The Week in Spandex - The Dark Knight Rises cameos, X-Men: First Class mistakes, and The Avengers at Comic-Con after all?

Presenting our weekly round-up of the biggest news stories from the world of movie superheroes…

It’s an exciting time for Batman fans at the moment, with the first teaser trailer and poster from The Dark Knight Rises arriving in cinemas alongside Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 later this coming week, and if recent rumours are to be believed, it looks as if we might be getting a couple of interesting cameos in Christopher Nolan's third Batman movie. First up came word that Adam West had been spotted near to the shoot in Nottingham, with FLOSS Magazine then reporting via Twitter that 'Hollywood bigwigs' had confirmed the Batman TV star would be making an appearance in the film. Quite who these 'bigwigs' were remains a mystery, with Batman-Online since suggesting the rumours to be false, but given that Nolan has signed up just about every actor in Hollywood then it wouldn't be too much of a stretch to see the former Caped Crusader crop up for a quick cameo.

Along with Adam West, there's also been speculation that Roland Daggett - a.k.a. the corrupt businessman from Batman: The Animated Series - could feature in the film, stemming from a set photo that seems to indicate the inclusion of a character called Daggett. You can take a look at the photos for yourself here. Meanwhile in other Batman news, we also got our first look at Eliza Dushku's Catwoman from the upcoming DC Animated Original Movies adaptation of Batman: Year One, with a trailer then making its way online later in the week. Year One receives its world premiere at Comic-Con later this month and is set to arrive on October 18th in North America, and will also feature a 15-minute Catwoman short written by DCAU legend Paul Dini.

Update - there's also some potentially juicy spoilers courtesy of an upcoming scene description from Carnegie Mellon University's blog - take a look here.

Moving on and MovieMistakes have been updating their records for 2011, with Matthew Vaughn’s X-Men: First Class currently holding the ‘honour’ of being the most mistake-filled superhero movie of the year so far (although it trails Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides and Transformers: Dark of the Moon overall). In fairness, a lot of the errors are to do with continuity between First Class, X-Men: The Last Stand and X-Men Origins: Wolverine, which I suppose shouldn’t really count seeing as it was only ever meant to be loosely tied to the previous movies. Thor fares a little better with only a few errors, while I’m presuming they’re just counting Green Lantern as one big mistake (saying that, we have posted a somewhat positive review earlier in the week).

On the subject of this year’s superhero movies, Thor is about ready to call time on its run in cinemas and continues to lead in terms of global box office receipts with $439m, with X-Men: First Class close behind on $336m and Green Lantern struggling to recoup its budget with just $139m to date, including a feeble $33m from the international markets.

The Marvel / Comic-Con saga took a further turn this past week with First Showing suggesting that despite shunning Hall H, the studio still plan on bringing The Avengers to San Diego with a S.H.I.E.L.D.-themed viral marketing campaign that may include the Helicarrier bridge set from the movie itself. The report also claims that footage from Joss Whedon’s superhero team-up will be shown around the floor, which could potentially include the first teaser trailer. It’s also said that stars such as Chris Hemsworth, Robert Downey Jr, Scarlett Johansson, Jeremy Renner and Mark Ruffalo may be in attendance, although Chris Evans is confirmed to appear to promote the release of Captain America: The First Avenger.

Wrapping up the best of the rest…

…Collider revealed the Friday schedule for Comic-Con, with some interesting superhero highlights including The Amazing Spider-Man, Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance, Green Lantern: The Animated Series, and the world premiere of Batman: Year One…

...Heat Vision have revealed that Harry Lennix (The Matrix Reloaded) has officially signed on to Zack Snyder's Man of Steel, where he will portray military man General Swanwick...

...And finally, a really poor quality French poster for Captain America: The First Avenger has arrived in advance of the film's release, while ComicBookMovie have also posted a few words about the movie from Dominic Cooper, Neal McDonough and Hugo Weaving.

Gary Collinson

Holy Franchise, Batman! - Coming 2012.