Bigfoot, R.I.P.?

Hero Complex is trying to deal with the overwhelming grief. I'm sure we all are. You surely have seen this news flash by now:

Georgia men claim hairy, frozen corpse is Bigfoot

By JUANITA COUSINS 

ATLANTA (AP) — Two men claim they've bagged Bigfoot, and they say the have the hairy corpse of the legendary creature stored away in a freezer. Matt Whitton and Rick Dyer say they stumbled across the corpse in the woods of northern Georgia, across the country from the remote regions of the Northwest where people usually claim to see the man-ape.

Still, the Georgia men say DNA will prove once and for all that the frozen creature is Sasquatch. They plan to present DNA test results and photographs during a news conference Friday in Palo Alto, Calif.

David Sarno, a good friend to the Hero Complex and author of the popular Web Scout blog, seems to think that these Georgia men may not be telling the truth. Could that be right? Oh, we pray that you're right, David!

In the meantime, let us all reflect on one of the truly golden moments in 1970s television history, the epic battle between Steve Austin and Andre the Giant. No, no, it wasn't a pro wrestling match. It was the other Steve Austin, the bionic hero in "The Six-Million Dollar Man," and Andre the Giant was channeling Sasquatch by wearing spooky contacts and a mangy get-up that reminds me of my Chewbacca costume from Halloween 1977.

You can watch the fight, first aired in February 1976, right here. (Trivia: Stefanie Powers pops up in that two-episode story, which also prominently features the spinning ice tunnel that was part of the Universal Studios Tour for years.)

-- Geoff Boucher

Photo of Andre the Giant and Lee Majors from a vintage ABC publicity still.

'The Dark Knight' relents, settles for No. 2

What does it take to bring down Batman?

Well, you need the tag-team of Iron Man, Kung Fu Panda, Ethan Hunt and Zoolander. Here's the top of the AP story on the Hollywood weekend grosses, which have "The Dark Knight" finding out what second-place feels like for the first time:

It took four of Hollywood's biggest stars to take down Batman.

The DreamWorks- Paramount comedy " Tropic Thunder" -- with Ben Stiller, Robert Downey Jr., Jack Black and Tom Cruise -- debuted at No. 1 with $26 million, bumping "The Dark Knight" to second place after four weekends on top, according to studio estimates Sunday.

The Warner Bros. Batman flick pulled in $16.8 million to raise its total to $471.5 million. "The Dark Knight" passed the original " Star Wars" ($461 million) and now stands as No. 2 on the all-time domestic charts, behind only "Titanic" ($600.8 million).

'Best Crime Comics' is killer

The Sunday Review: "The Mammoth Book of Best Crime Comics"

Edited by Paul Gravett (Running Press, softcover, $17.95)      

Earlier this year, there was quite a stir of attention (and appropriately so) for author David Hajdu's latest book, "The Ten Cent Plague: the Great Comic-Book Scare and How it Changed America," which delved into the quirky and alarming crusades against comics in this country that reached their shrill peaks in the 1940s and 1950s. In a piece I wrote in the Los Angeles Times Book Review, I admired the research but had some problems with the focus in the final analysis. That said, the book and its tale really stuck with me, and I think it should be on the bookshelf of anyone who loves comics history. And you know what should go right next to it? "The Mammoth Book of Best Crime Comics" and not just because both have oddly long and stilted titles.

If Hajdu gives us the motivation for the pop-culture offenses, this book, edited by Paul Gravett, gives us the crime-scene photos, so to speak. The book arrived in the mail the other day and the first thing I noticed was the heft; you get your money's worth with 480 pages of two-timing molls, square-jawed cops, doomed losers and booze-soaked ciphers. There's an impressive array of talent surveyed here, too, with classic names such as Will Eisner, Jack Kirby, Bill Everett, Joe Simon, Jack Cole, Bernie Krigstein and Johnny Craig. More than that, "Best Crime" brings its lurid mission well into the contemporary decades, with comics work by Alan Moore, Neil Gaiman, Charles Burns and mystery novelist Max Allan Collins (whose "Road to Perdition" comics spawned the film of the same name).

There's also the comics work of Mickey Spillane, who is no stranger to killers in trenchcoats, and best of all, some of Dashiell Hammett's "Secret Agent X-9" comic strip from 1934, which was drawn by Alex Raymond, the graceful illustrator who that same year would launch a little strip called "Flash Gordon" that would end up doing quite well.

'Potter' trailers and magazine covers still say November

One more dispatch about the Great Muggle Rebellion of 2008: I just took my son, Ben, to see "Star Wars: The Clone Wars" for the second time (George Lucas may have plenty of cynical critics but my Lego-loving, Jedi-worshiping 6-year-old is not one of them). "The Clone Wars" is being distributed by Warner Bros. so what was the first trailer we saw before the movie? That would be "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" and, at the end, the last word on the screen, written in wavering letters, was "November." I heard chuckles and even a few boos when the word popped up.

It occurred to me as the screen went dark how difficult it is going to be for Warner Bros. to put the brakes on the massive marketing machine that has been gearing up fans everywhere for a November release and now has to tell them to put their wands away until the summer of 2009. "Entertainment Weekly," for instance, just hit the stands with the "Half-Blood Prince" on the cover, which must be infuriating for editors at the publication. Everyone wants to be first, but no one wants to give their cover to a movie that is almost a year away. Some of the frustration is clear on an "EW" blog post written by Jeff Giles, who compared it to the infamous "Dewey defeats Truman" headline in the Chicago Daily Tribune.

Empire Magazine in the U.K. also has a cover story this week on the sixth film about the boy wizard. Harry looks appropriately battered, just like his dazed fans across the globe. The text on the cover blares that the issue is devoted to "45 New Movies You Need to Know About Right Now!" Well, make that 44 movies on the urgent, need-to-know list and one more about a Hogwarts student who surprised the world by getting enrolled in the 2009 session of summer school...

-- Geoff Boucher

Image courtesy of Empire Magazine

Related

Complete "Harry Potter" coverage on Hero Complex

Some happy 'Potter' fans? We actually found them

The Great Muggle Rebellion of 2008 rages on, but it turns out that not every "Harry Potter" fan is incensed by Warner Bros. and its profit-minded decision to postpone the release of the nearly completed film until summer 2009. There are some giddy fans in the Bay Area, in fact, who view the new release date as one of pure serendipity.

Here's an e-mail I got yesterday:

Hi Mr Boucher, I'm one of the organizers of AZKATRAZ, a Harry Potter convention set to take place in San Francisco from July 18 - 22.

Yes, the 18th. We announced it a few weeks ago, so WE were thrilled to hear about the change in the movie release date, because this provides a fantastic opportunity for fans to gather together to see the film en masse at one minute after midnight on the 17th, then spend the weekend discussing the film - and hundreds of other Potter-related topics, play Quidditch, write fanfic in round-robins, listen to Wizard Rock and perhaps even enjoy an alchemy-based wine-tour in Sonoma. And then a bunch of us are heading to Comic-Con for some multimedia fun immediately thereafter.

We're expecting hundreds, if not over a thousand, to attend Azkatraz; our average convention attendance at the last five events we've put on is just over 1,000 people, and we've had two sell-outs that were capped at about 1,400. Seeing the film in an IMAX theater with your fellow fans and people you've known from fandom for two, five, or even ten years is an amazing experience, and we're all looking forward to it!

Just thought you ought to know, and hear the counterpoint to your article.

Best,
Heidi Tandy
Team Azkatraz

Thanks for the note Heidi. If you want to make the convention an even bigger success, we suggest that you set up a dunk booth with Alan Horn, chairman of Warner Bros., who has replaced Voldemort as the villain that "Potter" fans love to hate....Heidi also told us that her event's website is a few days out-of-date (their webmistress had to take a few days off, the wrong ones as it turned out) but in the meantime there will be updates posted here.

-- Geoff Boucher

RELATED Read all Hero Complex coverage of "Harry Potter" and the Great Muggle Rebellion of 2008

Photo: Courtesy of Azkatraz

Good news, 'Twilight' fans: Santa's coming early this year

We at Hero Complex were as bummed as anyone to hear that "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" was being moved all the way back to July 2009.

But this has resulted in something of an early Christmas gift for "Twilight" fans: "Twilight" will now premiere Nov. 21, instead of Dec. 12.

According to a press release from Summit Entertainment, the move takes advantage of the new opening in the fall release calendar:

"When Warner Bros. decided to move 'Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince' to the summer of 2009, we saw a unique opportunity to slot in our film, which has been gaining tremendous awareness and momentum over the past several months," said co-chair and CEO of Summit Robert G. Friedman. "We by no means are trying to fill the shoes of the incredible 'Potter' franchise for 2008, rather we are just looking to bring the fans of Stephenie Meyer's incredible book series the film as soon as possible from a programming perspective."

Happy Friday!

-- Denise Martin

Photo credit: Summit Entertainment

Related

Complete 'Twilight' coverage on Hero Complex

'Twilight': What does the 'Breaking Dawn' backlash bode for the movie?
 

'Harry Potter' fan rebellion of 2008

Here's a short story I have in Saturday's Los Angeles Times:

Call it "Harry Potter and the Revolt of the Muggles."

A day after Warner Bros. announced that it would be pulling the sixth "Potter" film off of its Novemeber release schedule and instead releasing it next July to take advantage of skimpy competition in the summer, fans of the massively popular franchise were lighting up the Internet with their rage. Thousands of fans signed online petitions, others organized boycotts and assorted protests, and a vast number expressed their reaction with tears or clenched fists.

At Petitionspot.com, more than 12,000 fans had signed a demand that "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince," in post-production in London, be returned to the long-promoted November date. In comments posted, it was clear that Warner Bros. Chairman Alan Horn had, for a day at least, replaced Voldemort as the main villian in the hearts of "Potter" fans, who often call themselves Muggles, which means a nonmagical mortal in the Potter parlance.

Fans such as 25-year-old Brooklyn resident Patrick Allen promised marches on the corporate offices of Warner. "They are doing this for no other reason than to make more money," he wrote in an e-mail to The Times. "This is ridiculous, and I assure you that the millions of Harry Potter fans who have been looking forward to this release will not stand for it. We don't want to be pacified. We want the movie, as promised, this November."

The "Potter" films, based on the books of J.K. Rowling, have grossed more than $1.4 billion in the U.S. alone. As of press time, Rowling had not commented publicly on the postponement. Warner Bros. this summer released "The Dark Knight," now the second-highest grossing film ever, and "Half-Blood Prince" will now be released in that same mid-July slot next year.

There is a lot of anger over this move, and it's going to be interesting to see if there's a backlash against Warner. Denise Martin here at Hero Complex gave you the rundown Thursday on the early tumult, and it's just getting worse today. The problem is, what can fans really do? Certainly they could boycott the film, but I have to wonder if they will hold on to that kind of resolve between now and next summer. Also, some of the youngest fans of the movies just want to see it so badly that they will line up no matter what.

Where is J.K. Rowling on all this? David Heyman, the producer of the "Potter" films, told me during my set visit this year that he and Warner Bros. consult with the author and the key decisions about the franchise (she was, for instance, in favor of splitting the final book into two films, Heyman told me, and that move would not have been made without her assent).

There's so much fan-love for the franchise, Warner Bros. probably assumes that it can do this now, take some heat and then come back next summer with a massive success in a fairly wide-open summer because of the recent writers strike (so many films were postponed or called off that next summer will be the lagging indicator of that Hollywood shutdown).

'Watchmen': New images from the film

From your friends at Hero Complex, enjoy!

 

Photo credit: Warner Bros.

Related:

'Watchmen' sales soar, what does Alan Moore think?

Complete Hero Complex 'Watchmen' coverage

 

Comics to video games: Joe Madureira's still here

In May 2002, Joe Madureira was named one of the ten most influential comic book artists of all time in Wizard magazine.  Despite the lofty tag, within a couple of years he was in the comic book industry's version of the witness protection program.

Not that Joe hasn't been busy with comics.  He recently did a stint on Marvel's "The Ultimates 3" with writer/guru Jeph Loeb, but his focus has been more on video games than sketch pads.

"I've been a fan of games since I was a little kid," said Madureira.  "If I had gotten an 'in' before doing comics, I would've probably went that way."

The artist made a name for himself in the "Uncanny X-Men's" Age of Apolcalpyse story line, then later his own popular but consistently late series "Battle Chasers."  It was around this time that he began questioning his verve for the medium, calling "Battle Chasers his "last ditch effort."

"I thought 'if this doesn't help reignite the spark, I don't know what will,'" said Madureira of beginning his own book. "I had to get to a point where I was just burned out on the whole thing."

Take cover, Warner Bros.: Muggles everywhere are furious

Maybe they can send boxes of Weasleys Wizard Wheezes' Puking Pastilles over to the studio in protest.

After Warner Bros. announced Thursday afternoon it was pushing the premiere date of the next Harry Potter film “Half-Blood Prince” from November to July 2009, a petition of outrage immediately went up.

And just an hour after it launched, nearly 1,500 signatures had already been collected.

“I support this petition. I also support a movement to boycott all other Warner Brothers releases until they change it back,” wrote Tim Thurmeier.

Over at mega fansite MuggleNet.com, more than 400 angry fans have already complained about the longer wait.

Wrote hpninjaskills: “Someone better open up a cell in jail because I`m ready to murder. Just when we were under 100 days, we are back to over 100. I am angry ... totally shocked. I am in tears right now. I can't believe it.”

To be precise, fans that were expecting to see the film in three months will now have to wait 11.  As in nearly a year. Needless to say they’re none too happy.

Jessica D on cinematical.com warned that “They better not try to milk the penultimate movie in the series for too long... else people are just going to forget the enthusiasm over the movies, since the books are already over anyway.” And Chad speculated that “the one and only reason for this move is The Dark Knight. Unimaginative WB bosses think Harry Potter is their best chance at replicating that success so clearly it should open on the same date.”

Over at slashfilm.com, Hunter Stephenson surmised, “Hmm, maybe Warner Bros. [thinks] T4 will underperform?” But most, like emily, were just plain upset: “I’m seriously angry. First [they] move back Star Trek and now HP? Why are these studios tormenting me???”

-- Denise Martin

RELATED Click here for all "Harry Potter" coverage at Hero Complex and the latest on the "Great Muggle Rebellion of 2008"

'Watchmen' sales soar, what does Alan Moore think?

Down at Comic-Con International, Paul Levitz told us about a major new print run for the "Watchmen" graphic novel and I see in a short item in the New York Times that it's still going gangbusters:

The film trailer for “Watchmen” is proving to be a considerable boost to sales of the graphic novel the movie is based on. “As far as we can tell from our conversations with the book industry people, there has never been a trailer that did this,” said Paul Levitz, the president and publisher of DC Comics, which has printed 900,000 additional paperback copies of the novel since the trailer began running in mid-July. The book, about a conspiracy to discredit and murder a group of superheroes, was written by Alan Moore and illustrated by Dave Gibbons, and has been on the best-seller lists of Amazon.com, USA Today and The Washington Post. Mr. Levitz said “Watchmen” would have a print run of more than a million copies this year. Last year it sold about 100,000.

Zack Snyder says he will be happy if his movie is a "three-hour advertisement" for the graphic novel, and after visiting his Vancouver set (and seeing the same movie trailer that you've certainly seen by now) there's no doubt in my mind that the "300" director is intent on remaining absolutely faithful to the story that Moore wrote (and Dave Gibbons drew) more than 20 years ago.

That has me wondering if Moore, who loathes Hollywood types after watching their mistreatment of his printed darlings, will eventually embrace this new project? It's going to be difficult to reel the gifted eccentric back in; Moore swore off Hollywood years ago. 

'Harry Potter' shocker: 'Half-Blood' pushed to 2009

UPDATED POST:

Talk about a disappearing act: Harry Potter just vanished from the 2008 movie schedule.

Warner Bros. shocked fans around the globe on Thursday when it announced that “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince,” the sixth installment in the massively successful film franchise about a young wizard and his friends, will not hit theaters in November as planned. The film will instead be delayed eight months and arrive on July 17, 2009, according to Alan Horn, Warner Bros. president and chief operating officer.

The move was made in the wake of the writers' strike and to exploit the potent summer film market in the same fashion as the last “Potter” film, which grossed $292 million in U.S. theaters after its July 11 release last year, Horn said.

"We are still feeling the repercussions of the writers' strike, which impacted the readiness of scripts for other films — changing the competitive landscape for 2009 and offering new windows of opportunity that we wanted to take advantage of," Horn stated in the release.

That may be, but any scheduling change for a blockbuster release stirs intense scrutiny in Hollywood, and across the industry Thursday there was speculation that the move reflected some significant problem with the London-based production or with some other part of Warner’s release schedule.

The major Warner's film already scheduled for next summer is “Terminator Salvation,” a darker reboot of the killer-robot franchise, which stars Christian Bale. That movie is now shooting in New Mexico.

Warner is riding high right now with one of the great modern success stories in Hollywood, “The Dark Knight,” the Batman film that stars Bale as well as the late Heath Ledger. The grim super-hero movie has now gone north of $450 million in the U.S. since its release July 18. The film is now second only to “Titantic” as the top-grossing film in history.

That success alone may have emboldened Warner to shift “Half-Blood Prince,” its next world-class heavyweight release, to next year. “Half-Blood Prince” will in fact be released in the same weekend that “Dark Knight's” release fell on this year. Horn told the Associated Press that the rescheduling should not be parsed for signs of trouble.

“The picture is completely, absolutely, 100% on schedule, on time. There were no delays,” Horn said. “I’ve seen the movie. It is fabulous. We would have been perfectly able to have it out in November.”

Perhaps, but it’s quite a jolt to fans of the “Potter” films and books, who are among the most intense devotees in contemporary pop culture. There will be a two-year gap now between the film adaptations of books five and six in J.K. Rowling’s bookshelf of magical tales. But it will shorten fans’ wait between “Half-Blood Prince” and the final two installments, which are being shot simultaneously next year.

The seventh and final book, “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows,” will be split into two films, which apparently remain scheduled for November 2010 and summer 2011.

According to Jeff Robinov, president of Warner Bros. Motion Picture Group: “The release date change does not alter the production schedule for this or future Harry Potter films.  Post-production on ‘Half-Blood Prince’ was completed on time, and the studio’s release plans for the two-part ‘Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows’ will not be affected by this change.  We know Harry Potter fans are eagerly anticipating seeing the final chapters unfold onscreen."

'Clone Wars' director Filoni was a fanboy first

I got to spend some time with Dave Filoni a few weeks back when the director was in L.A. putting the finishing touches on "Star Wars: The Clone Wars." Then I ran into him (literally) backstage at Hall H down at Comic-Con International as we were heading for the dias. My main impression of the guy? Wow, what a friendly and thoughtful fellow.

I like, too, that he's still showing his Pittsburgh roots even as he works the showbiz circuit in L.A. and toils in the refined artistic colonies of Northern California. "I'm not a spa guy," he told me, "I'm a hockey guy." It's good that he's not thin-skinned: It's an odd thing to stand in the shadow of George Lucas and try to deliver a fresh new take on the "Star Wars" saga now entering its fourth decade, and the mainstream-press critics haven't been especially kind so far to Filoni's baby, the seventh theatrical "Star Wars" release and the first one that is completely computer-created.

I wrote a profile of Filoni that appeared on the cover of the Calendar section in today's Los Angeles Times. Here's the start of it:

GEORGE LUCAS, looking overheated under the midday sun, gamely worked the red carpet last Sunday at the world premiere of the latest cinematic installment to his space saga, "Star Wars: The Clone Wars." At one point, Lucas was photographed with one of his most avid fans, a grinning, chubby fellow from Pennsylvania who showed up at Hollywood's Egyptian Theatre wearing two-day stubble, a sweat-stained shirt and a brimmed frontier hat that Indiana Jones would admire.

That guy, Dave Filoni, also happens to be the director of "Clone Wars" (which opens Friday across the U.S.) and quite possibly the luckiest "Star Wars" fan alive.

Like Charlie inheriting the chocolate factory, the 34-year-old Filoni was plucked from relative obscurity two years ago and handed the job of using computer animation to create a "Star Wars" cartoon series for the small screen. Filoni and his team did so well that Lucas (who, it goes without saying, is not easily amazed) made the decision to hand them the keys to the kingdom and let them make the seventh theatrical release in the chronicles of the Skywalker family.

To read the rest, click here.

-- Geoff Boucher

Photo credit: Spencer Weiner / Los Angeles Times

'Star Wars: The Clone Wars' reviews

Michael Ordoña came back from "Star Wars: The Clone Wars" feeling like the film was more about Legos than ethos.

Ordoña is a frequent contributor to the Los Angeles Times and he's written the "Clone Wars" review, which will go up online tomorrow and appear Friday in the print edition. (It may be somewhat telling that the top staff critics took a pass on reviewing the film.) In it he bemoans the fact that the George Lucas space opera is still getting better with alien imagery and still getting worse with human emotion. Here's a section of his review. I will post a link to the full review on Thursday:

It’s all but given that the wonder of actual humans inhabiting the "Star Wars" galaxy would be lost in any animated feature. Still, these characters are so beautifully rendered and meticulously crafted, they resemble hand-painted wooden puppets — they’re works of art. Textures and inanimate objects look fantastic, often as convincing as in the live-action features.

But where new characters, plot threads and better dialogue might have made up for much, "Clone Wars" simply doesn’t aim high enough. For those who had expected improved writing from the last four films, your hopes will be dashed on the ornately realized rocks of Tatooine.

The off-putting narration replacing the characteristic opening crawl is the first omen that this movie is not aiming much above the new-reader level. You know it’s not your good old "Star Wars" when you hear electric guitars, a tween character call Anakin "Sky Guy" and the future Mr. Vader make a "Poltergeist" reference before a fight ("They’re ba-aack!"). All that’s missing is a skateboarding dog with sunglasses.

UPDATE: The full review is now up and you can read it here.

On the other hand: The very upbeat David Germain of the Associated Press feels strongly that the film "harks back to the fun, swashbuckling times of the original 'Star Wars' trilogy."

'Star Wars' and 'Lord of the Rings' as money machines

Rachel Abramowitz covers the film industry here at the Los Angeles Times, and in July she did a sublime job on an article about the egregious Hollywood treatment of the heirs of J.R.R. Tolkien. In essence, the family of the man who conceived "Lord of the Rings" hasn't been given a cent for the film franchise that has made a mountain of gold. It's one of the best articles I've read anywhere this summer. Here's the beginning of it:

So "The Lord of the Rings" made no money.

Let me amend that. The film trilogy, which grossed $2.96 billion worldwide at the box office and $3 billion or so more in DVD and ancillary markets, has not made any money for the heirs of J.R.R. Tolkien, author of the famous books.

Tolkien obviously isn't Peter Jackson, who directed the franchise, or Liv Tyler or Viggo Mortensen, who starred in it, or New Line Cinema, the studio that financed it, or Miramax, which owned the film rights for a second but couldn't get the movie made, or producer Saul Zaentz, who bought the rights in 1976. He's just the guy who dreamed up the cosmology, the whole shebang of hobbits and dwarfs, orcs, ents, wargs, trolls, whatnot. "Three rings for the Elven-kings under the sky, Seven for the Dwarf-Lords in their halls of stone, Nine for Mortal Men doomed to die, One for the Dark Lord on his dark throne." Those were old John Ronald Reuel Tolkien's words.

Rachel goes on to dig into the sad history of Hollywood's shabby strip-mining of author's legacy and family. It's a disheartening piece, frankly. In today's paper, she turns her attention to a sunnier story (and one with more personal tocuhes) about money matters and George Lucas, the wizard of the Jedi universe whose family, I can assure you, is doing quite fine and will be for the next couple of hundred years. Here's an excerpt:

Then this summer, my oldest son, Eli, discovered kiddie crack. That's what I call the Lego Star Wars game he plays on his Nintendo DS, a hand-held computer device. I have to admit that the 2-inch-tall Lego versions of Darth Vader and Chewbacca are pretty darn cute, and I guess it's fun to follow the plots of the six episodes. Still, the games' drug-like grip on my children is a little disconcerting. They prefer Lego to food, even parental bribes like cookies or ice cream.

Apparently, MY kids are not alone in jonesing for the Lego.

Howard Roffman, president of Lucas Licensing, told me that since 1999 they've sold a billion dollars' worth of Lego Star Wars toys. Since 2005, 15 million units of Lego Star Wars computer games have entered the galaxy. Star Wars, in case you've been stranded in an asteroid field for the last 30 years, is "the most successful boys' toy line in history."

According to lore (and Roffman), Lucas initially sold the merchandising rights to his creations to Fox along with the original movie. There was such little anticipation for the title that no toys were actually available until a year after the original film premiered in the spring of 1977.

That Christmas, the original toy manufacturer, Kenner, sold wrapped gift certificates for future action figures. When negotiating the sequel with Fox, Lucas demanded the rights back, and Fox reluctantly acquiesced, as they had to, or else they weren't going to get any of "The Empire Strikes Back."

Roffman says the toy sales actually "fell off a cliff in 1985" as the original audiences aged out of action-figure mania, and the company waited until the '90s to bring back the merchandise, initially for the rabid fans (now young men), which meant comics, books and ultimately video games in 1993. Now it's a well-oiled Force factory, with 100 global licensees and 100 domestic ones, and some 80 million books in print (including 75 New York Times bestsellers).

Lucas himself oversees the spinoffs in the movie and television arena. For everything else, the licensees get a lot of leeway to create products, though they need Lucas' approval. "For fans to get immersed, there has to be integrity to the universe," adds Roffman. That's why there's a staff dedicated to maintaining continuity between all the different "Star Wars" stories and one man, Leland Chee, charged with updating what's called the "Star Wars Holocron." That's the internal database containing every known fact about the "Star Wars" universe. Printed out, it runs about 12,000 pages.

Sometimes I feel as if my 9-year-old, Eli, is prepping for the day he too can run the Holocron. In the last month, the kids have finally seen all the "Star Wars" movies, and I've gotten a little tired of debating the relative merits of Ewoks and Wookies, Luke versus Anakin.

That's not to say I wasn't psyched for a mommy-sons night out in lovely Burbank. Chicken fingers at Bob's Big Boy, then an advance screening on the Warner Bros. lot.

So how is the new "Clone Wars" movie?

I'm not a film critic, and, more important, I adhere to the mom's commandment of good faith -- that is, "Thou shalt not criticize any pop culture artifact beloved by children -- specifically your own children." Suffice it to say, it was loud, extremely loud.

Our "Clone Wars" coverage will keep rolling today: I'll be posting a profile I've written of "Clone" director Dave Filoni later today and we'll be getting the Los Angeles Times review of the film up tomorrow. And most of all, I'm looking forward to hearing what you readers think of the seventh "Star Wars" theatrical release.

-- Geoff Boucher

Photo: Ian McKellen as Gandalf. Credit: Pierre Vinet / New Line Productions

"The Clone Wars" image courtesy of Lucasfilm Animation

Hero Complex: The first month

Hero Complex celebrated its one-month birthday on Sunday and, wow, what a month it's been.

First, a super-hero film enjoyed the most lucrative weekend in the history of Hollywood. In the days that followed, we chased "The Dark Knight" across Gotham and even made plenty of you mad (and some of you quite happy) by suggesting that Angelina Jolie would be a great Catwoman in the next Batman film. (By the way, if you were one of the people who responded that Christopher Nolan should get a real actress like Jessica Alba [!] please remember that Jolie did win an Oscar and that she has been called a truly gifted performer by no less than Clint Eastwood, one of the greatest living directors. I'm just saying...)

Our Hero Complex team covered Comic-Con International like crazy and took you to the front-row, backstage and even onstage: We sat next to Samuel L. Jackson when he explained the inherent comedy of toilets and "Torchwood" star John Barrowman when he began singing to fans.

H.C. was also there when Rose McGowan explained the finer points of wearing a chain-mail bikini and when Jason Statham, over a pint, lobbied Frank Miller to cast him as Daredevil. We watched Gerard Butler search for his lost sunglasses and stepped inside the Owl Ship with Zack Snyder. We even got to introduce the "Watchmen" director to comics legend Neal Adams. No one has covered "Twilight" like our young blog, be it at Comic-Con, at UCLA book signings, on the page or on the screen.   

Comic-Con was just the beginning. We took you to Oregon where Dark Horse Comics owner Mike Richardson revealed that he once tried to take over Marvel Comics with Disney money. Then it was Toronto to hear exclusive news about Trent Reznor's "Year Zero" television hopes. Back here in L.A. we sat down with Ice Cube in the studio to hear about his dream of taking on Mr. T's old role in a remake of "The A-Team." It was gangsta rappers to governors, because that same day we got Arnold Schwarzenegger speaking out for the first time anywhere on the next "Terminator" film. We went into some other unexpected territory too: David Duchovny told Hero Complex that "X-Files" was as big as God and, well, maybe God didn't like it, at least judging by the new X-film's fizzle at theaters.

It's been a great month and thanks for your patience and support. It's been one of the most successful blog launches ever for the Los Angeles Times, and we have some BIG plans coming up, with a lot more graphic novel reviews as well as exclusive news about "Twilight," the next "Harry Potter" film, "Watchmen" and all the other complex heroes you love to love.

Thanks for a fun month. Stick with us. You will believe a blog can fly.

-- Geoff Boucher

AP photo which was part of the Comic-Con photo gallery

'Star Wars: The Clone Wars' premiere in Hollywood

Randy Lewis, the longtime music writer for the Los Angeles Times and a friend of the Hero Complex, took his sons to the premiere of "The Clone wars" yesterday. Here's his take on the event:

Now here's something you don't see every day: The “Star Wars” universe taking over Hollywood Boulevard, that storied (and, not too long ago, fairly scummy) thoroughfare down below the Hollywood sign. The premiere of  “Star Wars: The Clone Wars” was an event with enough razzle-dazzle to fire up even the most hardened denizens of whatever wretched hive of scum and villainy you’d care to name.

I milled among clone warriors who brandished an assortment of blaster weaponry and passed by an Anakin Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi posing for happy snaps. Cast, crew, friends and fans, including “Clone Wars” director Dave Filoni and “Star Wars” patriarch George Lucas, who arrived in Marin County-casual for the opening at the Egyptian Theatre. 

For me, it had the out-of-body feel of a twisted journey through time and space.

It was 31 years ago that on this very same strip of asphalt I was pulled into the universe of the Jedi Knights and the Force. I attended the premiere of the first “Star Wars” film. It was certainly a less hectic affair: At that time, the solo presence of a Darth Vader strolling the theater aisles and breathing heavily was all it took to stir the crowd. I was covering the event that day for Cash Box magazine (now long gone) and there was no sense before I arrived that I was going to see history in the making. I walked in cold but from the very first few frames I was mesmerized.

You know you're a geek if...

...you look at the picture below and your first thought is, "Wow, where can I get one of those?"

 

This is Hawthorne Village's Star Trek electric train set because, really, what says "space travel in the far-flung future" better than a diesel train replica?   

This fine item costs about $70 per train car but hey that's a great deal. Why? It lights up (as the catalog says: "for a fully illuminated display of the symbolic Star Trek imagery that embellishes this Star Trek collectible!") and it comes with a genuine certificate of authenticity so everyone will know that you, uh, didn't just make it in the basement by yourself.

Yes, yes, we mock. But we also respect. If you have pointy ears and a bank account, you can proudly buy the Trekkie choo-choo right here. All aboard, and live long and prosper!

-- Geoff Boucher

Image courtesy of Hawthorne Village

Eddie Campbell and the 'huge extravaganza of baloney'

T.J. Kosinski, one of our talented interns this summer here at The Times, wandered around Comic-Con International a few weeks ago and interviewed some of his favorite comics creators. Here is the first of his guest posts.

"The biggest collection of near-sighted people in the world." That's how the quirky and enigmatic Eddie Campbell summed up the madness and mass of Comic-Con. The Scottish comics creator, best known for the horrific and scratchy art of writer Alan Moore's "From Hell," was somewhat frustrated with his experience at crowded expo. He explained how the convention used to be a small gathering centered on celebrating the medium, but now it's metastasized into “a huge extravaganza of baloney.”

Why put up with it all? Campbell has the newly released "The Amazing Remarkable Monsieur Leotard," and he was at Comic-Con to promote it. He arrived, though, with plenty of cautious cynicism. "The Amazing Remarkable Monsieur Leotard" is a “what-if” story that imagines a future where the nephew of Jules Leotard (the famed trapeze performer and creator of the leotard), secretly takes on his uncle’s identity. It’s an adventure that takes place throughout the 19th century and toys with many staple elements of the superhero genre.

Campbell said an inspiration for "Leotard" was a Will Eisner quote about all modern comics finding their prototypes under the tents of circuses. Campbell in the story presents a sideshow act billed as Le Quartette Fantastique with members that parallel a certain well-known Marvel Comics team. With a winking expression, Campbell noted that the main character in "Leotard" lives up to Eisner’s adage: He wears a fake mustache to conceal his true identity, dons a vibrant costume for action and, to the crowd, seems to possess the power of flight. Sounds super doesn't it?

Around this time next year, an exhaustive omnibus of Campbell’s semi-autobiographical "Alec" works will be released by Top Shelf Comix. In addition to out-of-print work from the highly regarded series of graphic novels, Campbell plans to add roughly 40 pages of new material.

Campbell, who is based in Australia, has seen his work yield a film (the 2001 "From Hell," directed by the Hughes brothers, adapted the 572-page book and starred Johnny Depp as the lawman on the trail of Jack the Ripper) and now there is a television project that is even more personal. Campbell is also in talks with Australian television producers to create a program that centers on his daily life, a sort of "Curb Your Enthusiasm" meets "American Splendor" with an Aussie flavor. Although things are far from finalized, the series has been optioned and Campbell seems entertained by the prospect of “Alec” on television.

-- T.J. Kosinski

Artwork from the cover of "The Amazing Remarkable Monsieur Leotard," courtesy of First Second

'Star Trek' hits another frontier: Online gaming

"I'm a doctor, Jim, not a massively multiplayer online-role-playing game designer!"

I'm sure McCoy, Scotty, Data and Geordi could've gotten it going, but finally, "Star Trek Online" (with no official release date set) will boldly go where lots of games already are.  Leonard Nimoy is set to introduce the world to the immersive experience at a "Star Trek" convention Sunday in Las Vegas at the Gene Roddenberry Theater inside the Las Vegas Hilton. The intro and panel will also be broadcast live at StarTrekOnline.com.

Cryptic Studios Inc., the developer originally responsible for "City of Heroes" and "City of Villains," snatched the franchise from Perpetual Entertainment.  Cryptic Chief Creative Officer Jack Emmert says it was a no-brainer.

"As it became apparent they weren’t going to continue to function, they decided to sell off the license. We swooped in and grabbed it. We took no assets. There was nothing to be had, to be honest. We’re building everything from the ground up."

So, if I say "Tea, Earl Grey" to my computer, will it come out?  Maybe not, but players will be able to customize characters to be any race, customize ships, and have adventures either hurtling through space at warp speed, or beamed down onto an uncharted deep space planetoid that turns out to be a discarded super intelligent spaceship bent on eradicating all human life ... or something.

-- Jevon Phillips

Photo: Associated Press