Fanboys moves again

You may be wondering why you haven’t seen FANBOYS playing in your local theater by now, especially when even the inferior CLONE WARS ‘toon can manage a major release.

The movie, set in 1998, is about STAR WARS zealots on a road trip to sneak a terminally ill friend into Skywalker Ranch so he can see THE PHANTOM MENACE before he croaks. And it’s been awaiting release for years from Dimension/WeinsteinCo (missing any marketing synergy for the first STAR WARS movie’s 30th anniversary, or even the launch of the CLONE WARS TV series).

First it was a straight scheduling juggle, then delays when an alternate cut made by the Weinsteins (excising the cancer plotline) vexed actual fanboys, demanding the tragic disease be replaced. The studio officially responded to the clamor by claiming fans would get both versions.

And yet, to date we’ve seen neither. Last we heard, the film was to get a limited release in September (with a November DVD date even reportedly hitting some solicitations), but the most anyone has seen are a couple of Con screenings and the couple of endlessly circulated snaps of cutie Kristen Bell in slave-Leia garb.

And now according to the LA Times, FANBOYS is finally coming in January 2009 so that, per Harvey Weinstein, “we can do a major promotion with Comcast, who’s arranging for a big advertising tie-in for us on the film.” Guess you should believe it when you see it…