February 2009 Archives

The tour of writer Zeb Wells and artist Todd Nauck continues. Visitors can get their copies signed and meet these local comic creators from 12 to 2 p.m. at Geoffrey's Comics -- address and more details below.   

For those who cannot wait for our review next week of "Watchmen," Comic Book Resources has put their review up and it is very exact and full of SPOILERS.

Once again, If you are not game to hear about the film don't click this link to the story. I don't wanna hear: Robert, you didn't warn us this would have spoilers!

If you are not going to read about it at CBR, please check out our review next week by Ryan Riley.

Maybe the cool Rorschach image above will pacify us until then.

Not only did we overwhelmingly choose Samuel L. Jackson as our pick to be the face of Nick Fury in all Marvel films, apparently Marvel saw fit to do the same.

According to the Hollywood Reporter, Jackson has been signed-on to play Nick Fury in The Avengers, Iron man 2, Thor, Captain America and maybe even a S.H.I.E.L.D flick.  And this is after reported disagreements Jackson's representatives had with the previous deals offered to the actor more than a month ago.

The article in the Reporter is here and estimates that Jackson's role could encompass nine films. NINE FILMS?!?

Yeah, that's a lot of Fury.

NEW YORK (AP) -- A rare copy of the Action comic book that launched Superman as the first superhero is coming up for auction.

Comic book expert Stephen Fishler says bidding for the comic book begins at $1 and is sure to go up, up and away. It originally cost 10 cents in 1938.

He says copies of Action Comics No. 1 in "fine" condition are worth about $126,000, but this one could sell for several times that. About 100 copies of the No. 1 edition are known to exist.

The owner, who was not identified, bought the sale magazine for 35 cents in 1950 and held onto it for 58 years. It will be on auction for two weeks beginning Friday.

Fishler and Vincent Zurzolo, co-owners of Metropolis Collectibles, will offer it on their Web site, http://www.comicconnect.com.

Say what you want to say about "300" but it looked incredible.

I have great respect for the amazing work of the visual effects team on "300" and their director Zack Snyder.  You've seen the "Watchmen" clips and there's no doubt it looks as brilliant as the adaptation of Frank Miller's Spartan epic.

Will Snyder's "Watchmen" be a great film overall?  We will see.

This video interview is courtesy of COLLIDER and Snyder raps about his next film SUCKER PUNCH and a handful of other flicks he's involved with -- GUARDIANS OF GA'HOOLE, HEAVY METAL and (I'm jealous as heck) Ray Bradbury's ILLUSTRATED MAN.

By Ryan Riley, Contributor

I was proud to see Heath Ledger posthumously win the Best Supporting Actor award at the Oscars on Feb. 22, 2009. It is, in fact, the only reason I would have ever entertained the thought of watching the Oscars at all, and as luck would have it I happened upon that moment during the telecast when I was channel-surfing. I might not be remembering my Academy Awards history correctly, but it seems that Ledger is the first actor (at least in recent memory) to be nominated for an Oscar for playing a character from the genre of sci-fi/fantasy. This speaks volumes to how powerful Ledger's performance as the Joker in "The Dark Knight" was.

I personally had my doubts about how well Ledger could pull off playing the Joker before "The Dark Knight" came out. His past body of work didn't scream "Joker" to me, and I thought it was a gamble to cast someone not known for edgy roles in that part. I don't think I'm alone when I say that the gamble paid off handsomely, because his portrayal of the Joker floored me. He was that good.

I feel that Ledger truly deserves every honor and award bestowed upon him since his untimely death last year. I stress this point because what I am about to say will seemingly deviate from it. It is my opinion that, had Heath Ledger lived, he would not have been nominated for an Academy Award, even though he definitely deserved the nomination. This is not a slam on Ledger by any means. This is an indictment of the selection process generally used by the panel that selects Academy Award nominees every year. They have a tendency to ignore the increasingly awesome achievements made by films in the sci-fi/fantasy genre and focus strictly on dramatic films for their major nominations, such as Best Picture, Best Actor, Best Director, etc. Sure, they throw nomination bones like Best Film Editing, Best Sound Mixing and Best Visual Effects. That's pretty much a given, seeing as how the vast majority of sci-fi/fantasy films are effects-driven. "Lord of the Rings: Return of the King" broke down the walls Y2J-style for the Best Picture and Best Director awards back in 2004. But other than the nominations for Ian McKellan (as Gandalf in "Lord of the Rings") and Johnny Depp ( as Jack Sparrow in "Pirates of the Caribbean") the actor categories still seemed unattainable until Ledger came along.

The Academy voters are a slow bunch when it comes to change. With their past voting history, they would have been reticent to follow the lead of other award shows like the Golden Globes and the SAG Awards in nominating Ledger had he still been alive. But since he is dead, they saw fit to nominate him due to a combination of politics and pandering. He deserved the nomination, but it took his death for the Academy to recognize that.

In case you need an example of how snobbish the Academy can be, just look at the last guy to play the Joker on the big screen, Jack Nicholson. He was an Oscar winner prior to Tim Burton's "Batman", and he didn't get any recognition from the Academy for that role (or for his role the same year in the "Chinatown" sequel, "The Two Jakes"). Sure, his performance wasn't nearly as intense as Ledger's, but his performance was at least as good as those of Best Actor nominee Gerard Depardieu (for "Cyrano de Bergerac") and Best Actor winner Kevin Costner (for "Dances with Wolves"). But because of the genre of the film he acted in, he got no love from the Academy.

I'm going to give the Academy the benefit of the doubt with this one, because they seem to be finally warming up to the sci-fi/fantasy genre. The voters could have just nominated him to shut everyone up and selected one of the other nominees from the bunch. They ultimately decided to give the Best Supporting Actor award to the actor that turned in the most powerful performance, and it happened to be Heath Ledger. This was a major change in thinking for the Academy, and I hope this opens the way for more mainstream love of the sci-fi/fantasy genre.

It does help that the movie studios are finally attracting brilliant actors like Robert Downey Jr. and Gary Oldman to act in these types of movies (comic book movies in particular). If the upcoming "Watchmen" is even half as good as the graphic novel that spawned it, I don't think I'd be out of line in demanding that the Academy nominate Zack Snyder for Best Director. And it wouldn't be out of the question to see Downey eligible for a Best Actor award if they ever adapt the "Demon in a Bottle" storyline from the Iron Man comic into movie form. These scenarios are a lot more likely now then they would have been five years ago, and it's largely thanks to Heath Ledger.

By MICHAEL KUCHWARA
AP Drama Writer

NEW YORK (AP) -- Spider-Man has conquered the movies. Now, with a little help from Julie Taymor and U2, it's Broadway's turn.

"Spider-Man, Turn Off the Dark" will open Feb. 18, 2010, at the Hilton Theatre, its producers announced Tuesday.

Preview performances begin Jan. 16.

The musical, directed by Taymor, will feature a score by Bono and The Edge, both of U2. Taymor who was the creative force behind "The Lion King," Disney's long-running musical, now in its second decade on Broadway. She will co-write the "Spider-Man" book with Glen Berger.

The story was inspired by the Marvel comic books hero and will include the story of his origins as well as new material.

No casting was announced.

Other members of the show's production team include set designer George Tsypin, who did the sets for "The Little Mermaid" on Broadway; Eiko Ishioka, costumes; Donald Holder of "The Lion King," lighting; Daniel Ezralow, choreography; and sound designer Jonathan Deans, who has worked for Cirque du Soleil.

"Spider-Man, Turn Off the Dark" is produced by Hello Entertainment/David Garfinkle, Martin McCallum, Marvel Entertainment/David Maisel, Sony Pictures Entertainment and Jeremiah Harris.

This illustration provided by Mike Lester shows a political cartoon by Mike Lester depicting President Barack Obama, right, and Michelle Obama. (AP Photo/Mike Lester, Rome News Tribune, 2009)

By JESSE WASHINGTON
AP National Writer

PHILADELPHIA (AP) -- Cartoonist Lalo Alcaraz was in front of a classroom full of black and Latino kids, drawing presidents. He sketched Bush, then Clinton. Next came his favorite, the man he voted for: Obama.

"Hey, those lips are big," Alcaraz heard a black girl say from the back of the room.

Alcaraz was disturbed. "I try to bend over backwards not to make him look like a cartoon stereotype," and certainly not a racial stereotype, he said.

Editorial cartoonists are bending over backwards a lot these days, as they try to satirize the nation's first black president. And when they don't, the result is the kind of outcry that erupted this week after a New York Post cartoon featured a bloody chimpanzee -- intentionally or unintentionally evoking racist images of the past.

The problem is, cartoonists make their living by making fun of people -- especially presidents -- and exaggerating their features and foibles.

The best political cartoons are "like an X-ray machine," said Amelia Rauser, an art history professor at Franklin & Marshall College and author of "Caricature Unmasked," which examines the art form's historical role in political discourse.

"You have to deform someone facially in order to make a larger point about their character," Rauser said. "But that deformity reveals their inner truth and makes them look more like themselves."

The late Herblock often saddled Richard Nixon with an enormous cartoon nose. Liberals drew George W. Bush like a simpleton, or worse. There have been minor kerfuffles from the left about drawing Hillary Clinton as insufficiently feminine, and from the right about depicting Condoleezza Rice as servile to President Bush.

Drawings of President Barack Obama, however, must contend with America's history of degrading racial imagery, from ape comparisons to enormous "Sambo" lips. (Caricatures of the president's admittedly large ears have so far escaped scrutiny.)

Michael Cavna, who blogs about comics for The Washington Post, wrote that "an unnerving number of North America's political cartoonists are bizarrely obsessed with President Obama's lips." He followed with a detailed analysis of several cartoons where Obama's lips were large, some shade of blue, or both.

On Wednesday, the New York Post published an editorial cartoon showing a chimp shot to death by police officers. "They'll have to find someone else to write the next stimulus bill," the caption reads.

Amid widespread black condemnation, the Post initially defended the panel by its longtime cartoonist Sean Delonas, saying it referred to a chimp that recently attacked its owner's friend and was killed by police. The newspaper apologized "to those who were offended" after 200 protesters picketed the Post offices on Thursday.

During the presidential campaign, The New Yorker magazine was accused of racism for an infamous cartoon of Obama dressed as a Muslim, fist-bumping his wife, Michelle, who was toting a machine gun and sporting a black-power Afro. The magazine said it was satirizing right-wing smears of the Obamas.

Scott Stantis, editorial cartoonist for The Birmingham News in Alabama, said he received several complaints this week that his Obama drawings look "simian." As a conservative in a city that's 77 percent black, Stantis has learned to consider the feelings of his audience.

"Being the typical American editorial cartoonist -- doughy, white, middle-aged -- I'm more than willing to accept that I don't know what may or may not be offensive," he said. "But editorial cartoons are supposed to be offensive, and provocative. We're entering new waters here. What can you use or not use?"

"All my characters look simian," he said. "I don't make Obama look nearly as simian as our former Gov. Fob James, who I DID draw as a monkey, on more than one occasion. And he's a white guy. ... I'm sorry, but when it comes to African-Americans, you just don't draw monkeys."

Ted Rall, president of the American Association of Editorial Cartoonists, said that Obama's race has affected how his colleagues do their jobs: "Without a doubt, people are stepping more gingerly. People are tiptoeing their way through this."

Rall, who is liberal, said it's harder to take shots at Obama because he's smart, charming and handsome, "so when you attack the personality, people suspect there's only one reason: It's gotta be his race. My conservative cartoonist friends find it very frustrating."

One of those conservative friends, Mike Lester of the Rome News Tribune in Georgia, said that when he was growing up, "if we didn't make fun of you, we didn't like you."

Perhaps race relations would improve, Lester said, if black people lightened up a bit: "They're not too good (at being) made fun of. We can all take a joke."

Lester said Rall told him before the election that an Obama presidency would be good for conservative cartoonists, but it's been just the opposite.

"I find myself having to temper my comments," Lester said. "I'm tired of it. (Obama) wants my money, he wants me to pay for my neighbor's foreclosed house that he can't afford.

"Race has nothing to do with it."

That's what Delonas said about his cartoon in the Post. So as the nation's edgy fraternity of editorial cartoonists continues to unload on Obama, lines will inevitably be crossed again.

"Being an editorial cartoonist is a high-wire act," Rall said. "If you're any good, you're taking lots of chances all the time. When you take chances, you fall and you screw up."

___

On the Web:

Lalo Alcaraz: www.myspace.com/laloalcaraz

Mike Lester: www.mikelester.com

Ted Rall: www.rall.com

Scott Stantis: http://blog.al.com/stantis

As I sparked a conversation with friends about what's hot on TV, I heard a few things about every show except one in particular. 

ME: "How about that Battlestar Galactica episode last week?"

FRIENDS: "Oh yeah, man. That was crazy! What do you think about all that Cylon $#*%?"

ME: "You catch Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles Friday?"

FRIENDS: "Yes I did, that's a very good show, Robert, thank you for asking."

ME: "What do you think about the latest episodes of Heroes?"

FRIENDS: (Cue the flatline tone).

This is the official Heroes Watch SPOILER mention in case you're saving episodes like frakking walnuts and not watching because you had better stuff to do (I admit I am guilty of saving a couple episodes on TIVO). All the fun continues after the jump. (Or image as the case may be.)

By NICOLAI HARTVIG
Associated Press Writer

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) -- "Dragonball" fans can expect an older, fiercer version of hero Goku in the Hollywood adaptation of the famed Japanese cartoon series about two magic-wielding rivals who compete for seven orange spheres that will grant the holder a perfect wish.

The filmmakers behind "Dragonball Evolution" added 10 years to its hero to give the movie a grittier look, actor James Marsters said at a press conference Wednesday.

In the comic book series, "Goku is 7 years old and fighting midgets all the time," said Marsters, who plays Goku's rival, Lord Piccolo. "We muscled it up."

Justin Chatwin, the 26-year-old Canadian actor who plays the teenage Goku in the movie, said the cast learned several different martial arts styles for the movie. He initially was worried about taking the role because of his slender physique.

"I was looking in the mirror, going like, 'I'm a beanpole, how can I pull off this role?'" said Chatwin, best known for playing Tom Cruise's son Robbie in "War of the Worlds" and a teenager stuck in limbo after an attack in David Goyer's "The Invisible."

But while Goku was given a more adult interpretation, director James Wong said he toned down another key character -- Roshi, a flirtatious, Hawaii-shirt wearing martial arts master -- to appeal to a broader audience.

Roshi, played by veteran Hong Kong actor Chow Yun-fat, is "a little tamer than he is in the manga," Wong said.

Wong said condensing the dozens of "Dragonball" manga books that have already been published was a tough task.

"All that we hoped to do was to preserve the essence of Dragonball -- the fun, the thrills the adventure," he said.

"Dragonball Evolution" will be released in Asia in March and in the U.S. on April 8.


Canadian actor Justin Chatwin speaks to press during a media event announcing his new film "Dragonball Evolution" in Taipei, Taiwan.  (Photo By Wally Santana/Associated Press)

I can't make this stuff up — B-movies are back. ELVIRA, where are you?

See the extended international trailer here.

This combination of undated photos released by Teshkeel Media Group shows a selection of artwork from the comic book series "The 99", published by Teshkeel Media Group.


By TAREK EL-TABLAWY
AP Business Writer

CAIRO, Egypt (AP) -- Abu Essam's footsteps echo loudly as he walks through the narrow alleys of Damascus' old city. Around him in 1930s Syria, tall stone buildings block the scorching sun.

Cautiously, he walks on. Around the next corner he could find the key to the gate to free prisoners captured by Syria's colonial ruler, France. Or he could face a shot from a French soldier's rifle. As he turns the corner, a shot rings out -- but it is the soldier who is dead.

This is not Syria of 75 years ago, however. It is a rolling, 3-D video game on Wael El-Zanaty's cell phone, and his thumb is a blur of motion as he navigates the alleys and fires at soldiers.

"The best thing about this game is that this is something that Arabs can relate to," said El-Zanaty, the technical director for Egypt's Good News Group, which developed the game "Bab el-Hara" based on a hit television series that airs during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.

"It's about part of (Arab) history -- the resistance to the French occupation."

From video games like "Bab el-Hara" to a Kuwaiti entrepreneur's comic book empire featuring Muslim superheroes, the Arab world's private sector is leading a push to provide Muslim and Arab youth with homegrown heroes, something sorely needed as a bulwark against the trend toward radical Islam throughout the Middle East.

Clearly, heroes in games or comics won't offset all the problems that stoke radicalism -- anger at corrupt Arab regimes and at Israel over its treatment of Palestinians -- but El-Zanaty said he hoped these pop culture characters could give young people a sense of hope and a positive image of themselves as Arabs.

"We wanted something that reflected our culture .... developed with an Arab perspective," he said.

In Kuwait, Naif al-Mutawa had a similar vision. The Teshkeel Media Group founder, a psychologist, drew some inspiration for his comic book empire from treating Iraqi soldiers suffering trauma after the first Gulf War in 1990. Some of these men told him they'd been raised to view Saddam Hussein as an Arab hero, .

"What kind of message are we sending to our children about what a hero is, and what a hero does?" al-Mutawa asked, seated in his Kuwait City office.

His "The 99" -- as the comic book series is called -- draws from the heyday of Muslim civilization. Each hero is named after one of the 99 qualities the Quran attributes to God, such as "The Powerful" and "The Loving."

While Teshkeel has yet to turn a profit, al-Mutawa has raised about $23 million from investors, including a Bahrain Islamic bank. The company also recently signed a multimillion dollar deal with Dutch media giant Endemol -- behind hit shows like "Big Brother"and "Power Rangers" -- to animate "The 99" for global distribution.

Al-Mutawa's stories are based on a pivotal moment in Islamic history: The 1258 Mongol invasion of Baghdad that left the city in ruins and led to the dumping of books from its famed library into the Tigris River, with the ink by legend turning its waters black.

In his stories, some librarians escape and are able to place special stones in the river to suck up wisdom otherwise lost.

Hundreds of years later, the 99 stones are found in different corners of the world by heroes who come from 99 different countries, including the United States, Saudi Arabia, Portugal, Hungary and Indonesia.

Jabbar, the Saudi hero, is a Hulk-like figure whose name means "The Powerful." The American hero, Darr, or "The Afflicter," is a young man paralyzed from the waist down when a drunk driver crashed into his car, killing his family. His power is to take away or inflict pain.

While al-Mutawa used Islam as the basis for his comics, none of the heroes prays or reads the Quran. There is no mention of religion, and the characters are roughly divided between men and women -- one of the main figures is Noora, an 18-year-old woman -- and only a few of the women in the comics wear the Islamic headscarf.

Such moves were calculated, said al-Mutawa.

"Our (Islamic) story has become (more) about what not to do, than about what to do," he said. "I wanted to ... go back to the same sources others have pulled out a lot of negative ideas from, and pull out positive, tolerant, multicultural, accepting ideas.

"I'm not trying to sell religion here. I'm trying to sell the idea that at the values level, we're all the same."

The message has resounded in the Muslim world and beyond. About 1 million of the comics are distributed monthly in several languages. The first of six theme parks built around "The 99" is to open in Kuwait later this year, and the superhero characters will appear on water bottles under a deal signed with Nestle SA and at an Arab arts festival next month at Washington's Kennedy Center.

While his comic books are broadening their reach, the computer games developed by Egypt's Good News Group also have a potential for a widespread audience.

Across Cairo, small storefronts and apartments are converted into video game salons, where an hour in front of an LCD TV hooked to a Playstation 2 console costs $1 to $5 an hour, doing brisk business day and night.

"What else is there to do?" 22-year-old Mustafa Abdel-Rahman said when asked why he was playing a soccer video game at 3 p.m. on a weekday. "I've put in applications, but still haven't found work."

Youths like Abdel-Rahman can be found in large numbers in much of the Middle East where sluggish economies do not provide nearly enough jobs to keep up with fast-growing populations. The situation provides a healthy market for the Good News Group's video games, said Ayman Shoukry, the company's managing director.

In Egypt alone, a country of about 78 million, "there are 40 million mobiles," said Shoukry, referring to cell phones. "We don't have 40 million (other types of) devices anywhere in Egypt. Not 40 million TVs, not 40 million washing machines."

Shoukry declined to reveal any revenue figures from the games, saying only that they had registered "hundreds of thousands of downloads."

Al-Mutawa, also the author of a prize-winning children's book, said part of the motivation for his comics was to introduce Arab youths who have grown up in a world dominated by the West to heroic characters similar to those from the Arabs' glorious history.

"I really think that we (Arabs) limit ourselves with this catastrophic thinking that the world is controlled by others and there is nothing we can do," said al-Mutawa. "I think this is rubbish."

Associated Press Writer Diana Elias contributed to this report from Kuwait City.

Quentin Tarantino and everybody else have been talking about this flick forever so here's the trailer courtesy of Variety.  While vibrant dialogue is Tarantino's forte, this film looks like more action and less chat. However, the speech from the character played by Brad Pitt is something to see and hear.

There are some violent parts so this may not be office or kid safe.

The MTV Movies Blog has brief piece on the unveiling of the new Bumblebee Camaro and its appearance at the Chicago Auto Show.

Check out the link to the Chicago show gallery, and if you are so inclined, see some of these cars in action again from when "Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen" was shooting here in Long Beach last summer in the video above.

Anyone know the names of all of the Transformer characters for these vehicles?


Related:
Why Megan Fox is a cool geek
Even more from the 'Transformers 2' set
GM responds to unveiling of Chevy Volt in 'Transformers 2'


Editor's note: If the link to the gallery doesn't work it should only be temporary.

The posthumous honors for actor Heath Ledger continued last weekend with his supporting actor win from the British Academy of Film & Television Arts.

The BAFTA'S are often described as the "British Oscars" and honors achievements in film from around the world.

Ledger's turn as the Joker in "The Dark Knight" has been recognized by the Screen Actors Guild and The Golden Globes.

With only two weeks to go before the Academy Awards, many are calling Ledger the favorite to win the best supporting actor prize against Robert Downey Jr. (TROPIC THUNDER) and Philip Seymour Hoffman (DOUBT).


(Editor's note: I tried to keep a lid on this but... I hope Ledger wins.)  

By Ryan Riley, Contributor

I haven't been all that impressed with the movie offerings that have been at theaters since last Christmas. I didn't think there would be any movies that would be worth checking out until "Watchmen" on March 6. But I have to say, there are a couple of films coming out this weekend that look pretty good. "Coraline", a Tim Burton-directed animated film based on the graphic novel by Neil Gaiman, looks like an intriguing all-ages film, and "Push", featuring Chris Evans (the Human Torch from the Fantastic Four movies), appears to be a well-executed action movie in the vein of the classic "Scanners". As I was scanning through the other films being released this weekend I noticed that "Fanboys" is being released on a limited amount of movie screens.

"Fanboys" tells the story of a group of friends that are Star Wars fans in 1998, the year before Star Wars Episode I came out. A time when no one could have anticipated how much Jar Jar Binks would negatively affect the good will fans felt toward George Lucas. When they find out that their friend Linus has cancer, they decide to break into George Lucas' Skywalker Ranch and pilfer a print of the film so he can see it before he dies. The film stars Sam Huntington ("Superman Returns"), Dan Fogler ("Balls of Fury") and Kristen Bell ("Veronica Mars").

The reason that I am writing this article is that this film has been a long time coming. I remember this film being announced at the San Diego ComicCon back in 2007. I saw the trailer for it and was psyched to see it when it was to originally come out on Aug. 17, 2007. This release date was postponed because the film's director, Kyle Newman, received more funding to shoot additional scenes. It was delayed again to accommodate the schedules of the actors, with reshoots to be directed by Stephen Brill ("The Mighty Ducks") instead of Newman. It was announced later that the cancer storyline would be removed from the film, turning it into a lowbrow road trip film in the vein of "Sex Drive". When Star Wars fans went online to protest the proposed change, Brill responded with a profanity-filled tirade and called them all losers. If there's one thing I've learned in my 35 years on this planet, it's that you can't snarl and bite at the people you are trying to sell your wares to. No good can come of it. Afterward, Newman was brought back to re-edit the film to include the cancer plotline with the newly shot material. Despite the fact that the new cut of the film got rave reviews at the 2008 San Diego ComicCon screening, the release date kept getting pushed back. And now finally, the film has been released, albeit in a small amount of theaters.

I got the chance to see the film recently, and even though there were a couple of scenes that made me cringe more than laugh (the scene where the boys are forced to strip to a Menudo song by a group of Mexican bikers comes to mind), I thought it was pretty darn hilarious overall. Of course, the gags wouldn't have worked as well as they did without the ensemble cast that Newman gathered together. Besides the core cast, there are a ton of celebrity cameos throughout. Newman raided talent from Judd Apatow (Seth Rogen, Will Forte), Kevin Smith (Smith, Jason Mewes & Ethan Suplee), and the TV show "The Office" (Craig Robinson, David Denman) to round out his cast. As great as those guys were in their cameos, it was the inclusion of Star Wars vets Carrie Fisher, Billy Dee Williams, Ray Park and Star Trek legend William Shatner that really put this Star Wars lovefest over the top.

Still not convinced you should check the film out? OK, I didn't want to have to resort to this, but I know a deal-sealer that might provide an impetus for you: Kristen Bell in a Slave-Leia outfit. You heard me right.

"Fanboys" is playing locally at the Edwards 26 Theater over at the Long Beach Towne Center on Carson St. at the 605 Freeway. Definitely check it out because it's likely to make a quick exit from theaters like "Mallrats" did back in 1995.

Police released this surveillance photo of the suspect, holding a double-ended weapon which resembled one used by Klingons in "Star Trek." (Colorado Springs Police)

By Kieran Nicholson
The Denver Post

A man wielding a "Star Trek Klingon-type sword" robbed two Colorado Springs convenience stores early this morning, police said.

The first robbery happened at about 1:55 a.m. at a 7-Eleven at 145 N. Spruce St., Colorado Springs police said in an incident report. The second robbery happened at about 2:20 a.m. at a 7-Eleven store at 2407 N. Union Blvd.

Witnesses told police that a man wearing a black mask, black jacket and blue jeans entered the stores carrying a sword. The armed robber took an undisclosed amount of cash and fled on foot from both stores, police said.

Officers searched the area but didn't find the robber or the weapon, which was described as a "bat'leth." 

By Ryan Riley, Contributor

If you've been to a comic book store lately, you might have noticed that a particular comic book issue with a cameo appearance by a certain newly-elected president going for upwards of $200.00 at comic book stores. Amazing Spider-Man #583 contains a back-up story with Spidey preventing a rather clumsy attempt to take the place of Barack Obama at his inauguration by C-list Spider-Man villain the Chameleon. It is the best-selling single issue of a comic book since, well, the Obama biographic comic from IDW. The issue is in such high demand that a first printing is selling for a king's ransom, and Marvel is releasing a fifth printing of the issue to satisfy all takers.

The creative team on Amazing Spider-Man, writer Zeb Wells & artist Todd Nauck, will be signing copies of the Obama issue over at Pulp Fiction comics on February 14, 2009. So ladies, before your man takes you out for a night on the town for Valentine's Day, humor him with a slight detour over to Pulp Fiction and buy a signed copy.

I recently had the opportunity to ask artist Todd Nauck some questions about the issue. Here's what he had to say regarding the issue and its historic impact on the comic book industry.

Modern Mythology: Who at Marvel came up with the idea for the Obama cameo in Amazing Spider-Man?

Todd Nauck: I'm not sure who exactly. All I know is the Spider-Man editor, Steve Wacker, contacted me to see if I was available to draw a 5-page story.

Modern Mythology: Describe for us the reaction you had when you found out that you were assigned to do this story.

Todd Nauck: When I was first contacted, I didn't even know what it was until the next day. And when I found out, I was a little awestruck. Then when I found out it was running in Amazing Spider-Man #583 the week before the inauguration, I realized this was gonna be big.

Modern Mythology: What's your take on the other comics that have featured Obama that have been released in the last few months (the Savage Dragon appearances, the bio comics)?

Todd Nauck: I didn't read those. I'm actually behind on a lot of my comic book reading. I ought to check those out!

Modern Mythology: Did you expect the Obama guest-appearance issue to sell as well as it has?

Todd Nauck: I knew it would sell well. I figured people who like Obama, whether they read comics or not, would be going to pick this comic up. I didn't expect it to go to five printings, though!

Yes, I said Kyle Baker.

I have become used to his usual "cartoony" style, but I also remember the work he did before that artistic evolution. One thing I learned about Baker is that he is a true artistic chameleon.

And he's taking on Hawkman -- a "warrior" with wings -- so the word that this book will be "violent" is no surprise.

Check out some of Baker's stuff, it is a style of work we haven't seen from this artist in awhile.  It's nice.

Go to Baker's site to see two pages from the comic  here.