When The Expendables dropped last year, many felt that—while Sylvester Stallone’s heart was in the right placed—the film failed to live up to expectations (there’s also a strong, vocal minority that love the film, and we should all just go ahead and assume now that they’re going to take issue with this statement).  Surprisingly enough, one of these people seems to be…Sylvester Stallone, who introduces the new Director’s Cut of The Expendables by saying, “I liked the theatrical version, but I love this (version)”.  Have improvements been made?  Is the film really and truly better?  And how can one tell, if one immediately forgot the first film almost as soon as they’d seen it?  Find out in my review of The Expendables: Director’s Cut, after the jump.

For a film that trades fantastical B-movie fun for deadly seriousness, The Expendables needs a reality check.  It thinks that the actors have on-screen chemistry.  They don’t.  It thinks that the script has plenty of witty banter.  It doesn’t.  It thinks that there’s thought-provoking pathos in the story.  There isn’t.  At best, The Expendables is misguided and at worst, it’s an over-confident mess that fumbles completely except for a few action beats.

Comic-Con got a huge jolt of testosterone early Thursday evening as Harry Knowles of Ain’t It Cool News moderated The Expendables panel featuring Terry Crews, ‘Stone Cold’ Steve Austin, Dolph Lundgren, Randy Couture, Bruce Willis (for a moment) and writer/director/star Sylvester Stallone. We got a trailer, a few new clips, a ton of laughs and plenty of curing and fun stories. Hit the jump for all the details.

Lionsgate has released a new Behind the Scenes Featurette on the making of The Expendables.  The featurette is the first in a five-part series, with a new one premiering every Thursday from now till release.

This first one focuses on filming a hostage scene and the video has interviews with a lot of the crew and even Harry Knowles from AICN on set while they were filming.  What’s well done about the 4 minute clip is the way it mixes in behind the scenes footage with final movie footage (including a shot with a lot of blood!).  If you’re looking forward to The Expendables, this clip is only going to get you more excited.  Hit the jump to check it out.

Lionsgate has released a few new images and a “sneak peek” from Sylvester Stallone’s The Expendables.   Starring almost every action star on the planet, The Expendables gets released August 13 and I can’t wait.  I heard they did a test screening not too long ago here in Los Angeles that went over huge.  Apparently people were screaming in the theater and having a blast while watching it.  Based on the first trailer and the new sneak peek…I believe it.  Hit the jump to take a look:

The trailer for Sylvester Stallone’s The Expendables has come online and it’s not good.  It spoils the Schwarzenegger cameo (we knew he was in the film, but they didn’t have to show us his scene), every attempt it makes at humor falls flat, the part where it tries for soulful reflection is where the movie looks funny, and I think the picture has become clear that this is what happens when you make a movie based solely on servicing the fans of B-action pictures.  Oh, and when they do all the actors’ last names at the end of the trailer they leave out Terry Crews.  No one leaves out President Camacho.  Also, Stallone looks like hell and should really lay off the human growth hormone.

Hit the jump to check out the trailer and the official synopsis.  The Expendables hits theaters on August 13th.

Last night was the first test screening of Sylvester Stallone’s 80s-action-movie throwback, The Expendables and reader reviews have started to hit the net.  Collider reader “TexMexes” was good enough to send us his thought on the film and we’ve included it in full after the jump.  It’s a highly positive review of the film but just as a standard disclaimer, studios do send out planted reviews so just keep that caveat in the back of your mind when you read this.  Also, this was just a test screening so things can and will change between now and the film’s August 13th release date.

Additionally, AICN has also landed a couple of reader reviews.  One that’s lukewarm on the film and another one that’s positive.  We’ve pulled some quotes from those reviews as well so you can check out those after the jump as well.

Finally, there was also a test screening of MacGruber last night so if any readers who saw it would like to throw us their thoughts on the film, just shoot us an e-mail at frosty@ collider.com and matt@ collider.com.

Earlier today, while most of us were trying to enjoy our Saturday, Sylvester Stallone, Bruce Willis and Arnold Schwarzenegger filmed a scene together for “The Expendables”. If you’re a fan of action movies, this is like Christmas morning. While the scene in question is just a small part of the movie…who cares! These three action stars have never worked together and even if it’s just for a moment in the movie, this is another reason why “The Expendables” is going to be awesome. More after the jump.

While some movie studios use Variety and The Hollywood Reporter to publish their press releases, Lionsgate is embracing new media in a big way as they’ve announced the release dates of “Kick-Ass” and “The Expendables” on Twitter! Very cool. According to Lionsgate, “Kick-Ass” is hitting theaters on April 16th, 2010 and “The Expendables” on August 20th, 2010. For more on the release dates…hit the jump: