Yearly Archive: 2008

The Michael Davis Network

 

It’s no secret I hate most reality television. I think shows like The Real World and The Real Housewives Of Orange County are real stupid. 
 
No, that’s not right, I like reality TV I just don’t like the “I’m better than you” attitude that some of these shows reflect. Take The Real Housewives Of Orange County for instance. This show is about these elitist bunch of middle age women who think that money and status are all there is in life. One woman on the show has a son who has serious problems so her solution is to kick him out of the house. OK, that’s tough love, I get that. 
 
However…
 
The mom is then upset that her son (who she kicked out) moved into the home of her husbands ex-wife. She is very hurt that her son would do that to her. 
 
What? 
 
This “mother” throws her son out of the house and then she is hurt because her son moves into her husband ex-wife’s house. Forget the fact the kid had nowhere to go, she could not get over the fact that he would hurt her that way. 
 
What kind of parent is this? 
 
Does having money make you a heartless self-centered bitch? 
 

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Happy Birthday to The Six Million Dollar Man!

Today in 1974, Lee Majors starred as Steve Austin, the world’s first bionic man, when the Six Million Dollar Man debuted as a regular series on ABC. Based on Martin Caidin’s novel Cyborg, the show created an explosion of superhero trends in TV, spawning the likes of Wonder Woman, The Incredible Hulk and The Bionic Woman, which was just revived in 2007. And yes, there was even a comic from Charlton back in the day.

What with shows like Heroes as well, it looks like the 70’s superhero revival has found its way into the new millenium– just as long as we don’t look back on this era and regret the hairdos as much.

We here at ComicMix paln to celebrate by doing everything in slow-motion while making na-na-na-na-na noises.

Comic Strips Tell the Stories of Sex Workers

A recent post on BoingBoing regarding comics based on the lives of sex workers has led to an interesting interview with Peter S. Conrad, a writer and artist whose latest project involves turning sex workers’ stories into comic strips. The interview, along with the four-page strip titled "Going Back" can be found at The Reverse Cowgirl.

RC: How did you create the artwork for the stories?

PSC: As much as possible, I don’t want to be in the way of the story. I print out the words typed by the person who told the story and use a pencil to make marks where I think page divisions will go. Sometimes I have to make a lot of cuts, or sometimes I replace a bunch of words with a picture that gets the idea across, so I know I am having an effect on the story, but I use as much as I can verbatim. My goal is to be invisible, because it’s not really my story to tell.

Keep in mind, the art and story are both of the NSFW variety, as they contain adult material.

Sneak Peek at X Files 2

20th Century Fox has provided Comingsoon.net with photos of Mulder and Scully from the set of The X Files 2, along with a brief explanation of the much-anticipated film’s plot.

"The film will dump the long-running ‘mythology’ plotline — that aliens live among us and are part of a colonizing effort."

More photos to be found at Comingsoon.net.

Cloverfield Mysteries Continue With New Manga

You’ve got to hand it to the marketing crew behind Cloverfield – they’ve managed to successfully stoke the fires under the J.J. Abrams-produced monster movie to an amazing degree while keeping the ‘Net rumor mill relatively spoiler-free. The level of online curiousity regarding the film is so high, in fact, that some sites have even ventured outside the U.S. to advance their quest for more Cloverfield clues.

Case in point: The strange path to (and revelations within) Cloverfield: Kishin by the crew at Comic Book Resources:

"As seen in the Cloverfield trailers, a character called Rob is set to leave New York City for a new job in Tokyo, and is celebrating his departure with friends when the Cloverfield monster first attacks.  In a blog posting, Rob revealed he’d be working for Slusho! Brand “happy drink.” It’s later revealed on Rob’s blog that Slusho is owned by Tagruato, a giant oil conglomerate.  What connection Tagruato has to the giant monster or the attack on New York City is unknown and likely to be revealed in the film, but it was the Tagruato brand-name and logo that caught our eye."

… and the investigation continues:

"After consulting with Cloverfield experts, we soon found ourselves navigating the website of Kadokawa –a major manga publisher in Japan, known for books like Sgt. Frog, X/1999Cowboy Bebop and others, as well as the leading manga magazine Newtype – where we discovered a manga featuring a boat with the Tagruato logo plastered on the side. This certainly piqued our interest, but as we here at CBR don’t speak or read Japanese, we enlisted the aid of some people who do, Audrey Shiomi and Justin Clemons, who helped decipher the 22-page comic."

You can find out what they discovered over at CBR, but keep in mind that it’s the journey, not the destination, when it comes to the quest for Cloverfield info.

 

Sega Debuts New Screenshots From Iron Man Video Game

ironmanjan17_1-2608710In an official press release issued earlier today, Sega of America released a gallery of screenshots from the upcoming Iron Man video game based on the Marvel Studios film.

SEGA® of America Inc. presents new screens from Iron Man, the highly-anticipated video game based on Marvel’s iconic Super Hero. These action-packed screens offer just a hint of the intense action gamers can look forward to and give fans a closer look at two of the Iron Man suits that will be featured in both the game and the movie.

Iron Man is based on Marvel Studios’ highly-anticipated Iron Man feature film starring Academy Award® Nominees Robert Downey Jr. and Terrence Howard, and directed by Jon Favreau. This project, the first feature film to be produced independently by Marvel Entertainment, will blast into theaters May 2, 2008. The Iron Man game is set for release Spring 2008.

You can find more screenshots at Comic Book Resources.

Enterprise Unveiled in New Star Trek Photo

trek1-9596003Moviefone recently posted the first photo from the upcoming Star Trek feature film. The shot depicts a somewhat grainy U.S.S. Enterprise.

The first trailer for the J.J. Abrams-helmed Star Trek is expected to be shown during this weekend’s premiere of another much-anticipated Abrams project, Cloverfield.

 

The Goldbergs Make Television History

Today in 1949, a show about a small Jewish family aired on television (after nearly 20 years on radio), beginning a tradition of one of the most lucrative and watched programs ever: the situation comedy, nick-named, the "sitcom." The charms of a Jewish family in the Bronx has led to stories about friends in Manhattan, um, another group of friends in Manhattan, a couple in Manhattan — are we sensing a pattern here? Oh wait, there’s also Two and a Half Men. Can’t forget that gem of an exception.

Thanks to the creators of The Goldbergs, we can now come home after our hard days at work, laugh at predictable humor and numb our minds so that we don’t have to hit the bottle. Cheers!

The Black Lamb meets the Steel Maiden

In today’s thrilling installment of The Black Lamb, Timothy Truman continues his tale of the vampire from space, The Black Lamb.  Good guys, bad guys, magicians, scientists, bounty hunters, double-agents — what more could you want in a full-color, free comic?

Justice League Film Delayed Due to ‘Script Issues’

justice-league-7765603The Hollywood Reporter confirmed today that filming of the George Miller-helmed Justice League will be delayed by Warner Bros. until after the writers’ strike. In its rationale for the delay, the studio cited a need for script rewrites as well as uncertainty regarding the film’s eligibility for tax incentives in Australia, where filming was planned.

"The feature was to have been a tentpole special effects extravaganza for Warners. Word leaked in the fall that the script, by Kieran Mulroney and Michele Mulroney, was good but that subsequent passes, including the latest by Miller, had pacing issues and took the project in directions the studio wasn’t happy with."

According to the Reporter, the Justice League delay comes as welcome news to Christopher Nolan, director of Batman Begins and its upcoming sequel, The Dark Knight. Nolan was unhappy with the significant differences between the Batman character planned for the League and the Batman of his current franchise.