New York Governor Andrew M. Cuomo announced passage of the Marriage Equality Act by a margin of 33 to 29, granting same-sex couples the freedom to marry under the law. New York is the sixth and largest state to approve gay marriage, effectively doubling the number of Americans living in states with the freedom to marry.
But don’t worry, you can still look down on stinkin’ mutants…
Hat tip: Miss Amerikka.
It’s official– Peter David has gone crazy. Go take a look for yourself.
Martin Harry Greenberg, the leading anthologist and packager of short science fiction, fantasy, and superhero prose stories, and senior editor of Tekno Comix, died at his home in Green Bay, Wisconsin on Saturday. He was 70.
Marty’s output was staggering– here’s one partial list of the books that he actually received credit on, and here’s another. Notice how little overlap there is between the two lists, and there are hundreds more where he did back end editorial, production, or most often financial work. Marty’s packaging company, Tekno Books, produced over 2,000 books since its creation, with more than 55 New York Times bestselling authors. His collaborators have included the likes of Tom Clancy, Dean Koontz, Nora Roberts, Deepak Chopra, Robert Silverberg, Jane Yolen, Esther Friesner, Ed Gorman, and the late Isaac Asimov. In the 90s, he lent his corporate name and expertise to Tekno Comix. He packaged the Further Adventures Of series of short story collections featuring Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman, The Joker, The Penguin, and Catwoman for Bantam Spectra in the 90s.
He is the only person to have won the Milford Award for science fiction editing, the Ellery Queen Award for mystery editing and the Bram Stoker Award for supernatural horror editing. He also received the Prometheus Award in 2005 and was one of the first recipients of the Solstice Award in 2009. He was also a professor of political science at the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay from 1970 until his retirement in 1996, where science fiction was often used as a teaching tool.
Like almost everyone else in science fiction, I’ve received a check from Marty at least once in my life on a book I didn’t even know he was involved in. He will be missed.
Just in time for the Fourth of July, we bring you the final trailer for Captain America: The First Avenger, starring Chris Evans, Tommy Lee Jones, and Hugo Weaving, opening July 22nd.
People occasionally ask me: so how do you fill your days working for ComicMix? Here’s what I did yesterday…
After getting up around 10 AM (because I’d been working overnight on various programming changes for the web site) I went into New York City to have lunch with authors [[[Dave Smeds]]] (X-Men: Law Of The Jungle), [[[Aaron Rosenberg]]] (World Of Warcraft, Eureka), [[[David Alan Mack]]] (Farscape: Scorpius for Boom!, Star Trek: Vanguard) and ComicMix contributors Alexandra Honigsberg and Kim Kindya, among others.
Headed off to a post-lunch survey of comic book stores, where I discussed with the owners about DC’s digital plans, and the meeting that DC will be having on Friday between their executives and various comic book store owners. We expect there to be fireworks a bit early this summer.
At one of the comics stores, also caught up with [[[Michael Uslan]]] (executive producer of the Batman films and author of [[[Archie Marries…]]]) who revealed that he’s in town to speak at the United Nations on Friday with Jerry Robinson (Batman artist and creator of Robin and the Joker) to address political cartoonists from all over the world.
Then after a brief meeting with a possible investor, I hopped a subway to Citifield, where I sat in Joe Quesada-provided seats with Peter David and his family to watch the Mets battle the Oakland A’s. Joe was a gracious host, and Peter and I spent a lot of time discussing an upcoming project of his we’ll tell you more about later this week.
It was a looooong game– started an hour late due to rain, and went to 13 innings. (The Mets won on a bases-loaded hit-by-pitch with two outs.) Between innings, I also played chess with Marvel Senior VP of Publishing, Tom Brevoort. I think it’s mate in seven moves, but I’m not sure for which of us yet.
But after the Mets victory, as I headed towards the number 7 subway station, I saw one more comics tie-in– our Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man was there, alternately serenading us with Take Me Out To The Ball Game and his own theme song.
Then back here, setting up a few more things for the site before I had to drive a friend to a 5 AM flight. And after I get back from the airport, the morning press releases will be coming in.
So how was your day?
…less than three months until [[[Star Wars]]] comes out on Blu-Ray!
Why, what did you think I meant?
Hat tip: Geeks Are Sexy. Amen.
This weekend, Bleeding Cool found a potential slip by Geoff Johns that hinted the Eisner and Harvey Award-winning Vertigo comic [[[100 Bullets]]] by Brian Azzarello and Eduardo Risso was coming to TV as a series.
Now Deadline reports that screenwriter and comic writer David S. Goyer (Blade, The Dark Knight) is going to write and executive produce the show for Showtime .
If you aren’t familiar with the series, here’s the setup: a man comes to you and gives you a briefcase with a gun, 100 untracable bullets, and proof incriminating the person who done you wrong– offering you a chance to exact justice for themselves with no danger of being caught. What do you do?
(Incidentally, I’m impressed with Deadline’s comment threads– more bile than Newsarama comments, possibly because much more money is discussed than what you usually see spent on comics.)
Mixing genres can be fun. Take a traditional western story and set it in outer space. Take a submarine thriller and set it during the Civil War. Transplant a samurai to the western frontier. Should work, right?
The Warrior’s Way, a modestly budgeted flop from last year, is such a collection of joyless clichés that a sure-fire gimmick fails to impress, let alone entertain. The film, coming out this week from 20th Century Home Entertainment, had the makings of something fun or compelling or something instead of arriving limp
Yang (Jang Dong Gun) is an assassin for a clan in blood feud with a rival group. Without expression, he slices and dices his way through the opponents, turning the Japanese roads red with spilled blood. All that now remains is an infant girl and rather than kill her, he takes the babe with him and heads east to America. Somehow, other members of his clan find out this innocent child remains breathing and fear a renewal of the rivalry if she’s allowed to live, so they sail in search of Yang.
The stoic Asian arrives in a late nineteenth century town to seek a friend, who has died. Encouraged by Lynne (Kate Bosworth) to reopen the laundry, she teaches him how to wash clothing and a bond slowly forms. The oddball town has the local drunk with a past, Ron (Geoffrey Rush), and a carnival in residence, its misfit performers led by Eight Ball (Tony Cox). Life settles down and Yang becomes part of the fabric, enjoying the simple things such as planting a garden and delighting in the baby’s development.
Lynne, though, is a tortured soul, having seen her family gunned down by the corrupt ex-Army colonel (Danny Huston) who tried to rape her a decade earlier. When the Colonel returns to town, Lynne tries to exact revenge but is endangered. Yang is then forced to unseal his katana and defend her. The act, though, lets the sword sing, a sound heard leagues away by his clan who come seeking the baby.
After that it gets messily predicable until the end credits. We’ve seen the archetype characters before, all better written and the American cast has certainly done better work in similar roles. Even the wire work felt familiar and uninspiring. There’s little wonder the $42 million film grossed barely over $11 million worldwide. Been there, done that and done far better. This is neither clever or original, funny or a touching homage to what’s come before. This is just a clear misfire from the first frame forward.
I will give the video transfer props for looking great and the score sounds lovely. There are scant extras: a two minute production montage and 12 minutes of mildly interesting deleted scenes.
An anonymous artist transformed Russian Red Army soldiers from a monument in the city of Sofia, in Bulgaria, into versions of Superman, Captain America, Wonder Woman, Robin, Ronald McDonald, Santa Claus, and the Joker.
The giant monument was built to commemorate the 10th anniversary of the Russian ‘liberation’ of Bulgaria in 1944. It is regarded as the prime example of the forceful socialist-realism of the period.
The place of honor goes to a Red Army soldier atop a column, surrounded by animated cast-iron sculptural groups depicting determined, gun-waving soldiers and members of the proletariat. But those characters have been painted over, along with graffiti at the bottom saying “Moving With The Times” in Bulgarian.
We put this up just to make sure nobody thinks these are new costumes for the reboot.
In the wake of the release of Green Lantern in theaters everywhere, there have been a few interesting reveals from people. Heidi Macdonald reveals that she doesn’t get the character of Green Lantern, and Adam-Troy Castro shakes his head at what may be the most famous page of Green Lantern ever (reproduced above). Ty Templeton, as he is wont to do, goes full mock, as does Let’s Be Friends Again.
Here’s what they’re missing.
Quoting Heidi:
While I’m willing to shoulder the blame for shunning Green Lantern over the years, as I’ve been learning and growing, I have noticed a few things about the character that do strike me as flaws, dramatically speaking. It’s often noted that DC’s heroes for the most part lack the melodramatic emotional flair of the Marvel heroes, Batman and Superman being the notable exceptions. Marvel’s heroes are flawed and troubled and their powers echo and magnify those flaws and troubles; DC’s leads, generally speaking, are dudes who get some great idea to shrink or go fast and then proceed to shrink or go fast. Green Lantern is a prime example of this.
Hal Jordan is precisely that type of flawed character. He’s a cocky guy with tremendous willpower who gets a ring that runs on willpower and can create anything he can think of (although it’s often had a weakness for yellow) and is turned into an interstellar policeman. So far, so good– he has a science fiction version of Aladdin’s lamp, he can create whatever he wishes if he believes hard enough.
But the fuel of his power is also his greatest flaw– he thinks he can solve everything through sheer force of will.
Columns / Glenn Hauman / News
Stephen Colbert, we have your writer for “The Chronicles of Amber”!
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