Something tells me there isn’t much crossover love between comic fans and the people who enjoy watching award shows each year but last night something strange happened. The Golden Globe Awards were filled with comic book characters. With all those heroes in the room I’m surprised a supervillain didn’t attack.

Boardwalk Empire may have won Best Television Series – Drama over The Walking Dead but that doesn’t mean Robert Kirkman didn’t win a Golden Globe in an alternate reality. Hey, you can’t blame a guy for playing make-believe.

So a creator was in the crowd, but as the show progressed,  people started noticing something oddly familiar about the audience – it was sprinkled with all kinds of comic book characters. (more…)

Over on DeviantArt, they are hosting an Inception comic cover contest, with some pretty impressive entries. Over at Studio Revolver member Tariq Hassan’s blog, he had posted his entry into the contest. Not too bad for something put together in about five hours. It’s simple, it’s direct, and Hassan’s style comes through.

According to Hassan, DA provided a script that explains the moments before Inception movie starts.  Basically the end scene of the script is the beginning of the movie – it details how Cobb and company got into Saito’s head.

Now that’s the sort of comic I can get into. Be sure to check out the rest of the entries, as well as Tariq’s blog. Both are full of crazy talent.

Looks like the David E. Kelley planned Wonder Woman tv series is “not moving forward”, reports Entertainment Weekly. Apparently, their sources told them that all the major broadcasters have passed on the project. NBC was the final network that declined to bring back the super heroine. Of course, Warner Bros. TV has said they are not giving up on this, but it is definitely on hold.

Outside of her appearing on DC animated’s Justice League franchise, Wonder Woman has not appeared in live action since the 1976-1979 series starring Lynda Carter and Lyle Waggoner as Wonder Woman/Diana Prince and Steve Trevor, respectively.

I just don’t get this. Smallville ends in a few months and this would have been the perfect heir. With Batman: The Brave and the Bold on the air, with a Green Lantern animated series coming soon as well, I’d gladly settle for a Wondy animated series at this point.

Will the bad luck ever end for this production?

Entertainment Weekly has reported that actress Natalie Mendoza, who was in the role of Arachne, a villain created solely for the musical, is about to leave the show. The New York times stated that she was on a vocal rest, but other reports indicate she was severely shaken when her co-star, Christopher Tierney, was injured after a critical accident. Mendoza was also injured herself a while back during the November 28th performance, suffering from a concussion, when she was struck in the head by a rope holding equipment while she was offstage.

Mendoza’s rep wasn’t available for comment and Spider-Man: Turn Off The Dark is still slated to open February 8th.

Today, Universal Pictures, via Yahoo! released the first teaser poster for the upcoming Cowboys and Aliens, starring Daniel Craig, Harrison Ford, and directed by Jon Favreau. Of course, the movie is based on the 2006 graphic novel created by Scott Mitchell Rosenberg and written by Fred Van Lente and Andrew Foley, with penciler Luciano Lima of the same name.

For those of you unfamiliar with the plot, essentially it’s pretty self-explanatory here. Aliens invade the Old West and cowboys and the Apache fight them off. I remember reading it a while back and just thinking it would be cool to see on screen. I’m sure if any plot details have been altered for the movie, but with a cast like this and a concept that just screams “hollywood”, I’ll be there.

Bruce Wayne, you were always were a player.

According to Deadline News, The Dark Knight Rises director Christopher Nolan is on the prowl (pardon the pun) for two actresses to play a villain and a love interest opposite Christian Bale, aka Bruce Wayne for the next installment of his Batman franchise.

The actresses being mentioned are Rachel Weisz, Naomi Watts, Blake Lively, Natalie Portman, Anne Hathaway and Keira Knightley.

While everything is speculation at this point. I’d love to see a new take on Catwoman and possibly Vicky Vale, a nosy journalist that is out to find the identity of Batman. There is also possibility of Talia al’Ghul, which would make sense and have the trilogy come full circle.

So readers, what do you think? Who would you love to see?

Well, now you have the chance to help.

It wouldn’t be the first time that one of best-selling author and contemporary legend Neil Gaiman’s stories have been turned into a movie. Both “Coraline” and “Mirror Mask” were critically-praised, the former even garnered and Academy Award nomination for Best Animated Feature. However, both of those had big studio backing, independent film-maker Christopher Salmon has a different idea. Utlizing the popular site, Kickstarter, Salmon has pitched the idea to make one of Gaiman’s short stories, “The Price”, into an animated short.

Newsarama recently spoke with Salmon about his artistic talents, the animation process of the short, and what it was like to recieve Neil’s approval.

Newsarama: Okay, Christopher, tell us a bit about yourself

Christopher Salmon: Where to start? I’m Canadian & grew up in the stunning Okanagan valley in BC.. I’ve always wanted to make movies an spent my youth and, well, pretty much my whole life trying to develop the talents and skill set to do just that taught myself to draw, write, and sculpt (so I could make rubber monster masks and then foam-latex creatures & stop-motion puppets) Took enough piano so I could generate a simplistic John Carpenter-esque score to go along with my cheesy horror films I made in High School TV class, which usually plotted around some cool new special effect I’d figured out, like my own version of the chest-burster scene from Alien so, totally high-class stuff

I thought I might get my break into film through special effects make-up, but I wound up in the video game industry for many years, just from reading stuff (Fangoria, Cinefex) and trying things out. I blew my chest off once trying out a home-made squib (not so funny) my Mom took one look at the blackened mess on my chest and ordered me to surrender my can of re-filling gunpowder on the spot not too bright either … (me, not my Mom — she rocks)

Nrama: So big horror fan, I take it?

Salmon: I love monsters, so yeah, I’ve watched a lot of horror flicks, but the whole blood/torture/dark-evil thing isn’t what draws me … I just dig the monsters, you know?

But I love Sci-Fi, fantasy, anything really mostly, I love movies. That’s what I love about this story of Neil’s; even with the cool monster stuff, the overall feeling is hopeful, positive, and a little melancholy.

Nrama: Out of all of Gaiman’s stories, what drew you to the Price that made you want to make something like this?

Salmon: The theme of redemption. A chance to design some really cool monsters. I like cats too, so really it was win-win-win! Also, I was looking for something on a small scale that I could handle the bulk of the work for. In the animatic, I didn’t feature any of the secondary characters at all (you could see their feet or profile in shadow) … by being able to keep the focus on the Narrator/Neil, The Black Cat, and the monsters, I could manage costs and put the funds towards these central characters. So it was all of these things, but primarily the theme & feeling I got while reading The Price.

Plus, if I can see it immediately in my mind, I know my chances of recreating successfully are very high and once it’s in there, the only way to ever get it out … is to make the film!

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Having done 20 out of the 21 covers for GI JOE: Origins, Tom Feister certainly has had one heck of a ride. This cover, GI JOE: Origins #21, gives off a more propaganda feel, like the previous #20 issue did. Though not in the usual WWII-style of posters, the cover of #21,  Feister was trying to convey classic American illustrators, especially J. C. Leyendecker

“The idea was, what would it look like if Leyendecker did a Cobra recruitment poster,” Feister told Blog@. “I did my take on Chinese propaganda for the last issue, but I wanted something here that would make Cobra seem appealing, seem almost American.”

With two more covers on the way until the series concludes, I have no doubt Feister will blow Joe fans away.

Something’s missing. Can’t put my finger on it…

Laura Vandervoort as Kara this season and she’s bringing a somewhat familiar look in the properly-titled episode: Supergirl. Kara brings Clark some not-so-welcomed news.

You know, I wasn’t too keen on the idea of Supergirl coming on board, but Vandervoort really makes the outfit work. I’ve always thought she carried the role quite well and I’m so ready for the rest of this season.

Well it’s about time.

David E. Kelley (creator of such hits as Ally McBeal and several other TV favorites) is writing and producing a new show centering around DC’s Wonder Woman, Deadline reports. This project is presumed to fill the void once Smallville ends this season, so it’s up in the air as of now if this is a show about Wonder Woman, or Diana, the Amazonian Princess.

With the live-action movie constantly in developmental hell, and the animated movie being quite the success (even outselling Green Lantern: First Flight) a TV show would be the perfect fit for fans of the character to get that fix.

I think Kelley has the creative know-how that could bring this show to a broad audience. We haven’t seen live-action Wondy since the 70′s with the famous Lynda Carter TV show that a lot of us grew up on.

So, readers, what do you think of a Wonder Woman show? Could this be another Smallville, or another Mercy Reef?

Since the first Ghost Rider blew their figurative wad, I was almost certain there wouldn’t be a Ghost Rider sequel. I mean, it had Blackheart and Mephisto in it. I’m not a Ghost Rider scholar by any means, but I couldn’t think of any other villain associated with Marvel’s Spirit of Vengeance. Then, this past Summer, news broke out about the guys behind “Crank” would take the directing helm. Even then, I had doubts.

Well, color me mistaken. Heatvision reports that Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance will feature the return of Nic Cage as Johnny Blaze, as he is recruited by an organization to defeat the devil, played by Ciaran Hinds (Caesar in HBO’s Rome), who wants to possess his son’s mortal form on the child’s birthday. I’m glad they decided to focus more on the supernatural elements a bit more.

The directors are aiming for a November start, with shooting to take place in Romania. No word if Eva Mendes will be coming back as Roxanne Simpson, or Sam Elliot as the Caretaker, but I’m thinking not this time around.

Photo courtesy Gary Miereanu

[The following is a pre-prepared interview provided by Warner Home Video.]

Whether as River Tam in Joss Whedon’s cult classic series and follow-up film, Firefly and Serenity, or as the indestructible android-from-the-future, Cameron, in Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, Glau has cornered the market on playing attractive, demure young females with the controlled homicidal power to destroy an opposing legion of trained warriors.

So it was only natural that as her first-ever animated voiceover role, Glau would fit neatly into the role of an uber-powered Kryptonian who falls under the spell of one of Superman’s greatest foes. Glau finds the perfect mix of youthful curiosity, teen angst and alien-turned-Earth-girl aggression as the voice of Kara, cousin of Superman (and ultimately destined to become Supergirl) in Superman/Batman: Apocalypse, the ninth entry in the popular, ongoing series of DC Universe animated movies.

Based on the DC Comics series/graphic novel “Superman/Batman: Supergirl” by Jeph Loeb, the late Michael Turner & Peter Steigerwald, Superman/Batman: Apocalypse is produced by animation legend Bruce Timm and directed by Lauren Montgomery (Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths, Wonder Woman) from a script by Academy Award-nominated screenwriter Tab Murphy (Gorillas in the Mist).

Glau’s career has been populated with frequent visits to the fanboy realm, adding regular roles on The 4400 and Dollhouse to her featured gigs on Firefly/Serenity and The Sarah Connor Chronicles. The professionally trained ballerina had a seven-episode run on The Unit, and will appear in the upcoming NBC series, The Cape, as well as in the film, Knights of Badassdom.

Following her recording session, Glau freely discussed a number of subjects – from the acting strengths of the Whedon alumni association to her consistent on-set nerves to a strong desire to land more adult roles. Interview after the jump.

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Ted Naifeh, like most artists, loves drawing Batman. Much like how almost every artist has that one character they get sheer joy out of drawing, Naifeh’s is definitely Gotham’s Dark Knight. Recently, on his website, he displayed some mock covers of Bat-books. Now, he’s already done some redesigns of Bats’ rogues gallery and other miscellaneous Gothamites, but what he’s done here is completely different, and truly amazing. Naifeh spoke exclusively to Blog@ about Batman and his thoughts on the character’s legacy.

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Time to celebrate Banned Books Week, since the ALA (American Library Association) has put out the list of the most challenged graphic novels. Some were understandable, others, I’m scratching my head here. Example: Maus has been challenged as being “Anti-Ethnic”. I don’t get where that’s coming from since it teaches of the horrors of the Holocaust. Now, Sandman, I understand, it’s not age-appropriate, but why would that be in a school anyways? Or Watchmen, which was “unsuited to age group”? What age are we talking about here?

“Not every book is right for each reader, but we should have the right to think for ourselves and allow others to do the same,” said ALA President Roberta Stevens. “How can we live in a free society and develop our own opinions if our right to choose reading materials for ourselves and our families is taken away? We must remain diligent and protect our freedom to read.”

Again, I think it’s silly for other people (read: strangers) to decide what is suitable for other people to read. Other than the fact it’s cost people their librarian positions for making that decision, it’s just morally wrong.

So go out there and enjoy these fine, banned books.

Bond. Frodo. You might have a home just yet.

Entertainment Weekly is reporting that Spyglass Entertainment (which has co-financed some of the biggest movies of the last decade including the J. J. Abrams Star Trek and The Sixth Sense, as well as the recent comedy Dinner for Schmucks) is nearing a deal to run the legendary studio, which is also in a $4 billion debt. This is good news for Bond fans, as earlier this year Bond 23 was officially post-poned indefinitely. As well as LOTR fans who have been waiting patiently for Peter Jackson’s two Hobbit films.

As both fans of those franchises, I am pleased as punch to know that such a studio with a legacy won’t just fade away.

DOUBLE FEATURE! 9.15 “Conspiracy;” 9.16 “Escape”

Long time no talk, Smallville viewers! I want to apologize for the delays! Bad timing on my part, what with the recent big news about a Season 10 happening! I got behind on the show when they virtually took the month of March off (not wholly unwelcome by me due to my love of NCAA basketball and a much needed vacation with my wife.) I’ll get you caught up on things with a look at the February 26th episode, “Conspiracy,” and the April 2nd “Escape.” Look for recaps of “Checkmate” and “Upgrade” sooner than you know it!

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The New York Times has a great article about Ruby Spears/Sid & Marty Krofft productions’ plan to develop some long-lost Jack Kirby concepts. Kirby apparently created scores of new characters while working as an artist for Ruby-Spears animation in the 1980′s, and the art on display in the piece is supposedly only the tip of the proverbial iceberg.

The article showcases some wonderful, and very 1980′s, character concepts from the king of comics, including what appears to be a superteam of stage magicians, a female, super-villain-fighting Indiana Jones archetype, and a wonderfully off-the-chain, purely Kirby team called “The Gargoids”.

Apparently, there are crates of old Kirby stuff archived by Ruby-Spears, and whether or not Kirby’s legendary status is enough to propel these inventive, but decidedly idiosyncratic creations into the mainstream, is up in the air. At the very least, this stuff could make a kick-as coffee table book.

There’s an interesting paradox at the heart of the new Planet Hulk animated film. “Planet Hulk” the comic book arc was conceived as a diverting detour from the Hulk’s status quo, not to mention a lead in to a cros-over mega-event. In the comics, with hundreds of issues of prototypical Jekyll and hyde Hulk stories weighing writers and readers down, a riff like the Maximus-meets-John Carter vibe of “Planet Hulk” worked as a novel break, a bit of variety to spice up Hulky’s pulpy life. With “Planet Hulk” fans got a few months of something different knowing fully well that eventually the character would return to something close to his Jekyll/Hyde status quo. (more…)

As the pre-release hype machine gears up for Joe Johnston’s The Wolfman, the director of The Rocketeer, October Sky, and Jurassic Park 3, is letting slip some details regarding his next little low-key indie project, Captain America: The First Avenger.

Gadfly/columnist Devin Faraci at CHUD is breaking the news that Hitler-smacking super-team The Invaders will not only appear in the film, but they will also play a major role in the story. What is unclear is just who Johnston’s Invaders Roster will include, although Faraci does a pretty good rundown of the rights entanglements involved with characters like The Sub Mariner and The Human Torch.

This comes hot on the heels of the junket confirmation of The Red Skull’s presence as Cap’s primary villain in the film. Could Master Man and Baron Blood be far behind? Wolfgang Von Strucker.

Of course with Johnston directing The Wolfman, maybe we can look forward to something like this…

In the spirit of Newsarama’s own Readers’ Favorites of 2009 Tourney, I thought I’d get a view from my local comics shop and see what my friend in comics, Chris Ureta Casos, the long-time buyer for Comics Dungeon, here in Seattle, had to say about comics in 2009 and much more.

Blog@Newsarama: Chris, with Newsarama’s Readers’ Favorites of 2009 Tourney in mind, tell us your thoughts on what tops your lists of favorites in comics this year.

Chris Ureta Casos: I have a lot of trouble really picking out top favorites for any categories, simply because different creators and titles appeal to me at different times and for numerous reasons. If I had pick on the spot though, my breakdowns would be:

Ongoing Titles: The Boys, the Green Lantern titles

Mini-series: Beasts of Burden, Atomic Robo

Writers: Geoff Johns, Garth Ennis, Peter Tomasi, Gail SImone really shines for her work on Secret Six And Wonder Woman

Artists: Marcos Martin, Darwyn Cooke, Patrick Gleason, Amanda Conner

Covers: Pretty much all the covers Marcos Martin has been cranking out this year. The Cooke covers (regular & variant) for Jonah Hex #50 really stood out for me this month as well.

And just as a general thing I’ve been loving all the great work being put into reprints from Fantagraphics, IDW, and a few others. The newly colored Prince Valiant book was a thing of beauty, as well as the Complete Rocketeer that just came out this month.

Blog@: Moving right along, tell us any thoughts that come to mind regarding trends you’ve observed in 2009.

Chris: Well, the “event” trend along with the nostalgia crawl have been fairly strong for the year. Some events fell on there faces while others actually spiked sales very well and generated a lot of new interest. Then it felt like since we managed to work our way through the bulk of the 80′s nostalgia we for some reason had to immerse ourselves with the ’90′s again which is honestly more than a little bit painful.

Of the more positive trends I would have to go back to the healthy amount of reprinting we’ve seen. Marvel’s finally released the soft cover version of the Marvel Masterworks, which are great if not a few years too late. DC’s Kirby Omnibus collections as well as the Showcase editions and other special hard covers have been fantastic. Then you have Fantagraphics offering such things as Blazing Combat and the Strange Suspense to name a few. Top that off with Dark Horse and IDW really coming up to bat and putting out some impressive collections and it’s just been a dream year for nicely packaged reprint material.

There were plenty of trends I wish we could have avoided. The price bumps, the over saturation of variant covers, and the odd marketing and packaging choices we’ve been seeing from the larger publishers. As a whole, I would think the worse trend is the widening of the gap of communication between consumers, retailers, distributors, and publishers.

Blog@: What can you tell us about your favorite comics from this last decade?

Chris: This is where I really just freeze up because there are just too many things to go on about. I think one of the greatest new titles we’ve seen from the past decade was Atomic Robo, not only for just the actual content (which is amazing) for the actual work ethic of the creators. Joss Whedon’s work on X-Men and his launch of Buffy Season 8 were great in and of themselves but when you factor in the amount of new readership and interest they brought in then you can’t ignore their value.

Geoff Johns has helped to not only resurrect interest in Green Lantern but to push the entire mythology of the creator into being one of the most successful, easily accessible, and expansive properties in the industry.

Pretty much everything Dark Horse has been doing over the past few years has been making me happy, from their production values to their overall content, and they always strike me as one of the if not the most solid publishers.

I don’t think I’ve read a Garth Ennis story I’ve never liked. So, from him launching Battlefields, to returning to Hitman for a few issues, to pinpointing exactly what a Punisher story should be, and to launching The Boys I’ve been a pretty happy camper.

There’s the obvious stuff like All Star Superman, Wednesday Comics, and Scott Pilgrim, which all deserve plenty of praise and attention.

Gail Simone emerging as one of the best writers in mainstream comics has been pleasant to watch. I’m disappointed she doesn’t seem to be doing too strongly on the Newsarama polls.

I was actually one of the minority it seems that really enjoyed Final Crisis and Batman RIP, but hell I thought they were just a lot of fun as experiments.

I feel like I’m neglecting a ton of things….

Blog@: What would you like to share with us about an all-time favorite comic?

Chris: There are two all time favorite books I think need mentioning. First is Mother, Come Home by Paul Hornschemeir. If you want an example of how much emotion can be put into a comic with a very minimal yet expressive style then you need to check this out. This is the only comic I’ve ever written a letter to when it was being published as single issues, and I was incredibly grateful for the reply I got back from the creator. It’s an incredibly sad story, so if you’re a fan of Chris Ware or Craig Thompson you should love it.

The second is Blacksad by Juan Diaz Canales and Juanjo Guarndio. Pretty much every time I read I realize that this is pretty much the perfect example of the heights the medium can achieve in storytelling and that more people need to know this work so they can understand how high the bar has really been set. The good news is that Dark Horse will be releasing a new compete collection in 2010.

Blog@: How would you describe the experience of reading comics?

Chris: Reading comics for me can range from incredibly transcendent to horribly enraging. I was taught how to read with comics and fortunately (or unfortunately) they’ve stuck with me for the long run, so visual narratives have been engrained into me and I often can get a little too engrossed in what I’m reading.

Blog@: Any quick and easy comment for someone walking in and wanting to read something that will blow their mind?

Chris: I need to talk with the person first and see what type of taste they have. It’s not that easy for me to assume they will like what I think is cool. Considering how excited I get when Starro the Conqueror shows up or Atomic Robo beats up a giant mutant ant with a Buick I think it’s a safe bet not everyone likes the same thing. It’s a little bit more interesting to gauge what a person’s taste is and see if you can find just the right thing for them, which means actually taking the time to expose yourself to different material constantly.

Blog@: What do you see ahead in comics in the new year, or in the future in general?

Chris: This is a hard one, simply because the future of comics really depends on how the economy holds up and how the publishers react. If we continue to see the trend of prices rising and a harder push to online comics, then we may see some really negative and possibly cataclysmic changes to the industry. There are a few things that could really help such as dropping the cost of production and material, but the main concern is that it feels like consumers are being drained of their blood at times and we are in a recession. I have customers who would love to buy more comics, but they can’t even afford 5-10 comics a week.

I was talking with a customer not to long ago, and we were asking the same question about Hollywood and other mainstream outlets and what trends might pop up over the next year. We decided that unless the powers-that-be were complete idiots, they would realize the potential with the increasing amounts of female genre fans with the popularity of Twilight and Firefly. Comics saw substantial new interest from female fans when Buffy Season 8 came out, and there were so many great books coming out at the time to cross-sell such as Runaways, Fables, and Y The Last Man.

Beyond that, I’m personally hoping that the next trend will be a competition between publishers to see who can publish the best reprint material. We’ve already seen both IDW and Fantagraphics release Ditko books of fantastic quality. I see Marvel is finally reprinting the Geoff Johns Avengers run, which, seriously, what’s been the hold up with that? Ideally, DC will now reprint the entire Abnett/Lanning run of Legion as a rebuttal. There are tons and tons of books actually worth reprinting (and no, I’m not talking about the Spider-Clone Saga and X-Men 2099). Books like the Peyer/Morales Hourman, the Jurgens/Epting Aquaman, the Waid/Kubert Ka-Zar, the original Busiek/Bagley Thunderbolts, and much much more. But please please please don’t make them deluxe hard covers. Just make something reasonable so we can easily recommend them to people without forcing them to sell blood to afford them.

Be sure to check out the Comics Dungeon Web site and, for further thoughts from Chris Ureta Casos, read his reviews at the Trusty Henchmen Web site.