The Fast & Furious franchise grabbed headlines recently when it added yet another recognizable action-hero face to its ever-growing ensemble (and if you haven’t seen the end credits of Fast & Furious 6, you might want to head to a theater and catch up on the latest buzz). Some made comparisons to The Avengers, which assembled a number of familiar fighters for one movie. 

 

Truthfully, it reminded me of Sylvester Stallone’s The Expendables, which is gearing up for a third adventure soon. 

 

Lionsgate announced that The Expendables 3 will open in theaters on August 15, 2014. That fits perfectly with the formula followed by the first two Expendables movies, which closed out the summer seasons in 2010 and 2012. So far, the series has been steady, distancing its sequels by two years while growing the cast and upping the ante. The latest names associated with The Expendables series have been Nicolas Cage, Jackie Chan, Wesley Snipes and Milla Jovovich. Get excited about that.

 

 

As release dates continue to shift around, former Expendable Arnold Schwarzenegger and his buddy Stallone are gearing up for their latest, Escape Plan (formerly known as The Tomb). The prison-break drama was due in theaters on September 13, but the studio recently pushed it back to October 18. 

 

And we have one last note on the action-hero front. Current butt-kicker Liam Neeson has another high-octane thriller coming to theaters. Non-Stop casts Neeson as a U.S. Marshal on a transatlantic flight who finds himself in an intricate and deadly game of cat and mouse with a potential terrorist. It was supposed to open on February 21, 2014 but has moved back one week to February 28. Adjust your calendars accordingly.