7. Cowboys & Aliens (DreamWorks/Universal, July 29)
Jon Favreau segues from Iron Man to a supernatural western with James Bond (Daniel Craig) and Indiana Jones (Harrison Ford). Craig lands in Absolution, Arizona, in 1873 with a loss of memory and a mysterious shackle around one wrist, who teams up with hard-nosed Ford in combating marauders from the sky bent on taking over the planet. Olivia Wilde and Sam Rockwell co-star. ILM (under the supervision of Roger Guyett) does the bulk of the heavy lifting in a very busy summer for them, with additional work by Legacy Effects and others.

6. Super 8 (Paramount/DreamWorks, June 10)
If there's a summer sleeper, this nostalgic, coming-of-age, sci-fi creature feature from J.J. Abrams could be the one. It's an ode to Spielberg produced by Spielberg (with a touch of De Palma's Blow Out for good measure) about a mysterious military train wreck in Ohio in the summer of '79, and an alien's escape caught on super 8 by a group of friends and amateur filmmakers. ILM (under Kim Libreri's supervision) provides the top secret vfx.

5. Green Lantern (Warner Bros., June 17, 3-D)
It's hard to rank the superhero movies, but this one arguably holds the most promise despite the off-beat casting of Ryan Reynolds as the DC guy imbued with otherworldly powers, thanks to a mystical ring, and entrusted with policing the universe with an intergalactic squadron. Martin Campbell (Casino Royale) directs; Karen Goulekas and Kent Houston are the overall supervisors, with Sony Pictures Imageworks leading the heavy-duty vfx charge (spearheaded by Jim Berney) and support from Rising Sun Pictures, Gnomon Studios and others.

4. Transformers: Dark of the Moon (Paramount/DreamWorks, July 1)
Michael Bay and Shia LaBeouf both swear this one's better than the second, so, with inspiration from Pink Floyd and Victoria's Secret model Rosie Huntington-Whiteley replacing Megan Fox as the love interest, we can only hope they've learned their lesson. The Autobots learn of a Cybertronian spacecraft hidden on the moon and try to beat the Decepticons in learning its secrets and gaining advantage in their final battle. At least we know the vfx will be great, and ILM is back (under Scott Farrar's leadership) with new hardware tweaks. Digital Domain also returns for support, among others.