Reanimated “As some of you may already know Blair Marnell is off this week, and so he has allowed me – John Voulieris – to guest host this weeks All The Rage. Rumor has it he is off digging out an inactive volcano somewhere in the Caribbean that he plans to use as a future base of operations.” For a long time now, we’ve been hearing that Kevin Smith was going to finish his scripts for the long overdue Spider-Man & Black Cat: The Evil That Men Do miniseries. But this time, we finally have confirmation from a reliable source, SM&BC artist, Terry Dodson, via his Yahoo group:
This Has A “Seven Years of Bad Luck” Factor of Seven Out of Ten
Serenity Now The recent delay of Joss Whedon’s Serenity isn’t the only intrigue taking place behind the scenes. Word is going around that Universal wanted to do a Serenity animated feature film direct to DVD, in the vein of The Animatrix or The Chronicles of Riddick: Dark Fury. And apparently, they were serious enough to commission a script. The writer chosen for this project was Brett Matthews, who wrote an episode of Firefly and also provided the script for Dark Fury. Matthews and Whedon came up with a story for the Serenity animated feature and Matthews was set to tackle the script. However, for reasons that aren’t entirely clear, the Serenity animated feature isn’t happening. But that doesn’t mean this story won’t see the light of day. Dark Horse is rumored to be very interested in using the story Matthews and Whedon came up with as the basis for their first Serenity miniseries. If it happens, look for the miniseries to be written by Matthews, who already has a few comic scripts under his belt, including the Marvel Knights Spider-Man/Wolverine miniseries that came out last year. This Has A “Reaver Nation” Factor of Eight Out of Ten
 Defenders of the NightIn 1994, Disney released Gargoyles, their first (and only to date) animated action/drama series. Gargoyles was one of the few shows that rivaled the Batman/Superman Animated Series in terms of quality storytelling and animation. Additionally it has built a large and dedicated fanbase over the last few years. Now, for the tenth anniversary and eight long years after the last episode, Gargoyles is finally coming to DVD later this week, when the complete first season will be released. Earlier this week, Gargoyles creator Greg Weisman took the time to answer a few questions about the DVDs and the future of Gargoyles: Blair Marnell: For some of our readers who may not be familiar with Gargoyles, can you describe the series? Greg Weisman: Sure. Gargoyles is basically about a small group of tenth century, medieval gargoyles who had a spell cast on them a thousand years ago, putting them to sleep. But gargoyles sleep as stone statues. So by definition, they were frozen in stone. The terms of the spell were that the gargoyles would sleep “until the castle rises above the clouds.” Now, from the standpoint of the mage that cast the spell, that was like saying “until kingdom come”. But he didn’t count on modern technology and a very, very wealthy man who could literally move the castle up above the clouds. Having done that, our six gargoyles burst forth from stone and awake from a thousand years of sleep. They wake up in Manhattan in 1994 and it’s a brave new world. And they’ve got to make massive adjustments, make new friends and they make a bunch of new enemies and they’ve got a few old enemies hanging around too. It’s an action/drama, so it’s heavy on that, but it’s got humor, romance, pathos and just a little bit of social concern in there as well.   The main character is Goliath, who’s the leader of the gargoyles. He’s a strong, optimistic character who’s been through some tough stuff in his life but basically believes that someday gargoyles and humans will be able to live in peace together. He believes strongly in the gargoyle way of life, which is to protect those weaker than you and to protect each other. With him are four other gargoyles and a gargoyle beast. The other four gargoyles are: Hudson, who is an elder statesman and was the leader before Goliath. Goliath looks to him as something like a mentor. Then there are three younger, teenage gargoyles: Brooklyn, Lexington and Broadway… they picked their own names. Finally there’s a gargoyle beast named Bronx. Later in the second season, we introduced another regular gargoyle, Angela, who is Goliath’s daughter. Our other major characters are: Elisa Maza, a New York City police detective who befriends the gargoyles in the pilot and becomes their main human ally. Then we’ve got a number of great villains, but two in particular are recurring: David Xanatos, who is a billionaire industrialist who owns the world’s tallest building in Manhattan, the Erie Building. He’s the one who moved the gargoyles and their castle to Manhattan from Scotland. Finally, last but not least, Demona, who was once Goliath’s mate. They once loved each other but Demona has intense hatred for humans and is determined to destroy humanity. So Goliath and Demona, once in love are now completely at odds. In fact, by the end of the second season, it was clear that Goliath and Elisa, the human cop had fallen for each other.   BM: Can you talk about how the fans have kept the show alive eight years after it went off the air? GW: Almost from the beginning we had a great fan following for this series. I did two seasons of the show and after I left the show they did a third season for ABC called The Goliath Chronicles without me. But the fans have been there from day one and the show has never been off the air. If it wasn’t making new episodes, it’s been in reruns, first on the USA network and more recently on Toon Disney. So we always get new fans as well, but these dedicated fans, starting in 1997 began holding annual Gargoyles conventions called The Gathering of The Gargoyles (which can be checked out at http://www.gatheringofthegargoyles.com). These annual conventions have just been a load of fun. I’ve gone to every single one. And there have been other guests as well: voice actors, artists, writers… we’ve had huge turnout of cast and crew at various times at these conventions. These fans have just been truly faithful and have always kept the flame alive, largely on the internet, at these conventions and in other ways as well. That’s helped me keep my passion for the project alive. And I am passionate about the project. Always was and always will be, I think. But it makes it a lot easier to stay passionate when you know people want to see more. These fans have worked hard and fought hard to get the DVD set, which is being released December 7th, 2004, a few short days from now. It’s the complete first season and it’s the direct result of the fans pushing for it and because of their desire I have also pushed for it. Disney sort of turned around after a few years and said “you know, maybe this would be a good idea”. These fans are the reason this property is still in Disney’s consciousness. BM: What are some of the features of the DVD set? GW: The main thing it has is the first season, all thirteen episodes uncut. There have been previous VHS releases where the pilot episodes were cut down into a single movie. This will have all five episodes of the pilot uncut plus the remaining eight episodes of the first season, also uncut. The first five episodes have a commentary track by myself and my fellow producer, Frank Paur and Keith David, the voice actor who played Goliath. There are also a couple of mini-features, one is the original series pitch from 1993 that we used to successfully sell the show, both internally at Disney and to stations across the United States. So, you’ll get to see me looking a lot younger. [laughs] The second feature is a mini-documentary on The Gathering of The Gargoyles most recent convention in Montreal, Canada. Our convention moves to a different location every year. We’ve been in New York three times, Dallas, Williamsburg, Orlando, Los Angeles and in this past year we were in Montreal. Disney sent a camera crew up there and shot a whole load of footage and edited it down to a pretty cool little documentary where the fans, myself and Keith David all talk about the show and what it meant to us. It’s a nice little package and I hope it does really well. Because I think if it does really well it means we’ve got a good shot at getting the second season out on DVD and maybe even original material down the line. I also think this may pave the way for other Disney Television Animated shows to go out on DVD, because there are a lot of great shows that are still unreleased, like Gummi Bears, DuckTales, Darkwing Duck, Talespin, and Aladdin.   BM: What do the DVDs mean to the future of the Gargoyles franchise? GW: To some extent, I think this is a make or break opportunity for the fans of Gargoyles. If this DVD sells well, REALLY well, then Disney is going to see that they can make money on this property. And if they can do that, they’ll want to continue making money from this property. They’ll release more DVDs and potentially other things as well. There’s nothing I’d like more than to come back and do an original direct to DVD animated Gargoyles movie, or a series or one of the six spin-off sequel or prequel series we developed. I’d also love to do a lot of ideas and material that I’ve got in my head and on paper that we didn’t get to cover in the 66 episodes I worked on. I’d love to do Gargoyles novels or comic books. My background is actually in comic books, I worked for DC for years and years. I’d really enjoy doing a Gargoyles comic book. If this DVD demonstrates that there is money to be made here then I think that stuff has a good chance of all happening. Touchstone even has a live action movie in development, which is on hold at the moment, but again it depends on the DVD. This is a chance for the fans to prove to Disney in an objective way that they are ready, willing and eager to support Gargoyles. The flip side of this, of course, is a little scary. Which is if the DVD doesn’t sell that well then Disney is going to shrug and sort of walk away from it. And it will be more difficult to get people interested in pursuing more stuff in the Gargoyles universe. I’m very excited about the DVD release and I’m crossing my fingers. I’m extremely hopeful but also a little nervous. If it does sell well, then the sky’s the limit. This Has A “Stone by Day, Warriors by Night” Factor of Ten Out of Ten
Hellspawn An update on the status of the new Spawn Animated Series was posted earlier this week at Spawn.com:
Now that things have begun moving in the right direction we should have some very interesting details to share over the next few months, so stay tuned. This Has A “Clownspotting” Factor of Seven Out of Ten
 He Is The LawIn about three weeks, Will Eisner’s John Law will make its print debut with the release of Dead Man Walking. With a long running webcomic at ModernTales.com. John Law has already built a steady following under the stewardship of Gary Chaloner. Recently, Chaloner took the time to elaborate on the history of John Law and the future of the series in print:
 I originally thought of running the series on Will’s web site, but at around the same time, Joey Manley was launching ModernTales.com. Seeing an opportunity to get the new Law series up and running quickly in an environment that included work by Roger Langridge, Tom Hart, Donna Barr, Lea Hernandez and James Kochalka (to name a few), I approached Joey and he happily invited Will to place the series there. I thought it would be a great way for readers to see what the new John Law is all about, without having to wait for the planned print series to go through production, solicitations and release. Now, though, after several years of online publication, we have Will Eisner’s John Law: Dead Man Walking from IDW Publishing.   This first print edition from IDW is pretty damned special. It collects three of my stories that set up the premise for the new series. It also has the original three stories produced by Will Eisner back in 1948. These stories were turned into Spirit stories, but for this edition, we’ve restored the original art and dialogue, as well as coloring the stories in glorious new gray tones. I’ve seen the printed product... and Will’s art has never looked so good. IDW have done a wonderful production job, as usual. I think it’s worth the cover price just for these classic Eisner tales! My job with John Law, was to try and keep the soul of the character Will created alive, but separate John Law and Denny Colt from their common, comic book origins. That’s what allowed me pick and choose elements from Will’s original work, plus add my own bits and pieces to flesh out the new interpretation of Crossroads and the cast.   Having a look back at how it’s developed, I suppose the best way of describing the series is Dick Tracy meets The Godfather meets Karl Kolchak (!) with the human touch of Bruce Springsteen’s lyrics... all filtered through Will’s original stylings. I want readers to care about Law and what happens to him. I want readers to like him... or at least care about what happens to him. I’m not looking to do a heavy crime comic here, but stories about an ensemble of characters. Much the same way Will developed a close-knit cast in The Spirit. He said to me when we were developing Law: “Keep the stories human.”  Will’s been so supportive of what I’m doing with the stories. With the release of the Dead Man Walking, I’m hoping that more people will visit ModernTales.com to read more of the new adventures as I produce them, as well as support the IDW print edition well enough to keep it in print and allow me to produce many, many sequels. I’ve got a lot of Law stories to tell... a whole stack are already in production. The characters have a life of their own now - and I’d like to see them all in print through IDW.
Wings Over the World Warren Ellis’ recent webcomic musings have had an almost immediate impact upon the strips that he mentioned. Case in point, Athena Voltaire, of which Ellis said:
  
Holding their interest could be pretty tough, I admit. On our regular schedule, we're doling out a page a week. But this holiday season is squeezing color god Chad Fidler really hard (with deadlines and family obligations), we're going to update every other week in full color instead of going black-and-white for a short period. We want to do right by the readers and the story, and that means creating breathtaking epic visuals for the story's finale in full color. Worst case scenario, this will only go on through the end of the year or so (2-3 strips). On those weeks where we won't have a new strip, the newest strip will still be available, as well as some additional material: pin-ups, concept art, etc. Hopefully the readers will keep checking in; we promise to make it worth their while. In February, following the conclusion to Athena Voltaire: The Wrath From The Tomb, we kick off our next storyline, A Rescue on Formosa. It's a short story (10 pages), mostly a quick dust-up to re-establish Athena and cleanse the palette after finishing up a sprawling epic.   A Rescue on Formosa is actually already completed. It marks a switch in format from the horizontal comic strip layout of our first two arcs to a traditional comic book vertical page layout. Formosa was nearly the follow-up to our first arc, The Terror in Tibet. But we opted to do Wrath in a horizontal format, too, so that Terror wouldn't be an anomaly. With Wrath and Terror, we'd like to eventually package them as a trade paperback, Athena Voltaire: The Complete Webstrips. While we've been juggling all of the webcomic stuff, we've also been working on a print project that we're starting to shop, Athena Voltaire: The Flight of the Falcon. Paul [Daly, Athena Voltaire writer] has the story done, I have the first 12 pages penciled, inked and lettered and Chad will start coloring them in early 2005.      We get to really play up the whole "globetrotting aviatrix" thing, with the action taking place on 6 different continents! Plus, there's two lost cities, an ancient artifact, black magic, nazis and more! It's set for 96 pages and we'll either do it as an OGN or a mini-series, at the publisher's discretion. We haven't found a home for it yet (although we've received some inquiries), but interested publishers can contact me through the Athena Voltaire website. Regardless, we'll begin shopping it in earnest early next year.
The Bat of Tomorrow Neal Adams recently took the time to redesign Batman’s costume over at his website:
 If I redesigned Batman, I wouldn't exactly redesign him. I would revamp him. I would find the perfect story to do this in and I would attempt to correct errors made along the way as well as make the costume do the work better. I would take disadvantages of the old costume and make them into advantages. Same ol' Batman. Man of tomorrow. This Has A “Bat Wave of the Future” Factor of Seven Out of Ten
Bendin’ In The Wind Brian Bendis posted these two pics at Jinxworld earlier this week. They’re from What If Jessica Jones Joined The Avengers? and New Avengers #2.   Enjoy. That’s it for this week. Thanks again to John for filling in last week. That won’t be the last you see of him here. He’ll be back on Dec 26 during my Christmas vacation. But in the interim, he has an interview with Roger Stern, which will be going up on SBC very soon. See you in seven. Later, Blair PS If anyone has any rumors, stories or news to share, please email me at blairm@silverbulletcomicbooks.com. Thanks to everyone who has been sending stuff in. It’s greatly appreciated. |
