Silver Surfer (2014) #10

Written by: Dan Slott
Art by: Mike Allred
Colored by: Laura Allred
Lettered by: VC's Joe Sabino
Cover by: Mike Allred

Published by: Marvel
Cover Price: $3.99

Weaver: I don’t generally like space stories, I’m going to say that from the start…

From Entertainment Weekly:

For the eagerly anticipated Sherlock special episode, Holmes and Watson are essentially going back in time.

Co-creator Steven Moffat has now confirmed the special will take place in Victorian London, validating fan assumptions about the episode. Last month the show’s stars Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman were spotted filming Sherlock in 19th century clothes, causing fans to wonder if perhaps the crime-fighting duo attended a costume ball, or ir perhaps it was just some kind of dream sequence within the special. But no: The 90-minute episode literally takes place hundreds of years ago.

Anniversaries. They have a nasty habit of just sneaking up on you without notice. Some of them seem to come faster than others, and even The Fastest Man Alive has to eventually succumb to them.

While much has been made of Batman's 75th anniversary, we're now leaving behind the year of the bat and entering the era of the lightning. And with a hot new television show burning up the airwaves, it's never been a better time for fans of The Flash. So we sat down for a little conversation with current FLASH scribes, Robert Venditti and Van Jensen to get some insight into being at the helm of the Scarlet Speedster at this pivotal point in his history.

How fun is it -- or how scary is it -- to be at the helm of THE FLASH at what has to be his most visible point in 75 years?

Howard the Duck. Unfortunately, when most people hear the name, they immediately think of the pretty awful movie from the 80's. But before that, Howard the Duck was a real funny comic from Marvel by Steve Gerber and Val Mayerik. Marvel has tried to bring the character back a few times over the years, including having him as a regular in Generation X for a short period of time, but he just never seemed to go much higher than cult favorite.

Last year, Howard the Duck had a brief cameo appearance in the credits of Guardians of the Galaxy. Since Guardians was such a huge hit, Marvel has seemed determine to flood the market with Guardians-related series. Just last week, they announced that Groot is getting his own book soon too. So, I'm not surprised that they decided to give Howard the Duck another try. What did surprise me though, was that this issue was great!

I really liked Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure when it first came out. I was ten years old and a bit of a history nerd. So seeing characters like Billy the Kid, Abe Lincoln, and Joan of Arc dealing with life in modern day California was just a lot of fun. I also thought the end of the movie used some real clever tricks when it came to time travel. It was just about a perfect movie to my ten year old self. Despite my love of the movie, I never watched the cartoon, read the comics, etc. It just seemed like a pretty closed work that any expansion to would ruin. Because of this, I have never even seen Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey.

But, when I heard they were doing a comic series, I decided to give it a try. Clearly ten year old Mike was MUCH smarter than 35 year old Mike...

There's a lot of wrong ways you can go when you want to blend 'cute' and 'dark'. Ted Naifeh gets it right with COURTNEY CRUMRIN. So does Roman Dirge with LENORE.

Stan Silas takes things a step further with his Chibi characters living in a CALVIN AND HOBBES-like world, in the Titan Books publication, NORMAN. The titular Norman is a cute little 8-year-old blonde-headed boy with an imaginary friend. It just so happens his imaginary friend to urge him to kill people, and taunts him about getting caught.

Growing up, I was never really into Star Trek. When I met my wife, she was a big fan of Star Trek: The Next Generation, especially the tie-in novels. So, I became a fan of Star Trek through her, but I've never really had a huge nostalgia connection to Star Trek. Because of this, I've been real open to enjoying some of the newesr Star Trek like Enterprise and the relaunch movies.

IDW has done a terrific job with their ongoing series exploring the new Star Trek continuity. A few months ago, the Enterprise crew encountered Q and were sent into the future to see what the Deep Space Nine crew were up to. After that, the Enterprise was finally able to embark on their 5 years mission...to boldy go where no one has gone before. Though that took a bit of a twist...

Star Trek #43

Variety posted some big news about upcoming Star Wars movies, including the title of next year's spin-off film and the release date for Episode VIII!

Disney and Lucasfilm have announced details of the upcoming “Stars Wars” films at its annual shareholders meeting in San Francisco.

Rian Johnson has also been confirmed to write and direct Star Wars: Episode VIII, which will hit theaters May 26, 2017.

Gareth Edwards’ upcoming standalone film, starring Felicity Jones, will be called “Rogue One.” The movie starts filming in London this summer and opens Dec. 16, 2016.

“Rogue One,” based on an idea by Oscar-winning vfx supervisor John Knoll, was written by “Cinderella” scribe Chris Weitz.

Kathleen Kennedy will produce the standalone film alongside Knoll, Tony To and John Schwartz.

Plot details of “Rogue One” are unknown.

This contest is over. The randomly selected winner is: LINDSAY D. of URBANA, OH.

Well, we promised you it was coming, and now it's here. On the heels of our POWER RANGERS COMPLETE SERIES giveaway, we now have POWER RANGERS SEASONS 4-7 -- the series that came after the "complete" series.

This hotly sought after series by fans of Saban's POWER RANGERS show includes the story arcs ZEO, TURBO, IN SPACE and LOST GALAXY, and includes a bonus disc of extra features.

But how, you may ask, can you make this set yours? Well, one way is to be the randomly selected winner of this contest, which is as simple as entering your information in the form below! Really, it's that easy!

I saw this story on Lucha Underground's Facebook feed.

Danny Trejo was announced as joining the cast of El Rey's From Dusk Till Dawn series.  Sadly, we don't get El Rey by me, but I love Robert Rodriguez, so I've been wanting to see this series for a while.  I have been considering subscribing to Sling just so I can more easily follow From Dusk Till Dawn and Lucha Underground.

I have always had a love for lesser known actors...you know, those guys you've seen in many movies, but you don't know their names.  Well, I take the time to learn their names, and Danny Trejo has been one of my favorites for a while (I should do a column on some of my favorites...including Tina Majorino, Andre Braugher, Peter Stormore, and Clancy Brown).  Danny Trejo has appeared in around 200 different roles, including doing voice work.  He even had a brilliant cameo in the Muppet's Most Wanted as a prisoner in a Russian Gulag...named Danny Trejo. 

From Entertainment Weekly:

Want to see Firefly stars Nathan Fillion and Alan Tudyk not only back together on screen but back together on a spaceship? Then we recommend you get out your credit card and head over to the just-launched-today Indiegogo page for the pair’s planned web series, Con Man.

Cheap Pops - March 11, 2015

by Chris Delloiacono, Mike Maillaro and Jeff Ritter

This week!

• Jon Stewart Vs Seth Rollins

• Best Tag Teams All Time

While I was flipping through DC's upcoming solicitations, I saw the below solicit and image featuring DC's "All-New" Batman (hey, I thought All-New was a Marvel thing)...

BATMAN #41
Written by SCOTT SNYDER Art by GREG CAPULLO and DANNY MIKI
Cover by GREG CAPULLO
THE JOKER Variant cover by SEAN MURPHY
On sale JUNE 10 • 32 pg, FC, $3.99 US • RATED T
Retailers: This issue will ship with two covers. Please see the order form for more information.
The all-new Batman makes his debut! Who is he, and what happens next? Find out here as a new era begins in Gotham City!

For all the spectacle of a San Diego Comic-Con or a Wizard World, there' something that's been slowly slipping away from the concept of the comic book convention: the comic book. Oh, it's still there, but now it's become a mecca for video game developers to show off their latest beta releases and Hollywood movie studios to generate buzz for their next year's action movies.

Mike D'Alessio is no stranger to comic conventions. He may not be known to the fans, but to the industries who attend these conventions, he and his Promoguys Marketing Group are major -- nay, invaluable -- players. Now D'Alessio is bringing all his experience and klout to bear as he brings the first annual Atlantic City Boardwalk Con to New Jersey -- but this isn't just another comic book convention, as you'll see as we talk with Mike about what's going to make this convention bigger and better.

It's always good to learn something when working on a review. Reading Vampirella: Our Lady of Shadows, I learned that when you are sitting by yourself in a nice restaurant reading a Vampirella comic is probably not the best choice. I was getting a lot of odd and annoyed looks at Ramsey's Pub in Caesar's Palace in Atlantic City when I was putting this review together.

BTW, and this isn't related to the comic at all, the food there was great and the service could not have been nicer. But, I'm afraid I've got some bad news....the drinks are way overpriced. Two rum and cokes cost me more than a three course dinner. Yikes!

But, that has nothing at all to with Vampirella. On with the comic!

 Vampirella Vol. 1 Our Lady of Shadows

Welcome back to Critical Blast’s weekly look at what new comics you should check out each week.   Just a warning, I make these picks pretty much a week BEFORE I actually get to read any of these comics, so if something is a stinker, I take no blame on that.  Let's get to it!

Comics Shipping This Week

Wait, are you telling me you haven't read Bone? Really? Okay, stop reading this right now. Go! Go, buy Bone. Go buy this trade right now and come back. I'll wait here.

…

…

Oh, you're back? Great. Now, let me tell you why you need to keep buying Bone for your grandparents, your parents, your children, your nieces and nephews, and for yourself. I originally read Bone in black and white about a decade ago. Simply put, I loved it. It was funny, heart-warming, and sweet. I was in college at the time and remembered loving the simple, but wonderfully written story about this little creature, Bone, and his adventures. It brought me back to a time of well-crafted fairytales. Jeff Smith weaves a web that enthralls the reader into needing “just one more issue!” Going back to it a decade later, I knew there was no way the story could possibly hold up to the standards I had set in my head years ago.

Descender #1

Written by: Jeff Lemire
Art by: Dustin Nguyen
Lettered by: Steve Wands
Cover by: Dustin Nguyen

Published by: Image
Cover Price: $3.99

I got an interesting press release from Valiant Entertainment this weekend:

Jerry Springer is like Coca-Cola. When someone says “Coke” you immediately think “sweet, brown, carbonated beverage.” When someone says “Jerry Springer” you immediately think “cross-dressing Neo-Nazi cheats on his pregnant midget fiancée with his gay first cousin.” Well, okay, maybe not that exact scenario, but you’d agree that it’s within the realm of possibility. The Jerry Springer Show is relevant not because it shows the biggest fools America can produce this side of Congress, but because it has done so with consistently solid ratings for two decades. Jerry himself was not immune. Before he became as big of a household name as, well, that other Jerry (Seinfeld), he was a budding politician in Ohio with dreams of the Governor’s mansion. That fell apart when he bounced a check—a check mind you—to a prostitute.