Chewbacca's Blog

More Info about DC's weekly "52 " Series Revealed

Starting on May 10, following the conclusion of Infinite Crisis, and filling in the gap between the Crisis and the "One Year Later" stories that follow, is "52", a weekly series that follows several characters , written by Geoff Johns, Grant Morrison, Greg Rucka and Mark Waid with layouts by Keith Giffen and covers by J.G. Jones. Here's what appears to be the cover to the first issue:

This week it was announced that each issue will be $2.50 and that there will be no trade collections of the series until after is conclusion next year. Also from the press release:

The first four issues will feature art by Joe Bennett & Ruy Jose. In addition, beginning with WEEK 2, the series will include the 10-part back-up feature "The History of the DC Universe," written and pencilled by Dan Jurgens with inks by Art Thibert.

DC's Dan DiDio had previously revealed the following information about the series:

52 will start one week after the end of Infinite Crisis and the story will run in real time over the next 52 weeks. There will be six (possibly more) independent stories (that will occasionally crossover) that will touch upon nearly every aspect of the new DCU following Crisis. Every character from every series will be seen during the course of the story. As an added bonus nearly every issue will feature a back up story starting with the 10 part serialized “History Of The DC Universe”. Probably most important, every step is being taken to insure that every issue ships on time to keep the weekly schedule.

And DiDio teases the series some more here.

Batman and Superman: One Year Later

More details about the "One YearL ater plans for DC's two biggest characters are coming to light, including the creative teams. Here's a rundown:

• Kurt Busiek and Carlos Pacheco take on Superman
• Paul Dini and Rags Morales take over Detective
• Kurt Busiek and Geoff Johns talk about "Up, Up and Away" their 8-part series that kicks off after Infinite Crisis.
• Kurt Busiek talks about taking over Superman after "Up, Up & Away"

It's still not known who will be witing Batman and Action Comics.

Superman Movies to be Re-Re-Released on DVD

About four years ago, Warner Bros. released new versions of the four Superman movies, including a brand new special edition of Superman: The Movie, adding new footage and other special features. The remaining three movie had little special features.

Now with Superman Returns hitting theatres in June, Warner Brothers is back at it again with plans to re-release (this would make the third release) the four movies, along with the spin-off Supergirl, spearheaded by oneof the producers, Ilya Salkind. The good news about this latest re-release is that we will likely see the long anticipated "Donner cut" of Superman II. The article provides some background on what happened:

The Salkinds originally retained Donner to direct "Superman" and "Superman II" simultaneously. Budget over-runs and personality conflicts eventually led the Producers to replace Donner with Lester..... [who] joined the "Superman" production as an uncredited producer and intermediary. "Lester contributed two gigantic ideas," Salkind explained. "Drop the second part because we had missed summer [19]78 and take the end of the second part for the first part." This permitted Donner to finish the first film without worrying about filming for the second, with the rationale being that, if the first film bombed, there'd be no reason to have a second film ready to go. After the first film's release, work resumed on the sequel with Lester in the director's chair.
The original idea was to end the first film with a cliffhanger - the first of the two nuclear rockets that Superman threw into outer space explodes and frees the three Phantom Zone villains. After the Salkinds decided to hold off finishing "Superman II" till after the first film's release, it was decided that it made more creative sense to present the sequel's story independently of the first film. This necessitated plotting changes such as the addition of the scene where terrorists attempt to hold Paris hostage, which results in the freeing of the Phantom Zone baddies, and the deletion of scenes that referred to events from the first film as being recent.

I feel vindicated. I bought the new Superman DVD, but held off on buying Superman II because I knew that someday that they would release this alternate verson, probably around the time of the new movie. My patience has paid off. I still won't buy Superman III or IV or Supergirl though.

Justice League Unlimited Returns to Cartoon Network

On Saturday, Feb. 11 (two weeks!), “Flash and Substance” the first of nine new episodes of Justice League Unlimited will air at 8:30 pm. This episode spotlights the Flash and his Rogues Gallery. Also featured are Batman and Orion.

This and several other episodes have already aired in the UK and can be found online for those interested. You can read reviews of these episodes here.

Yesterday, descriptions of the rest of the season were released, including one for the two-part finale: “In a knock-down drag out battle on Earth and in space, the power moving behind the scenes of the villains is revealed leading to the most unexpected team-up in Justice League history.”

Check out a recent interview with two of th show's producers, Bruce Timm and James Tucker, who talk about how the series has progressed, and gush about what’s coming up.

This article ends with some guessing by the author about what’s next for the animated DC universe, including speculation about a Supergirl and the Legion of Superheroes (also featured in one of the nine upcoming episodes)series, a new Superman series (similar to The Batman, and coming in wake of the new movie), a, a Doom Patrol (featured this season on Teen Titans) series and a JLU team-up spin-off, something along the lines of the comics World’s Finest or the Brave and the Bold.

DC's plan for Flash post-Infinite Crisis -UPDATED

In the wake of Infinite Crisis #4, DC's Dan DiDio, who has been saying that Crisies have tradtionally been bad news for Flashes, sheds a little light on what he means in a new interview with Newsarama.

He notes the the important role the Flash plays in comics history:

“I’ve always felt that the Flash have marked significant turns and changes in DCU history – the start of the Silver Age is marked by Barry Allen’s first appearance,” DiDio said. “It was the Flashes who brought out the whole Earth-1/Earth-2 concepts for DC. Wally West’s assumption of the mantle as the Flash kicked off the DCU after the original Crisis, with a new approach was taken with the character that was new and fresh. In looking at the magnitude and scope of what we were doing here, I felt that it was important to identify that this was an important turn in DC’s history as well. I look at the changes in Flashes as something that signifies that."

New writers Danny Bilson and Paul De Meo were both writers/producers on the 1990s Flash TV series (featuring Barry Allen), which was recently released on DVD.

UPDATED with an interview with the new writers.

WB and UPN combine to create new network

Animated Superman DVD confirmed

Dana Delany and Tim Daly will reprise their roles from Superman: The Animated Series with an all-new DVD movie from Warner Bros. Animation later this year.

In Superman: Brainiac Attacks, the Man of Steel faces a combined threat from his two biggest foes, Lex Luthor and Brainiac. But perhaps even more daunting will be getting in touch with his feelings for Lois.

The latest issue of TV Guide magazine will include a picture and more details.

New "Superman Returns" Photos

Click the link to see more.

Full Trailer for "Ultimate Avengers" Animated Movie

Welcome Isabel!

Roger Ebert on Chuck Jones

Film critic Roger Ebert reminisces on the bygone day of the theatrical cartoon short and reviews three great Chuck Jones' Warner Bros. cartoons, including Duck Amuck where the shot below comes from.

Holiday season releases scheduled for DVD

A lot of movies have come out since November that almost made it worth going to the theatre for. But then you wait a few weeks and the sense of urgency seems to fade. And here's why. Below is a list of the scheduled DVD releases of recent movies, many of which are still in theatres now:

March
7 - Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
14 - Good Night and Good Luck
14 - A History of Violence
14 - Capote
28 - King Kong

April
"Early" - The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
25 - Syriana

No word yet when Walk the Line, the Johnny Cash bio pic starring Joaquin Phoenix and Reese Witherspoon hits DVD, though April or May seems likely.

Real Life Superheroes

Fed up with crime in their hometown of Indianaoplis, a couple of guys have decided to become superheroes. For real. See here. Comics rumor columnist Rich Johnston followed up this item with an interview with one of the gang here (scroll down to "Interview with a Superhero").

For the rest of us, though there are a few other ways to become superheroes, such as on stage, or as part of Stan Lee's new reality TV show.

Yikes.

Justice League Unlimited Update

“Late spring/early summer”

That’s the unofficial word about when we’ll see new episodes, sparking anger and frustration among the show’s fans. The leading theory as to the reason for the continued delay is to time it with the release of Superman Returns, or perhaps with the direct-to-DVD animated Superman movie, that reportedly takes off from the 90s Superman animated series.

In the meantime, the first season of Justice League will be released as a DVD boxed set in March, along with the first season of Batman Beyond.

Dwayne McDuffie, a producer and head writer on the series talks about past and future episodes of the series on a recent podcast at wordballon.com.

There hasn’t been a new episode since September 2005, and it still isn’t on Cartoon Network’s schedule, but news about upcoming episodes still continue to leak out. So what’s coming up when the show finally does return to the air?

First up will be “Flash and Substance”, which formally introduces the Flash’s Rogues Gallery, the Flash Museum and his future wife (in the comics) Linda Park. As an added bonus, the Trickster will be voiced by Mark Hamill, who played the same character in the Flash live-action TV series, which was released this month on DVD. Deadman will make his animated debut. Another episode, written by Paul Dini will feature Supergirl joining the Legion of Superheroes.

Read descriptions of most of this season;s episodes here.

As for the future of the DC animated universe, Teen Titans is over (the final episode is airing as I type this), and it’s likely the remaining episodes of this season’s JLU will be the last. However, Krypto and The Batman continue, a new Legion of Superheroes cartoon is on the way, and a new Superman series will probably debut within the next year or so, all unrelated to the animated universe started by Paul Dini and Bruce Timm with Batman: The Animated Series in 1992.

Batman.... One Year Later

Peter Tomasi takes over as editor on Batman as of March, when the One Year Later timeframe kicks in with an 8-part story arc written by James (Starman) Robinson, which will run through Batman and Detective for four months. Tomasi was Robinson’s editor on Starman following the death of Archie Goodwin.

In an interview with Newsarama, Tomasi talks about getting Robinson on Batman, teases the storyline and reveals how he sees Batman, which is a departure from how he’s been portrayed over the past several years:

Bruce/Batman to me, is not driven by the death of his parents anymore. Yes, it was the catalyst and a driving force at first, and yes, seeing his parents murdered before his young eyes is something that will stay with him forever, but I don't feel he's haunted by it anymore. What Bruce does now is honor their memory each and every night by going out into Gotham as its protector and in a strange way its advocate. Because what he does each and every night is saying something to the people of the city: This city will never fall prey to the evildoers. It may be banged up and kicked around sometimes, but it's always gonna get back up and keep fighting, keep living, because as trite as it may sound, to keep on keeping on is what it's all about. Evil and darkness will not win. Good will triumph as long as you don't turn your head - or as that old saying goes (I'm paraphrasing): all that takes for evil to win is for a good man to say/or do nothing.

He won’t yet reveal who will be taking over the books following Robinson, but he confirms Bruce Wayne will still be Batman and Tim Drake will still be Robin (though this may not necessarily be true at the outset of the storyline). We will also see more stories featuring Batman AND Robin. Unclear is what is happening with Nightwing.

All in all, it sounds promising.

Read the whole interview, where he also talks about Green Lantern here.

Ultimate Avengers: The Animated Movie

Ultimate Avengers: The (animated) Movie (featuring Captain America, Hulk, Iron Man, Thor and more) comes directly to DVD on February 21. The movie is based on the first storyline of The Ultimates, by Mark Millar and Bryan Hitch, and is based on Hitch's designs.

Clerks 2 Teaser Trailer

With the failure of Jersey Girl, and his abandonment of the big budget shot with The Green Hornet, Kevin Smith goes back to his roots with Clerks 2.

See the first teaser trailer here.

The Year in Review....

.... courtesy of Conan O'Brien.

"Challenge of the Superfriends" South Park Parody