December 17 marks a historic moment for Vertigo as its flagship title Hellblazer reaches issue #250 — the first ever Vertigo title to do so. Vertigo has assembled some of the most celebrated creators in the industry, to ring in this milestone issue with five unique stories set in London during the holidays. It is also being billed by Vertigo as an excellent jumping on point for lapsed or new readers.

ABOUT THE CONTRIBUTORS:

Dave Gibbons is best-known for the iconic look of the best-selling Watchmen— one of Time Magazine’s 100 best English-language novels from 1923 to the present. Gibbons’ story “Happy Fucking New Year” takes Constantine from a museum theft to a human sacrifice.

China Mieville has written stories for McSweeney’s and Hellboy; he is the author of 5 novels. His story “Ash” explores the real angels of Christmas.

Peter Milligan, author of Shade, the Changing Man and X-Statix will be taking over as the ongoing Hellblazer series writer with the next issue. His story in issue #250, “The Curse of Christmas”, follows a ghost trying to unravel the mystery of what killed him.

Brian Azzarello, acclaimed Chicago author of 100 Bullets, and Joker returns to the pages of Hellblazer. His story “All I Goat For Christmas” explores the myth of the Chicago Cubs curse.

Jamie Delano, the first ongoing Hellblazer writer (#1-24, 28-31, 33-40, 84) is back. His story “Christmas Cards” takes Constantine to a high stakes poker game.

Sean Phillips is best-known for his art in Sleeper, WildC.A.T.s, and earlier issues of Hellblazer.

Giuseppe Camuncoli’s work has appeared in Swamp Thing, Batgirl Secret Files, and Spider-Man.

Eddie Campbell is best-known for collaborating with Alan Moore on the acclaimed graphic novel From Hell and his work as writer/artist on Bacchus.

Rafael Grampa has provided illustration for Cartoon Network, Nickelodeon, Diesel, and ESPN-NBA Sports.

David Lloyd is best-known for illustrating the seminal work V For Vendetta; this is his third time drawing the John Constantine character.

The School Library Journal named eight graphic novels in its list of 30 adult titles that “will appeal to high school readers and provide a bridge into the vast world of adult publishing.”  The selected books had to have been published between September of 2007 and November of 2008, and were chosen by SLJ’s Adult Books for High School Students Committee made up of librarians from public and school libraries who work with teens in a variety of rural, urban, and suburban settings across the U.S. and Canada.

The eight graphic novels on the list include Lewis Trondheim’s pirate saga Bourbon Island (First Second), Lynda Barry’s What It Is (Drawn & Quarterly), Andrew Helfer’s Ronald Reagan: A Biography (Hill and Wang), Akira Hiramoto’s Me and the Devil Blues (Del Rey), Mat Johnson’s Incognegro (Vertigo), G. Willow Wilson’s Cairo (Vertigo),  Marc-Antoine Mathieu’s The Museum Vaults: Excerpts From the Journal of an Expert (NBM ComicsLit), and Howard Zinn and Paul Buhle’s A People’s History of the American Empire (Henry Holt).

Hiromoto’s Robert Johnson biography was the only Manga title on the list.

Alfonso Cuaron (Children of Men) has given up his plans to direct an adaptation of Roald Dahl’s The Witches and has decided to produce it instead. Stepping in to direct the stop-motion film will be Hollywood’s busiest man, Guillermo del Toro.

Cuaron told England’s Empire magazine, “Well I am involved with Guillermo del Toro, but as a producer, not director. I think it started because I’ve always wanted to do a version of Roald Dahl’s very naughty ‘Uncle Oswald’. So we were talking to Lucy Dahl, when we got onto the subject of The Witches. Then Guillermo wrote this amazing screenplay really quickly. It won’t be like the original Nicholas Roeg version, which was a beautiful film — because Guillermo wants to do it completely in stop- motion animation. I’m excited about it- I really hope we can put it together.”

The 1983 novel was turned into a 1990 live-action film directed by Nicolas Roeg and starred Angelica Huston in the tale of a young boy trapped in a hotel during a convention of witches. Given the subject matter, it’s no surprise the charming story appears on the American Library Association list of the 100 Most Frequently Challenged Books of 1990-2000 at number twenty-seven.

Michael Marshall Smith’s The Straw Men novel and its graphic novel adaptation have both been optioned by Benderspink for feature film according to Variety. The crime novel was released in 2002 and was adapted by Zenescope Entertainment this past summer. Envisioned as a trilogy, the first book involves serial killers, some apparently random brutal murders, and a dark conspiracy.  The film will focus on ex-homicide detective John Zandt who comes out of retirement to track down the serial killer who may have been responsible for the murder of his daughter.

The film will be produced by Benderspink’s Chris Bender and J.C. Spink along with Zenescope’s Joe Brusha and Ralph Tedesco serving as executive producers.

Benderspink has been one of the most active Hollywood production companies engaged in adapting comic book properties.  Among the numerous comic-based projects that Benderspink has initiated are adaptations of Y: The Last Man, Pet Robots, Pencilneck, Zombies of Mass Destruction, Last Blood, Starkweather, Area 52, The Ghouly Boys, Power and the Glory, Drafted, and The Gray Area.
 

Genesis: Apes, the reported remake of Conquest of the Planet of the Apes, was acknowledged as a live project by Fox president Tom Rothman and now 20th Century Fox has turned the project over to Scott Frank (Minority Report).  The writer/director has already renamed the film Cesar and told CHUD that the film is an original story and not a remake.

The movie, the site notes, “will not feature talking monkeys, and it will not end with chimpanzees running wild in the streets, taking over the world. But it isn’t entirely divorced from the world of Planet of the Apes, either. In fact, Frank sees his movie as the opening chapter in a saga that could span the thousand years between today and a world where apes rule.”

Scott explained that he’s been researching modern day science and extrapolating what it would take to evolve common apes into a “hyper-intelligent chimpanzee”. In addition to the hard science, he intends to make audiences relate to the characters including the simian dubbed Cesar.

CHUD reports Scott is at work on rewriting the script he inherited from Rick Jaffa (The Relic) and Amanda Silver (Eye for an Eye) in addition to figuring out how he can work with real animals and not CGI creations or people in suits. He also anticipates a final go or no go from Fox by February which means at earliest, Cesar wouldn’t be seen in theaters until 2010.

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