In case you missed all the crazy Warner Bros/DC restructuring last week, there’s this new entity called DC Entertainment. The head behind it is Diane Nelson. And apparently she has no plans to push through a Superman movie at the moment:

Via Slashfilm:

We’ve obviously done a lot of great things behind the property in our history, and it’s a key part of the family, but we don’t have current plans behind Superman.

So we have a Green Lantern movie in development staring fucking Van Wilder, but no one is working on a Superman movie? Something about this doesn’t compute. If I was Diane Nelson, I’d do two things. First, I’d get Mark Millar back into the DC Universe. I’d give him the keys to Superman. Because if anyone can make Clark Kent one-thousand percent awesome, it’s him. And then I’d make sure that there was a Superman movie put into production that doesn’t just use two-hours of film to slob on the knob of Christopher Reeves.

It’s simple: Make a film where Superman deals with the usual existential crisis, while getting to punch the crap out of something. Like Metallo, I don’t care. And someone please make Lex Luthor imposing. We have flying, relate-able internal strife, a machavelian villain, and a dude fighting a robot. Seriously, c’mon. Easy. It’ll make a zillion bucks. But uh, good luck with Green Lantern And the Emerald Dongs.

I’m such a douche with the Bat-puns, I know. I can’t help it.

When I found out that Frank Quitely was leaving Batman and Robin for a spell after his initial arc, I was bummed out. But then I heard Philip Tan was taking over, and I breathed a sight of relief. Well, DC has announced that Cameron Stewart is taking over with issue #7, following Tan. It’s good news abound! I’m always weary of creative turn-overs on title. Suddenly the design, and perspective you’ve been used to shift, and sometimes for the worse. But Stewart’s promo art is gorgeous, and I’m looking forward to seeing what the dude can do.

Dig the gorgeous promo, and check out Stewart’s blog for other general coolness.

Covered is a truly awesome blog that I came across today via an article by Wired. At Covered, old school comic book covers get re-imagined by other artists. The result are pretty fantastic. Artists such as Mark Grambau take something like this:

And reimagine it like this:

The contents are countless, and they’re all absolutely awesome. Check out the blog Covered.

If you haven’t been reading DC’s Wednesday Comics then you’re either stupid or crazy. Provided you’re not both, go to your local comic shop right now buy as many of them as you can. Yes, they’re that good.

Those of you who have been picking up this weekly treat have probably already decided which strips are worthwhile and which aren’t. To me, the only real toss-away strips are Metal Men (apparently DiDio writes an interesting story about as well as he edits), Teen Titans, and (until last week, anyways) Caldwell’s Wonder Woman. Other than that, we’re talking straight-up comic-book masterpieces.

One of these masterpieces is Superman. The story is simple enough — Superman is having some sort of existential crisis and he travels about while trying to figure out what it all means. The execution, however, is perfect. Arcudi’s writing and Bermejo’s pencils depict Kal-El as both iconic and humanly relatable. Kudos to them.

But what I find most breathtaking about this comic are the colors. When I fold open the newspaper-style strip, my eyes explode and nearly knock the lenses out of my glasses. I don’t even know what to write…the colors of this Superman strip are just perfect. Vibrant, warm, welcoming, heavenly.

So once I realized that I was in love with the colors, I decided to contact the woman responsible: Barbara Ciardo.

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Pepsibones has been vociferously arguing that the Disney acquisition of Marvel could actually be super disco breakin’ and shit. He proposes that the deep-pockets that have picked up Marvel could actually benefit fans. How so, you ask? Well, if comic books are in fact dropping and dropping in sales, they may be willing to eat the cost moreso than if Marvel was alone. Why would they be willing to do that?

It’s easy.

Marvel and DC have long since been using their comic books as thinktanks for movie ideas, t-shirts, theme parks, et cetera. In other words, they’re a the testing ground for more lucrative propositions. And if Disney is willing to eat the cost on this comic book R&D, they should do us a favor as well.

Drop the cost of comic books. If they’re capable of eating cost, why not make the average comic book cheaper? Them shits are currently bordering on $3.99. If they were halved in price, being the sucker I am, I’d be more inclined to pick up some of the slop out there. Like the fifteen Avengers titles.

Pepsibones isn’t alone in his sentiment, Rich Johnston at Bleeding Cool reported that Disney may be thinking the same thing internally in a good article:

Via Bleeding Cool:

However, what if Disney was preemptive? What if Disney want to do something that makes a big impact on the comics business. It may make less money, it may cost them in instant revenue, but it also may reignite the kind of buzz that will help the slew of Marvel and Marvel-related films and merchandise.

What if the comics, rather than creeping towards the $3.99 price, suddenly dropped. To $1.99. Across the board.   Sales would rocket, market share would sour, other publishers would be squeezed off the shelves, plastic rings or no plastic rings,   comics revenue would fall. But buzz would increase, increase, increase.

C’mon Disney. Do all of us Marvel zealots a solid and drop the price. We know you can afford it, you gobble up companies like I eat slices of pizza. Careless and with no regard for the ramifications.

It’s a common fear of mine that my comic book store of choice, Webhead, is a bad year away from folding. The owner Dean, who is a good lad of mine, told me recently that they wouldn’t even be capable of staying open without their business selling shit online.

I was floored. I knew things were bad, but not that bad.

Then I came across this great article by Christopher Butcher that was linked from another blog I frequent, The Beat. Here’s an excerpt:

Things aren’t stable, behind the scenes (and sometimes spilling onto message boards and websites) people are very worried. Fans, Retailers, Publishers. Distributors. But the thing that to me is the most disconcerting and heralds the biggest change? Diamond Comics Distributors drastically raising their order minimums.

I can’t imagine that this is going to do anything but make life more difficult for the struggling comic book store. It’s a lengthy article, but it’s worth checking out if a Wednesday trip down the comic book store means the same thing to you as it does to me.

Check out the article here.

Whenever I wander around Warren Ellis’ Whitechapel Forums (which is pretty much everyday) it doesn’t take long before I find something worthwhile. Some days, it’s a new book to read or an 8tracks mixtape or some scientific article I can barely wrap my head around. In other words, Whitechapel is a failsafe source of discovery.

Today was no exception. Browsing the Splash Page Art Challenge Thread, I was struck by the work of George Zapata (who posts as ‘gzapata’). His submission (as seen below) wonderfully depicts the differences between Batman & Superman. And while this interplay between light/dark, cheerful/brooding, inspiring/frightening has been explored ad nauseam, Zapata’s effort is much more refreshing and playful.

From Superman’s ridiculous hair-curl to Batman’s scowl, Zapata helps the reader remember that these are cartoons — they don’t always have to be  complicated characters of  socio-cultural critiques. Sometimes, believe it or not, comic books can just be fun – and that’s exactly what these two pages prove.

I made my way to Zapata’s website to discover that he is a former student of the Joe Kubert School of Cartoon and Graphic Art and is trying to cut his teeth in the comic book world. I emailed George and asked for permission to post these images and he has yet to respond. With that being said, I’m going to assume he’s cool with it.

Go to his  blog. Check out his sick art. Let him know what you think. Help out the small guys.

Last night, Pepsibones asked me if I had heard about Guy Ritchie. Yeah, I said, the dumb ass is directing the Lobo movie. Which is going to excite my fourteen year old self. Lobo was awesome back in the day, because he was a dumb swearing piece of shit who stabbed stuff. I was fourteen. Hopped up on testosterone and giggling at boobs. This dude understood me.

I convey to Pepsibones that I thought Lobo sucked now, when he hit me with:

Yeah, but did you know he was created as a commentary on Wolverine and other ridiculous anti-heroes?

I was aware of that, but it only was made vaguely known to me after I had evolved out of my primordial testosterone madness. Into my uh, post-mordial, testosterone semi-madness. And that said, I wasn’t the only boner-sporting adolescent who completely missed the message, according to the guy behind Lobo’s popularity, Keith Giffen:

Via Lobo’s Wiki:

I have no idea why Lobo took off,” Giffen once said in an interview. Referring to the 1990s incarnation of Lobo he created, he said, “I came up with him as an indictment of the Punisher, Wolverine, hero prototype and somehow he caught on as the high violence poster boy. Go figure”

No idea? I can help you dude. Because people always miss the point! Especially in mainstream culture. Maybe in indie comics or Focus Feature films the point is gotten, over-analyzed and then thrown to the wolves. But shit like Lobo? C’mon. It was marketed towards teenage boys who wanted to see gunshots and swears. It’s ironic, how the very medium you used to make your commentary turned against you! People always miss the point. The Dark Knight was just about Batmobiles, the Matrix was just about guns and kung-fu, and Fight Club was about people punching one another.

There isn’t much room for social commentary when dealing with us mouth-breathing teenage boys.

Are you fools ready to Fuck Crime! next April? I hope so! Because the movie adaptation of the comic book Kick-Ass is spilling into theaters on April 16, 2010. I have to say, I’m one of the few people I know that isn’t totally jizzing over the comic book. It’s yet another Mark Millar riff on SUPERHEROES IN THE REAL WORLD, ala Wanted, Marvel 1985, et cetera, et cetera. And it seems to rely on hyperviolence and shock value. I should probably admit after stating that though, that Mark Millar is one of my favorite comic book writers. And he’s scribed countless stories I’ve adored. Maybe I’m just burnt out on ultraviolence. It’s not his fault. I love you Mark! It’s just that every time I read an issue, I get the feeling there’s the “Are you shocked?! Are you offended? Eh! EH?!”

No, I’m not. I jerk off to scat porn. A little girl saying the word “Cunt” doesn’t blow me away anymore.

That said, I couldn’t help but be amazed by the clips that leaked from San Diego Comic Con this year. They’re pretty god damn faithful. Deep down inside I’m sweating the movie, and I have the funny feeling it’s going to blow my god damn socks off. As well, the fact that the movie was independently funded reeks of awesomeness and I love the fact that they just shot the fucking movie they wanted, and sold it afterwards. I think I may be fawning. Fuck. Shit.

I’m conflicted.

Lay off me, I’m bipolar.

DC, not comfortable with being utterly forgotten today, has released some new pictures of their MMO, DC Universe. I feel bad for DC. I don’t begrudge them from trying, but I have seen the future of this release. And it staunch mediocrity at best. Maybe it’ll cut out enough of a chunk to exist for a while. Maybe it’ll even be fun. But there’s no way that they’re going to be able to conquer the market. Blizzard continuously pumps out new WoW content to keep us junkies playing. Sure, maybe we’ll dabble in DC Universe. But like any man who leaves his girlfriend for a while for that cute girl who works at Newbury Comics and listens to the Pixies, we’re going to realize the truth: There’s a reason we spent four years with our beautiful WoW. Shit can’t compete.

Oh, and if shit could compete? It’s going to be Star Wars: The Old Republic. The loudest of MMO detractors are salivating over this release. My friend, The Dude, never misses a chance to take a swing at WoW and the stupidity of MMOs. And you know what? He’s pledged that he will be picking up the Old Republic. There’s only so many hours in the day, and when push comes to shove, it’s going to be a Star Wars/WoW world. That shit is just the truth.

[ check the pictures @ kotaku ]