and what he does is accidentally get caught in Spring Break fever.

Presented as a love letter for Logan, by Jason Latour (Daredevil: Black and White, Loose Ends, and of course, Wolverine) and art by Robbi Rodriguez (Uncanny X-Force, Polly and the Pirates 2, and the upcoming Collider). What starts as a misadventure for Logan as he comes across an old dive he frequents for Bike Week mistakenly during Spring Break, ends with some pretty funny and violent moments. It’s almost like something that would have appeared in Marvel’s Strange Tales.

Completely unauthorized, but absolutely insane, check out the rest of Sping Break Wolverine, but be warned that last page will catch you off guard.

Snikt.

Remember when I told you Nicolas Cage was a vampire. Would you believe this? John Travolta is a time traveler! This explains so much.

Yup, another Victorian-era individual bears a striking resemblence to a Hollywood star has surfaced and is being sold on Ebay. And according to The Hollywood Reporter, the woman selling this photo and the man who was attempting to sell the one of “Nicolas Cage” are friends. “The woman, who prefers to go only by Fawn, says she and Jack Mord, the man behind the Cage ‘vampire’ photo are both collectors of Victorian era post-mortem photography,” said THR.

The asking price for the Cage/vampire photo was $1 million, Fawn was asking for only $50,000 for the Travolta/time traveler. The Face/Off jokes are too numerous.

“Earlier this summer, Jack was joking about his Nicolas Cage vampire photograph and that he was listing it on eBay and I told him about my John Travolta time traveler ambrotype and he said list it because they were a good match,” she told THR. ”We were just having a good time.”

Fawn told THR the most she was offered for the photo was $35,000 but has not heard from Travolta himself. ”Most people were curious and just thought the photo was fake or that I was weird. It’s a really cool photograph but I never thought it would cause this sort of hoopla… funny.”

We here at Newsarama have found corroborating evidence that Travolta is indeed, a time traveler.

Have a great weekend kids…

This story couldn’t be anymore ridiculous, thus I had to share. A seller on Ebay was offering a photo which he claims proves Nicolas Cage is a vampire. The listing has since disappeared.

The Hollywood Reporter caught it and says a Seattle-based man was asking $1 million for what he says was a photo taken in 1870 of a Tennessee man. A man he believes resembles Cage far too much to be a coincidence. “Personally, I believe it’s him,” wrote the seller, “and that he is some sort of walking undead / vampire, et cetera, who quickens / reinvents himself once every 75 years or so. 150 years from now, he might be a politician, the leader of a cult, or a talk show host.”

Nothing has ever made more sense in this crazy world we live in.

The seller insisted it was for real and that the photo was taken around the time of the Civil war. There were 76 offers on the photo before the listing was removed, all were declined by the seller. He did however have several inquiries which he answered:

“Do I get a discount if I AM Nicolas Cage?” (yes, 25 percent)  and “Nick Cage has aged terribly in the past 10 years, he’s obviously not been drinking his daily amount of blood to stay young.” The answer to the second question is “My theory is that he allows himself to age to a certain point, maybe 70, 80 or so, then the actor ‘Nicolas Cage’ will ‘die’… but in reality, the undead vampire ‘Nicolas Cage’ will have rejuvenated himself and appeared in some other part of the world, young again, and ready to start all over. From time to time somebody might mention to him that he bears a slight resemblance to the young version that dead American actor, whose name they can’t recall, but eventually, those occurrences will stop altogether.”

THR writes, “As of Sept. 22, eBay had a message that read, ‘This listing (260821098271) has been removed, or this item is not available’ and advised those seeking the photo to ‘Please check that you’ve entered the correct item number’ and ‘Listings that have ended 90 or more days ago will not be available for viewing.’”

I think we can safely assume Cage TOTALLY bought the photo to keep his secret. I always knew there was something strange about him…

A few months ago we showed you a letter column from one Frank Miller about Amazing Spider-Man from 1977. Now, another letter to Marvel has surfaced, this time from A Song of Ice and Fire series author George R .R. Martin.

The image comes to us courtesy of Coheed and Cambria singer and comic creator Claudio Sanchez who tweeted it today. The letter, published in Avengers #12, was the fantasy author showing his profound love for Fantastic Four #32 and Avengers #9. “I have finally come to the decision to have both mounted in bronze and set on a pedestal in the center of my living room,” he wrote.

The issue of the Avengers was written by Stan Lee with art by Don Heck in 1964, both of whom Martin thought were extremely talented. “What a story! It was beyond words; the fast-paced action, solid characterization, and that terrific ending all gave it that extra oomph an catapulted it into the great class. Stan old boy, you can put another notch in your pen for this materpiece,” he wrote, “And that art! I’ve always like Don Heck’s work but on this occasion he outdid himself.”

And even though Martin enjoyed the issue of FF, he was very particular about which villains should and should not continue on in the series. “I feel that the only foes of the F.F. has worthy of becoming regulars are Namor, Doc Doom, the Hulk and the Rd Ghost. A few others, like the Hate Monger and the Molecule Man, were great in their first appearance but still not worthy of returns, as a comeback would destroy the effect of the first tale,” he wrote, “Some others like the Thinker, the Puppet Master, the Moleman and Diablo have definitely deserved eternal exile…please, whatever else you do, do not bring back these chaps.”

Come on, tell us how you really feel George! I love when these things surface. Martin was all of 16 when he wrote to the letter column, just one year before he won an Alley Award for ”Powerman vs. The Blue Barrier,” his own superhero story and 47 years before his series would be adapted to the HBO series Game of Thrones. With all his success maybe he did manage to bronze the issues. I’m betting not but I’m sure he still owns them, he’s a long-time Marvel fan and collector of Silver Age comics.

via Agent M Loves Tacos

You all know I had some strong thoughts over DC’s decision to take Barbara Gordon out of the chair and return her to Batgirl duty. Well, it’s long past due Babs had a chance to speak for herself. Here are her semi-sensored thoughts on the DC relaunch…

That’s comedy gold right there.

Barbara Gordon is really Teal Sherer. You may know her better as Venom, the vicious video game vixen from Felicia Day’s web series The Guild. Sherer, like Oracle, is a paraplegic, having broken her spine in a car accident when she was fourteen. So as you can imagine, just like I do, she has a very strong connection to the DC comics character and also like the character and myself, Sherer doesn’t let her disability get in her way. Or stop her from making hilarious videos.

Check out the trailer for Sherer’s “My Gimpy Life,” which premiered at the ITV Festival earlier this month.

Geek hosts Blair Herter and Jessica Chobot took their relationship to the next step over the weekend and got engaged with a little help from Wonder Woman and Jim Lee.

The pair simultaneously made the announcement via their Twitter feeds with Herter tweeting, “In a lifetime of affirmation, this was the best “Yes” I’ve heard. Luckiest guy alive.” With his statement, the X-Play host also posted this picture…

Herter, knowing his girlfriend was a huge Wonder Woman fan, had DC artist and co-publisher Jim Lee create this piece specifically to ask for her hand in marriage. Chobot retweeted the picture with this note, “YES!!!!! @blairherter and a ginormous thank you to @JimLee00 for the incredible art! We’ll treasure it always!” And Herter echoed her sentiments on the one-of-a-kind piece, “Massive massive thanks to @jimlee00 for the art. It will always be our most treasured piece.”

The IGN Strategize host then tweeted a picture of her unique engagement ring.

As you can see, the ring is Wonder Woman inspired, and was designed by Herter himself according to Chobot. You can see the lasso/star detail on the left but I can’t quite make out the details on the other side. Either way, it’s gorgeous.

No word on whether or not the proposal was a surprise but Chobot’s last tweet before the announcement was that her and Herter were going on a mini-vacation to San Diego for “sunshine and tattoos,” so it may well have been. Herter thanked everyone for their heartfelt congratulations on the engagement and said, “I promise our future Intergalactic Space Ninja offspring will protect your families against the robots.”

Congratulations to Herter and Chobot and here’s to a comic-themed wedding!

Some of you folks are headed to San Diego and some of us at Newsarama will be there! And two of us in particular hope that you’ll come say hello!

For the past couple of months, Jill Pantozzi and I have been hosting the podcast Crazy Sexy Geeks, an off-shoot of my web-series of the same name. Each week, we not only discuss the latest in pop culture and comic book news, we also give out fun dating advice for geeks! Those weeks where we don’t give out specific advice, we get to share fun/embarrassing dating stories that help illustrate what NOT to do. We also have fun guests, such as Jessica Mills of the web-series Awkward Embraces and Kristin Reilly of GeekGirlsNetwork.com.

If you haven’t been listening, you really should. We’re available on iTunes and you can download the audio files directly at http://CrazySexyGeeks.libsyn.com. Jill and I will both be wandering the floor of SDCC, so if you have ideas for topics we can discuss on the show in upcoming weeks, please feel free to let us know! You can follow our progress through the con via our Twitter feeds: @TheNerdyBird and @SizzlerKistler.

And if you have any fun questions or dating stories to share, feel free to drop a line at Jill’s Tumblr account and/or at my e-mail: AlanSizzlerKistler@gmail.com. Until next time, cheers!

You may have already seen the Captain America: The First Avenger food and beverages at Dunkin Donuts across the nation but it turns out the company is going one step farther than the run of the mill movie promotions. Dunkin’ Donuts and Baskin-Robbins are teaming with Marvel and Facebook for a contest celebrating the U.S. military.

With all the wacky promotional tie-ins we see these days, this one seems like a breath of fresh air. It’s called “America’s Super Soldiers.” From the press release:

Beginning today through July 15, 2011, fans can visit Dunkin’ Donuts’ or Baskin-Robbins’ official Facebook pages to nominate a veteran or active serviceperson, answering short questions about why their Super-Soldier is making a difference in their hometown and/or the communities in which they serve. The grand prize winning Super-Soldier, as selected by Dunkin’ Donuts, Baskin-Robbins and a representative from the USO, will win a cash prize of $5,000, a new high-definition television, a new Blu-Ray DVD player and a selection of DVD movies in which Dunkin’ Donuts and Baskin-Robbins products are featured.  And as a thank you, the nominator of the grand prize winner will also win a $1,000 cash prize and a $100 Dunkin’ Donuts Card.  Please visit the [Facebook app page] for official rules.

“Dunkin’ Brands is thrilled to partner with Marvel Studios to bring the excitement of Captain America: The First Avenger to our guests, and we are particularly proud that our America’s Super-Soldiers contest provides an opportunity to continue our tradition of recognizing both U.S. veterans and active servicemen and women who give selflessly,” said John Costello, Chief Global Marketing and Innovation Officer at Dunkin’ Brands. “We hope everyone will help us recognize these real-life heroes whose commitment to our local communities makes such a difference to so many people,” he said. The chain is also holding an instant win game and sweepstakes to win a trip to a Marvel film premiere in 2012 on their official website.

Besides putting a charitable spin on what is normally a pure promotional tool, I think it’s fantastic they actually have the USO involved in this too. Of course, if you don’t know of anyone to nominate you can still get a huge sugar rush with a Captain America Coollata in a First Avenger Tri-Cup, a Captain America Donut or a Stars & Stripes donut at participating locations.

There’ve been some great Green Lantern trailer parodies the last few weeks, the Onion’s version as well as The Muppets, but none of them hold a candle to this reenactment of the film by a few adorable kids. See Abin Sur and Hal Jordan in action and make sure to keep an eye out for the special cameo at the end.

What’s a lantern? You know, that may be the one thing they didn’t explain in the movie…

With Oracle gone from the DCU, it was only a matter of time before the Birds of Prey put their headquarters in the Gotham Clocktower up for sale. Did you know it actually resided in Brooklyn, New York?

Located at 1 Main Street in Brooklyn, the building overlooks the Manhattan Bridge and the New York Harbor. I’m not making this up. There actually is a Clocktower building. In fact, I was just telling Gail Simone about it last week. I see the building while driving into Brooklyn to see my boyfriend and every time I thought, “Man, I gotta look up that building so I can write about its amazing likeness to the Birds of Prey headquarters.” The last time I drove by, I even thought how cool it would be if the clock part of the building was an actual apartment. Sure enough, this listing popped up on Yahoo news.

The actual Clocktower portion of the building holds a triplex penthouse apartment. In 2009, the asking price for the whole shebang? $25 million. Well a few months ago it went back on the market (I can’t believe there weren’t any takers!) for a mere $23.5 million. Turns out, the wealthy Gothamites, I mean, Brooklynites, weren’t biting on the 7,000-square-foot abode. So they decided to try something else.

The gigantic apartment is now for rent instead. For $50,000 a month. Well in THAT case! *reaches into pocket*

Currently, the Clocktower apartment sits atop Brooklyn’s most-expensive real estate list. The website Brownstoner writes, “According to StreetEasy, second-place honors go to 11 Cranberry, which can be had for $22,000 a month.” More details from the New York Times, “The main floor of the sleek modern apartment is dominated by four working clocks housed in four 14-foot-high round windows, which provide nearly unobstructed views (except for the clock faces) out to the four points of the compass.

“The 3,000-square-foot main floor has an open living room, dining room and kitchen with 16-foot-high ceilings,” writes the NYT, “There are three bedrooms on the 2,300-square-foot second floor (watch your head as you walk along the exterior walls), and on the floor above that, a 988-square-foot open loft with a 15-foot ceiling. Finally, up a narrow staircase at the very top of the building is a tiny windswept crow’s nest.”

There’s no name listed on the building, just a company. But that’s classic Oracle. I’m sure the real ownership runs through several dummy companies anyway. And just for the record, there’s an elevator in the apartment.

If you like hearing a grown woman cry, follow me on Twitter. I’m weeping over this. And buying a lottery ticket.

Jim Shooter on visual storytelling:

Let me tell you the secrets of visual storytelling. Again, we’re in the business of storytelling—that’s our number one priority. We’re here to tell a story. What is storytelling? As I was telling you writers, it’s conveying information. CONVEYING INFO. As Frank Miller once said, when he had the epiphany and went from being a talented young artist/writer to being a genius, “I get it. We know the story and they (the readers) don’t, and we’re telling them the story!”

I hear a lot of you thinking, “duh, no kidding.” Listen to me. How many comics have you read in which the artist is more concerned with drawing lots of pin-up shots so he can sell the pages for more money at conventions than getting across what’s happening? How many have you read where the writer is so busy showing how cleverly he or she can do snappy patter that they fail to convey who these people are and why we should care about them?

When you get it into your head that you need a good story to tell, and that telling it—well—is the mission, you’re making the same jump to lightspeed that Miller made that one fine day.

File under: He may be wrong a lot of the time (See Gary Groth’s response to Shooter’s explanation of what happened between Jack Kirby and Marvel in the ’70s and 80s: “Has anyone falsified a moment in comics history more persistently than Jim Shooter?” he asks), but when he’s right…

Correct me if I’m wrong but putting on a cape doesn’t actually *make* you a superhero, right? Well, Florida officials are now investigating why one unemployment agency in the state spent $14,000 to buy red capes for 6000 unemployed citizens. Yes, this actually happened.

The agency, Workforce Central Florida, had an idea to start a campaign called ”Cape-a-Bility Challenge.” It gave both job seekers and employers the chance to win $1000 prize packs. In order to do so, WCF asked them to participate in various activities like taking a Facebook quiz titled, “Which superhero are you?” liking the WCF Facebook page, reccomending someone on LinkedIn using the word “super,” tweet a job opening from their website or take a photo with Dr. Evil Unemployment. Yes, they even made up their own supervillain.  (more…)

As if Mjolnir wasn’t big enough, Marvel decided to go extra large with their new Thor movie standee (you know, those giant cardboard things in theater lobbies).

I was all prepared to find one and take a silly picture with it when I read Marvel is holding a fun contest of sorts for just that type of thing. From Marvel.com:

“[We] wanted to let you know that once the standee begins appearing in movie theaters across the country on March 18 you can send in photos of yourself and your friends standing next to it to a special Flickr page! After you submit your photo with Mjolnir to flickr.com/groups/thorstandees, we’ll review and pick select photos to appear here on Marvel.com!

Thor will hit theaters May 6, the standee will, I’m sure, hit many defenseless patrons on March 18.

The comic book in which Spider-Man made his first appearance went for an amazing $1.1 million in a transaction Monday night. That’s gonna buy a lot of web shooters.

Amazing Fantasy #15, written by Stan Lee , with a cover by Jack Kirby and interior art by Steve Ditko, was originally published in 1962 and sold to many for just 12 cents. (Sales for the issue were some of the highest for Marvel at the time.) These days, they’re a little harder to come by. This particular comic was graded 9.6 or near-mint, plus, and was sold by ComicConnect.com from a private seller to an undisclosed buyer. Aren’t they always? WHO ARE THESE RICH GEEKS AND DOES ONE WANT TO HELP ME OUT WITH MY CAR INSURANCE?!

I digress.

The sale now makes Amazing Fantasy #15 the second most expensive comic ever behind Superman’s debut in Action Comics which went for $1.5 million last year. However, it is the most money ever shelled out for a Silver Age book.

Chief Executive and Founder of ComicConnect, Stephen Fishler, said in a statement Tuesday, “People have often wondered how much this near-perfect condition book would sell for, and today we found out.”

I need a Doctor…Who t-shirt. Or five.

Today the internet has blessed us with some fantastic new Doctor Who inspired t-shirt designs. Hurry though, some of these are only up for one day.

From artist ZeroBriant comes “The Whos.” Or more appropriately, The (Doctor) Whos. Classic British show, classic British rock group. Makes sense to me. Via Teefury.

From New York City’s Anna-Marie Jung comes this spacial bending image called “Who Needs Gravity?” I believe if the Doctor ever goes back in time to visit M.C. Escher, this is what it would look like. Bonus points for adorable Doctors. Via Woot.

From the birthplace of Doctor Who, the U.K.’s Billy Allison gives us “Crack,” the opposite view of what we saw all through Season 5. And there’s a discount on this one thanks to Doctor Who News! Via Qwertee.

TheOneTrueBix has late night talk show host Craig Ferguson to thank for inspiring this one. As shown in this lost cold-open from the show, this is what makes the Doctor, the Doctor. Via MySoti.

Perhaps this one wasn’t meant to include a Doctor Who reference but I’m taking the liberty of crossing the fandom streams here and calling it an overt Star Wars joke with a subtle nod to “bowties are cool.” From D4N13L comes “Imperial Bowtie Fighter.” Via Ript Apparel.

Many politicians use “going green” as a platform these days but in his State of the City address this morning, Austin Mayor Lee Leffingwell wasn’t talking about his city becoming environmentally friendly, he dropped one hell of a geek reference.

“If New York is Superman; and Chicago is Batman; and Los Angeles is the Flash; then Austin is the Green Lantern,” said the Texas politician.

We all know the fictional home of Green Lantern Hal Jordan is Coast City, usually compared to real world California cities like San Diego or Los Angeles, but Leffingwell is staking the claim for Austin.

Anyone can name superheroes in a speech but it seems Leffingwell really knows his stuff. “We are a city without fear,” he continued, “We are a city that can create anything we can visualize, through sheer force of will. We are a city with a special charge to shine a light into the darkness and lead the way to a new and better day.”

The mayor also spoke of his cities inhabitants as, ”smart, driven, courageous and compassionate people. People who make things happen. People who keep moving forward no matter what.”

So he messed up the real-world correlation for where the Flash lives but I think we can forgive him after that amazing speech, don’t you?

In his speech, Leffingwell also mentioned breaking ground on a new 800-room hotel in downtown Austin in the next year. His goal? ”We will rock it to the top of convention destinations,” he said.

Build it, and geeks will come.

via Big Shiny Robot and KXAN.com

Fans of the short-lived space western Firefly have been eager to see more of their favorite characters since the show was canceled back in 2002. They got their wish with Joss Whedon’s feature film Serenity and again with a series of comic books from Dark Horse. But with the recent news that the lone season of Firefly will once again be airing on cable television, the fever has re-ignited. Fans are now petitioning for Firefly’s star Nathan Fillion to purchase the rights to the series so that it may go back into production. And they’re willing to foot the bill.

According to Entertainment Weekly, fans have created a website and a Facebook page dedicated to the cause. “Help Nathan Buy Firefly” may sound like a ridiculous venture but crazier things have happened. I mean, we did see a feature film made out of this extremely short-live television series after all.

When the news of Firefly coming back to cable was announced, Fillion told EW, “If I got $300 million from the California Lottery, the first thing I would do is buy the rights to Firefly, make it on my own, and distribute it on the Internet.”

Well, that’s all he needed to say. The movement went into immediate action with Fillion’s colleagues even getting in on the fun. From EW:

Jose Molina, a producer on Syfy’s Haven, former Castle producer and author of two Firefly episodes tweeted Friday regarding Fillion’s comment: “For what it’s worth, I’ve told him I’d drop what I was doing and follow.”

Then Jane Espenson, writer of a Firefly episode, a producer on Battlestar Galactica and co-creator of Warehouse 13, replied to Molina: “I’m there, if needed.”

EW also points out, Fillion wouldn’t need nearly the amount of money he mentioned to purchase the rights seeing as how the Terminator franchise recently went for only $30 million and that had a far more successful past.

Now of course, none of this means the people who own the rights currently, 20th Century Fox, have any intention of selling them. And the fans aren’t asking anyone to put up money just yet (so be wary if someone does ask you). But you can’t take the sky from a Firefly fan.

I’m not sure if you’ve noticed but there’s this little event going over at Top Cow now called “Artifacts”. Ring any bells?

Sarcasm aside, one of the great selling points on Artifacts isn’t just the fantastic story (so far) that’s being architectured by Ron Marz, but he’s working on a rotating team of artists. Recently it was announced that Jeremy Haun (Detective Comics, Berserker) will join the rotation, picking up where Whilce Portacio leaves off.

Blog@ spoke briefly with Marz about the artists he’s been working with and the great chemistry between story and art, as well as working with Jeremy Haun.

Blog: Okay, so, first it was Michael Broussard, then Whilce Portacio, and now Jeremy Haun — who approached who about working on Artifacts? You or Jeremy?

RM: Top Cow publisher Filip Sablik was the matchmaker here. When he knew Jeremy was signing an exclusive with Top Cow, Filip called me up and asked what I thought of Jeremy taking the last on the third arc of Artifacts. Took me all of two seconds to say yes, as Jeremy is somebody I’ve been wanting to work with for a while. We actually talked about working together last year, but I don’t think either of us expected it to fall into place this quickly.

Blog@: Some say Whilce Portacio is doing some of his best work in a long time working on Artifacts, what is it about this story you think that elevates these artists to a whole other level?

RM: I certainly agree, I think this is some of Whilce’s strongest stuff ever, but I’m a bit biased obviously. Whoever I’m working with, whatever project I’m working on, a big part of my job is to play to the artists’ strengths and give them something they’re excited about drawing. Comics are a visual medium, so the scripts need to be as visual as possible. Otherwise, what’s the point? I also think you have to mention Joe Weems on inks and Sunny Gho on colors. They’re both bringing their best as well, so they make a great team with Whilce.

Blog@: Who’s on your shortlist of the artists you’d love to have on the final installment of Artifacts? Or do you already have somebody in mind?

RM: My shortlist has one name on it for who should draw issue #13, and that’s who’s drawing it.

Artifacts: Volume 1 is on sale now.

By Lan Pitts and Zack Smith

Two years ago, Wednesday Comics took the business by storm with its breath of fresh air approach to comics as it collected stories from various creators, touching on characters from Superman to Batman, to lesser known characters like Kamandi (well, lesser known to most people outside comic readers). It is confirmed that there is a sequel in progress, with Steve Rude working on a New Gods story. With that in mind, we took the liberty to come up with some pretty interesting combinations and dream teams that we’d love to see in the upcoming WC2.

Evan “Doc” Shaner on Captain Marvel: Shaner came to my attention last summer when Jeff Parker told me he was going to be huge; shortly after that, I was alerted to his gorgeous Captain Marvel pieces on his site and on ComicTwart. Not only does he have a great style for the character combined with a deep and abiding love for his mythology, but several of his pieces work as beautiful stand-alone Sunday pages themselves — just check out this masterpiece from last September. The man’s practically doing the job already. Might as well pay him for it.  – ZS

Mike Carey and Fiona Staples on Zatanna: It’s hardly any secret I’m a fan of Zatanna. While she finally has her own ongoing, I’d love to see Mike Carey (The Unwritten, X-Men) teamed up with Mystery Society artist Fiona Staples. Staples has been on the cusp of superstardom for a while now as she also worked on DV8 with Aaron Williams and a few covers for Superman/Batman. Both Carey and Staples have dabbled with supernatural forces on their resume and I would love to see them work together on a Zatanna strip. It could be quite magical. — LP

Paul Pope on the Atomic Knights: All right, this is a repeat creator from the first round, but Pope’s Adam Strange was one of the absolute joys of the series — a creator bringing his voice and visual style to a classic character, with surprises and fun throughout. Afterward, it occurred to me that he would be a perfect fit for the characters who shared reprint space with Adam Strange in STRANGE ADVENTRES in the 1970s — the absolute weirdness of their one cover appearance has haunted me since I was a kid (I’m meaning to commission Matt Kindt to do a recreation of it next time I see him at a con).

So obsessed am I with Paul Pope rendering giant Dalmatians and mole men that I started a Facebook group for this last year. As it happenes, I asked Mark Chiarello about this at one con, and he loved the idea — as did Pope when I brought it up to him at another show a few months later. In fact, he raved about DC’s hardcover reprint of the series, and even drew a quick Atomic Knights doodle. There’s only two caveats — first, Pope wants to get his long-gestating Battling Boy done, and second, Pope says that Dan DiDio is protective of the Atomic Knights and Kamandi, and already turned down a Pope/Brian Azzarello Kamandi proposal (you can see those pictures onlinehere). Give the man a chance, Dan — he’ll craft the most memorable story with those characters since the Silver Age.– ZS

(more…)

DC Comics’ popular line of manga-style superheroine statues have been transformed into Halloween costumes for the masses. Really? Yes, really.

I’m not quite sure what to say about this. I’m mostly just surprised these exist at all. I mean, they’re costumes based solely on action figures with costumes that haven’t appeared in the comics. And the weirder part is, they don’t look half bad if you consider what most store-bought superheroine costumes look like.

I mean, who knows what they’ll actually feel like in person but they seem decent from where I’m looking. It’s important to note, the Ame-Comi designs have been very popular with cosplayers looking for something new and different to challenge their costume-making skills on the convention circuit the last year.

Online store Costume Craze seems to have the exclusive rights to the Ame-Comi costumes right now and so far just have Wonder Woman, Catwoman and Supergirl in production. But you can bet if these do well you can expect to see them everywhere and probably Robin, Poison Ivy or even perhaps *gasp* a Star Sapphire costume to capitalize on the Green Lantern film hitting theaters this summer.

Costume Craze says they’ll be available for pre-order soon and in stock in the summer but no prices have been revealed. Expect them to be somewhere in the $59.99-$79.99 range just like all the other overpriced Halloween costumes out there.

What’s your take on these? Are you as surprised as I am they’ve been created?

(via Topless Robot)