JIMSMASH ! ! !

Tuesday, March 13, 2007

CAPTAIN COLBERT

Last night on the COLBERT REPORT, Stephen read a letter from Marvel Editor-In-Chief JOE QUESADA, in which he was given Captain America's shield:

Dear Stephen,

As Editor in Chief of Marvel, I am burdened with the handling of our characters’ estates in the sad event that a hero should perish before his time.

Captain America’s will was read last Friday, and while heavy-hearted, I am proud to announce the Star-Spangled Avengers has bequeathed his most valuable possession, his indestructible shield, to the only man he believed had the red, white, and blue balls to carry the mantle, Stephen Colbert.

Welcome to the Marvel Universe.

Sincerely,
Joe Quesada

Colbert accepted the shield and knocked it with his knuckles.

“That’s the sound of indestructible Wakandan Vibranium. I take this responsibility very seriously, and I promise to use this shield only to fight for justice....and to impress girls. Ladies, anybody want to touch it? Cap, I hope I make you proud."

Hahaha, awesome.

CLIVE BARKER SHORTS

MIDNIGHT MEAT TRAIN
Speaking of meat.... looks like they're going to adapt Clive Barker's short story "THE MIDNIGHT MEAT TRAIN" into a movie starring VINNIE JONES (Snatch & X3), Brooke Shields (yeesh) and Bradley Cooper. Its from his Books Of Blood series (of short stories) and its pretty fucked up. Basically, a down-and-out man, Kaufman, falls asleep on a New York subway train. He wakes up at a secret station beyond the end of the line and encounters a man who has killed and butchered several people and hung their bodies up on the train, and says he will be forced to kill Kaufman to guard his secrets. Soon after, the doors of the train open, and then the story gets weird and gory. I have no idea how they can flesh that story out into a 2hr movie.

THE YATTERING AND JACK
The Yattering & Jack is one of my favorite stories by Clive Barker. Many Barker fans disagree because its a dark comedy and not his usual dark, macabre gorefest (which I like, too). Anyway, the story is basically a small demon torments a writer named Jack, trying his all to drive Jack insane, but never exposing his presence. Bound by the powers of Hell to stay in Jack's house until it succeeds, the Yattering subjects him to increasingly severe torments.... but all fail. The Yattering is frustrated by his good cheer and apparent obliviousness and begins to become the Tormented one. It's fun, dark and demented!

Both of these stories are in Barker's BOOKS OF BLOOD VOL 1. Also included is "The Book of Blood" and "In The Hills, The Cities", which are pretty cool themselves; the visuals Barker gives you are like non other! Pick it up sometime! I always thought those stories should have been adapted into ANIMATED shorts. Super cool imaginative shorts by talented people. You know, something different!

(source)

TOY OF THE DAY: THE MEAT

Jakks Toys has recently been putting out toys based on ROCKY. The figures pretty much suck all around, but I appreciate the effort. But they're really reaching with their latest Rocky figure: The slab of Cow Meat Rocky punches during training. The figure, called "THE MEAT", doesn't even come with Rocky. As Spinal Tap so wisely said once, "There's a fine line between Clever and Stupid." You decide.

ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK.... FOR SPARTAAA ! ! !

BAD NEWS: They Unimaginative Fuks are going to do a REMAKE of John Carpenter's classic ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK. (Argh!!)

GOOD NEWS: According to Variety, GERALD BUTLER of 300 is set to portray SNAKE PLISSKEN. Under the right director, this could be a fun remake with Bulter in the ole eye patch. But I can only think of about 3 directors who could do it justice. Ken Nolan (Black Hawk Down) is writing the script. But again, why remake it? Yes, its low budget, but that was part of the charm! Go rent it today.

Monday, March 12, 2007

AMBASSADOR OF THE DAY: TZURIEL REFAEL

Israel has yanked their ambassador to El Salvador, TZURIEL REFAEL, after he was found drunk, naked (unless bondage gear & toys count as clothes) outside of an S&M party. Apparently, according to police reports, he was only able to identify himself to authorities after the rubber ball from his mouth had been removed. Holy shit, you just can't make this stuff up! Quite embarassing for Israel, but not the first time one of their Ambassadors have been in trouble. According to the AP:

* Last year, Israel replaced its ambassador to Australia, Naftali Tamir, after he said Israel and Australia are “like sisters” because both are located in Asia and their peoples don't have the Asian characteristics of “yellow skin and slanted eyes.”

* In 2005, Israel canceled the appointment of a diplomat to Australia after it was discovered that he published pictures of nude Brazilian women on the Internet while on a mission in Brazil.

* In 2000, Israel's ambassador to France died of cardiac arrest in a Paris hotel under circumstances the Foreign Ministry refused to publicize. Media reports said he was with a woman who was not his wife at the time.

(one of the articles)

GAS PRICES

For those of you keeping track (or not), Gas in the U.S. has gone up 20-cents in the past 2 weeks. Here in L.A. its above $3 for Regular. Here's a chart tracking gas prices (US) since 2002.

CAPTAIN AMERICA SHRINE

Speaking of the Death of Captain America....

Lisa's store, NEPTUNE COMICS, is sporting a nice tribute Shrine to Cap! Check it out! It even got blogged on Newsarama! Nice work, Lisa!

(Lisa's blog)

COLBERT REPORT: DEATH OF CAPTAIN AMERICA

Stephen Colbert on CAPTAIN AMERICA's death:

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*thanks, Shane!

ASK A NINJA #37: LAST WORDS

The Ninja talks people's last words:

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*thanks, Dylan!

AMAZING SCREW-ON HEAD

I finally watched THE AMAZING SCREW-ON HEAD. Based on the one-shot comic by Mike "Hellboy" Mignola, this animated adaptation is spot-on awesome! FINALLY someone has put his artwork style to animation. Obviously, its gorgeous to look at and it makes me weep in disappointment at the current HELLBOY Animated movies they're putting out. Stop making the current animated movie and stop making the live-action movies.... and START making proper animated adaptations of HELLBOY in THIS manner!! Besides the killer visuals, Amazing Screw-On Head is a great fun ride and hilarious! You have PAUL GIAMATTI opposite DAVID HYDE PIERCE, both just nailing their parts. Pierce is absolutely brilliant as EMPEROR ZOMBIE, cracking my shit up just about anytime he opens his mouth. I wish I had watched this earlier because Emperor Zombie deserved his own "Villain of the Day" post. And I feel I must give a nod to MOLLY SHANNON as the vampire PATIENCE! Anyway, I am giving an extremely high recommendation on this dvd. Go watch it TODAY!!!

-----

"It's as I always say, all really intelligent people
should be cremated for reasons of public safety."

ATTACK OF THE ZOMBIE COW ! !

Villagers in West Bengal (India) are being terrorized by a Carnivorous Cow, hellbent on feasting on the fresh blood and flesh of chickens. Ok, maybe "terrorize" is a bit too harsh. But they do have a cow on their hands that's eating all their chickens; 48 thus far! Zombie Cows... The End is Nigh, people.

(article)

RYAN VS DORKMAN 2

High Rez Version: http://stage6.divx.com/content/show/1137289

RYAN VS DORKMAN 1 (in case you missed it before)

RICHARD JENI SUICIDE

Aww, man! StandUp comedian RICHARD JENI died from an apparent suicide saturday! WTF? I remember catching his stand ups on Comedy Central throughout the years. Funny guy. Sad and tragic news.

(more)

ANIMATED YODA

Here's another look at what YODA's going to look like in the upcoming 3D Animated STAR WARS show. It looks like they're going with a similar style to the CLONE WARS cartoon.

DROID MAIL

The US Postal Service is going to help celebrate STAR WARS' 30th Anniversary by putting out R2-D2 mail boxes! Look for em at your local Post Office soon!

(source)

PAUL DOLLINS' SILVER SURFER

Check out this killer SILVER SURFER painting by PAUL DOLLINS (sorry, the pic does the actual painting injustice). Ok, its not really the Marvel character, but that's what it looked like to me when I first saw it; the SS with "Kirby Energy" around him. I met Paul this weekend and bought this painting from him. Super cool dude. He's been painting since the early 70s and describes his style as "Molecular Art". There's an energy to his work that reminds me of late 60s/early 70s Psychedelic Space Rock art - Perfect for Silver Surfer!

X-MEN VS SENTINEL II STATUE

SideShow has a new X-MEN VS SENTINEL statue to go along with its previous one which featured COLOSSUS and CYCLOPS. This one has EMMA FROST & BEAST and is eh-ok. Especially compared to the Ultra Sweet first one. Plus, they used the anus-icular "Cat-Man" BEAST. Remind me again to cockpunch Grant Morrisson and Frank Quitely for giving us this Beast. Anyway, I still want the first SENTINEL statue but will pass on this one. Plus its $300. (link)