Monthly Archive: June 2007

Mandrake Gestures Cinematically

1778_4_04-9413658Perhaps the comics’ first "costumed" hero, Mandrake The Magician, is headed to the big screen once again.

The creation of Lee Falk (who created The Phantom in 1936, two years after starting Mandrake) and artist Phil Davis, Chuck Russell is directing the new effort. Fans might best remember his work helming The Mask. Mindfreak star Criss Angel is involved in the magic stuff.

Mandrake had made it to the movie serials in 1939 with Warren Hull (The Spider) in the lead and Anthony Herrera played the magician (with Ji-Tu Cumbuka as Lothar) in a 1979 made-for-teevee flick that featured Harry Blackstone Jr.  The comic strip is still running, being written and drawn by long-time Falk associate Fred Fredricks.

At one time Fererico Fellini was set to do a Mandrake film, but I suspect the prospect made owners King Feature Syndicate weep.

Artwork copyright King Features Syndicate. All Rights Reserved.

Big ComicMix Broadcast Turns 50!

Our Golden Anniversary Broadcast is stuffed with pop culture nuggets that include more with Quantum Leap‘s Debroah Pratt and a profile of the upcoming Heroes Convention with organizer Sheldon Drum.  There’s plenty of news including 20 or more ways DC Comics wants our Christmas cash and a trip back to when one of he guys making hits on the radio was named…Luigi!

Please Press The Button. Your weekend will never be the same!

Fan Power: Jericho Un-Cancelled

107823-6196967After receiving tons of mail, e-mail, phone calls, and about 40,000 pounds of peanuts, CBS has decided to pick up Jericho for a seven episode second season.

"CBS Entertainment President Nina Tassler posed posted a letter on CBS’s Jericho web site announcing the show  will return in midseason. Her plea: "Please stop sending us nuts."  The network will rebroadcast the first season this summer and release it on DVD in late September.

"You got our attention; your emails and collective voice have been heard," Ms. Tassler stated. "But, for there to be more Jericho, we will need more viewers … we will count on you to rally around the show, to recruit new viewers with the same grass-roots energy, intensity and volume you have displayed in recent weeks."

The short second season will be aired straight through without repeats.

JOHN OSTRANDER: Overlooking the Obvious

18185_4_012-5634033Awards season is loose in comicland and I can already tell you what won’t be getting awards, this year or any other year. Anything that smacks of a licensed property. When I speak of a licensed property, I mean anything like Battlestar Gallactica, or The Phantom, or Buffy, or Conan. Or Star Wars.

   

And, yes, I write some of the Star Wars comics – currently my book is Star Wars: Legacy. If that sounds like a conflict of interest on my part or that maybe I have an axe to grind – so what? If there is one thing being in rotation with Michael Davis has taught me, there is no shame in saying your own name and being proud of what you do. Michael is my hero and my shining example. I intend to channel my inner Michael.

   

I’m as proud of my work on Star Wars as I’ve been of anything I’ve done in my career – and never more so with Legacy. We’ve jumped down the Star Wars timeline 100 years past anything that is being currently done in Star Wars, including the novels. We’ve imagined a whole new galaxy of characters and re-defined Star Wars, working from its past while making it open to newcomers.

   

But forget me for a moment. Wait – I’m channeling my inner Michael. Don’t you ever forget me but, in addition to me, there are other folk doing superlative work. My artist and partner in crime, Jan Duursema, is doing some of the finest work of her career and, given the amount of talent she has to begin with, that’s considerable. When a new Star Wars project is conceived, it usually takes a team of designers a year or so to come up with the look. Jan designed it herself (with Sean Phillips designing a lot of the ships) in less than a year while she was finishing work on our predecessor Star Wars title, Republic. She has a wonderful team of Dan Parsons on inks and Brad Anderson on colors and both of them contribute massively to the just straight out beauty of the books.

   

And it’s not just our book. Doug Wheatley does breathtaking work on Star Wars: The Dark Ages. Nor is it only Star Wars; Timothy Truman and Cary Nord have been doing stunning work on the Conan title. Nor is it only Dark Horse books; the number of books based on licensed properties is growing and coming from many different publishers. Their sales are increasing; the first issue of the new Buffy, the Vampire Slayer series cracked the Top Ten on Diamond’s list the month it came out.

   

So – where’s the love? Where’s the respect? Certainly, Legacy gets it from the Star Wars fans. I was out at Celebration IV about two weeks ago and it was in plentiful display. I find it frustrating that more general readers aren’t at least looking at the titles. These are just good comics, gang – good characters, good stories, lots of adventure, intrigue, great dialogue. And these are just in my comics. (Man, I’m loving channeling my inner Michael. Maybe I’ll call him John-Michael. Or is that too French?) The point is – they’re as good as or better than most of the comics out there. I’ll stand them up against anybody else’s willingly. (more…)

Thundercats Scratch the Big Time

thundercatspicture1a-2833801Variety reports that Warner Bros. Studio has optioned a script by Paul Sopocy to turn the Thundercats cartoon into a CGI-animated feature.

Sayeth the article, "Warner-based Paula Weinstein will produce through her Spring Creek Prods. banner, along with Dick Robertson and Lew Korman. Property revolves around a group of humanoid cats (with feline names like Lion-O, Tygra, Panthro and Cheetara) who must flee their planet of Thundera after it’s destroyed. Once crash-landing on another planet, Third Earth, they must thwart Mumm-Ra, an evil sorcerer, bent on killing them off."

Give me strength.  Seriously, what’s next, Jem and the Holograms?  I’m much more psyched about Warner acquiring the screen rights to Terry Brooks’ Shannara series…

New Shooter work at Valiant

zephyr-3077693Like many of you, I thought the Valiant universe was dead and gone. Well, not so fast.

CBR reports that Valiant will be releasing a hardcover collection entitled Harbinger: The Beginning (which will be "digitally recolored and remastered using state-of-the-art computer techniques") which will include a brand-new story written by one-time Valiant head-honcho Jim Shooter, with art by Bob Hall (who drew Valiant’s Shadowman) entitled "The Origin of Harada."

The book is solicited in June previews, which means it’ll be in stores in August (Valiant’s shooting, pun intended, for the 29th).  I’m very pleased because this item gives me an excuse to run a picture of one of my favorite all-time comic book characters, the lovely and zaftig Zephyr.

Artwork copyright Valient Entertainment. All Rights Reserved.

Walt Disney Gets Stan Lee

  • Uncategorized
  • June 6, 2007

Walt Disney Studios has signed an exclusive multi-year deal with Stan Lee and his production company POW! Entertainment Inc. Lee and POW! will be developing and producing "all sorts of entertainment," according to the House of Mouse.

After a nearly unbroken string of successful movies based on characters and/or concepts which Lee helped to develop, this deal’s a natural. It’s also ironic, as his former employer – Marvel – has been patterning itself after Disney of late. Stan is expected to retain his credit as Marvel’s chairnam emeritus.

The question is, is the world ready for the True Believer animatronic?

Thanks to John Tebbel for the timely lead.

Taking the plunge

  • Uncategorized
  • June 6, 2007

Your must-watch of the day, courtesy of AOL Video — the unaired Aquaman pilot. It’s been around for a bit, and it’s available on the bootleg circuit, but with the announced Justlce League movie and all that Smallville action, we thought you might find it of interest.

It’s preceded by an ad, ’cause it’s AOL so what do you expect… But at least AOL and Aquaman share a common owner.

Game Over: The Follow-up

playstation_3_220605-8522544Last Friday, our Michael Davis opined the inherent suckiness of the Playstation 3. Reuters provides us with an amusing follow-up. They inform us that Nintendo Co.’s Wii game console outsold Sony PlayStation 3 by more than five to one in Japan last month: 251,794 units of the Wii to 46,321 of the PS3. The ratio the previous month (April) was four to one.

Sony’s game division posted an operating loss of $1.91 billion in the year that ended March 31. And you thought the PS3 was expensive!

Sony’s going to be spending a half billion dollars upgrading its censor chips – so if you just bought a PS3, you lose. The consensus in the gaming community is that said half billion would be better spent developing cool new games.

There’s no reason to count Sony out, but I’ll bet its CEO and chairman, Sir Howard Stringer, had stayed at CBS.

 

7-Eleven Hosts Fantastic 4 Screenings

2873_1-1827424Having trouble staying awake during movie sequels this summer?  The 7-Eleven chain has created a new Slurpee energy drink with caffeine, taurine and guarana.  It’s so strong, you can see The Thing drinking it in Fantastic Four: The Rise of the Silver Surfer.

And that’s not all!  You can drink yours in a special collector cup.  Plus 7-Eleven is hosting advance screenings in 20 cities.

You say you want more?  Well, you can also go to your friendly neighborhood Spide — uh, I mean 7-Eleven and enter a contest during their month-long promotion.  Prizes include a chance to win a trip, a walk-on role in a Fox flick, and a whole lot of other suff.  According to the press release, "Visitors to http://www.slurpee.com, http://www.biggulp.com or http://www.7-eleven.com can register on the site to try to win instant prizes by playing the Fantastic 4 game."

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