Marvel

Fox has been holding back on the January Jones/White Queen lingerie shots for X-MEN: FIRST CLASS but The Hollywood Reporter is delivering with some shots in era-appropriate (and now fetishized) garb.

Nothing much goes on at the third day of the BookExpo America -- it's generally a chance just to run around and talk to the people you missed the first two days, although most people have already gone back to the office. We'll have a full write-up tomorrow both here and at PW, but in the meantime, a couple of photos.

With screenings unfolding around the globe, all the buzz on X-MEN: FIRST CLASS has been great (100% on Rotten Tomatoes), and last night the film had its world premiere in NYC, with Marvel's own John Lowe doing some red carpet commentary. Releasing studio Fox has just added to the fun with a new iPad app X-Men EXTRA which plays into the whole conspiracy angle of the film, which follows Xavier and Magneto as young allies in the 60s. As you can see the app has some fun with the historical record, ala Boilerplate, imaging Emma Frost standing beside Jackie Kennedy in a fetching go-go booted ensemble. Check out the byline for another in-joke.

Do successful comic book movies create new comics readers? As the "Watchmen Principle" demonstrates, when a movie is based on a finite graphic novel or series, the answer is yes. When it is based on an ongoing 50 year saga the results are not so clear. CBR's Greg Hatcher chanced upon a display of bagged comics at his CostCo which showed that Marvel had put together a product that seemed to be aimed at people who liked THOR and wanted to know where to go next: A photo-cover of hunky Chris Hemsworth as Thor graced the front of the package and an assortment of alluring titles lurked beneath.

Behind the scenes at FLASHPOINT and Marvel, among other things.

Did you know that Disney owned Marvel Comics? You do now, as Marvel is putting out a licensed comic from the ABC show Castle, which stars nerdlebrity godhead Nathan Fillion as a mystery writer who also solves crimes. The GN. will not be an adapttaion of the show, however, but a story about Castle's best-selling character, Derrick Storm. Tellingly, this will not be a periodical, but a standalone graphic novel, due in September, written by Brian Michael Bendis and Kelly Sue DeConnick with art by Lan Medina and a cover by Carlo Pagulayan.

This is the busiest month Marvel have had in quite some time. The big release for March was the relaunch of FANTASTIC FOUR as just plain FF, but the month also sees the prologue to upcoming mega-crossover FEAR ITSELF, two new ongoing titles in VENOM and IRON MAN 2.0, the revival of CrossGen titles RUSE and SIGIL, and issues from the "Death of Spider-Man" and "Age of X" crossovers. We also have the second month of Point One issues - more on that below. As usual, Marvel had the largest share of the direct market, both in terms of dollars (leading DC by 40% to 28%) and unit sales (45% to 32%).

Thor is all around, no need to fake it.

To no one's surprise, THOR scored a hit at the weekend box office topping the domestic till with $66 million, adding up to a worldwide gross of $242 mil. The thunder "god" lagged only IRON MAN and SPIDER-MAN's debuts, making the third biggest first appearance for a Marvel character. (But NOTE the others didn't have the benefit of inflated 3D ticket prices. It was also proof that a film can make a big debut despite two weeks of piracy: THOR opened two weeks ago overseas to take advantage of various local holidays and the Royal Wedding 3-day weekend in Britain. Although THOR also handily blasted the Mel Gibson come-back vehicle, THE BEAVER, it was not all good news:

We'd venture the opinion that a fairly entertaining film could be made of Mark Ruffalo just wearing Hulk Hands. BTW, is this the slowest news week ever or what? Is everyone just exhausted from the brutal spring convention schedule? Probably.

Why do all the mutants have English accents? Jennifer Lawrence, hot off her Oscar nod, is steamy as Mystique! X-MEN: FIRST CLASS opens on June 3rd.

Marvel has released the first still from the just commenced AVENGERS movie, and it's all about the sitting down. Director Joss Whedon and crew went into production yesterday in Albuquerque for the movie you may have always dreamed would happen.