Okay, it's really not fair to use the picture on the right with this next item, but we really can't help ourselves. Just acknowledge that we attempt to scandalize and demonize the truly salacious news bits, plus titillate our friends from NAMBLA.
Harry Potter star Daniel Radcliffe (who is demonstrably older than he appears in the pic we're using, by the way) is set to star in a play in London's West End where . . . well . . . we'll let someone else describe it for you:
The 17-year-old will make his stage debut as Alan Strang in Peter Shaffer's Equus - a drama about a stable boy's erotic fixation with horses.The role calls for Radcliffe to simulate sexual pleasure as he rides naked.
Apparently, this play opened on Broadway in 1974 with Anthony Hopkins and enjoyed 1,200 performances, so that makes everything okay. IT'S ART, YOU PERV.
Posted by YMB Staff at 10:00 AM | Comments (0)
When readers of Jane magazine were asked who they'd cast as homosexual lovers in a Brokeback Mountain sequel, they unanimously gave the movie pirates their vote.
So, does this mean slash-fiction has finally gone mainstream?
Posted by YourMomsBasement at 08:30 AM | Comments (0)
Mark Millar's done a 180 on the Superman flick.
The further away from SR I get the more of a failure it seems to be. It's a shame because it's not a bad movie. It's just not a GREAT movie. It is, however, a massive missed opportunity.
But is that really it? Fans ponder and psycho-analyze...
Mark, you loved this movie. You anticipated this movie. And I'm disappointed that one extra viewing and mediocre box office would change your mind as drastically as it has. Several people have said that they find it refreshing that Mark is no longer "blinded" by his love for all things Superman with regards to this movie. Well... My feelings are quite the reverse. Love for something doesn't make you blind. It gives you second sight. My feeling is that Mark took the red pill, to use a Matrix analogy, and chose to take the more comfortable and damning view of the film because it was harder not to.Mark, your mutable temprament is a part of what makes you a solid writer, someone in touch with the zeitgeist of pop culture and a great prankster.
But I feel a bit wounded as a fellow fan that you've chosen to take the emerald glasses off and denounce the wizard as a charlatan.
Spoilers in the thread, by the way.
Posted by YourMomsBasement at 08:15 AM | Comments (0)
How about a nice game of chess?
Geeks of a certain age will remember NORAD as not only the setting of the 1983 Cold War paranoia flick "War Games", but also the site of X-Man Thunderbird's death way back in 1975.
Posted by YourMomsBasement at 08:00 AM | Comments (0)
If you've ever wondered how the people on reality TV shows satisfy their more "primal" urges, wonder no more.
Ewww...
Posted by YourMomsBasement at 08:50 AM | Comments (0)
Please to be checking out this cool site. You can even submit to the exhibits and help the Museum grow.
Posted by YourMomsBasement at 08:45 AM | Comments (0)
Over at ComicBookResources' forums, Erik Larsen had the following to say about the possibility of Rob Liefeld ever returning to Image Comics:
While, I think he may draw a cover or a story at some point - it's inconceivable that he might one day be a partner in the company again and I wouldn't trust him to complete anything that he solicited. His track record, in that regard, is pretty miserable. But it's not impossible that he might do a cover or story, however.
I'm sorry, but Savage Dragon was like a year late and so is the current Super-Patriot title, so where does the holier than thou stance on late books come from. Image is back stocked with late books, so people in glass houses should use more caution...
And another good point made by another poster:
Marc is just as late with stuff. Look at Hunter Killer, I already gave up hope on that one. And what was that one he had a few years ago, where the team went into hell, he never finshed it. And yes, dont forgot about SD being a year late, they have no room to talk.
Then someone relates this less than flattering Erik Larsen story:
at a con several years ago, a friend of mine and I were just walking around, just taking it all in...it was our first semi-big con. We were looking at everything, all the tables, seeing was artists were there and whatnot. We came across Eriks table. Not many people were standing around his table, maybe 10-12 including us. We were just watching him sketch. I was never a fan of his or his characters but my buddy seth was so I went over to the table and watched him sketch. about 10 minutes later, erik says to us, "if you are going to continue to just stand there and watch, its going to cost you...if not, you can leave" We all thought he was just kidding. One by one some people started to wander off but a few leftovers including seth and myself stayed, since seth is (was) a huge larson fan. Then, Erik stood up, threw his sketchbook on the ground, told some guy that was behind him to have us removed, which he did. He told us to pay or walk away...we were kind of shocked, and I guess we didnt move fast enough because the guy that was with erik took us by the arms and pulled us away from the table. As we were being pulled away, erik said something along the lines of "im not here to make friends, im here to sell" or something like that...i swear to you, that is a true story.
Posted by YourMomsBasement at 08:30 AM | Comments (0)
We love you, Dan Slott. We love your comics. We love your humor. We love the big yellow bus you drive when you take Internet comic geek h8terz to school.
Mr. Slott over at the Bendis board:
Here's the deal...When you're a "pro" in the industry, you're EXPECTED to act professionally. You're expected to be above it all, to let things slide, and to allow some fans to get away with being... well... @$$holes. But every now and then one of them is behaving like such a COMPLETE TOOL that I feel the need to write a strongly worded post... And those posts usually start with the words:
Dear Idiot...
Whenever I take the effort to write a "Dear Idiot" post, by the time I get to the end I usually laugh it off and toss the darn thing into trash. Well, today's a first...
Because the idiot-in-question has been SO HISTORICALLY STUPID that I can't bring myself to delete my response. So here goes... My first EVER "Dear Idiot" post that's actually making it onto the internet.
It seems a "She-Hulk" detractor (how could such a being even exist?) posted the following elsewhere:
Slott's "She-Hulk" did not even make the top 100 list at all for April. How's that for a book that's "doing so well" and "safely out of danger?" I can't spin the same BS that Slott can and blind you with a snowstorm of double-talk, I can only point out solid evidence that you can readily find at your disposal at any comics shop anywhere. I suppose that's why I'm the nobody and Slott's the darling of the fan boards. But take a look for yourself, sometime, and see what the actual solicits show versus what Slott usually tries to spin.
Slott's response?
Wait for it...
Dear Idiot,You got me. SHE-HULK didn't place in April's Top 100. Or even in the Top 300. Maybe that's because SHE-HULK didn't come out in April.
Posted by YourMomsBasement at 08:00 AM | Comments (4)
Picking up where we left off yesterday, the Washington Post is soliciting stories about nightmare employees. Some snippets:
One young lady who worked in our marketing department was fond of wearing outfits that were "up to here and down to there" as her boss would say. It was such a problem that we would joke about her "Wide Belts". Thankfully, she had a great sense of humor and would come to my office each morning and ask if her belt was too narrow. She kept a pair of slacks in her office for the days when we asked her to change. I never figured out why she didn't just wear the slacks to start with!
. . . .When my wife and I were first married, she had a few outfits she would wear to her office that I thought exposed way too much cleavage, so I dropped a few quarters in the slot, pressed the button, and asked her where my soda was. The maintenance guys that worked around her office loved her!
. . . .I have observed mostly younger women on the Metro who look like they're dressed for work, except that they're dressed in such a low-cut shirt that their "girls" (as Stacy and Clinton say) are practically falling out.
. . . .
God bless these women. God bless every single last one of them..........
More after the jump.
More stories:
I had an intern who volunteered to take urgent, priority first-delivery to FedEx - which he lived next to, because I was working on a tight deadline and wouldn't be out of work by drop-off time. The next morning all 25 people called because they didn't have the packages. He had forgotten to drop them off at night, so did it first thing in the morning! And then Devil Boss scream me out because I should have done it in the first place.. . . .
About 13 years ago I worked for about 6 months with a young admin asst. who thought she was oh-so-smart and intelligent. But her work was only average at most, and she proceeded to use the office as a place where she starting her own business. So she would use the work phone and computer for her home business. They finally let her go, and no one was sad about that.
. . . .
I supervised someone who took unscheduled days off even tho it was against policy and even after she was warned several times. We weren't unreasonable with her, she was calling in every other week with an unscheduled vacation day, usually Monday, leaving a message around 5am on my voice mail even tho we'd asked her to call during regular hours so someone could speak with her in person (ie, ask some questions). Nothing doing, she would call in every other Monday, say she wouldn't be in, no reason, and not answer the phone at home if I called. Next day she would tell me she had to take the day off to go to a funeral. Eventually even she had to admit she'd run out of relatives, so she switched to telling me she had to have the day off to go to a funeral for a close friend. Then it was former neighbors. Everyone she knew was dying. I finally asked her if she could go to a funeral and then come to work afterwards, since it seemed she had become a professional mourner. Nope, she informed me, she had to have an entire day off to go a funeral because she might have to drive out of state. And, she told me, no way was she going to make any changes, she would take off whenever she felt the need. Thankfully, when I told my boss about this conversation, it was the last nail in the employee's coffin and she was downsized shortly afterward. Before she left she told everyone she knew that I got rid of her because I wanted her job.
. . . .
I became a controller and office manager of one of my companies subsidiaries a couple of months shy of my 22nd birthday. I supervised just three women (all older than me - one late 20's, one mid-30's, one early 50's), but it was certainly trial by fire. Within about 9 months, 2 of them (the younger two) were having affairs with plant supervisers. All four were married. :o/ I realize that intracompany romance is common!, and they were discreet - sort of - but it was still a difficult situation for me!
. . . .
We had a girl in our office who went out every night to clubs and would come straight to the office afterward. One day she came in wearing a black mesh shirt with large holes, so you could just see her bra.
We have a girl who leaves her dirty dishes in the office sink or at her desk for days at a time. Once she went on vacation for two weeks. A colleague and I discovered a mouse in our office and went around to see where it could have come in. We saw five dirty dishes laying on the floor under this girl's desk caked in mold and mouse droppings.
. . . .
I once worked as an art therapist for an organization serving severely troubled children. My assistant at one point was a nice woman, but extremely flakey. One day she thoughtlessly left a SHARP KNIFE in the classroom sink (it was usually locked up.) Immediately, one of our charges noticed, grabbed the knife and began threatening the other kids and us with bodily harm. Eventually, the only course of action was to leave the room and lock him in until the police came. In the meantime he sliced up all the other kid's artwork, detroyed a display that I had stayed up several nights to finish, and got himself into a whole lot of dangerous trouble. I watched the police use pepper spray to subdue him and take him away, handcuffed, in a squad car. The boy was 12 years old (although he had 100 pounds on me). It was very sad for everyone. I left the organization the next year and don't believe the assistant was rehired.
. . . .
the worst situation I dealt with was our IT support guy. We were under a huge deadline -- had to get two massive documents filed by a 4:30 Tuesday afternoon deadline, and I had been working round the clock with another associate to get them done. Sunday night, about 1:30 AM, the document freezes, and then we get the Blue Screen of Death. Computer ate the first document.
I immediately paged our IT guy (first time ever), apologized profusely for bothering him in the middle night, but explained our deadline and said I needed to recover the document right away (at that point, didn't know if we'd lost just the changes or the whole thing). He basically said, "I'll get to it tomorrow when I come in." I explained again that we needed it now, and he said, "if it's not due until Tuesday, I don't see why you can't wait until tomorrow." I again tried to explain that we needed it now, because we had two documents, and unless we could finish one tonight, we wouldn't be able to get the second one done tomorrow. To which he said, "do you know what time it is?"
I absolutely lost it -- first (and last) time I have actually yelled at someone at work. I started screaming that I knew %&*^@%(@ well what time it was, because I'd been there working on this document since 7 in the morning, on 3 hrs of sleep because I'd done the same thing the night before, and was going to be doing the same thing again the following night, for which I needed a document to work on. And turns out, when he got his butt out of bed, he was able to log in from home and recover an earlier version of the document for us in under a half-hour, so we only lost 2 hrs of work -- if he'd just TOLD me he'd try that, instead of giving me flak, I'd have been happy as a clam.
Luckily, he was let go within a couple of months. But that associate I was working with never forgot the day she saw a completely different side of me!
Posted by YMB Staff at 11:00 AM | Comments (1)
Click here for similar pics of Tim Allen, Martin Lawrence and William H. Macy.
See, that pic on the left is why we don't remove our shirt in public. And why we have sex with our shirt on. And shower with it on. And weep with it on. On the other hand, the pic on the right is why we grease ourselves up every morning before heading out for the day.
Posted by YMB Staff at 08:15 AM | Comments (0)
TV mogul Aaron Spelling dies, right? And he apparently leaves his talentless beloved daughter less than $1 million in his will.
It's no wonder she's been spotted at a pawn shop and buying groceries from the dollar store.
And her with a baby on the way!
Not exactly an an open smile on a friendly shore of a dynasty on a fantasy island, is it angel? (We're so sorry. We couldn't resist. Kill us. Please.)
Posted by YMB Staff at 08:00 AM | Comments (0)
Dude . . . .
Why? WHY????
What the hell is wrong with you? Do you not have enough to do in your free time? Don't have you enough re-prints of comics from the 70s to keep you occupied? Don't you, you know, have a frickin' JOB or anything??? Why THIS????
The primary purpose of this essay is to examine the life and times of Gwen Stacy and Norman Osborn, the Green Goblin, and how I (and many, many others) feel these characters (as well as Peter Parker and Mary Jane Watson-Parker) have been blatantly defiled by writer J. Michael Straczynski's "Sins Past" storyarc in Amazing Spider-Man # 509-514 (which revealed that Gwen Stacy had a fling with Norman Osborn and secretly had his children before he killed her).It's also designed to dissect and debunk Sins Past, and show how the numerous retcons and mischaracterizations that appear in the storyline are simply not possible. I feel that consistency of character is more important than strict continuity, but since JMS and the gang have insisted on dredging up the past and retconning it, I will show, point-by-point, how the events depicted in this story are not possible.
Dude. Seriously. We hate that particular little retcon as much as you do. Trust us. But seriously, get a frickin' life already, okay?
IT WAS 121,896 WORDS LONG. ONE HUNDRED TWENTY-ONE THOUSAND EIGHT HUNDRED NINETY SIX. That's approximately 488 typed, double-spaced pages. You maniac.
Posted by YMB Staff at 07:50 AM | Comments (2)
The message boards at Boston.com has a thread soliciting embarassing work stories from its readers. The thread gets started well by "Tina160":
When I was 26 years old I was working at a mortgage company which employed about 250 people. At that time, "cubes" were none existing and everyone mainly sat out in open space with desks lined side to side and back to back. I always wore a nicely "fitted" skirt with a blouse, suit jacket and heels, and must admit I had a great figure (legs too!).One morning, I arrived at work and as usual was very busy running from one end of the company to the other. Everyone kept looking at me running back and forth with "#&*@" eating grins on their faces. I met with my boss, the VP, and through our whole meeting he was smiling and flushed in the face.
Finally, half way through the day, one of my female sales reps took me aside to tell me that I forgot to zipper my skirt prior to my arrival at work! Well, when you wear a tightly fitted skirt that zippers in the back and don't zipper it, you have a round opening in your backside. With much embarrassment, I headed for the ladies room. My first reaction was to turn around and look in the mirror to see what everyone saw.
"AHHHH!" - that morning I had put on bikini underware that had a cartoon picture on the rear end of a baby sucking its thumb with the caption "COAX ME". Since I had nude panyhose on, everything was in FULL VIEW!
But things really take off when Tina160 follows up with this:
Yeah - although I had to swallow my pride a bit, not all was lost (especially the respect I had from my co-workers). It was worth the embarrassment as I earned a 12% pay raise and a promotion that year.
Homina. Remember ladies, show off your hind quarters at work while wearing suggestive panties, get a 12% raise.
Oh, and speaking of work-related stories, have you visited Useless Sponge yet?
Posted by YMB Staff at 04:30 PM | Comments (0)
Stop me if you've heard this before:
In the early 1990s, pricier, more polished-looking cards hit the market. The industry started to cater almost exclusively to what Beckett's associate publisher described to me as "the hard-core collector," an "older male, 25 to 54, with discretionary income."
Posted by YourMomsBasement at 01:00 PM | Comments (0)
Old Balls is at it again. In a thread over at the John Byrne Forums that began innocently enough (you really think Brian Bendis is listening to music while writing, thus providing a "soundtrack" for all those silent scenes he writes? WHO CARES??!?), but then just became an excuse for Old Balls to whine some more about them damn kids who constantly blow their deadlines and are ruining the industry. Of course, this isn't the first time he's moaned about those pesky kids and it probably won't be the last. But it's still fun. Says OB (his is the bottom quote plus the image, which responds to the top two quotes):
I even miss JB's art behind the old Marvel format of covers with the character box at the top left and the freaking month on the cover. Why take away the month even? +++Probably to keep people from realizing that the book is 3 month's late.***
Something very much like that, no doubt. Also probably because the publishers don't know with any certainty when a book will come out, even up to the time the covers start rolling off the presses.
Not to be outdone, Howard Mackie joins the party to comment on whether strict adherence to the "Marvel Method" of comic writing (plot, pencils, then script) would speed up the process and save many a blown deadline:
the Marvel method, for untrained writers and editors, comes with it's on problems. Instead of writers who would rather be writing screenplays you are likely to get writers who want to write novels. A good Marvel method plot is not, and should not be, a novel. Also, as John has said, it gives the artist much more room to ignore and/or drop things out in their entirety. I have worked with some of the best artists in the business who have totally changed things I called for in a plot because"it was going to take too long to draw."I still think that a plot-art-script-ink scenario works best, but if I knew so much perhaps I could get work!!
Mackie, of course, is the former Marvel editor and writer whose name became so damned radioactive he had to be credited as "Writer X" in his latter days at the company.
Perhaps it's not Mackie's opinion on the proper way to create a comic that stands in the way of him getting work today. Perchance, it's this:
Posted by YMB Staff at 10:30 AM | Comments (1)
Se7en, starring Butthead as Det. John Mills and Beavis as John Doe. Maybe it's just us, but it's funnier than it sounds.
Posted by YMB Staff at 08:15 AM | Comments (0)
So what do you get when you combine the following?
Posted by YMB Staff at 08:00 AM | Comments (0)
David Hasselhoff is set to star in . . . David Hasselhoff: The Musical. Says Mitch:
“I am also doing a heart-rendering set on my life and the mistakes I have made,” the star says. “It sounds like a bad joke, but it is really going to be a good show…totally campy. It’s written by the same people who wrote Bette Midler’s show and produced by the people who produced Chicago in London.”
Those poor bastards down in Melbourne, Australia get exposed to this horror first. We're sorry. We're so very, very sorry.
To make up for it, here's the "Hooked on a Feeling" music video. We swear, THIS WILL MAKE UP FOR EVERYTHING.
Posted by YMB Staff at 08:00 PM | Comments (0)
That's what the fanboys at the Comic Bloc boards want to know.
Currently leading the pack? None other than Lois Lane.
To which we call horses#!*! How good of a girlfriend could she possibly have been when she spent the first 50+ years of her existence trying to prove her boyfriend was lying to her, huh? I SAID I WAS BOWLING, DAMNIT. I DON'T KNOW WHY I SMELL LIKE COOTCHIE.
Posted by YMB Staff at 03:45 PM | Comments (2)
Lindsay Lohan is apparently trying out amateur Internet porn just for the fun of it. No, there's no nudity, but you expect to see a link to ccbill somewhere next to her pics there. (In other words, it's work-safe, you giant perv.)
What's the over/under on when she'll finally appear in Penthouse?
Posted by YMB Staff at 03:30 PM | Comments (3)
Over at SuperHeroHype, someone has started up a thread calling Cap out onto the mat for his actions in Civil War:
I've come to the conclusion Captain America is a dick.Let's review some of his wonderful tactical decisions upfront.
- He finds out about the Registration's clause about hunting down bad guys, is nearly gunned down. Does he report this to the media? Retire? No, he declares WAR.
- He recruits a bunch of kids and tells them not You need to go lay low and retire from this but "Abandon your families and work with me in a gurilla war that has no definite end" (it's FEDERAL LAW moron-they'll be on the run for the rest of their lives).
- He expects Hank Pym to join with him on this bizarro crusade of his and live his life on the run too.
- He dismisses the fact that Peter Parker has a VERY GOOD reason for supporting Registration and made a heartfelt decision based on the idea it was for MONEY.
That especially bugs me and shows me Captain America is a no down, lying, dirty ingrate whom apparently has no faith in his friends and no judge of character. He turned his back on them and apparently can't understand there's MERIT to the position.
- His words towards Peter during Issue 3# are beyond the pale and frankly of a dirtbag that I wish Spidey had pounded within an inch of his life. Captain America has NO idea what this kind of problem is.
- His cheap shot at Iron Man also removes any semblance of moral authority the man has.
Who the hell does Captain America think he's fighting anyway? Nazis? He's fighting a democratically created LAW that's about people no longer being allowed to be vigilantes. . . .
His behavior is increasingly sickening.
Oh no you didn't. You don't get to talk smack about Captain freakin' America in a post-9/11 world:
This thread is sickening.
You tell 'im.
Posted by YMB Staff at 03:15 PM | Comments (1)
We posted last week regarding some apparently craziness involving Internet sideshow, J-Bolt. Turns out, someone purporting to be his agent posted at the Comicon.con boards (slightly) slagging off poor J-Bolt.
The plot thickens. A post purportedly from his (former) agent's assistant:
Good afternoon.I'm Judith Moose's assistant and she has asked me to respond to J-Bolt's post and offer an apology for the actions of one of her employees. She didn't know anything about this board until someone sent her a message this morning regarding your posts. One of our former interns had said something about seeing her name on a forum last month connected with this topic. When asked about it, Judith said that Jaki Baskow had been given a script for "Bombshell" but that Jaki wasn't currently representing him and that he hadn't been a client of hers since around 2001 and that was all. We were unaware that he had posted anything regarding this information.
Judith has asked me to let you know that she has absolutely nothing against J-Bolt and in fact, considered him a friend throughout their working relationship. She wishes him nothing but the best in all of his projects and hopes that he and his loved ones are well and happy.
To those of you on this board as well as J-Bolt himself, please accept our apologies on behalf of our intern. This and other items are serving as reminders of why this intern is no longer with us.
Best wishes,
Catherine Ingham
And supposedly an email from Ms. Moose herself:
Hello Tom,Thank you for your message. I had received one yesterday from another member of your board pointing out the same item. Up until that point, I had no idea of my supposedly posting on the forum and you may post this message as a reply if you wish. An intern that I had in my office through the end of June had mentioned something about seeing my name connected with a forum concerning J-Bolt stating that Jaki Baskow and I are involved in his projects. Not having seen the forum or any of its content, I commented to my intern that we both did work with him but that Jaki didn't currently represent him and that I hadn't worked with him since around the end of 2000 or beginning of 2001. I had no idea that he would take it upon himself to impersonate me, much less create chaos in the process. As each day passes, I'm becoming more pleased that I let him go last month as I have discovered that this is not the first item he's lent my name to.
Catherine Ingham is indeed my assistant and while that's not exactly the message I had dictated to her over the telephone yesterday, it's close enough to what I wanted to convey. I personally have no problem with J-Bolt at all. As far as I'm concerned, he's a talented artist who is simply trying to find his way in an industry that he loves. We socialized quite often throughout the time we worked together and I considered him to be a friend.
For the sake of knowledge, other than yesterday's message from Catherine, I will not be posting on the forum as my business dealings with J-Bolt were over several years ago. I wish him well with his current and future endeavors but honestly have nothing to discuss. Any type of future discussion that I would possibly have with him would be either over a telephone or face-to-face. I have two companies to run on a daily basis and taking part in a smear campaign isn't something that I would do. One of my companies is an Entertainment PR firm, at which my staff and I protect people's reputations, not try to destroy them.
Once again, thank you for your message. I appreciate you bringing this issue to my attention.
With all good wishes,
Judith A. Moose, President
JM Media Group / Signing Stars Publishing
Posted by YMB Staff at 08:00 PM | Comments (0)
Peter David, formerly the writer of Young Justice, responds on his blog to comments DC Executive Editor Dan Didio apparently made in an interview on Newsarama. PAD writes:
First he [Didio] complained about the quality of the book's sales, stating that a book which features such iconic characters should have far higher numbers. And second he asserted that "Slobo" ruined the character of Lobo.The aspect that Dan perpetually leaves out of his two-part evisceration of "Young Justice" is that YJ was specifically designed to appeal to a younger readership. That was the mandate from editorial. That's what I was asked to write. YJ was intended to skew young--in its stories, in its subject matter, in its readership--with the notion that it would draw in younger readers who would eventually "graduate" to the older-skewing titles. I was told at the outset that DC neither expected nor needed the book to sell huge numbers; it was aiming at the long-term goal of bringing in new, younger readers. So his complaining about the quality of the sales is irrelevant...not to mention that YJ outsold "Impulse" and "Superboy," both of which were also cancelled, and even he admits the book was turning a profit. So pointing to these iconic characters--characters so "iconic" that DC did away with them--and complaining that sales didn't reflect their presence is really beside the point.
Later in the comments section, PAD writes:
what is deceptive is that he [Didio] didn't say, "Peter was writing exactly what he'd been told to write, but I decided to go in a different direction." Instead he simply said, "The book wasn't selling as well as it should have been." They canceled it for one reason and one reason only: To relaunch "Teen Titans" so that they could tie in with the new animated series. A series which was, ironically, in tone and style, influenced by "Young Justice."
To which retailer Brian Hibbs responds in the comments section:
I'll just note that the last issue of YJ (#55, 3/03) sold approximately 24k copies.TEEN TITANS #1 (7/03) sold approximately 75k.
The most recent issue of TT (#36) came in at 71k.
Regardless of the "tone" of Didio's comments, it does appear that his decision was the correct one FOR THE FRANCHISE -- sales have about TRIPLED in the rebranding/repositioning, and have stayed high ever since.
Posted by YMB Staff at 06:30 PM | Comments (0)
A thread on MillarWorld ostensibly about the new projects DC announced in San Diego has devolved into a "DC is teh suxxor" and "Marvel is teh RULOR" thread. Was Infinite Crisis too inaccessible for new readers? Is it better to have a more easily-explainable premise, like Civil War, but also have 428 crossover issues?
wasn't the stated intent of Infinite Crisis to "simplify continuity issues"? Or did I miss the revision of that intent to "setting up the events that will lead into another mini that will simplify continuity issues" It just seems that if it's taking 11 backup strips and a completely separate series to explain, it's missed the mark somewhat.Personally, it feels a bit too much like I'm studying for my DC Exam. I certainly don't see how IC has made the DCU more accessible to new readers. But hey - I'm a reader who started off reading Earth 8, so what do I know?
. . . .
Does anyone else remember a comic that tried to make the DCU more understandable so we could concentrate on stories rather than minutiae? Crisis on Infinite earths or something.
. . . .
Jesus, does everyone have to read everything to get everything? It's very easy to read what you want and ignore everything else, *especially* with this thing you're on called "the interweb" where someone else has read everything and can very easily tell you about it.
. . . .
Seriously, not to turn this into a Marvel v. DC thing, but try explaining the current status quo of both universes to someone who doesn't read comics, as I did this weekend to a friend who read a few when he was a kid but was hearing good things about them through the media.
Marvel - A group of heros made a mistake and a whole bunch of kids got killed. The government is trying to make all the heros register. Some of them do it, some of them don't and they're punching each other to work out their issues.
DC - 20 years ago, there was a Crisis. What Crisis? Well there was this guy called the Monitor and he had an evil twin called the Anti-Monitor who wanted to destroy the universe....
*Half an hour later*
... and then Batman created this satellite called OMAC, because he didn't trust his friends because of what he found out his friends did to him in Identity Crisis. What do you mean, what did they do to him - weren't you listening when I explained Identity Crisis? No *IDENTITY* Crisis, not *INFINITE* Crisis.
sigh. Okay, one more time...
15 years ago, the Justice League was on a Satellite...
. . . .
I'd like to be treated with some intelligence as a reader. I like the new Checkmate for example even after Sacrifice.
I'd like to have a clue as a 25 year DC reader as to what the hell is in continuity or not. We used to have a clue, but now we're in a poor pick and mix situation which seems to offer the chance to do remakes of stories that did not need remaking like the original Batman/Superman story on the cruise ship.
I'd also like Donna Troy to stop being the pivotal force of the DCU and therefore making all other characters as nonsensical as she is now.
. . . .
But this is the problem with EVERY crossover. Over on the MCW #3 thread, whenever I've questioned a character's rationalizations for their behavior, I've been told that if I'd only read MCW #1 Director's Cut and bought X-Factor 8 and Thunderbolts 103 and make anagrams of the dialogue while playing my copy of Abbey Road backward, I would TOTALLY understand why Thor would be Pro-registration.
. . . .
The perfect crossover was Invasion - perfectly self contained and a great universe spanning story.
I think Civil War is perfectly understandable by the fact the mods here have read it in isolation and understood it.
. . . .
If the only criteria for a perfect crossover is that it is perfectly self-contained than that's too bad, because besides that one distinction, INVASION! was pretty crap.
Posted by YMB Staff at 06:00 PM | Comments (0)
Continuing on our McFarlane-Kirkman post from earlier today, a video on YouTube of Robert Kirkman asking Todd McFarlane about doing comics work in the future.
We'll save you some trouble. Kirkman first appears at about the 5:00 mark, and the fun begins at about the 7:24 mark.
The best part comes right after McFarlane mocks Kirkman saying "I can do layouts." At about the 8:55 mark, we get a panicked fanboy. Screaming. And pointing.
Posted by YMB Staff at 08:15 AM | Comments (0)
Next person who makes that joke thinking they're being incredibly witty gets whacked upside the head.
So rumors abound that Heath Ledger is apparently the new Joker in the sequel to Batman Begins. Not having seen one single movie with this guy in it, we have to wonder: Why does this bother so many fanboys?
Some snippets from a thread on CBR (as always, the typos are all theirs, not ours):
Interesting choice.... . . .
If by interesting you mean bad, terrible, horrible, unthinkable then yes I agree.
. . . .
The main reason I hate this: "A Knights Tale"
I hate that movie so much that I will hold it against Keith Ledger. Still haven't seen Brokeback Mountain yet, not because I'm a homophobe or anything, but because of "A Knights Tale". . . .
I think jim carrey is the best actor to play joker or more precisely, he should have been the joker. His physique closely resemble the comic book joker's tall and thin yet built for comedic stunt not to mention carrey's versatile face and comedic nature. All you need is to give him a white make up and dye his hair green and have him dress up and he's joker. Watch him closely when he played the riddler, he was joker in riddler's costume. Jack nicholson should have been the riddler!
. . . .
keth ledger is def an out of left field choice....
. . . .
I want to see Boner from Growing Pains play Joker.
Heath Ledger doesn't really bother us. You want to know what does? The thought of putting comic book fanboys in charge of movie casting. From CBR:
Heath Ledger is too pretty for the role. Personally I preferred the Justin Timberlake as Two-Face rumour to this one.
I DID hear that John Cusack was openly campaigning for Harvey Dent/Two-Face, which I love.
'Nsync and Lloyd Dobler as Batman villains? No, thank you. They'd just be too frickin' whiney and stuff.
Posted by YMB Staff at 08:10 AM | Comments (0)
CNN.com has a report on a disturbing scene 12 year-old Dakota Fanning shot for a movie called Hounddog. As first reported by Lloyd Grove of the New York Post, the script apparently calls for Fanning - again, ALL TWELVE YEARS OLD OF HER - to:
be raped in one explicit scene and to appear naked or clad only in "underpants" in several other horrifying moments.Fanning's mother, Joy, and her Hollywood agent, Cindy Osbrink, see the movie as a possible Oscar vehicle for the pint-size star.
Apparently, and as evidenced by the tagline in the CNN report linked above, RAPE = OSCAR. Duh. Of course. Jodie Foster. The Accused. Plus, she was a 12 year-old hooker in Taxi Driver. That makes it all better, right?
Good thing they apparently ran out of money for that production.
Keep in mind, Dakota Fanning is next set to appear as "Fern" in the new Charlotte's Web movie. If we're the studio putting out that movie, we're thinking that nowhere in the universe should Wilbur the pig have to cross paths with pedophilia and rape, but that's just us. We're funny like that.
Posted by YMB Staff at 08:05 AM | Comments (0)
So, CBR reports that McFarlane was being questions by a fan about why he doesn't do more comic work.
The fan turns out to be Robert Kirkman, writer of Invincible.
"I know Marvel has tried to get you to do stuff and other people have tried to get you to do stuff," Kirkman continued. "You're here because of the comics. I don't want to say you 'owe' it, but why can't you help on a comic book? Why can't you do a new comic book? I think everybody here will agree they'd love to see you work on a new comic!"Everybody did agree, and when the applause died down, McFarlane answered Kirkman, "You write comic books. You should try drawing one some day, pal."
"I can do layouts!" Kirkman declared.
"Yeah," McFarlane responded. "You and my mom."
McFarlane approached Kirkman."You wanna do stuff? You wanna do a book with me? How good is Robert Kirkman's stuff?" The crowd went wild, including members of McFarlane's panel.
"How cool would it be for Todd and Bob to do something?" Haberlin yelled.
"OK," McFarlane relented. "If you convince Haberlin, [and if] he convinces me ... me and you."
Cue thunderous applause as the pair of creators shook hands.
Bendisboard reacts.
Millarworld reacts.
Posted by YourMomsBasement at 08:00 AM | Comments (0)
pburtch07 at the DC comics boards implores you to Stop Comparing Superman Returns to Batman Begins!
Seriously. It's making him mad.
Superman Returns would need to gross $481 million worldwide to match the profit of Batman Begins. It still could if foreign gross is very high, but its too early to speculate on that. The point is its useless to compare Superman Returns to Batman Begins in terms of trying to justify SR's success.Obviously the movie is not a flop, but it may end up being a disappointment. If it is, the Superman franchise will be in a very different position than the newly-energized Batman franchise.
Bitching ensues.
Posted by YourMomsBasement at 10:00 AM | Comments (1)
This was neat.
Top Five Most Common Comic Book Writer Medical Errors
Posted by YourMomsBasement at 02:00 PM | Comments (0)
The Ricardos had it right all along!
According to the article:
When men spend the night with a bed mate their sleep is disturbed, whether they make love or not, and this impairs their mental ability the next day.The lack of sleep also increases a man's stress hormone levels.
According to the New Scientist study, women who share a bed fare better because they sleep more deeply.
Dr. Neil Stanley, who clearly plans to use the study results to kick his wife out of bed, said, revealingly:
"Historically, we have never been meant to sleep in the same bed as each other. It is a bizarre thing to do."Sleep is the most selfish thing you can do and it's vital for good physical and mental health.
"Sharing the bed space with someone who is making noises and who you have to fight with for the duvet is not sensible.
"If you are happy sleeping together that's great, but if not there is no shame in separate beds."
Posted by YourMomsBasement at 12:00 PM | Comments (0)
By now, you may have heard of the flack that arose after Good Morning America's movie critic, Joel Siegel, loudly walked out of an advance screening of Clerks II.
"First movie I've walked out of in 30 [expletive] years!" the Post quotes him saying of the sequel, which follows the continuing misadventures of two convenient store slackers 10 years after audiences discovered them in the 1994 indie sensation Clerks."It was so foul and mean and repulsive. I finally realized I could not say anything positive," he said to the Post. "I wasn't ready for this kind of smut...I hope he doesn't make any more movies."
Of course, this being the Internet age and this being a flick by Kevin Smith we're talking about, there was bound to be a response by Smith on his blog, right?
You’d imagine this would bother me, and yet, I’m as delighted by this news as I was with the eight minute standing ovation “Clerks II” received in Cannes.I mean, it’s Joel Siegel, for Christ’s sake. As Paul Thomas Anderson once said of the man, getting a bad review from Siegel is like a badge of honor. . . .
. . . .
Now, I don’t need Joel Siegel to suck my dick the way he apparently sucks M. Night’s, gushing over his flick before he’s even seen it; but shit, man - how about a little common fucking courtesy?
Never mind the fact that when you’re paid to watch movies for a living and the only tasks required of you are to a) sit through said movies and b) write your thoughts about them before your deadline, walking out before a movie’s over is pretty unprofessional. Never mind the fact that the scene he was offended by (the ordering of the donkey show), with its (misleading) crude references is only the set-up to a third act pay-off that is a true bait-and-switch from where Joel’s imagination went (and if you’ve already seen the flick, you KNOW what I’m talking about). . . .You never… NEVER disrupt a movie, simply because you don’t like it.
Cardinal rule of movie-going: shut your fucking mouth while the movie’s playing. . . . If you want to share your displeasure with everyone, that’s fine, dude; just do it AFTER the movie, not during. Some folks were enjoying themselves. I don’t come down to your job and slap the taste out of your mouth for coming up with a line like “‘Shark Tale’ Is a Halibut Good Time”; so don’t fuck with my stuff WHILE IT’S STILL SCREENING.
It doesn't end there, though. Apparently, Smith went on the Opie & Anthony radio show and bitched about Siegel so much, they called him right then and there. Smith posted an audio clip of the call on his blog and we link you here.
Posted by YMB Staff at 10:40 AM | Comments (1)
The great Mac vs. PC debate rages at Fark.com.
So it begins...
I love the smell of whiny PC users in the morning.
The never ending spiral of violence...
The worst thing about Macs are the users.
Nerd:
haha I was waiting for ApogeeX to be brought up lol!
Imagine there's no heaven... It's easy if you try...
But here's my final question... if overnight, all of the sudden, all the graphics people stopped using Macs and started using Windows... If everything was created in Windows and printed from Windows... no more fonts or color correction conversion issues... would there be a difference in quality? Do Macs actually produce better quality prints? If so, why?
And while ostensibly true, this guy's comment proves he's never been on the Internets before:
You people care too much.
Posted by YourMomsBasement at 09:00 AM | Comments (0)
As we repoted previously, the John Byrne Forum is set to "read-only" mode while Old Balls is on vacay somewhere. Some JBF devotees have set up a temporary shelter in the interim.
And it seems that while JB's away, they're all indulging themselves in the things that Old Balls expressly prohibited. Such as liking Superman Returns, for example. The following is by "Hugh Cherry":
Loved loved LOVED this movie! Action, excitement, drama, and the effects blew my mind. I had a blast. If things work out we're planning on seeing it again this afternoon. I understand the complaints that JB and others have, and I'm not knocking them. But a movie is not a comic book (novel/short story/tru-life event/etc), a movie is a movie. Different dynamic alltogether. As an adaptation, it has a few things that are off base. but as a continuation of a story set in the same 'universe' it works fine.
Man. They're liking the Superman movie, they're posting rampant speculation about the reason Old Balls isn't on Atom anymore, they're probably not typing "M*****" for Marvel anymore!!! Whatever happened to the rules from the Byrne Forums?? Without rules, it's anarchy!! Without rules, it's chaos! Pure freakin' chaos!!! JOHN BYRNE!!!! WHY HAVE YOU FORSAKEN THEM?!?!?!
Posted by YMB Staff at 12:49 PM | Comments (0)
Over at MillarWorld, Civil War writer Mark Millar has started up a thread linking to a site that . . . well, it's naughty cosplay, let's leave things at that.
The site? SuperSexyHeroines.com.
Millar admits:
it's oddly sexy, combining the two great loves of my teens-- superheroes and porn. It's relatively safe as far as I can see from the previews, but still looks like the thing that could get them into a shitload of trouble with the Big Two. I applaud their bad taste in these final days before they're shut down.. . . .
I don't care how pathetic it makes me-- This is the job I want to do when I grow up!!!
And dude, that's just all kinds of wrong right there.
But there's apparently a whole segment of the market who have progressed beyond asking the one-woman-in-their-lives-who-will-ever love-them to wear a Princess Leia slave girl outfit:
You just figured out about this? I don't know if that should make me feel ashamed for already knowing about it. Or shocked because Mark didn't.(Though shame is a pretty rare emotion for me. SHOCK it is!)
. . . .
...and it gets worse, and even less work safe, at, wait for it, ULTRASEXY HEROINES!
(OHMYGOD!!! Is that Kyla Cole on that last site??? *Squeals like a little girl*)
Crap. We now fully retract any air of moral superiority and mockery we visited upon the poor, put upon Mr. Millar.
Because getting an amateur model to dress up like Power Girl and strip for you is just creepy. Getting a porn star to do it is HAWT.
Posted by YMB Staff at 11:30 AM | Comments (3)
Now, you, yes you, can be Marvel's Editor-in-Chief for a day.
What would you do with such awesome power?
Can I get to kill everyone in a bloody gruesome manner?
Punch!
Does that mean I can retcon Gwen Stacy being a whore?
Counter-punch!
I feel bad for the women in your life.
Uppercut!
you're assuming there are women in his life
Jab! Jab!
"The grand prize is a trip to New York City to spend the day as editor-in-chief for a day. Other prizes include being scripted in as a villain in an upcoming issue of The Marvel Universe"Isn't that the same thing?
Posted by YourMomsBasement at 09:45 AM | Comments (1)
Is J-Bolt Back? Could it be? Have the gods of Internet Idiots smiled upon us again?
Is this mysterious all-caps posting guy on page two of this Comicon.com thread really J-Bolt?
IF THIS IS THE REAL JUDY MOOSE, YOU'D BETTER IMMEDIATELY E-MAIL ME THROUGH THIS BOARD OR, SO HELP ME, I WILL EXPOSE WHY YOUR EMPLOYMENT FROM MY COMPANY WAS TERMINATED BY ME, IN 2000!!! NO MORE LIES AND NO MORE COMMUNICATION WITH THESE BASHER MORONS OR I'LL EXPOSE THE TRUTH WITH DOCUMENTATION POSTED ON THE LIGHTNING BOLT ENTERTAINMENT WEBSITE CONCERNING YOUR DISMISSAL FROM MY COMPANY!!! IS THIS UNDERSTOOD? I'VE NOT SAID THE GROUNDS OF YOUR DISMISSAL FROM MY COMPANY OUT OF PROFESSIONALISM, BUT WHAT YOU'RE DOING HERE NEGATES MY OWN PROFESSIONALISM CONCERNING YOU!!!
And this:
I SERIOUSLY hope that you all get jobs as TELLERS AT A FREAKIN' SPERM BANK!
What the hell does that even mean?
Godspeed J-Bolt. Godspeed.
Background on J-Bolt:
YABS thread on J-Bolt (for a rainy afternoon of reading).
Posted by YourMomsBasement at 09:00 AM | Comments (1)
Millar's announcement of having notes NOTES! detailing ideas for DC has riled up the Internet something fierce! FIERCE!
Loads of people have been emailing and Bendis board has a flaming thread on the subject
Bendis board has a thread, you say?
And I can't see how he's making many friends at DC with all of this. The interviews I've heard with Rucka and all the rest make it seem like they think the DCU is under control now and headed in a great direction. Millar's premise is that things aren't working now and would be so much better by following his 236 easy steps.Millar is right on many levels (I do think his Civil War is great for Marvel, and I do think DC is a mess right now) but its just really odd to see him pointing those things out. These other guys are his peers after all and they have egos as well.
Full of flames, you say?
I'd wait to see how Civil War pans out a year or so after its over before I handed DC to him - seems to me Millar is breaking Marvel long term to tell a great story in the short term.
That doesn't sound like any kind of Bendis board I've heard of before.
If i'm writing for Time magazine, i'd hardly go online and talk about all the fun i'll have at newsweek in 2 years
Posted by YourMomsBasement at 02:00 PM | Comments (0)
So, should there be a sex scene in the next Batman movie? The Superhero Hype! Boards wonder outloud.
Do you think this movie should include a sex scene?
The reply:
Why do we need one.
The quick retort:
idk, character development........
The indignant reply:
Why's it a BAD thing?Oh, right....Heroes can't get laid. It's "wrong" for a Man like Batman to make love to a woman........
And you wonder whay people have accused him of being homoerotic.
The post that tries to be all "thinky":
why, you have never heard of two consenting adults engaging in sexual intercourse to further their relationship into a higher emotional and physical level?
And the response to all that "thinky-ness":
That's horse****. Most of the time in movies it's completely gratuitous. This is an idiotic thread.
Posted by YourMomsBasement at 09:00 AM | Comments (2)
Over at Millarworld, Millar himself announces a bold new plan for the DC Universe!
I woke up two nights ago and thought of something as big and as simple as Civil War for the DCU and spent two hours during the night writing it all down.I'm obviously not going into details, but this is so bloody simple, screws with nobody, could be explained to a 4 year old and would ramp up DC's sales as much my little Civil War book is working for Marvel. It would spin off into me doing Superman with Hitchy and JLA with McNiven and I worked out a cracking line-up of creator pals for all the other books this would influence. I said I was only doing a Marvel crossover if they let me rethink the whole MU and rejig a lot of books that needed a face-lift (some huge characters selling nothing for 5 years now). Similarly, I'd only do this if DC let me go the whole hog and, although I have a very good relationship with DC again, I'm under exclusive for almost 2 more years.
But these notes have been filed and this thing, if anything, will work BETTER a couple of years down the line. It's incredibly exciting.
So, look for this bold, new direction in two to three years! Maybe five. We'll see.
Posted by YourMomsBasement at 08:30 AM | Comments (13)
Courtesy of Jossip, we get word of a column written by Chuck Klosterman, Senior Writer for Spin, columnist for Esquire and other publications, and author of several books. He laments the pending release of the Internet phenomenon Snakes on a Plane:
I have not seen Snakes on a Plane, so I have no idea how good this movie is (or isn't). But I do know this: Its existence represents a weird, semidepressing American condition, and I'm afraid this condition is going to get worse. I suspect Snakes on a Plane might earn a lot of money, which will prompt studios to assume this is the kind of movie audiences want. And I don't think it is. Snakes on a Plane is an unabashed attempt at prefab populism, and (maybe) this gimmick will work once. But it won't keep working, and it will almost certainly make filmmaking worse.
More Klosterman quotes, the tie-in to angry Internet nerds, a YouTube video, and a suggested SoaP movie snack, all after the jump-cut. (Don't ever say we never did nothing for you.)
Klosterman continues:
This kind of entertainment is irony in reverse. Let us assume you're in the target audience for Snakes on a Plane. Now, it's possible you inhabit that demographic because you're interested in how poisonous reptiles would react to high altitude. However, it's more likely that you're the kind of person who loves "bad" movies. You find poorly written films hilarious, and you enjoy their implausibility. Such sentiments are common; people who understand film tend to appreciate cinematic failure.But here's the thing: This kind of appreciation is based on the premise that the bad movie aspired to be good. If a film nev¬er takes itself seriously and originates as satire, everything is different; its badness means something else entirely. SOAP doesn't fit into either category: It doesn't take itself seriously, but it's not a satire. It will probably be unentertaining in a completely conventional way. Which, apparently, is what people want. They want to see Snakes on a Plane in order to tell their friends that it's ridiculous, even though a) that's the only thing everyone seems to know about this movie, and b) that's been the driving force behind its marketing campaign. It's not a bad movie that's accidentally good, and it's not a good movie that's intentionally bad; it's a disposable movie that people can pretend to like ironically, even though a) it's not ironic and b) they probably won't like it at all. The only purpose of Snakes on a Plane is to make its audience feel smarter than what it's seeing. Which adds up, since that's part of the reason people like reading the Internet.
I think this is one of those things like Nextwave and Napoleon Dynamite that I just don't get. This movie looks like utter shit to me and I just cannot see supporting it with my moviegoing dollar.You guys should really all wait 'til it comes out on DVD and put in your blockbuster online queue so you can watch it drunk in the comfort of your own homes. That way you're not boosting ticket sales and making the movie studios think "this is what they want."
Seriously, I'm worried about the message it will send Hollywood if they misinterpret the sales of all the people who're going to see it for comedic value as real interest.
Besides, it's not like you'll have to wait long. This thing will be available for rental before Thanksgiving, I'd bet.
Which leads to a post in agreement:
Regardless of whether people agree with his assessment on what makes a good film or not (one which he and I happen to be on the same page), he does at least contribute to the discussion and make a very good point - if Snakes on a Plane is going to be an intentionally bad film as it more than likely will be, it is incredibly disappointing that people will fall for it nonetheless and spend money on it due to just how much of a marketing ploy it's become.
And a post in disagreement:
I don't see anyone here "falling" for anything. It seems clear that everyone is acknowledging its silliness. People get that it's intentionally bad. Some even find some charm in that. Some still further expect to find more charm in it after getting completely shitfaced.
And more disagreement:
What if it's actually good? You won;t know til you see it.I mean, I'm going to see it regardless. If it's actually good: great! If it's wicked dumb: great! I can be entertained on both levels.
And a little bit more disagreement:
I got an idea.Just because they're both movies, lets compare citizen kane and dude where's my car, and debate whether each is worthy of a sequel.
Re-Damn-Dicolous.
And then a whole bunch more disagreement:
It takes a pretty unilateral and egocentric view of the world to try and tell people what movies they should and should not find entertaining. This isn't a movie celebrating racism. It's not a movie glorifying pedophilia. It's a stupid little fun movie about snakes on a goddamn plane.To get your panties in a bunch and whine about it seems pretty fucking self-absorbed. If you don't like it, don't watch it. That's all there is to it. It won't affect your life one damn bit.
Get over it.
All this over a movie about muthafuckin' snakes on a muthafuckin' plane? Internet nerd fights are weird.
Lest we leave you lacking for entertainment, we offer the following, courtesy of YouTube:
The Snakes On A Plane Music Video featuring Jules Winnfield!
And finally, for a movie snack, may we suggest . . . "Ants on a log"? Courtesy of Kathy Ireland, no less.
Posted by YMB Staff at 08:05 AM | Comments (1)
*Spoiler alert!*
There's a thread over at Newsarama discussing a spoiler to Civil War #3.
Apparently, a couple of threads at Millarworld that gave up the big spoil went bye-bye and Midtown Comics took down an image of an alternate cover from their website that also spoiled the ending.
We'll put the spoiler behind the jump. We're courteous like that.
Thor's back.
Before the BIG REVEAL, he's referred to as a new agent of SHIELD named "Lightning." Unknown whether that's supposed to be a truly new codename or just a nickname used to throw the reader off. We're betting on the latter. Oh, and in case you couldn't guess, that means he's on Iron Man's side. At least for now.
And what do the readers have to say? From that Newsarama thread:
If this is true then Civil War just took a turn for the worse and got really stupid. I was impressed with what they were doing so far but this just sounds really dumb. The only way I see this being true and making sense is if this isn't really the "God of Thunder" Thor, and just some kinda "made by Tony and Reed" version of Thor that works for them and government, but after writing that, it sounds even dumber than when I thought it.. . . .
I don't like the fact that SHIELD has somehow turned Thor into a weapon for their own benefit. And yes, the Thor at the end pretty much looks like the Thor we are use to. No silly costume updates or anything.
Still brooding over if I like this turn of events or not.
. . . .
Please god let this be a clone or something.
This just sounds craptacular.
. . . .
It it's the old Thor: *yawn*
If it's not (bring back Thunderstrike!!!): Then yay and kudos to Marvel for something interesting and new.
Oh yeah, and the new civilian IDs that Cap, Falcon, Daredevil and Hercules take on? The last names are the names of mods at Millarworld.
Posted by YMB Staff at 08:00 AM | Comments (4)
As we mentioned yesterday, Rob Liefeld apparently thinks that Keith Giffen's property, "TAG!", is very similar to a character that used to appear in Liefeld's Bloodstrike, which Giffen wrote at one point.
The never-ending battle for truth, justice and blown deadlines continues at Liefeld's own forum, where he says:
A new zombie book by Boom! Studios called TAG! about zombies written by Kieth Giffen has been released and I have noted that Kieth has written for Bloodstrike before, a book about zombie soldiers featuring a character named TAG. Kinda simple math if you know what I mean....definitely not a coincidence.Of course the zombies at 'rama would equate "well you swiped a dozen pictures in your 18 year career" to justify my noticing that I've had my own pocket picked.
This is the equivalent of me writing Batman and selling a concept called Batman....I mean zombie girl TAG becomes zombie comic TAG?
Not terribly bright...
What follows is (quite naturally, where Liefeld is concerned) a typically long internet nerd shitstorm, so it awaits you behind the cut.
And even though these are Liefeld's own forums and the sycophants abound, the H8TRS are also very well-represented. From "citizenSNIPS":
Thing is, the concepts are alike moderately at best.Tag, a zombie female superheroine, touches people and they are paralyzed. She uses her powers to fight evil or whatever.
In Giffen's TAG, a man is touched by a zombie, dies, then gets back up as a zombie. As if a curse was spread by the touch seeing as how the original zombie was turned human. The story deals mostly with how being a zombie affect him, his ex girlfriend and his relationship/ The TAG name is more in reference to the saying TAG you're it and the story ring around the rosety.
I'm trying to be fair about this Rob but to his idea is only marginally similar. And that's stretching it. His story has little to nothing to do with your character other than a similar name for his book, which was not a creation of yours. The word Tag was used in the way he and you used it for years in a children game.
This is the equivalent of me writing Batman and selling a concept called BatmanDid you not create a character named Agent America with his arch nemesis Cyber Skull? I wasn't going to bring that stuff up since it wasn't pertinent to the discussion but still...
Rob responds:
Hey Snip, you might want to get some HISTORICAL EDUCATION which will show, as we did to the judge, there have been over 40 patriotic characters wearing a variation of the flag since Captain America's inception and 2 dozen characters with skull motif's.I'm not certain you know of what you speak or what how feeble the connection you're attempting to make is.
"citizenSNIPS", however, later contends that whenever he tried further this discussion, his post would get deleted, leading him to save his post as a JPG image to show where it originally was. It read:
You're right, Rob. However, how many flag themed heroes carried around a circular shield (with a star), used for defensive and offensive purposes (thrown), had a young sidekick (that looked like HR Bucky) and fought against [illegible] skull themed villain [sic]? THe odds of that happening is [sic] staggering.
SNIPS wasn't the only one to call Liefeld on this. From "ImpactPlayr":
Rob,You know I'm a big supporter of yours, but is this a fact of plagerism?
I'm honestly not too sure what to think on this as i don't know the copyright law well enough.
Honestly we see Character's powers stolen and used all the time. But is this sueable?
As for the name thing I think you got him there.
Good luck
To which Rob Liefeld, self-made intellectual property lawyer, answers:
Zombies, character named Tag who paralyzes victims.Zombies, book called Tag, who curses victims.
I've compared sequences and circumstances, there's plenty re-cycled and enough people I know who have looked at both see the problems. To be honest having the property called TAG! was the big stupid.
You work on a work for hire zombie comic featuring a character named Tag and you honestly think you can sell a zombie comic called Tag without protest?
No.
I've been through plenty of these suits and know this road well.
rob
And it goes on from there. If you're at all familiar with the usual responses Rob Liefeld gets from fans on the internet, you have a general sense of what happened after that. There was a "GO GET 'IM, ROB!" message here, a "You steal other people's shit ALLTHETIME you hypocrite!" message there.
But then someone posting as "dfb8084" seemed to touch on a few nerves. Most (if not all) of his posts in that thread have been deleted, but some were preserved as quotes in other people's posts. Included in his rather caustic remarks:
- Someone who barely managed to produce two dozen comics in 10 years all of which featured rip-offs of Cable....
- Someone who thinks there is no difference homaging a well-known cover (Like action #1) and tracing the work of his contemporaries
- Someone who promises paychecks to up and coming talent, but spends the money on himself causing his company to default
- Someone who is blacklisted from 2 of the 3 largest comic companies
- Someone who bankrupted not ONE, not TWO, but THREE comic labels
- Someone who mouths off about confidential matters about a well respected comic creator.
- Someone who begs A.C.T.O.R. for money, but never contributed when he was making big bucks!
and
Think what you'd like.... its all trueGo to the public access for the municipal courts in Fullerton, CA.
These things are all public knowledge (in regards to Rob's bankruptcies, the creditors he STILL hasn't made restitution to, and civil lawsuits filed by employees who claim wages were never paid!)
Rob went back to Marvel in 1996 and made money for himself, and left HUGE amounts of money owed to many, many people.
HE IS A TOOL!!!
Which leads to "Chris Flowers" challenging froggy to jump:
dfb8084Don't say stuff on the net that you wouldn't say to a persons face.
Don't talk $hit that you can't back up. ......keyboard warrior and nothing more. Go away....You're a chicken $hit for saying all that crap and bringing Rob's kids into this.
Show up at Wizard World Texas in Nov. and i will happily kick your fat@ss.
Posted by YMB Staff at 02:35 PM | Comments (5)
Ahhh, Paris Hilton. You magnificent bag of dumbass.
Hilton did an interview with the U.K.'s The Sunday Times, and the following snippets resulted, the first of which should rightfully go down in history as the single most self-important and delusional quotation in the history of civilization:
"There's nobody in the world like me. I think every decade has an iconic blonde - like Marilyn Monroe or Princess Diana - and right now, I'm that icon.""There's a lot of heiresses out there, and I don't see any of them doing what I've done. It's Paris Hilton plc, baby! I have so many projects - bags, fragrances, make-up. I go round the world every three days, designing and personally approving it all. I've got movies to make, a tour, TV shows. Every day of my life is scheduled until the end of 2007."
"[Paris Latsis and I] we're better as friends. I wasn't ready to get married. I'm not going to have a boyfriend for one year. We'll see. I definitely want to have children at 30."
"I love my job, and I think I've earned the right to be happy now. God gives you good karma if you work hard and play nice."
These remarks, of course, can't be left untouched in blogland. Comments from readers of perezhilton.com:
Ok so I'm a massive Paris fan and I think she's da bomb - but I'm gettin a lil concerned with the way she's talkin and the fact that she doesn't have a free day till the end of next year. I feel like this compilation of quotes all from one interview makes her sound a little bit "Pre-Breakdown Mariah" added to this the crazy schedule I mentioned before and I just don't think its a good mix. I hope she remembers to take some time off - (it's Paris I'm sure she will). Anyway keep up the good work Perez you rock - don't listen to those haters.. . . .
Hey you guys who have so much bad things to say about her but yet had bother to to finish reading the whole article and leave your comments are just LAME!! I think you guys are just jealous you're not borned half as rich as she is!
. . . .
if i hear one more person say that the only reason people don't like Paris is because they're jealous, I'm going to scream. Is there ANYONE jealous of this vapid, arrogant whore?
IS THERE ANY MORE POLARIZING FIGURE IN THIS NATION??? Clearly, there are three topics of discussion that should be barred at your dinner table in the interest of family harmony: Abortion, politics and Paris Hilton.
NB: In our research for this piece (and never let it be said that we at the Lint Trap don't go the distance for your entertainment), we came across the greatest waste of server space on the Internet: The Paris Hilton Forums.
Posted by YMB Staff at 11:20 AM | Comments (6)
Okay, so sue us. We don't troll around all of the various comic-related message boards all the time, and we don't know each and every single thing that's been posted at these forums. (Incidentally, that's where you come in, dear reader! See something interesting? Mail us a link!)
So over at the GEOFF JOHNS!!!! Forums, "grendel824" relates a story a few months about how he was banned from the ComicBookResources.com forums because he would not admit that Geoff Johns hates gays:
On a disturbing note, I was actually banned from CBR for *GASP* daring to suggest that Geoff Johns did not hate homosexuals simply because he didn't retroactively turn JSA members gay. I was pounced on by mods after remarking that it wouldn't matter to me if he made ALL the JSA gay so long as he could tell good stories with it, and was called derogatory terms for homosexuals and threatened to be "banned unless I admitted that Geoff Johns hates gays." Needless to say, I told them to go to hell and took the ban. Sometimes the world is a depressing place...
Somehow, I don't think this is exactly what happened, do you?
Posted by YMB Staff at 10:55 AM | Comments (1)
Seven-of-Nine is engaged to be (re-)married, according to blogsters. Damn! I was getting so close to getting approved for that 36-month layaway plan, too!
Ryan crushed the romantic hopes of fanboys worldwide when she announced her engagement [to French chef Christopher Eme] during the Television Critics Association press tour to promote her new TV series "Shark."Eme, who's the head chef of the West Hollywood restaurant Ortolan, where he's partners with Ryan, set up an elaborate romantic scene for the proposal.
"He brought me home, covered my eyes and took me up to the bedroom," she recalls. "He had candles lit everywhere and champagne on ice. He had gotten this huge canvas and painted it with words that said in French 'And you come with me forever.'"
*Shakes fist*
Damn you, Frenchie!! DAMN YOUUUUUU!!!!!!
Remember, this is the woman who derailed the Senate campaign of her ex-husband, Jack Ryan, effectively handing the vacant office to Barack Obama. How, you ask? Oh, just allegations of how her hubby forced her to have sex in public, attend sex clubs in New York, Paris and New Orleans, and attend an S&M club somewhere. These allegations didn't go down well with Jack's Republican supporters.
Huh. Republicans are so uptight. My dad used to make my mom go to key parties all the time. Of course, I wasn't allowed out of my bedroom on those nights, but it sure sounded like they had a good time.
Posted by YMB Staff at 10:48 AM | Comments (0)
Newsarama has weird-ass age-specific threads.
Here's the one for 20-somethings.
for those adults who want to bring us kids down for having a good time say hi to the enemies list.
You tell 'em! Those adults will never understand you! They just don't "get it."
Posted by YourMomsBasement at 10:00 AM | Comments (0)
Hard-boiled dectective fiction writer, Mickey Spillane, died at age 88. Interesting bits from his obituary:
Mr. Spillane was a struggling comic book publisher when he wrote "I, the Jury." He initially envisioned it as a comic book called "Mike Danger," and when that did not go over, he took a week to reconfigure it as a novel.. . . .
He briefly attended college in Kansas and considered studying for the law before a friend got him a writing and editing job at Funnies Inc., a comic book publisher in Manhattan. He churned out one a day when other authors needed a week.
After stateside service in the Army Air Forces during World War II -- he was a cadet flight instructor -- he and two friends began a comic book business. About that time, he and his first wife bought several acres of land in Newburgh, N.Y., and he wrote "I, the Jury" to afford the $1,000 property.
. . . .
He also carried on a long epistolary flirtation with Ayn Rand, an admirer of his writing.
Posted by YMB Staff at 09:13 AM | Comments (0)
That's what the Washington Post's "Book World" section wondered yesterday.
Posted by YMB Staff at 05:45 PM | Comments (0)
Keith Giffen's "Tag" has been optioned as a movie. Newsarama has an interview.
But the really interesting stuff happens when Rob Liefeld shows up in the article's thread and says...
Interesting and potentially problematic fact....Kieth Giffen used to write a book for me called BLOODSTRIKE featuring a female zombie soldier character named TAG.
This should be good....
Did that character have the same premise of tagging someone and they fell down dead only to rise up and walk around? If so, then "maybe" there would be a problem. Did said character have their own series titled Tag? No. The only problem is that you are reaching to make a buck from this. Wasting the legal systems time with petty stuff like that.
My TAG is a zombie girl who if she tagged you, you were paralyzed.Trust me, you won't be the deciding factor on this one.
Fine. But my question is, if this is the case and you do have some sort of claim here, why don't you just call your lawyer or whoever you need to call and get everything sorted out, instead of posting in here? What is to be gained by posting your comment and thereby stirring stuff up on the internet? Because I'm sure you knew that that's what was going to happen as soon as you hit that Reply button.
Posted by YourMomsBasement at 03:00 PM | Comments (4)
Dave Chappelle famously left his successful and lucrative Chappelle's Show and Comedy Central recently started airing the taped, but unaired episodes from the third season (Sundays at 9 pm, 8 pm Central). In an interview with Anderson Cooper, Chappelle admitted to having mixed feelings about the network airing these taped shows:
Cooper: You talked on "Oprah" about some of the sketches that you were working on and that you felt that they were almost inappropriate or, I don't want to put words in your mouth, but irresponsible.Chappelle: Socially irresponsible. In that case, I was speaking about one in particular, in where I appeared in blackface. It's funny but it's like -- someone on the set while we were filming it laughed in such a way that I was like, I can't subject my audience to that.
What is Chappelle talking about? Apparently, this right here, courtesy of YouTube:
Dave Chappelle Racial Stereotype Pixie Skit Uncensored.
Posted by YMB Staff at 12:35 PM | Comments (3)
Oh man, where to start? If you haven't heard of the Steve Niles-Sarah Wilkinson-Matt Busch situation yet, you're missing out, although there's no reason on God's green earth you would have ever heard the names Matt Busch or Sarah Wilkinson before. Steve Niles, of course, is the co-creator of 30 Days of Night. And he's going to come after you from every angle.
The general gist of the story is this: Hot girl is engaged to her art teacher from college. Steve Niles meets her. Niles talks about working on a comic together with her and her lumpy boyfriend. Niles and hot girl shag. Hot girl dumps lumpy art teacher. He cries about it on the internet for months. The best place to get started with the details of this story is probably the "May 22" entry from Matt Busch's blog. (That date is in quotes because Busch has changed that entry at least twice since he initially posted it on May 22. Who knows why?)
A large reason why this story has gained traction with us here at the Lint Trap is largely because of the audio recordings Busch has posted online of Niles leaving Busch threatening voice-mails. Highly, highly amusing stuff, actually. It is nerd smack talk in its most pure, undiluted form. It is the Ferrari of nerd smack talk. If smack talk were poetry, then Steve Niles would be the guy who invented the dirty limerick. In fact, we'd recommend you give these recordings a good listen.
But, these audio recordings never made a lick of sense. If one believed everything Busch was saying about this situation (and he was the only one of the three who was publicly talking about the situation at the time), he had his girlfriend stolen away from him by a big-shot Hollywood comic book writer. Said big-shot -- after having already won the girl -- repeatedly calls the dumped ex-boyfriend, not to taunt him, but to threaten him with grave, nerdly, bodily harm. How much sense does that make? Why would a guy who has successfully stolen away a woman from another man then proceed to repeatedly call the other guy and constantly threaten him? Clearly, something else was going on that Busch wasn't saying. Maybe he was pestering Wilkinson with drunken pleas for a second chance or threatening Niles or something. But one distinctly got the sense that something was going on that Busch wasn't telling his adoring public.
Now, we have at least a possible answer.
After a prolonged public silence about this issue, Wilkinson has finally posted on her Livejournal about Busch and Niles and the whole sordid affair. Here's what she has to say on the subject of the phone messages:
--The phone messages. Obviously, there is a story behind these edited phone messages that Matt had strewn across the internet. After Matt and I broke up, Matt began calling Steve and emailing him harassing and threatening messages. Matt threatened Steve, me and even Steve's ex-wife nichole. He claimed to know where they lived and will be driving by their house.
Matt would call Steve, Steve would answer, and would provoke Steve to no end...telling him horrible and disrespectful things about me, then hang up on him and wait for Steve to call back, only Matt wouldn't answer (hence the angry voicemails). I was present for several of these phone calls, and it was clear Matt knew what he was doing. Sound like entrapment? Once he got the voicemails, Matt felt like he could say anything and people would believe it. Matt did make threats to Steve, did call him names and did provoke the messages.
Steve leaving those messages was not the best thing to do. It was obviously a bad decision to say what he did on voicemail, and Steve is truly sorry about them. But they were edited. Matt took out the pertinent points Steve made and spliced it to paint him in the worst light possible. Both parties were wrong in my opinion, but provoking him into getting pissed is doubly wrong. Steve was reacting to an action initiated by Matt.
But wait! There's more! Alarms went off in the beginning of this post when you read that a hot art student was hooked up with her college art teacher, right?
And did Matt forget . . . all the students he's slept with over the years? Why do you think he became a professor at a college? In recent years, he prefers them young, girls. So be careful. Many people would be sickened by the amount of A's he's given to girls because he liked their nails or hair, or just plain thought they were cute. Even worse, he tells them his reasons to their face! Imagine me having to hear this from the girls he gave the A's to.
Busch has accused Niles of concocting some kind of fake project to work with Wilkinson, all in an attempt to get in her pants. It's not a real original tactic, apparently:
--Matt is so forgetful. Did he forget about the FAKE PROJECTS used to lure me into a relationship with him? Does Lara Croft/Tombraider sound familar? What about me modeling clothes for his online store? Both projects never panned out (but he got free reference pictures and a teenage girlfriend, panned out well FOR HIM). They were merely bait that I took (I was 19 and flattered that my 30 year old teacher was hitting on me). Matt always said that people hate most in others that which they are most capable of. I believe that applies here on many levels.
Busch's retort is here. Try as we might, we just can't get excited for it. It's just a bunch of nuh-uh responses and self-contradictions. Such as, you ask?
"Matt would call Steve, Steve would answer, and would provoke Steve to no end...telling him horrible and disrespectful things about me, then hang up on him and wait for Steve to call back, only Matt wouldn't answer (hence the angry voicemails)."Riiiight. Not true. And both of them know it. I guess that's about the best excuse you can come up with for 16 threatening voicemails, spread over a 3 week period. Certainly I must have been calling, threatening him, hanging up, and waiting for his calls, right? The fact is, I just wasn't taking his abuse on the phone, and since I wasn't answering, he left his threats on my voicemail. Simple.
"He claimed to love me when he was talking to his ex fiance Diana on a regular basis."This is flat out not true. In the first month that Sarah and I dated, Diana did call a handful of times, to which I would tell her to stop. After a month, she did.
At this point, we really hope Busch means it when he says "I'm done, and am moving on with my life," because he's just not doing any good for himself here. Then again, he's said he wouldn't be writing about Wilkinson many times before. Just as he said many other things, for example, that he was only posting this entire story and making it public in order to "protect" himself.
Busch. Not butch.
Posted by YMB Staff at 08:00 AM | Comments (1)
Sunday's Washington Post is reporting that the 9-11 Commission Report has been adapted into graphic novel form. The 600+ page report by the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States has been reduced to 150 pages of graphic storytelling by Sid Jacobson and Ernie Colón.
Jacobson created "Richie Rich." Colón, in addition to working as an artist at Marvel and an editor for DC, also illustrated "Richie Rich" and "Casper" comics for 25 years.
Next up: The Sarbanes-Oxley Act as illustrated by "Cherry Poptart" creator Larry Welz.
Posted by YMB Staff at 01:31 PM | Comments (0)
What in the blue hell is the Miss World contest? It's apparently the 56th time they've done this little need-for-attention-wrapped-in-an-evening-gown affair. Huh. Who knew?
There's a thread in the Something Awful discussion forums on this contest.
I sure as hell wish my countries contestant looked as much like a porn star, or was even there!. . . .
Whatever, I get WAY hotter girls than that. *cough*
. . . .
I would teabag all but a handful of them. For most of these chicks these contests are a "stepping stone" to something else. Usually shaking their ass in a music video or hosting a shitty reality show.
. . . .
I'm pretty sure Miss Congo has a penis, or at least did at one time in "her" life.
. . . .
miss cambodia looks like william hung
Nice. A few of those guys also said they were training to become cage fighters.
Posted by YMB Staff at 11:01 PM | Comments (0)
Over at The Engine, Warren Ellis started up a little thread about his Heroes Con experiences. In it, he says:
I'm going to think very carefully before I do another US comics-only show. I seem to have passed the point where I can just disappear into the background.
And YMB spies at Heroes Con largely tell us this was true. At least on the con floor. After con hours, when it was time to get your freak on, was another story entirely. Ellis says:
I had no idea so many people were at the Westin, and had no way of getting there due to not knowing where it was and having a fucked-up leg.(The Hilton staff gave me four different sets of directions to the convention center, all of which were wrong, so I wasn't about to let them direct me to the Westin.)
If Ellis was in such demand at the con itself, why didn't anyone think
