GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY Yes, that is a raccoon with a gun. After four days, 125,000 sweating people, and one death, pop culture’s biggest advertising expo came to a close yesterday. While there was approximately one interesting/unexpected comics announcement at Comic-Con—Neil Gaiman is writing a new Sandman miniseries—the focus, as usual, was on film, videogames, […]
Comic Books
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Tonight at Floating World: Casanova Release Party
From Casanova: Avaritia, art by Gabriel BÁ When he isn’t getting pushed down hills behind Comic-Con, Portland’s Matt Fraction is one of the best comics writers around. And tonight he’s having a party at Floating World Comics (400 NW Couch) to mark the release of the trade paperback of Casanova: Avaritia—the final volume in his […]
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Here Are Some Things You Can Get Me at Comic-Con
Oni Press, via Comic Book Resources I’m not going to Comic-Con this year—I’ve gone three or four times in the past five years, and generally get a kick out of it, but jesus: The ever-growing scale of the thing has basically made it a futile exercise in patience, endurance, and diseconomy, so I’m kind of […]
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This Is How You Sell The Dark Knight Rises
I’ve been left fairly underwhelmed by everything I’ve seen from The Dark Knight Rises so far, which is odd considering that—despite some problems with both of their narratives—I liked Batman Begins and really liked The Dark Knight, and I generally—despite some problems with their narratives—like Christopher Nolan’s movies. The guy’s an incredible visual and tonal […]
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Comics Recommendation: Lookouts #1
From Lookouts #1 on Comixology A few years ago, the guys behind the web comic Penny Arcade came up with Lookouts—a too-short comic about a bunch of kids in an organization somewhat like the Boy Scouts… if the Boy Scouts weren’t creepy, and also if the Boy Scouts lived in Middle-earth. It was great—gorgeous and […]
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Hey, Here’s a Review of The Amazing Spider-Man!
The Amazing Spider-Man is out! I reviewed it! Because I like Spider-Man! And since the movie’s out now, but since the Mercury isn’t out until Thursday, we’re posting the review early—because how will you know if you should see it or not unless you read my precious, precious words? Anyway, yes. Spider-Man! The review’s here. […]
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The Only Two Names That Strike Fear Into the Avengers’ Hearts: A.O. Scott and Manohla Dargis
The Amazing Spider-Man starts playing tonight at midnight, and my review will be up tomorrow morning; in the meantime, this is worth a read: A.O. Scott and Manohla Dargis talking about this summer’s superhero movies and the “current superhero boom [that] dates to the dawn of the century—Bryan Singer’s X-Men came out in 2000, Sam […]
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Marvel Goes Pink
In this week’s film section, I wrote about Pink Ribbons, Inc., a documentary on the sneaky corporate side of the pinkwashed breast cancer support effort. Bottom line: The money you toss at pink-ribboned product (yogurt, bucket of KFC, hairdryer, firearm) goes mostly back into the pocket of its maker. And the tiny percentage shaved off […]
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DC’s Greatest Heroes are Actually British Kids Eating Cookies
In this OMIGOD SO ADORABLE clip produced by DC Nation for the Cartoon Network, claymation representations of Superman, Batman, the Joker, and Catwoman are voiced by six-year-old British kids. Because, OF COURSE, and because we never really want to watch anything else.
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Sony Releases 25 Minutes of The Amazing Spider-Man, Gets Mad at People for Watching It
Previews have had an air of desperation about them lately—the idea’s that since mainstream audiences don’t like surprises, movie studios try to show just about everything they can in a film’s advertising campaign. (Not coincidentally, and a little depressingly, this also touches on one of the reasons Brave works so well—that film’s ads show almost […]
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Tonight at Powell’s: Joe Sacco
Groundbreaking comics journalist Joe Sacco will be at Powell’s tonight, along with Pulitzer-winning journalist Chris Hedges. The two will be reading from their new collaboration Days of Destruction, Days of Revolt, which Joe Streckert reviewed for us in the paper this week: THERE’S TRAGEDY in America, and failure. Whole towns in Appalachia suffer the ravages […]
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Comic Book Stores to Host Gay Weddings This Week
Bleeding Cool says: Along with a number of comic stores across the country, Midtown Comics Downtown in Manhattan are hosting a same-sex wedding in their store between customers Scott Everhart and Khris Wilson to coincide with the release this week of Astonishing X-Men #51, featuring a gay wedding between Northstar and his boyfriend Kyle. Bleeding […]