FoolishPeople

FP caught up in Heath Ledger conspiracy theories...

...about his death on site Godlike Productions:

"Here's what I found.  No wonder Heath Ledger couldn't sleep"
Anonymous Coward
User ID: 364972
1/30/2008 4:37 PM

[link to www.foolishpeople.com]

1988 made up for this with the other extreme, the finest Batman story to date, Alan Moore and Brian Bolland’s The Killing Joke. This tour-de-force for the first time examines The Joker’s origins giving, him some pathos, whilst showing some of his most sick crimes to date. The Joker escapes from Arkham and sets up HQ in an abandoned fairground. He breaks into the apartment of Barbara Gordon, daughter of Commissioner Jim Gordon, and Batgirl in her spare time. He breaks her spine and then proceeds to sexually abuse her. Kidnapping her father he takes him back to his lair and forces him onto a ghost train showing him blown up pictures of his own daughter writhing naked in her blood. Whilst this grotesque ride is going on The Joker sings a catchy little number about the joys of insanity.

“When the human race wears a sorry face,
When the bomb hangs overhead.
When your kid turns blue it won’t worry you’
You can smile and nod instead”

This was part of a piece originally written by Richard Freeman for fp.com
and bizarrely turned up amongst various people musing conspiracy theories about Heath Ledger, Numerology, Symbolism, and Channels Closing.

You, me and the Art Whore

1000 ft and still rising, I have no fucking idea how I'm going to get down. Fuck it. I will probably jump off as soon as we get to the top. I can hardly breathe up here the air is so thin.

FP's next ritual Weaponised Art 1.0, takes place at Dead Head Haunts - Guerrilla Zoo at the Corsica Arts club on the 19th of August. The edges of this one are blurred. Deliberately. I'm fucking loving it. Never felt so free and yet piss pant scared.

I hope to see you on Saturday. I will be the one with a plastic bag over my face. No really a plastic bag.

Do you fuck for art?

Rocket Pirates

Who wants to be a Rocket Pirate?    Joey Manley talked me into curating a mass webcomics site. I've known Joey for getting on for six years now. It's partly my fault that he got involved with comics at all. I suspect this is his revenge.

People who want to make webcomics are invited to submit their ideas to me for membership in the Rocket Pirates, a webcomics collective which will be housed at http://www.rocketpirates.com.

Rocket Pirates will be the first site to launch with the new Webcomics Nation Collective Edition technology, which will be available as a commercial product for people wanting to quickly and cheaply launch their own multi-creator webcomics portals sometime in the next few months. Because we're all about being quick and cheap, believe me.

Rocket Pirates will be free to all readers, all the time. This means, of course, that there is no cut of subscription fees to offer to creators. Instead, the system allows each creator the freedom to install Google Ads, Amazon Associates ads, ads for their own products, rate cards for prostitution services or any other damn thing on their comic's Rocket Pirates page. Also, since we're not paying, all Rocket Pirates engagements are on a non-exclusive basis, allowing the creators to run their comics on their own websites or any other place that'll have them.

The non-subscription approach means that I'm also doing this for free, so anyone who wants to send food and clothing c/o Joey Manley at Modern Tales is welcome to do so. I also offer inexpensive adult services.

The submissions system is simply this: email your materials to me at warrenellis@gmail.com. I want to see at least three completed pages and an overview of what you intend to do. No need to be formal -- rambly emails talking about the central concepts and what you want to achieve are fine.

I'm open to anything -- series, serialised graphic novels, single panels, self-contained shorts, newspaper-style strips -- in any style, from manga to clipart to whatever the hell you just invented in your basement. No limits.

I'm open to any kind of content. You're going to have to work pretty hard to get me to accept a superhero project for the site, but if you've got something that knocks me flat, I'll take it. But, seriously, I want to eventually curate something that takes in a wide breadth of what comics can achieve. Surprise me. Give me something straight out of literary mainstream fiction, give me a warped genre, give me something I've never seen before. That's the "theme" of the site, the glue that holds it together. It is quite simply "stuff Warren really likes."

The submissions process is open to everybody. I don't care if you only decided you wanted to try and make a comic ten minutes ago -- I'll look at it. I'll warn you in advance that the chances of my being able to provide detailed and constructive rejections are slight, but I'll do my best.

(Also, if the site turns out to be all-male because only guys submitted, I'm going to be very pissed off, and will infect you all with this lung disease my girlfriend seems to have passed to me over the weekend.)

I'd like to be up and running by the end of the month, but I won't kick the site live until I have enough work of quality. The submissions process will remain permanently open. Unless, you know, I change my mind. I am unpredictable and I drink a lot.

That's all I've got.  Please feel free to pass this unedited post on anywhere you like. -- Warren Ellis

The Sun God Returns

New Trailer for Superman now online. With Grant Morrison writing All Star Superman and now this new trailer things look good for one of the most powerful of modern myths.

Dr Bleach meets Dok Discord

 

I have just had the pleasure of interviewing Dok Discord for Key23. It was a most pleasant and illuminating experience as you can see from the following extract.

I nudge him...nothing...I yell at him to wake up...STILL nothing.
Mr. Silent pokes him with his cane and he doesn't even twitch...this guy was dead to the world, so I decided to use a hypnosis induction script on him to see if it'd work. I used imagery from "The Wall" (due to his shirt and his obvious familiarity).

With hollow statements and questions, I slowly lead him up to the events that brought him to the mall, and right when I had those giant Nazi hammers about to crush him (image of police taking him to jail), I said, "Hello-hello-hello is there anybody in there, just wake if you can hear me". Immediately, this kid SAT STRAIGHT UP! It was fucking bizarre. He looked at Mr. silent and I with these ultra wide eyes and ran off panicked without a word.

Imagine waking up from a horrible dream in an unfamiliar place and seeing Mr. silent and I standing there saying, "are you alright citizen?"

I bet he's still not right in the head after that...think he'll see my face every time he hears comfortably numb?

Dok Discord

You can read the full interview here.

What Has Happened to the Clown Prince of Crime?

In 1940 comic book writer Bob Kane and artist Jerry Robinson were looking to create a foil for their new hero Batman. Since his conception the year before, Batman’s villains had been the standard thugs with the odd mad scientist throw in for colour. Kane brought a photograph into the studio. It was a still of the German, silent actor Conrad Veidt in the 1928 film The Man Who Laughs based on the novel by Victor Hugo. Veidt was playing the roll of Gwynplaine, son of French Nobleman, Lord Clancharlie. Gwynplaine has a permanent smile carved on his face by the King, in revenge for his father's treachery and ends up in a traveling circus.

The photo of Veidt with his mad eyes and maniacal grin became the blue print for the most violent, disturbing, and wildly popular comic book villain of all time, The Joker.

The Formidable Mr Freeman.

Damn great news No2.

Richard has agreed to write for the blog! As many of you are already fully aware, this is a mind packed full of detail, knowledge and  tremendous insight. What can I say, we are honoured to have the CFZ's Zoological Director taking his turn at the wheel.

His first piece will be up tomorrow morning, I've read it, and it's fucking great, like a fountain of fanboy knowledge and opinion combined with the same sense of humour that has people rolling off of their seats during his talks.

Welcome to the blog Rich. ;o)

Ghost Rider

First pictures of Ghost Rider and his ride from Marvel Ghostrider movie staring Nic Cage.  

V for Vendetta

Alan Moores V for Vendetta graphic novel has never been more relevant. The poster to the V for Vendetta movie above bodes well, we need this film.

The Wachowski brothers have no choice but to plant this deep and hope it grows strong.

Lo-Fi FP 1

FP is going Lo-Fi today. No heavy thinking, no deep and meaninful shit. Just stuff to make you smile. Because if you feel like I feel you need some fun. Lo-Fi FP 1 Norse God getting high.

Ear not near enough...

...but I do get there eventually!

It seems Grant Morrison is in negotiations to adapt one of his recent creations We3 - illustrated by Frank Quitely - into a feature film for New Line Cinema.

Don Murphy, Susan Montford and Rick Benatar are set to produce.

Copycat

A short fan film - Catwoman 'Copycat' is currently in production.

View the teaser trailer here

Found via UKScreen
 

Bootleg Batman

Batman + Lone Ranger = Silver Bat

Found Via Sachs Report

Unearthly Defence

Unearthly defence
By: Mukul Sharma
April 23, 2005

Has Michael Jackson been acquitted? If so, of what?

After all the accusations and counteraccusations flying to and fro between the defence and prosecution fighting the ex-fading pop star’s celebrity sex molestation case, only one piece of evidence has apparently stood the test of the taxpayer’s time and courtroom drama: that of a former Jackson maid who described unusual sightings made by her at Neverland in the early 1990s.

The woman, who worked for Jackson for about five years beginning around 1986 testified that after the first such “sighting” on the grounds of Neverland in 1989 she saw what looked like a small boy’s “underwear” lying outside a shower stall near the swimming pool.

“At first I thought they were regular underwear that boys wear under their pants but on closer examination I began to have serious doubts because they were bright neon red in colour,” she testified under oath.

“Is it possible,” asked Jackson’s attorney Thomas A Mesereau Jr during cross-examination, “that they were not really regular underwear that’s worn under clothes? I mean could they be the kind of underwear that’s worn over one’s clothes? You know the kind Superman wears outside his uniform, which, may I remind you, are also bright neon red?”

At this point prosecution objected to the line of questioning saying that going by the size of the underwear that had been admitted as people’s exhibit #432, they could not have been Superman’s.

However, Superior Court Judge Rodney S Melville overruled the objection after the defence showed him comic books of Superman when he was a teenager called Superboy.

At that time, the defence contended, Superman also wore the same kind of underwear over his uniform, though it was of a smaller size...

(click for more...)

Whedon Wooed For Wonder

Producer Joel Silver confirmed to SCI FI Wire that he is wooing Buffy the Vampire Slayer creator Joss Whedon to write and direct a new film version of Wonder Woman

"I'm trying," Silver said in an interview at WonderCon in San Francisco on Feb. 19. "I'm trying to work a deal with Joss. ... I was just in the other room [where Whedon was talking about his upcoming SF movie, Serenity]. I don't know if I could work that out. It's a complicated deal to do, but I would love him to do it. It would be great if he could do it."

Silver (the Matrix films and the upcoming House of Wax) said that Whedon, an avowed comic fanatic and current author of Marvel's Astonishing X-Men series, came to him with a new twist on the venerable character. "It's just a great, legendary comic-book hero, and it's one that has never been kind of brought back to life after Lynda Carter [who starred in the 1970s Wonder Woman TV series]. I mean, it's a reinvention. ... Tim Burton reinvented Batman after Adam West, and ... [director Richard] Donner reinvented Superman after George Reeves. It's time to do that to Wonder Woman. It's a thing that could be great if it's done great. ... The idea is to try to find a way to make it, and I thought Joss has a great idea, because he understands a kind of female superhero character, and also he's great at what he does. So I'm trying to find the best way to do it. ... We're working our way through it."

Fonda Considers Ghost Rider

Counterculture icon Peter Fonda is in negotiations to appear in the upcoming comic-book adaptation Ghost Rider, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Donal Logue (the WB's Grounded for Life) has also joined the cast, which includes Nicolas Cage, Eva Mendes, Wes Bentley and Sam Elliott.

Based on the Marvel comic book of the same name, the film centers around the adventures of Johnny Blaze (Cage), a demonic, motorcycle-riding vigilante who saves the world from evil spirits. Fonda is eyeing the role of Mephistopheles. Logue will play Mack, Johnny's chief mechanic and best friend.

Ghost Rider began shooting this week in Australia under the direction of Mark Steven Johnson (Daredevil). The film is scheduled for release in 2006.

Fear In The Community

FEAR IN THE COMMUNITY Teaser poster by Kel Winser.

FEAR IN THE COMMUNITY is the story of the Cedar Views Residential Home, run by the Life Point Charity, for people who just dont or wont fit into normal or polite society. People like Cedar Views newest client, Patrick Normale.

Patrick Normale must unite the five other clients of Cedar Views into a unique group of heroes who must exploit their disabilities if they are all to survive the very real and evil fear that is feeding on the Cedar Views residential home.

Fear In The Community is a six part horror comic book mini series written by John Harrigan and illustrated by Kel Winser. Published by FPPress in the second half of 05.

Kel's Haikus

Kel Winser (FP member) has some handmade Haiku comic books for sale at kelwinser.com. Each Haiku book contains five Haikus in comic form with no dialogue. I have one and the workmanship is superb. This is a limited run, so these Haikus wont be available for long.

Sin City

Robert Rodriguez adaptation of Frank Millers cult graphic novel Sin City is looking to turn out to be one of the highlights of 2005. Casting Nick Stahl as that yellow bastard is an act of genius.

View the trailer here.

'Spawn' Publisher in Bankruptcy Court

PHOENIX - A $15 million jury award against "Spawn" creator Todd McFarlane has pushed his comic-book business into bankruptcy court.

Todd McFarlane Productions Inc. of suburban Tempe filed for Chapter 11 protection from creditors Friday in U.S. Bankruptcy Court.

A jury in St. Louis awarded former NHL player Tony Twist $15 million after concluding that McFarlane and his company profited by using Twist's name without permission and that Twist's publicity rights were infringed.

McFarlane gave the name Antonio "Tony Twist" Twistelli to a New York mob boss character in his "Spawn" comic books in the early 1990s.

The U.S. Supreme Court (news - web sites) in January rejected without comment an appeal by McFarlane arguing that his work was free speech.

Last year, he said his McFarlane Cos., then an umbrella of seven businesses, had annual sales exceeding $50 million.

The bankruptcy filing allows McFarlane's company to continue to operate and reorganize its finances while freeing it from the threat of creditors' lawsuits.

In 1999, McFarlane paid $3 million for Mark McGwire's 70th home-run baseball. He also paid $450,000 last year for Barry Bonds' record 73rd home-run ball and owns Sammy Sosa's 66th home-run ball

Batman Begins New Trailer and One Sheet

Above is the new one sheet teaser poster for Batman Begins. The second trailer for what seems to be the first attempt to get Batman right (Apart from of Course Batman DeadEnd. Sandy Collora's independent, but spot on depiction of the dark knight) in a big studio setting is also now available at www.batmanbegins.com.

Batman Begins Teaser Trailer

Heads up. The Batman begins teaser trailer is up at http://batmanbegins.warnerbros.com/

Collector Amasses Complete DC Collection

A private collector in the northeastern United States has accomplished the astounding and unprecedented feat of assembling a complete collection of every comic book ever published by DC Comics.

For those of you who have trouble visualizing the enormity of the task, that's over 30,000 individual comic books!

Spiderman 2

I hated the first Spiderman film. I saw the second one yesterday morning at a preview. Its a truly fantastic film. It hits all its marks hard and fast. Its a joy to watch Peter Parker go through so many trials and tribulations and its so close to the spirit of the comic. All the things that i didnt like about the first one are gone, The costumes webbing has been reduced, the colour is perfect. The silly one liners are in the right places. The cgi is minimal and strong. I even liked Tobey Maguire.

The story isnt rushed and to top it off you get a taster of things to come in Spiderman 3. This is by far the strongest comic to film adaptation.

Bat Fall

More visual proof that Warner have probably got things right on Batman Begins.

Batman Begins.

Above and below are some of the first images released from Batman Begins, from these pictures it looks like it could be the best Batman movie yet heavily influenced by Miller's Year One and Dark Knight Returns rather than some camp dated t.v show.

Hope you're paying attention Schumacher.

Backed Up

I have so much to read and no time to do it in. Can we just agree to twist physics and our biology to allow twenty four extra hours of time per day. Time that is set apart in which we don’t age.

Currently struggling to get through.

The Sandman Endless nights - Neil Gaiman
Ghost in the shell - Masamune Shirow tpb
Lovecraft - Hans Rodinoff
Fables volume 2 - Willingham tpb

Whole boxes of comics and magazines. I am becoming one of those people that social services find dead amongst mountains of papers and books.

Sean Astin To Direct Marvel Comic Movie?

Lord Of The Rings actor Sean Astin plans to make his directing debut on the long-awaited Fantastic Four movie - if studio bosses give him the go- ahead. The 32-year-old star hopes to film the Marvel comics adaptation, despite facing competition from Traffic directorSteven Soderbergh with George Clooney as Fantastic Four leader Reed Richards. Astin says, "I'm a friend of George Clooney too. I think he would make a perfect Reed." Although the ambitious actor remains cagey about exact details, he confirms that he under consideration to direct the mega-budget film. He adds, "Yes. I'm in the running to direct this $100 million to $130 million movie which the studio wants to release in 2004. I've got a meeting scheduled but I can't talk about it yet."

Bowen Designs

Good news for fans of Bowen Designs Statues. They have managed to renew the license to produce Marvel statues after they lost it last year.

Most fans agree (FoolishPeople Included) that Bowen statues are far superior to other companies that are producing statues of Marvel Properties. Below is a press release taken from the Bowen Designs website.

BOWEN DESIGNS and MARVEL fans rejoice! The day has come that you've been demanding! Bowen Designs will resume production of Marvel character statues and mini-bust effective immediately and expects to release its first pieces under a new agreement in the spring of 2004. Under the new agreement, Bowen Designs will have access to a large portion of the "classic versions" in the Marvel character library!

Randy Bowen, President of Bowen Designs, Inc. stated: "We're proud of the trail that we've blazed with Marvel, and we're only too happy to be able to do some of the projects that we've wanted to see come to fruition for a long time. This is a chance to complete some of the "Super Teams" that we started with the mini-bust and statue line, as well as add some of the characters that are the cornerstones of the Marvel Universe. There's a lot more competition out there than when we first began the series, but we feel confident that we'll be able to fulfill the wish lists of the fans who made this all possible from the beginning."

Bowen Designs will also be involving fans in its new Marvel relationship. Mr. Bowen explained: "We want to give the collectors a say in to process, so we're going to create a virtual suggestion box on our website, so the fans can speak out on the pieces they would ultimately like to see in their collection."

Bowen Designs is expected to solicit initial orders for retail beginning in winter 2003.

Batman DeadEnd Question

After reading my post about Batman DeadEnd Steve had a couple of question about the Short Batman film by Sandy Collora. First he wanted to know if the film is available to buy. Not legally. DC via Warner owns the rights to Batman and has already threatened to Sue Collora if he tries to sell the film. Saying that, the film has been sold to people via EBay and the convention circuit by individuals who have downloaded the film from the internet. Steve also asked if it’s likely to be made into a longer version. This is unlikely due to the fact that Warner already have the next Batman film in production with Christopher Nolan (insomnia) Directing, Michael Caine as Alfred the Butler and Christian Bale as Batman. The film looks like it will return to a darker younger version of The Dark Knight as seen in Batman Year One by Frank Miller. Collora is openly pursuing directing duties on Shazam.

FoolishPeople Interviews Warren Ellis

Below is a short interview that Foolishpeople conducted with award winning comic writer Warren Ellis earlier in the week.

FP: Who or What has most influenced your work?

WE: So many things I couldn't begin to list. I guess early influences
were people like Jack Kerouac, William Burroughs, Nigel Kneale and Lou Reed
but really, everything's an influence. You have to take in as much information as possible.

FP: Do you ever feel that your imagination is constrained by the rules you need to follow to write a successful comic book?

WE: What rules? I create my own work. There are no rules. It's not like I'm writing Spider-Man or something.

FP: What single thing in popular culture most excites you at present?

WE: Almost nothing. Popular culture in 2003 was an awful dead zone of a thing. Put a drink or nine in me and I will rail at great length about how we are living in The End Of Popular Culture.

FP: Do you feel that Computer Games are stealing audiences away from Comic
Books?

WE: What steals audiences from comic books is that it's frankly really bloody hard to buy comic books. There aren't enough comics stores, because no effort was ever made to broaden the audience for the medium during the superhero comics boom.

You can read more about Warren ellis at warrenellis.com or punyhumans. You can purchase Collected Editions of the majority of Warrens work in comics at all good comic books stores. If you can find a comic book store that is. If not try Amazon.

Warren Ellis

We have a treat for you on New Years Day. We will be posting an exclusive mini interview that Warren Ellis conducted for FoolishPeople.

Warren Ellis is the award winning writer of TRANSMETROPOLITAN, PLANETARY, THE AUTHORITY, GLOBAL FREQUENCY and ORBITER. GLOBAL FREQUENCY has recently been optioned for television by the WB in the United States.

You can find more out about Warren Ellis and his work at warrenellis.com and also at Die Puny Humans which is his Blog.

Batman Dead End

Not too many people know that the definitive Batman film has been shot by fanboy and semi-professional film maker Sandy Collora. Collora got his break into film making through working for Stan Winston the special effects maestro.

Batman DeadEnd is an eight minute lesson in how to make a Batman film true to the roots of the character.
The film depicts batman taking on his recently escaped arc nemesis the Joker before going head to head with Alien and the predator. The film is dark, Batman dark. True fans of Batman will understand what I mean by Batman dark. DC comic artist Alex Ross publicly stated it was the best representation of Batman on film.

You can expect to see Sandy Collora's first Hollywood feature very soon. Rumours suggest that New Line Cinema is courting him for Shazams first celluloid outing. Here’s what sandy has to say about Shazam.

“It’s pretty rare when a script captures my imagination and inspires me so much, that I have to read it twice, or even rarer still, THREE times. SHAZAM! By William Goldman is just such a script, but it’s something more… A lot more.

Captain Marvel is one of my favorite superheroes. I’ve always been drawn to him because Billy Batson was like every fifteen-year-old boy I knew… he was like me. The only difference is Billy Batson was given the power of being the mightiest hero in the world, something every young boy hopes to be in one way or another.

But, as so eloquently put in another of my favorite comic book movies; "With great power, comes great responsibility." After the reality of being Captain Marvel has manifested itself in his psyche, Billy is faced with a dilemma that is played out impeccably in this script.

Goldman has truly captured the spirit of Billy Batson’s plight, both as Captain Marvel, and as a fifteen-year-old boy trying to figure out his place in the world. Like it’s tremendously successful predecessors “SUPERMAN” and “SPIDERMAN”, Goldman has stoked this script's furnace with what most comic book films lack… HEART.

I FEEL this film… I SEE this film… every moment, every frame… every ounce of trepidation and frustration Billy feels, every detail of Captain Marvel’s costume, every magnificent beam of magic hour light that bathes his muscular frame with the girl in his arms as he majestically floats skyward.

I had always hoped that someday, someone would make a SHAZAM! movie, now I sincerely hope with every fiber of my being, that someone will be me”

I hope he gets the gig. You can see Batman DeadEnd here.

Create Your Own Comic Strip

Create your own comic here http://www.monkeydyne.com/rmcs/buildmeat.html

View mine here
FP Comic Strip