J.J. Abrams and Steven Spielberg’s Super 8, opening later this month, is certainly starting to generate buzz. The early reviews confirm that the movie has a CE3K mixed with Stand By Me feel. Things blow up but that’s not what the movie is about (thankfully). Paramount Pictures just sent us the following clip for your perusal:
USA Network sells itself as a place with memorable characters, which they certainly do. When they don’t have a lot of money compared with prime time networks, they need to be challenged creatively and have delivered over the last few years a handful of series that are never less than entertaining to watch. Beginning with the wonderful [[[Monk]]], they set the template for engaging and quirky series set in a variety of settings (wherever they can shoot cheap and probably get a tax break) but it also means the shows have distinctive looks unlike the slick gloss found on the big five networks.
The high concepts aren’t all that different from what you find on the majors but the tone feels lighter and brighter, even when things get dire. By building the shows around the characters, you quickly get emotionally invested so when things happen to them, you cheer or cry or anxiously want to see what comes next.
A new quirk is that the seasons are broken up, with around half offered up over the summer, when we want lighter fare, and you get a cliffhanger until January, when the networks tend to avoid burning new episodes in the post-holiday fatigue period. This way, we get fresh, fun fare with familiar characters as a nice bridge.
USA isn’t alone in this arena, but they started it and capitalized quite nicely adding show after show, with two new ones coming soon. Tonight, [[[White Collar]]] returns for its third season and today, the second season is available on a four-disc box set. The show, for those unfamiliar, is largely a buddy story of a seemingly uptight FBI agent, Peter Burke (Tim DeKay), and the notorious forger and thief Neil Caffrey (Matt Bomer), whom he has captured twice and now uses as a consultant. (more…)
About the only reason we’re interested in the remake of Fright Night is because it features the current incarnation of Pavel Chekov and the previous version of The Doctor. The film, opening August 19, the same day as Spy Kids 4, will hopefully be entertaining. We have a newly released clip for you to check out:
The DreamWorks release stars Anton Yelchin, Colin Farrell, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, David Tennant, Imogen Poots and Toni Collette and was directed by Craig Gillespie from a script by Marti Noxon (another reason we’re interested).
Senior Charlie Brewster (Anton Yelchin) finally has it all—he’s running with the popular crowd and dating the hottest girl in high school. In fact, he’s so cool he’s even dissing his best friend Ed (Christopher Mintz-Plasse). But trouble arrives when an intriguing stranger Jerry (Colin Farrell) moves in next door. He seems like a great guy at first, but there’s something not quite right—and everyone, including Charlie’s mom (Toni Collette), doesn’t notice. After witnessing some very unusual activity, Charlie comes to an unmistakable conclusion: Jerry is a vampire preying on his neighborhood. Unable to convince anyone that he’s telling the truth, Charlie has to find a way to get rid of the monster himself in this Craig Gillespie-helmed revamp of the comedy-horror classic.
On August 19, Robert Rodriguez takes his [[[Spy Kids]]] on a fourth mission, All the Time in the World.
The cast includes Jessica Alba, Joel McHale, Jeremy Piven, Ricky Gervais, Alexa Vega, Daryl Sabara, Rowan Blanchard, Mason Cook, Danny Trejo, and Antonio Banderas.
It’s interesting to watch how time and again, writers, artists, moviemakers, and studio executives struggle to find ways to adapt the very first comic book super-hero. Superman was something readers (and rival publishers) had never seen before, and he served as the template for the heroic fantasy that followed these last seven decades. When you have powers and abilities far beyond those of mortal men, you need visionaries to bring the character from the printed page to other media. Robert Maxwell figured out how to do that with the popular radio serial. In fact, Maxwell came up with various characters and concepts that seeped into the comics, a symbiosis that made both stronger.
I was given to considering Superman in his many forms when the eight-disc Superman The Complete Anthology Blu-ray set arrived for review. Warner Home Video has taken all the previous versions and spruced them up a bit, added some new features, and placed them in a handsome box. Despite the uneven content, this is a must-have for fans.
When the Fleischer brothers got a chance to animate the Man of Steel, they set the standard that all other animators have emulated or strived to match. It certainly raised the bar when Superman came to the movie serials, with Kirk Allyn looking the part but the low budget and low-tech kept his feats to the above-average, not super-human. Things got somewhat better with the George Reeve television series of the 1950s, imprinting the archetype on two generations of television watchers and comics readers. Again, Maxwell receives credit for his serious translation to the half hour demands of syndicated television before he left and it got dumbed down in subsequent seasons. (more…)
From Tom Johnson
X-MEN:FIRST CLASS didn’t quite ace the box office exam over the weekend, and we examine just how it falls in the scope of other Marvel films. Meanwhile, Greg Grundberg talks more about LOVE BITES with a comparison to another heroic series he was associated with.
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Do you think the lack of Wolverine hurt X-MEN:FIRST CLASS? Drop us a comment below!
TIPPIN’ HANCOCK’S HAT-Reviews of All Things Pulp by Tommy Hancock
PRIDE OF THE TRAVELER
by Bryce Beattie
Originally Published in Astonishing Adventures Magazine #2
Now Available at http://www.smashwords.com/ and http://www.storyhack.com/ (Author’s site)
It’s always nice to discover new authors plying the New Pulp trade, especially when it’s via digital media, the wave of the future for New Pulp creators and stories. Such is the case with PRIDE OF THE TRAVELER, a short swashbuckler by Bryce Beattie.
Set in Beattie’s own land of fantasy and swords, Caldera, this tale focuses on a sword for hire by the name of Key who essentially goes town to town challenging swordsmen for money. Also on his travels, Key has made a habit of stopping into visit fortune tellers and gypsies and that is where this story starts. Visiting a gypsy named Drabardi Fawe, Key asks for his fortune to be told. What the gypsy shares with him figures prominently into his working the crowd in this latest town, a town peopled with guards who are not only practiced swordsmen, but have a few dark practices as well.
This short story did exactly what a short piece should do. It lured me in, hooked me with the dialogue, the characters, and the fight scenes, and left me wanting to see more of Key and other characters. Beattie definitely set this up for other adventures and I for one hope to see more. Theres a real Errol Flynn feel to Key that is quite obvious and enjoyable throughout the story.
Although the dialogue could be a bit more consistent, shifting from ‘formal’ to modern vernacular here and there, PRIDE OF THE TRAVELER is most definitely a fantastic introduction into Bryce Beatties work and into the world of Caldera itself.
FOUR OUT OF FIVE TIPS OF THE HAT-Would love to unlock more stories with Key and crew for sure and certain!
TIPPIN’ HANCOCK’S HAT-Reviews of All Things Pulp by Tommy Hancock
GUAN-YIN AND THE HORRORS OF SKULL ISLAND
by Barry Reese
Published by Wild Cat Books
2009
One of the best things about Pulp fiction is that since it was a medium that arguably has grown into its own genre, it is rife with all sorts of sub genres one can write within. One story by one author can be a masked vigilante tale, then the next a straight western, and the third a science fiction ‘what if’ and all three will still be called Pulp. The stories are more varied and authors are thankfully allowed to be more versatile, to take chances outside of the sub genres they are known for.
Barry Reese, known for his hero, THE ROOK, and most recently for LAZARUS GRAY as wellas a plethora of other tales and such, took just such a chance two years back by walking the plank right off feet first into a pirate tale that also doubled as a mash up of sorts.
GUAN-YIN AND THE HORRORS OF SKULL ISLAND focuses on a saucy, talented, and smart female captain of a pirate ship. Helming THE LOTUS BLOSSOM, Guan Yin is a pirate that can stand her own with sword, fist, and pillaging up against any man calling himself pirate, but she is also a woman with a mission. As a child, Guan’s pirate father went on one more escapade and never returned. Growing up in his shadow and eventually filling his figurative boots, Guan Yin harbored for years the hope of finding out what happened to her father. That hope is answered when a strange African, M’buku tells her that a great treasure awaits him, her, and her crew on an island draped in mysteries and myths. An island where, according to M’buku, hints of what happened to her father, also exist.
This book is a quick read, both short in length and traveling at a break neck speed. The characters often start off as stereotypical, but Reese throws a little bit of that exploration and realization that he is known for, adding a bit of flesh and fat to the bare bones of the words he writes.
Is this book a definitive tale rife with pirate lore and nautical fact? No. GUAN YIN is not to be held up in comparison to Sabatini and other pirate classics, but I don’t believe that was necessarily the intent. Is this Reese’s strongest entry into the Pulp genre? No. But this is a fun romp through a Pulp trope with a certain large monkey and his worshipping natives froma certain hollywood classic thrown in for good measure. GUAN YIN is the tale that we all imagine we’d like to write and/or live as we’re growing up and Reese did one of those and for that imagination, he did it well.
THREE OUT OF FIVE TIPS OF THE HAT-A great romp on the high seas worth the read.
To support The Dark Knight, Warner Premiere offered up Batman: Gotham Knight, a collection of stories from various animators that were dark and largely uninteresting. It’s gratifying to see that they have learned from this rare misfire and have offered up a companion to this month’s The Green Lantern feature film with Green Lantern: Emerald Knights, on sale Tuesday. There are five stories, largely culled from the comic books, with a sixth tale connecting everything together. Essentially, Krona, the fallen Guardian, has come back from banishment as an enormous, angry form, having coalesced within a star. Summoning Shadow Demons from the Anti-Matter Universe of Qward, Krona threatens the Guardians and their world of Oa.
The entire Green Lantern Corps has been summoned to deal with this cosmic danger but they pause to stand in line to take their turn recharging their rings. While waiting patiently to save all of reality, Hal Jordan (Nathan Fillion) spins tales for his latest recruit, the young, idealistic Arisia (Elisabeth Moss). On the one hand, Krona is a big menace and the climactic scenes are incredibly strong and powerful. There’s a scope to his rising from within the sun that is what animation and comics is all about. That sense of scope, though, is missing from the frame in that in the comics, the central Power Battery was large enough that scores of the Corps could float before it and recharge en masse. Watching them stand in a queue is absurd.
The frame and five stories along with the characterization and visualization of the Corps and Guardians are cherry-picked and modified from the fifty years comics featuring the second incarnation of the Green Lantern. It’s nice to see that several people with comic book roots, including GL editor Eddie Berganza, got a shot at penning some of these stories. About the oddest juxtaposition of realities is seeing Sinestro (Jason Isaacs) still a member of the corps in good standing. Why he’s here is clearly a nod to his role in the live-action film, done so as not to confuse viewers.
We’re told the story of “The First Lantern” (written by Michael Green & Marc Guggenheim) which tells us a variant version of how the Corps was formed. It’s still a solid story showing how anyone can become a hero and show others the way to act. There are mammoth space battles and lots of ring-slinging but why the planet is under attack and the motives of the attackers are never even questioned, let alone explored. (more…)
Columns / Glenn Hauman / News
Stephen Colbert, we have your writer for “The Chronicles of Amber”!
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