Sunday, May 26
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Do you remember (assuming you collected the blasted things) that every He-Man and the Masters of the Universe action figure came with a little comic book? Well, this site has them all uploaded for your reading pleasure, albeit with an annoying watermark.
– The Lego enthusiast known as oxcrew has decided to retell the origin of Two-Face using … well, you figure it out. (hat tip: The Ephemerist)
– So Time Magazine is doing gag cartoons now? That’s interesting.
– David Welsh examines Jiro Taniguchi’s The Quest for the Missing Girl.
– Paul Hornschmeier has an amusing new T-shirt available for puchase.
– DJ Coffman and Scott Kurtz go at it on the Internet, and everyone wins.
– Spot the Frog creator Mark Heath has a new Web site up, promoting his gag cartoons.
Warner Bros. picks up film rights to second Nolent comic
Comic creator Alexis Nolent’s Headshot has been snatched up by Warner Bros. Headshot, or Du plomb dans la tête in French, is a graphic novel series that was published in France by Casterman and drawn by Colin Wilson.
As we mentioned back in March, Nolent’s Cyclopes is also being adapted into film by Warner Bros. Meanwhile, Nolent’s The Killer is being adapted at Paramount.
The Ticker
• The big Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe game hits North American stores on Nov. 16 and European stores on Nov. 21, just in time for the holidays.
• If you live in Canada, you can watch for several of the upcoming Marvel Comics animated shows, like Iron Man, Avengers and Wolverine, on Teletoons next year. [Variety]
• An animated Hot Wheels show will rev its engines on the Cartoon Network next year. [Variety]
KISS is joining Indiana Jones, Optimus Prime and Spider-Man by being immortalized in potato form — as a set of Mr. Potato Heads. The toys hit the stage in 2009.
On his Toycutter blog, John Struan spotlights some of the offerings from CustomCon21, the “online convention” dedicated to customized action figures. Among them is this terrific Stan Lee Mighty Mugg, which holds in its little hand a teeny-tiny copy of Amazing Fantasy #15.
Agatsuma Entertainment in Japan is releasing a really adorable little Iron Man figure. This 16 cm tall soft vinyl figure sports a really big head, stubby arms and legs, then finished with a metallic paint job, ready to cap super villain butt in the cutest way possible! The figure retails for 4000 yen.
Found on National Console Support.
I listen to a whole lot of podcasts and one that appears regularly on my iPod is This Modern Death. It’s a podcast “about Modern Horror and Dark Future role-playing games.” In their latest episode, Shaun, Kristin and that other guy discuss media properties in role-playing games. They talk a great deal about some recent entries into the market, such as the Serenity and Battlestar Galactica rpgs.
The hosts regard these games as failures since the systems utilized do not capture the spirit of the setting.
Which got me to thinking…
The system that totally nailed the feel of its setting was the DC Heroes Role-Playing Game (you were wondering what this had to do with comics, right?). From 1985 to 1993, the now-defunct Mayfair Games published DC Heroes. It was a system that fully integrated massively powerful characters such as Superman and less powerful guys like Batman in the same game world. Truly, it allowed players to duplicate the experience of the DC Universe around the table.
The system, the Mayfair Exponential Game System (or MEGS), utilized a logarithmic scale to measure the characters’ skills, attributes and powers. It was an easy system to learn, yet it beautifully expressed the action and feel of the setting.
The game came out right after Crisis on the Infinite Earths. It captured a lot of that Man of Steel re-work in the game as well as other post-Crisis changes.
I am still using the system for my supers games.
While DC Heroes is no longer in print, it is widely available on eBay.
The Podge Cast is a podcast that focuses heavily on the subject of tabletop role-playing games, such as Burning Wheel, Savage Worlds, and — yes — even Dungeons & Dragons. The Podge also covers movies, TV, books and comics. Essentially, whatever the hosts are geeking over today is what they’re going to be talking about.
This week’s episode, titled “Childish Things,” covers the topic of gamer shame, that bit of embarrassment some feel for playing “pretend” in our adult years. That’s a subject folks like you and me know a little bit about. I mean, how many times have you talked around the issue of your hobby?
You and your wife are at a dinner party with your spouse’s co-workers and somebody asks what you’re reading right now. How likely are you to answer truthfully? Something like, “Guardians of the Galaxy. I loves me some Rocket Raccoon, yo!”
Or do you punch it up with some flowery words to make it sound a little less geekish than it actually is? “I am studying an illustrated narrative exploring modern heroism in a nihilist society.”
That works real well until asked for the title and you have to reveal you’re reading Howard The Duck (the Gerber stuff, not that other crap).
This week’s Podge Cast also addresses growing out of comics. Or in their case, growing out of supers comics. Interesting discussion. They are fairly well unified on their dislike of the traditional Marvel and DC universes, but love books like Walking Dead and Preacher.
I am totally going to have to hook them up with the Guardians of the Galaxy trade.
Rocket Raccoon is the frakkin’ shizzle.
A man known only as Professor Plastik has created some downloadable paper model kits of classic golden age superheroes. So far only Superman, the Flash and Batman (based on Chris Ware’s design) are up yet, but many more are promised to roll out over the next several months. (link via the Ephemerist)
For the month of September, Mattel is showcasing the DC Comics Dolls on their Barbie Collector website, and offering three sizes of the DC Barbie desktop calendar featuring the 2008 DC Barbie line-up: Supergirl Barbie Doll, Batgirl Barbie Doll, Wonder Woman Barbie Doll, and that hussy Black Canary Barbie Doll, who is hiding her skanky legs in the back.
Related:
Group calls Black Canary Barbie ‘filth’
Variations on a ThemeL Black Canary Barbie
Action Figure Hub has hi-res images of the first five action figures based on the movie The Spirit. The first five include the title character, The Octopus, Plaster of Paris, Sand Seref and Pathos. They are available for pre-order from Mezco Direct.
– Project Rooftop and Harris Comics have teamed up for a “Vampirella ReVamp” contest.
– David Lasky’s doing a book about the Carter Family.
– The Daily Cross Hatch talks to Jamie Hernandez.
– Our own Tim O’Shea chats up Dirk Deppey.
– DK plans to keep making funnybook-related coffee-table books.
– How much more black could this be? The answer is none. None more black.
– Cripes, I completely forgot that Otakon was last weekend.
– Good lord, people are still griping about that Kramers Ergot volume? Buy it or don’t buy it, just stop complaining about it.
– Not Comics: Clue is being updated. Now you can kill people with a baseball bat.
Compiled by Chris and JK.
– I really don’t need any more tote bags, but if I did, I’d snag this Adrian Tomine-designed one The Strand is selling.
– Here’s the cover for the next Kramers Ergot. And here’s the cover for the next issue of Kevin Huizenga’s Or Else.
– Wow, Franklin’s 40 years old? Now I feel really old.
– Danny Fingeroth picks his favorite comics evar.
– Will no one save the Aquaman hoodie?
– Missed it: Phoebe Gloeckner talks about her current project.
– This just in: Publishers like Comic-Con.
– Chris Arrant profiles Tiki Joe Mysteries.
– The greatest double-page spread in comics history. In my book, anyway. Bully has a few more.
– If Charles Schulz drew Sandman. Via.
– Action Figure Insider has a bunch of toy pictures from the San Diego Comic-Con.
– Time looks at The 99, a comic-book series “based on characters that each personify one of the 99 qualities that the Koran attributes to God.”
– Chris interviews Cul de Sac creator Richard Thompson.
Compiled by JK and Chris.
It was announced before the San Diego Comic-Con, and now Mattel’s collector’s website is live. Unfortunately, you can’t buy anything off of it yet; the four con-exclusive toys they had at the show are listed as “coming soon” and the “add to cart” button on the home page image generates an error.
Update: You can now order the Giganta and Lobo exclusives from San Diego.
– Sam Thielman notes DC has completed its run of Eisner’s The Spirit, and takes a look at the history of the character.
– Chris Arrant looks at The Foundation.
– The LA Times is blogging about comics, though they seem to be mainly focusing on the movie spin-offs.
– Here’s a video interview with Gary Panter.
– And here’s one with Wendy Pini.
– Tim O’Shea talks with Bob Greenberger about The Essential Batman Encyclopedia.
– Take a look at the JLU Question figure.
– Looks like they might be doing a The Dark Knight video game after all.
– “The Secret Origin of Omake!!!”
Compiled by JK and Chris.
More publishers, more creators, more activities, more of everything …
Feel free to keep sending me stuff up until the show starts.
*****
UDON will have a Street Fighter Tribute limited edition hardcover, among other activities …
A British religious group is criticizing Mattel’s new Black Canary Barbie doll, calling it “filth.”
Unveiled in February at the New York Toy Fair, the Black Canary doll is part of a fall line that includes DC Comics superheroines Batgirl, Supergirl and Wonder Woman. Like the character on which it’s based, the Black Canary doll wears fishnet stockings, a motorcycle jacket, gloves and boots.
“Barbie has always been on the tarty side and this is taking it too far,” the Christian Voice is quoted as saying by the tabloid The Sun. “A children’s doll in sexually suggestive clothing is irresponsible — it’s filth.”
In true tabloid fashion, The Sun’s headline reads, “S&M Barbie is lashed by the public.”
Mattel put out a press release on their San Diego plans, which includes an announcement about a new collector’s website that’ll feature exclusive action figures from several of their lines:
Starting the Monday after Comic Con, because you demanded it, Mattel will be launching a brand new Collector Website with the latest news, updates, previews and – the big one – EXCLUSIVE action figures from your favorite Mattel toy lines like CARS, DCU and more! Wait – you want more? – this new site will also be the EXCLUSIVE home of Masters of the Universe Classic action figures with a new character available EACH MONTH starting this fall!
Of course we’ll have more details including the URL name at San Diego Comic Con, but we wanted to make sure to give online toy fans the scoop first. Oh – and to kick off the new online store, we’ll be putting aside a very limited number of each of this year’s SDCC exclusives which will go on sale on the new collector web site at 8:00 am Eastern Standard Time on July 28th.
What would be nice is if the site would offer all the hard-to-find JLU figures that have come out over the last nine months or so. You can read the whole announcement over at Action Figure Insider.
G.I. Joe: Resolute, Hasbro’s upcoming online animated series, will be PG-13 and “designed to bring adult fans back into the market.”
The 10 five-minute episodes and one 10-minute finale, written by Warren Ellis, later may be released on DVD or on television. Resolute is expected to debut online early next year.
Details were revealed this weekend during JoeCon 2008, the international G.I. Joe collectors’ convention.
Toy News International reports that although there will be little to no blood depicted in the series, bullets will replace the lasers of the ’80s cartoon. (Thanks to “The Invisible Hand of Fate” episode of The Venture Bros., I can never think of the cartoon the same way.)
More details can be found at the links.
Thom Zahler, who wrote this week’s I ♥ Toys here on Blog@, shares a few more pictures of the Marvel and DC houses his aunts made for him as a kid. I like Aquaman’s pet seal in the picture above, as well as the fact that while Batman appears to be eating dinner up top, Robin is regulated to cleaning the Batmobile down in the Bat cave. Or sitting on it, anyway.
