Heroes Graphic Nover Hardcover
September 5, 2007 | Leave a Comment
Curious about some of the details that occur between scenes or episodes in NBCs hit series Heroes? This additional content was made available for free in a series of short digital comics available for free on the Heroes site (unfortunately not in CBR or CBZ).
Now, those digital comics are being delivered by DC and their Wildstorm label in a 240 page hardcover starting October 24th! Even better, it’s only $29.99. If you are on top of things, you can also order from Discount Comic Book Service, preorders go for $14.99 there! It’s on my pull list and I can’t wait.
This stunning hardcover collects the amazing online comics based on the smash-hit, Emmy Award-nominated NBC show HEROES! This volume — featuring two stunning covers by comics legends Jim Lee and Alex Ross — also includes an introduction by Masi Oka (Hiro), all 34 chapters of Season One, and Tim Sale’s artwork as seen on the show.
Tags: comics, dc, graphic novel, hardcover, heroes, nbc, show, television, tv, wildstorm
Kristen Bell Joins Heroes as Elle
August 20, 2007 | Leave a Comment
Kristen Bell, star from the amazing yet canceled Veronica Mars, will be staring in a few Heroes episodes this fall! Bell will play Elle a “mysterious young lady with ties to the supposed death of Peter, H.R.G.’s past and the future of Claire. Elle makes her mark right away, by committing a serious crime.” It is unclear yet if she will be a good or evil character, as is often the case with Heroes ensemble cast of characters.
Bell’s portrayal of the young detective Veronica Mars for three seasons on UPN/CW sky rocketed that show to the top of my must see show list. I’m insanely excited to see her joining my favorite remaining show this season.
Tags: claire, crime, cw, elle, fall, heroes, kristen bell, mars, nbc, peter, sexy, television, tv, upn, veronica mars
A Look at Joost
March 9, 2007 | 44 Comments
Jenny recently hooked me up with a much coveted Joost account. Sadly I do not have any invitations yet, and there is a long list of people who have already asked me for one, you know who you are…
I was initially frustrated by the lack of client for MacOS-PPC, since this is the machine running in my living room, hooked to my TV. With that aside, I downloaded the client onto my Windows Vista laptop, where it initially also would not run. Luckily, with Vista all you need to do is jump through a few hoops. Here’s what you do:
- Right click on the shortcut, select properties.
- On the compatibility tab, un-check everything, except “Run as administrator”, this must be checked.
- Then click “Show settings for all users”, and do the same here.
- At this point you should be set to run Joost!
After the initial frustration of getting it running somewhere, I started to appreciate the potential here. In general, it runs pretty smoothly, the quality is surprisingly good for on demand web video. I think it is head and shoulders above the quality of YouTube or Google Video, probably comparable to VHS.
At the moment, the content is a bit limited, although I did watch the Green Day: American Idiot concert, which was very cool. I was extremely happy with the interface. I believe the channel based delivery of content will be familiar and intuitive to the general public who is familiar with cable TV.
My one final complaint would be the advertisement placement. It seems like the software just randomly decides to insert commercials from time to time, which I am OK with, but it doesn’t have any intelligence for deciding when to cut in. For example, I say a stupid Maybelline ad twice, both time in the middle of a song. I think this will work out in time, but just an insiders view of what’s wrong in the beta from my perspective…
Tags: american idiot, google, google video, green day, joost, macosx, Maybelline, television, video, web, windows vista, youtube
Moon Knight TV Series Coming Soon
October 25, 2006 | 12 Comments
Marvel announced today a deal with No Equal Entertainment to create Marvel’s character Moon Knight as a television series. Moon Knight is not the most well known of Marvel’s heroes, but he certainly has the potential for development. After many short and semi-successful comic series going back to 1975. Moon Knight did not experience real success until the 80’s when he managed to sustain 60 issues or so.
I count Moon Knight amongst Marvel’s other 70’s era vigilantes who have seen medium success, more so in the 80’s to early 90’s. Each of these heroes is currently being explored and expanded in new series by Marvel currently. These heroes include: Ghost Rider, Iron Fist, Power Man, and Punisher.
Since most people aren’t familiar with MK, from the Wikipedia character analysis:
Moon Knight is often criticized as an ersatz Batman and the parallels are indeed apparent. Writer of the 2006 relaunch of Moon Knight, Charlie Huston, attempted to answer these criticisms in an interview with Comixfan. The interviewer noted that the comparison is not baseless, as both Moon Knight and the Dark Knight are wealthy, “normal” humans that use gadgetry to fight crime. Though not specifically mentioned by the interviewer, further comparisons may be drawn due to the two characters’ specialized vehicles, use of themes in their gadgets, and use of fear to aid their fight against the criminal element.
Huston, though he disagreed, accepted that the character may be a rip-off of Batman, but went on to contrast the two by noting in particular differences in origin, motives, and personality. “Bruce Wayne,” he said, “fights crime to avenge the murders of his parents,” whereas Moon Knight “beats up whoever has it coming because he believes he is the avatar of the Egyptian god of vengeance and it helps him to feel better about all the people he killed when he was a mercenary.” Thus, while Batman is motivated by vengeance for wrong done to his parents, Marc Spector primarily seeks redemption from crimes he committed in his mercenary past. Huston further notes that Bruce Wayne, Batman’s alterego, takes on other personalities merely to aid in his fight. However, Moon Knight has three alteregos which aid him as much in dealing with personal demons as fighting law-breakers, and which have taken a further psychological toll of causing multiple personality disorder.
I actually think Moon Knight has the potential to be developed into a useful TV franchise. Since few people are familiar with the character, he can be expanded and developed in whatever ways the writers want to take them. Additionally, with his Batman-like characterization, there is plenty to fall back on. Add to that the dark and twisted features mixed with the multiple personality stuff and suddenly this vigilante story can go mainstream.
With this in mind, I remain hopeful. I’ll be paying close attention to casting and hopefully No Equal Entertainment can pull off a hit TV show with this. Anything has to be better than the short lived Blade Series…
Tags: batman, blade, charlie huston, comic books, comics, iron fist, marc spector, marvel, moon knight, no equal entertainment, power man, punisher, television
Psych - A Great New Show
July 11, 2006 | 4 Comments
USA stepped up to the plate and drove this one so far out of the stadium they are being investigated for steroid use. Yes, the new series Psych is an absolutely fantastic show.
The premise is great. Shawn Spencer is a guy who was raised by a cop father who developed his extraordinary skills of observation and memory through extreme and constant training. He is grown up and in every imaginable way a screw up. Gosh we love screw ups. Now he has fanagled his way into helping a local police department solve crimes by posing (of all things) as a psychic.
The acting is good for TV quality and the casting equally satisfactory. Shawn Spencer is played by James Roday who manages to make a character who is in many ways a jerk, undeniably likeable. His partner Gus is played by Dule Hill who plays it straight keeping Shawn in line as best he can. Shawn’s father Harry is played by Corbin Bernsen, equally likeable and annoying. The entirety of the blundering police force is fun to watch as they repeatedly doubt Spencers psychic abilities and are then wowed by his ability to see things and “prove” he is psychic.
Finally, the advertisements for this show are good enough to watch multiple times. These are the kind of commercials I rewind my DVR to be sure I don’t miss them. If only ad agencies realized we only skip ads that are boring…
The show’s feel could be best described as a cross between Veronica Mars and Monk. Both fun and entertaining shows in my book. Without compare this is the best new show of the summer. A complete must see. Go catch the reruns, USA will be playing them repeatedly.
Tags: detective, monk, psych, psychic, show, television, tv, usa, usa network, veronica mars
Who Wants To Be A Superhero?
July 9, 2006 | 3 Comments
Premiering July 27th on SCI FI Channel is Stan Lee’s new 6 episode reality series “Who Wants To Be A Superhero?” at 9PM.
The basic premise is that a bunch of hopefuls will show up in self-made costumes and strut their stuff as a character of their creation. “Lucky” finalists will leave their “normal” lives and compete 24/7 to prove they have what it takes to be true super heroes. They’ll each be tested for courage, integrity, self-sacrifice, compassion, and resourcefulness — all traits that every true superhero must possess.
In the end, one aspiring superhero will be declared the winner of this six-week competition. They will walk away with their character immortalized in a new comic book created by Stan Lee himself and the winning character will also appear in an original SCI FI Channel movie…
I’m a crazy rabid comics fan, but this seems a bit out there even for me. I poked around in the initial gallery of hopefuls and just like American Idol, the real entertainment here may be in seeing who shows up to compete. Everybody loves a train wreck…
Tags: charater, comic, comic book, comic character, comics, sci-fi, science fiction, scifi, stan lee, super hero, superhero, television, tv, Who Wants To Be A Superhero
Blade Series
May 22, 2006 | 2 Comments
I love shows about vampires, both Buffy and Angel rank among my favorite shows ever on television. Additionally, I liked all three Blade movies. With this in mind I had been pretty excited about the upcoming Blade: The Series which will be running on SpikeTV.
However, my hopes for this show quickly went in the toilet after seeing this trailer. The dialog seems forced and any hope for good character development seems like a long shot. Hopefully I’m wrong. I’d really like Marvel to have some luck with TV adaptations of their characters.
Tags: angel, blade, blade the series, buffy, marvel, spike, spiketv, television, tv, vampire, vampires