Sure, it’s old news by now, but Disney’s announced purchase of Marvel and all its characters has revved up the Internet’s creativity machine, with comic-book fans and Disney-loving pedophiles alike firing up the imaging software to imagine their favorite mashups. The thing is, no one’s as good at it as we are (suck it, Conan!) Besides, no one cares about Disney characters, and the House That Walt Built knows that it’s gonna need a lot more than Mickneto to get its movie mojo back. That’s why we went ahead and planned out Disney’s next few tentpole releases (ayo!), starring the only sure-fire moneymakers in Hollywood…
It’s hard to say which we’re looking forward to more: Iron Man 2, which hits theaters in May 2010, or this new Iron Man TV show that hits Japan’s Animax channel in 2010 (and presumably the internet, with subtitles, soon thereafter). It’s the first in a four series collaboration between Marvel and Japanese animation studio Madhouse, the iconic company behind a long string of critical and commercial anime smashes, including Ninja Scroll, Perfect Blue, Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust, Metropolis, Paprika, Millennium Actress, and Tokyo Godfathers (to name a few). They’ve also released the trailer for the new Wolverine series, which looks pretty cornball compared to the badass Tony Stark teaser, but we’ve posted it below for you to check out anyway…
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Our love for comics might have started when we were kids, but it’s persisted well into our non-kid years. And being the adults that we are now, with our attendant adult tastes, we sometimes like our comic books to have…let’s call it “mature content.” After all, stylized violence seems weird when it’s all THUD! and no blood.
That’s why we maintain a love for books that manage to juggle it all: great writing, great art, and no-holds-barred material when the time is right. You can keep your tights and sterile fights; we’ll stick with the comic books that put the “ill” in “illustration.” And we’ve rounded up The 40 Most Violent Comic Books Ever in anticipation of this weekend’s San Diego Comic-Con; read up now, impress a booth babe with your detailed knowledge later…
Last year when The Simpsons movie hit theaters, BK launched a promotion called “Simpsonize Me,” where you could turn a photo of yourself into a Matt Groening-style cartoon. But since then, Dean Fraser has been the only one still going hard, Simpsonizing a wide variety of pop culture icons for a little project that he’s calling the “Springfield Punx“.
Some of the characters Dean has rendered include Dwight from The Office, Neo from The Matrix, and even former Simpson’s writer Conan O’Brien. This month, Fraser is focusing on Marvel, posting a different superhero or villain from the comic universe each day. In addition to three of the Avengers pictured above (Captain America, Thor, and Iron Man), he’s dropped 12 other characters so far. Check ‘em out below…
For some reason (probably because he’s black), Marvel character Black Panther has never quite gotten his due. Since being created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby and debuting in a 1966 issue of Fantastic Four, he’s never achieved the marquee status of his peers, despite being the first major black superhero. Wesley Snipes tried for 15 years to turn the character into a movie, but all we got is three Blade movies instead.
Well now, BET executive Reginald Hudlin'who also started writing the Black Panther comic for Marvel in 2005'is bringing the icon to the small screen. In early 2009, a prime-time animated Black Panther series will debut on the BET network. And if the series is a success, you can bet the live-action movie (which John Singleton was recently rumored to be directing) won’t be far behind. After the jump, check out the trailer from 2006’s Ultimate Avengers 2: Rise of the Panther, one of BP’s rare TV appearances.
You gotta love the name Kick-Ass. John Romita Jr.’s cover and interior art definitely live up to the title. From the jump pain, brutality and general mayhem of all sorts take center stage in the comic. But Mark Millar’s story arc doesn’t really get traction.
