Tagged: James Bond

Mindy Newell: Moving Day

I had one hell of a weekend, and I don’t mean that in the swinging wild party, gorgeous male strippers in thongs stuffed with dollar bills, wake up and don’t remember what the hell happened. I mean hell in all its Dante’s Inferno Nine-Circles-Of, sturm und drang blitzkrieg, complete with crying jags and sheer, utterly emotional exhaustion.

We moved my parents to what is called in healthcare parlance a “continuous care retirement community.” They’re still living independently. It’s not quite assisted living. Yet.

Not that it’s a bad place. Actually, it’s quite lovely. Their new apartment is more spacious than the place they left; we didn’t have to get rid of any of their furniture, and by the time I left early yesterday afternoon, it looked like “home,” especially after brother Glenn, daughter Alix and her husband Jeff hung all the pictures and what-nots and set up the phone and the cable TV.

Actually, my brother was there with the cable guy when we arrived, so we didn’t miss any of the Olympics opening ceremony. Of course Queen Elizabeth II, with a little help from Daniel Craig, absolutely rocked the evening. Her outfit was stunning – luved the feathered “fascinator” she wore instead of one her standard hats, which I wouldn’t be surprised to find out her new granddaughter Kate picked out – and watching Her Majesty was lots better than watching Team USA wearing Ralph Lauren by way of a Chinese sweatshop.

Previously, my parents had Cablevision but now they have Comcast, so they’re having trouble figuring out how to use the remote, which is waaaaay more complicated and harder to read than the remote you get from Cablevision and Comcast’s channel guide is waaaay more “busy” (visually) than Cablevision’s, which really, really, sucks when you have macular degeneration like my dad does.

And the apartment overlooks a small lake with swans and a walking path and a gazebo. The staff is superb, caring and friendly, everything you could possibly want for your parents. And several of the residents were sort of a “welcome wagon” for Mr. and Mrs. Newell, accompanying them to their first meals in the main dining room.

But the first thing my mom said to me on Saturday morning, when she woke up in her new home was “I want to go home.”

I gave her a big hug, we talked, she went into the shower. I went outside and sat on one of the lovely rocking chairs on the lovely front porch and had three cigarettes in a row…between tears.

But I basically held it together – hung up their clothes in their new closets, folded the shirts and sweaters in the bedroom furniture, even did the laundry for them while they were went to dinner – until this morning, when I lost it completely. The above-mentioned sturm und drang blitzkrieg, complete with crying jag.

Absolutely the wrong thing to do in front of my parents, who are stressed enough. Pissed off Glenn and Alix, disturbed Jeff.

So I went out for a ride. Went to the nearest WaWa, got a whole bunch of bagels – plain, garlic, onion, and pumpernickel. Checked out some nearby dry cleaners, which is the one service the retirement community doesn’t offer. Stopped at Rite-Aid and picked up some personal sundries for Mom.

And smoked some more cigarettes. (I admit it, I smoked a lot of cigarettes this weekend.)

And popped a Xanax.

So here I am, sitting at the computer, writing this column. Meant to write about moving, what it would be like to be Superman moving all that shit, Terran and intergalactic, to the Fortress of Solitude from his apartment in Metropolis. Wondering what was in Diana’s suitcases when she left Themiscrya. And how many times the moving vans have pulled into and out of the driveway of Avengers’ Mansion, with the constantly changing membership of that organization.

And where the parents of super-heroes – and super-villains, for that matter – go when they’re unable to live on their own.

But I’m just too exhausted and emotionally spent tonight to think about make-believe.

Life got in the way for me this week.

TUESDAY: Emily S. Whitten and 15 Minutes

 

San Diego Fans can pose with a Classic James Bond Car

WHAT: In celebration of James Bond’s Golden Anniversary, MGM and Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment in partnership with EON Productions are bringing 007 to Comic-Con. Fans will be able to get behind the wheel of one of four famous vehicles featured in a past Bond film, with a new vehicle featured each day of the convention, and see props from the Bond archives representing 50 years of the iconic franchise.

Using RFID technology, attendees will be able to take a photo with the vehicle and have it instantly uploaded to their social media profile. Each day will feature a different Bond vehicle, so fans will have to check back in at booth #3528 with their RFID bracelets to see what’s new!

Fans will also be the first to get a sneak peek of the BOND 50 Blu-ray collection available September 25, 2012. Fans who pre-order the set on-site at Comic-Con will get an exclusive limited edition Bond 50th anniversary t-shirt.

BOND 50 features all 22 classic films on Blu-ray neatly packaged into one cool, sleek collectable box-set. The collection marks the debut of nine James Bond films previously unavailable in high definition Blu-ray and comes with a dossier of more than 122 hours of bonus features.

Mike Gold: Bourne, On The Fourth Of July

I’m not the world’s biggest Jason Bourne fan. Not by a long shot. I’ve seen and enjoyed the movies but I haven’t read any of the books. But two days ago, as I was sitting in the theater awaiting The Amazing Spider-Man (for the ComicMix Mixed Review), I saw a trailer for the latest chapter, The Bourne Legacy. It’s a continuation of the series… but without Jason. As I was watching the trailer, I was thinking in the terms of my trade.

 “Reboot! Reboot!”

We can argue if this is a genuine reboot or not, but let’s ride with the concept for a bit. My next thought was “why do the teevee and movie people do successful reboots of major properties, while in comics we butcher it every chance we get?” Which, by the way, is way too frequently.

Recent media reboots have included James Bond, Doctor Who, and Sherlock Holmes – the latter, twice. Other reboots have included Superman, Batman and the aforementioned Spider-Man. Only the former lacked enduring success. The Batboot was stellar, and we’ll have to wait and see about Spidey. So, of the five major characters, only one was a bust.

Allow me some jealous feelings here. To paraphrase Paul Simon (the singer, not the dead politician), after reboot upon reboot, the comics biz is more or less the same. Yes, there’s usually a solid sales bump and maybe it lasts long enough to make a difference, but that’s almost always short-lived. Is the Spider-Man marriage thing resolved? Is Jean Gray forever dead? What about Uncle Ben? Are you sure? Go ask Captain America and Bucky.

Over at DC, they’ve pressed the reboot button more often in the past 37 years than a lab monkey on an crystal meth test. How long should a reboot last before it’s deemed successful? I don’t know; we’ve never had one that lasted more than a couple years. Is the New 52 successful? Well, yes, in the sense that Dan DiDio still has his job. But they’ve only got sales figures in for the first year, and over a third of the titles have either been cancelled or have endured new creative teams. That doesn’t make it a failure, but if simply cancelling some titles and changing the crew on others is all it takes to make a character work for a contemporary audience, then we don’t need reboots.

In fact, this is the error message we get over each reboot. There’s no system upgrade here. We could have provided stability and growth by simply cancelling some titles and incubating those characters within their universes, and by changing creative teams on others – creators who will not restart history, but simply put it on an exciting path out of the woods. This may be the real “success” of the New 52. We’ll see in maybe five years or so.

The fact is, the media people haven’t pissed all over the trust of their audience. Despite public perception, most all of the pre-reboot movies and television shows featuring James Bond, Doctor Who, Superman, and Batman made money (I really can’t say about Sherlock Holmes; he seems to have made PBS a lot of money in the form of enhanced underwriting and public support). Maybe not enough to support the highest-ups’ eight figure salaries, maybe not as great a return on investment to make the stockholders happy, but in an industry where they put tens of millions of dollars on the line with each project – more than enough in each case to support a front-of-the-catalog comic book publisher – a five million dollar profit might not be a desired return on investment, but it’s still five million dollars.

Comics executives and, more important, their corporate masters need to give the four-color medium the same degree of patience and, quite frankly, they need to give their consumers the same amount of respect.

We need a comic book industry with an attention span.

THURSDAY: Dennis O’Neil

Bond 50 Brings 007 to Blu-ray in 23 disc Box Set

We cannot begin to tell you how excited we are that this collection will be out in time for the holiday shopping season. An amazing adrenaline-fueled time capsule, it will give James Bond fans a treat as all their favorite actors, stunts, gadgets, and Bond Girls are in high definition in a complete set. Given the excitement earlier this week when the Skyfall trailer hit, it’s clear the appetitie for 007 has yet to wane. Here are the official press release details:

All the Bonds. All the girls. All the action. All in high-definition. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios and Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment mark James Bond’s monumental golden anniversary with the release of BOND 50, the complete Bond experience showcasing all 22 classic films on Blu-ray together for the first time ever, neatly packaged into one cool, sleek collectable box-set. The collection will be available beginning September 24 in the United Kingdom and September 25 in North America with additional international markets to follow that week. BOND 50 marks the debut of nine James Bond films previously unavailable in high definition Blu-ray and comes with a dossier of more than 122 hours of bonus features.

Set for release just prior to the theatrical premiere of SKYFALL, BOND 50 will offer a look at the latest Bond film through videoblogs shot with the cast and crew. The BOND 50 collection also provides two all-new pieces that spotlight the history of 007. “The World of Bond” takes a look at the style and attitude that is signature to Bond; pulling together the cars, the women, the villains and the music that have been a staple of these films for the past 50 years. “Being Bond” profiles the six distinguished actors that have had the honor of portraying 007.

“We have a whole program of exciting activities planned for our 50th anniversary year, beginning with today’s announcement, by Fox, of the release of all 22 films on Blu-ray for the very first time,’’ added Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccoli, with Eon Productions.  “We are also delighted that Fox has unveiled a specially designed anniversary poster which we hope the fans will love as much as we do. Our website, 007.com will be regularly updated with all the latest anniversary news and events.” (more…)

A Death In Our Family

A Death In Our Family

I can’t begin to tell you how much I hate writing this.

Back in the late 1970s, I was editing a home video consumer magazine called Video Action. Amusingly, I staffed the publication with freelancers from the comic book community – people who excelled in the art of visual communications and popular culture. It wasn’t long before I received a letter from Martha Thomases and John Tebbel inquiring about writing opportunities. They presented their pedigrees and cited a whole bunch of mutual friends as references. They could have stopped at Denny O’Neil and Larry Hama.

John and Martha quickly became good friends. There isn’t enough bandwidth in all of Apple’s clouds for me to detail the nature of that friendship and divine the depth of the love I have for them, so instead I’ll focus on one element. There is nothing I value more than brilliant conversation with good friends. It takes wit, intelligence, experience and personality to pull it off on an ongoing basis, and I would swim upstream in piranha-infested waters to spend a few hours with these two.

A few months ago, the three of us met for a wonderful meal at a midtown Manhattan steakhouse. The three of us arrived separately, and John and I arrived early. We got into a deep conversation about how much the James Bond novels meant to us as kids but, upon later reflection, how Ian Fleming was a genuinely crappy writer and what the hell did JFK see in him anyway? By the time Martha arrived we had moved on to our favorite topic, the genius of Jack Benny and his stylistic influence over the next two generations of comedians (Benny begat Carson, Carson begat Maher). When we were seated, we moved on to an array of topics. This was typical for our dinners, but because we had that time before Martha arrived it was, for me at least, an important bonding event. We left vowing to get together again soon.

Several days later – it might have been longer; right now it seems like moments later – Martha called to tell me John was in the hospital after significant medical trauma at home. In short order, we learned he had lung cancer.

John appreciated the irony of having a particularly nasty form of lung cancer despite his lack of an addiction to tobacco. Martha showed more strength in spirit and in love than one could imagine, but none of us were surprised in the least.

You know this story doesn’t end well. John died yesterday. And that, folks, sucks.

Martha’s birthday is tomorrow. Their friends are gathering this weekend to be with her; we were planning on that anyway when we all knew John was in dire straits. It’s a lousy way to celebrate her birthday, but her essence is beautiful and she’s one of the most grounded people in Manhattan. By and large you do not cope with the death of our closest loved ones, but eventually you accept and understand you are surrounded by the love and support of your friends and family.

The ComicMix community lost a member of our family this week, and we grieve as we celebrate John’s wit, intelligence, experience and personality. Our hearts go out to Martha and to their son Arthur, and I know I speak for the extended ComicMix community, our bloggers, our commenters, our friends, co-workers and associates, in offering our love eternal.

– Mike Gold

MIKE GOLD: Truth, Justice, and the American Way

Well, I suppose it was inevitable.

After all, the American Nazis objected to Heimdall being played by a black man in last year’s Thor movie. To swing 180 degrees in the opposite direction, many Asian groups objected to the casting of a European in the role of a Eurasian in the play Miss Saigon. They felt that the part should have gone to an Asian and not to a Eur.

There are numerous examples of this, and some attracted justifiable outrage. I’m not too certain about the Miss Saigon thing: the character is Eurasian but Asians are woefully underrepresented on western stages. The Thor thing is just completely stupid: Heimdall is Asgardian and not Teutonic, and the American Nazis are assholes.

Several thousand white actors have been cast as American Indians in several hundred (at least) motion pictures, and that’s simply wrong. We should have grown out of that, yet for the past several years I’ve been involved in a comics project that stars an American Indian lead but has been “unsellable” to Hollywood because they “can’t find” an acceptable American Indian actor. Besides, there are none who could carry a movie.

So I’m not surprised to see the beginnings of … let’s say discomfort … at the casting of a British actor in the lead role of this summer’s Man of Steel. Truth, Justice, and the American Way, right? Superman lives in Metropolis, which is in or near Kansas, and you can’t get more American than that, right? Hollywood is pushing its internationalist agenda down our throats again, right?

Well, no. That’s not right. Superman is not American, he’s Kryptonian. Clark Kent is American, but he’s not the guy referred to in the title Man of Steel. Clark Kent is a disguise. Kal-El is Superman, and he wasn’t born here.

In fact, he’s an illegal immigrant.

I don’t get bent out of shape over characters not being portrayed by actors of the same nationality or race. It’s called “acting.” Look it up in the dictionary. Should only white people be cast as characters originally conceived as white people? Tell that to Jeffrey Wright. James Bond wasn’t born in Scotland, but Sean Connery was. Johnny Depp is playing Tonto, and that’s just too weird to be right or wrong.

And Kabuki? Hello – men playing all the female roles? Orson Welles cast himself in the lead role in Othello and then he cast black actors in all the other roles in Shakespeare’s ditty, and then they performed Othello in Harlem!

Acting!

The fault of extremist thinking on both sides is that people jump at the symptoms and ignore the issues. The real issue is the underrepresentation of minorities in our media, and that’s an issue that is slowly being addressed. Should we never make a Charlie Chan movie ever again because white actors had played the Hawaiian detective, most notably a performer from Sweden. But nobody complains about the current incarnation of Hawaii 5-O even though the two Hawaiian detectives in that show are played by actors of Korean descent.

Grow up and let actors act. And let’s level the casting stage. Right now.

THURSDAY: Dennis O’Neil

 

MARTHA THOMASES: Grimm – Once Upon a Time

As I wrote a few weeks ago, this is a great time to enjoy non-realistic fiction. Technology has evolved to the point that, even with no budget, people can tell the most fantastic, unimaginable stories without spending millions of dollars.

As an example, there are two different broadcast network television shows this year based on classic fairy tales. They’re very different, appealing, I suspect, to different audiences. Let’s discuss.

NBC’s Grimm is, in my opinion, the better show. It’s premise is that there is a race of people, Grimms, who hunt down supernaturally evil creatures from folklore, like trolls and ogres and giants. The last Grimm is a young married police detective, Nick Burkhardt, played by David Giuntoli (who looks a lot like Brandon Routh). He is helped in his investigations by a charming werewolf, Silas .

As you might expect from that premise, this series owes a lot of its structure to Buffy, the Vampire Slayer. So you won’t be surprised that the producers worked on Buffy show and the spin-off, Angel, as well as movies. The other two producers have experience in comedy.

The show is paced very much a police procedural, with a crime committed at the beginning of the show that must be solved by the end. The only difference is that the criminals are almost all supernatural, and Burkhardt is the only one who knows. There’s also a continuing story about some kind of conspiracy against the Grimms, one that the chief of police seems to be in on. The relationships among the characters seem real, the town seems like a place where people actually live, and the hero is happily married (at least so far), which is refreshing. Too many shows rely on the sexual attraction between two characters and a “will they or won’t they” dynamic to provide suspense.

By contrast, Once Upon a Time is much more of a soap opera, which is appropriate, given that it’s the lead-in for Desperate Housewives. The premise here is that the fairy tale characters have unknowingly left their dimension because of a spell by the Evil Queen, and now live Storybrooke, with no memory of their true identities.

As with Grimm, every week there is a mystery to solve. The sheriff, Emma Stone, is a former bail bondsman who was brought to Storybrooke by her long-lost son, Henry, who was adopted by Regina, the Mayor. As you might expect from that name, Regina is the evil queen.

Appropriate to a series with a queen, Once Upon a Time is campy fun. There are lots of knowing winks to Disney films, and the comic book rack at the drugstore has only Marvel titles. The child psychologist who works with Henry is, in the fairy tale universe, Jiminiy Cricket. Hilariously, his name on our world is Archie.

Best of all, the mysterious Mr. Gold is played by Robert Carlyle, an actor who can do anything. In Trainspotting, he was a scary psychopath. In The Full Monty, he was adorable. He was a Bond villain. He was Hitler. This show doesn’t give him enough to do.

The Evil Queen is always evil. The good guys are always good. The characters are not as complex as those on Grimm. However, half the time, they get to dress up like royalty.

As I said, I think Grimm works better overall. If you can only watch one, choose that. I can’t imagine why you would have to so limit yourself. Maybe that will be next season’s fantasy series.

SATURDAY: Marc Alan Fishman

 

 

Complete James Bond Collection Comes to Blu-ray for 50th Anniversary

In celebration of James Bond’s monumental golden anniversary, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios and Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment today unveiled BOND 50,  a collectible box-set  featuring all 22 James Bond films on Blu-ray Disc for the first time in one complete offering. The longest running film franchise of all time, the Bond 50 collection marks the debut of nine James Bond films previously unavailable in high definition Blu-ray.  Fans around the world can pre-order now with participating online retailers.

Acclaimed Bond directors John Glen (five Bond films including For Your Eyes Only, Octopussy, A View to a Kill, The Living Daylights & Licence To Kill), Martin Campbell (GoldenEye, Casino Royale) and Michael Apted (The World Is Not Enough) with special guests Olga Kurylenko (Quantum of Solace) and Caterina Murino (Casino Royale) made the Blu-ray announcement today during a Directors’ Panel discussion in the Panasonic Booth at the annual Consumer Electronics Show.

BOND 50 showcases fifty years of Bond neatly packaged into one cool, sleek collectable box-set featuring all six iconic James Bond actors.  Produced using the highest possible picture quality and audio presentation, the collection includes all 22 James Bond feature films from Dr. No to Quantum of Solace and more than 130 hours of bonus features including some new and exclusive content.

“With all 22 feature films available on Blu-ray in one collection for the first time this is a great way for fans to catch up on 007’s epic journey before Skyfall hits theaters next Fall,” said Michael Brown, Senior Vice President, MGM Home Entertainment.  “Now viewers can enjoy the intense action of the innovative franchise in the most immersive home experience possible.”

“We have a whole program of exciting activities planned for our 50th anniversary year, beginning with today’s announcement, by Fox, of the release of all 22 films on Blu-ray for the very first time,’’ added Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccoli, with Eon Productions.  “We are also delighted that Fox has unveiled a specially designed anniversary poster which we hope the fans will love as much as we do. Our website, 007.com will be regularly updated with all the latest anniversary news and events.”

JOHN OSTRANDER: Prognostications 2012

Crap. Crappity crappitry crap.

It’s New Year’s Day. If it was New Year’s Eve I could look backwards and wax philosophic about 2011. But here we are smack dab in the middle of New Year’s Day, Day 1 for the year 2012, so I really should be looking ahead and prognosticating about what the year will bring especially for comics and related media.

I’m a crappy prognosticator.

Years ago, I read a squib in a newspaper about how a Japanese cell phone company had worked out how to add a camera to their phone and I thought, “What a stupid idea. They’ll have these crappy little photos and how good could the lens be and so on. Who would want that?”

Well, everyone, as it turned out.

Before that, I read another little squib about how the Dean of St. Paul’s cathedral in London was going to do a controlled jump with a parachute from the top of the church to bring attention to a rock opera that was premiering called “Jesus Christ Superstar.” And I thought, ‘What a stupid idea. A rock opera? About Jesus? Who would want to go see that?”

Well, gobs and gobs of people, as it turned out.

So I’m not the world’s foremost prognosticator. The Great Criswell I ain’t.

This year, however, it may not matter. The Mayan calendar ends with 2012 and some people predict that means the world is going to end in 2012. Heck, they’ve already done a big, loud, lousy movie about it. How you can take such a potentially fantastic event and make a lousy movie about it is beyond my – wait. The director was Roland Emmerich, wasn’t it? He’s also the one who directed Anonymous which says Shakespeare didn’t write Shakespeare’s play (piffle, I say!). And the producer/director of the heinous Godzilla remake. Never mind.

Okay, I grant you that maybe this isn’t real strong evidence. I mean, just because the calendar I have on my wall ended last night didn’t mean the world ended. Not if you’re reading this. I bought another calendar. And if the Mayans were all that sharp as prognosticators, why didn’t they chop up every single Spaniard they met into tiny little pieces?

In 2012, we have The Avengers movie coming out, the new Spider-Man movie, The Dark Knight Rises, and even the first of The Hobbit movies. The first of The Hunger Games movies, the next James Bond movie (Skyfall) will also make their appearances. Heck, based on the latest trailer, I’m hyped to see John Carter. This doesn’t even include the stuff that I don’t know I’ll want to see yet. I didn’t know about Hugo until relatively late this year and that may be my favorite film of 2011.

Seriously, would any sort of just and loving god end the world before Mary and I get to see The Hobbit?

Wait, That’s right. I’m agnostic. Said so last week. Doesn’t matter; I’m not going to believe in the Mayans either. We’re going to have 2012 and it’s going to be fun. Despite the Mayans, despite the elections, there are good times waiting out there.

As Stan (the Man) Lee himself was known to say: “Face front, True Believers! Because that’s there the future’s coming from!”

Words of wisdom for us all. Happy New Year, folks.

MONDAY: Mindy Newell

 

Review: “Cold War: The Michael Swann Dossier: The Damocles Contract” #1

There were three phases the entertainment industry went through during the Cold War. The first was “The Russians are Coming!” when movies and comics and what have you spat out tales of woe like I Married a Communist, in which we were warned that the enemy wore no convenient uniform or had any distinct facial features that could tip us off that he was the most horrible man in existence. Then you had the “Man, what would it be like if the Russians were coming?” phase where we had movies like Red Dawn and books like Red Storm Rising, trying to give us an idea of what a real shooting war with the Soviets would be like.

Now we’re in the “Man, remember when the Russians were coming?” phase, where we all get nostalgic for M.A.D and make video games about what it would be like to weather a Russian invasion, like in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare and the like, but in modern times. We’re suckers for traditional western wars, which probably has its roots in fetishizing World War II while forgetting that most combat veterans don’t like to remember what they did back then.

Beth nabbed issue 1 of this comic called Cold War: The Michael Swann Dossier by John Byrne since I professed my undying love for East vs. West in my Supergod review, and she thought this would be right up my alley. I like it a lot.Well, it’s kind of generic, but we’ll talk about that and whether or not it matters.

(more…)

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