There's one big news story this week - that 2000AD themed costumes have finally hit Little Big Planet. 

If you own a PS3 and the game, £4.75 will get you a Judge Dredd, Anderson, Rogue Trooper, Hammerstein and Strontium Dog costume - as well as a whole herd of 2000AD themed stickers to adorn your home-made levels with.  The costumes are quite nicely done, it must be said, and no one can deny the rather large amount of publicity this has gotten 2000AD from the games press over the past few weeks. 

Many of the US game sites are wondering why Media Molecule went with 2000AD costumes before some bigger comic book names - but as they are a British company, it seems quite sensible that they went with some of the biggest UK comics characters first.  Whatever, it's certainly good to see 2000AD getting some of the publicity it deserves.

You can get a preview of all of the characters, along with some rather nice 2000AD covers featuring the dolled-up sackboy over at Media Molecule's site .

It's time for another brief update of all things 2000AD.  Things for you to check out today are...

• Matthew Badham interviews Al Ewing
• David Bishop and Sam Kelly reveal more about the genre-fiction MA
  
• Ian Edginton reveals what's coming next from him in 2000AD.
  
• Judge Dredd comes to Little Big Planet
  
• Simon Bisley talks about Batman vs Judge Dredd
• Sean Phillips comes back to Armitage for a Megazine cover

As Internet rumours go, this one was shot down very fast indeed. 

A story in Production Weekly indicated that the A-list star was attached to the film adaptation of Button Man.  Going by his recent outing in The Departed, it's not a bad choice.  However, it was also just too good to be true.  DiCaprio's reps were contacted by Entertainment Weekly and, alas, threw cold water on the story.

But it's not all bad news.  What this story managed to achieve was to give a huge amount of publicity Button Man and now there's real awareness that there's a film version in the works.  We know the film is with Dreamworks and that Hillary Seitz (who wrote Shia La Bouef's recent thriller, Eagle Eye) is handling the script.  It also gave a good indication that Hollywood is looking for A-list talent in the role of Harry Exton, which means it should be a high profile release.

And finally, many of the sites that published both the connection to DiCaprio and the later retraction linked the film with Wagner, 2000AD and Judge Dredd.  Given that there's a Dredd film in the offing too, this can only be considered a Very Good Thing from a marketing and PR perspective.

Elsewhere in the news...

• Read the full version of Andy Diggle's recent Megazine interview
• Big Finish are due to be bringing out four more Judge Dredd audio adventure.  More on this soon.
• RIP 2000AD classic artist Jose Casanovas
• Ian Rankin is still talking about Judge Dredd. Perhaps Rebeillion should approach him..?
• Keep an eye out for the Creative Writing MA in Edinburgh featuring lecures from Alan Grant, David Bishop, Mark Millar and others.  Possibly worth attending to see how Grant and Millar get on...
• Expect a Ron Smith interview in June's Megazine
• And finally, D'israeli has a wonderful commentary on Low Life: Creation over at his blog...

Aside from the official site and this humble offering, there are quite a few blogs deveoted to 2000AD out there, and we through it time to raise the awareness of some of them.

First up - the 2000AD Prog Slog, where Paul Rainey endevours to read and review every single 2000AD, Megazine and reletaed material since prog one.  Now up to prog 755, it shows a dedication that puts this site to shame, and is well worth sticking on your watch list.

On a similar note, it's also worth looking at A Journal of Zarjaz Things where The Hipster Dad also looks fondly at his 2000AD collection - updated every Thrillpowered Thursday.

Next we have 2000AD Review contributor Alex Frith's Meanwhile on the Dark Side of the Moon , where he takes a slightly broader approach to 2000AD,most recently looking at 2000AD's approach to superheroes.

Of course, we're now seeing more and more creators turning up on blogs, twitter and the like. A pick of the buch is:

• PJ Holden's regularly updated blog.
• Cliff Robinson accasionally showing off some forthcoming covers.
• Al Ewing talking about everything.
• D'israeli seeing his early work come back to haunt him.
  

And in other news... 

Listen to an interview with Peter Doherty.

Colin Wilson talks Dredd.

Comic Book Resources includes 2000AD in its A Year of Cool Comic Book Moments.

And finally, don't forget thet More4 is screening the John Hicklenton documentary Here's Johnny on February 17th.  A must watch for everyone.

It's been fairly quiet since the recent announcement of the new Judge Dredd movie, but during the last week, the mists have begun to clear.  

First of all, the last couple of days have seen some allegedly leaked concept art for the movie by none other than 2000AD artist Jock.  The shots look nice and moody, with Jock's characteristically bulky judges in evidence, but it looks like the images were produced to raise interest in the movie, as opposed to being production art.  Still, it provides an insight into what got DNA Films interested in the first place, and they do look mighty fine.

But, alas, it's not all good news.  Danny Boyle is closely associated with DNA films, the studio that is producing Judge Dredd, so online speculation went into overdrive as to whether or not the currently hot director will be helming the film.  However, in his recent webchat with Empire Online readers, someone finally asked him directly about his involvement.  His reply was not positive:

"Where has this come from? Someone asked me about Judge Dredd the other day! Well... ha! I hated the last version of it; I can't imagine the next one will be any better."

So, chances of him helming the film have now dramatically decreased, and you can also bet that DNA Films (Empire apparently reminded him about the connection between DNA and Dredd) aren't too happy with that off-the-cuff answer.

But to end things on a brighter note, The Guardian thinks Hollywood's current obsession with "dark" films could work in 2000AD's favour - with a number of properties, particularly Rogue Trooper and Strontium Dog being ideal films for that kind of treatment.  Could more 2000AD film news be around the corner..?

It's been rumoured for the last few weeks, since a Facebook page was set up, but Rebellion have given us all an early Christmas present and confirmed that a Dredd movie is indeed in the works, with production allegedly starting in 2009. 

It's being produced by DNA films in association with Fox Searchlight - the people behind Sunshine and 28 weeks later - and Alex Garland is rumoured to be the writer.  We can only hope that Danny Boyle, currently on a high with the tipped-for-Oscars Slumdog Millionaire, can be tempted to direct.

So - month/years of speculation as top who will play the man himself starts here, but surely Ray Stevenson is in with a chance...

Read the announcement here