I'm not sure what to think about this film with the nagging rumors about a patchwork production (although the ever-earnest Hugh Jackman stepped up to say re-shoots were a planned part of a complicated schedule, not some late-in-the-game salvage effort). If the film is good, this is going to be a pretty massive year for fanboys with "Watchmen," a new "Harry Potter" film, "Terminator Salvation," "Star Trek" and "Avatar" topping the deep list of genre fare. To see the trailer for "Wolverine," check below...
Welcome to the latest edition of Everyday Hero, your roundup of handpicked headlines from across the fanboy universe....
THE NEXT BIG 'THING': The Sci Fi flagship show "Battlestar Galactica" is winding down (we've already told you how the channel will try to soldier on without it) so what is Ron Moore going to be up to while he waits to launch "Caprica"? According to Michael Fleming, writing in the trades, Moore will be taking on a script about the alien who came in from the cold: "Universal will add a new chapter to 'The Thing,' lining up another take on the paranoid horror classic most recently brought to the screen by John Carpenter in 1982. Studio has set 'Battlestar Galactica' exec producer Ron Moore to write the script and commercials director Matthijs Van Heijningen to direct the re-imagining. New project borrows heavily from the John W. Campbell Jr. short story 'Who Goes There,'the basis of the Carpenter film and 1951 Howard Hawks original 'The Thing From Another World.' It is set in a Norwegian camp and chronicles how the shape-shifting alien was first discovered and overcame the inhabitants of that camp ... Van Heijningen has shot blurbs for brands including Toyota, Pepsi, Heineken, Bud Light and Visa. He is also developing 'Army of the Dead' at Warner Bros. with producer Zack Snyder." [Variety] ALSO: Hollywood is gearing up more than a dozen other remakes of classic sci-fi films; you can read about it here.
FAR TO GO, DAKOTA: The "Twilight" fans, a famously mellow and forgiving bunch, are going to love this tidbit from gossip maven Elizabeth Snead: "Dakota Fanning is really, really excited about taking on the role of Jane, the Volturi vampire in 'Twilight's' sequel, 'New Moon.' However, she hasn't even read the book yet. Fanning admitted at this afternoon's junket for her new film, 'Coraline,' that she's only halfway through reading the first 'Twilight' book. Asked if there was any movement on 'New Moon,' Dakota replied, 'It's not 100% for sure yet that I will be doing it, but it's definitely not like a rumor or anything. It's definitely a possibility and something I'm excited about.' Asked if there was any particular scene from the book that she was looking forward to doing, she said, 'I don't know ... I just think the character is what I'd be excited about. It's kind of evil, it's a vampire, it's really cool.' Does she have any favorite vampires from films? 'I don't. The only vampire movie I've seen is 'Twilight.' " [Dish Rag]
ZACK SNYDER REVEALED: Writer Nisha Gopalan has contributed to the Hero Complex, and we always enjoy her work. That's especially the case with her new interview with "Watchmen" director Zack Snyder, who confesses to dark chapters in his past (Attending Renaissance fairs! Making beer commercials! Hanging around with naked blue men!) and also talks about casting his son as young Rorschach. Here's a chunk of the Q&A exchange: "'Why on Earth would you cast your 11-year-old son in this movie as a younger version of Rorschach, an abused sociopath whose mom was a hooker? My son was in '300,' too, as the young Leonidas -- he fights the dad, and then he punches a kid in the face. [Laughs] I feel like he’s together enough actually, that he can handle [the 'Watchmen' role]. I didn’t try to get too deep into it. Though there is a woman yelling at him, 'I should’ve had that abortion!' " [Nylon Guys] ALSO: Check out all "Watchmen" coverage at Hero Complex right here.
ON THIS DATE:Christian Bale celebrates his 35th birthday today and now clearly reigns as the dark prince of fanboy cinema. He has played Batman in two films (one of which now stands as the second-highest grossing film in U.S. box-office history) and he will star in the new "Terminator" franchise that launches this summer. He has played a dragon slayer, reluctant gunfighter, a serial killer with a penchant for Huey Lewis hits and (in one of my favorite recent films) a magician with a dark secret. To see some video scenes of the Wales native through the years, keep reading....
EXCLUSIVE: This is the second part of an interview with J.J. Abrams about his cinematic voyages aboard the Starship Enterprise. Today he talks about his concerns that "Star Trek" is "clearly in the shadow" of George Lucas. He also addresses premature talk of a "Trek" sequel: "I'm in the middle of lunch and someone asks, 'What do you want for dinner?' "
"Star Trek" is back. The11th film in the storied franchise returns to theaters in May and this time the director is J.J. Abrams, who was just 2 months old when the original television series premiered in 1966. Abrams has conceded that he was never an impassioned fan of "Trek" but his take on the mythology promises to be intriguing considering his television success with "Alias," "Lost" and "Fringe" as well as his work as director of "Mission Impossible III." He talked to Hero Complex about navigating his movie through the neutral zone that lies between hard-core "Trek" fans and average summer moviegoers.
GB: Is it your sense that you are winning over skeptical fans to this point?
JJA: You know, I would think that especially fans of "Star Trek," which is an optimistic universe, a universe about working together and the possibility of the human endeavor, you would think that people who appreciate that wonderful portrait of the future and that universe would be open to literally going to a place no one has ever gone before. I'm very optimistic that fans of the show, even the purists, will be willing to embrace the spirit of Roddenberry and once they see these actors doing this extraordinary work, I think they will not have to intellectualize it all, they'll simply enjoy the experience. It's a cliche now to say "Where no man has gone before" because it has been the vernacular now for more than 40 years but if you actually think about it -- and actually remind yourself that we live on this planet and we are creatures inhabiting in this space with undefined limits and with technology that will invariably come -- "Star Trek" is positing a future that is incredibly inspiring. If you can get past the cliche and make it real and relevant, there's something very exciting about that. This is not "Star Wars" which happened a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away. This is us and our future.
GB: Can you talk a bit about the story of this film?
JJA: This story is ultimately about a guy who is full of unbelievable potential but he is aimless, he is lost. He ends up finding a path that takes him beyond his wildest dreams. It helps him find his purpose. That's a great story in any situation, in any culture. There is something about that spirit of innovation, collaboration, possibility, adventure and optimism that is inherent in what "Star Trek" was.
GB: How much did you go back to the various "Trek" shows, films, novels, etc., to research the mythology? I imagine at some point sifting through all of it would become a counterproductive exercise.
JJA: I looked at a lot of the episodes of all the series that came after the original "Star Trek" but because we are focusing on the original series I didn't really need to know every episode of "Deep Space Nine" or "Voyager" or even "Enterprise." But, yeah, I watched episodes, I read up a lot, I watched the movies, I talked to people, whether it was our "Trek" consultant or one of the two writers [Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci] about what it would mean to do what we wanted to do. We have one producer, Bob [Orci], who is a complete Trekker and another in Bryan Burk who had never seen an episode of the show ever. And it was a great balance. We could make sure it passed the test of the ultimate fan and the ultimate neophyte and make sure that it was equally entertaining to both parties.
They have no super powers, but they are heroic: they are the store employees across America who sell comics and, like the guys in "High Fidelity," bicker with each other all day long about the true treasures of the discount bin. They are the Comic Book Store Clerks of America and we salute them.
Meet Chris Rosa, a 30-year-old dead ringer for "Green Lantern" (circa John Stewart) who works in brighest day and blackest night at Meltdown Comics & Collectibles (7522 Sunset Blvd, Los Angeles, [323] 851-7223). Rose is mighty proud of the store's pop-culture bonanza range "from vinyl toys to art books to a vast children's section to weird imports back to comics" and he bravely answered all our questions.
Be honest -- think about your life and tell us which stereotype about comic-book geeks applies to you?
I refer major moments in my life to events in comics. For example, my best friend and I both refer to our "one that got away" as Dandel, the long-lost girlfriend from "Goodbye, Chunky Rice."
Which comic book series is in desperate need of becoming a TV show?
Without question, "Scalped" by Jason Aaron and R.M. Guera. Done on either FX, HBO, or Showtime, it would be the next great American crime epic.
The Marvel superheroes just challenged the DC capes to a battle to the death. Was this a smart move for Marvel?
That would be a typically brash Marvel move. But unlike their great business successes, this would backfire terribly. Why? DC has Batman, and Batman always wins, even when he dies, as in "Final Crisis" #6.
Which comic book star would you take on a date and where would you go?
A customer walks in and tells you that "Ghost Rider," is their favorite movie of all time and that Jennifer Garner probably shoulda got an Oscar for "Elektra." What do you say?
I'd put my arm around them and say, "If you dug that, I've got some stuff for you -- the current Ghost Rider series, written by Jason Aaron (collected thus far in the "Hell Bent and Heaven Bound" trade paperback), straight-up grindhouse insanity. You know you want to see Ghost Rider face off with a motorcycle gang made up of nuns. As for "Elektra" -- take this here "Elektra Omnibus" by Frank Miller and Bill Sienkiewicz. Do not attempt to drive or operate heavy machinery after reading.
-- Michelle Castillo
Want to meet more Comic Books Clerks of America? Click here
EXCLUSIVE: This is the first part of an interview with J.J. Abrams about his cinematic voyages aboard the Starship Enterprise. Read part two here.
Gene Roddenberry had this notion in the early 1960s about a television show that felt like "Wagon Train" in space, a frontier tale with groovy sci-fi imagery and a proud parable spirit. And just look what he started. In May, the pop culture phenomena of "Star Trek" proudly returns where it has gone before -- the movie theater -- with the 11th film in the franchise. This time the director is J.J. Abrams, a creative force in television with "Alias," "Lost" and "Fringe" as well as the director of "Mission Impossible III." He talked to Hero Complex about navigating his movie through the neutral zone that lies between hard-core "Trek" fans and summer moviegoers. This is part one of the interview.
GB: As franchises move into new eras it's interesting to watch how they change -- or don't change. "Battlestar Galactica" could hardly be more different than it was in the 1970s while "Star Wars" is essentially the same. With "Star Trek" you seem to be pursuing a revival like we've seen with Batman and James Bond, which holds on to core mythology but recalibrates the tone.
JJA: I think I benefited because I came into this movie as someone who appreciated "Star Trek" but wasn't an insane fanatic about it. The disadvantage is I didn't know everything I needed to know immediately at the beginning and had to learn it. The advantage though is I could look at "Star Trek" as a whole a little bit more like a typical moviegoer would see it; it allowed me to seize the things that I felt were truly the most iconic and important aspects of the original series and yet not be serving the master and trying to be true to every arcane detail. It let me look at the things I knew were critical.
GB: What are some of the things that made that "critical" list?
JJA:The characters was the most important thing in it. We needed to be true to the spirit of those characters. There were certain iconic things -- if you're going to do "Star Trek," you've got to do the Enterprise and it has to look like the Enterprise. If you're going to do "Star Trek" you have to do costumes that feel like the costumes people know. You have to be able to glance at it and know what that is. Even the text, the font of "Star Trek" has to look like what you know.
The phasers, the communicators, the Starfleet logo -- there are all these things that are the touchstones, the tenets of what makes "Star Trek" "Star Trek." If you're going to do this series those are things you don't mess with. And yet, they need to withstand a resolution that "Star Trek" has never had to withstand before. And I don't just mean IMAX -- though it will have to work there too -- but what I mean is that audiences are so savvy now and they've seen every iteration of "Star Trek," "Star Wars," two separate versions of "Battlestar Galactica," they've seen "Alien" and "Aliens," they've seen countless science fiction movies. They've seen it all. And even worse, they've seen a movie as "Galaxy Quest" that completely mocks the paradigm in its entirety.
GB: That's very true, you can't afford any accidental "Galaxy Quest" moments on your ship's bridge.
JJA: The trick is how do you use a ship like that, uniforms like that, characters who look like that and the name "Star Trek" and make it feel relevant and legitimate. the challenge is to take the familiar -- for better or worse -- and embrace the elements that make it unique but be sure the master you're serving is the making of the most entertaining movie possible. You can't look backward and try to make sure that every decision you're making is true to the past. that's not to say that we weren't true to the past, but that wasn't our guiding principle.
GB: You know that no matter what you do, you'll get an earful from hardcore fans.
JJA: The key is to appreciate that there are purists and fans of "Star Trek" who are going to be very vocal if they see things that aren't what what they want. But I can't make this movie for readers of Nacelles Monthly who are only concerned with what the ship's engines look like. They're going to find something they hate no matter what I do. And yet, the movie at its core is not only inspired by what has come before, it's deeply true to what's come before. The bottom line is we have different actors playing these parts and from that point on it's literally not what they've seen before. It will be evident when people see this movie that it is true to what Roddenberry created and what those amazing actors did in the 1960s. At the same time, I think, it's going to blow people's minds because its a completely different experience than what they expect.
Neil Gaiman is still spinning from the news of the Newbery Medal win for "The Graveyard Book" and during an appearance on "The Today Show" the British author announced that there will be a film adaptation written and directed by none other than Neil Jordan ("The Crying Game," "The Brave One" and "Interview with the Vampire").
Welcome to a winter's day version of Everyday Hero, your roundup of handpicked headlines from across the fanboy universe....
"A-TEAM" GOES TO PLAN B: Way back in August, I sat down with Ice Cube and heard how eager he was to work with Bruce Willis in a remake of "The A-Team" being directed by John Singleton. But the rapper/actor/producer was worried that the writers strike might undermine the effort. Looks like it did, because now Singleton is out and the project is moving forward with a new team that may or may not be interested in Cube taking on the challenge of replacing Mr. T in the role of B.A. Baracus. In the trades today,Michael Fleming has an informative update on the revamped project: "Twentieth Century Fox has assembled a creative team to transform 1980s TV series 'The A-Team' into a summer 2010 film. Studio has set Joe Carnahan to direct and Ridley Scott to produce, with Tony Scott exec producing through their Scott Free banner. Also producing are Jules Daly and Stephen J. Cannell, the latter of whom created the original TV series. Carnahan will team with Brian Bloom to polish a script by Skip Woods ('G.I. Joe'). The intention is to start production by June for a June 11, 2010, release. Fox has struggled to find a way to exploit the branded TV show while avoiding the series' campy tone. Director John Singleton had most recently been attached to such an attempt before dropping out. Woods came in and started over. 'Tony and I feel that marrying this Scott Free project with Joe's sensibility will result in a fast-paced, exciting franchise, one we hope will be around for years to come,' Scott said. Carnahan and the Scott brothers say they will use the original premise of the series as the template for an action film. In the original, four Vietnam vets convicted of armed robbery escape from military prison and became do-gooder mercenaries. The Middle East will replace Vietnam as the place the four did their tour of duty, but Carnahan said the origin story is the jumping-off point. 'You can ... make a film that reflects on the real world without losing the great sense of fun and the velocity of action in a classic summer popcorn film,' Carnahan said." [Daily Variety]
JASON BOURNE AND JAMES BOND, IT'S ON!: It's spy vs. spy as Matt Damon (who will be seen later this year in the Paul Greengrass film "Green Zone"),who portrays amnesiac super agent Jason Bourne,talks smack (and it's not the first time) about a certain old-school British agent with the same initials: "Matt Damon has lashed out at Ian Fleming's famous British spy, James Bond, currently portrayed by Daniel Craig. 'The Bourne Identity' actor -- who plays CIA agent Jason Bourne in three hit films -- said: 'He's repulsive. Bond is an imperialist, misogynist, sociopath who goes around bedding women and swilling martinis and killing people. The movies have a formula, they stick to it, and it makes them a lot of money. They know what they are doing and they're going to keep doing it.'" [Stuff]
GOING BACK TO THE "TOMB": In a perfect summary of everything Hollywood is about these days, there's a the story in the trades today about a major studio remaking an eight-year-old film that was based on a video game. Here's what Steven Zeitchik writes: "Warner Bros. and producer Dan Lin are in early development on a a reboot of 'Tomb Raider,' the popular video game action franchise. 'Tomb Raider,' which was published in 1996 by a London-based video game company called Eidos, was a wildly popular game that involved the daredevil archaeologist Lara Croft on a series of global missions. Several spin-off games have been published since, with a 10th-anniversary edition of the game released in 2006. Paramount previously made the two movies based on the game, but the rights have since reverted to Eidos. When Time Warner upped its stake to 19.92% in Eidos in December, films rights to the property were included as part of the deal. Lin will produce the project via his Lin Pictures banner while Stephen Gilchrist will co-produce; Ian Livingstone of Eidos will exec produce. Matt Reilly is overseeing for Warners. Lin is the producer behind Warners' upcoming Guy Ritchie-directed update of 'Sherlock Holmes' and the adventure film 'Jonny Quest.' The new project, however, is expected to revamp the character and her mission and bear little resemblance to the original pictures. It will reimagine the origins of the character, her love interest and the main villain. As an open-writing assignment, the project is still in its nascent stages. An actress who could play the role Angelina Jolie made famous would likely come on after a writer and director are attached." [Hollywood Reporter]...Oh, and what about those rumors of the nubile Megan Fox as Croft? So far, they're just that.
ON THIS DATE: It was on Jan. 28, 1958 that the modern Lego brick was patented, ushering in the famously simple but extraordinarily versatile toy system. The path to the brick began in the workshop of Ole Kirk Christiansen, a carpenter from Billund, Denmark, who started crafting wooden toys in 1932 and dubbed his company "Lego" in 1934. It was his son, Godtfred Kirk Christiansen, who locked in on the idea of a brick-building system and, well, the rest is history. Now there are "Star Wars" Legos, Batman Legos, Indiana Jones Legos, and the list goes on and on and on ... To celebrate this historic day, let's all enjoy the White Stripes and then engage in hours of safe creative play....
Thanks for reading, keep checking back...
-- Geoff Boucher
CREDIT: "Green Zone" photo by Jasin Boland\Universal Pictures. "Tomb Raider" photo courtesy of Paramount Pictures.
Welcome to Everyday Hero, your roundup of handpicked headliens from across the fanboy universe...
"GRAVEYARD" WINS NEWBERY: Congrats are in order for Neil Gaiman, whose latest work has been awarded the Newbery Medal. Here's the announcement: "The 2009 Newbery Medal winner is 'The Graveyard Book' by Neil Gaiman, illustrated by Dave McKean, and published by HarperCollins Children's Books. A delicious mix of murder, fantasy, humor and human longing, the tale of Nobody Owens is told in magical, haunting prose. A child marked for death by an ancient league of assassins escapes into an abandoned graveyard, where he is reared and protected by its spirit denizens. 'A child named Nobody, an assassin, a graveyard and the dead are the perfect combination in this deliciously creepy tale, which is sometimes humorous, sometimes haunting and sometimes surprising,' said Newbery Committee Chair Rose V. Treviño." Over at his online journal, Gaiman has a fun account of how he got the big news: "I was not yet sure what was going on or who was trying to do what. It was 5:45 in the morning. No-one had died, though, I was fairly certain of that. My cell-phone rang. 'Hello. This is Rose Trevino. I'm chair of the ALA Newbery Committee...' Oh. Newbery. Right. Cool. I may be an honors book or something. That would be nice, 'and I have the voting members of the Newbery Committee here, and we want to tell you that your book...' 'THE GRAVEYARD BOOK,' said fourteen loud voices, and I thought, I may be still asleep right now, but they probably don't do this, probably don't call people and sound so amazingly excited, for Honors books....'...just won...' 'THE NEWBERY MEDAL' they chorused. They sounded really happy. I checked the hotel room because it seemed very likely that I was still fast asleep. It all looked reassuringly solid. You are on a speakerphone with at least 14 teachers and librarians and suchlike great, wise and good people, I thought. Do not start swearing like you did when you got the Hugo. This was a wise thing to think because otherwise huge, mighty and fourletter swears were gathering. I mean, that's what they're for." VIDEO EXTRA: Want to see a trailer for "The Graveyard Book" and hear Gaiman reading from "Graveyard"? Go to the end of this post....
JEEZ, THIS GUY AGAIN?: OK, it was cool when there was a graphic novel biography of Barack Obama (especially since it was very well done) and it was fun when Alex Ross drew that picture of Obama in superhero mode. It was also kinda endearing to find out that the 44th president is a Conan the Barbarian fan and everybody certainly got excited when the new president showed up in the pages of Spider-Man but, well, can we just tone down at this presidential fanboy stuff for awhile? Apparently not. There's a fourth printing of the comic book issue featuring the meeting between Savage Dragon and Obama, which I believe was the first comic-book appearance by a politico in a nationally distributed comic book. Matthew Brady at Newsarama has the scoop on it. Considering that Spider-Man issue also flew off of shelves in multiple printings, I'm guessing we haven't seen the last comic book cover featuring the new leader of the free world. I'm hoping for an Obama team-up with Herbie the Fat Fury. UPDATE: Wow, so Eric Larsen, the creator of Savage Dragon, is more than a little miffed at Marvel and says they stole his approach, some of his ideas and a lot of his thunder when Spidey met Obama. You can read his rant here and a Marvel editor's rebuttal here. What's my take? Well I pretty much loathe all gimmicky superheroes-meet-contemporary-famous-people issues because they always read like those old wretched Radio Shack comics with Superman. So I'll just sit this one out...
A "HORNET'S" NEST: I had lunch with some of the Industrial Light & Magic folks at a great place called Magnolia over on Sunset Boulevard and while we were talking about Jim Cameron's "Avatar" we heard a distinctive laugh at the next table -- we knew it was Seth Rogen before we even looked over. I debated the idea of going over before his food arrived and asking a question or two about "The Green Hornet" but I opted not to because, well, who wants to bug a guy while he's relaxing at lunch? Anyway, there's been much discussion of "Hornet" after the strange doings with Stephen Chow who was brought in as Kato, then helped steer the all-action film into a comedy project, signed on as director and then quit that job over creative differences -- but differences that weren't intense enough for him to abandon the Kato role. Got all that? Rogen is the co-writer of the film and the title character and while the project helped him get in trim shape, it's not yet clear what else he is accomplishing with it. (I also heard a random rumor about the 'Hornet' film: Two different people in the industry told me that Adam Sandler has a brief but key role in the movie as a certain surprise superhero...I heard which one, too, but I don't want to ruin it. Sandler and Rogen have another project together as well.) With all the fits and starts it's no wonder we keep reading things like this dispatch from Drew McWeeny: "It looks like 'The Green Hornet' is about to collapse again, and if this particular configuration doesn't happen, then I suspect it never will. Ever since Stephen Chow started to waffle about his participation in the film, I've been hearing rumors that there were major hesitations at Sony. Then at Sundance, I heard several people say that the film was off completely. I spoke this afternoon with a source close to the film, and while they didn't call it completely dead, they did say it is 'highly unlikely' that the film will shoot in 2009 at all." [Hit Fix]
LEAPING LIZARDS, IT'S "V": Last month we brought you an in-depth look at the past and future of the classic TV sci-fi epic "V" and here's an update via a blurb in one of the trades: "ABC is flashing the 'V' sign.The network has given a pilot order to a reimagining of the 1980s miniseries about an alien invasion. Written on spec by '4400' co-creator/exec producer Scott Peters, the new 'V' will center on a female Homeland Security agent. Peters is exec producing the pilot with HDFilms principal Jason Hall. Two ABC pilots picked up so far this pilot season are presold titles based on 1980s properties, 'The Witches of Eastwick' and 'V.'" [Hollywood Reporter]
RANDOM PLUG: I covered the Screen Actors Guild Awards last night and had a great time backstage. You can read the story here if you like that kind of stuff.
THIS JUST IN...SUPERMAN EXISTS AND HE'S AMERICAN: Here's yet another "Watchmen" video for your enjoyment. Considering all the ancillary videos that have been cooked up for the movie (and, of course, "The Black Freighter" featurette) I'm predicting now that the "Watchmen" Blu-ray will be a pretty staggering package...
ON THIS DATE: Comic book artist Silvio "Sal" Buscema is celebrating his 72nd birthday today. Sal got his start in the 1960s as inker for his brother, John Buscema, and Sal came into his own with long runs of work on "The Incredible Hulk," "Captain America," "Spectacular Spider-Man" and one of my faves, "The Defenders." Sal was a utility player in the Marvel bullpen often doing emergency fill-in issues and inking others between doing his own pencil and ink work and while he is considered more steady than spectacular by fans, his style really evolved through the years and his knack for clear storytelling was a key part of the Marvel glory years.
They have no super powers, but they are heroic -- they are the store employees across America who sell comics and, like the guys in "High Fidelity," bicker with one another all day long about the true treasures of the discount bin. They are the Comic Book Store Clerks of America and we salute them.
For theCure, love came on Friday, but for Todd Matyja, 28, it's all about Wednesdays. That's when the new issues land at Comic City (5703 E. Beverly Blvd., Los Angeles, (323) 888-1877) and the customers follow. An avid comics reader for 16 years, Todd is proud that Comic City still has a major back-issues inventory even as other stores abandon the old stuff for space and allergy-inducing issues. We caught up with the Lex Luthor look-a-like while he was working the counter.
When you were a wee young lad, where did this whole comic-book problem start?
"X-Men"! Actually it was the cartoon series that got me reading the comics. It wasn't any book. I just wanted to read "X-Men"!
You can own one piece of comic book art by any comics artist. What is it and where do you hang it?
It would be a piece by Alex Ross. He did a piece called, "Dedication for Alan Moore." It had all the characters he had ever written, and his face is the background. I would frame it and put it up in the living room.
Think about the final issue of your favorite comic-book series. Is there one little thing you would change?
Well it would be "Preacher." I really wouldn't change it. I mean, how good was that? He road off into the sunset. How else could you end that? I've got nothing.
NBC has just hired you to save "Heroes," where do you start?
Stop using story lines that have already been done in Marvel!
Should all Saturday morning cartoons be turned into anime?
No! This is a tough one. This can vilify me.... I like a couple of mangas, but I like comic books. I'm a comic book fan. They'll write a manga about anything! There's one called, "The Prince of Tennis." What is that?
It's not every day you spend a morning at Wes Craven's house chatting about the future of horror movies, but Hero Complex contributor Gina McIntyre was lucky enough to do just that last week. It was part of her research for a major article today in the Sunday Calendar section of the Los Angeles Times that stabs deep into the heart of contemporary horror. Gina is a big fan of the genre, and in this piece she really captures a sense that 2009 will make a big splatter in the history books. Here's an excerpt...
Moviegoers, beware. A host of masked, murderous slashers, demented fiends and demonic forces are about to converge on the multiplex, but it's not your immortal soul they're after. It's your hard-earned dollars.
Horror films are dominating the release schedule in 2009 -- almost certainly, event movies like "Watchmen" and "Terminator Salvation" will outgross their spookier kin, but not a month will go by without at least one film designed to terrify audiences making its way into theaters. January already has seen the release of "TheUnborn" and "My Bloody Valentine 3-D," and this week the psychological thriller "The Uninvited" will attempt to scare up box-office receipts.
If horror films reflect the anxieties of a culture, then it makes perfect sense that so many nefarious characters are emerging from the darkness: The collapse of the housing market, the menacing approach of a potential economic depression, an ongoing war and international unrest -- they're the stuff of nightmares.
And yet, sitting in dark theaters watching unspeakable acts on screen, we find release -- or at least distraction from the real threats we face.
"Horror is the genre that makes you feel something, like comedy makes you laugh," said Andrew Form, a partner in Michael Bay's company Platinum Dunes, which produced the new "Friday the 13th." "It elicits an immediate response. You sit down in the seat and you just know that your hand's probably going to be over your eyes and you're going to be waiting for those jumps. For 90 minutes, you're guaranteed to feel something."
Growing up, Geoff Boucher always wanted to be a mild-mannered reporter working for a major metropolitan newspaper....or maybe a wookiee. He came to the Los Angeles Times in 1991 and, after years covering crime and local politics, he switched to the Hollywood beat covering film and music. Now he's the paper's go-to geek.
Also contributing:
The Legion of Super-Bloggers here at the Hero Complex includes Jevon Phillips, a Times staffer who specializes in our favorite television shows, especially "Heroes" and the frakking brilliant "Battlestar Galactica;" Denise Martin, another Times staffer, who has an undying passion for "Twilight" and anyone ever enrolled at Hogwarts; Gina McIntyre, a Times editor who learned her craft by watching too many slasher films; and Yvonne Villarreal, whose earliest memory of wanting to be a journalist stems from watching broadcast reporter April O'Neil on the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles television series.
ON THIS DATE: Comic book artist Silvio "Sal" Buscema is celebrating his 72nd birthday today. Sal got his start in the 1960s as inker for his brother, John Buscema, and Sal came into his own with long runs of work on "The Incredible Hulk," "Captain America," "Spectacular Spider-Man" and one of my faves, "The Defenders." Sal was a utility player in the Marvel bullpen often doing emergency fill-in issues and inking others between doing his own pencil and ink work and while he is considered more steady than spectacular by fans, his style really evolved through the years and his knack for clear storytelling was a key part of the Marvel glory years. 
