TV - Torchwood Season 2

The trailer for BBC's Torchwood Season 2 just hit the web. Season 1 was hit or miss, but Season 2 has appearances from Buffy's James Marsters and Marta Jones from Doctor Who.

Check out the trailer.

TV - Battlestar Galactica Propaganda

This site just posted a set of Battlestar Galactica Propaganda posters. They are very sweet.

Check them out.

Movies - Go Speed Racer Go!!!!

I'm sure you've seen it. But I think it's gonna be fun.

MOVIES - BATMAN

Well the WB has started their marketing campaign for "Batman the Dark Knight". They've been doing some internet viral marketing for months, but this week they turned it up a notch. These 3 posters will be in theaters this week and there will be a 6 minute preview in front of the IMAX screening of I Am Legend along with the 1st trailer for the film.



The trailer hits the web on Monday, but someone posted a pirated copy of it on YouTube today. I would embed it here, but I'm sure it'll get pulled. You can check out the Ain't it cool link HERE.

TOYS - Iron Man the movie figures.

Looks like Hasbro has released some pics of their 1st wave of Iron Man the movie figures. The big news is that these are 6 inch. They tried producing a 5 inch wave for the Spider-man 3 movie line, and failed miserably.


Although from the looks of it they have learned from their mistakes and really raised the bar on these Iron Man the movie figures.

I'll have to see them in person to give them a final rating but for now they look like a

3 of 4 Ass Monkey

TOYS - Wave 03 of DC Superheroes from Mattel.

Some pics just surfaced of Mattel's Wave 03 of DC Superheroes. I thought I'd share. These are scans from the new issue of Toyfare.

This line looks to be fantastic. I only have 2 problems.

1 - I have bought most of these figures from DC Direct. So do I really need to buy them again, cause they might look at little cooler and have better articulation? I think everyone knows the answer to that one.

2 - Mattel is producing these. They have a track recored of poor distribution that will kill most of their lines buy the 3rd wave. They have publicly stated that they are trying to re-think their distribution, in order to not have these issues in the future. So I guess well see.


I'll have to see them in person to give them a final rating but for now they look like a

4 of 4 Ass Monkey

TV - Knight Rider lives again.

Well it was only an matter of time. Knight Rider will be returning to the small screen with David Hasselhoff in tow. NBC has just commissioned a tv movie that could potentially turn into a new series. I guess the series revolves around Michael Knight's son and the next generation of KITT. KITT 2.0 is also now a Ford Mustang. This show could be really cool, or it could be complete crap. I'm betting it will be crap, but you never know. I guess we'll have to wait till next season to know for sure.

You can read all about it HERE on Ain't it Cool News.

COMICS - Batman & The Joker

Well it's a big week for the Joker. 1st we got of some official press images of Heath Ledger as the Joker from "Batman the Dark Knight". I got to say I'm not too crazy about the look. I think Heath Ledger is a fine actor and I'm looking forward to his portrayal of Mr. J, but I think they went too far away from source material for the film. That being said, if the script and the performances are strong enough, then I'm sure I can look past it. I mean I looked past the fact that Alfred didn't have a mustache in "Batman Returns". :)

I give this look a 1 of 4 Ass Monkey

However I reserve the right to change my rating once the film is released. It could potentially go as high as a 3 of 3 Ass Monkey. If you're out there Heath I'm sure you're standing by.

On another Joker note. All-Star Batman and Robin #8 hit the stands last Wednesday. It's the 1st appearance of the Joker is this book. As most of you know I HATE this book. I mean I wouldn't wipe my ass with the pages from this book. It's god awful. Poor Jim Lee's talents are waisted on this POS. The fact that the same guy who wrote Sin City, Daredevil and Dark Knight wrote this crap-fest astounds me.

I do honestly believe that Miller knows what he is writing, he can't be that stupid. He's throwing his shit at the Warner Bros. wall knowing that DC will pay him an ass-load for it.

I know for a fact that he writes this book on the crapper while reading the latest issue of Maxim.










If you read this book knowing that simple fact it can be a fun read. A buddy sent me a link to a humorous article that breaks down the 1st 7 issues. This a MUST read, even if you haven't read any issues of the book. Here is PART 01 and PART 02. check them out, the dude summarizes this book perfectly.

I can't give this book anything more than a 1 of 4 Ass Monkey.

Not even Jim Lee's art can help this rating. If I could give it less I would.

TV - Conan O'Brien vs Walker Texas Ranger

If you like Conan O'Brien and Walker Texas Ranger, then you'll love this clip.

I give it a 3 of 4 ass Monkey

Comics - Midnight Men

There has not been much to blog about the last few weeks, I don't know why, but not much has caught my fancy. Maybe it's the holidays. Anyway I thought I'd share some pages from the comic book I'm producing called "Midnight Men" . Hope you like them. You can read up on all the characters HERE on the Midnight Men blog.

TOYS - TMNT

Now those of you who know me know I'm not a big Ninja Turtles fan. However I know quite a few of you are. I ran across a blog called The 5th Turtle. It's written by the head of Licensing, for the Turtles property. It's got some interesting insight into what it's like to manage an IP as large a the Turtles. By far my favorite post is this one HERE. It discusses the recent shift in power from the licenser to the now ALL POWERFUL Retailer.

TV - Simpsons vs Alan Moore

Last night comics writer Alan Moore had a guest appearance on the Simpsons. It was priceless. I need to score me a copy of Watchmen Babies.

Comics - Pulp it up

Thought I'd share a blog I found today called Pulp Sunday. Every Sunday artist Francesco Francavilla draws a scene from a pulp novel or radio show. He's starting off with one of my favorite pulp heroes, The Shadow.

You can also check out Francesco Francavilla's website HERE.

I give this site a 4 of 4 ass monkey (but how can I not).

TV - Battlestar Galactica: Razor

I was able to get a sneak of this thanks to a heads up from my buddy Chuck. I can't say anything about this, cause it'll spoil the show. All I can say is it kicked all sorts of ASS.

I give it a 4 of 4 Ass Monkey.

Also I recommend that you check out the Battlestar Galactica Flashback webisodes before watching this. They are on the Sci-Fi website. You can check them out HERE.

TV- COBRAAAaaaaaaaaaaaa

I thought this was kinda funny. That crazy Destro.

Art - The Works of Eric Canete

Every couple of moths or so there is a local Comicbook/Sci-Fi convention in LA. I try to attend, if not only to hang out with my friends and eat lunch at my favorite Mexican restaurant, which happens to be around the corner from the con. Well last Sunday a group of us went down to see if we could score any good deals. Also one of the Artist's who's blog I link on this here page, ERIC CANETE was there signing and doing sketches. I posted on his blog that I would stop by, so I did. Eric could not have been nicer. The guy was a true gentleman. Not only was he talking it up with his fans, he was doing sketches for FREE. He even missed out on the AvP 2 presentation so he could do a few sketches for folks (AvP 2 looked great by the way). He was nice enough to do this great Captain America sketch for me. I will be framing it and putting up on my wall.


I even offered to buy him lunch as a thank you, but he graciously declined. What a nice guy. This guy is a tremendous talent and it was great to chat with him and watch him work. As he's based in Los Angeles, I hope to bring him on to do some freelance concept work sometime in the future. Maybe he'll let me pick him up lunch then. If you've got some time, check out his blog. He's got some great art.

Comics - Occasional Superheroine Blog

I just discovered this Blog called Occasional Superheroine. It's written by a chic who has worked in the comics business. She's got some interesting insight to the business of comics as well as some funny comments of other pop culture stuff. It's a fun read. If you like my blog I think you might find this cool as well. I'm gonna add her blog to my links list below.

Movies - American Gangster

So I was lucky enough to attend a Producer's Guild screening of "American Gangster" this weekend followed by a quick Q&A with Producer Brian Grazer.


In 1970s America, detective Richie Roberts (Russell Crowe) works to bring down the drug empire of Frank Lucas (Denzel Washington), a heroin kingpin from Manhattan, who is smuggling drugs into the country from war torn Vietnam.

Click HERE for the trailer.

I could say alot about this movie and ALL of it would be good. Most of the movies I see always have a caveat, like the acting was great, but man did the script suck. Well this movie is all around fantastic. Every aspect of the film is amazing, the writing, the acting, the directing, everything is well crafted. Both Denzel Washington & Russell Crowe are outstanding and although they only share 1 scene on screen they both give great performances. Do yourself a favor and go check this out.

I give this flick a 4 of 4 Ass Monkey

On a side note, I was gonna go see the new Coen Bros movie, "No Country for Old Men", but it turns out the screening was actually the BIG HOLLYWOOD premiere. So we went, walked down the red carpet, and found our seat. Our seats turned out to be poop so we left. I would rather pay for the movie and see it from a good seat, then sit through the premiere in an un-watchable seat, but that's just me.

TV & Movies - Writer's Strike - WTF

As most of you know I work in the entertainment business. It sounds alot more special then it is, as I work in the ass end of business, Visual Effects. However even though I work in VFX there happens to be a HUGE writer's strike looming that could potentially effect my job. Many folks have asked me what the deal is with the strike and although I knew it was happening, I did not know all the details. Well as it turns out I was browsing my usual toy boards this AM and came across this post that gives a pretty good explanation of what's going on with the strike. It's a tad long, but very informative.

What's up with the Writer's Strike?

The WGA is one of the three main guilds in Hollywood along with the Director's Guild(DGA) and Screen Actor's Guild(SAG). Due to various abuses by studios since the beginning of the medium the guilds were formed to protect their members through collective action. The guilds provide members with health care plans, since nearly all jobs in the movie industry are contract work and the employers don't offer any. They manage the royalties issued to their members. This last thing is the main issue in the current situation.

Each guild contains pretty much everyone in their particular craft in Hollywood that actively works with the studios. The major studios have signed agreements with the guilds that they will only employ their members, or individuals who get waivers from the Guild that represents their craft.

There are directors who aren't members of the DGA like Quentin Tarantino, who mostly work with non-Guild signatories. Most actors are in SAG but usually every one joins because it's next to impossible to get work unless you're a member.

Every working writer in Hollywood is a member of the WGA. Every director of a studio film is a member of the DGA, as is every assistant Director(the bulk of the membership). You may recall Robert Rodriguez was going to direct John Carter of Mars for Paramount but had to quit because he gave up his DGA membership to co-direct Sin City with Frank Miller(co-directing a film is against guild rules unless it's a pre-established team, such as the Wachowskis who made the Matrix).

The reason the guilds insist on this is because the situation for writers, director's and actors before the guilds was horrible, with rampant abuse by the studios(we're talking 1920s, 1930s here). Their only strength lies in the group, if a significant number of quality writers weren't members of the WGA then the ones who were members would be black listed, and the abuses would almost certainly start again.

These contracts with the studios expire every few years and get renegotiated each time they end. Sometimes those negotiations go badly and the guild strikes. The last time the WGA struck was 1988. That strike didn't end too well for the WGA and at the last renegotiation the WGA didn't make too good of a deal with the studios, in order to avoid a strike.

The main issues this time are that the writer's want an increased percentage of dvd sales(they currently get 4¢ for every dvd sold of a movie they have written, they want 8¢ per dvd) and to negotiate a percentage of any revenue from internet downloads. Currently that revenue is negligible but they're planning for the future. Also there are certain issues that writers want resolved, such as studios demanding free rewrites on screenplays they buy, whereas they used to pay per draft.

The studios initially wanted all revenue sharing to end, but that was not a serious demand and they took it off the table to make themselves appear to be reasonable.

The Writer's Guild contract has ended at 12:01am November 1st. The Screen Actor's Guild and Director's Guild of America contracts end on June 1st. The thinking is that the WGA was going to wait until June 1st to strike, working until that time without a contract(following the terms of the now expired one) and going on strike with SAG, who have their own complaints. The DGA has only struck once in their entire history, for six minutes. They're traditionally the ones to lead the way to a new deal, as they are both the most conservative and most powerful union(no films or tv shows being possible without their membership).

The past several months has seen the studios stockpiling and fast-tracking movie projects based on the belief that the strike would happen in June. This was meant to give them a surplus of material to release in the event of a strike. This was a fairly well known strategy and the Writer's Guild decided that they'd be stupid to give the studios so much time to prepare, so they decided to threaten to strike early when it would do far more damage.

As it stands right now as I write this the Writer's Guild contract has expired and the negotiations have ceased, the WGA can go on strike at any moment, they are expected to do so starting next week.

What this means to the audience is that all tv production aside from reality shows will necessarily cease by the end of November due to lack of scripts. There are several episodes in the can for most shows(not sitcoms) but only 2-3 at best. No movies in preproduction can move forward(rewrites are constant until date of production begins, and sometimes throughout), so if a movie has not started shooting yet, such as the Justice League movie, it likely will not begin until the strike is over(assuming one is called).

Beware of what you read about this situation in newspapers and magazines and movie websites. All of those places entirely depend on studio advertising to survive, so there is not even a real assumption of neutrality there. If they upset the studios they can and will go out of business. If they upset the WGA they will be fine.

This is not a situation like when the baseball players went on strike, where millionaires were complaining about being shortchanged by the team owners. None of the rich WGA members stand to benefit from any new deal, they already have a better deal than what will be negotiated. The deal being negotiated is for the minimum terms available to a writer.

This will solely benefit the lowest rung of writers, who are not rich and have to work very hard to make a living. The number of top tier writers is 20 or so, the total number of WGA members is upwards of 12,000.

The same is true of the Screen Actors Guild, where the really rich and famous(or even semi-famous) actors are less than 1% of the total membership.

- fin

Movies - Superman 2 needs new writers, and it's not Mark Millar.

So earlier this week it was announced by Warner Bros. that the writers of "Superman Returns" would not be back for the sequel. As you can image fandom as a whole was pretty broken up about it. Oh wait...I'm lying, I think the general consensus is that these 2 douches could go pound on each other and noone would by tickets. I mean really did anyone like "Superman Returns"?

Needless to say, WB is looking for a new writer. Enter comics writer Mark Millar. Mark is one of the better comic book writers to emerge over the last few years. With the exception of Civil War, most of the stuff is great, His titles include, The Authority, The Ultimates, Ultimate X-Men, Wanted, etc... Well on Tuesday, he wrote on his blog that he'd try to throw his hat in the ring to write the Superman sequel... for free. Then a mere 24 hrs later WB put the kibosh on the whole deal. On Wednesday Millar announced that he'll not be writing the next movie. You can read his account HERE.

The reason that WB won't even consider him is that, he's currently an exclusive writer for Marvel, and as WB owns DC, he basically writes for their direct competition. Although Millar was very nice about it on his blog, you can tell this is a big load of BS. First of all the studios hire all sorts of writers, who have written films for other studios, who are also their "competition". Secondly Millar's Marvel contract runs out in 1 year, so by the time this movie would have been released (at least 2 years from now) DC could snag him up and he could be writing books for them.

This is just a spin on WB's part cause I'm sure they have other folks lined up and they want to make a big PR deal out of it. Which is too bad cause I'm sure Millar would have hit one out of the park. Now if WB could just get rid of Byran Singer and re-launch the franchisee everyone would be happy.

Comics - Online comics..to download or not?

As many of you know I download my comic books. If I read the book and like It, I pick up the trade. This way my money supports worth-while material. Most of my friends are on the fence about downloads, as it's waaay illegal. My feeling is why should I pay for something if it's gonna suck. Especially if someone else like advertisers are paying for it already. It's not like comics don't have ads, they do. And not just for other comics, that I would be okay with, but you have to dig though ad-upon-ad for movies, games and deodorant. At least with other things I do pay for blindly, like movies, I only have to sit though a few trailers, of other movies, before I can see if I've wasted my money. Also with movies I get a "trailer" to see if I'm gonna like the movie. Not that a good trailer means a good movie, but do you get that with comics? No, you do not. All you know is if the cover looks good and who's writing and drawing the book. Plus 60% of the time the cover artist is not the artist of the book itself....anyway I could go on and on, but I digress.

The point of all this is that I come across a website today that you can download comics (among other print material, like books) legally. This site is called Wowio.com. CBR did a review of it in their Pipeline column called "MORE COMICS ON-LINE". Basically you sign up, which it kind of a pain cause they ask you a bunch of questions, but after that you're on your way. They don't have any main-stream books as of yet, but they have lots of indies you can check out. They limit you to 3 downloads and day and each downloadable pdf is bookend with an advertisement. Not bad as you're getting it for FREE. You can also set up a que like Net-filcks, so you know what you can download everyday.

I see this as the future of comics, as my friend Chuck says, " the comic companies are going to wake up one day and their lunch is going to be gone". It's really only a matter of time.

I give this site a 3 out of 4 Ass Monkey

Movies - The NEW Star Trek

Well Paramount cast the new Star Trek. What do you think?


How long till Lucas decides to re-make the original trilogy I wonder.

Art - Jose Holder & Dan McDaid

CBR is doing their annual talent search for artists again this year called Comic Book Idol. You can check out this years entries and see who's winning HERE. Out of the 10 they picked I found 2 guys I really liked, Jose Holder & Dan McDaid.

Jose Holder

Jose Holder has a Barry-Winser Smith + Walt Simionson + Larry Stroman thing going on. You can check out his blog HERE.

Dan McDaid

Dan McDaid is a mix of Bruce Tim & Dwayne Cook. You can check out some of his art HERE.

Toys - DC Direct - SHOWCASE PRESENTS SERIES 1

DC Direct is putting out a new series of figures based on their Showcase line.

Four DC characters are presented here as they were portrayed by some of their top artists! This inaugural series includes Superman by Curt Swan, Batgirl by Carmine Infantino, Hawkman by Joe Kubert, and Jonah Hex by Tony DeZuniga. Each figure features multiple points of articulation and a base.

JONAH HEX
HAWKMAN
SUPERMAN
BATGIRL

THE BEST PART IS THAT THE SUPERMAN FIGURE INCLUDES ALTERNATE RED KRYPTONITE HEADS.

That red kryptonite is some messed up shit. I mean look at this:

Art - The War In Iraq: A Soldiers Perspective

I came across this animation today thru an email chain at work. It was created by U.S. Army Specialist Colby Buzzell and details the events of a battle in Iraq. It's pretty cool. The art and storytelling is pretty amazing. I watched it with the sound off at 1st and was surprised how good it was visually. I give it a

4 out of 4 Ass Money

The War In Iraq: A Soldiers Perspective - Watch more free videos

TV - Moonlight

From our friends at TV.com.
Moonlight follows Mick St. John (Alex O'Loughlin), an immortal vampire and private investigator and his struggle to exist after he was bitten 60 years ago by his vampire bride on their wedding night. It also follows his internal torment as he falls in love with one he should not, one who is mortal named Beth (Sophia Myles), a news reporter, as well as his dealings with the woman who made him a vampire, his sire Coraline (Shannyn Sossamon).

WOW!!! is this bad. I'm mean it's Alias season 3 bad. It's like a 4th grader wrote this crap. It opens with a voice-over exposition of the lead character Private Eye Mick St. John talking about being a 60 year old vampire and how cool it is. I mean really, is this necessary? Really, come on. This whole show is so cliché, it's like a joke but no one is laughing. The story meanders on as Mick St. John (god, I love that name) solves this episodes big "who done it". Along the way we discover some of Mick's back story and it revolves around a little girl he saved back in the 80's. We'll it turns out it's twenty years later and she grew up to be a internet news reporter named Beth and is smoking hot. ( go figure) Mick is of course falling in love with her, but alas she is the forbidden fruit as he saved her as a child and it would be creepy if they "did it"...Or would it?

The show is made for fans of the "Gilmore Girls" and the "Princess Diaries", who as you can imagine are mostly women. The only saving grace is a few of the minor background characters. They have Jason Dohring (Logan Echolls from Veronica Mars) as Josef Konstantin, a centuries old vampire, and St. John's mentor. He is horribly miss-cast, but fun to see on the screen again. Also Kevin Weisman (Marshall Flinkman from Alias) plays a super small role as Beth's cameraman, although he is not on the cast list for future episodes I hope he shows up again.

I might turn in for episode 02 as I like to give even bad tv a few episodes. Heck as most of you know I stuck with Alias till the bitter end. But for now I give this show

1 of 4 Ass Monkey.