Looking Forward to The Secret Saturdays

Next Friday evening will be the debut of this great monster movie/Johnny Quest mash-up called The Secret Saturdays on Cartoon Network. The show is the creation of Jay Stephens, a guy who has come up with comic books Jetcat and The Land of Nod then went on to make the animated series Tutenstien.

I'm looking forward to this show as from what I have read and seen, it looks like a show that has parts of shows like the aforementioned Quest show and bits of Scooby-Doo along with the great parts of classic monster movies and a smidge of superheroics. Without giving too much away, it is the story of a family of three scientific adventures who are fighting against an evil, egocentric villain while trying to discover more about a species called Cryptids.

To find out more and to play a great online 2-d scroller game, go to the Cartoon Network website. The Secret Saturdays will premeire October 3rd at 8PM EST.

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2008 Baltimore Comic-Con Exclusives

Sometimes, I do wish that I was back living in Northern Virginia; expecially when I receive something as simple as a PR from Marc Nathan announcing some recent additions to this weekend's Baltimore Comic-Con exclusive swag list (which are pictured above).

All of them look great but the gotta have item has to be the Jim Lee-drawn Batman tumbler from Popfun. If anyone is in the neighborhood and wants to do me a solid, I promise that I'll hook ya up.

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J-E-Wha? Life as a New York Jets fan

Courtesy of Sportscracklepop.com

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New 2-Disc set for "Superman: Doomsday" in November

Shocker, Warner Brothers/DC decided to do the same crap that all of the other movie houses are doing and issue amopre extensive version of a previously released DVD. This one is for Superman: Doomsday which was released over a year agoto fair reviews.

This new version includes a second disc with all sorts of extras and docs. there will be a Blu-Ray format release to coincide with this new 2-Disc set. Both versions will be released on November 25th. More info can be had at Worldfinestonline.com.

Shown below is the front and back cover to the 2-Disc release:

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Free Mp3 from The Mighty Underdogs

Saw this news on the old MySpace and decided that it was worth the bandwidth for the DL. With guests like Chali 2na and Aion plus regulars Lateef the Truthspeaker and the Gift of Gab, I knew that War Walk would be a good joint. If you are a fan of true old-school rap/hip-hop, you should really get this one. Just click here or the image below to get up on it.

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Line 'Em Up Week 3 is Up

Week #3 brings a very familiar opponent, the Miami Dolphins, and this week's column is titled "Playing with a Porpoise". Topics of interest include the the common thread in the two Dolphins losses, the lack of any positive numbers in Miami and a look around the fan-based media in regards to this game.

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Aisle Seat's Mason Channels His Inner Howard Beale

Comicswaitingroom.com Edior-In-Chief Marc Mason posted a very raw and somewhat confusing essay for his Aisle Seat column titled "Comics Are For Kids?" Without reposting the entire thing, here's an excerpt from the last half which I think properly summarize the entire idea behind the column:

Then 2000 rolled around and it all went to shit. A stolen election. The next year, the worst terrorist act in history perpetrated against us. A phony war followed, thousands of my fellow citizens dead, hundreds of thousands of civilians in graves next to them. More election fraud loomed with Diebold. Our culture has devolved to the point of making stars out of the mediocre and talentless, while greatness flounders on the fringes, unable to find a toehold in the collective consciousness. A hurricane destroyed one of our greatest cities. A tsunami damned near wiped out an entire country. The global environment continues to rebel against our human presence as even more hurricanes have taken paths of super-destruction this very year. And now we have another election, featuring the senator from my state, who has already been relegated to second-class citizen on his own ticket because of the VP choice forced on him, and the first black man to have a chance to win the highest
office in the land.

And while I have no problem telling you that I am obviously a Democrat, I will also tell you this: I no longer contain the slightest bit of certainty that anything will ever be okay again. No matter who wins this election. I think human society, and the planet we live on, have become so fragile and broken, that we are past the point of no return on putting things back on the right path. Not without a MEGA reboot. Is that cynical? You bet your sweet ass.

So are comics for kids? No. They present such a warped picture of the world that they may just be as destructive as Wertham tried to tell the world, but for an entirely different reason. Why should we offer our children false hopes?

Now, I have worked alongside Mr. Mason back in the Movie Poop Shoot days but I do not know the man directly. After reading this missive, I discussed it with a few of the guys from KFR and here's what I wrote:

I understand things are getting rough for millions of people - especially lately. But if he took the tact that there are few quality All-ages superhero comics to allow guilt-free escapism like there were during the other rough patches in American history, I could totally get behind his cause. But to say that comics are bad for kids because they perpetuate the myth that good wins over evil (by whoever's definition) sounds not only obtuse but uninformed as well.

As you may or may not know, I am a parent of two grade-school kids and I feed them superheroic adventures in various forms by the bucketful. Right now, DVDs of Superfriends and Justice League Unlimited, TiVo'd airings of Spectacular Spider-Man and TMNT as well as action figures of JLU and animated Spidey rule their world.

Although, finding such material in print to supplement the cartoons is not the easiest. Marvel, for some strange and maddening reason, does not have a companion piece for its TV show. DC does have a good line of comics but as their TV shows die off, their print versions will do the same. But it doesn't stop there. Hobby stores (at least in my area) have little to none All-Ages capes-and-tights stuff. The only place that I can find a monthly mag is at a book superstore.

To me, all of these signs exhibit a complete deviation from what a business should do - expand and grow their customerbase. If tobacco companies had the same business sense as the Big Two that run the comic book industry, they would've been out of business years ago.

As humans find more and more ways to cover the world in a millions shades of gray, I've decided that grounding my kids in a Black and White world where superheroes do exist is the first building block in nurturing their ability to further their imagination while helping them make sound rational decisions. I know it sounds like I'm selling my kids a false bill of goods but when the alternative is to give them the world as it is now, I'll take my chances with the likes of Spidey versus Green Goblin every time.

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One-Sentence Review: “Death Magnetic” - Metallica

Posted simultaneously on Kung-Fu Rodeo

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The Weekend Video - Metallica "The Day That Never Comes"

To celebrate the return to relevancy, here's the first video from Death Magnetic titled The Day That Never Comes:

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Line 'Em Up Week 2 Is Up

This week's column is about this week's opponent, the NY Jets, and is titled "Melodrama in the Meadowlands". Topics of interest include the predominant formation that the Jets will run against the Pats, a change in the Jets' Special Teams and a look around the media in regards to this game.

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In Memoriam - The Twin Towers and Sept. 11th

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"Best of Both" programming is announced by merged Sirius XM

FMBQ reported yesterday on Sirius XM's PR about the new programming available on the merged networks. Best of Both package will offer both former XM-only and Sirius-only subscribers a few channels from the other service. Here's the breakdown:



The Press Release also gave some more description on what the package will entail:

Included on the "Best of" XM on SIRIUS will be such shows as Basketball and Beyond, hosted by Duke and Olympic basketball coach Mike Krzyzewski; Andretti Green, with driver Danica Patrick; 60/20, a sports magazine show by Luke Russert and James Carville; Indy Racing League car races; and games from the top college conferences, including the PAC 10, SEC, Big 10, Big 12, Big East and ACC.

To me, the XM owners got the best deal in the Best of Both package. They not only get the man who made Sirius, Howard Stern, and his secondary channel, scoring the two sports that lend itself to radio (the NFL play-by-play for all 32 teams and NASCAR) that they didn't have before plus Playboy Radio while still keeping the excellent Boneyard and it only costs an additional $17? I'm this close to being finally sold on the satellite radio experiment come October 6th when this package, new programming and a la carte ordering will be offered.

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My Take on the Brady Injury at Patriots Daily

Of course, everyone will have a reaction to the almost confirmed serious injury to the NFL's reigning MVP and I am no exception. So, I wrote about a 900-word missive to Patriots Daily and what came out was Grinding Those Lemons. Here's the intro to the piece by the site's EIC:

Editors Note - As you might imagine, the PD staff has been on high alert since the startling loss of the Patriots’ best player yesterday, just moments after a new season began. We’re all trying to figure out where the Pats players and coaches - and yes, their fans too - go from here. Britt Schramm, author of our weekly Line ‘Em Up feature, offers these early thoughts (SB).

Click the image above or this link here to read more from the Head of the Pats Bunker in Hurricane Alley.

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Seinfeld brings "nothing" to Microsoft's new ad

The Associated Press is reporting that the new Microsoft commercial featuring Bill Gates and Jerry Seinfeld is bombing with viewers. The Baltimore Sun's pro-Mac columnist David Zeiler is claiming the reasons why the commercial doesn't do what Apple's PC versus Mac ads do is because there are no real benefits for using a PC running Vista over a Leopard-fueled Mac. Excuse why I file this under non-objective journalist run amok on keyboard.

Granted, Vista is not the greatest OS around; hell, it's probably dead last. But the point is that the commercial is not about Vista; it's really supposed to be about nothing computer-related at all. The idea behind these commercials is to show that Microsoft has become so integral with the world at large that their OS-helmed processes are running behind the scenes which allows for two people to talk about absolutely nothing and still get things accomplished.

You've got Seinfeld, who is not in full-on shill mode (like the one for AmEx with Superman while he was still shooting his sitcom or the one for HP to plug the theatrical release of his Bee Movie). And Gates has already left the company but is still the face of Microsoft. So, if the overall plan is to reveal how big Microsoft has become, why not go for the quirky slow burn at the beginning of the series of commercials? With the players involved, it makes sense not to hit the viewers over the head with blatant mugging to pimp Vista and go a more sublime route.

Here's the clip below. Am I wrong? If so, please nlighten me.

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The New Patriots Daily Column Is Up

This week's game versus the Kansas City Chiefs is titled "Hitting The Reset Button". Topics of interest include the youth of the Chiefs, the reliability of Nick Novak and what other web commentators are saying about the Chiefs. Give it a chance and Lemme Know what you think of it.

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Wowio Update And Prize Whore News

It appears that there is more fallout from Wowio's slow payment news that includes its parent company, Paltinum Studios. Hero By Night creator and erstwhile Platinum employee DJ Coffman has taken issue with some of the comments that were posted on a financial message board by the COO of the company, Brian Altounian.

While Coffman does have some vitriol towards Platinum in regards to their business deal that went south after some lengthy non-payment problems, his words are not without merit. Altounian comes off as a minor league ambulance chaser trying to discredit anyone and everyone who doesn't substantiate his claim that the slow payment to Wowio creators is a mere bump in the Platinum's road to Hollywood gold.

Also, if I was the CFO of this company, I would be pissed that my COO has nothing better to do than post his views on a message board; especially one that is searchable by a Google crawlbot. There is a reason why there's a Public Relations division in most competent companies that handle this type of stuff in an official and diplomatic fashion. To me, this type of stuff are just further signs that Platinum is not meant to last longer than a year, tops.

In better news, I have made no effort to hide that I am a prize whore. And I would've posted more on this when it was first announced but I was a big winnah of a indie movie poster from the good folks over at NewsAskew.com. And while you may think that it would involve a Kevin Smith production, you would be wrong.

It's a poster for the direct-to-DVD movie Brutal Massacre, a spoof in the Spinal Tap vein of Slasher movies. it stars David Naughton (of American Werewolf in London and TV's Making It fame) and Brian O'Halloran (Dante and various other Hicks family characters in the View Askew movies).

What makes me the prize whore that I am is that I haven't seen the movie and really have no plans to actually view it (may Netflix if it's a slow week) but I still threw my name and address in the hopper for a chance to get the free stuff. Man, am I clinical or what? The poster is pictured below in case you're interested.

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Wowio Starts Its Death Knell By Stiffing Creators

A couple of weeks ago, I reviewed the website Wowio.com not less than glowing review. Well, it appears that their business model is not working out for Platinum Studios like they may have hoped when they purchased the flagging website this past July.

CBR has posted an insightful piece about how the page rates have changed for the company, how those changes have affected the creators and some creators are getting payments late. In case you are new to the whole comic book industry, the recognition of late payments to creators is usually one of the first signs that a publisher is headed for the comic book graveyard much like former mid-level players like CrossGen and Speakeasy.

This article also gives another black eye to Platinum Studios. There were rumors and gossip that the publisher was having problems with paying creators. These rumors became full-blown facts when its late payments and contract squabbles with DJ Coffman and his creation, Hero By Night. And although the Coffman incident has somewhat subsided, the company is not viewed with a very positive light, which can't be good for sales.

So, while the eventual demise of Wowio.com may not affect the overall health of Platinum Studios in the short term, they may not be long for this earthly plane. And I do find it ironic that the faux sunrise that Wowio uses for their logo may actually be the headlight of an oncoming train for its creators and its parent company.

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RIP Bandit's Snowman aka Jerry Reed

I love that first Smokey movie and a big part of it was the connection between Reynolds and Reed. Just two good old boys trying to beat the Man. Unfortunately, Cletus Snow aka the Snowman has driven off the mortal highway. I'm sure he was hitting the gas singing East Bound and Down rather than When You're Hot, You're Hot.

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Real-life Jerry Maguire

Give the above video a watch. It seems that Kirkman stayed up for 48 hours creating his Comics manifesto. Not that his ideas aren't without merit but I swear that if Jerry Maguire was filmed in this century, he would've done his missive via YouTube instead of Kinko's.

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Killer Exclusive Indy and Iron Man DVD Sets at Best Buy

I know that last week I just noticed that Iron Man was being released at the end of this month but now, I've not only stumbled upon the Best Buy exclusive for Marvel's latest blockbuster but also one for the fourth installment of the Indiana Jones flick (Kingdom of the Crystal Skull).

Both sets feature mini-busts created by Sideshow Collectibles, a recent player in the statue and bust arena. Their work has been lauded for its details and quality so I'm sure that both bust will look great. But for my money, I like the more traditional Crystal Skull one instead of the garish ID plaque that they used for Iron Man.

Both $50 retail sets include the 2-disc DVD version of the movie, the mini-bust and a $50 gift cert for Sideshow Collectibles.com.

(Photo used above was provided by Filmschoolrejects.com)

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