Category: News

We just got an alert from our friends at Warner Bros. that on Saturday, at 6 p.m. PST, Terminator Salvation director McG will particiate in a discussion with fans via BD-Live. Here’s the official release:

Experience the first-ever audio-enabled Live Community Screening (LCS) exclusive to owners of the Terminator Salvation Blu-ray Disc and hear director McG answer your questions during this BD-Live exclusive LCS on December 5th, 2009.  The Terminator Salvation LCS marks the first time that real-time audio will be available to enhance the interactive experience.

The LCS, which showcases the expansive capabilities and interactivity offered with Blu-ray and Warner Bros. BD-Live, will take place on December 5th at 6:00PM PST  (9:00PM EST) live from Los Angeles.  The LCS will allow fans that own a BD-Live capable Blu-ray Disc Player the ability to simultaneously watch the movie with McG and hear an interactive Q&A where they can submit questions about the blockbuster film to McG, directly from their home via their internet-connected computer or mobile device. The LCS will also feature the questions and answers in text form on screen.

Warner Bros. BD-Live is an interactive feature exclusive to the Blu-ray format that allows users to experience a variety of exclusive features.  In addition to access to the audio LCS, other exciting BD-Live content available to Terminator Salvation Blu-ray owners include:

• Compilation of 10 viral videos from the “Resist or Be Terminated” alternate reality game revealing SKYNET’s secret plans.
• The first episode of Terminator Salvation Machinima Series
• Digital version of Issue #1 of the Terminator Salvation official movie prequel comic (available for a limited time only)

Warner Bros. BD-Live community members who have registered and signed up for the Terminator Salvation LCS will receive an emailed invitation to participate in the event. The first 100,000 members who RSVP will secure a spot for the screening. WB BD-Live registered users who own the Blu-ray Disc and have signed up for the BD-Live LCS event will be able to insert the disc, connect to WB BD-Live via broadband and logon to the LCS at this designated time to participate in this ground breaking exclusive event.

BD-Live is only accessible through a BD-Live enabled Blu-ray Disc™ played on an Internet-connected Blu-ray player (including PlayStation®3) with BD-Live capabilities and sufficient data storage.  Please consult your Player Manual or Player Support Website for more information.

Manga-format comics have a tropism
for high school even stronger than that of sunflowers for the sun – it is possible to find manga without a hint of high-schoolery in
them, but serious digging is required. But you couldn’t loose an arrow in a
manga warehouse without hitting at least one book about girls in sailor outfits.
(Hm. Did I just inadvertently explain the appeal?) So we reviewers have to
specialize even further. This week I have three a) second volumes in series b)
set in high schools c) with female lead characters who d) have amazing and
unexpected powers.

Even there, I’m sure a devoted
reader could name a dozen or more series that fit qualifications b) through d)!

Sumomomo, Momomo, Vol. 2
By Shinobu Ohtaka
Yen Plus, October 2009, $10.99

Ohtaka’s comedic piss-take on the
“martial arts high school” genre here veers more towards the overwrought drama
and fighting technique minutia of its targets than the tight, original satire
of the first volume, which is disappointing – there’s a center of gravity of
standard manga traditions that has the force of a black hole in Japanese
comics, dragging every outlier to be closer to the generic standard. And so the
supposed main character of Sumomomo, Momomo – Koushi Inuzuka, scion to a great family of karate
champions, who only wants to be left alone to study and become a great
prosecutor – is either pushed aside entirely or relegated to running and
cowering, like any other weak young man in a manga. (If this is opaque to you,
perhaps you need to drop back to my review of the first volume.)

Oh, it’s still funny – very funny
at points, particularly when it’s picking on the ex-Olympic gymnast gym
teacher, Daigoro, who is a fine self-satisfied gym rat caricature and gets shown
up repeatedly by a cute little girl. And the new enemies this volume are fun as
well: teenage Yakuza hit-girl Iroha Miyamoto and her overly emotional sidekick
Hanzou. But Iroha falls in love with Koushi nearly the moment she shows up, and
is under the impression that Koushi is in love with her. And so Sumomomo, Momomo comes one step closer to being yet another harem manga.

I hope I’m wrong, and that
the next volume sees more of Koushi being a budding lawyer and talking his way
out of problems, and less karate and pretty girls throwing themselves at him.
But I know which way to bet when it comes to manga! (more…)

First, we have this cover for Buffy The Vampire Slayer #33…

…wherein they reveal who Twilight really is. (Twilight in a vampire comic. What a saga that must be.)

CBR had a story claiming Twilight was Barack Obama. However, I thought that cover shot looked really familiar…

(more…)

Of course, we all know that comics can be for adults now…but
they don’t have to be. Some of the best books
out there now were made for kids – which is just the way it was fifty years
ago, come to think of it. Now, I’m not claiming that these three books are the
best out there – my reading has been slipshod and random this year – but they’re
all worth reading for the right audience:

Tiny Tyrant: Volume One: The Ethelbertosaurus
By Lewis Trondheim and Fabrice
Parme
First Second, May 2009, $9.95

Trondheim is a prolific French cartoonist for both younger
readers and adults, with books like Kaput and Zosky and A.L.I.E.E.E.N. for the rugrats, the Dungeon series (with Joann Sfar and others) for various
audiences, and books like his diary comics (Little Nothings) for adults. Tiny Tyrant sees Trondheim in full kid-pleasing mode, with pint-size
King Ethelbert of Porto Cristo running amok and terrorizing all the adults
around him (with the possible exception of the nearly unflappable Miss Prime
Minister).

This volume collects six stories of King Ethelbert, as he
discovers dinosaur bones, avoids assassination, engages in an
all-crowned-head-of-state motor race, meets Santa Claus, chases his favorite
author, and replaces all children in his domains with robot duplicates of
himself. Nothing ever turns out as he hopes, of course, but the stories have massive
amounts of verve and energy along the way, propelled by Parme’s stylish and
classy art (reminiscent of the UPA style).

Ethelbert is the kind of fictional character we’re all
deeply happy is purely fictional – he’d be a massive pain in person, but he’s
utterly funny and lovable when contained between the pages of a book.

(One note to consumers: this volume contains
exactly half of the stories published in 2007 in the book just titled Tiny
Tyrant. In publishing as in
business, the name of the game is putting together things that were originally
separate, and then separating things that were together. Repeat every few years
until interest runs out.) (more…)

It’s been twelve years after Robin Hood saved Marian and Sherwood and
restored Richard to the throne. Is he living happily ever after? Of
course not… Robin is a drunk. He hasn’t seen Marian since he saved
her. He hasn’t seen the merry men, either. And now comes word that
Marian has been jailed as a witch by the Inquisitor from Rome…

Written by Robert Tinnell
(EZ Street, Feast of the Seven Fishes) and painted by Bo Hampton
(Viking Glory, Legend of Sleepy Hollow, Batman, Moon Knight), Demons of Sherwood is a new and inspirational look at a famous legend. Buy your copy today at your local comic shop or order it online!