Entertainment

The summer of comic book movies continues as the trailer for JONAH HEX hits the internet. http://d.yimg.com/m/up/ypp/movies/player.swf I guess it might not be that bad, even...

I was moving an exercise machine - The Total Gym -down to the basement on the sly. My wife and I had discussed moving it from our bedroom – she wanted to keep it there and I wanted to move it to the basement. So, of course I moved the machine behind her back. Now, the thing weighs about 90 pounds and has ropes and pulleys so it’s awkward to carry. As I wrestled with it coming down the stairs, I missed the last step, and landed on my left ankle. As I went crashing to the ground, the Total Gym followed and came down on my chest…just as my wife was turning the corner. She screamed thinking I had died. When she realized that her idiot of a husband was alive, she started yelling at me for being an ass for carrying it down on my own and reminded me she didn’t want it moved at all. Even though the machine was still on my chest, my wife was crying and yelling, and my ankle hurt like hell and was ballooning up to the size of Schwarzenegger’s bicep, all I could think was; “Shit, the Neil Gaiman book is coming out soon – I have too much to do.” Then I asked my wife for an Advil. 2003 turned out to be an important year, for me and for graphic novels. DC Comics was publishing a BIG book, Neil Gaiman’s Sandman: Endless Nights. It was Neil’s return to Sandman comics and it was not a collection of comics, but an original graphic novel. There was the idea floating around the office that maybe, with Neil’s success with his novels and the fact that American Gods had hit the New York Times Bestseller List, we could have a bestseller on our hands. It was of a dream of mine, to have one of our graphic novels become a best seller.

Cartoonists were showing off their upcoming books covers EVERYWHERE this week. Here's the cover of the first collection of Dylan Meconis's historical yet mystical webcomic, Family Man . And here's a photo of Meredith Gran's first Octopus Pie collection from Villard, coming in June. The book is shown with a cup of coffee for both scale and inspiration.

Reader Maclaine Diemer alaerted us to this new Gorillaz video which, in addition to being just excellent, features a couple of guest stars. One is obvious -- the star of many comic-bookical movies. The other -- appearing at around the 4:00 mark -- could be an homage to another well known character? Since this is the first part of an evolving story, perhaps this mysterious figure will be back in future installments.

Waitaminnit! That Slaterman23 is quite the busy bee -- he's also designed a Lost: The Animated Series poster. Click for larger image! Looking at...

Is this the supergroup for our time? Even more super duper than the other Gorillaz superstar lineups on their new album? Over at Vulture,...

• Yow, lots of Marvel movie news percolatin' out there. Claude Brodesser-Akner reports that Columbia is the first studio to run up against the...

Just to wrap things up, re our "Bad Week For Comic Book Movies" post, THE LOSERS was another blow to the Joel Silver empire,...

David Mazzucchelli's stunning ASTERIOS POLYP won the prize for the best Graphic Novel in the Los Angeles Times Book Prizes, which as the...

So how's that April 17th working out for you, Mark Millar? You'll recall that the excitable Scottish scribe was waiting for the day AFTER the KICK-ASS opening for his agents to take out his next project, NEMESIS, a move he may regret considering the tepid opening for KICK-ASS, which only managed a sub-$20 million opening AFTER Lionsgate toted up every penny -- thus avoiding being #2 to a four-week-old cartoon about getting your dragon to use a potty chair. Millar seems to have made peace with the opening however, probably because his agents didn't listen to his advice and already sold the hell out of his next few books. Although there's no disputing that KICK-ASS will recoup on home DVD and got a very smart, savvy marketing push to the target audience, it's still being looked at as a case study of internet buzz not equalling actual movie goer buzz. Some are using it as a platform for wider mythbusting:

Oh yeah, speaking of the London Book Fair, this little news nugget was buried in Rachel Deahl's preview of the event for PW: Russia will...

Cartoon Brew, the respected animation blog, ran the promo art for the new Looney Tunes show we mentioned yesterday day, and the reaction can...