Year: 2005

The man can’t even exit a room.

PAD

On oversight on my part: I should have mentioned that “Funky Winkerbean” began the trial last week of the comic book store owner up on obscenity charges. John Byrne makes an appearance as an expert witness, and the strip echoes the Jesus Castillo case (right down to the notorious, “C’mon…everyone knows comics are for kids” comment from the DA which wound up swaying the Castillo jury.) The strip can be found here: http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/fun/funky.asp?date=20051120

PAD

So we were channel hopping yesterday, and stumbled over a half hour documentary running on the Independent Film Channel, of all things. It featured a presentation of the recent San Diego Comic Con from the point of view of three different sets of attendees, each going to garner attention for their individual indy project endeavors.

“Maybe you’ll be in there somewhere, daddy!” chirped Ariel. I considered it unlikely: With 80,000 attendees over three days against the odds of my happening to wander on camera…well, do the math.

So we’re watching it, and they have an interview with Tim Leong and Amber Mitchell of http://www.comicfoundry.com. They start talking about having attended the CBLDF get-together, and I said, “Oh. That’s funny. I was at that.”

And then they started talking about me. My jaw dropped. A helpful pop-up appeared on the screen that stated, “Peter David is a science fiction writer” for the benefit of the likely 99% of viewers to whom my name meant nothing. This, of course, delighted Kathleen and Ariel.

“I can’t escape me,” I muttered.

For anyone interested who has the IFC, the half hour is next being broadcast Tuesday at 3:30 PM EST.

PAD

1) After Kath and Ariel caught the midnight opening night showing of “Harry Potter And the Rapidly Aging Cast,” I went (with Ariel again) to see it this evening. Definitely the best of the lot, as the kids truly come into their own as actors with this film. Certainly the most sophisticated and compelling plot (wisely not split into two as was originally considered) with many wonderful sequences allowing the increasingly sophisticated cast to bring many shadings to their performances. At Kath’s suggestion, we watched “Sorceror’s Stone” before Ariel and I went this evening, and it’s amazing to see how this franchise has grown from a rote condensation of the books to works of art in their own right.

There were some curious omissions (would it have killed them to take a minute of screen time to explain what happened with Harry’s and Voldemort’s wands?) but most of the cuts were correctly made and serve the course of the film story. Miranda Richardson was gloriously daffy as reporter Rita Skeeter, who I’m convinced is J.K. Rowling’s payback for reporters who have their stories written in their heads, regardless of what their subjects have to say. And Brendan Gleeson was so great as Mad Eye Moody that I wanted to see a whole film just about him. Plus Ralph Fiennes as a creepily chilling Voldemort and tons of great special effects makes this a must see. I should mention, though, that it’s a lousy jumping on point if you’ve never seen any of the films or read the books, because–like the second and third LoTR films–it just assumes you know everyone and everything involved.

2) We’re taking Caroline to her very first ice show tomorrow: “Disney on Ice,” featuring the Incredibles. We picked up one of the program books in advance and Caroline has been flipping through it for the past several days. We figure this way she’ll have a frame of visual reference (although “Incredibles” is already one of her favorite CGI films.)

3) Ariel is trying out for the high school bowling team. Tryouts go four days, so they can get a feel for the kids’ consistency. After all, a lousy player could have three great games and a great player can have three lousy games. This way the coach sees 12 games over four days. So far she’s doing very well, showing poise and confidence in her delivery and averaging a consistent 155-165. She’s not stringing together a lot of strikes but her spare shooting is remarkably consistent, and that’s really what it’s all about. Monday and Tuesday are the final two days, so fingers crossed.

PAD

So it’s definite, I’ll be doing a “Battlestar Galactica” novel (I say it’s definite because I got the contract in the mail.)

I figure I must be on the right beam because two of the story elements I wanted to explore were nixed by the BG folks on the basis that it’s stuff they’re planning to explore in season 3.

On the downside, “Night Stalker” has been canceled. Now, honestly, I’m not THAT choked up since I’d seen an episode or two and wasn’t all that impressed. However, the annoying aspect is that Mira Furlan was talking up her guest appearance slated for December 8th…except the series is being pulled with this week’s episode. Talk about “Lost.”

PAD

The Lot Auctions server has crashed due to high volume. We’re working on the problem and will be extending the comic book auction 24 hours from when we get the server live again.

Well, score one for my agent, who told me two weeks ago that Warners had pulled the “Aquaman” movie option from the folks who’d been developing it because they were planning to do a “Smallville” spin-off featuring the sea king. Kinda sucks to be the actor who is now going to be recast. Perhaps he can form a support group with Stuart Townsend who was tossed after a week of shooting LOTR for Viggo.

Speculation is abounding as to the title since reportedly it’s not going to be called “Aquaman.” I’m thinking “Miami” isn’t happening. They could go with a watery term like “Depths” or “Waves” or “Tides.” If they want to go for symbolic, they could go with “The Trident” and have an image of a trident be the running visual motif and potential link to his past. Or they could just call it “Arthur,” although that evokes the Dudley Moore film.

Any other thoughts? Serious notions, not the inevitable “Fish Tales” jokes.

PAD