by two pilots.  One of the pieces of concept art gives another look at the jaeger “Cherno Alpha”.  As for the other, I assume it’s a kaiju skull, although with the designs on Del Toro’s films, it’s sometime difficult to know what body part you’re looking at.

Hit the jump to check out the concept art.    The film stars Charlie Hunnam, Idris Elba, Rinko Kikuchi, Charlie Day, and Ron Perlman.  Pacific Rim opens in 3D on July 12th.

A few years back, Pixar was working on a film called Newt.  The premise was about the last remaining male and female blue-footed newts on the planet who are forced together by science to save the species, but they can’t stand each other.  Sound familiar?  The film was scrapped after being too similar to Blue Sky Animation’s Rio.  I think Pixar could have done more with the premise, but I guess we’ll never know.  The best we’ll probably get are leaked pieces of concept art.  We saw some back in 2010, and now more has been released online.  It’s a great look, but sadly, most concept art for 3D movies tends to get watered down (remember how Tangled was supposed to resemble the artistic style of French Rococo artist Jean-Honore Fragonard’s painting “The Swing”?).  Either way, it’s an interesting look at a film that never was.

Hit the jump to check out the concept art.

Snowpiercer is flying under the radar at the moment, but I can’t wait to see what happens when the trailer drops.  The story is set in a new ice age caused by a failed experiment to stop global warming that killed virtually all life on the planet.  The sole survivors live on a train called Snowpercer—powered by a perpetual machine—who struggle with the class system implemented on the train.  That’s almost too much premise, but the man in charge is Korean writer/director Bong Joon-ho.  Bong has shown a skilled hand with extraordinary story beats over his last two features, Mother and The Host, and hired the kind of balanced ensemble a director must dream of for his English-language debut: Chris Evans, Song Kangho, Tilda Swinton, Jamie Bell, Octavia Spencer, Ewen Bremner, Alison Pill, John Hurt, and Ed Harris.

Tonight we get our first taste of Snowpiercer.  Check out the first teaser poster, some concept art, and a clip from the score after the jump.

Pixar recently sent out a holiday card, and the card contains the concept art for the studios 2013 – 2016 slate of pictures.  The card includes previously released concept art for Monsters University as well as a first look at The Good Dinosaur, the Untitled Movie That Takes You Inside the Mind (now titled Inside Out), and the Untitled Dia de los Muertos movie.  There’s nothing too revealing about any of this concept art, but it’s still nice to have a glimpse at three Pixar films that aren’t sequels or prequels.

Hit the jump to check out the concept art along with loglines for the films.  The Good Dinosaur opens May 30, 2014.  The Untitled Movie That Takes You Inside the Mind opens June 19, 2015.  The Untitled Dia de los Muertos movie opens in 2016.

Though many have likely already pored over all the extras on the multiple Blu-ray and DVD releases of The Dark Knight Rises, some might not have made it to the “concept art” section just yet.  For those of you that haven’t, a massive collection of images from said bonus feature has now landed online.  The result is a interesting look at the development and design process of a number of costumes and props from the film, including Bane’s mask, Catwoman’s goggles and costume, the Batpod, weapons, and even “Howard Hughes Bruce Wayne.”

Hit the jump to take a look at all the images.  The Dark Knight Rises is available on Blu-ray, DVD, and digital download now.

Before a movie opens, we’re all eager to see the concept art so we’ll have some idea of what the film will look like.  After the film opens, concept art is still great because it shows us the roads not taken.  Artist Andy Park has posted plenty of concept art from The Avengers on his website, and it’s worth checking out.  Some of the changes are drastic (I can’t imagine Nick Fury without his black trench coat), and some are nice and subtle.

Hit the jump to check out the concept art.

Financially, Pixar has had a lot of success at the box office by going back to their previous films.  They’ll be going back again next summer with Monsters University, a prequel to 2001′s Monsters, Inc.  The new film shows how monsters Mike Wazowski (Billy Crystal) and James P. “Sulley” Sullivan (John Goodman) weren’t always the best of friends, especially in their college days.  The trailers looked like a lot of fun, and now concept art has landed online showing the characters when they were younger.  We also get a look at supporting monsters Don, Squishy, Squishy’s Mom, Art, and Terri & Terry.

Hit the jump to check out the concept art.  Monsters University opens in 3D on June 21, 2013. [Update: We've been asked by Disney to take down the concept art as this wasn't an official release.]

I’m not exactly sure why we need a fourth Jurassic Park film, but Universal has been trying to get one for years.  At one point, John Sayles (Lone Star) wrote a script that took an Island of Doctor Moreau bent, and created genetically engineered human-dinosaurs mercenaries that could wield guns.  What’s more dangerous than a velociraptor?  A velociraptor with an AK-47 (clever girl).  The project was eventually scrapped due in part to concept art by Carlos Huante that has now been leaked online.  Some of it just looks like The Lizard from The Amazing Spider-Man, but there are some seeds of a cool idea, like the triceratops, since he’s the only one with opposable thumbs.  I don’t know if this would be a good fit for the Jurassic Park franchise, but I can absolutely see it working for a SyFy movie.  They should hire Lorenzo Lamas, shoot it this weekend, and release it next week.  I’d watch.

Hit the jump to check out the concept art, and click here for what producer Kathleen Kennedy had to say about the current status of Jurassic Park 4.

Neil Gaiman‘s brilliant comic book series The Sandman should probably never be adapted into a movie.  Even a TV series would be difficult because the books are so intricately tied to the varied artwork, styles, and tones of the stories.  But back in the early 1990s, Warner Bros. wanted to turn The Sandman into a movie even though Gaiman said [via David Hughes' book Tales from Development Hell], it would be “like taking a baby and cutting off both of its arms and one its legs and nose and trying to cram it in this little box, and filling the rest of the box up with meat.” (He does have a way with words)  However, he did try to “pitch/explain” Sandman to the studio, and he and artist Jill Thompson drew up some concept art for their pitch.  Gaiman has now tweeted the concept art, which was part of a pitch for a Sandman trilogy.

I haven’t read Sandman in a decade, but I can tell from the images that this covers the first graphic novel, Preludes and Nocturnes and maybe some of the second book, The Doll’s House.  Hit the jump to check out the artwork, and if you want to read the whole torrid history of The Sandman movie, be sure to pick up Tales from Development Hell.

New concept art for Disney’s upcoming princess movie, Frozen, has leaked online.  For those unfamiliar with the film, Kristen Bell voices a young dreamer named Anna who teams up with “a daring mountain man” to find the Snow Queen (Idina Menzel) and put an end to a spell that has trapped their kingdom in eternal winter.  Broadway vets Robert Lopez (The Book of Mormon) and Kristen Anderson-Lopez (Winnie the Pooh) tapped to pen original songs for the feature.  Chris Buck (Tarzan) is onboard as director.  I’m glad Disney has another animated musical up their sleeve, but it will be computer-animated, so it looks like the studio has gotten skittish when it comes to 2D because The Princess and the Frog and Winnie the Pooh underperformed at the box office.

Hit the jump to check out the images.  Frozen opens November 2013.

I love concept art books because you can see the evolution of a design and see all the roads not taken.  A big production like The Amazing Spider-Man goes through thousands of designs as artists draw out their ideas for the sets, costumes, creatures, props, and other good stuff.  Today, some unused costume designs and concept art has landed online.  The costumes design is fascinating because one costume is remarkably similar to the outfit from Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man trilogy, and the other two are radically different from anything we’ve seen (especially the mask and spider emblem).  As for the concept art, it’s a different look at the Lizard, and while I’m not sure if it would have translated to a three-dimensional model, I like that it looks less humanoid than the final version.

Hit the jump to check out the images.

New concept art for Iron Man 3 has gone online.  The concept art will be available at this year’s Comic-Con, presumably over at the Marvel booth.  If you’re wondering what time it will be available, just look for the crowd of people crushing each other as they bite and claw their way towards the booth.  As you can see from the image above, Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) is also in a tight spot, although no one likes to be interrupted in the middle of changing outfits, even Iron Man.

Hit the jump to check out the full image.  The film also stars Ben Kingsley, Gwyneth Paltrow, Don Cheadle, Rebecca Hall, Ashley Hamilton, and Guy Pearce.  Iron Man 3 opens May 3, 2013.

Before Paul Verhoeven cranked out Total Recall in 1990, producer Dino De Laurentiis approached David Cronenberg to direct the feature.  The project never came to fruition because Cronenberg’s vision never coincided with De Laurentiis’.  The two parted ways, Cronenberg went on to make The Fly, and Verhoeven made a movie where a woman has three boobs.  Wins all around.

But the question of “What If?” is always fascinating, and we’ve never had a chance to see what Cronenberg was planning until now.  Artist Ron Miller and his wife Judith Miller worked at De Laurentiis’ studio outside Rome, and the duo produced concept art and sculptures under the direction of production designer Pierluigi Basile (1982′s Conan the Barbarian).  Ron Miller has now released some of the designs he and his wife created along with some details on how Cronenberg planned to adapt the source material, Philip K. Dick‘s short story “We Can Remember It For You Wholesale”.  Hit the jump for more.