You can sleep easy tonight: Warren Beatty has successfully retained the film and television rights to Chester Gould’s iconic detective comic strip Dick Tracy, Deadline reports.

Beatty, of course, produced, directed and starred in the 1990 film version of the character. The Tribune Co. were looking to reclaim the rights, but it was ruled that a TV special where Beatty appeared in character as Tracy — one that has never been aired anywhere, I’m pretty sure — was sufficient for Beatty to hold on to the rights before deadline. What, if anything, Beatty has planned for Dick Tracy remains to be seen.

Here’s another wrinkle, a recent tweet by Powers and Avengers writer Brian Michael Bendis: “im the biggest warren beatty fan in the world so its odd that he is keeping me and @oeming from doing the dick tracy strip we were offered”

(Side note: How cool were these ads? They were in the inside front cover of like every comic book for a month in 1990.)

Most folks have heard of Batgirl, but not as many know about the Batwoman!

Kathy Webb was a spy who left behind her life of action to become a successful film director, later marrying the wealthy Nathan Kane. A woman of many talents and a thrill-seeker, Kathy was given a circus by her husband Nathan simply because she’d always wanted one. After her husband’s death from a stroke, Kathy felt directionless and didn’t know how to express her grief beyond courting danger as usual. But then she was recruited by the mysterious organizations Spyral and asked to learn what she could of Gotham’s mysterious Batman, who had recently begun operating alongside the first Robin.

Accepting the assignment, Kathy was surprised to find herself drawn to this dangerous, driven vigilante and decided that the best (and most fun) way to get close to him and learn about him was to join his war. Outfitted in a bright, circus-style outfit, she became Batwoman, armed at all times with a utility purse and a smile. After a heated but brief relationship with Batman, Kathy Kane seemingly ended her own mission by retiring from the life of a superhero and breaking up with Bruce Wayne. A couple of years later, she met her death when she was killed by the forces of Ra’s al Ghul and the O-Sensei.

Years later, Kathy’s relative Kate Kane left the U.S. Marine Corps when she was forced to admit she was gay. Driven by the memory of her mother and sister’s deaths, Kate was a warrior at heart who now didn’t have a fight. Inspired by Batman, she later became the new Batwoman. Since then, she has been a dedicated vigilante, hunting down some of Gotham’s most dangerous psychotics and becoming an enemy of the religiously-driven Church of Crime. With recent appearances in Batman, Inc. and a new on-going series coming out, Kate Kane is definitely a hero to watch.

So let’s take a look at these two women. We’re going to stick primarily with mainstream continuity, as usual.

KATHY KANE, CIRCUS STAR

Kathy Kane first debuted as Batwoman in Detective Comics #233 in 1956. Accusations of Batman and Robin’s adventures having a homosexual subtext had made many parents concerned. So Bob Kane (Batman’s creator) and Sheldon Moldoff created Kathy Kane to disprove this idea by becoming a romantic interest for the Dark Night Detective. To emphasize Kathy’s femininity, she had a utility purse and all her weapons were based on what could be a woman’s personal items. Strangely though, the stories often involved Batman avoiding Batwoman’s romantic attentions, unwilling to settle down or expose is secret identity to anyone.

Now look at Kathy’s outfit. Although she is modeling herself after the Dark Knight, she’s definitely not following his color scheme or basic imagery. We could argue that this makes no sense and that she should dress just like Batman, but let’s remember that just because you’re attracted to someone or trying to get their attention, it doesn’t mean you have to dress like them. Batman was a lighter-hearted character in the 1950s than he had been in his early days, but he was still someone who intimidated his enemies and who would make himself seem like a creature of the night when he operated in the shadows. If you see him as a silhouette moving across a rooftop, you could believe he was a creature rather than a man.

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Hungry for more Thor imagery? Well, with the movie in theaters in just a bit more than a month (May 6 if your calendar isn’t already dutifully marked), today IMDb is unveiling six new Thor character posters, one at a time, serving as both splashy promotional material and also quick four-word biographies for folks who may be unfamiliar with the main characters. So far three four five all six have been revealed — the final, Tom Hiddleston as Loki, “the god of mischief,” is above; the rest are after the jump.

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It’s Friday, which means DC Comics is debuting new Flashpoint-related material on their official blog, The Source. This week? Character designs for new (or altered) character borne out of the story, starting with “Element Woman” by DC co-publisher Jim Lee. Check out the latest after the jump!

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It’s heartening to see the comic book community respond to the situation in Japan in some very cool, creative, and generous ways, and here’s one: writer Greg Pak is offering a free trade paperback of his creator-owned series Vision Machine to anyone who d0nates $20 to the Japan relief charity of their choice.

Heck of a deal, right? Fans have responded in kind, with Pak raising more than $2,000 in about a week and a half, and looking to get up to $2,500 by midnight tonight.

More information on Pak’s offer is here, and an interview by Newsarama’s David Pepose with Pak on Vision Machine is here.

James Kochalka has got to have one of the most interesting resumes in comics: Check out the cover he provided for the magazine Trends in Cell Biology.

Did you know Jim Henson made a Muppet Wizard of Id pilot?: Well, he did, and Alan Gardner has four minutes of it.

My favorite part of comic book conventions I don’t attend?: Seeing Cliff Chiang’s convention sketches. This round from C2E2 includes some characters who look a bit unusual but also pretty awesome in Chiang’s style, like Bryan Lee O’Malley’s Ramona Flowers and Julie Adams…in the clutches of the creature from the Black Lagoon, of course.

The saddest title to a blog post I’ve read in months: “I guess porn is the only way I get to see my favorite DC women on film”

Don’t look at this tumblr thingee: Seriously, don’t. You won’t like what you see! It’s not good for you! It might upset your stomach! (Via Mike “Black Fury” Sterling)

Marvel shipping two issues of their monthlies in a single mont, good or bad?: Bob Bretall discusses, and iFanboy offers further commentary. It’s a tricky one, especially if the plan is to publish more than 12 issues a year, as some folks at Marvel have stated was the plan. I agree that if you love the title, it’s a great thing, but if it’s one you’re on the fence with, the accelerated schedule will only accelerate the time in which you decide to drop a title. One likely side effect is diminishing the role of the artist in a particular title, though, as writing, say, 14 or 18 comic scripts a year (I think Brian Michael Bendis does that eveyr month, actually) instead of 12 is a hell of a lot easeir than drawing 14 or 18 comic books per year  instead of 12. Thoughts? (Via Comics Reporter)

Are superheroes still Jewish?: Eli Valley checks in. (By the way, I’d buy a pickle from Superman…and I don’t even like pickles). (Via Comics Reporter again…where would this entry be without Tom Spurgeon’s links to cherrypick from?)

Two thoughts on two great DC artists: Good God Rags Morales sure can draw, can’t he? I hated that comic book, and hate it more each time I reread it, but I’m having  a hard time thinking of a better-drawn bad comic from the last 20 years or so. Why isn’t DC (or someone, anyone) publishing a monthly, Morales-drawn comic? That’s something I’d love to spend my comic book money on (Speaking of Morales and how awesome he is, did you guys pick up the recently recleased Dungeons & Dragons: Forgotten Realms Vol. 1 from IDW? If not, you totally should; it’s Morales doing non-superhero stuff, and it’s great). Also, DC’s Source blog is kicking off another Flashpoint Friday, with a Jim Lee redesign of Element Girl (Now Element Woman), last seen in Neil Gaiman and Mike Allred’s Wednesday Comics strip. Her costume is…pretty dumb, actually, just patches of clothing here or there, and I have no idea how it stays on (Glue? Elemental powers? An invisible fabric stretching between the visible stuff?). It made me realize that although I love Lee as an artist, I don’t care for his costume design work at all (factoring in his Wonder Woman and Huntress redesigns).

It was recently announced that director DJ Caruso would be taking on the task of translating Garth Ennis’ Preacher comic series to the big screen. Now the I Am Number Four director talks a little about what he has in mind.

Speaking to the French website, CloneWeb, Caruso mentioned how controversial the story is as well as who he’d like to cast in the main roles.

“It is a crazy trip and I think what’s amazing and what makes Sony so brave is they can see there’s a real universality in the story when you have good versus evil. And I think when you have these crazy characters that are not necessarily politically correct, there’s something genuinely attractive to those characters and those elements,” said Caruso, “but at the end of the day, it really is a story about good versus evil and the decisions that you make and whether the demons are gonna win or the Genesis, or the good inside of Jesse is gonna be there.” He said that even though he thinks the story can be commercial, it will shock a lot of people at times.

Preacher follows Jesse Custer, a minister who has a crisis of faith when his entire congregation is killed when he’s possessed by a supernatural being called Genesis. He sets out on a journey to find God and have a few words with him along with his ex-girlfriend and a vampire.

Caruso said he read Preacher when it was first released but Sam Mendes was originally set to direct it. “Then when Sam went off to do James Bond, the opportunity came up again so I inquired,” he said. “But you know, I think the possibilities are great and I’m a huge fan of the comic. It is a lot of story to put into one movie and so that’s really the challenge.” Caruso also mentioned John August (Charlie’s Angels, Corpse Bride) is doing a great job with the script.

As far as casting, Caruso said he’s got a couple of ideas but isn’t quite there yet. However, he’s looking to Star Trek star, Chris Pine, for the lead role of Jesse. “I want to get the script in really good shape then start to put it together but I will say that for any movie I’ve ever done I’ve never gotten more phone calls or texts or things from actors,” he said. “An actor that I love very much and I’ve had a conversation with is Chris Pine, for Jesse. Shia LaBeouf loves Arseface. He wants to play Arseface, so we’re kinda working that out too.” LaBeouf previously worked with the director on Disturbia and Eagle Eye.

“And this guy right here [speaking to Alex Pettyfer, his I Am Number Four star], he’s thinking, he’s really thinking that the Saint of Killers is a good role even though he hasn’t read it yet. But he will.”

Caruso admitted he’s not a huge comic book fan but likes a lot of DC’s Vertigo line. The director was also attached at one time to adapt Brian K. Vaughan’s Y: The Last Man.

Looks like another current creator-owned series may be getting the TV series treatment: Deadline.com is reporting that Image’s Chew, by writer John Layman and artist Rob Guillroy, is in development as a half-hour comedy at Showtime. The script’s from Terri Hughes Burton and Ron Milbauer, who have both worked on Supernatural and Eureka (plus, IMDb tells us that Milbauer wrote the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers episode “I’m Dreaming of a White Ranger,” so that’s a plus). Stephen Hopkins, no stranger to Showtime with directing work on Shameless and Californication among his credits, is attached to direct and executive produce.

Chew — the story of “cibopathic” federal agent Tony Chu who psychically receives information of the live and death of whatever food he eats — has been in development from production company Circle of Confusion since July. Circle of Confusion is also behind TV versions of the The Walking Dead, which is headed to its second season on AMC this year, and Powers, currently in the pilot stage at FX. Chew debuted in June 2009, and last year won the Eisner award for best new series.

A couple of pieces of late Thursday DC Comics movie casting news to pass on: Variety is reporting that Juno Temple — set to appear in this year’s Paul W.S. Anderson take on The Three Musketeers — is confirmed for a role (likely a small one) in The Dark Knight Rises. The part? Described as a “street-smart Gotham girl,” and whether or not that’s an entirely new character or based on one from the comics is not public knowledge at this point. Last week, Variety’s Jeff Sneider, the same reporter behind this past week’s disputed report of Joseph Gordon-Levitt playing Alberto Falcone in the very same film, said Temple was being “eyed” for Christopher Nolan’s third (and reportedly final) Batman pic.

Elsewhere, Deadline.com says Michael Shannon, of Boardwalk Empire and Revolutionary Road, is being looked at for a role as a villain — nope, we don’t know who — in Zack Snyder’s forthcoming (reportedly title) Superman: The Man of Steel.

In the dog-eat-dog world of professional comic-bookery, it’s always gratifying to see creators play nice. And in the case of Skullkickers’ Jim Zubkavich and The Sixth Gun’s Cullen Bunn and Brian Hurtt, it’s more than just a common courtesy — they’re helping drum up each others’ sales by placing ads in each other’s books.

“Cross-company promotion like this is rare in the comic biz, but both creative teams are enjoying each other’s series and felt that the audiences were quite compatible, so we set up an ad swap to see if we could cross-pollinate interest between readers,” Zubkavich wrote on his blog. “Creator owned comics are all in the same boat and we’re looking for every edge we can get in this market.”

For those who haven’t been reading, both series have recently released trade paperbacks. The Sixth Gun follows a scoundrel and an innocent girl as they wrestle with some demonic pistols in the Old West, while Skullkickers chronicles two nameless bounty hunters as they fight zombies, witches and other fantasy ghouls.

As far as the cross-promotion goes, the most recent issue of the Sixth Gun just came out this Wednesday, while Skullkickers returns in late May for its second arc.

Yes, The Amazing Spider-Man is still shooting. It’s not out until 2012. That doesn’t stop the Hollywood engine from running, with preliminary work already underway on a sequel — today the Hollywood Reporter stated that Amazing Spider-Man writer James Vanderbilt is officially on board, returning to draft a screenplay for the next film. Of course, that doesn’t mean that there will be a sequel, but wouldn’t it be considerably more surprising if there wasn’t?

The Amazing Spider-Man — starring Andrew Garfield as the title character and directed by Marc Webb — is scheduled for release on July 3, 2012.

Wow, whatever happened to sugar, spice and everything nice? That panel is from Peyo and Yvan Delporte’s story La Schtroumpfette , recently translated and published by Papercutz in their fourth Smurfs collection, The Smurfette.

Now, as a reader and as a critic, I think it’s always important to consider the context a work was originally created in, and, at least as a critic, not to judge by the standards of the days. The Smurfette comic was made in 1966,  in Belgium (a country whose mid-20th century culture I know exactly nothing about), so I’m reading it from 55 years in the future.

Additionally, the Smurfs comics aren’t terribly complex in their characterization. The majority of the characters introduced into the series so far all have exactly one character trait a piece, which they are named after—Grumpy is grumpy, Lazy is lazy, etc–and the most complex seem to be the ironically named Harmony and Brainy, who are named for traits they think they possess but are actually the opposite.

Even still, it’s hard to read The Smurfette and not wonder if Peyo and Delporte were coming out of terrible relationships when they made this comic or what. The above panel, in which the wicked sorcerer Gargamel follows a spell to create a female Smurf, is part of his plan to wreak a terrible vengeance on the Smurfs. Apparently, the existence of a female in their all-male world is all he thinks it will take to make them all completely miserable.

And he’s right!

The spell ends with a footnote, which appears along the bottom of the page as a disclaimer, “This text is the sole responsibility of the author of the spell-book ‘Magicae Formulae,’ Beelzebub Editions”, so readers won’t blame Papercutz for the portrayal of females.

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Oh wait a minute, that’s not one of those weird little trailers comic book publishers sometimes put together for “Spider-Island,” the big Amazing Spider-man arc by Dan Slott and Humberto Ramos (Which you can read more about here on the main site).

It’s actually the theaterical trailer for the American release of the not-very-good 1960 German-Yugoslav bikini girls-in-peril horror movie, The Horrors of Spider Island. It’s not about everyone in Manhattan getting Spider-Man’s powers, but is instead about a troupe of exotic dancers who end up on a remote, uncharted island after a plane crash. There they find a giant spider, whose venom turns the dancers’ manager into a half-man, half-spider monster. (How not-very-good was it? It was the subject of a 1999 episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000).

Sorry, my mistake.

While many fans are worried how creator David E. Kelley’s new television series about the Amazonian Princess will turn out, it seems no one was more worried than Kelley himself.

Kelley spoke with Vulture about his lengthy career, both the ups and downs, but managed to get in a little information about the inception of his Wonder Woman project for NBC. He said in the beginning he said no to working on the show for obvious reasons. “It’s not really what I do; it’s not a genre that’s in my wheelhouse,” he said, “But then I started thinking about, What if there were such a person in today’s world and what must it be like to be her? And I was imagining the sense of social isolation that she must feel, that she indeed would probably be a rather complicated beast.”

“When I started thinking about all the complications and potential layers to this superhero, I just got more and more intrigued. It was also something I was a little bit afraid of. That’s good, too,” said Kelley, suggesting that writers need to get out of their comfort zones once in a while.

And with that, he jumped head first out of his comfort zone. “I did not truthfully commit to doing it until I wrote the script. I was going to try writing it, and if I failed on my own terms, I would say no. If I thought, Yeah, this is something I believe in, then I’d turn it in. And it was something I ultimately did get behind. It was hard, but I had a good time writing it. And Warner Bros. and DC both responded very positively.”

As to the casting of Adrianne Palicki in the title role, Kelley said although it was a challenge, the process didn’t take very long. “After writing this script, I remember looking at several people and going, ‘Yeah, now good luck trying to find her.’ She’s got to be strong, smart, emotionally accessible — and oh yeah, an Amazon! Good luck,” he said.

With all that in mind, Kelley was prepared to go with an actress who didn’t quite look the role if it meant she encapsulated everything else. “I remember speaking to DC, and saying, ‘We may have to compromise on the physicality. We need to go with the best actress. And if the best actress is five-foot-five, we have to be open to that, because there’s too many layers for this character to also demand that she be nearly six feet tall.’ And then lo and behold, in comes this girl named Adrianne Palicki.”

“I had seen her on Friday Night Lights and I always liked her work, but I didn’t get a sense of her stature. I guess she was sitting down in a lot of the scenes,” said Kelley, “So she stood up, and we met — eyeball to eyeball — she smiled … and I knew during the course of the conversation that this was Wonder Woman. I just knew it. I had an instinctive feeling that this was her. So then she read. And she was. And she is.”

And no Mark Steines narration! And Tommy Lee Jones says “Adolf Hitler,” potentially silencing the “why aren’t there any Nazis in Captain America: The First Avenger” people for good!

Here it is (updated with HD version):

Hellraiser #1 is in stores right now from BOOM! Studios, and the publisher is also offering an eight-issue prelude — not in stores. The only way to get it is download it in PDF format, and a result it’s spread far and wide across the Internet — in fact, you can download it right here, even!

It may sound suspicious, but we can assure you it’s fully legal and completely free, and sharing the comic is highly encouraged by the publisher, saying “READ IT. SHARE IT. e-mail. upload. tweet. torrent. link. facebook” (Still holding on to that hyphen in email that the Associated Press eliminated last week; stay strong, brothers.) The eight-page prelude is co-written by Hellraiser mastermind Clive Barker and Christopher Monfette, with art from Leonard Manco.

The PDF ends with a list of ComicsPRO-participating retailers and an ad for the Comic Shop Locator Service, clearly establishing the purpose of this digital comic to drive people to physical stores to pick up the print product. The Best Shots team has a review of Hellraiser #1 here.

(And oh yeah — it’s a little gory and probably NSFW, which you may have gathered on your own given the fact that it’s, y’know, a Hellraiser comic.)

You may not know this, but a few months ago Starbucks launched the “Starbucks Digital Network” — essentially an intranet powered by Yahoo, accessible at Starbucks coffee shops and accessible via laptops and mobile devices. Today they announced some new content for the platform, including the following:

On the Entertainment Channel, watch for the upcoming arrival of the Marvel Universe as Super Heroes, mutants, aliens, armor-clad super-geniuses and thunder gods join forces with the Starbucks Digital Network on Apr. 23, 2011. Known for engrossing stories and a library of more than 8,000 characters, Marvel Comics gives Starbucks customers unlimited, free access to its full library of Marvel Digital Comics Unlimited. Spider-Man, Iron Man, Thor, Wolverine and others await to captivate as customers explore the comic realm and imagine fighting villains with a cup of coffee in hand.

The entire library of Marvel Digital Comics Unlimited? That’s a lot of comics, and as prolific coffee consumers ourselves, we’ll be sure to test it out in a month or so. But to be fair, who hasn’t been imagining fighting villains with a cup of coffee in hand for years already? (On a mostly unrelated note, Top Cow’s coffee-centric miniseries Common Grounds remains unavailable on the Starbucks Digital Network.)

DC Nation is coming to Cartoon Network in 2012, as announced today in their upfront presentation and reported by Deadline.

DC Nation, of course, is the name used by DC Comics for its convention panels and promotional column seen in the back of its comic books. But what is it on TV? Well:

DC Nation: A multi-platform, branded block of original programming and exclusive content based on the DC Comics library of legendary character properties, DC Nation is developed in partnership with Cartoon Network, Warner Bros. and DC Entertainment. The all-new venture will harness the publishing, theatrical and television assets together for one powerful on-air block on Cartoon Network with exclusive online content.

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A great comics-related  you’re not going to read: Dean Trippe and Daniel Krall apparently pitched DC a series of ilustrated young adult novles called Lois Lane, Girl Reporter. I believe it’s currently being shelved alongside athe Absolute Edition of Tintin Pantoja’s Wonder Woman comic in Dream of The Endless’ library…

Mark Trail tracks Billy Keane: Drawn and Quarterly’s Chris Oliveros shares some images of a really neat looking place in Orlando. For comic strip fans, anyway.

How late is Batman Inc anyway, and who’s to blame?: In a image and information round-up post from his visit Wizard World Toronto, David Diep says the delays are “a combination of slowness on Grant and Yanick’s part” and that we should expect more delays and/or fill-ins (Paquette disagrees with what Diep reported, and takes the full blame for the book not being monthly). My favorite part of Diep’s post, however, was the sentence, “Francis [Manapul] revealed that Jim Shooter isn’t the easiest guy to work with.” Manapul was talking about the way Shooter’s writing style and his own art style mesh, not the reasons past pros have cited for Shooter not being the easiest guy in the world to work with.

In  other Batman scheduling related news…: Matt Duarte tries to figure out whatever happened to the caped crusader’s creative team (on Batman and Robin, which was created as a Morrison and friends book, and has since become a Batman Confidential/Legends of the Dark Knight-like book).

“‘Event fatigue’ is easy to say but hard to prove: how do you decide whether or not fans are sick of events if they still continue to buy the events?”: In the course of reviewing Fear Itself: Book of the Skull and some other recent books, Tim O’Neil wonders about how Marvel’s latest event got put together, and how it compares to the events it is following. Me, I think it’s a little too soon after Siege for more Norse gods business.

I don’t think they do  either of those things, personally: “Do Superhero Movies Make Us More or Less Fearful of Transhumanism?”

Noooooooooooo!: Achewood has gone on hiatus…and it sounds like it may be a long hiatus. This is obviously pretty bad news for fans of the strip, and pretty surprising when one considers that Chis Onstad has been a bottomless ocean of gags and ideas for years now. Of course, seeing as he’s seemingly done the work of at least a dozen cartoonists on that strip over those years—writing blogs in the voices of the characters, bits of prose, recipe books, etc.—perhaps it’s not that surprising.

I like the idea of The Leader vs. Anyone, really: Inspired by the latest Invincible Iron Man story arc, Ben Morse plays “Mix & Match Super Villains.”

Wait, neither of those guys is Japanese…: “Robert Pattinson, Andrew Garfield Among Frontrunners For ‘Akira’ Adaptation”

It Came From the NYPL

King: King of Comics
Written by Mark Evanier
Published by Abrams

Jack Kirby is, of course, the most important and influential artist in comic book history. He, along with a few contemporaries, created the visual language of the comic book page; the sheer volume of his pages boggles any imagination; and he’s created, co-created, or radically reimagined about two-thirds of the commercially viable characters (even Superman’s carried the influence of those Jimmy Olsen stories for a long, long while) to appear in superhero comics over the past forty years.

So clearly, the world really needs a proper biography of the life of a man who did more for comic books than anybody else. Fortunately, Mark Evanier is available for the job. Kirby: King of Comics, which I recently borrowed from the New York Public Library, does a wonderful job introducing readers to Jack Kirby, the man. We’ve known his work, but most of us have never had the opportunity to meet the person.

Evanier’s biography is a loving effort, with the author’s affection for Jack apparent on every single page. Insight into Kirby’s work ethic, motivated by his need to provide for his family, comes through clearly, as does Kirby’s enthusiasm for telling stories and the comic book medium. When it comes to Kirby’s battles for recognition – monetary and public – Evanier takes the high road, avoiding most blame. Martin Goodman, Jack Schiff and the money people are the clear villains of Kirby’s life. Many of the industry-based anecdotes have been heard before, but the book is largely about Jack as a man, how he struggles on, always bringing home that paycheck for his family.

An oversized hardcover, King: King of Comics provides readers with hundreds of pages of artwork and illustrations. The book’s dimensions showcase the drawings beautifully, allowing the detail and power to really come across. It’s a very attractive book, complementing Evanier’s affectionate tribute.

Kirby: King of Comics isn’t quite essential – it’s too reverent, but it’s a loving tribute to the most important creator in comics history. Mark Evanier’s done a fine job illuminating the man behind the creations, providing readers with a book well worth owning, or at least worth a visit to your local library.