Mondo is a killer poster company. Marvel seems to be doing OK in the comic book industry. And Mike Mitchell is doing his thing in the art world. So when you put the three together, you are going to get gold. And that is what we get from the newest Mondo release. Mike Mitchell was given full run of the Marvel stable of characters to construct a series of 12 x 16 side view portraits, and the results are a mix of surprising and fantastic. In this series he chooses some interesting subjects to say the least. A bunch of X-Men (but not the usual suspects), 2 Daredevil's, and a version of the new Ghost Rider that is just amazing. It is a fun mix, and the pieces all vary in the amounts being produced. You need to follow Mondo on Twitter (click here) all day Tuesday April 29th for release information. I am waiting with anticipation. How about you? And who else would you like to see Mitchell take on in his next series? Check out all the pieces after the jump...
My love for comics was forged at a very early age. I remember being four or five and walking into my local neighborhood candy store, seeing a rack of comics, and falling in love with how colorful they were. From that point on I spent my life idolizing comic book characters, buying and collecting hundreds and thousands of them through the years. But now I am a grown up geek, and I have grown up needs. Enter graphic designer Marcello Rizzetto, who must be in the same boat as me and decided to do something about it. He created a six pack of beers based on the core six members of the Justice League, with each beer taking on characteristics of each hero. This is a killer idea. Superman as a super strong Pale Ale. Wonder Woman as an American Lager. The Flash as an Irish Red Ale. Aquaman as a Belgian Blonde Ale. Green Lantern as a special edition St Patrick's Day Green Beer. And finally Batman as a Dark Ale. It all works so perfect, both in reference to the heroes and to the potentially deliciousness of these beers! I can get behind this. You can see all 6 beers after the jump, and hopefully we see something like this in the future...
Peter Dinklage has made his mark as Tyrion Lannister on Game of Thrones. He has quickly risen up the ranks as one of the greatest characters in the history of television. His short stature only makes his powerful work that much cooler. This cat commands the screen whenever he is on, and the character is so well written and executed that you can't help but love him even when it may call for you to loathe him. Be as it may, I never thought that loving Tyrion so much would lead me to like... no not like, love... a version of the Game of Thrones theme song composed of just utterances of his name. Yup, this is about as awesome as it sounds. Enjoy this on your Game of Thrones Monday....
I certainly do love me some Freddy. Nightmare On Elm St is one of my favorite film franchises in history. And the character has grown to levels that no one, not even Wes Craven, could have ever imagined. He has appeared on countless products, especially in toy form. But companies are always looking for a way to bring a new Freddy product to market that is unique and can take the character to new heights. Leave it to NECA, one of the titans of the toy industry, to come up with a great idea for this years 2014 San Diego Comic Con exclusive. Not only did they come up with a great idea... it is one of the most obvious ones that hasn't been done before!
Read more after the jump...
Later this summer NECA will be unleashing Super Freddy. This makes so much sense for a Comic Con exclusive. The toy features an 8.5 inch height, classic felt costume with a cape, and our hero even has his own superhero logo!
What a great idea, but that doesn't surprise me very much when it comes to NECA. The guys have been changing the game with every single figure they issue, especially the Nintendo Entertainment System versions of Freddy & Jason that came out in the last few years. Those figures were epic, and this one takes a character that has been done a billion times before and make an original figure out of it. I am sure this will be a monster release (no pun intended) and that people will be scrambling all over San Diego to get this one in their collections. So far the above pic is the only one available (thanks to Action Figure Insider and IHorror for the pics), but if more begin to surface I will add them later....
I remember being super excited to see Robert Rodriguez's version of Sin City back in 2005... I had read the books, and since this was the early days of Internet there was not a lot to go on in terms of what to expect. After all, they were a bunch of Sin City books and you couldn't really tell which ones they would be adapting. While I was really happy with the stories they did use for part 1 of the film, I did really want to see 'A Dame To Kill For' hit the screen. The movie was a huge success, and considering the rising stock of comic movies at the time I thought for sure we would see a sequel shortly. I couldn't wait to see the cast reunite in Basin City... and a sequel was announced early on. But as time dragged on, all we were given were rumors... no actual filming, no progress on the project. It seemed like a fantasy project, one that was often talked about by everyone rumored to be involved but never actually realizing its potential. And then the stories started pouring out last year about filming starting, and that 'A Dame To Kill For' would be the meat of the story being adapted for the film. I was over the moon... I couldn't wait. And then yesterday during the NBA playoffs I caught the first trailer for the film. Yup, exactly what I needed in my life. It looks the same (which is a good thing, even though it takes place 9 years later) and feels the same, and that makes me very happy. Seeing old faces like Jessica Alba, Mickey Rourke, Powers Boothe, and others made me very content... and seeing new faces like Ava Green, Joesph Gordon Levitt & Josh Brolin made the film something I yearned for even more. I can't even begin to express how excited I am. I will be re-reading my over sized library editions of my Sin City books in preparation, and I can't wait to see what Rodriguez and co-director Frank Miller have for us this time around. if it is a success, lets hope it doesn't take another decade to get out number 3. Check out the trailer after the jump...
Even though this is an ad campaign for make-up, I thought my fellow nerds would enjoy it immensely. I recently caught the Keanu Reeves flick '47 Ronin' and was pleasantly surprised by the mystical kung-fu flick and what it had to offer. It was high action, a great story, and had some interesting characters... none more interesting that Rick Genest. He was great with all his tattoos, and looked awesome on screen. if you don't know, Rick is covered from head to toe in tattoos. They are mostly of the skeletal variety, leading to Rick being nicknamed 'Zombie Boy' & 'Skull Boy'. When some people see him all tatted up it may make them gasp and wonder what the hell is wrong with him. But makeup company DermaBlend Pro did not see it that way... they saw a great opportunity to use his tattoos as a perfect example of the age old adage 'You can't judge a book by it's cover'. They put Rick through a full cover up of his tats, filmed it, and then came up with a crazy commercial on just how amazing their makeup is. The resulting video was great... and proves the above saying to a T. It is pretty cool, so check it out after the jump...
... When they change stuff in the comic book to make it match the movies? Ok look, I understand the corporate robot-think that leads to comic book companies doing this, but I find it contemptible and I'll never agree with it. And that's not just nerd-rage talking, the way I see it, its a really shortsighted and stupid thing to do.
Ostensibly, the (flawed) logic behind this practice boils down to this: more people see the movies than read the books. Some of those people MIGHT see the movie and be curious enough to start reading the books too. So, lets make the books look as much like the movies as possible so that when (if) these potential new readers come along, they're not immediately alienated by things being different than they're used to. To me, this just reeks of desperate pandering and, if you think about it, its actually insulting not only to the people who were already comic fans, but to these potential new readers as well.
Basically, this practice demonstrates that the publishers' (despite seemingly being desperate for their business) have an underlying belief that these non-comic book reading movie-goers are a bunch of morons. Seriously, "the comic is a little different" or "they changed that for the movie" are concepts any 10-year-old can understand. Why the conceptual red carpet needs to be rolled out for a bunch of people who are only potentially reading the books is beyond me. Is "the X-Men wear blue and yellow costumes in the comic books" really too high-concept for the average non-comic reading movie-goer to grasp? Are the publishers that insecure that the stories and art aren't good enough to sell themselves on their own merits? If someone is curious enough buy a comic book, the fact that something is different isn't going to make or break their decision to keep buying. Have some self-esteem!
Because, while you're busy pandering to people who aren't buying your product yet, the worse effect of this is that it inevitably alienates the loyal readers YOU ALREADY HAVE!. You know, the ones who are already regularly shelling out 3 bucks an issue, week after week, all these years? The ones whose loyalty was a large part of the reason these characters (and the whole medium) have enjoyed the longevity that made movies about them a viable option in the first? No? Not ringing any bells? Oh, right, screw them. They're hooked, and you're already getting their money.
For me, and I'm sure I'm not alone, every time there's a change in a book I'm reading to match something from the movies, its jarring. And annoying. Sometimes its just a cosmetic change, but other times the storylines have to do gymnastics in order to get things to line up. Either way, it's like a metaphorical record scratch right across the page of the comic. Below, I have a few of the most egregious, off the top of my head examples, but before I give you those, I just want to sum up. Comic Book Publishers, STOP DOING THIS! You're alienating people who already pay you money in order to pander to people who don't. Let them join the club, stop trying to change the club while begging them to join!
In case you're lost, here's some examples of what I mean:
1. Nick Fury is black now (in the Marvel 616 Universe).
Ok, so in the Marvel Ultimate Universe, the design of Nick Fury was based on Samuel L. Jackson. Then they make the Marvel movies and cast Sam Jackson as Fury... which somehow leads to a convoluted story where the Nick Fury in the main (616) Marvel Universe is a black guy that looks like Sam Jackson. Ohh, he's Nick Fury JUNIOR? Yeah, that makes it better.
2. Mystique is a blue lizard:
In 2001's X-Men Forever miniseries Mystique is exposed to dangerous levels of radiation and ends up looking like the ridiculous naked blue lizard they made her in movies. Sure, in the films it was a nice excuse for horny geeks to pretend they were seeing naked Rebecca Romijin or Jennifer Lawrence, but one, you're really not; and two, the visual does not translate well to the comic book page at all.
3. Toad has cool powers:
Now, objectively this one could be called an improvement. In the comics, Toad was a short fat dude whose power was he could jump real high. In the movie he's a skinny, athletic guy who could jump real high, knows parkour and has 25 foot long prehensile tongue. So of course, again in the 2001 X-Men Forever mini (which may as well have been called X-Men: PLEASE BUY US AND LIKE US BECAUSE YOU SAW THE MOVIE) convoluted measures are taken to make Toad green, skinny, have a 25-foot tongue, adhesive saliva, and pheromone powers (because there's a rule that every non-main character mutant in the X-Men movie universe must have 47 powers). So sure, while the new movie-inspired Toad is "cooler" than the old Toad, it still feels like unneccesary pandering to me.
4. Transformers faces:
I didn't feel like doing photo research for this one. You all know what I mean. They looked shitty in the movie, they look even shittier in the comic. Thankfully, I think they've already stopped drawing them that way.
5. Spidey's organic webbing:
So, to match the way it was in the movies (and because Peter having biological webbing is more "realistic" than him having invented a webbing and shooters to go along with his other powers), Marvel made Peter develop organic web shooters in the comic. Yeah that's a great idea, take an integral part of classic comic book Americana and discard it so some movie jerk won't feel too alienated by it... on the off chance that that movie jerk actually picks up the comic in the first place. The comic storyline involved Spidey being turned into an actual giant spider and then back. Can we just acknowledge that Spider-Man spraying sticky organic fluid all over his enemies, and the city, is gross? Thankfully, the spinnerettes coincidentally developed in his wrists, instead of his rear end, like a real spider. This mutation of his powers has been ignored since the "Brand New Day" storyline (which I will not discuss here, because its a whole other can of nerd-rage), and Peter is back to using his man-made webbing.
So that's five of the worst. There's more. Hawkeye's costume; the aforementioned cladding of the X-Men in all leather; Coulson suddenly showing up everywhere; I could go on and on. I guess we should just be thankful that there's an even longer list of stuff that was changed for the movies that the comic books have left intact (Deadpool anyone?).
Natalie Dormer is a piece. That is not debatable. The chick is a hottie, and has been since the minute she appeared on The Tudors. As Anne Boleyn she was sexy, smart and a very good actress. And she has been piecing together a pretty solid career since. But she is on the precipices of greatness due to her current roles as Margarie Tyrell on Game of Thrones, as well as her upcoming role of Cressida in part 3 of the Hunger Games, Mockingjay. On Game of Thrones she is important, but her role in the Hunger Games is huge... and she is making sacrifices for it. One of those sacrifices was shaving her beautiful locks... or at least half if them off for the role. She is rocking the look expertly, and boy oh boy does she look good doing it. Check out here recent GQ spread as well as some red carpet pics of the gorgeous Dormer showing off her new hairdo. God I love this chick. Enjoy the pics after the jump....
David Branstetter is just like any other independent graphic artist that wants to break into the comic world. Check that... most guys that are trying to break into comics want to be down with the kings: Marvel, DC, Image, etc. But from reading Branstetter's blog it is apparent that this isn't his goal at all... he wants to get his own work, Straw Man, and other original ideas out there for people to see. His Straw Man strip is pretty great, and you can see much more of it by clicking here. He is also contributing to Comic Book Resources 'The Line Is Drawn' weekly art round up, which always produces some great stuff. But when I came across his Deviant Art page (click here to see his stuff, its amazing!) I found this killer mash up piece that tickled me inside, because it is completely off kilter yet works so well after it was executed. What do you get when you mix floating head super villain Modok with the one and only film legend Bill Murray? Check after the jump to see for yourself....
I remember the time of year vividly. It was closing in on Spring of 1989.... I was just passed my 10th bday, and was still obsessing over my Christmas gifts. I was starting to drift away from toys (I remember getting my last toy gifts being of the TMNT and Batman the Movie variety) and more towards video games totally. Sega Genesis was on the horizon, and Nintendo was at its peak stride. There were so many games... and all were better than the other. Improvements were coming rapidly, and I remember vividly wearing out my NES Max & NES Advantage controllers playing for hours on end. But that was when the video game market was about to get turned on its ear. Commercials started to fill the Saturday morning airwaves for a new video game system.... not another console system, but something quite different. A hand-held game system that promised 8 bit graphics (the same as your home NES system) and a way to play a friend head to head on your own separate systems. It was to be called GameBoy... and I wanted one terribly.
Read more after the jump:
The rumors began flying around about it being released in Japan (this was before a time with Google, so we used to revel in stories about Super Famicon and things like that from the video game mecca of Japan that were passed around word of mouth) and that it would be out that summer here in the US. I remember wanting one terribly bad... but I knew I wouldn't be getting one for quite a while. You see, my birthday is in January... on the 5th, just 10 days after Christmas. So I tend to have really great gift getting months in Dec & Jan and then don't get shit for another 11 months... and this was killer as a kid. Having to wait all that time for gifts stunk, and it was made worse by my older sister Oona having an August bday. She had something to look forward to twice a year spaced out with her bday and Christmas... and it stunk for me who got both at once. But that year my sister was turning 15 and wanted a big party in our yard with her High School friends. Plus she asked for bigger gifts. My dad felt bad at all the attention and fanfare my sis was getting, so he went out and bought me the GameBoy I longed for. I was so shocked.... but it was kind of bittersweet. It came with Tetris, which was cool. But I didn't get any other games... and I wouldn't until Christmas of 1989, six months later!
RIP Warrior
The reason I bring this trip down memory lane up is because April 21st marks the 25th anniversary of the release of GameBoy in Japan. It ushered in an era of personal gaming that forwarded the industry in many different ways. I never really fell in love with my GameBoy... I think it was because I loved my home systems of NES & Genesis better. But I did eventually love my Sega Game Gear, which was the evolution of GameBoy's personal gaming technology. But looking back, you gotta give props to the innovations that allow for changes to come. Big shout out to my buddy Rob Martin for posting this original GameBoy commercial over on Facebook. It is funny to take a look back at something so innovative. Thanks for the memories...
As I said in my Wrestlemania review, coming out of this weekend, I was more excited to be a wrestling fan than I have been in a very long time. Unfortunately, that excitement has been tempered by the sad and untimely passing of the Ultimate Warrior this past Tuesday. If you were a wrestling fan in the late 80's and early 90's, then the Ultimate Warrior was part of your fandom, no question. Personally, I was a Randy Savage kid. In fact, my fandom of the big three went Savage, then Hogan, and then Warrior. But even with that said, Warrior's passing is definitely another little part of my childhood that’s now been snuffed out, and too early at that, because he was only 52 years old. He'd just mended his bridges with the WWE, was inducted into the Hall of Fame and was getting ready to assume the role of some kind of goodwill ambassador with the company. And again, even though I was never the biggest Warrior fan, I was definitely looking forward to seeing what this would entail.
Continued after the jump!
Despite the fact that he was my #3 in the 80's triumvirate of wrestling icons, there's no arguing the impact the Ultimate Warrior had on the WWF in the late 80's. He may not have had the technique or skill of The Macho Man, or the monumental cultural influence of Hulk Hogan, but the Warrior brought an unrivaled intensity and unique charisma to his craft. His entrance was pure bombast. He was the only guy who would come flying down the aisle at 90 miles an hour as soon as his music hit. He would lap the ring a few times, then get in and shake the ropes like he was trying to break the ring apart. It was unique and electric and it definitely made the Warrior stand out from the crowd (so did the crazy face paint, neon tassels on his arms and his absolutely shredded physique). It didn't even really matter that he was absolutely sucking wind before the bell even rang most days, his matches usually weren't booked to go that long anyway! I'd almost go so far as to say Warrior gets a bad rap when it comes to his work rate in the ring. He was no Ric Flair by any stretch of the imagination, but the dude COULD work a match, especially when paired with an opponent with superior in-ring skills (more on that in a second), he just didn't need to. No one wanted to watch Warrior wrestle a mat classic. They wanted to see him bulldoze an opponent and press his vanquished foe over his head before sending him crashing down to the canvas again. Its part of what made the gimmick work so well. It's like he took Hogan's superhero shtick but dialed it up to 1000.
Wrestlemania VI is one of Warrior's shining moments, and I still remember where I was when it happened. The Ultimate Warrior, then the Intercontinental Champion was wrestling Hulk Hogan, the World Heavyweight Champion. This was unheard of . Babyface vs. Babyface. Hero vs. Hero. This was like Optimus Prime fighting Grimlock. Or Batman fighting Superman. It had never happened before, and it had the effect of immediately separating the Hogan marks from the Warrior marks. I think Warrior was probably the "cooler" choice, but I was cheering for Hogan, who was my hero as long as he wasn't fighting the Macho Man. The promos leading up to this match between the two were like a contest for who could spew the most overblown, hyperbolic nonsense. Meaning they were absolutely incredible. Warrior won that match at the Skydome in Toronto. He moved out from under Hulk Hogan's legdrop! You'd have thought something truly tragic had happened for 10 year old Joey because no one had ever done that before! Warrior then pinned Hogan to simultaneously hold both titles. That had never been done before either! This was nuts!
If Warrior's wrestling career ended right then and there, he would still have had a historic run. He went on to have memorable feuds with Andre the Giant, Ravishing Rick Rude, Jake the Snake, The Undertaker and Randy Savage, with some of those guys, Rude and Savage in particular, even able to carry him to some truly excellent matches.
Disputes over money, backstage politics, and the Federal steroid investigation all contributed to the souring of Warrior's relationship with the WWF, and he eventually left the company in the early 90's. Stories came out about the guy being a major headcase, being difficult to work with, and also that he was a raving lunatic. The fact that he changed his name legally to Warrior in order to circumvent Vince McMahon's copyright on the name "Ultimate Warrior" does nothing to dispel these stories, especially not the last one. He would return to the WWF briefly in 1996 but be gone just as quickly, and then had a brief run in WCW, about which the less said, the better (actually if I'm being honest, I can't write about it because I didn't see any of it. I was always a WWE loyalist, and had no interest in watching Nitro at the time. I read about it all though, and it sounded awful). He also had a truly nonsensical, "epitome of everything wrong with the 90's comic book industry" comic book come out some time during this period. Thankfully, it only lasted 4 issues.
By the late 90's, Warrior had gotten a bad reputation. That was fueled in part by the WWE's "Self-Destruction of the Ultimate Warrior" DVD, (which was one hell of a hatchet job on the guy), and in part by the fact that in the years since his retirement he's said some things that some people found incredibly offensive (and I found, for the most part, incredibly hilarious, just for the sheer lunacy of it all). This led to me not really expecting much, or investing much emotion when it was announced that he'd returned to the fold and would (rightfully) be part of the Hall of Fame class of 2014. So I was really pleasantly surprised by his acceptance speech. He definitely humanized himself in my eyes. He has two sweet little girls and a beautiful wife, and when I heard he'd died my first thought was of them, because whatever you think about this guy as an outside observer, its tragic for kids that age to have to grow up without their father. As a wrestling fan, I'm gratified that Warrior was able to come back to the WWE and be part of the family again before he passed. Whatever my opinion became of the guy after he left the ring, its the memories he created for 10 year old Joey that I like to remember. My thoughts are with his family in their grief, and I wish them strength and peace of mind in the days to come.
To close this out, I thought I'd share a few of my favorite Ultimate Warrior memories
This first one is my favorite Ultimate Warrior memory. Honky Tonk Man had used trickery, deception and other nefarious means to hang on to the Intercontinental Championship for 18 months. He was scheduled to face Brutus "The Barber" Beefcake at Summer Slam '88, but a boating accident put the Barber on the shelf. Honky had begun calling himself the greatest Intercontinental Champion of all time, and was becoming a real heat magnet because of that. So it was suitably epic when Honky got in the ring and wrote a check his body couldn't cash by demanding an opponent. Warrior hit the ring and the Garden came unglued. A few seconds later it was over and Ultimate Warrior was your new Intercontinental Champion. Truly epic!
This was Warriors half of the WrestleMania VI promos. Hoke Hogan never saw him coming!
And here's the finish of that match where Warrior beats Hogan. I can't emphasize enough how earth shattering this was for me. Hulk Hogan lost. This was like finding out there was no Santa Claus.
I wanted to post the Ultimate Warrior vs. Randy Savage retirement match in its entirety because that's definitely Warriors best work in the ring ever, but I can't find it on YouTube. So go get yourself the WWE Network and check it out. Its from WrestleMania 7. The ending is also one of Randy Savage's greatest moments, and possibly my favorite wrestling moment of all time, but I won't spoil it.
This one is some cheesy early 90's greatness. While feuding with the Undertaker, the Warrior sought the assistance of Jake the Snake in order to teach him to conquer the Undertaker's darkness... or something. Anyway, Jake turns heel on him here. Silly, but classic stuff.
And here's some even sillier stuff.. Also great, but for different reasons. Voodoo witch doctor Papa Shango put a curse on the Warrior. Enjoy.
And this is from Warriors WCW stint in 98 or 99. Again, the less said about this, the better.
And finally, to help get that terrible taste out of your mouth, Here's The Ultimate Team (Ultimate Warrior, the Legion of Doom and Kerry Von Eric) vs. The Perfect Team (Mr. Perfect and Demolition) from Survivor Series 1990! Awesome.
