Entertainment

As we do every year, it's time to take a look at the five Animated Shorts in this year's Oscar race. Picking this obscure category is a key to winning your pool. Anyone can pick the best Movie or Actor (although this year Oscar may finally have reached parity in the Best Picture race as it's almost anyone's guess what will win.) But it's those pesky, unknown short subject films that really separate the knowledgeable from the guessers.

Well, maybe. Our long-wished-for ERB adaptation is already, a few days before opening, the latest Hollywood disaster, with comparisons to ISHTAR and other mega bombs. The Daily Beast has a super-lengthy expose on the Game of Thrones-like studio politics of former head Dick Cook, who greenlighted the film, and current head Rich Ross, who has enemies of his own:

Archer, the wildly successful animated show that surpasses even Mad Men in the number of drinks the characters consume in a single episode has...

Only days ago we were speculating with an industry pal on what had ever happened to Morgan Spurlock's documentary about the San Diego Comic-Con, which was filmed with some fanfare in 2010, had a splashy tie-in book last summer, premiered at the Toronto Film Festival and then went silent.

Ben Towle's baseball sketches remind us that pitchers and catchers have already reported.

You don't get to 500 episodes without some...comfy lounge wear.

The new Nerdist YouTube channel is hosting the first look at the Plastic Man shorts that will be airing shortly on DC Nation. As we reported earlier, Tom Kenny voices Plas, while Andy Suriano and Stephen DeStefano are involved in the animation—the John K. influence is strong but it works with the character.

Artist Mike Cavallaro writes to alert us to an event tonight, the book launch for UNDER THE MOONS OF MARS, a new anthology of short stories inspired by the Edgar Rice Burroughs mythos by writers including Joe R. Lansdale, Jonathan Maberry, Peter S. Beagle, Robin Wasserman, Garth Nix, and more, as well as a foreward by Tamora Pierce and introduction and header notes by John Joseph Adams. Oh, and illustrations by Cavallaro, Charles Vess, Michael W. Kaluta, Molly Crabapple, and more.

Here's the latest AVENGERS photos, showing Chris Hemsworth as Thor and Clark Gregg as Agent Coulson feigning interest in mundane supercomputers. And then Hawkeye, Cap, and Black Widow striding confidently into battle.

Actually, we were out Sunday night and forget to set the DVR. Oops. Here's a mostly positive recap from TV Geek Army. It seems the boys went for a spin in the Batmobile and Jason Mewes showed up and stole someone's credit card. Just another day on the job. By all accounts, this was a better episode than the first.

New collections from Marvel, including a storyline which takes place between paragraphs in another book! And the Justice League as zombies! New Titles from DC, including Silver Surfer and Captain America!

If you didn't hear about it, the Ghost Rider sequel film, "Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance" debuted this weekend. It also didn't finish where the experts thought it would. Initial estimates have it in the #3 slot behind Safe House and The Vow.