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Watchmen extra material coming to DVD in March

  • News
  • February 5, 2009

watchmen-black-freighter-7917212Before you scream that Watchmen has been butchered to get it into theaters, do two things:

1. Actually see the film first before you judge, you mook.

2. Take a look at the side projects coming out in March on DVD and Blu-Ray.

Three days before the movie hits theaters, Warner Premiere’s Watchmen: The Complete Motion Comic arrives on Blu-ray and DVD on March 3rd from Warner Home Video.

Overseen by “Watchmen” illustrator Dave Gibbons, Watchmen: The Complete Motion Comic contains all 12 chapters of “Watchmen,” the most celebrated graphic novel of all time, adding motion, voice and sound to the book’s strikingly drawn panels, spanning everything from the mysterious demise of the Comedian to the crisscrossed destinies of loosely allied superheroes to their fateful impact on the world.  The 12 approximately 30-minute chapters were previously available exclusively as iTunes downloads.

Produced by Watchmen and 300 director Zack Snyder, Watchmen: The Complete Motion Comic was colored by John Higgins and narrated by Tom Stechschulte.

The 2-disc standard and Blu-ray sets includes nearly 6 hours of content and both include Movie Cash, good for $7.50 off of a movie ticket for Watchmen beginning on March 6th.  In addition, the Blu-ray disc includes a first look at the theatrical film with an action-packed scene from the movie available exclusively through Warner Bros. BD-Live™. 

Watchmen: The Complete Motion Comic will be available in a 2-disc set for $29.98 and a Digital Copy Special Edition Blu-ray set for $34.99.

Then three weeks later, Watchmen: Tales of the Black Freighter & Under the Hood arrives on Blu-ray and DVD on March 24th from Warner Home Video.

Tales of the Black Freighter, the story-within-the-story in the acclaimed Watchmen features the voices of Gerard Butler (300) and Jared Harris (The Curious Case of Benjamin Button) and is directed by Daniel DelPurgatorio and Mike Smith and written by Alex Tse (Watchmen) and Zack Snyder.  Tales of the Black Freighter is produced by Brian McNulty and Karen Mayeda-Vranek.

Tales of the Black Freighter brings to strikingly animated life the graphic novel’s richly layered story-within-a-story.  Within the graphic novel, Tales of the Black Freighter, appears as a comic book read by a young man in New York City while the city is being destroyed.  This daring pirate saga chronicles a sailor’s journey home from being marooned.  During his journey, the young seaman is "forced by the urgency of his mission to shed one inhibition after another" and experience horrible events along the way.  The turbulent events the sailor endures seem to mirror those in the Watchmen’s world.

Hollis Mason’s tell-all autobiography, Under the Hood, chronicles the events in Hollis Mason’s life that led to him to become the masked avenger Nite Owl and discusses how the Minutemen were formed.   It features the original Sally Spectre, the Comedian, Moloch the Mystic, along with Hollis Mason, the original Nite Owl.

Under the Hood is directed by Eric Matthies, written by Hans Rodionoff and produced by Eric Matthies and Wesley Coller. Stars Carla Gugino, Matt Frewer, Stephen McHattie and Jeffrey Dean Morgan appear as their characters from the theatrical Watchmen film in this live-action documentary style special.

Watchmen: Tales of the Black Freighter & Under the Hood will be available on standard definition disc for $27.95 SRP and Blu-ray disc for $35.99 SRP.

IDW Adds ‘Bloom County’ to Comic Strip Library

  • News
  • February 5, 2009

IDW Publishing announced yesterday the forthcoming release of The Bloom County Library. Beginning in October 2009, each of the five volumes will collect nearly two years worth of daily and Sunday strips, in chronological order. This will be the very first time that many of these comic strips have been collected, and the first time in a beautifully designed, hardcover format. The books will be part of IDW’s gorwing Library of American Comics imprint, and designed by Eisner Award-winner Dean Mullaney.

"Fans have pestered me for years,” said Berkeley Breathed, “for this ultimate Bloom County collection in that polite, respectful badgering way that only fans can manage. Thank God I can now tell them something better than just ‘please remove your tent from my lawn.’ I can say, ‘It’s coming!"

Berkeley Breathed’s Bloom County is one of the most popular and critically acclaimed newspaper strips of modern times. Premiering on December 8th, 1980 — a month after the election of Ronald Reagan as President — the strip brought to the comics pages a unique amalgam of contemporary politics and fantasy, all told with hilarious humor and wit.

The beloved and quirky denizens of Bloom County include Opus, Steve Dallas, Bill the Cat, Milo Bloom, Michael Binkley, and Cutter John.  Breathed was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Cartooning in 1987 for his work on Bloom County. The strip was published in an astounding 1200 newspapers.

The phenomenon that was Bloom County spawned a merchandizing bonanza, as well as two spin-off strips, Outland and Opus. The first paperback collection of the strip, Loose Tails, sold over one million copies. Bloom County paperbacks cumulatively sold over six million copies. At the height of the strip’s popularity, Breathed walked away on August 6th, 1989.

IDW Publishing Special Projects Editor Scott Dunbier conceived the series. “I’m absolutely thrilled to be editing the Bloom County Library,” said Dunbier. “This is a series that I can’t wait to hold in my hands.”

The Bloom County Library will also contain a series of “Context Pages” sprinkled throughout the volumes. These pages will provide perspective for the reader, presenting a variety of real-life events and personalities that were contemporary at the time of original publication.

ComicMix Quick Picks – February 4, 2009

  • Uncategorized
  • February 5, 2009

* Personally, I don’t think this cartoon needs a caption. But Michael Cavna does, and he’s running a contest for it– the best one gets the original art. So Write a Caption, Win a Cartoon.

* "Mike Gold is not human." Yeah, we know. (BTW, KC, is your chronology off? I started in ’88 and you were already there, and I started the same week Dooley did.)

* Joystiq has early impressions on Batman: Arkham Asylum.

* I will pay cash if someone will slip this Cornify script onto Warren Ellis’s website. It’ll go along with his kids page.

* Superhero Game: Homespun Superheroes

Anything else? Consider this an open thread.

PREVIEW: ‘Batman: The Brave and the Bold’ with Dr. Fate and the Green Lantern Corps

  • News
  • February 4, 2009

This will make Linda happy… we’ve obtained preview footage of this week’s Batman: The Brave and the Bold episode, “The Eyes of Despero” airing this Friday, February 6 on Cartoon Network at 8:00 PM. The episode is written by comics veteran J.M. DeMatteis.

This week: In the middle of thwarting a robbery by the Cavalier, Batman is whisked away into outer space.  When he arrives on their home world, he discovers The Green Lantern Corps is MIA after a battle with Despero – leaving the entire universe defenseless!  To save us all, Batman joins the surviving Green Lanterns, G’Nort, Guy Gardner and Sinestro, to defeat the rampaging tyrant Despero before he turns OA, the living Green Lantern planet into his personal weapon of mass destruction! Take a look…

And in the teaser, Batman teams up with Dr. Fate to battle Wotan.

(more…)

Klingon Weapon Used in 2 7-Eleven Robberies

  • News
  • February 4, 2009

It’s come to this.

A man wielding a batleth robbed two 7-Eleven stories in Colorado Springs overnight.  The first assault using the deadly Klingon weapon occurred at 1:50 a.m. when a man police described as white in his 20s, wearing a black mask, black jacket, and blue jeans walked in brandishing the weapon.  The clerk recognized the traditional armament and forked over an undisclosed amount of cash.

Thirty minutes later, according to The Denver Channel, the same man hit a second store but this time the clerk showed bravery in the face of certain death.  He too recognized the ancient weapon but refused the demand and the would-be thief showed his true colors and fled.

Police are reviewing the stores’ surveillance tapes and Lt. David Whitlock said he does not plan to release the video or photographs "at this time."
 

Joe Simon extra signing at NYCC

  • News
  • February 4, 2009

joesimongirlwhotemptedme300-9019262Living comics legend Joe Simon, still going strong at 95 (!), will attend the New York Comic Con as Titan Books hosts him in their first year as exhibitors. In fact, he’s going so strong, he just announced an extra hour of signing at the Titan booth (#1514) before his Saturday panel.

Following the recent announcement of Titan’s plans to publish The Official Simon and Kirby Library, launching this May with a deluxe compendium of the duo’s work entitled The Best of Simon and Kirby, Simon will be the subject of a special Spotlight panel, ‘Secret Origins of the Comic Book World’ [Saturday, Feb.7,  4-5pm]. Simon’s audience will be treated to jaw-dropping anecdotes from the Golden Era of American comics, revealing the stories behind the creators and creations that shaped an American art form.

Before and after the panel on Saturday, Feb. 7, from 2:30-3:30pm and 5:30-6:30pm, Joe Simon will be appearing at Titan’s booth to sign exclusive printed lithographs for fans. Two designs will be available, one featuring the iconic Fighting American and the other starring the perennially seductive The Girl Who Tempted Me. With each one hand-numbered from 1 through 100 and signed by Joe Simon himself, these glorious limited edition lithographs will be on sale for $75 each and only available at NYCC.

Full size copies after the jump. (more…)

Webcomics You Should Be Reading: ‘Penny Arcade!’

  • Uncategorized
  • February 4, 2009

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It’s the trifecta of modern comedy: Sarcasm, Near-Cartoon-Levels-of-Violence, and The Deflowering of Fruit. I speak of a web comic that has consistently delivered all these aspects without fail for over 10 years. Since its creation in 1998, it’s spawned graphic novel collections, a charity that has raised millions of dollars for children’s hospitals, nearly half of my roommate’s funny tee-shirt collection, and its own convention to boot. I speak of Penny Arcade.

In concept it is merely a riff on the (now) age-old Beavis and Butthead theorem: Two dudes and a TV. Swap the TV with a video game system (or PC, or Tabletop RPG), and swap the aforementioned dunderheads with the highly sarcastic Tycho Erasmus Brahe and his friend, the sometimes-sharp-as-a-marble Jonathan "Gabe" Gabriel . The two will comment on various video games they are playing, or wax poetic on other whims and flights-of-fancy we nerds take to heart.

The strip is written by Jerry Holkins and illustrated by Mike Krahulik. Over time the strip added an additional (beloved) character or two… and will (from time to time) not include Gabe or Tycho in lieu of an in-game strip. Be forewarned (if you’ve not been clicking on the links above, because you’re patient unlike me) the boys do love the potty humor and foul language. Never-the-less…. violence, swearing, and video games has always made for excellent laughs.

The guys have a wonderful store chock full of tee’s and hoodies adorned with cute catch phrases only "very cool and socially acceptable" people like us understand. They also recently added a feature allowing you to order any of their strips in a nice high res print, suitable for framing and posting with intent to have your co-workers acknowledge your exquisite taste. Suffice to say, the guys over at the arcade have spent a good long time perfecting their craft, and three days a week you can get your fill. There’s a great archive to dig through, and their news posts, while not as auto-biographical as their Texas counterpart Scott Kurtz, offers some great thoughts about the game industry from time to time.

Some Strips of Note:

The Breakdown:

Drama: Well, aside from the "sagas" from time to time, (see Cardboard Tube Samarai above) there is little is any drama. And it’s probably best that it stays that way.

Humor: Covering everything under the sun in nerditry from video games, role playing, computers, to insider-only game industry humor…all under the banner of cartoon-violence, swearing, and general bafoonery.

Continuity: Well, Gabe and Tycho have been long time friends, but that aside, really, there’s little you’d need to know to start laughing your pooper off.

Art: Mike Krahulik’s artwork has taken considerable leaps over the last 10 years. At the beginning, backgrounds were simple, and the colors were flat. Over time, Mike’s character stylings has gotten looser, and to his credit, far better. The exaggerated figures emote wonderfully. i dare you not to laugh at Gabe’s face when he wishes Tycho vast amounts of pain. At present, the strip is a great example digital painting technique, with a vivid color palate that always compliments it’s subject matter; Be it in Fantasy, Space, or just ‘Guys on the Couch’.

Archive: The strip is over 10 years old… Generally three strips a week over the course of 10 years? By my math that’s over a boatload.

Updates: Currently updates on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.

Risk/Reward: It’s a free web comic folks. By my dime, it’s well worth your time if you like topical nerd humor with a dash of blood, guts and laughter. Plus, every now and then you get a strip like this.

 

ComicMix Quick Picks – February 3, 2009

* Quote of the day from novelist David Mack, talking about Sandman:

One story from that series, “Calliope,” continues to haunt me; a writer who tried to justify his crimes as a desperate search for ideas is cursed by Dream to be deluged with story ideas faster than he can write them down. In a handful of panels, the character rambles off nearly a dozen snippets of story concepts as he succumbs to a delusional fugue. What really haunts me about that scene is that Neil Gaiman tossed off a dozen story ideas as throwaway lines of dialogue that are all better than anything I’ve ever written. As a writer, I’ve never slept well since reading those panels.

This is all part of agent Lucienne Diver‘s weeklong discusion about comic books. Monday was Keith DeCandido‘s turn. I look forward to seeing who’s next– and slightly insulted she hasn’t asked me yet.

* Sandman, of course, is not to be confused in any way with Mr. Sandman, who, "though immortal and existing since the beginning of time, is your standard everyday teenager from the 50s. He enjoys such activities as going on dates with Calliope and Nada (rivals for his affection), meeting up with his old friend Jughead (a mortal granted everlasting life) at the same soda jerk every 100 years, and bringing into existence desirable new teenagers at the request of existing ones." Here, we see Mr. Sandman’s famous crossover with Jughead.

* This is ironic and deeply cruel: Unscrewed, which was formed to help comics creators who’d gotten screwed by a particular publisher, had funds embezzled by their former treasurer. Via Rich Johnston.

* TNT renewed the drama series Leverage for a second season, ordering 15 new episodes. Congratulations to show co-creator John Rogers, who won’t have much time to write comics any more, and the rest of the crew and cast.

* Hank Pym Is the New Doctor Who.

* And finally, our condolences to Scott Edelman on the passing of his father.

Anything else? Consider this an open thread.

Kick-Ass Umpteenth Printing

  • News
  • February 3, 2009

 

Yes, you know it’s silly. I know it’s silly. And thank heaven, even Marvel knows it’s silly. The press release reads:

Marvel is pleased to announce the first four issues of Kick-Ass are going back to press again — this time with Kick-Ass Umpteenth Printing Variants #1-4!

Now this is the shameless Marvel marketing machine I remember! Coming soon: the Zillionth Printing! Mark my words.

Review: ‘Planet Saturday Comics: Volume One’ by Monty S. Kane

Planet Saturday Comics: Volume One
Written and illustrated by Monty S. Kane
Planet Saturday, LLC, $12.95

[[[Planet Saturday Comics: Volume One]]] collects short vignettes previously published on the Planet Saturday Web site. The stories, apparently based on the writer/illustrator’s own life, all concern either the child Emory (aka M, as in Monty), and his attempts at [[[Calvin and Hobbes]]]-like flights of fancy, or the 40-year-old Emory and his travails parenting his daughter Dorothy. (I’m not sure where the mother is in this picture. In real life, Kane’s wife helps him run the site.) Each vignette is accompanied by an entirely unnecessary text explanation that seems to be there solely to pad out the book.

Critiquing Planet Saturday feels a bit like kicking a puppy. The characters are just so darn sweet, and if you buy the book directly from the site, they’re donating $1 to health care for uninsured kids. Nevertheless, if I don’t kick the puppy, I must at least nudge it gently back into its owners’ yard; it’s not getting a particularly warm reception over here, despite its almost desperate eagerness to please.

It’s unfair, considering that so many of the mainstream newspaper features have moved online, but I still expect Web-only comics to be a bit more edgy or niche-oriented than the stuff I read in the local daily. I really can’t see what this strip provides that I couldn’t find in [[[Stone Soup]]], [[[FoxTrot]]] or (shudder) the [[[For Better or for Worse]]] retread. Emory’s kid imagination is pretty garden variety (I wish I could fly so I could escape the local bully; I ruined my shirt pretending to be a caveman), and his parent’s-eye view offers no insights we haven’t seen before (my daughter plays her music too loud and she’s growing up too fast). The strip’s just not funny, or quirky, enough to really grab your attention. The art is nice (appealingly rounded, slightly exaggerated figures against a softly detailed background), but that’s about all this book’s got going for it.

If you simply must see the strip for yourself, I’d advise sampling the free milk online, rather than paying for the print version of the cow. (You can still donate that dollar to children’s health, though, if it’ll make you feel better.)

Amy Goldschlager is an editor for FindingDulcinea.com.

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