Let’s kick off with some video. Last month we showed you the book trailer for Abe Lincoln: Vampire Hunter. I kind of thought that was a one-off, until I ran across Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: The Dawn of the Dreadfuls book trailer. I guess this is a thing now.
The James Tiptree Awards relating to gender in science fiction and fantasy have been announced and two winners share the top prize. But coming from the world of folk tales and manga, they’re very different works. Greer Gilman’sCloud & Ashes folk tales were honored along with Fumi Yoshinaga’sOoku: The Inner Chambers.
Summit Entertainment is flush with cash from Twihards — and ready to blow some of it for street cred. They’re looking for a director for Breaking Dawn, and qualifications include a directing Oscar. They’ve put out feelers to Gus Van Sant, Sofia Coppola and Bill Condon.
Summit also coughed up big bucks for a concept called The Last Witch Hunter, which they hope has franchise potential. Somebody make them stop!
Andrew Zubko drew this. It should be in the Louvre — just take down something from that hack da Vinci. Go see some of Andrew’s other work.
SyFy is bring you The Phantom (can’t beat Robot Chicken’s version), Sharktopus, Mega Piranha, Stonhenge Apocalypseand more to their cheesy SyFy Original Movies I can’t stop watching. But until then, enjoy the trailer for Dynocroc vs. Supergator.
Some people think that SyFy should stop making these movies, like they’re something to be ashamed of. To those people I say “Good day to you, sir. I said, ‘Good Day’!”
I had mentioned the British Buck Rogers, called Dan Dare, was going to make a big screen bow starring Sam Worthington. That has folks dusting off all their old Dan Dare concept art from 40 years back. Great gallery over at io9.com.
Simon Oaks tries to justify Let Me In, his remake of the hit Euro-vampire Let the Right One In. He does seem to have a grasp on why we hate remakes, but I’m still not sold this was something that will work Americanized. And attaching Matt Reeves of Cloverfield doesn’t help, because I wasn’t a fan.
I can’t watch Lost, and I can’t stand talking to Lost fanatics who want to explain to me the differences in time-lines and smoke monsters and temples and all sorts of silly stuff that the writers have tossed out there just to see if people will obsess about time-lines and smoke monsters and temples and polar bears. But I do find Lost In Comics to be regularly amusing.
I’m not sure exactly how this fits in, but Hot Chip has a new video out with people vomiting lasers and other genre twists, and I don’t think we’ve ever had a musical interlude:
There’s still not much of a real time-line for Simon Pegg’s alien comedy Paul, but Kristen Wiig does try to explain all the in-jokes and homages that Pegg is trying to squeeze in, starting with Star Wars’ cantini scene, which has been homaged to death if you ask me.
Charles Stross has been taking a lot of heat as to why the cover for his new book is just so awful. He sets out in a diary entry to explain how little control authors have over anything other than the manuscript they deliver. Not even the book — just the manuscript itself. He then outs all the publishing dirty laundry, like the cover blurbs and even the author’s photograph and even fights about the titles. It’s all so tawdry!
Meanwhile, Tor has an extensive essay up about the creation of the ebook cover for the Lord of Chaos by Robert Jordan, and the process that went into it, complete with video and sketches. So the cover art is serious business.
Horror-comedy Vamps, starring Alicia Silverstone and Krysten Ritter as socialite vampires in New York City just found some gravitas, signing Sigourney Weaver as the HBIC. This could go either way, and Sigourney plays both badass and comic equally well.
Futurama is coming back to Comedy Central in June, and they’ve released a new teaser trailer for the series. Needs more Hypnotoad. All Hail Hypnotoad!
Buried in this article about a Tron: Legacy set visit is a discussion with Stephen Lisberger, who directed the first film. And if you do a little reading between the lines, it really does seem that he’s given up the ending to the new film. Only read it if you don’t mind knowing.
By the end of Joss Whedon’sDollhouse, it was completely obvious to me that the best actor on the show was Enver Gjokaj as Victor. If I had any doubt, the episode where he went from killer to bubbly bimbo in the nightclub in a heartbeat sealed it. He’s got a new webseries he’s launching Monday called Previously on Point Dume, and it’s being called Twin-Peaks-meets-Clue. The official synopsis hits all the points with evil doppelgangers, supernatural happenings, and a lot of camp.
George Lucas is bored, so he’s bastardizing his universe again. Which universe you ask? The Star Wars universe this time, with a new animated series for small children. Think Muppet Babies in space.
M. Night Shyamalan sat down to talk with io9.com about Avatar: The Last Airbender. They just give a tease and promise video of the chat soon, but it promises to touch on the race issues in casting, which characters got left out of the world for time constraints, keeping things real while creating a six-legged flying bison, and supposedly my big issue: Where’s the funny? This may be one of the single biggest fantasy releases of the year, and since they want a trilogy or more, we may as well all get onboard.
I recently shared a photo of The Guild’s Felicia Day from the set of her Red Riding Hood vs. Werewolves SyFy movie Red before. Here she is with the rest of the cast of good guys. No idea what their version of a werewolf looks like, or if it has amazing abs.
Manolith is the Maxim of the digital age. They’ve got pictures of what they consider the 15 Sexiest Cosplays of All Time. I’m not really an expert on what makes a woman sexy, but I’m pretty sure these women have it.
Something that’s not sexy is the fact that the casting calls that went out for Pirates of the Caribbean 4 specifically state that the women should have the boobies they came with from the factory, not aftermarket equipped.
BBC has an interview with Matt Smith at the premiere of the new Doctor Who, and they also have some footage from the first episode.
And finally, it should be said that I don’t like Will Farrell. He is not a funny man who thinks he’s very funny, which makes him seem even less funny. So I was prepared to hate Megamind, the new animated film he’s voicing alongside Brad Pitt and half of Hollywood. Yet this teaser trailer is kind of funny. Have a great weekend!
i hate how they degrade classics like pride and prejudice into zombies and vampires they have no right to! i going to youtube to say what i really feel and spare the thetorchonline the profanity.
Very much in agreement with you on Enver. I would watch that man read from the phone book simply because I’m sure he would do it in interesting, unique and new ways.
Also, can I saw that him playing a character who never wears a shirt (whoops, was that a spoiler?) also sweetens the pot, for me, at least. :-)
I don’t get the whole “let’s get an Oscar-winning director for Twilight!” thing. I mean, are they really thinking it’ll give them cred at this point? On the other hand, I guess they have money to burn and are thinking, “Well, why the hell not? Hey, let’s use dollar bills for toilet paper too!”
i hate how they degrade classics like pride and prejudice into zombies and vampires they have no right to! i going to youtube to say what i really feel and spare the thetorchonline the profanity.
Very much in agreement with you on Enver. I would watch that man read from the phone book simply because I’m sure he would do it in interesting, unique and new ways.
Also, can I saw that him playing a character who never wears a shirt (whoops, was that a spoiler?) also sweetens the pot, for me, at least. :-)
What’s a cosplayer?
I don’t get the whole “let’s get an Oscar-winning director for Twilight!” thing. I mean, are they really thinking it’ll give them cred at this point? On the other hand, I guess they have money to burn and are thinking, “Well, why the hell not? Hey, let’s use dollar bills for toilet paper too!”
Twihards = funny
Doubly agree with you on Will Farrell and can’t wait for the new Futurama episodes.
With you on Will Farrell.