The Mix : What are people talking about today?

Casting the 11th Doctor Already?

Russell T. Davies, who is handing the Doctor Who series over to Stephen Moffat, has suggested that whenever David Tennant is done being the Doctor, the role should go to Russell Tovey.

The 26-year-old Tovey was seen in the most recent Christmas special as the young crewman, Midshipman Frame, left to pilot the sinking starship Titanic. He has also been on stage and screen in Alan Bennett’s The History Boys.

The creator, who leaves the show next year as lead writer and executive producer, said he thought Tovey was "going to be huge" and is "amazing".

In excerpts leaked throughout England for the forthcoming book Doctor Who: The Writer’s Tale, Davis also floated the idea of JK Rowling appearing in a Christmas special and the author would work some sort of Doctor cameo into a Harry Potter novel.  Tennant objected, feeling it was crossing a line.

"David doesn’t like the JK idea, he thinks it sounds like a spoof, so we’ve paused slightly, wondering whether to win him round or just abandon something that he’s not going to be happy with," Davies said in an e-mail excerpted in the book.

‘Ghost in the Shell’ now Downloadable

ghost-in-the-shell-dented-tachikoma-1656305Jaman.com has cut a deal with Starz Media’s Manga Entertainment to allow downloading of Japanese anime including classic titles such as Ghost in the Shell. Other familiar titles include Robotech, Astro Boy, Street Fighter II V, Noein, Karas and Tactics.

The downloads will cost $2.99 for feature-length films, while all series episodes will be available for $1.99. New subscribers, enticed by this development, will also receive two free movies.

Jaman was founded by Gaurav Dhillon, a silicon valley wunderkind, and it has been a leading supplier of downloadable entertainment to computers and TiVo recorders. Starz Media is more than just the cable channel but also includes



Film Roman, Anchor Bay Entertainment, and Manga Entertainment among its holdings.

“Jaman is excited to bring some of the most well-known and iconic titles in Japanese animation history to our online audience,” said Gaurav Dhillon, founder and CEO of Jaman.  “Animation fans are among the most passionate in the world, and episodic content has proven to be very popular with our audience. We look forward to bringing new fans into our vibrant community with this amazing collection of titles.”

“We saw an obvious match between Manga Entertainment’s properties and Jaman’s sensibilities,” said Mara Winokur, Starz Media’s vice president of digital media and business development. “Jaman’s audience has come to expect cutting-edge, quality titles from across the globe, and they will find what they’re looking for in the entertainment we’re supplying to Jaman.”
 

Gallery of Recalled Classics

Comic book fan Charlie Meyerson, currently a reporter for the Chicago Tribune, helped assemble a photo gallery of infamously recalled comic books.  We direct your attention to their website.

Not every title included here was recalled nor is this list in any way complete.  But in the wake of last week’s recall and reprinting of Action Comics #869, All-Star Batman & Robin #10, and DC: Decisions #1, it was a good time to go tripping down memory lane.

lynda-carter-2032036

Wonder Woman vs. Sarah Palin

Many of us know Lynda Carter. She was the star of the 1970’s Wonder Woman TV series, where she did many of her own stunts andlynda-carter-2032036 became forever linked with the character, setting the standard for any future portrayals. She’s been seen in supporting roles in comedies such as Super Troopers and the very funny Sky High. She’s appeared in the popular Smallville TV series and played Mama Morton in the 10th anniversary show of Chicago in West End London. And she hasn’t aged in the last 25 years.

Recently, Lynda Carter was being interviewed by Victor Fiorillo of the Philadelphia Magazine. They talked about nude scenes, life, alcoholism, her singing career and, yes, the many recent comparisons between Sarah Palin and Wonder Woman.

The actress was not shy about her opinions concerning how the Alaskan governor stacks up next to the Amazon warrior of Paradise Island. The full interview can be found at this link, but the highlight is pasted for you below.

PHILADELPHIA MAGAZINE:  Okay, last question. I’m sure you’ve seen all the comparisons in the media and among Republicans of Sarah Palin to Wonder Woman. How do you feel about that?

LYNDA CARTER:  "Don’t get me started. She’s the anti-Wonder Woman. She’s judgmental and dictatorial, telling people how they’ve got to live their lives. And a superior religious self-righteousness … that’s just not what Wonder Woman is about. Hillary Clinton is a lot more like Wonder Woman than Mrs. Palin. She did it all, didn’t she?

"No one has the right to dictate, particularly in this country, to force your own personal views upon the populace — religious views. I think that is suppressive, oppressive, and anti-American. We are the loyal opposition. That’s the whole point of this country: freedom of speech, personal rights, personal freedom. Nor would Wonder Woman be the person to tell people how to live their lives. Worry about your own life! Worry about your own family! Don’t be telling me what I want to do with mine.

"I like John McCain. But this woman — it’s anathema to me what she stands for. I think America should be very afraid. Very afraid. Separation of church and state is the one thing the creators of the Constitution did agree on — that it wasn’t to be a religious government. People should feel free to speak their minds about religion but not dictate it or put it into law.

"What I don’t understand, honestly, is how anyone can even begin to say they know the mind of God. Who do they think they are? I think that’s ridiculous. I know what God is in my life. Now I am sure that she’s not all just that. But it’s enough to me. It’s enough for me to have a visceral reaction. And it makes me mad.

"People need to speak up. Doesn’t mean that I’m godless. Doesn’t mean that I am a murderer. What I hate is this demonization of everybody but one position. You’re un-American because you’re against the war. It’s such bullshit. Fear. It’s really such a finite way of thinking about God to think that your measley little mind can know the mind of God. It’s a very little God that way. I think that God’s bigger. I don’t presume to know his mind. Or her mind."

 


Alan Kistler isn’t gonna lie, he’s kind of in love with Lynda Carter. And his love is pure! Alan Kistler has been recognized by Warner Bros. Pictures and mainstream media outlets such as the New York Daily News as a comic book historian, and can be seen in the "Special Features" sections of the Adventures of Aquaman and Justice League: New Frontier DVDs. His personal website can be found at: http://KistlerUniverse.com. One of these days he’d love to write for DC, Marvel or Doctor Who.

New ‘Hitckhiker”s Writer Named

Eoin Colfer, best known for the Artemis Fowl series, has been tapped to write new novels set in Douglas Adams’ Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. Adams’ widow, Jane Belson, personally selected the author.

According to a profile at the BBC, Colfer said the opportunity was akin to "being offered the superpower of your choice".

Penguin International will make the announcement in London today including the news that the new book will be titled And Another Thing… to be published in October 2009.  Colfler joins a growing list of authors brought on to write works in another author’s world, a practice that has seen very mixed results from John Gardner’s underwhelming James Bond pastiches to Alexander Ripley’s hated sequel to Gone with the Wind.

Years ago, Adams said, "I suspect at some point in the future I will write a sixth Hitchhiker book…I would love to finish Hitchhiker on a slightly more upbeat note.

"Five seems to be a wrong kind of number; six is a better kind of number."

There are already 16 million copies of the five books in print in addition to television, radio, and film adaptations.

 

Frank Miller Presents John McCain

Hey, kids. Have you ever watched someone on TV and thought to yourself  "Man, that presidential candidate seems almost like a parody of Frank Miller’s aging Batman from The Dark Knight Returns"?

Well evidently, Matt Sheperd at www.shep.ca had that very thought cross his own noggin. And here is what he did with it.

Enjoy!

 

Review: ‘Holy Sh*t! The World’s Weirdest Comic Books’

holy-sh-t1-8879091

Holy Sh*t! The World’s Weirdest Comic Books
By Paul Gravette and Peter Stanbury
St. Martin’s Press, October 2008, $12.95

This is the kind of book I’m actually surprised to still see – I thought “look at this weird stuff” books had been entirely superseded by the greater speed and flexibility of the Internet. (I can think of three similar sites just off the top of my head – Superdickery, James Lilek’s Funny Books, and Scott Shaw!’s Oddball Comics – and without even diving into the blog world.) But I suppose as long as there are cash registers in this world, there will be eye-catching little impulse-buy books to sit next to them and lure in the curious, unwary, or amused. [[[Holy Sh*t!]]] is a small-format hardcover, roughly six inches square, and I wouldn’t be at all surprised if there was a corresponding point-of-purchase cardboard display that holds six to eight of them.

The title gives away the whole point of Holy Sh*t! – it’s a collection of amusingly weird, or weirdly amusing, covers from the last sixty years or so of comics, supposedly covering the whole world but actually staying, for the most part, very close to the mainstream of American corporate comics (with regular excursions into the well-known underground movement). I should mention, to save confusion, that the UK edition has the somewhat more boring title [[[The Leather Nun and Other Incredibly Strange Comics]]].

(more…)

Time’s Maghound goes Live

Time Inc. is hoping to do for magazines what Netflix has done for movies and if successful, could open a new avenue for comic book readers. Maghound has opened up, allowing people to subscribe to tiers of magazines for reading.  It has opened up a beta site with 240 titles from not only Time Inc. but also Men’s Health, ELLE, Martha Stewart Living, Maxim, Ladies Home Journal, Parents, Better Homes & Gardens, Woman’s Day, Best Life, Popular Science, Prevention, Runner’s World, Women’s Health, VIBE, Car and Driver, PC Magazine, Gardening and Bicycling.

At present, no comic books, including any from sister division DC Comics, are available for purchase. Mad Kids, though, is available.

A reader can choose one of four tiers starting with three titles for $4.95 per month up to eight or more titles for $1 each per month. A reader can alter which titles read month to month so a first-timer could try Time, Runner’s World and PC Magazine then the following month swap out PC for ELLE.  Should a title not be published monthly, the site will offer substitute selections.

The site was in development for four years and was announced about a year back. When the launch date was announced, they had expected 280 titles so this comes in under estimates.

“It’s vital for circulators even more so than ever in this economy to test innovative new ideas," Peter Winn, director of planning and development, consumer marketing for Bonnier Corporation, told Folio Magazine. "Maghound has potential to be an important program for the industry and that is why Bonnier is in."
 

003-6026828

LEGO Batman Happy Meals

003-6026828September 23rd, hurry up and get here already. All we ever seem to do is build up anticipation for the LEGO Batman videogame (coming to every now-gen game system). To forget about my lack Batman brick bashing I went to McDonald’s for a healthy salad. Really. I swear.

But what do I see spotlighted like the Batsignal, but Happy Meal toys based on LEGO Batman. I can’t escape their cute, grim visages. Offered toys include Batman with Batarang, Robin with Grappling Hook, the Batboat, the Joker Helicopter, Mister Freeze with Ice Blast, the Batmobile, the Penguin Submarine, and the Joker Surprise.

“Is this for your boy or girl?”

“Uhhh… My boy. Yes, my son. Whom I have at home. Waiting for his Happy Meal. By the way, which toy am I getting?”

See the McDonald’s promo page for the LEGO Batman Happy Meals here.

 

Creative Arts Emmys Given to Genre Faves

emmyaward-9041854With the Emmy Awards four days away, much so being made of the main event although many awards have already been given out.

The 2008 Creative Arts Emmys were presented and among the winners of note include:

Outstanding Animated Program (For Programming One Hour or More went to the “Imaginationland”  special episode of South Park while the less-than-one-hour category went to The Simpsons’ “Eternal Moonshine of the Simpson Mind”.

The guest acting awards were presented to Cynthia Nixon as Outstanding Guest Actress in a Drama Series for NBC’s Law & Order: Special Victims Unit; Outstanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series went to Kathryn Joosten for ABC’s Desperate Housewives. Joosten, one of our favorite character actors, notched her second win as Karen McCluskey. Accepting her statuette, Joosten declared, “This solves a problem. I have two sons, and now they don’t need to fight over which one gets this when I die.”

Outstanding Guest Actor in a Drama Series went to Glynn Turman for HBO’s In Treatment; and Outstanding Guest Actor in a Comedy Series went to Tim Conway for NBC’s 30 Rock.

The awards for Interactive Media were presented by Evan and Gregg Spiridelis of the online media company JibJab Inc. The award for fiction went to nbc.com’s Heroes Digital Experience. The nonfiction award went to Disney Channel Games Digital Media Event from the ABC Television Group, Creative Asylum and Walt Disney Internet Group.

(more…)