This poor Easter bunny gets beaten to a furry pulp by stoners Jay and Silent Bob in front of a shopping centre full of children in Kevin Smith’s 1995 box office bomb-turned cult classic.

In fairness, those suits are provocatively creepy.

Cuddle Rating: 2/10. Probably lice-ridden.

I’ve always said I’d leave room for a possible CLERKS III, but w/o Jay or Bob, focusing on Dante & Randal, if I felt like telling a story about how I felt to be in my 40’s (as CLERKS was me in my 20’s & CLERKS II was me in my 30’s). But rather than manufacture a CLERKS III, I decided to live a real life CLERKS II. My favorite moment in that flick will always be Randal finally revealing his dopey secret heart & yelling “I’D BUY THE QUICK STOP & RE-OPEN IT MYSELF!” I wrote that line for a deeper reason that I thought I had, in retrospect. From day four of the RedState shoot, all I could hear was Randal in my head, insisting “THAT’S what I’d do. That’s what WE should do.” A long time ago, Randal gave me my entire career; nearly 20 years later, he did it again.

But that all being said? Right now, I honestly have NO story to tell with Dante & Randal. I was always really happy with where we left them.

So while I’ll always allow for the possibility of a CLERKS III, it’s not likely. HIT SOMEBODY is the film the end on. Then? MORE PODCASTS!!!

“Red State is done. Next step is the hockey movie, Hit Somebody. Then I’m done. There’s possibly a Clerks 3. If I have something to say in my late 40s about being in my late 40s, I’ll think of [Clerks’] Dante and Randal. Shy of that, I don’t have any more movies I want to make.”

Did we take this as a unofficial announcement of retirement from filmmaking? Not at all, really. Kevin has always said he wanted to get 10 films out there (he’s been saying this for a LONG time, dating all the way back to Dogma around 1999). So, to our loyal readers, this may not have seemed major news, though it seems some outlets picked this up as some sort of bombshell without even checking with the source. /Film, however, decided to contact Kevin directly about the quote, and he Kevin took the time to script a thoughtful, detailed response which we’ll share a few excerpts from here:

… But THIS “retirement” crap? Not news so much as another sad example of how fucking lazy movie press has become: they cannibalize stories by other writers just to have something to post on their own blogs. Yours was the only website that bothered to go DIRECTLY to the source, Peter – other cats ran articles without even tossing a Tweet my way to check veracity. And I answer Tweets like I answer the dinner bell: often & much. While sweating. And already eating something else.

I’ve always said (since CLERKS, even) that I’ve got about ten films in me (that info might even be on my Wikipedia page). And COP OUT notwithstanding (solely because I didn’t write it), HIT SOMEBODY is the 10th film I’ve got in me. At this moment in time, I’ve got no other flicks I wanna make. The musing about a possible return visit to the View Askewniverse with a third CLERKS is something I’ve been doing since CLERKS II, but I’ve always opened said musings with the disclaimer “If I ever wanna make a flick about being in my 40’s, I’ll think of Dante & Randal first.” There are no concrete plans for a CLERKS III.

…

…If you’ve GOTTA have some Kevin Smith news to hold you over? Here’s something that’s not so much news as my stated intentions for RED STATE: if it gets into Sundance, my plan is to pick the RED STATE distributor right there – IN THE ROOM – auction style. Might even bring up a professional auctioneer to make it fun and unintelligible. And if you’re a multi-millionaire who can’t make it to the first screening of RED STATE, fear not: maybe we’ll set up an eBay page for the post-screening bid-calling as well.

Congrats to /Film for doing the diligence to check with Kevin, and for getting the facts straight. More news later, as we’ll be watching for the “Hit” news and anything else that drops, as well as catching up on some leftover holiday tidbits from the break. Stay tuned.

“…And for all of the homophobic barbs that Jason Lee’s character unleashes upon the queer folks in Smith’s Chasing Amy, the movie is constantly telling us that it’s Lee’s character who’s got the issues and not his supposed targets. (The fact that Lee’s character is revealed to be gay himself at the end of Jay and Silent Bob Strikes Back brings the whole point home.”

“Behaviour CEO Remi Racine tells Eurogamer that initially, the team was unaware of any other meanings for the studio name, until the “issue became known to us five years ago. It was mentioned in a movie and it started to grow from 2005/2006.”

The story links directly to a YouTube video from none other than “Clerks II”.

“Brian Fiete, who co-founded the company along with Jason Kapalka and me, was our primary coder in those days (he’s still our chief tech guru). Right after we made the decision to offer a ‘deluxe’ version of Bejeweled for $19.95, Brian devised a little ‘applet’ that would cause a “cha-ching!” old school cash register sound every time someone actually ponied up $20 for the game. At first it was great fun to hear it go off… on one occasion the three of us were sitting around watching the film “Clerks” and one of the characters said something like “dude, you’ll never get rich sitting around on your ass all day” – and the “cha-ching” sounded and we just fell over laughing… after a couple of days that damned “cha-ching” was going off every minute or two and it was driving us nuts… but that was when we realized we might actually have a hit on our hands.”

Though sculpted and prototyped, production of the CLERKS II InAction Figures are on hold with no released planned for the immediate future. We have a considerable amount of time and money invested in these figures and will do everything we can to make these figures available at some future date.

We thank you for your patience (and support), and ask that you keep your fingers crossed and keep your eye on our websites. Hopefully we’ll be able to get these figures out sometime prior to the 10th Anniversary of Clerks II.

Best,

Bob

We realize this isn’t the news anyone wanted to hear, including us, though now ya know. When we’ve got better news, you’ll read it here.

SMODCAST #103: Amazing Grace

In which a Mother learns the benefits of going green.

Don’t miss it, available immediately now exclusively at www.smodcast.com via downloadable and streaming audio formats.

The hourlong “Blues,” from Clooney and Grant Heslov’s Smokehouse Pictures and Warner Horizon, centers on Dwight Hendricks (Lee), a Memphis police officer who lives with his mother (Celia Weston) and moonlights as a musician.

The pilot, written by Liz Garcia and Joshua Harto and directed by Clark Johnson, co-starred Alfre Woodard, Abraham Benrubi and DJ Qualls. Clooney, Heslov, Garcia and Johnson are executive producers, with Henry Bronchtein and Abby Wolf-Weiss co-executive producing and Harto producing.

Becky Scott

Actress/Film: Rosario Dawson, Clerks II (2006)

Cheating On/With: As manager of a local fast food outlet, she’s relatively footloose; employee Dante Hicks (Brian O’Halloran) on the other hand, with whom she’s apparently been dirtying up the diner tables, really isn’t.

Alright, We Forgive You: Despite being pregnant as a result of their tryst, she tries to let Dante pursue his new life of marital mediocrity in Florida.

And, since every bloke must at some point face the abject humiliation of learning to dance, it might as well happen like [caution: swears] this.

Catch ya next time! Thanks for checking in with News Askew today.

Via @BrandonConsoli “what kind of feel is hit somebody gonna have?” I’m going for FORREST GUMP of sports films. Big valentine to the Game.

Via @LeakingPan “Just got tickets to a prescreening for tomorrow” Score me up, Homey: I wanna make A BIGGER COP OUT after HIT SOMEBODY.

Via @dibbs34 “LOVED The Smomcast. does she return for next weeks as well?” For two solid hours. One of ’em completely baked. S’awesome.

Re: Toronto’s Roy Thomson Show, Feb 6th – 23 tix freed up on TicketMaster. 63 full view. 48 partial view. http://tinyurl.com/tdotkev

Via @rosecity1980 “ticketmaster is turning me down, sir. says they got nothing…again” Call Roy Thomson box office. They’ve got some there.

DailyDevils: @NHLDevils want to get to 10k followers, and they’re giving out 100 pairs of tickets to do so! http://bit.ly/7bW2hK #devs10k

A request from Jeff Anderson (and a rare chance to get a signed page from his CLERKS II script): http://tinyurl.com/arequestfromjeffanderson

Via @themuckshow “is it worth the 9+hr drive from Ont 2 NJ just to see a store?” It’s gonna be, the weekend of August 2nd…

Yes, all we can confirm right now is that early August weekend will bring something big to Red Bank. But for now…No further deets. When we know, so will you.