Category: News

Introducing… The New Guy!

Introducing… The New Guy!

  • News
  • October 20, 2015

Today we’d like to welcome Joe Carallo, our newest weekly columnist here at ComicMix. Like all of our columnists, Joe will be speaking his mind as he sees fit, limited only by the bounds of sanity. And, like all of our columnists, Joe will be speaking from his own perspective and experiences, shedding much-needed light on issues critical to our medium. His bio lurks at the bottom of his column, along with a really cute photo. And, yes, his involvement in the [insertgeekhere] website involves their EIC Molly Jackson; the fact that Molly’s our now-second newest columnist is a pure coincidence. Well, maybe not.

Of course, this is not to say Joe won’t be goofing around from time to time. That, along with our bizarre lunch meetings, is a ComicMix tradition. I’ve known him for several years now, having been introduced to Joe by also-columnist Martha Thomases at one of her famous Chanukah donut parties. Martha maintains the salon movement on this annual basis, and I’ve met many an interesting person at these occasions. Why it didn’t dawn on me to ask Joe about writing for us as a columnist just goes to show how non-smart I’m can be.

Please feel free to comment. We’re going to have a good time here… starting… now!

The Point Radio: CASUAL Is Comedy Served Up Dark

CASUAL is the new dark comedy produced by Jason Reitman exclusively for Hulu. We talk to series stars Tommy Dewey and Michaela Watkins about how thy walk the fine line between comedy and drama. Then meet Lizzie Velasquez, branded “the world’s ugliest woman” by an online bully who turned that into an inspiring new documentary called A BRAVE HEART.

Follow us here on Instagram or on Twitter here.

The X-Files – The Collector’s Set Arrives for Christmas Giving

X-FIles Box SetLOS ANGELES, Calif. (October 8, 2015) – The truth is out there…and now it can be found in its entirety when Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment exposes the complete world of The X-Files on Blu-ray for the first time – just ahead of the event series premiere Sunday, January 24, 2016. The X-Files: The Collector’s Set – featuring a slot for the upcoming six-episode event series – releases on December 8, giving fans the chance to own a piece of television history and one of the year’s must-have giftset collections. Fans can also purchase each season individually on Blu-ray on December 8.

Since its inception in 1993, The X-Files has remained a worldwide phenomenon, garnering a loyal cult following, 16 Emmys® and five Golden Globes® Awards, including “Best Dramatic TV Series” during its nine-season run.

Now for the first time, all nine exhilarating, groundbreaking seasons of The X-Files, along with special features, can be yours to own on Blu-ray! Although they began as reluctant partners, FBI special agents Fox Mulder and Dana Scully (Golden Globe®*** winners David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson) ultimately form a powerful bond as they struggle to unravel deadly conspiracies and solve paranormal mysteries.

The X-Files: The Collector’s Set features more than 23 hours of content across all nine seasons – perfect for catching up on the series before the new event series airs. Relive all the mythology, conspiracy theories with special features, including behind-the-scenes featurettes, and commentaries by executive producer Chris Carter (“Millennium,” “Harsh Realm”), R.W. Goodwin, Rob Bowman, Kim Manners, Frank Spotnitz, Robert Patrick and Rod Hardy.

“THE X-FILES” – THE COLLECTOR’S SET SPECIAL FEATURES

  • Season One
    • Series Intro by Frank Spotnitz
    • Chris Carter Talks About Season 1
    • Deleted Scenes
    • International Clips
    • Deep Throat: Audio Commentary by Chris Carter
    • Erlenmeyer Flask: Audio Commentary by R.W. Goodwin
    • Special Effects Clip From Fallen Angel
    • Documentary: “The Truth About Season 1”
  • Season Two
    • Deleted Scenes
    • Chris Carter Talks About Season 2
    • Humbug
    • Documentary: “The Truth About Season Two”
    • Duane Barry: Audio Commentary by Chris Carter
    • End Games: Audio Commentary by Frank Spotnitz
    • Anasazi: Audio Commentary by R.W. Goodwin
  • Season Three
    • Deleted Scenes (w/optional commentary by Chris Carter)
    • Chris Carter Talks About Season 3
    • International Clips
    • Special Effects with Commentary by Mat Beck
    • Documentary: “The Truth About Season Three”
    • Threads of Mythology: Abduction
    • Talitha Cuma: Audio Commentary by R.W. Goodwin
  • Season Four
    • Deleted Scenes
    • Extended Scenes
    • Special Effects with Commentary by Paul Rabwin
    • Deleted Scenes (w/optional commentary by Chris Carter)
    • Tunguska – Interview With Chris Carter
    • Paper Hearts – Interview with Vince Gilligan
    • Memento Mori: Audio Commentary by Rob Bowman
    • Introduction to Memento Mori by Chris Carter and Frank Spotnitz
    • Max: Audio Commentary by Kim Manners
    • Documentary: “The Truth About Season Four”
  • Season Five
    • International Clips
    • Deleted Scenes (w/optional commentary by Chris Carter)
    • Special Effects with Commentary by Paul Rabwin
    • Documentary: “The Truth About Season Five”
    • Threads of Mythology: Black Oil
    • FX Featurette
    • Introduction to The Post-Modern Prometheus by Chris Carter and Frank Spotnitz
    • Patient X: Audio Commentary by Kim Manners
    • The Red and the Black: Audio Commentary by Chris Carter
    • The Post Modern Prometheus: Audio Commentary by Chris Carter
    • The Pine Bluff Variant: Audio Commentary by John Shiban
  • Season Six
    • Special Effects with Commentary by Paul Rabwin
    • Deleted Scenes (w/optional commentary by Frank Spotnitz)
    • International Clips
    • Two Fathers: Audio Commentary by Kim Manners
    • One Son: Audio Commentary by Frank Spotnitz
    • Triangle: Audio Commentary by Chris Carter
    • Introduction to Milagro by Chris Carter and Frank Spotnitz
    • X-Files Profiles: Cigarette-Smoking Man
    • Featurette on Season Six
    • Documentary: “The Truth About Season Six”
  • Season Seven
    • Deleted scenes (w/optional commentary by Chris Carter)
    • Special effects sequences with commentary by Paul Rabwin
    • International Clips
    • Documentary: “The Truth About Season Seven” Behind-the-Scenes featurette
    • X-Files Profiles: A.D. Skinner and Samantha Mulder
    • Closure: Audio Commentary by Kim Manners
    • Documentary: “The Truth About Season Seven”
  • Season Eight
    • Special Effects by Mat Beck with Commentary by Paul Rabwin
    • International Clips
    • Deleted scenes (w/optional commentary by Frank Spotnitz and John Shiban)
    • Documentary: “The Truth About Season Eight”
    • Deleted Scenes with Optional Commentary by Chris Carter
    • Threads of Mythology: Colonization
    • X-Files Profiles
    • Within: Commentary by Kim Manners and Robert Patrick
    • Deadalive: Commentary by Frank Spotnitz
    • Vienen: Commentary by Rod Hardy
  • Season Nine
    • Deleted scenes (w/optional commentary by Frank Spotnitz)
    • Special Effects by Mat Beck with Commentary by Paul Rabwin
    • International Clips
    • Audio Commentary by Chris Carter, Vince Gilligan, John Shiban, Frank Spotnitz, Kim Manners
    • Documentary: “The Truth About Season Nine”
    • “The Making of ‘The Truth’”
    • “Secrets of The X-Files”
    •  “Tribute to The X-Files”
    • Threads of Mythology: Super Soldiers
    • X-Files Profiles
    • Reflections on the Truth Featurette
    • Wonder Con Panel

The Point Radio: Melissa Fumero Still Smokin’ On BROOKLYN 99

It’s a new season of the Fox hit series BROOKLYN 99, and our favorite detective, Melissa Fumero, is along to talk about how her character is only slightly less neurotic (but still adorable) despite a few changes in the show this year. Then actress Illena Douglas shares the news on her month long hosting gig on Turner Classic Movies’ TRAILBLAZING WOMEN

We are off to New York Comic Con. Follow our exclusive coverage here on Instagram or on Twitter here.

REVIEW: iZombie: The Complete First Season

1000575783DVDLEF_432b167Chris Roberson and Michael Allred created a charming little series for Vertigo called iZombie and it got snatched up by the CW for a television. Unfortunately, the 28-issue comic was long gone by the time the show arrived this past winter. For 13 episodes, we were treated to a slightly off-kilter series that proved to be very enchanting in its own right and viewers embraced it well enough for a full season renewal. While the second season debuts tonight, Warner Home Video has released iZombie: The Complete First Season on DVD. Interestingly, unlike other releases from DC Entertainment, this one does not have a Blu-ray companion.

What makes the series fun is the approach taken by series developers Rob Thomas and Diane Ruggiero-Wright, a pair who know a thing or two about offbeat projects. After all, they gave us the wonderful Veronica Mars. Now they have taken another female-centric show and made it a fascinating world to visit weekly.

The comic, which justly earned an Eisner nomination, was about a woman named Gwen who just happened to be a unique zombie, required to eat a deceased person’s brains once a month to stay alive or revert to traditional zombie mode. The series was populated with all sorts of supernatural figures and themes.

Thomas and Ruggiero-Wright took the broadest strokes and revamped it for their purposes. Here, the show features a woman named, ahem, Liv Moore (Rose McIver) who was a med student until she was bitten during your typical zombie apocalypse. To access a regular supply of grey matter, she now works in the King County morgue, receiving visions from her meals. Being a television series, she meets up with a detective and they become odd couple partners.

Roberson and Allred brought one type of quirky humor to their project while the TV producers brought as fresh but altogether entirely different vibe to the series. They also layered in some meta arc material to keep things interesting. After all, something started the zombie uprising plus it all has something do with a drug called Utopium.

Characters are slowly introduced so we first get to know Liv and her concerns before worrying about everyone else’s issues. The performances are fun and the characters engaging making us eager to see what happens this year. McIver stretches every episode as she takes on the persona and quirks of her latest meal, shifting how she interacts with her colleagues. And in the background is David Anders as Blaine DeBeers, the series’ antagonist. It’s nice to see his creepily charming self on a regular show again.

The episodes are spread across three discs, looking and sounding just fine. There are a smattering of DVD extras along with the ubiquitous “DC Comics Night at Comic-Con 2014” (29:31).

Fox Celebrates its Centennial with 100 Digital Releases

Fox Celebrates its Centennial with 100 Digital Releases

20th Century Fox logoLOS ANGELES, Calif. (October 2, 2015) – In 1915 William Fox founded Fox Film Corporation and forever changed the course of cinema. Over the next century the studio would develop some of the most innovative and ground-breaking advancements in the history of cinema;  the introduction of Movietone, the implementation of color in partnership with Eastman Kodak, the development of the wide format in 70mm and many more.  Now in honor of the 100th anniversary of the studio, Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment will celebrate by releasing some of their most iconic films that represent a decade of innovation.

Starting today, five classic films from the studio will be made available digitally for the first time ever – Sunrise (1927), Drums Along the Mohawk (1939), Man Hunt (1941), How to Marry a Millionaire (1953) and The Flight of the Phoenix (1965).  Throughout the rest of the year a total of 100 digital releases will follow from Fox’s extensive catalog, including 10 films which have never been released on any format – the Raoul Walsh classics The Red Dance (1928), The Cock-Eyed World (1929), The Bowery (1933), Hello Sister (1933) and Sailor’s Luck (1933); John Ford’s Men Without Women (1935), Will Rogers in State Fair (1933), Shirley Temple in Mr. Belvedere Goes to Washington (1949), the Marilyn Monroe documentary Marilyn (1963) and Metropolitan (1935), the first film from 20th Century Fox.

Other highlights include Oscar winning and nominated favorites from such legendary filmmakers as F.W Murnau, Frank Borzage and Akira Kurosawa, and such incredible performers as Marlon Brando, Tyrone Power, Jimmy Stewart, Betty Grable, Clark Gable, Frank Sinatra, Joan Fontaine, Sophia Loren and many more.

Complete list of Fox 100 Digital Releases

The Affairs of Cellini (1934)
Alien Nation (1988)
Anna and the King of Siam (1946)
Baby, Take a Bow (1934)
Bad Girl (1931)
The Best of Everything (1959)
The Big Trail (1930)
The Black Watch (1929)
Black Widow (1954)
Blood and Sand (1941)
Blood and Wine (1996)
The Blue Bird (1940)
Born Reckless (1930)
The Bowery (1933)
Boy on a Dolphin (1957)
Call Northside 777 (1948)
The Call of the Wild (1935)
Can-Can (1960)
Captain from Castile (1947)
Cheaper by the Dozen (1950)
The Cock-Eyed World (1929)
Come to the Stable (1949)
A Connecticut Yankee (1931)
Crash Dive (1943)
Daddy Long Legs (1955)
Dangerous Years (1948)
The Detective (1968)
Doctor Bull (1933)
Down Argentine Way (1940)
Drums Along the Mohawk (1939)
The Flight of the Phoenix (1965)
Four Sons (1928)
Gay Deception (1935)
Greenwich Village (1944)
Guadalcanal Diary (1943)
Hangman’s House (1928)
A Hatful of Rain (1957)
Hello, Frisco, Hello (1943)
Hello, Sister (1933)
The House on 92nd Street (1945)
How to Marry a Millionaire (1953)
In Old Arizona (1929)
It Happens Every Spring (1949)
Jane Eyre (1944)
Judge Priest (1934)
Just Pals (1920)
Kagemusha (1980)
Kentucky (1938)
The Keys to the Kingdom (1944)
King of Burlesque (1935)
Lillian Russell (1940)
The Luck of the Irish (1948)
Man Hunt (1941)
Marilyn (1963)
Marines Let’s Go (1961)
The Mark of Zorro (1940)
Me and My Gal (1932)
Men Without Women (1930)
Metropolitan (1935)
Mister 880 (1950)
Mr. Belvedere Goes to College (1949)
My Darling Clementine (1946)
Pigskin Parade (1936)
Poor Little Rich Girl (1936)
The President’s Lady (1953)
Prince of Foxes (1949)
Prisoner of Shark Island (1936)
A Private’s Affair (1959)
The Rains Came (1939)
The Red Dance (1928)
Romancing the Stone (1984)
Rookie of the Year (1993)
Sailor’s Luck (1933)
Scudda Hoo Scudda Hay (1948)
The Seas Beneath (1931)
The Shocking Miss Pilgrim (1947)
Sing, Baby, Sing (1936)
Sleeping With the Enemy (1991)
The Snake Pit (1948)
Soup to Nuts (1930)
Stand Up and Cheer! (1934)
The Star Chamber (1983)
State Fair (1933)
Street Angel (1928)
The Sun Also Rises (1957)
Sun Valley Serenade (1941)
Sunrise (1927)
The Tall Men (1955)
Tall, Dark and Handsome (1941)
Teenage Rebel (1956)
This Above All (1942)
Three Bad Men (1926)
To The Shores of Tripoli (1942)
Tobacco Road (1941)
Under Pressure (1935)
Up the River (1930)
Wizards (1977)
World Moves On (1934)
The Young Lions (1958)
Young Mr. Lincoln (1939)

 

New Doctor Who spin-off, “CLASS”, announced for BBC Three

  • News
  • October 2, 2015

This scene will likely not happen in the new show.

Doctor Who is going back to school. BBC announced today a new spin-off for the popular series, aimed at young adults, and written by noted YA author Patrick Ness. Titled Class, the show will take place at Coal Hill School, historic location of the series, and feature the students facing threats from across space and time.

Set in contemporary London. Incredible dangers are breaking through the walls of time and space, and with darkness coming, London is unprotected. With all the action, heart and adrenalin of the best YA fiction (Buffy, Hunger Games), this is Coal Hill School and Doctor Who like you’ve never seen it before.

Steven Moffat, who will executive-produce the show, says: “No one has documented the dark and exhilarating world of the teenager like Patrick Ness, and now we’re bringing his brilliant storytelling into Doctor Who. This is growing up in modern Britain – but with monsters!”

Coal-hill-school-650x364Coal Hill School was the site of the first Doctor Who adventure, An Unearthly Child – The Doctor’s granddaughter Susan was attending the school, and endlessly impressed and confused her teachers with both her knowledge and naivete.  Those teachers, Ian Chesterton and Barbara Wright, blundered into the Doctor’s mysterious TARDIS and became his first companions on the show.  In the modern series, Clara Oswald is a teacher there, and the selfsame Ian Chesterton is now chairman of the school’s Governors.  We’ve already met several precocious students at the school who we can only hope and pray will make an appearance in the series, including future president of the Earth Courtney Woods (Kill the Moon), and little Maebh and fellow members of the school’s Gifted program (In the Forest of the Night).

We’ve seen a few spin-offs of the main Doctor Who series.  Elizabeth Sladen starred in the first, the one-shot pilot K-9 and Company, but it wasn’t till decades later that she got that series order, with The Sarah Jane Adventures.  Torchwood, aimed at an older audience, got its name from an anagram hastily contrived to hide the name of the actual show being filmed before the new series first aired, and went on to be a hit in its own right, both in the UK and the US.  For a brief period of time, Who-fen never had to wait for more than a handful of weeks before a Who-related series aired.

Who_is_Patrick_Ness__Meet_the_man_behind_the_new_Doctor_Who_spin_off_ClassPatrick Ness, described by John Green as ‘an insanely beautiful writer’, is author of nine books, including six bestselling and critically acclaimed YA novels. He has written the screenplay for his own novel, A Monster Calls, which has been filmed for release in 2016 and stars Liam Neeson, Sigourney Weaver and Felicity Jones.

The new series will film next year, to debut on BBC Three, the digital/online channel later in 2016.  No details have been revealed if the episodes will overlap with the next series of Doctor Who, or which, if any characters from the main show will appear.

REVIEW: Twice Upon a Time

People of a certain age (i.e. “Old”) will remember when in the early days of HBO, a weird ,wild animated film called Twice Upon a Time made the rounds.  Many paid it heed because it was executive produced by George Lucas, currently in the process of imprinting our childhoods with a new mythology.  But except for a laserdisc and VHS release, the film rather fell off the table, save for dedicated maniacs who remembered it fondly.

Warner Archives, print-on-demand masters of unearthing lost bits of cinema and making them available to the masses, have achieved the impossible and presented the world with a brand new release of the film, unearthing both audio tracks, and getting many of the animators together for a commentary track, including Henry Selick, who has gone on to great things like Neil Gaiman’s Coraline and Tim Burton’s Nightmare Before Christmas, and in that order.

0002

Botch (Marshall Efron) presents a perfectly reasonable plan; Mum entreats his cohorts this is not the case

The film tells the tale of two magical lands; Frivoli and The Murkworks, who create the happy dreams and horrid nightmares, respectively, for The Rushers of Din, a land that looks suspiciously like San Francisco.  The head of The Murkworks, Synonymess Botch (voiced by former Sunday School teacher Marshall Efron) hatches a plan to plunge Din into eternal nightmares, and cons our heroes Ralph the All-Purpose Animal (Lorenzo Music) and his cohort Mum (who…remains so) into stealing the main spring from The Cosmic Clock, which will freeze time and allow Botch to set his plan into motion.  They attempt to undo their blunder with the help of their (and everyone’s) Fairy Godmother (Judith Kahan Kampmann) and Rod Rescueman (James Cranna) a superhero in training.

The animation style of the film is a unique delight, a process called Lumage, that uses colored paper and fabric cutouts to create the characters, a process that inspired the creators of South Park decades later.  Animator John Korty used the process for a number of shorts for Sesame Street, most notably “The Adventures of Thelma Thumb” (starring Kahan and Cranna), which amazingly is not available on the web anywhere or I’d have linked to it just there.

0001The tale of the two audio tracks is somewhat of a confusing tale.  There’s a more raunchy version of the dialogue that features a number of curse words – it’s been long assumed that was the original version of the film, but that’s not the case.  As Korty explains in the commentary, they were contractually obligated to deliver a family-friendly film, and so they did.  But when sneak previews proved unsuccessful, Korty’s producer Bill Couturié (Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt) took it on himself to re-record many of the lines with more salty language, to attempt to make the film more accessible to an older audience.  It had the opposite reaction – the film’s limited release resulted in numerous walkouts and demands for refunds, and the wide release was cancelled.  The second version is the one that was (accidentally, it’s believed) to HBO, and when it was replaced with the “clean” version for later showings and the video release, the belief arose that the film had been censored – indeed, it had been returned to its original form. Interestingly, even Warner Archives mixes this up – They describe the dirty version as the “Director’s Original Version”, when in fact it’s the PG version that was Korty wanted and delivered.

The print is in widescreen for the first time on video, and bright and pristine, the sound (both versions) is clear and clean.  The songs by Bruce Hornsby and Maureen McDonald are pleasant, and don’t litter the cinematic landscape like so many kids’ movies. It’s truly a forgotten classic, one that deserves a new generation of eyes on it.

The Point Radio: How HEROES Was Reborn

Are you caught up in HEROES REBORN Yet?  Jack Coleman and Greg Grunberg talk about the transition from the old show to the revival, plus meet two of the new cast members. And Jerry Springer is celebrating the 25th Anniversary on TV. How has he survived so long? You might surprised at how he answers that question,

Be sure and follow us on Twitter now here.

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