loonyblog.

Lots of Aquaman craziness going on…first the canceled Aquaman series pilot winds up (officially!) on iTunes, and now there’s talk of a real Aquaman movie being made. And while that show wasn’t picked up, the actor who portrayed the titular character will be on Smallville next season as another b-list DC hero (minor spoilers on that link). For a second (or really, third) string superhero, there sure is a lot of buzz about Aquaman.

I haven’t watched the pilot yet, but I’m considering it. I want to check it out, but I just don’t know if I can stand to watch the whole thing in low-res on my monitor. Maybe if iTunes let me burn it to DVD, but of course, they don’t. Dang.

In any event, that people are talking - and seriously! at all about Aquaman is downright surreal. And it begs the question: when is Green Lantern gonna get some love? And not the stiff-necked John Stewart version. I want the entertaining Kyle Rayner. Or failing that, Hal Jordan. But definitely Kyle Rayner first.

Apparently Time Warner is telling people that they will not provide CableCards to be used in TiVo Series3 units.

I was under the impression that Time Warner has to support any CableCard-ready device, but there may be a legal loophole that makes the entire CableCard project useless. This means war.

Here they are, my photos from Comic-Con 2006. There was some crazy stuff there. A guy who looked like Richard Pryor in a Superman costume, two dudes dressed up as mustard bottles (?), Lou Ferigno, and even this wacky guy:

I love Comic-Con. Go check out all the madness.

I’m back from Comic-Con! And good lord did I come back with a lot of stuff. I got so much crap that I had to ship back a bunch of it, and still had to carry a shopping bag with me on the plane. Oy.

Here’s all the stuff I got…some I paid for, a shocking amount of it was free, and all of it rocks.

• Marvel Legends Face-Off: Hulk vs. the Leader figures (I got the variant edition with classic vertical head Leader!)
• All four PVP collections plus Captain Amazing from Scott Kurtz/PVP
• A free copy of City of Villains for buying the above
• Superman, Wonder Woman shot glasses (they’re really nice, too)
• A Green Lantern t-shirt
• A Wonder Woman shirt (teeny tiny sized for Heather)
• A Superman Comic-Con 2006 shirt
• A Superman paperweight (which is totally awesome, btw, and a con exclusive)
• A Wonder Woman figure (for Heather, of course)
• Two mini-toys from I.W.G. Rocketworld
• The Halo Graphic Novel
• Michael Turner’s Fathom TPB
• A (con exclusive) Star Wars Shocktrooper bust and Boba Fett bust-ups from Gentle Giant
• A Kong Fighting V-Rex statue from Weta
• The Warhammer 40,000 preview book from Boom Studios
• A Green Lantern (John Stewart) Mini-Mates from DC Comics (In order to get that I had to recite the Green Lantern “recharge speech”…you know what I’m talking about)
• A Hellgate: London comic from Dark Horse Comics
• Batman: Detective 27 TPB, Superman: The Man of Steel TPB and three Hellboy collections from TFAW (who did their awesome five for $25 deal they had the last time I was at SDCC)
• An “Age of S&M” Sam & Max sketchbook from Steve Purcell himself (signed and sketched in!)
• The Strange Adventures of H.P. Lovecraft preview book
• Jurassic Trailer Park #2 (Freebie)
• The Red Line #1 and Living in Infamy #1 from Ludovico Technique
• Freshmen TPB from Top Cow
• The Tick Spoon (SPOON!) from BVHE
• Wonder Woman and Looney Tunes buttons from DC Comics
• A (slightly hideous) Superman Returns light-up button

Just got back to my hotel room from this evening’s preview night at Comic-Con. Considering that I’ve been awake since 1:00 AM in this time zone (had a 6 AM flight from NYC, hence the ridiculously early post this morning), I’ll probably pass out any second, but I wanted to throw something up since I forgot to do so beforehand.

I’ll be manning the Darkness booth…we’re at #2400 (or so…not sure of the exact booth number) right by DC Comics, Nintendo and Alex Ross. You can’t miss us. We’re showing the game and giving away comics, prints and bandannas, and Mark Silvestri is doing a signing on Friday. If you’re at the show, stop by and say hello.

For preview night I had virtually no time to walk around, but I did pull myself away long enough to stop by the Image booth and meet Scott Kurtz of PVP fame. I bought some stuff from him (and got my free copy of City of Villains…w00p), and chatted briefly about the fact that I was once a character in his strip. Sadly (or maybe fortunately), those strips will never get published in print, as they were long before he started doing high-res versions. But that’s okay, since they’re forever archived online.

Tomorrow I should be able to wander a bit more, and then on Friday I should have a good amount of time on my own. I’m taking lots of pictures and will post them all when I get back, but here’s a preview, showing off one of the darklings we have at our booth:

Apparently TiVo has begun prepping CableCard installers about TiVo Series 3, which the leaked instruction sheet says, “will be generally available in retailers soon.” Oooh…I just got all tingly.

I must say, given the presence of many real, legitimate news stories today, I’m shocked at the amount of coverage that the Bush expletive video has gotten. Several times today I visited CNN.com, and the chaos in the middle east wasn’t top story, it was our commander-in-chief saying the s-word. Who cares?

With all apologies to those who are shocked (shocked!) that a grown man might use such language, I for one want to know for sure that when presented with appropriately shocking news (like what’s currently going on), our intrepid president says, “holy shit!” Instead of, you know, sitting there for seven minutes like nothing is happening.

Among Warren Ellis’ reasons for not attending Comic-Con is this delightful gem:

Klingons. I never want to have to piss while standing next to Klingons again.

Well okay then. But speaking as someone who made the pilgrimage to Quark’s Bar in Las Vegas, I for one look forward to sharing a bathroom with Klingons. I do however draw the line at those dorky robots from the original Battlestar Galactica. Even I won’t go that far.

Well here’s something I never could have predicted…David Denby of the New Yorker actually liked The Devil Wears Prada.

There are some critics I tend to agree with (Roger Ebert being the most notable, although I don’t know what he’s been smoking lately with some of those reviews), and then there are the ones I just find entertaining. Denby falls into the latter group. I read Denby’s reviews every week in the New Yorker…it’s the first thing I read, in fact. I genuinely enjoy reading them, but lately, it seems like the guy hates everything produced in this country. And most of what comes out of Europe, actually.

But here we are with a silly movie like this, and what do you know…Davey likes it. Go fig. I guess I don’t have to feel guilty for enjoying it myself then. Good lord…I’m agreeing with David Denby and disagreeing with Roger Ebert? Is this Bizarro world? I don’t see any dogs and cats living together, but I think I’ll keep an eye out just to be on the safe side. I don’t want to be the last person wearing shoes on my hands.

RIP Syd Barrett: 1946 - 2006

Here’s hoping the great gig in the sky is all he hoped it would be.