EXCITING NEWS!

Today is an exciting day, folks!

First off, we have The Siegels getting the rights back to Superman! I'm very much for the old school creators of icons getting their due. Additionally, this will force Warner Brothers to fast track any possible Justice League notions and Superman/Batman thoughts, which may or may not be a bad thing.* In any case, I'm really interested to see what the Siegel estate will do with the character in 2013.

Secondly, AMC, the home of Mad Men and Breaking Bad, have picked up Robert Kirkman's The Walking Dead to make into a TV series!** While it's not a series I follow in regular issues, I've been a fan of the series in trade format. This is not your typical zombie story. It's not one of those "hack by numbers" movies where everyone dies in two hours, amusingly or not. The Walking Dead tells a much more interesting story - how people survive day to day in a hopeless, horrible world. It's a lot smarter, moodier and character driven than just about any zombie story I've ever read. You can read the first issue of The Walking Dead for free at Image Comics, along with the first issues of a lot of their other titles, because they are clearly a very smart company***. And speaking of smart, any story where zombies are around less in the winter because they freeze up and then appear in more numbers in spring when they thaw out = CLEVER. Mind you, it's still not the cleverest zombie story I've ever seen but it's still an impressive, bleak ride. I'm very curious to see how dark they'll go with this series and how casting will shape up.

And lastly, Dark Horse Comics MyspacePresents website is, uh, presenting new comics again! Huzzah! Any site that brings us Sugarshock, Empowered in glorious color and other delightful fare is worthy of celebration.****

Again, I say huzzah!


*Since I really didn't like Superman Returns (outside of Kevin Spacey and that guy who played Jimmy Olsen), I wasn't really too psyched for a Batman/Superman movie anyways.

**I shamefully admit that I haven't watched more than a few episodes of Mad Men Season One. It's a great show and all but I just don't want to fall down a rabbit hole and get obsessed. I'm sure I'll watch it all eventually, if just because I adore Christina Hendricks (who was great in Firefly and Life, too, but I'm sure most of you haven't seen her in those regrettably canceled shows). I liked the one episode of Breaking Bad I saw, too, but the cognitive dissonance from seeing Hal from Malcolm in the Middle fingering a woman under the table during a PTA meeting kinda broke my brain a little. Anyways, hooray for AMC!

***You can also hunt around and read the first issue of The Sword for free on said site, which is another series I'm sure some of you remember me being pretty enthused about.

****I still need to get the Dark Horse TP that collects both Sugarshock and the Empowered one-shot. Any collection that has both Adam Warren art and a panel that declares "Squirrels have no souls!" clearly deserves my hard-earned cash.

I laughed at these way more than I should have

Worth it entirely for 3:16

See more funny videos and funny pictures at CollegeHumor.

And I don't recall if I posted this one here before but it always makes me smile.

Saving Superman's Home

I know I've been embracing Blogging Silence for the most part lately and I'm sorry about that. It's been a busy, busy month with the DNC being in town. Luckily, I've just come across something that puts a big smile on my face.

Over at his blog, the always excellent Greg Rucka has done two things in one awesome post. He's offered up a touching defense of Superman as a concept and pointed out a massive celebrity auction to help benefit the preservation of Jerry Siegel's childhood home.

Even if you don't find the cause worthy (because you have no souls), the amazing amounts of talent lining up at this auction should grab your attention. If I had the cash, I'd be totally ponying up for a wide variety of these auction prizes. I'd especially want a role in Rucka's new PI series, Stumptown, or for a Jim Lee pin-up with me and Superman (I'd totally have Lee draw Supes as about to kick my ass, just because I find the concept hilarious). Oh, and VIP tickets to The Colbert Report? Wouldn't suck.

Go and read. Hell, donate for free if you've got the spare cash. It's well worth your time.

In honor of Chris Sims' Birthday

If you're not reading Chris Sims' Invincible Super-Blog, you're missing out on the web's premiere factory outlet for superhero facekicking, Silver Age Crack, Buffy comic photomanips and other fine products made of sheer awesome.

In honor of Mr. Sims' 26th Birthday, I present the following. It's no Silver Age Lois Lane kung-fu fighting Robot Cheerleaders but I do hope that the following videos honor him in spirit -

Silver Age Superman Birthday!


And the closest scientists have come to creating a decent Lois Lane facekicking someone to punk rock music!*


Happy 26th, Sims!

*NOTE: I'm not actually all that impressed by Smallville or Erica Durance but facekicking Lois Lane does win them a few points. Plus, catchy song!

A few quick thoughts

If this map is accurate, Smallville was/is in the state of The Flash. This amuses me greatly because that means that, when Supes goes home, everybody's a rabid Flash fan instead of being geeks for Superman. I don't know why that tickles me so much.

Also, check out the new animated Batman team-up series, The Brave and The Bold - now with extra-Blue Beetle!



(In other animated news, the surprisingly awesome Spectacular Spider-Man show is also coming back for a 2nd Season, which pleases me.)


And if you're reading Helen Killer (which of course, you should be already), you might be pleased to know that the fellow behind it is going to take over the writing duties on Black Canary/Green Arrow. I've resisted picking up this title for a long time - mostly because I felt like Black Canary and GA were more interesting and natural-feeling as an on-again/off-again relationship (and also, Ollie annoys me) - but dang it if this doesn't force me to start reading the book.

And in other news, there's some sorta comic book convention going on in San Diego right now. Who knew?