Of course, "bad" is a relative term; a panel of doctors and public health officials set up by the National Academy of Science to look at the effects of such an explosion agreed that everyone within a one kilometer radius would be almost certainly be killed, but that things could be much worse. As panel head Georges Benjamin explained,

Clearly there would be loss of life, but it's not hopeless... We feel that there are things that one can do to mitigate it.

The panel's recommendations focus on those protecting those outside of the kilometer radius from the dangers of radioactive fallout from the blast. According to New Mexico Veterans Administration Health Center's Fred Mettler, a member of the panel, just making sure people stay inside would bring immediate benefits:

That's a place where you could get big gains if you plan right... Without prior education, it would be a horrible issue.

Also under advisement from the panel are drugs to combat radiation sickness and software to predict the drift of fallout. There's been no response from the government to the panel's report yet, but Benjamin is hopeful that will come once they've had a chance to digest it:

This is hot off the press... We've literally just briefed them.

Is your city prepared for a home-made nuke? [New Scientist]

As Michael Bay's second Transformers movie slowly crushes all opposition, the Wall Street Journal notes that projections are for Transformers owner Hasbro to sell 25% more Transformers-related toys than they did during the first movie's boom period, offering up anywhere between $550 million and $595 million (at least) in revenue. Except not all of that money will go into Hasbro's pockets, despite their owning the franchise.

The relationship between Dreamworks/Paramount, Hasbro and Michael Bay is oddly incestuous when it comes to money. Dreamworks/Paramount, of course, have to pay Hasbro a license fee to use the Transformers brand and characters in the first place, but in turn, Hasbro has to give up money on movie-related merchandise; many people have already made a big deal out of Bay's profit-sharing on the Transformers movies - He'll make way more than his $75 million share from the profits of the $708 million-grossing first movie on Fallen - but he also makes an estimated 8% of the profit of every movie-related toy released, as well.

Considering that Bay is heading towards a payday of somewhere in the region of (and this is more than a little conservative) at least $150 million in addition to his actual fee for directing Revenge of The Fallen, two things become clear - Firstly, that Bayhem is an extremely lucrative career, and secondly, that - desire to do something smaller or not - there's almost no way that Bay will be able to refuse the lure of a similar pay day with a third installment.

Carnegie Mellon's Alessandro Acquisti and Ralph Gross have correctly calculated the complete SSN for 8.5 percent of people born between 1989 and 2003 in less than 1000 attempts, proving that any system that relies on SSN and date of birth for security is seriously flawed. As Acquisti explains:

It's possible that criminals are already using this.

The US Social Security Administration is already working on a way to avoid this problem in future by randomizing the selection of the nine digit number - currently, the first five digits are selected depending on zip code of your birthplace - but the workaround won't help the millions of Americans with SSNs currently. For them, their best hope is that would-be cyberthieves give up before their 1000th try.

Social security flaw leaves way open for cyber-theft [New Scientist]

Marc Guggenheim told MTV Splash Page that rumors about the movie would feature a guest spot from Clark Kent to establish a "universe," just like Robert Downey Jr.'s appearance in last year's Hulk movie, could still turn out to be true depending on the editing room:

Honestly, it changes on a daily basis. Whatever information I gave you today would be obsolete in a week, and maybe come back again in two weeks... I will say, all the Easter Eggs and the cameos that I put in, I couldn't even begin to predict at this point which ones will stay and which ones will go. I'll be as interested as anyone else to see what we end up keeping and losing by the time the picture is actually locked… and that's pretty far away from now.

Green Lantern is set for a late 2010 release.

A Superman Cameo In ‘Green Lantern' Movie? Marc Guggenheim Weighs In On Rumor [MTV Splash Page]

Fox announced the move via press release (which also revealed that Joss Whedon would be writing and directing the season premiere, although I'm not sure many people didn't expect that), leading to some speculation that the move was due to more production problems or Fox interference. The Hollywood Reporter's Live Feed blog, however, suggests a much more benign reason:

With production starting in late July, the network pushed back the start date to ensure that episodes would run consecutively.

Equally likely to influence Fox's decision is the fact that the move also allows them the chance to give the much-buzzed Glee an encore performance in Dollhouse's place in the original timeslot.

Even if many people may be secretly hoping for more Dollhouse disaster (Hey, it makes for good headlines!), we may be in for a surprisingly stable year for the show — especially with Tim Minear coming on board as an Executive Producer and the network getting a clear demonstration of the audience goodwill it's engendered. Could this be the chance the show needed to truly shine?

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.
Pinocchio: Vampire Slayer, released this September from SLG Publishing, tells the story of what happens when Gepetto gets killed by vampires and Pinocchio swears revenge... and uses his ever-growing nose as an endless supply of material for making stakes. Created by Dustin Higgins and artist Van Jensen, the 128 page graphic novel is released in September.

Pinocchio: Vampire Slayer Preview [SLG]

The show's producers are holding a contest for fans to provide their own ideal theme music for the show, with the winner to be unveiled in a surprisingly public place:

For this year's Comic-Con panel, our theme is about giving back to YOU...the fans!!! It is because of you that we are celebrating our 5th year at Comic-Con, and we would love to incorporate your astounding creativity. We'd like to feature YOUR ideal version of what you think a LOST title song would be (if the show had one). Over the years, we've been witness to your incredibly innovative pieces on LOST, and would love to hear your fetchy melody for LOST which you were waiting to share!

Of course, how could it really measure up to these classics?
The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.

You have until July 16th to come up with your own moment of musical genius. We're just hoping that someone can come up with a good rhyme for "DHARMA initiative."

Lost Mock Theme Contest [ABC.com]

Fandango has reported that advance sales for the sixth outing of Warner Bros' version of the magical hero are outstripping those for Transformers: Revenge of The Fallen, which barely fell short of The Dark Knight's 2008 record, with sales for the movie currently making up 65% of all Fandango sales. Whether it's audience desire for something magical in these troubled times, box office frenzy brought on by the success of Transformers and Ice Age, or a mix of positive reviews and a return to the PG certification, there's every chance to that Harry Potter could surpass Batman's $203million opening weekend.

Of course, there's no guarantee that advance sales will translate into final box office success; initial glee based on Watchmen's pre-release sales failed to lead to bigger boffo bucks once the movie opened, and Fandango may be skewing facts by offering a free download of a song from the Potter soundtrack with every advance ticket sale.

What do you think? Will this end up being the summer of Harry, or will Transformers' Bayhem end up reigning supreme?

'Harry Potter' Outpacing 'Transformers' in Advance Ticket Sales on Fandango [PR Newswire]

5.94 million people tuned in for the first episode of the show's third season, it's first on BBC One. If that doesn't sound like a lot, previous season premieres have pulled in 2.4m (Season One on BBC Three) and 3.72m (Season Two on BBC Two), making 5.94 million an impressive leap (more than double than that of its lead-in, an episode of current affairs show Panorama) - and also enough people to win the timeslot for the night.

The season continues this evening and for the rest of the week on BBC One, before premiering in America on BBC America July 20th.

5.9m tune in for new 'Torchwood' [Digital Spy]

The MEMS robot, built by scientists from Israel's Technion University, has a one millimeter diameter and no on-board engine or controls; instead, it is guided using magnetic fields operated by scientists externally. Using arms that grip onto artery walls, it can crawl at a speed up to nine millimeters a second through the body, its creators say. They're currently planning to add some new features to aid in its life-saving potential:

A small cross sectional area on the tiny robot apparently allows fluids to flow with minimal interference making intra-vascular motion more feasible, and opening up the possibility of minimally invasive medical treatments, as well as diagnosis within the body. Researchers are also apparently toying with the idea of attaching miniscule cameras to the bot, as well as other "tools" it may need to perform internal surgery.

If something goes wrong with the robot in practice, Technion University scientists have already lined up a secondary market; they're looking at adapting it for use in urban water distribution systems to look out for and repair leaks.

Robot invented to crawl through veins [The Inquirer.net]

It's unfair, really. Even if you ignore the dual Obama-bandwagon-jumping of President Evil and Drafted: One Hundred Days (pitting the president against zombies and aliens, respectively), there's a lot to look for in stores this week.

Marvel focuses on familiar faces with its Marvel 70th Anniversary anthology, new Uncanny X-Men: First Class retro series, Dark X-Men: The Beginning franchise redo and Hulk: Broken Worlds parallel-green-dude collection.

IDW does the same with a GI Joe: Best Of Storm Shadow anthology. And a collection of the alternate history "what if the Klingons fucked everything up" story, Star Trek: The Next Generation - The Last Generation.

DC, meanwhile, make a great play for winning the week even before you get to Wednesday. For one thing, there's Jeff Lemire's The Nobody (which we reviewed last week). There's also a collection of the recent spin-off comic from NBC's Chuck, a re-issue for the oversized (and extra-paged) edition of DC: The New Frontier and a specially-priced ($1) new edition of the first issue from Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely's wonderful All-Star Superman.

Plus, of course, there's the new deluxe hardcover Superman: Whatever Happened To The Man of Tomorrow, which collects all of Watchmen and V For Vendetta writer Alan Moore's work on the Man of Steel under one set of hardcovers for the first time.

The only competition for that line-up comes from Dark Horse, who's releasing a handsome hardcover version of horror comic Pixu: The Mark of Evil by indie sweethearts Becky Cloonan, Vasilis Lolos, Fabio Moon and Gabriel Ba (Consider it highly recommended).

But, still. Wednesday Comics has our attention and our heart - A weekly 12-issue series of oversized strips by some of comics' best cartoonists, starring some of DC's best known characters (and some lesser-known but equally awesome - Adam Strange? The Metal Men?), it has the potential to be either the kind of comic that reminds you of the medium's potential, or a terrible carwreck. But either way, we'd be first in line to pick it up. Just the thought of seeing Paul Pope, Karl Kerschl, Eduardo Risso and Ryan Sook artwork at that size in the first place makes our fannish hearts go all a-flutter, never mind writing from Kurt Busiek, Neil Gaiman, Walt Simonson and many, many more.

Whether it's weekly proof that comics can dazzle and entertain or watching the leader of the free world shoot aliens in the head, consider your local comic store the place to be tomorrow... and if none of the above sounds your scene, set your peepers on this week's Diamond Distributors Shipping List, Daddio, to see what else you cool cats could be reading. Just don't bother us; we're going to be wondering whether we should frame some of that gorgeous newspaper-size Wednesday work...

The UK Daily Mirror newspaper reported that Williams is looking to step up her acting career (She's previously appeared as a guest on er and Law & Order: SVU) with a meatier role with a tougher stance on evil:

I don't get the opportunities but I would love to play a superhero character... With my body type I would be good at action movies, maybe doing my own stunts. I would be really good at that.

Hey, Marvel: Looking for a Captain Marvel for your Avengers movie? I think a stunt-casting opportunity just presented itself...

Serena Williams wants to play movie superhero [Mirror.co.uk]

Rhett Reese, one of the screenwriters for the Sony movie, was happy to tell Superhero Hype that Lee's place in the evil Spider-Man's solo movie debut was assured:

Oh, yeah. Stan Lee is in it.. I feel like that's the one thing we can say. He does appear in our script, and we're very specific about where he is and why.

Considering that Lee had nothing to do with Venom's creation - unlike Hulk, Iron Man, Spider-Man and Fantastic Four, all of whose movies he's blessed with his presence - we're curious to see where he turns up... and whether Jim Shooter, Mike Zeck, Tom DeFalco, Ron Frenz, David Micheline or Todd McFarlane (all of whom were involved in the creation of Venom in one way or another) also get cameo appearances in the movie.

Stan Lee to Appear in the Venom Spin-Off [Superhero Hype]

The potential existence of Cosmic Strings - lines of pure mass-energy with as much mass as the sun, but as wide as a proton at most - has been described as the result of matter "cooling" into galaxies following the Big Bang, potentially giving us an insight into how the universe was formed. The theory came from physicist Thomas Kibble in 1976, but remained somewhat unproven ever since.

New Scientist reports that evidence of the hypothetical "topological defects" in space-time may have proven to be so difficult to find because the strings were too unstable to exist in the form that scientists expected:

As the strings broke... analysis shows that their split ends would have been capped off by more monopoles, eventually leading to a universe filled with fragmented strings with beads at their ends. In an infant universe, these high-tension strings would have been whipping around, accelerating the massive beads to relativistic speeds. These would have generated tight beams of gravitational waves, which could still be travelling through space-time.

The theory comes from a team led by Ben Shlaer of Tufts University in Medford, Massachusetts, who explained:

It's possible that if you wait long enough, one of those highly focused bursts would hit the Earth, and that would cause one of our gravitational wave detectors to chirp.

So apparently we're going from looking for hypothetical cosmic strings to waiting for theoretical strands traveling through space-time to come and hit the Earth...? I'm not convinced that that's the greatest idea of how to prove the existence of something that I've ever heard, I have to admit.

Cosmic 'whips' may have left their mark [New Scientist]

For those familiar with some of Chaykin's other work, there are definitely echoes to be found in Flagg - the corny puns, the stocking-and-heels combo fetish, the square-jawed hero out of his depth but somehow still irresistible to all women and able to save the day (despite his complaints) when the situation demands it. But there's enough elsewhere to distract from the Chaykin Formula and turn you into a believer.

In concept, Flagg is very much a product of its times - You can see echoes of the media-led futures of Blade Runner and Max Headroom in here, as well as a Cold War paranoia/parody that wouldn't be imagined today - but the execution is amazing and, at times (specifically in the first storyline, "Hard Times"), almost faultless.

The set-up for the series is that, in the not-so-far future, the US Government and various corporations have fled Earth for Mars, leaving a power vacuum cemented by the fall of the Soviet Union and only partially filled by "The Plex," a new body made up of US officials, corporate heads and former Russian scientists who run things in America from afar. The police force of this new America are called Plexus Rangers (Told you about the puns), and one such Ranger is Rueben Flagg, a former television star replaced by his own CGI stunt double and drafted into service on Chicago's mean streets.

Of course, none of that really explains what the series is actually about, which is a heady mix of political and social satire (Not for nothing is one character called Medea Blitz), old-school action adventure and Chaykin living out his sexual fantasies through his lead character. The intentionally-absurd quality to the stories manages to work, surprisingly - everything happens with a kind of hyper-reality, amped-up and unbelievable but enjoyably so - that leaves the reader breathless by continually pummeling them more and more information to take in.

Helping out considerably with that pummeling is the look of the book. It's not just the artwork, although this is Chaykin at his best and most daring, before he fell into the (admittedly pretty) rut that he's in now of tight close-ups and familiar layouts - His linework, as ever, is crisp and attractive, a distinctive collection of influences from fine art, design and comics blended together to come up with something that seems timeless even now - but the look of the book. As much as Chaykin, Flagg's aesthetic is defined by the stunning lettering of Ken Bruzenak, which goes so far beyond speech balloons and thought bubbles and sound effects that it becomes one of the most memorable things about the book, a visual hook that explains the chaos of the future in a way that seems as much musical as anything else.

The two collections dip in quality towards the end - Chaykin's writing becomes emptier, and other artists take over on the last couple of chapters - but it never becomes dull or a chore to read; when American Flagg is at its best, it's a classic piece of science fiction satire that stands up there with Robocop and Brazil, but even at its worst, it's an enjoyable piece of eye-catching comics that offers a future at once recognizable and distant.

American Flagg is available now and published in the UK by Titan Books and in the US by Dynamite Entertainment.

SFX Magazine talked to producer Peter Bennett about what's different - and what's the same - about the third season of the British sex-and-aliens drama:

We actually take this series on a darker journey, if anything. But Children Of Earth is still the same show. Jack is still as cheeky and irreverent and sexy. Telling one big story meant that the story had more scale and reach than we ever had in series two, but no, nothing's changed... When we set out we did initially think it would be nice to go down the kind of Bourne Identity route, make it very thriller-like. But after our first couple of tone meetings it was evident that actually that wasn't the way that Russell saw it. Although between Euros [Lyn, the director] and I we did try and put a certain amount of our stamp on it, at the end of the day, as Russell said, it's still gotta be Torchwood. It's still got to be fun-packed; yes, it can be thrilling, but it's still got to have the real Torchwood feel.

Does that mean that at least one of the episodes will be a distinct let-down and kind of embarrassing to watch for everyone involved? It wouldn't be Torchwood without that happening.

Children of Earth launches tonight in the UK on BBC One, and July 20th in the US on BBC America.

Torchwood producer talks Children Of Earth [SFX Magazine]

The movie leaked late Friday and early Saturday this weekend, brightening some Independence Days for Watchmen-obsessed fans but barely unnoticed by the world at large - BleedingCool.com aside, especially compared to the shitstorm caused by the X-Men Origins: Wolverine leak in March. So why the lack of outrage?

One possibility is that, extra footage aside, everyone who wants to have seen Watchmen has seen it already; unlike Wolverine, it's a relatively known - and unsuccessful - quantity by now. Yes, it's a new version of the movie, but still: while the extended Director's Cut may be grounded in rumors of being more satisfactory to disappointed fans of the book, it's also much more of a niche product than not only Wolverine but the original Watchmen release; it's being aimed at those who have already seen and enjoyed the movie in theaters, and those people are more likely to want to see the HD version and extras on disc, as opposed to a torrented bootleg.

It's also much less of a story than the Wolverine leak; Wolverine's leaked print was unfinished and the source of much (faux) intrigue - Where had it come from? Was it an attempt to sabotage the movie's box office? What did it tell us about the movie? Can you see where the reshoots may have been inserted, or why it needed them in the first place? and so on - whereas this is... well, a leaked DVD re-edit, at heart. There are multiple breaks in security where it could've come from, and much less possibility that internal strife will be revealed by what you can see. Not only that, of course, but it's worth noting that Wolverine was a first... this is just "another" leak, by comparison.

(Let's not forget that Fox made the Wolverine leak into an even bigger story with their reactions, whether it was hastily telling everyone that the finished version contained extra footage or hastily condemning anyone who downloaded it. This leak, by comparison, has been met with silence from Warner Bros. so far.)

Alternatively, it's possible that not that many people knew about it, as it broke over the holiday weekend. It'll be interesting to see if it gains more infamy and popularity over the course of the next few days.

SciFi Wire reports Hartley talking on the subject of how long the show may continue recently:

"Look, they're so busy right now, they don't know if they're doing one more season or eight more seasons or two more seasons... They have no idea. So we'll see.

Quite how that clearly-intentionally ridiculous "eight more seasons" seemed to be taken more literally than it should've been by some, we're not sure, but it seems more like Hartley was saying "anything's possible," than "this show will never end."

Then again, he blew our mind when he revealed how old Green Arrow is supposed to be in the show ("I'd say I'm playing what, 14 or 15 right now, about, roughly"), so who knows?

So now it's possible Smallville's upcoming ninth season may not be its last? [SciFi Wire]

Here are five pieces of wisdom that we've gleaned from the last six months (and handful of days):

President Obama Is The Greatest Hero Of All
As his many comic book appearances have demonstrated, there's no end to our current president's ability to save the world from any genre of threat. Amazing Spider-Man has him fighting supervillains, Youngblood shows him carrying massive laserguns to shoot renegade soldiers taking over the White House, Drafted gives us an alien-invasion-battlin' Barack and Barack The Barbarian brings everything back down to sword and sorcery basics. He's like a modern-day Arnold Schwarzenegger - and enough to make us wonder just how the comic industry would've dealt with John McCain winning the election instead.

Threats To Humanity Are Getting Weaker
Last year, it was the Large Hadron Collider and the possibility that it would rip existence apart when someone flipped the switch, and this year, it was... Swine Flu. It can't just be me, can it? I mean, Swine Flu... Doesn't that seem like a step down from the technological "Our Quest For Knowledge May Destroy Us All" conceptual genius that threatened us last year? Even calling it "the H1N1 Influenza Virus" still sounds kind of shit. Okay, so there's no chance of "hardon" spoonerisms, but still: Pandemics? Haven't we done that already? I'm holding out hope that sewer monsters will brighten the remaining months of the year, however.

The BBC Should Stop Making Us Feel Old
Yes, we know that it's just one of those aimless homilies that you know that you're getting old when the policemen and doctors start looking younger, but selecting a twelve year old to be the new Doctor Who really doesn't make us feel very good about ourselves nonetheless. I know that we started with the oldest of the Doctors and have progressively gotten younger since then - well, roughly - but between David Tennant and Matt Smith, I'm convinced that we'll have our first pre-teen Timelord by 2015. And then, the next one will be a little baby, just like in 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Joss Whedon Can Defy The Laws Of Nature
If nothing else, the renewal of Dollhouse proves that he can defy the laws of television. I wouldn't put money on him being unable to fly if he really wanted to.

Fuck Dystopia
Terminator Salvation and Watchmen - two downbeat movies offering popcorn versions of pessimistic views of humanity ("Ultimately, man's greed and laziness will lead us to become disconnected from our fellow man and controlled by the machines and mechanisms that we created to ease our daily existences - but doesn't this slow-motion action sequence look hot?") - both failed to meet expectation at the box office, while Star Trek's hopeful, colorful version of a future that may be too lens-flarey to be cuddly but is nonetheless positive surpassed expectations. Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles also died a slow death on television. The obvious conclusion? No-one wants to their entertainment to end with the lesson "We're all screwed." The Dark Knight's glossy hopelessness was so last year, people. We hadn't experienced so much of the economic downturn and/or the hopetrain of Obama back then. We were all so much more innocent and desperate to be mistreated by our movies. (Along the same lines - Size Matters: Terminator, featuring human-sized robots, fails to become a hit. Transformers: Revenge of The Fallen, featuring giant robots, breaks box office records. I think you can see what I'm saying here. See also: Robot On Robot Action Is More Acceptable Than Robot On Batman Action and Megan Fox Is Hotter Than Moon Bloodgood. Sorry, But There It Is.)

Bolstered with this new knowledge, we look forward to what the rest of the year can teach us - presuming, of course, that the sewer monsters don't decide to team up with Joss Whedon and end the world before then. Pray for us.

The three page short "Almost Darkest" - written by Whedon and illustrated by Jo Chen, the artist behind the amazing covers to the current Buffy The Vampire Slayer Season Eight comic - may just end up as a seemingly random dream indulging fans' and Whedon's fantasies (Buffy marrying Warren? Really?), but at least it features this sequence:

The strip is available on publisher Dark Horse's website, as part of their Dark Horse Presents online anthology series.

Always Darkest [Dark Horse]

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Talking to the Guardian newspaper on the 40th anniversary of the historic mission, Aldrin said,

People want to know what it felt like... They want us in a few words to generate the enthusiasm that the world had as they contemplated what we were about to do. Well, what it felt like is something that we trained for. We were trying to treat it as calmly as we could and perform to the best of our ability. We tried to repress feelings of exuberance, of disappointment, and be proud and responsible people accomplishing the task that was given to us. That sounds kind of boring. Except that what we did was kind of earth-shaking.

The man who fell to earth [Guardian.co.uk]

Talking to the Wall Street Journal, Bay repeated that he's not looking to jump into the next Transformers movie right away despite Dreamworks' announced release date:

I just want to take some time off. It's been almost three years that I've devoted myself entirely to this world of robots. At some point, enough is enough-and I literally carried this movie on my back. I only finished it in the last week [before release... but] I don't know who [would] want to take on my shoes with this franchise. We might just take a year down.

One thing you shouldn't expect from a Bay-directed Transformers 3 will be 3-D, apparently:

I prefer the flat screen. I'm not jumping to do 3-D at all-it's a pain in the neck to shoot it and I actually like the flat image. I've heard that some people can't even see 3-D and, moreover, that a major side effect of watching it is feeling exhausted. Can you imagine how you'd feel watching one of my movies in 3-D?

And, judging from the tone of his comments about Transformers star Megan Fox, maybe we shouldn't expect her in the third movie, either:

She says some very ridiculous things because she's 23 years old and she still has a lot of growing to do. You roll your eyes when you see statements like that and think, "Okay Megan, you can do whatever you want. I got it." But I 100% disagree with her. Nick Cage wasn't a big actor when I cast him, nor was Ben Affleck before I put him in "Armageddon." Shia LaBeouf wasn't a big movie star before he did "Transformers"-and then he exploded. Not to mention Will Smith and Martin Lawrence, from "Bad Boys." Nobody in the world knew about Megan Fox until I found her and put her in "Transformers."

He made you and he can break you, Megan. Not that he's outright saying that last part, or anything. Well, only kinda sorta.

Master of Machines [Wall Street Journal]

Shock Till You Drop has received confirmation that the next movie in the one-time trilogy will be released on September 17, 2010. Called Resident Evil: Afterlife, Paul WS Anderson's fourth movie will - as we revealed last year - feature an army of Milla Jovovich's Alices taking on the Umbrella Corporation. September 2010 seems too far away already.

Confirmed Exclusive: Resident Evil 4 Arriving in Late 2010 [Shock Till You Drop]

During his LA appearance with Clive Barker earlier this week, Morrison admitted that Wonder Woman had disappeared from Final Crisis midway through the series, although he had a good reason why:

[The ideas] went into a different project with Wonder Woman... The basics of Wonder Woman come from William Moulton Marston, a psychologist who created the lie detector, of all things. His idea was that a utopia would be achieved if men were placed in subjugation to women. So, Wonder Woman is a character where you imagine this very strange mélange of girl power, bondage, and a slightly disturbed sexuality. There is this bondage element; these extremely weird dark elements of Wonder Woman haven't been adequately dealt with. Wonder Woman remains a really bizarre, untouchable character. She should represent women in the same way Superman represents men.

The project - all detail of which, including release date, format, artist and (most importantly) whether or not DC have greenlit it - has a simple mission statement, according to the author:

To make it work, to give [Wonder Woman] a sexuality that isn't exploitive, because that's too easy; but also to give her a [narrative] power.

Well, it's definitely better than her calling men "sperm bank," I guess.

Grant Morrison & Clive Barker Meltdown Hollywood [Comic Book Resources]

Admittedly, they're talking about the new animatronic Obama that provides the news hook for their revamped Hall of Presidents attraction in Florida's Walt Disney World. His selling point? Apparently, that you can't tell the difference between this Obama and the real one, even down to muscle dominance:

Imagineers traveled to the Washington, D.C., to record Obama's voice for the show. They also worked with White House staffers to make sure his wardrobe, hair and mannerisms were portrayed as accurately as possible. "He's very tailored and very well-dressed all the time so that's what we were trying to achieve, and I think we did," said Janice Jones, a costumer at Walt Disney World.

Disney sculptor Valerie Edwards created the Obama figure's likeness. "Well, it's a great pressure of course to completely do an accurate job of somebody that's in the media so often," Edwards said. She used an array of pictures and video of the president to capture even the slightest facial expression. "I can watch the different speeches and I can watch his cadence as he speaks, I can watch his muscles as they move, I can see how his face changes as he speaks to see if there's any dominance in muscle," Edwards said.

Disney call Robot Obama "the most dynamic figure Disney has ever created," which makes me convinced that - midway through his speech - he's going to suddenly leap into action and punch Robot Lincoln in the jaw or something.

The revamped Hall of Presidents opens today.

Disney adds robotic Obama to attraction [CNN]

For almost as long as there have been superheroes, there have been superheroes who were intended to be patriotic figures representing American values by offering up inspirational speeches, standing up for the little guy and socking Hitler in the jaw whenever possible. Considering the popularity of the medium during the Second World War, it's easy to see why Real American Heroes became so prevalent, even if they've failed to find so easy a purpose ever since (Although trying to do so has produced such great stories - and such sly commentary as Captain America's 1970s villains, the Committee to Regain America's Principles... or CRAP, for short). But this isn't a day to think about troubled times... so let's salute the brave, bold and... others... of America's Fictional Finest.

The Classics
The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Captain America
Still the best of all of America's superheroes - or, at least, the only one who's really weathered the years and stayed in print the longest. Sure, there was that whole period he disappeared after the War, but that's because he was frozen in a block of ice. Who would've wanted to have read that month after month?

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Uncle Sam
Who could be more patriotic than Captain America? Well, how about Uncle Sam himself? Oh, alright; this character, created by The Spirit's Will Eisner, wasn't the Uncle Sam, but instead the resurrected spirit of a Revolutionary War-era soldier who mystically returns in America's various hours of need, but still. Look at that beard and wonder just who could argue?

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.The Shield
Created more than a year before Captain America, Archie Comics' super soldier patriot may not have the name recognition of Marvel's counterpart, but DC Comics is doubtlessly hoping that J. Michael Straczynski's upcoming revival of the superpowered military man will change all of that.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.The Fighting Yank
A character so wonderfully named, he's been revived not once but twice in recent years, and by no less than Alan Moore (in a 2001 issue of his America's Best Comics series Tom Strong) and Alex Ross (in his ongoing Project Superpowers series). But who could resist the lure of a man haunted by the ghost of his War of Independence-era ancestor who fights for his country's honor?

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Liberty Belle
What are the odds that a woman could have a spiritual connection with the Liberty Bell so strong that it gives her superpowers and the ability to fight Nazis? if you're a comic book character from the 1940s, apparently they'd be good enough for that character's daughter to take on the same costumed identity and fight crime with the Justice Society today.

The Forgotten Heroes
The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Mr. America/Americommando
Reason #1 to love this 1941 superhero: His secret identity is a Texan oilman out for revenge against the Nazis. Reason #2: His sidekick's name was "Fatman." Reason #3: His Nazi-fighting technique? Dying his hair black and whipping his enemies until they surrender. Why is this character not getting multiple movies and fan worship as we speak?

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Miss America
Sadly unrelated to the above, Miss America gained her powers from a dream where the Statue of Liberty came to life and gave them to her, and thankfully kept up that level of weirdness all the way through her career, whether it was faking her own aging process in order to live a quiet life or making a new body for herself from space debris and renaming herself Miss Cosmos. There's something admirable about that kind of ingenuity, wouldn't you agree?

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.USAgent
A much more recent patriotic hero than most, John Walker hails from the 1980s and an unsuccessful stint as a replacement for Captain America that accidentally led to his parents' death. His success as a character is perhaps best defined by the fact that he - an American-themed hero with a very American name - was transplanted to Canada by Marvel in a desperate attempt to make him a success. It failed.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.American Eagle
Marvel Comics' 1981 attempt at inclusiveness resulted in this Native American hero, Jason Strongbow, whose generic origin story (Gained powers in accident caused by supervillain, seeking revenge for a dead brother) and lazy stereotypical costume didn't hint at the potential that's slowly being unlocked by more recent creators in series like Thunderbolts and War Machine.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Star-Spangled Kid
DC Comics keep trying with this name, even if the characters keep getting popular enough to outgrow it; the first SSK became Infinity Inc.'s Skyman in the 1980s, and the second became the Justice Society of America's Stargirl. Luckily, we now apparently have a third in the Teen Titans franchise, even if she does happen to be martian. Does an alien really count as star-spangled?

The Crazy Ones
The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.The Comedian
Sure, there may be nothing particularly American about his name - or even his outfit, most of the time - but there's no doubting that Alan Moore's Watchmen character served his country - or more accurately, his country's government - better than most superheroes. Not enough to stop himself getting thrown out a window, sure, but them's the breaks.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Nuke
Frank Miller's intentionally-failed attempt to repeat the Captain America experiment may have seemed slightly out of place in the classic "Born Again" Daredevil storyline, but there's no denying that his drug-fueled, crazed Vietnam-flashback rantings made him a memorable indictment of mindless patriotism in Reagan's America.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Superpatriot
An old-school superhero captured, made into a cyborg and going insane and murderous in the process? Erik Larsen's quasi-parody may have a history that's as ridiculous as it is eventful - and that's before you've gotten to the kids he didn't remember having and his half-martian grandchild - but we're choosing to look at him as a man who's just made a few mistakes, is all.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Major Victory
Leader of conservative supergroup the Force of July - Get it? - this DC Comics character was everything some would want in a true American hero: Charismatic, attractive, arrogant and racist as all get out. Never given to complex characterization, the character's descent into political parody continued when he joined a new corporate superteam called the Captains of Industry - Get it? - before, thankfully, dying.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Captain America
Yeah, I know; Steve Rogers isn't crazy, right? But his retconned 1950s replacement most definitely was. After all, how else would you describe a man whose take on American values was deemed acceptable by Nazi supervillain the Red Skull on more than one occasion? Yes, he may think he was a patriot - and, thanks to cosmetic surgery, he even looks exactly identical to the original Cap - but this guy is not the kind of hero you want in your corner.

WTF?
The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Yank & Doodle
Yes, it's a crime-fighting duo called Yank and Doodle. Even during their heyday of the 1940s, there's no way that kids didn't find these two America-loving teenagers more than a little dumb. Surprisingly, they've just been revived in Dynamite's Project Superpowers series... Here's hoping that new names are forthcoming.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Yankee Poodle
Well, what else would you call the world's most patriotic crime-fighting dog? Part of DC Comics' Zoo Crew, Poodle isn't even the most America-centric of the team... That'd be American Eagle. Who, you guessed it, is an actual Eagle. Stunningly, thanks to Final Crisis, these characters are officially part of DC's main continuity these days.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.American Maid
Armed with a boomerang tiara and her quick wits, The Tick's occasional partner in crimefighting stands out as being probably the most capable of all the characters in the comic/show - Dressed like Lady Liberty and working for the US government more often than not, evil will never get away with it as long as she's around.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.The First American and US Angel
Alan Moore's turn of the millennium take on the idea of patriotic comic characters was this unusual duo - An overweight, incompetent superhero (The latest in a long line of First Americans) and the former stripper who dreams of taking his place. Social satire, or serious commentary on the impotence of American masculinity in the face of an increasingly revelatory society obsessed with surface glamor above all? You be the judge. But it's not the latter.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.US 1
If a trucker who can pick up CB transmissions thanks to the metal plate in his head, and then gets kidnapped by aliens before opening an intergalactic diner in space doesn't sound like the very personification of the American Dream to you, then there's only one explanation: You're not an American in the first place. But even that doesn't stop us from wishing you a happy Independence Day... even if it was independence from you that's being celebrated in the first place.

Goldstein explains:

As a young girl, growing up abroad, I was not exposed to Fairy tales. These new discoveries lead to my fascination with the origins of Fairy tales. I explored the original brothers Grimm's stories and found that they have very dark and sometimes gruesome aspects, many of which were changed by Disney. I began to imagine Disney's perfect Princesses juxtaposed with real issues that were affecting women around me, such as illness, addiction and self-image issues.

These images appeared in JPG Magazine, and Goldstein plans to add more before the entire series goes on exhibit in October.

Fallen Princesses [JPG Magazine]

According to New Scientist, two separate teams of scientists in the Netherlands and the US have discovered through testing on animals that the pandemic strain of the virus differs from other seasonal strains in the way that it binds with its victims:

Both groups found that the seasonal virus binds almost exclusively to cells in the ferrets' noses. But, the pandemic H1N1 binds deeper, in the lung's trachea, bronchi and bronchioles. The pandemic virus also replicated more, and caused more damage, though none of the ferrets were severely ill... The US group found also found binding in the intestines, explaining the unusual nausea and vomiting seen in some cases of the pandemic flu. Both teams concluded that the virus could adapt further to humans, which might make it more severe.

So all we have to do to be protected from the pandemic is quickly evolve less-lung- and intenstine-centric ways of existing, right...? We'll get right on that.

Revealed: How pandemic swine flu kills [New Scientist]

Brad Caleb Kane, a writer and producer on Fringe, announced the project on Twitter earlier this week:

Almost official — after the alien movie I'll be writing a movie for [Dreamworks] based on a famous toy we all played w/ as kids. Any guesses?

Within an hour, Kane said that someone had guessed correctly, and that the toy was Viewmaster, the "stereoscopic sightseeing" from 1939 that achieved mainstream popularity in the 1960s. He continued,

Writin it for the Kurtzman/Orci boys! It'll be like the old 80's Amblin movies: Goonies, Young Sherlock... In that vein.

On the one hand, we're unconvinced that this isn't a particularly obscure joke based on the success of Transformers: Revenge Of The Fallen, but on the other, they're making a movie out of Asteroids, for fuck's sake; all bets are off as to the visionary powers and/or sanity of movie executives. If it's true, however, we feel as if a new bar has been set for unlikely toy-based movies - and look forward to seeing who can take it further.

Antal's involvement was confirmed by Rodriguez - who's "overseeing" the movie, as well as co-writing - on Ain't It Cool, where he also spilled a small amount of beans about what'll be happening in it:

I can't go too much into the story right now, because we're still writing. But it still involves a very intense group of people stranded on a Predator planet discovering unspeakable horrors (that are not always from outside their group). So like the original movie, the title does have a double meaning. Aliens was a different take on the Alien idea, and an original movie in it's own right, and that's what we want to do with this.

So, let's see - Aliens made the original movie's title plural and upped the ante by taking characters to (potentially) the home planet of the first movie's monster, whereas Predators will make the original movie's title plural and up the ante by taking characters to (potentially) the home planet of the first movie's monsters. Hey, I've got a great idea for a sequel to The Thing - I'm calling it The Things. Anyone want to guess what the plot is?

Snark aside, Rodriguez explained what we should expect from the new movie:

When I was hired to write the original draft back in 1994, i was only brought on as a writer. I never thought I'd get to work on it in any other capacity. So a few months ago, when Alex Young at Fox contacted me about re-inventing the franchise using my original draft as a template for getting as far away as possible from the AVP movies, I jumped on it... Alex came down and saw Troublemaker Studios, and the facilities and crew that I've built up over the past 12 years, and he felt right away that this is where the movie should be made and that doing it down here would be the best way to protect it from the studio system. He was keen on making a very "non-studio" picture... As to how this movie will be viewed, one of the guys at Fox told me "No one is ever going to talk about AVP again after this film, I will stake my life on it." And he's a really nice guy, so I don't want to see him dead. Now that lives are at stake, it's no longer a job it's a mission. Failure is not an option.

A non-studio studio relaunch for the franchise to make people forget all about Aliens Vs. Predator? We can get behind that... as long as it's much less of an Aliens rip-off than it currently sounds.

Nimrod Antal is directing Predators - Q&A with Robert Rodriguez reveals more!!! [Ain't It Cool]

BleedingCool.com suggests that Lyn has already been approached for the project - confirmed as in development by the BBC and expected to be announced at this year's San Diego Comic-Con - and that the movie will be headed up by departing showrunner Russell T Davies and starring outgoing Doctor David Tennant, allowing the incoming team of Steven Moffatt and Matt Smith to concentrate on the television series. If true, then the movie will reunite Lyn with Tennant and Davies; as well as directing many episodes during their Who tenure, Lyn will helm Tennant's final episodes, including the scene regenerating the character into his new, younger, Matt Smith incarnation.

Adding fuel to the fire, Lyn, Tennant and Davies have all been confirmed to appear at Comic-Con later this month.

Will Euros Lyn Direct The Upcoming Doctor Who Movie? [Bleeding Cool]

Previewing today's release of the first issue from Marvel's much-hyped, star-spangled, series, the publisher yesterday released an eight-page, online-only prelude issue by Reborn writer Ed Brubaker and artist Luke Ross that offers more hints at just what is going on behind the scenes of the Captain America title, as well as tying events into Marvel's larger Dark Reign storyline. What role does the daughter of the Red Skull have in the resurrection of Steve Rogers? And have they thought what the acronym HAMMER actually stands for yet? Clues are dropped and teases are laid, and all for free. What more could you ask for?

Reborn Prelude [Marvel.com]

There's something iconic about the title "Batman and Robin" (as well as the idea of Batman as this well-adjusted, not-entirely-fucked-up character) - With getting a new #1 and new series to continue the story you've been telling since 2006, is this your attempt to open up the character to another audience who either have never been interested in the character, or who may have strayed away as Bruce Wayne became more and more grim?

I hadn't thought of it in those terms. The 'grim 'n' gritty', noir approach to Batman has been fairly successful over the last 25 years, so I don't know if I ever imagined it keeping readers away. It's an interesting thought. If the style of Batman and Robin opens the door for new or returning readers, I'd be very happy.

You've talked before about this title being a mix of the '60s Adam West TV show and David Lynch, with Chris Cunningham's peculiar brand of wrongness thrown in as well... This seems to continue to an extent both the pop-art imagery of early in your Batman run with Andy Kubert, and the weird psychological darkness of Batman RIP - Audiences are used to seeing a screwed-up Batman thanks to things like The Dark Knight, but the comedy/brightness that you bring to the character has kind of been shied away from since, perhaps, Bob Haney and Adam West. Is it important to you that the character has that balance?

Certainly. The Bruce Wayne voice I hear in my head when I'm writing is sardonic, upper-class, absolutely self-assured and hyper-intelligent. He's seen it all, he's been desensitized to a lot of stuff the rest of us might find shocking and I've always imagined him as a man with a very refined, jet-black sense of humour.

There have been other attempts to do a 'brighter' Batman, of course. Immediately after Frank Miller reinvented the wheel with The Dark Knight Returns and Batman: Year One, Mike W. Barr and Alan Davis launched a brilliant run of stories which owed more to Adam West than to Frank Miller. Bruce Timm and Paul Dini's Batman from the Animated Series was portrayed as a tough but psychologically-healthy individual and Miller and Lee's All Star Batman and Robin has plenty of room for comedy, so these aspects of the character have never truly gone away and form an intrinsic part of the appeal of Batman for many people. The Batman TV series was immensely popular after all and retains a certain undeniable charm even today.

I think any good, long-running thoroughly-developed fictional character will naturally come to have many faces and aspects. Batman's had 70 years to build up quite a complex and layered 'personality'.

Of course, one of my all-time favourite Batman panels was written by Haney and drawn by Jim Aparo and shows Batman strolling down the sunlit streets of Gotham, checking out the mini-skirted girls and accompanied by the line to end all lines: 'Yes, Batman digs this day!'

I'm not saying that's the Batman we want to see on every page, but I love that he might have this aspect to his character. I love the notion of a Batman who enjoys a peaceful stroll down the summer sidewalks of the city he keeps safe. There's something very human about that and it makes him much more relatable and rounded. I can certainly see the Dick Grayson Batman digging this day on a more regular basis!

To my mind, you've firmly put the sci-fi back into Batman, after years of his comics becoming more and more... mundane isn't the right word, but more of a hardcore crime book. Then you come along and suddenly there are crazy psychosomatic drug hallucinations of aliens and then Bruce Wayne gets zapped back in time by an evil god. Is this just trying to bring back all the pre-Silver Age ideas from the character's history that've been lost, or do you feel as if Batman works better as a concept when the weirdness of his rogues gallery gets amped up?

Putting Batman up against ordinary street criminals or organized gang bosses is fine but it's a bit one-sided in Batman's favour, given his training. I tend to assume that Batman goes out every single night as Gotham's Guardian and stops dozens of robberies, muggings, suicides or whatever all the time. Those 'ordinary', 'mundane' crimes are his bread and butter but they don't really challenge him and they don't necessarily make for compelling stories, so I prefer to focus on the wilder, weirder nights of his career and I like to see him facing devilishly brilliant, flamboyant psychos who can actually put him under pressure and take him to his limits. Watching a billionaire Batman disarm poorly-trained, poverty-stricken muggers effortlessly or beating up skinny junkies might be fun for a scene or two but does tend to raise thorny issues of class and privilege that the basic adventure hero concept is not necessarily equipped to deal with adequately.

As for the sci-fi elements, there's actually very little genuine sci-fi in the Batman title or in Batman and Robin. Batman RIP was certainly an attempt to recuperate those elements of Batman's long and contradictory history which no longer fit the profile of the Grim Avenger (although it's nice to see a lot of that material resurfacing in the Brave and The Bold cartoon, which features one of the most enjoyable takes on the character I've seen for a long time).

I don't have many comics in my tattered, bath-damaged 'collection' that date before 1972 when I became a 'fan' and a collector. My era of comics is the 'dark age' of the 70s and 80s, not the so-called 'silver age', so contrary to popular belief, I don't have any particular emotional attachment to 60s comics, other than John Broome's Flash stories which enchanted me as a small child.

I grew up with Neal Adams and Denny O'Neil, Len Wein, Engelhart, Starlin, Gerber, McGregor so my comic-writing style can be traced back to some combination of O'Neil' 'relevance' and Starlin 'cosmic'. Silver age, not so much.

Something that struck me about Batman RIP was the meta-deconstruction of the Batman mythos - When Jezebel Jet told Bruce Wayne that it wasn't healthy to be Batman, she may have been evil and trying to undermine his mission, but was she really completely wrong? With a new (and probably temporary) Batman who's going to not have those demons, are you trying to show how a healthier Bruce Wayne would do things?

I never really subscribed to the idea that Bruce was insane or unhealthy. As I've said before, Bruce Wayne's physical and psychological training regimes (including advanced meditation techniques) would tend to encourage a fairly balanced and healthy personality. Bruce Wayne would have gone mad if he HADN'T dressed as a bat and found a startling way to channel the grief, guilt and helplessness he felt after the death of his parents. Without Batman, Bruce would be truly screwed-up but with Batman he becomes mythic, more than human and genuinely useful to his community. I believe he began to slay his demons the moment he became a demon.

I also wanted to show a healthier Gotham City too. That whole Son-of-Sam, Rorschach-narration - 'This city is an open sewer where the rats feed on the broken dreams and filth of umm...other rats...where sneering, gnawing urban predators...blah blah...' - has become clichéd, tired and unconvincing. If Gotham was so bloody awful, no-one normal would live there and there'd be no-one to protect from criminals. If Gotham really was an open sewer of crime and corruption, every story set there would serve to demonstrate the complete and utter failure of Batman's mission, which isn't really the message we want to send, is it? You've got Batman and all his allies as well as Commissioner Gordon and the city still exudes a vile miasma of darkness and death? I can't buy that. It's simply not realistic and flies in the face of in-story logic (and you know I like my comics realistic!) so my artists and I have taken a different tack and we want to show the cool, vibrant side of Gotham, the energy and excitement that would draw people to live and visit there.

Gotham needs as many faces as Batman - it should be the loudest, sexiest, jazziest city on Earth. It has the best restaurants, the best theaters, the best art, the best criminals, the best crimefighters etc etc. People put up with the weird crime for the sheer buzz.

Why does Damian want to be Robin, if he can't show off to his dad?

Ultimately, Damian wants to be Batman. Being Robin is a step along the way.

Are you going to reference Dick Grayson's previous attempt to be Batman in the early '90s at any point in Batman and Robin?

Probably. I've tried to keep Dick Grayson's entire character history in mind, much as I did with Bruce Wayne in the earlier volumes of the story. Issue 2 has a reference to Grayson's time as a beat cop in the Bludhaven PD and the Bat-Bunker has a few trophies of his Nightwing adventures.

You've talked before about how the first year of the series works out, with artist Frank Quitely drawing the first and last three issues. What happens after the first year of the book? Are you planning on sticking around with Batman as a character, or will you be finished with Gotham for awhile once #13 rolls around?

That was the original plan but I can't seem to stop coming up with ideas for Batman, so we'll see how it goes.

Okay, last one. How would you sell Batman and Robin to people who haven't picked up a Batman comic in years?

Batman is dead. Robin is now Batman and Batman's evil son is now Robin. Everything is new again. If you ever liked Batman and don't want to see how that dynamic plays out, then may the Lord have mercy on your dry and shriveled worthless husk of a 'soul'! G'wan, g'wan, g'wan and buy Batman and Robin before the whole world starts laughing at you for missing out! Missing this is like missing your own birthday!

Batman and Robin #2 is in comic stores now.

Talking to MTV's Splash Page blog, Jackson said that Iron Man 2's Fury won't be the super spy that we've been hoping for:

Not this time, not yet... We still haven't moved Nick Fury into the bad-ass zone. He's still just kind of a talker.

With Jackson signed to a nine-picture deal with Marvel Studios, maybe it's not surprising that they're choosing to wait before unleashing the full action Jackson, but if we're not seeing a bad-ass Fury by the time that 2012's Avengers rolls around, then something has gone horribly wrong.

Sam Jackson Says Nick Fury Won't See Action In ‘Iron Man 2' [MTV Splash Page]

Talking to British TV Guide magazine Radio Times, Barrowman revealed hurt feelings about the decision to move networks from BBC Two to BBC One and limit the season to five episodes:

[P]ersonally, I felt like we were being punished. Other shows move from BBC Three and Two to One and they don't get cut. So why are we? It felt like every time we moved we had to prove ourselves.

Torchwood producer Russell T Davies explained the choice as less a punishment and more of a creative challenge:

Part of us thought, 'we could do another 13 episodes, we've learnt how to do that, and the second series was better than the first'. But why not change it?

Someone should introduce Davies and Barrowman; it sounds like they'd have a lot to talk about.

Torchwood cut 'like punishment' [BBC News]

The first project for DC's Vertigo imprint by Lemire, known for his indie series Tales From Essex County, The Nobody brings a quieter, less cynical sensibility to the line. This is the comic equivalent to a Bright Eyes record, with all the beauty and annoyance that that comparison suggests; there's a wonderful willingness to recognize stillness and melancholy at play in this book, but that's almost rendered toothless at times by what seems, at times, like a willful refusal to do the same to the darker side of human nature in anything beyond cartoony strokes that lack convinction... For all the danger hinted at throughout, moments that should come across as terrifying and alien instead seem weightless and dishonest.

(The plot of the book, although this isn't necessarily the most plot-driven book, is that Griffen, a man covered head to toe in bandages, arrives in the small town of Large Mouth and keeps himself to himself, much to the consternation of the townsfolk. When a series of crimes occur after his arrival, he becomes the main suspect, which leads to a confrontation with the failed experiments in his past as well as the local authorities.)

There's a lot to recommend in The Nobody; Lemire manages to perfectly conjure a feeling of bleak disconnection that perfectly matches his lead character's sensibility, transcending the intentionally-pulp nature of the plot (reinforced by the chapter breaks, which use pulp magazine and comic cover cliches to illustrate the story about to unfold). The ambiguous nature of the ending adds to this, allowing for both a straight-forward and an allegorical reading depending on the reader's taste, and bringing a greater weight to something that otherwise would be in danger of disappearing through its own introverted nature (Again, something that fits with the lead).

Lemire's art, scratchy and awkward in the best ways, may be the star of the book. It's simple enough to keep the reader's attention but detailed in all the right ways, especially the flashback/inkwash sequences and the evocative way he portrays the characters' environment (It's all about the negative space, especially the way Lemire shows the town of Large Mouth in the winter). There's something in particular about his characters - skew-wiff, imperfect and familiar - that keeps you engaged even when the writing threatens to lose itself in its own preciousness.

This is science fiction almost by accident; it's really a story about people after the science fiction, about what happens once the credits have rolled and everyone's left the theater. Whether it's a success in doing so, I'm still not sure. The Nobody is definitely an interesting book, and one worth reading, but days later, I'm still conflicted about whether or not it was actually a good one.

The Nobody is released July 8th in comic stores.

DC Comics launches two new series this week; Justice League: Cry For Justice is a six-part spin-off from the main Justice League of America series, written by soon-to-be-new-JLA-writer James Robinson. It focuses on Green Lantern, Green Arrow and their pals deciding to kick ass to work out their grief issues over the deaths of Batman and the Martian Manhunter in Final Crisis.

There's also the much-less-heralded — but much more exciting — Greek Street, which sees cult writer Peter Milligan begin a Kings-esque retelling of classic Greek myths recast in the London Underworld; it's smart, sexy and disturbing in all the right ways, and the art from Davide Gianfelice will make believers of everyone. Well worth picking up.

Marvel mixes things up by launching two much-talked about series: Marvel Divas - better known as "that comic with the terrible cover that upset a lot of people" - and Captain America: Reborn. Even though I'm convinced I know how Reborn is going to turn out, there's no chance I won't be picking this up for Ed Brubaker and Bryan Hitch alone... and, despite the unpromising interviews and pre-release controversy, preview pages for Divas suggest that it might not be the exploitative T'n'A-fest we were all expecting.

If you're looking for something completely out of left-field, I'd steer you away from horror-movie-on-paper Bad Kids Go To Hell (It does what it says in the title, folks). Instead, I'd push you towards the sealegs of Far Arden, Kevin Cannon's tale of a crusty old sea dog searching for a mythical island that may or may not exist. You won't be disappointed.

That said, release of the week is probably Star Wars: Invasion, a new series from Dark Horse taking place 25 years after Return Of The Jedi, and bringing the characters we know and love from the original movies face to face with new scum and villainy in the form of the Yuuzhan Vong. Classic Expanded Universe action the way you want it, as they used to say in the comics, only without using those exact words.

Galaxies far, far away and time-tossed superheroes can all be found in your local comic store, and if none of the above comics take your fancy, there's always the complete Diamond Distributors shipping list for the week to peruse to come up with something better. But is there anything better than Star Wars done right...?

The X-Men Universe Relationship Map - seen in miniature form below just to give you a glimpse of how insanely complicated it is - does all the heavy lifting and explains 40 years of crushes, affairs and reincarnated characters from alternate dimensions for you... As well as making you feel very curious about just how much of a slut Wolverine really is.

The full-size version is available here; get ready to feel sorry for Iron Man. [UncannyXMen.net]

Talking to Crave Online, Marvel Studios' Head of Marketing, Doug Finberg, seemed both on-message about Iron Man 2 ("The combination of what Kevin [Feige, Marvel Studios President] has and what everybody at Marvel Studios brings to the table is really a winning formula that we look forward to repeating so we're really hopeful that audiences continue to come and that's our goal") and eager to drop hints about the studios other upcoming movies, Captain America and Avengers:

Let's get through Thor before we actually get that far [as to discuss casting of Captain America]... It's ultimately about we want to get Thor right and then move on and actually just really give that the time that it needs to develop it, get it on screen, bring it to the audience. Then we're going to move on to Captain America so we're a little far out [to finalize the line up of] The Avengers, so we'll get there.

If we're a little far out for Avengers, why is Zak Penn scripting the movie already?

I think that's a tribute to just how rich the Marvel universe is, that it actually is that deep and the fabric is that intertwined that it takes that long to actually develop the process before we can actually get to the point of shooting a script.

Doesn't having a rich, deep backstory mean that writing the script would be easier...?

Doug Finberg on Marvel Studios projects [Crave Online]

Bloody Disgusting initially reported that Dimension Films had bought the remake rights to John Landis' 1981 horror comedy, but Ain't It Cool has heard a different take:

The source says that there might not be any interest in doing a remake because of a rights issue, something about Universal's ownership of DVD, TV and online rights. What this source hears is Dimension is talking about franchising it. My guess is it wouldn't be a direct sequel like An American Werewolf In Paris, but rather keeping the werewolves and horror/comedy tone, but moving it around the world.

We're unconvinced about either idea; AAWIL is one of those near-perfect movies that doesn't need a remake, and the idea of doing a series of movies with wacky American werewolves in new countries just sounds filled with carcrash potential. Besides, aren't the cool kids over werewolves already?