I have no idea what to use as a lead in to this week’s news post, so here’s a picture of a Llama.
Our podcast this Thursday is going to be about expanding your comics worldview beyond the Big Two of Marvel and DC. We’ll have an interview with a rep from Image comics and we’ll be talking about some cool titles from smaller publishers that you may want to check out.
Your Monday news is under the fold.
Anime
Hayao Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli’s “Ponyo” now has an official DVD and Blu-Ray release date. Producer Frank Marshall made the announcement on his Twitter that the movie would be released March 2 and would include “great extras”. Nausicaa.net is reporting that the extras will include a Ponyo plushie!
Books
The World Fantasy Awards were given out at World Fantasy Convention 2009 in San Jose this weekend. The winners were;
- Life Achievement: Ellen Asher and Jane Yolen
- Novel (tie): The Shadow Year by Jeffrey Ford and Tender Morsels by Margo Lanagan
- Novella: “If Angels Fight,” by Richard Bowes
- Short Story: “26 Monkeys, Also the Abyss,” by Kij Johnson
- Anthology: Paper Cities: An Anthology of Urban Fantasy edited by Ekaterina Sedia
- Collection: The Drowned Life by Jeffrey Ford
- Artist: Shaun Tan
- Special Award—Professional: Kelly Link & Gavin J. Grant (for Small Beer Press and Big Mouth House)
- Special Award—Non-professional: Michael J. Walsh (for Howard Waldrop collections from Old Earth Books)
Comics
iPhone users will now have access to Marvel Comics through the comiXology, iVerse, Panelfly and ScrollMotion apps. Robot 6 is reporting that the catalog will include the following titles;
Panelfly
- Amazing Spider-Man #1-25
- Amazing Spider-Man #519-523
- Astonishing X-Men #1-24
- Invincible Iron Man #1-16
- X-23 #1-6
- X-Men: Age Of Apocalypse #1-6
comiXology
- Astonishing X-Men #1–24
- Captain America #1–30
- Marvel Zombies #1–5
- X-23 #1–6
- X-Men: Age of Apocalypse #1–6
iVerse
- Amazing Spider-Man #519–524
- Astonishing X-Men #1–12
- Captain America #1–7
- Invincible Iron Man #1–6
- X-23 #1–6
- X-Men: Age of Apocalypse #1–6
There was no list of titles that will be available from ScrollMotion yet.
Amazon has announced the ten finalists in their Comic Strip Superstar competition. This American Idol-like competition is meant to find “the next popular comic strip artist”. Sample comic strips from the finalists are available on Amazon and you can vote for your favorites until Friday November 6.
Movies
In what surely would have been the most exciting movie news of 2003, Columbia Pictures is pushing forward with a third installment in the “Men in Black” franchise. Variety is reporting that “Tropic Thunder” writer Etan Cohen will be writing the script for “Men in Black 3″ but that there are no deals in place for the franchise’s stars Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones.
More casting news on the “Thor” movie. Variety is reporting that Anthony Hopkins will be playing Odin. Kenneth Branagh will be directing the movie and Hopkins’ Odin will be joining Chris Hemsworth as Thor, Tom Hiddelston as Loki and Natalie Portman as Thor’s love interest, Jane Foster. The movie is set to be released in March of 2011.
TV
Variety has an article outlining the plans of Apostle Films’ Denis Leary and Jim Serpico now that their series Rescue Me has ended. The news relevant to the geek crowd is that Leary and Serpico are interested in developing a TV series based on the Ethan Hawke and Uma Thurman science fiction film “Gattaca”. They plan to develop the small-screen Gattaca as a one-hour police procedural set in the future.
SF Universe is reporting that *shudder* SyFy has ordered 13 episodes of an American remake of Being Human. Being Human is the story of three twentysomething roommates — who happen to be a ghost, a vampire and a werewolf — as they help one another navigate the complexities of living double lives. The original material is quite good but the track record of American adaptations of BBC series is not good.
In more BBC series news, BBC America announced the air dates for the final episodes of David Tennant’s incarnation of Doctor Who in a press release. There are just three episodes, a special and the two-part finale, to go before a new Doctor arrives on screen next year. The special, Doctor Who: The Waters of Mars, airs on BBC America Saturday December 19 at 9:00pm ET/PT and the finale will air over the holiday season.
Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.