Looks like the people over at Warner’s Animation have found their Superman, Lois Lane, and Lex Luthor for their upcoming “All-Star Superman” movie.  James Denton (Desperate Housewives), Christina Hendricks (Mad Men) and Anthony LaPaglia (Without a Trace).  This would be Denton’s and Hendricks’ first foray into animated voice overs, while LaPaglia had worked on Happy Feet and the upcoming Legend of the Guardians. In addition to Denton, Hendicks, and LaPaglia, Ed Asner is Daily Planet editor Perry White, Frances Conroy as Ma Kent with Linda Cardelini, Arnold Vosloo and Matthew Gray Gubler as yet to be named voices.

I am more than enthused about this casting call. While, I might not be the biggest Superman fan on the planet, this just seems stellar, especially for the no-brainer that is Ed Asner for Perry White.

So sound off, readers. What do you think of All-Star Superman‘s cast?

Writer Brian Clevinger announced back in January that Atomic Robo, his Red 5 Comics creation with artist Scott Wegener, was getting an animated short film courtesy of The Fictory, titled Atomic Robo: Last Stop. Now we have the first teaser trailer, and though it’s definitely just “a teaser,” it looks pretty much exactly how you’d hope it to look:

Psyched? It’s scheduled for “late 2010.” Don’t forget that both Clevinger and Wegener have upcoming Marvel projects, both with the word “Avenger” in the title — Clevinger is writing Captain America: The Fighting Avenger, and Wegener’s providing art for Avenger’s: Earth’s Mightiest Heroes.

Adult Swim’s Scott Pilgrim vs. The Animation was scheduled at sort of a weird time – midnight on Thursday going into Friday last night, the exact same time that many hardcore fans would be at theaters watching a midnight screening of a little live-action film called Scott Pilgrim vs. The World. Luckily, as things tend to happen in the 21st century, they posted all four glorious minutes of the short, adapting scenes from volume 2 of the Oni graphic novels, on their Web site this morning!

What a week it’s been for Scott Pilgrim fans. (Month, really, if you count from when Scott Pilgrim’s Finest Hour came out.) It looks amazing, but be warned — after watching this, there’s no way you wouldn’t want to see the entire series adapted in this format, and may never be able to truly rest until that happens. It’s just too cool and perfect. Ah, first-world problems.

News came Wednesday that Paul Dini, one of the minds behind Batman: The Animated Series, was joining Brian Michael Bendis and the Man of Action crew (Joe Kelly, Joe Casey, Steven Seagle and Duncan Rouleau) on the already impressive Ultimate Spider-Man cartoon series creative team.

This afternoon, Marvel confirmed what the exact title for each of them will be on the show, and how the division of labor breaks down. Dini will be “Creative Consultant” and write the pilot; the Man of Action guys are “Supervising Producers,” directing the write staff, generating scripts and editing stories; Bendis, writer of each and every issue of the Ultimate Spider-Man comic, will serve as “Consulting Producer,” overseeing the whole thing.

Jeph Loeb, as announced in June, has a supervisory role given his job as head of Marvel TV. Full Marvel press release after the jump.

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UPDATE: MTV Splashpage has confirmed the news, as well as gotten a bit of casting. Geek entertainment veteran Summer Glau, of Firefly and Sarah Connor Chronicles fame, will be voicing Supergirl! Still no official word, however, if the animation will follow Michael Turner’s art as a template.

Well, this is just Jeph Loeb’s day, ain’t it?

This morning, Marvel announced that Jeph Loeb is now Executive Vice President, Head of Television, and will be in charge of bringing more Marvel properties to TV. Now, according to Superman Homepage, who acquired the cover art for the next DCAU project, we learn that another arc of his Superman/Batman run is coming to small screens via DVD.

After Superman/Batman: Public Enemies‘ success, Warner Home Video will be bringing Superman/Batman: Apocalypse to DVD and Blu-Ray on September 28, 2010. An official announcement is expected at Comic-con International: San Diego this July. The cover art shows Darkseid and the “Evil Supergirl” designed by deceased artist Michael Turner. These were the two key characters in the second arc of Jeph Loeb’s run, used to re-introduce Superman’s cousin Kara Zor-El to the DCU.

Also of note is the bottom corner of the case… wherein the next short film, Green Arrow, is also announced.

Bruce Timm did just assure viewers that more DC Animated videos were on the way. What do you think of the next feature?

Just in from The Hollywood Reporter, it seems Cartoon Network let early word slip of a coming Green Lantern Animated Series on the network.

Not much was said about the show, other than it is a joint venture between Warner Bros and Turner Networks (CN’s owner). The show is based on the DC Comics character who has a live action movie coming in Spring 2011, and could be on the air soon after the movie, in Fall 2011.

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.

The fabulous blog for all things Hayao Miyazki, the Ghibli Blog, has found a new treasure: a rare 1989 manga by  director Miyazaki called The Age of the Flying Boat.

This short manga served as the inspiration and precursor for the film Porco Rosso, and was only made available once in English — until now.

Read the full manga over at Ghibli Blog. link

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…)

If they ever assembled a Justice League: North Pole, the founding members would be pretty obvious. There’s Rudolph and Charlie Brown, Ebenezer scrooge, and Frosty would be on the roster, the Grinch… but the superpower of warm fuzzy holiday sentiment isn’t limited to just the big guns. There’s a whole universe of audiovisual Christmas cheer out there waiting to be found. Pick your favorite TV show or cartoon, and there’s probably a very special Christmas episode for you to enjoy. Even Pac-Man had a Christmas special for crying out loud. The Grinch and Frosty will always be at the top of the holiday heap, but there are still a lot of lesser known Christmas specials that have more to offer than simple kitsch value. Consider these suggestions as a sort of JLA North Pole reserve. The Captain Marvel to Rudolph’s Superman, the Guy Gardner to Charlie Brown’s green lantern. (more…)

Warner Home Video spoke with rising anime director, Toshiyuki Kanno, about “The Babysitter” episode within Halo Legends. This is an all-new anthology of seven stories that expands the universe of Halo, one of the world’s most popular video games. Halo Legends will be available on February 16, 2010 on DVD and Blu-Ray as well as On Demand and Digital Download.

Kanno provided insight into the production of “The Babysitter” in this following interview with Warner Home Video:

Question: How does Halo lend itself to anime/animation?

Kanno: Halo is a property filled with so many exciting characters and detailed story settings with a very vast/huge background and I believe that the property has a lot of room to create episodes. Thus, I think that various ways in anime development can suit the property in whatever style the creators employ.

Question: What was the inspiration for your artistic vision in your episode of Halo Legends?

Kanno: What inspired me the most are the “ruins of an unconfirmed space alien.” Of course, we had a premise that the ruins are Forerunners, and Microsoft/343 Industries provided us with a good deal of leeway to create new elements. We have tried to incorporate a Japanese taste as much as possible to the buildings, costumes and other visual things to try to add greater depth and expand the Halo realm.

Question: Were there any particular images within the Halo realm that helped shape or drive your creative vision?

Kanno: We found inspiration in all of the art books provided by Microsoft, especially the beauty of the nature shown in the image boards as well as in the game itself. I tried to incorporate a similar beauty in my episode. In addition, the costume and the weapons of various characters such as the Brutes, Elites and Prophet provided me with inspirations in creating the characteristics of this episode.

Question: Why were you the right person to direct/design/write this episode?

Kanno: The original script describing a story relating to the relationship between Spartans and ODST was provided by Mr. Frank O’Connor. I discussed with Ms. Tanaka, the producer of the episode, that we needed to brush up the story to make it more understandable and impressive, and proposed the new scrip to Microsoft. I believe that the script has become better suited to animation.

We had a very strong design and animation team. I was in charge of character designs and focused on creating designs to easily express emotions of each of them. I employed Mr. Hayashi and Mr. Suzuki to design mechas, such as those involving the Spartan, ODSTs and Covenant. They have been very good in creating mechas that are simple but very cool designs.

Mr. Sasaki was in charge of background designs, and his ideas helped realize a very distinguished world of “The Babysitter” – giving our anime sensibility, but retaining the Halo taste. He has created an origina UNSC spaceship and the design seemed to please the Microsoft staff.

Both Ms. Miyuki, who was in charge of coloring, and Mr. Watanabe, who headed the CGI as well as the screen plan, focused on keeping a balance throughout the entire episode. I believe that they contributed a lot in accomplishing a profound screenplay.

Question: What did you set out to accomplish in this episode, and why do you think you achieved or exceeded your goals?

Kanno: The most distinguished characteristic of this episode is that this is the only episode in Halo Legends where ODST characters appear. During the production of this episode, a new Halo game, “Halo 3: ODST,” featuring ODST characters, was released – and our episode has some common characters with the game. Thus, we felt an intense pressure to make the episode very enjoyable to the newcomers to the Halo world and, more over, to ensure that the episode would not betray the trust of the game fans.

I, myself, was quite a newcomer to Halo at the beginning of this project, and it was a very hard process to understand the vast realm of Halo and to create new things out of it. Consequently, I have found out that the episode has become very exciting and much better than I had originally expected. I believe that this result comes from the efforts of each and every member of our production staffs. This was a very collaborative effort.

Question: How important was having Halo gaming experience to bringing the world to life in anime?

Kanno: I am not at all good at playing video games, and I have not played that much. But my staff played a great deal, and both myself and my staff spent a lot of time viewing the long-playing movie many times to ensure we understood the Halo realm as well as the details of its settings.

Question: Are there any hidden images or behind-the-scenes “Easter eggs” – special little things you included for the devout Halo fans – that appear within your episode?

Kanno: It was simply tough enough for me to understand the Halo universe during such a short period of time, so I did not have time or room to created such “hidden images” etc. However, I strongly believe that every viewer will feel the enthusiasm of all our creative staffs in the episode.

They come from the shadows, striking silently…leaving behind only b-movies, Halloween costumes and tongue-in-cheek internet memes in their wake. They are the Ninja and as Ninja Assassin lurks in the mutiplex shadows, you might say the ninja is back…but some of us know they were always there. You just didn’t see them….y’know because they’re ninjas. Here’s a list of a few a noteworthy ninjas that might have stalked under your pop-culture radar. (more…)

With DC putting in Manhunter, the Question, Blue Beetle, and the Metal Men in their comics as second features, it’s cool to see other DC Entertainment properties following suit.

According to a release sent from Warner Home Video, in the upcoming DVD Crisis of Two Earths, the main animated feature will be joined by a second animated short, starring the Spectre. Gary Cole from Entourage and Alyssa Milano from Charmed will be voice acting, while the short itself was written by 30 Days of Night creator Steve Niles.

In a lot of ways, this looks like a smart idea. With the episodic structure of comics, there’s a lot of trivia and continuity and reimaginings that bog down characters for new readers. For film and cartoons, however, there’s a clean slate and a wide distribution platform — in other words, you have to distill the character to what makes them work, and cast to the wind much of the idiosyncrasies inherent to a character such as, say, a third-level legacy character such as the Spectre. Adding what’s essentially an intro-level course on the Spectre — for free, no less — is a great move for DC, as it helps diversify their stable of heroes, and helps bring in fans of Jim Corrigan. Every comic is someone’s first — why can’t that be the same for cartoons?

Muscles, long flowing hair, a European vibe — I’m not talking about Thor, I’m talking about Fabio!

But Colleen Doran reports that the two could have very easily become synonymous, as she posted some images from a now-decommissioned animated series the European model green-lit. Considering the series’ logline — “with power comes responsibility” — sounds fairly similar to a well-known Webhead, part of me is kind of glad this thing is in development hell. What say you?

Batman: The Brave and the Bold
The Mayhem of the Music Meister

“As I regale you with my story
you know you’ll have no choice
but to do my evil bidding
when you hear this booming voice!”

– Music Meister (Neil Patrick Harris)

This is the musical episode that you’ve heard about that was shown at San Diego Comic Con this year, and it was worth the wait. Well, to me anyways. I have a theater background, as well as a degree in it, so this was right up my alley. It hasn’t debuted yet on American TV, but aired a few days ago over in the UK.
Today, I see it found its way to YouTube and below my review is the episode yourself (split into 3 parts) in case you want to view it yourself.

Now, I am a bit biased towards something like this. I mean, we’ve seen Adam West’s Batman dance, but this is something entirely different all together. Neil Patrick Harris supplies the voice for the Music Meister (a villain that resembles the Fiddler) though instead he uses song to induce a trance instead of an instrument. There are some great musical numbers here and NPH does an excellent job showcasing his talent. For those of you worried, Diedrich Bader’s Batman doesn’t have a song, though Grey DeLisle as Black Canary nails it. Then again, are you really surprised by Ms. DeLisle’s extraordinary voice? You shouldn’t be by now.
There’s action, drama and a tad of romance thrown in this episode. Just when I thought this show couldn’t get any better, they throw something like this at me. Michael Jelenic (who has worked on the Wonder Woman and Legion of Super-Heroes animated programs) wrote four out of the six songs and they are sure to drive you batty, but, in a good way.

Author’s Note:
However, while they were linked to the official Batman: The Brave and the Bold Facebook Fan page, the episode has been since taken down. We apologize for those who didn’t get a chance to view it.

He is the night — he is Batman! Kevin Conroy has been the voice of the Bat for nearly two decades, spanning from a TV series to the recently released Batman: Arkham Asylum video game. Warner Home Video talked with Conroy about assuming the Mantle of the Bat once more in the upcoming animated feature Superman/Batman: Public Enemies, due out September 29th.

QUESTION: You’ve been doing this role for nearly 19 years. Are there still challenges to doing the voice of Batman?

KEVIN CONROY: I guess the biggest challenge to doing any kind of animation voice work is that you only have your voice to tell the story. And you want to keep it real and you don’t want to get cartoony, especially now because the audiences are much more sophisticated. Anything over the top is going to read over the top. So it’s a very fine line that people walk. For Batman, I think the biggest challenge is the timber of the voice that I established early on. I just kind of improvised it and it stuck. It’s very deep in my register – very throaty – and whenever it gets emotional, it’s a difficult sound to create with a lot of volume technically without blowing your chords out. So there’s all kinds of tricks you learn along the way of how to produce a sound, how to produce it without injuring yourself, and how to juice it enough. It’s a delicate, funny balancing act.

Recording Superman/Batman: Public Enemies was actually easy because of the cast that Andrea (Romano) put together. Tim (Daly) and Clancy (Brown) – all of us have worked together a lot over the years, and there’s a real shorthand when you’re dealing with people who have done a lot of it and know what they’re doing. Which is really a pleasure. Andrea doesn’t have to say very much for me to know what she wants.

QUESTION: What do Tim Daly and Clancy Brown bring to their respective roles?

KEVIN CONROY: Tim brings to Superman that strong voice, but there’s also a real humanity to Tim as an actor and that really comes through. So there’s strength but there’s a great sensitivity, and that’s unique about his take on Superman.

Clancy is great at being crazy. He’s a very talented actor. He’s got that great sound, that resonate voice. And yet when you’ve got that kind of power under you, you can afford to be very casual with it. It makes his sinister quality so much more frightening when this guy with this voice is just being very debonair.

QUESTION: What can people expect to find different about Superman/Batman: Public Enemies than most crossover stories?

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I’m sure Hawkman and Hawkgirl would beg to differ!

Courtesy of Player vs. Player, August 10, 2009.

Apparently so. This show has been talked about for a while now and it’s good to see some actual footage. Marvel released this little clip (more of a music video actually) of the show and I’m intrigued. Marvel really doesn’t have a show like this out now, or has EVER made a show like this.

I’m a big fan of the SHS toys, I have several that surround my kitchen and my office. I’ll give this show a try especially after hearing some of the voice actors involved: Mark Hamill as Red Skull, James Marsters as Mr. Fantastic and George Takei as Galactus. In addition to the show, coming out this fall, a variety of Super Hero Squad merchandise spin-offs are planned, including a video game from THQ (also coming out this fall), expansion of the Hasbro toy line, and a major fastfood partnership.

So, what do you readers think of the clip? Do you think it’s something you and your child would watch, or is just too kiddie?

Mattel posted this news and video today over on their MattyCollector.com site:

San Diego Comic-Con is just about here, and man, do I have an early show-stopper toy for you! You already know our DC Universe Classics Wonder Twins figure set includes Zan, Jayna, an eagle, and a water bucket with the face of Zan. Sweet, but that’s not what I’m talking about… it’s the AMAZING package that features lights and sounds you gotta see to believe!

DCUC Wonder Twins packaging w/lights and sound

Remember, the set that includes Gleek will only be available at SDCC while supplies last. If you don’t make it to SDCC, you can still get the Wonder Twins — but without Gleek — here at MattyCollector.com on Monday, August 3rd at 12:00 Noon!

For more information on Mattel’s Comic Con Exclusives and panels click here.

The shojo animated series Nana will be available on the iTunes store, Viz Media has reported!

Episodes will be exclusive on iTunes through the end of August — and buying the Season One pass will also get viewers a special bonus episode. The series follows two girls named Nana — Nana “Hatchi” Komatsu, who has traveled to Tokyo with her boyfriend, and Nana Osaki, a punk rock dynamo who is shooting for the top of the rock-and-roll pantheon.

“NANA has touched millions of fans in Japan and North America with its realistic portrayal of two young women coming of age in life’s fast lane in modern Tokyo,” Ken Sasaki, Vice President of Strategy & Business Development, VIZ Media, said in a press release. “The anime series possesses all of the attributes that made the original manga such a smash hit and combines them with a rocking soundtrack and creatively designed characters that audiences can really root for, laugh and even cry with. We invite fans to check out NANA on iTunes and take these girls’ adventures along as they navigate their own busy lives.”

The original manga by Ai Yazawa has sold more than 43 million copies. You can learn more about all this by clicking here.