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Exclusive ‘Dollhouse’ Season 1 DVD for San Diego Comic-Con, 1st look at ‘Epitaph One’

dollhouse-season-1-6601743In a studio first, Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment is offering fans of Joss Whedon’s mysterious cult series Dollhouse a chance to purchase a special advanced limited edition Blu-ray or DVD of the first season, exclusively at San Diego Comic-Con International. Individually numbered and highly collectible, only 5000 (2500 Blu-ray/2500 DVD) copies were created, each featuring a personal letter to fans from Whedon, exclusive Comic-Con packaging, and a first look at the unaired episode “Epitaph One”.

Available for pre-order at FoxStore.com beginning Monday, July 6 at 10:00 AM PST (oh noes, thirty minutes from now!!!) through July 20 (or until product is sold out), a limited quantity will also be available for on-site purchase at the Fox Booth (#1429).  In person pick-up for those that pre-ordered the collection will begin at the Fox Booth on Wednesday, July 22 (preview night).  Photo ID is required or purchasers must designate at checkout someone who will pick-up the DVD on their behalf.

The Dollhouse Season One Comic-Con Blu-ray Disc will be available for a suggested retail price of $69.99 and the DVD will be available for $49.98.  Regular versions of Dollhouse Season One BD and DVD will be available everywhere July 28.

Here’s an introductory video from Joss, spelling it all out:

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‘Doctor Who’ movie with David Tennant coming?

david-tennant-2698827That’s the latest rumor kicking around everywhere across the web– that there might be a new Doctor Who movie that, if the rumors are correct, would star David Tennant as the Doctor and that the movie will be officially announced later this month at Comic-Con in San Diego, like everything else in the world.

The rumors also have former Doctor Who writer/executive producer Russell T. Davies involved in the project, and both he and David Tennant are rumored to be showing up at San Diego… are they showing up for a victory lap, or is there something bigger going on? Hmm… IDW is doing the Doctor Who comic, maybe they know something.

Webcomics.com debuts new look as Brad Guigar models for DC Comics

Congrats to Brad Guigar of Evil Inc. and the rest of his evil crew (Kris Black, Josh Price, and a minyan of minions) on the relaunch of Webcomics.com.

And yet, with all this, Brad somehow found the time to appear on the cover of this month’s Jack Of Fables. If I was British, I’d put this in a Swipe File…

Review: ‘Peanuts 1960’s Collection’ DVD

  • Uncategorized
  • July 5, 2009

I’ll be honest and tell you that I am in the minority who felt that [[[Peanuts]]] stopped being funny after 1972 and should have been retired long before Charles M. Schulz’s death. All its charm and whimsy had been drained out of it as witnessed by the 1970s material that has been reprinted since his passing. The world had changed and their innocent worldview ceased to feel at all relevant.  But once Schulz found his characters and voice, the strip was brilliant for quite some time.

By 1965, Charles Schulz’s Peanuts had grown to become one of the most popular comic strips launched since the end of World War II if not the 20th Century. It made perfect sense that the characters would eventually find their way onto television. They were first licensed for use as pitchmen for Ford in 1961 and appeared in black and white commercials animated by Bill Meléndez. When Lee Mendelson tried to make a documentary on Schulz in 1963, he hired Meléndez to create a short segment while hiring Vince Guaraldi for the score. The proposed show never sold but sowed the seeds for what came soon after.

As we know today, that first holiday special, was something unique and heartwarming from Guaraldi’s amazing score to the characters being funny and poignant.  While the holiday-themed specials have become television perennials, several of the others have not achieved the same attention.

That oversight is rectified in the Peanuts 1960’s Collection
, coming Tuesday from Warner Home Video. Those first six half-hour cartoons which set the standard for animated specials thereafter, are collected on two discs. In addition to [[[A Charlie Brown Christmas]]], there’s also [[[Charlie Brown’s All-Stars]]], [[[It’s the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown]]], [[[You’re in Love, Charlie Brown]]], [[[He’s your Dog Charlie Brown]]], and [[[It was a Short Summer, Charlie Brown]]].

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Review: ‘Erotic Comics: A Graphic History Vol. 2’

  • Uncategorized
  • July 4, 2009

There is sharp divide between erotica and pornography in any media, including comic books. To help draw attention to the former while casting a jaundiced eye at the latter, Britain’s Tim Pilcher has produced two strong volumes entitled Erotic Comics: A Graphic History. The first volume, taking readers from the birth of graphic erotica to the underground comix explosion of the 1960s, was reviewed last summer and this spring saw the release of the second volume, which covers the 1970s through today.

Pilcher breaks down the book into five sections — Porn in the USA, Gay and Lesbian Comix, European Erotique, Tits and Tentacles: The Japanese Experience, and Online Comics Eroticism – devoting a spread or two to specific creators or titles. As a result, we see the familiar such as Dave Stevens and Frank Thorne to those deserving of more attention in the states, such as Italy’s Giovanna Casotto, who provided the stunning cover artwork.

He does a good job quickly sketching in biographical details and telling you about the works that make them worthy of inclusion. Each section works in its own chronological order and oddly, the USA section covers the Comics Code, something better left to the previous volume, and largely ignores most mainstream efforts at erotica. Most disappointing was that Vaughn Bode and Phil Foglio were left out since both produced some of the most imaginative and clever erotic comics during their careers. The book relishes the controversies stirred up by someone as mainstream as Howard Chaykin producing [[[Black Kiss]]], or Barry Blair’s descent into porn comics in order to make a living.

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Happy Independence Day! Celebrate with fireworks between Mark Waid and Gail Simone!

Why not celebrate it by reading the Twitterwar battle of patriots between ex-Captain America writer Mark Waid and Wonder Woman scribe Gail Simone? Lots of fireworks here:

  • Simone/Waid
    Twitterwar FACT: Mark Waid has been arrested TWICE for giving CrossGen
    comics to CHILDREN. “EVIL!” says local crack dealer!
  • Simone/Waid Twitterwar FACT: Simone gifted by Dave Gibbons with original Watchmen covers, uses them as placemats. IT’S TRUE.
  • Simone/Waid Twitterwar Update: Waid needs grocery list, Peyer and Augustyn write most of it.
  • Simone/Waid Twitterwar FACT: At least WAID pays HIS ghostwriters in something other than old copies of ROSE & THORN.

I haven’t seen a scuffle like this since the Joss Whedon/Warren Ellis slapfight of ’06.

We, of course, will continue to monitor the fighting as long as safety allows.

We’d ask “Whose side are you on?” but the last time we did that, the guy with the shield died. On the other hand, he’ll be better soon, so feel free to exercise your right of free speech in the comments section.

The Point First Chance To See First Flight

  • Uncategorized
  • July 3, 2009

Fireworks & beaches lay ahead and in the meantime we’ve got your answers to questions like how can I meet comics’ top notch Asian comic creators, how can I be a VIP member of MARVEL ULTIMATE ALLIANCE and how can I see GREEN LANTERN FIRST FLIGHT – first?  Just click and all will be covered!

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The second coming of Comico? CO2 comics comes online

As a company that has strong ties to the 80’s independent comics scene, with us publishing stuff from First Comics and Eclipse, we’re really happy to hear that Bill Cucinotta and Gerry Giovinco are getting back into the game with CO2 Comics, a web comics publishing site developed by the former Comico partners and publishers.

Making the jump from print to pixels is an exciting adventure for the pair who were instrumental in laying the groundwork for Comico the Comic Company, which was one of the most dynamic and influential independent comic publishers during the 1980’s featuring such titles as Mage, Grendel, Elementals, Robotech, Jonny Quest, Gumby, Starblazers, and Space Ghost.

The project is quickly turning into a reunion of Comico artists. Besides works by Cucinotta and Giovinco, comics are presented featuring the talents of Chris Kalnick, Joe Williams, Andrew C. Murphy, Reggie Byers, Bernie Mireault, Bill Anderson, Rich Rankin and Neil Vokes.

We look forward to seeing what they’re up to.

One more tragic connection between Michael Jackson and comics

The one Michael Jackson comics reference I haven’t seen mentioned yet is from Wasteland #16 from DC Comics, in a story entitled “Heartshadow” written by John Ostrander and drawn by Rick Magyar. It’s a story where a young fan of “a dark prince named Michael” commits suicide.

Now, in the wake of Jackson’s death, reports are coming in of Michael Jackson fans committing suicide:

Fans of MICHAEL JACKSON have
been hit hard by the star’s death – 12 devotees have allegedly killed
themselves following the tragic news.

The King Of Pop passed away on Thursday (25Jun09) from a cardiac arrest and millions of his fans worldwide went into mourning.

But several of them found it too hard to cope and subsequently
ended their own lives, according to the founder of an online Jackson
fanclub.

Gary Taylor, president and owner of MJJcommunity.com, says, “I
know there has been an increase (in deaths), I now believe the figure
is 12. It is a serious situation that these people are going through
but Michael Jackson would never want this. He would want them to live.

“They (fans) can’t accept it, they feel in some sort of different
reality. I’m stunned that he’s dead. One minute he is coming here for
concerts and the next he is gone. I think the funeral will be where the
reality kicks in that he is gone and won’t be coming back, there will
be a huge depression in the fan community when that happens.”

Review: Stop Forgetting to Remember by Peter Kuper

  • Uncategorized
  • June 30, 2009
stop-forgetting-to-remember-1-5658287

Stop Forgetting to Remember
By Peter Kuper
Crown Publishing, July 2007, $19.95
 

[[[Stop Forgetting to Remember]]] is the autobiography of “Walter Kurtz,” a fortysomething cartoonist born in Cleveland and resident in New York City, who worked on a strip about two color-coded spy-types for a satirical magazine popular with teen boys, and who otherwise has an immense amount in common with Peter Kuper. But he is not Peter Kuper – or, rather, he’s different enough from Kuper to provide any plausible deniability that might become necessary.

Kuper worked on [[[Stop Forgetting to Remember]]] for at least ten years, 1995-2005, and the final product is loose-limbed and discursive, a collection of autobiographical stories folded into the “present-day” obsessions and concerns of Kurtz. The present-day material is all in gray tones, with the flashbacks and similar imaginative scenes drawn in a maroon like a day-old bruise. Each chapter does make a connection between present and past, but Stop Forgetting reads like a collection of shorter biographical pieces rather than one graphic novel. (That ten-year span means the book isn’t quite the way either the 1995 Kuper or the 2005 Kuper would have made it. It ends up being loosely organized around the life of Kurtz’s daughter Elli, but it’s not about her; she’s just there, growing up, and her life gives Kurtz things to reminisce about.)

Prose novels sometimes show the signs of too much development time, but there it’s typically an overworked surface, like a miniature painting from an obsessive, with every tiny detail written and rewritten and re-rewritten until it’s completely airless and self-enclosing. By contrast, comics that have been worked on too long get disjointed; it’s much more difficult to rework a ten-year-old comics page than it is to rewrite a ten-year-old novel chapter, so the comics page gets a few tweaks or a new panel pasted on top where the prose chapter would get rewritten from beginning to end. Stop Forgetting to Remember has a mild case of this; there’s a sense that Kuper had an overarching idea for this book – or had more than one, at different times – but that idea doesn’t come through cleanly, so the book becomes a series of glimpses of a life.

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