Tagged: Stephen King

“The Stand” Trailer Premieres on Marvel.com

“The Stand” Trailer Premieres on Marvel.com

Marvel.com recently posted a new video "trailer" for their upcoming five-issue series based on Stephen King’s The Stand. While I’m not sure how I feel about the whole movie-style "trailer" as a promotional tool for comics, the video does show some previously unseen art from the series. I was really impressed with the way the two previous King stories were handled by the Marvel crew (Dark Tower: The Gunslinger Born and Dark Tower: The Long Road Home), so I have high hopes for this project.

The Stand: Captain Trips #1, written by Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa with art by Mike Perkins, goes on sale September 10.

You can also read an interview with Aguirre-Sacasa about the project on Marvel, as well as a video interview with Perkins. Both are fairly standard promotional material, but worth the time for anyone interested in the publisher’s latest collaboration with Stephen King.

SDCC: Stephen King and Marvel Make Video Comics

SDCC: Stephen King and Marvel Make Video Comics

Hot on the heels of announcements of the pseudo-animated versions of DC’s Watchmen and Image’s Invincible, the Wall Street Journal breaks early word that Marvel will join that game with an adaptation of an unpublished Stephen King short story.

Marvel’s announcement probably will come today. The story, N, will be available in 25 installments starting next week, available for download on iTunes, Amazon and elsewhere.

It’s sort of a tie-in promotion for King’s new book of stories, including N, from publisher Scribner. And no one’s sure what to expect:

For Scribner, the venture is a shot in the dark. There’s no way of forecasting how well the videos will translate into book sales. While Scribner’s corporate sibling, CBS Mobile, cites Nielsen data showing that roughly 14 million cellphone users in the U.S. pay for video services, it doesn’t know how many of those people are regular book buyers. However, the links from the videos to the NisHere.com pre-ordering Web site will allow Scribner to get a sense of how many sales result from video viewings.

Mr. King is optimistic about the video’s prospects. "I think they’re readers," he says of likely video viewers. But he admits that the venture is "something of a test" whose outcome isn’t certain.

 

ComicMix Radio: Marvel Trumps With Another King

ComicMix Radio: Marvel Trumps With Another King

While the second run of Dark Tower is coming to a close, Marvel has another Stephen King project in the wings — one that will please his fans new and old, plus:

— The Scarecrow moves to Heroes

Magic: The Gathering gets a big makeover

— Another great week of new comics and DVDs, including Secret Invasion and the debut of DC’s Trinity

M-O-O-N spells "Press the Button!"

 

 

And remember, you can always subscribe to ComicMix Radio podcasts via iTunes - ComicMix or RSS!

 

Interview: Peter David on Stephen King, ‘X-Factor’ and ‘Dark Tower’

Interview: Peter David on Stephen King, ‘X-Factor’ and ‘Dark Tower’

Peter David has had many successes during his long career as a writer. From his beginnings as an assistant in the sales department at Marvel Comics, through his character-redefining run on The Incredible Hulk, to his bestselling Star Trek novels, David’s talent, wit and style continue to serve him, and his readers, very well.

More recently, he’s taken on the task of helping to bring Stephen King’s The Dark Tower to the pages of comics and jumped back into the X-Universe by writing the re-booted  X-Factor title for Marvel. ComixMix recently caught up with the multi-talented author to get the latest on X-Factor, how he works with artists and the legendary Stephen King, and what makes a good story.

COMICMIX: Peter, thanks for taking the time to talk. Getting right to it, take us back a bit — how did you get started writing comics?

PETER DAVID:
Well, I was working in the sales dedepartment at Marvel Comics under Carol Kalish and writing was something I was doing on the side. Long story short, I started pitching ideas around at Marvel and wound up impressing Jim Owsley, the then-editor of Spider-Man, and was assigned to Spectacular Spider Man as a writer.

I did that for about a year or a year-and-a-half. After that, I was offered the Incredible Hulk, which I, of course, took on. During that time, I also started to send out inquires to other publishers like DC and asked if they would be interested in hiring me.

They said they would so I decided to become a full-time writer and never looked back. That was in 1986 or 1987, something like that.

CMix:
Was there one particular moment when you realized you could do it for a living?

PD: People coming to me and asking me to work for them kinda tipped me off. It was primarily when I approached DC to see if they would be interested in me as a writer and they said they were.

If they had said no, that might have been it. I might still be in the sales department at Marvel.

CMix: Did working at Marvel at the time help you make the transition to full-time writer? Did it help to already have your "foot in the door"?

(more…)

Evan, 1408 top charts

Evan, 1408 top charts

Variety reports that, as expected, Evan Almighty topped the weekend box-office charts with $32.1 million in ticket sales.  What was not expected was that 1408, the movie based on a short story by Stephen King, starring John Cusack and Samuel L. Jaackson, would come in second with $20.1 million.

Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer was third, and Ocean’s Thirteen was fourth.

Sicko, the new documentary from Michael Moore, opened in limited release and earned $70,000 at its one and only venue in New York City.  Reports say that all the Saturday screenings for the film sold out in 43 markets.

DENNIS O’NEIL: On triskadekaphobia

DENNIS O’NEIL: On triskadekaphobia

Do my hands tremble as I type these words? Are there creaks and groans coming from the room behind me? Is the air chill and sticky?

What could be happening?

Ah, I think I have it! Triskadekaphobia – that must be it! And what is triskadekaphobia? My computer’s dictionary defines it tersely and simply: An irrational or obsessive fear of… (that number between 12 and 14.) (Parentheses and paraphrasing mine.)

This is the that number of these whatever-they-ares that I’ve written and that, my friends, is scary. That it is also irrational goes without saying, at least to the non-believers among you.

My irrational fear of… that number is not exactly new. If you look at any of the comics I’ve written in the last dozen (nor baker’s dozen!) years or so, you won’t find the dialogue balloons and captions on any single page totaling that number unless the editor added or subtracted or conflated something, in which case it’s on his or her head. And if I’m doing a script and reach the end of page 12, I either quit or make myself charge on until I get to page 14, even if I run out of steam half way through that page.

(more…)

TNT drama series in development

TNT drama series in development

TNT has a few new series in development that could be of interest to us all:

  • The Talisman – a six-hour limited series scheduled for summer 2008; a new project from DreamWorks Television and executive producer Steven Spielberg, based on the Stephen King and Peter Straub novel of the same title.
  • The Saint – a new one hour series based on the Leslie Chateris classic character – the famous Simon Templar. From executive producer William J. McDonald and producer Jorge Zamacona. The Saint was featured in movies dating back to the late 1930s (starring the great George Sanders) and the British television series from the 1960s starring Roger Moore. I can hear the theme song now…
  • The Company – a limited one-hour, six-part series debuting in August with Chris O’Donnell, Alfred Molina and Michael Keaton that looks at the CIA’s activities during the Cold War, based on the bestselling novel by Robert Littell. Batman, Robin, and Doc Ock? Sure, why not.