Dreamwave has informed me that the second issue of “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” has sold out.
Also, FYI, issue #5 will be the first issue that is wholly original and not a “re-view” of one of the animated episodes. It’s a lot of fun; Raphael rescues a cat from a tree, which sets off a chain of events that ends up with him fighting for his life.
Really.
PAD
I’ve been informed by editor Andy Schmidt that CAPTAIN MARVEL got the go-ahead for another six issues beyond where we’re scripted, taking us to issue #24. Think of it as being informed by the network that your show’s doing well enough to be picked up for the rest of the season. So that’s pretty positive.
Since Ivan was snapped up to draw “Superman,” I don’t know yet who’s going to be penciling it. Hëll, any volunteers?
PAD
Okay, actually, it’s rated PG-13.
“Pirates of the Carribean” was a fun film. Now I have to admit I’m a sucker for pirate films going in, so I’m hardly impartial. Furthermore, the movie was about a half hour too long (they go from point A to point B, and then there’s a lot of running around and sword fights and ships firing at each other just so they can get back to point B again.) But the cast does wonders with the material. You’ve got Geoffrey Rush in the “traditional” pirate vein of Captain Barbossa, contrasted with Johnny Depp’s delightful Captain Jack Sparrow, played as a total fop which hides his gloriously devious mind (most particularly when he executes a deft bait-and-switch to obtain a new vessel right under the noses of the British military.)
It’s surprising how many images from the ride they managed to sneak in without it being disruptive to the story flow. Snappy use of CGI and skeletal pirates combined with nudge nudge wink wink self reference makes the film far more entertaining than I expected. It’s easy to determine how many people in the theater really know the ride: At one point, several imprisoned pirates are trying to coax a mangy dog, holding the keys in its mouth, to come toward them. “You can stand there forever and the dog’s never going to move,” says Sparrow, apparently foreseeing the eventual Disneyland tableau featuring exactly that. Anyone who laughs at that has been on the ride. Anyone who doesn’t, hasn’t.
PAD
Haven’t been near a computer the past couple of days. I’ve been busy proofreading the copyedited manuscript for “Stone and Anvil,” the next New Frontier hardcover. It’ll be shipping in October/November of this year, and will be a direct follow-up to the long-awaited “Gods Above.” “Gods Above” wraps up the cliffhanger that “New Frontier” fans have been hung up on for some time now.
I turned the CE MS in to John Ordover today, so hopefully we’re on target for the pub date.
PAD
Although the contracts haven’t been signed yet, I have a deal with Del Rey paperbacks to write the novelization of Spider-Man II. The movie will be out in May, I believe, which puts the paperback release at sometime in April.
The novelization for the first Spider-Man film is probably one of the best selling books I’ve ever written, with somewhere around a quarter of a millioin copies sold.
PAD
Well, breathe a sigh of relief: She’s well on her way to recovery.
The swelling has gone down on the area of her flank where she was bitten. The wound crusted, then the crust fell off to reveal a small hole no longer inflamed. Bleeding and oozing has completely ceased. Even more important, she’s acting more like her old self, even repeatedly going to the door and asking to be let out (which I’m not going to do until she’s done with the antibiotic and the shaved area has grown back in).
PAD
Among some of the sillier comments the politics threads have spawned (What could I possibly know because I’m “only” a comic book writer. And George W. Bush is only a failed businessman and Ronald Reagan was only an actor and Harry Truman was only some haberdasher, because one aspect of someone’s life completely dictates all other aspects, right?) there was a fairly reasonable question as to my news sources.
It’s eclectic. I read Newsday, the NY Daily News, Time, Newsweek, watch CNN, the Daily Show. But the one I’ve come to find the most informative is a magazine called “The Week.” Quite simply, it’s a weekly news magazine that beautifully sums up everything of major importance that’s gone on in the previous week, presenting viewpoints from all sides in brisk, even-handed fashion. I strongly recommend subscribing to it if your local newsstand doesn’t carry it.
PAD
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