A staggering 33-million-plus likes can be found at The Fast and Furious 6 Facebook page. By comparison, Iron Man 3's page has fewer than half of that. Star Trek: Into Darkness? Just 2.7 million. The much anticipated Superman reboot Man of Steel comes in with just 621,000. The Fast and Furious franchise isn't just a blockbuster, money-generating film series—its a lifestyle franchise. It's the perfect marriage of big balls, small bikinis, bad guys with good hearts and, most importantly, automobile porn. It is, in no understated terms, America's id.

Dodge is once again partnering with that id, continuing what might be one of the most successful product placement partnerships in film history. This time Dodge is hoping to rub some Furious id off on its Dart and Challenger models. And it might. But Fast and Furious will always be about the Charger.Continue reading...

Guns. Cars. Explosions. Heat. That just about sums up Rockstar Games' Grand Theft Auto III, which is being released on Saturday. What's so special about this version is that it's a 10th anniversary edition — and bring Grand Theft Auto to iPad and Android-based tablets.Continue reading...

It seems that every time we turn around lately we're seeing Chrysler product placement.

But forget the inert Chrysler placement in the Rebecca Black video Friday. A whole different viral video with Chrysler placement is proving to be a tremendous, and perfectly timed, bit of publicity for the brand. And it didn't cost the brand a dime. Continue reading...

Rockstar Games, best known for Grand Theft Auto, has confirmed a release date for its crime thriller L.A. Noire: May 17th in North America (May 20th in Europe) for the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 title. The better-than-most-movies-trailer is above.

He's got a "contract for life" at Chanel, but that hasn't stopped haute designer Karl Lagerfeld from extending his personal brand to Orrefors crystal, not to mention his image to become a videogame character and a silhouette on Coca-Cola bottles. A talented photographer, he also just shot the latest (risque) calendar for Pirelli.

And he's so well-established beyond fashion, a fake Twitter account of supposed Kaiser Karl musings boasts more than 300,000 followers.

Now the designer is going truly "masstige" with his latest venture: designing a capsule collection for Macy’s.Continue reading...

After years of success on home gaming systems, the Grand Theft Auto series is finally on the iPhone.

Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars, the latest installment of GTA, places gamers in the body of Huang Lee, the vengeful son of a gang leader, who is on a quest to destroy and kill everything that steps in his path.

More importantly, it puts the popular game in the hands of iPhone users. So, from now on, when people ride the subway, fly to Paris, or sit in the back seat of a crowded beach-bound car, they will have more gaming options to choose from. How nice, right? But make no mistake. This is about more than entertainment.

This is about the very essence of human interaction.Continue reading...

Apparently more people are interested in military combat and espionage than jacking cars and shooting mobsters. Activision announced that its “Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2” video game set an opening-day sales record on Tuesday, moving 4.7 million units and trouncing the previous mark by Rockstar Games’ “Grand Theft Auto IV,” which sold a mere 3.7 million copies in April 2008.

Cnet’s Daniel Terdiman begrudging applauds the new record while assuming that it’ll be broken by the next hot game – possibly Super Mario Brothers Wii, which goes on sale Sunday – but we see a success story for a brand that was founded before many of today’s gamers could properly hold a joystick.Continue reading...