http://www.overheardinnewyork.com/archives/019798.html

Blonde chick: So...isn't she going to want her stuff back?
Dude with cute voice: Actually...she doesn't know I have most of her stuff.

--Broadway & 28th St

Overheard by: Stormy

http://scifiwire.com/2009/07/report-ryan-reynolds-is-g.php

A day after The Hollywood Reporter said that three actors were vying for the coveted title role in The Green Lantern it reports that one has prevailed: Ryan Reynolds, whon Warner Brothers has settled on as its choice to play Hal Jordan. The film is being directed by Martin Campbell and produced by Donald De Line and Greg Berlanti.

Here's what the trade paper reported Friday night:

Reynolds and his camp entered negotiations for the part Friday, after the studio held two rounds of screen tests, along with actors Bradley Cooper and Jared Leto. Justin Timberlake also did a screen test. . The studio had holding options on the actors, but, except for Reynolds, those expired Monday. Reynolds' option would have expired end of day Friday.

......I am pleased to announce that as of today I am officially a vegan. I am grateful for the hundreds of emails I received from vegetarians and vegans showing their support and sharing tips. As this is a all new for me, I invite you to continue sharing your experiences with me. A special thanks to the Montreal Vegetarian Association for their support.

Finally, I decided to invest time in supporting animal rights. I have already joined various animal rights organizations. I feel it is important to help the living creatures that don’t have a voice to defend themselves. I believe that we should all, especially public figures, raise awareness for this cause......

have it your way

http://www.the-isb.com/?p=1845

I’ve mentioned this a few times before, but I’m not exactly what you’d call a fan of the Transformers.

Admittedly, the idea of a talking semi-truck that fights a talking gun is probably in the top three high concepts of all time–narrowly edged out by “gorilla with a jetpack”–and I think I’ve proven over the past five years that I’m a pretty big fan of robots in general. In practice, though, the property itself does absolutely nothing for me, and my affection starts and stops with Lion’s version of the theme song. As such, I’ve never really bothered to read many of the comics, and that’s probably why I was surprised that just how bad Transformers #24 actually is.

This little gem from 1987 was actually recommended to me by Chris Piers, the artist of my upcoming comic Woman of A.C.T.I.O.N., and after actually reading it, I’m seriously considering re-evaluating our working relationship to one where I do more screaming and threatening.

So basically it’ll be more like the way I work with Smithy.

Anyway, the plot, such as it is, revolves in equal parts around a) the exciting new world of video games, and b) a plug for Hasbro’s many fine playsets and toys that’s so shameless they might as well have ended lines like…

Not yet, Megatron! Not when the Protectobots can combine to form… Defensor!

…should be followed up with “each sold separately at your local Kay-Bee Toys!”

Also: “Protectobots?” Really? I mean, I realize that a devout GI Joe fan like me can’t really throw stones at goofy names when I’m within arm’s reach of both Big Lob and the A.W.E. Striker, but man. Protectobots? I hope somebody took the rest of the day off after they wrote that one down on a piece of paper.

Regardless, the Protectobots and Optimus Prime tumble to what is possibly the vaguest evil scheme of all time, as the Decepticons plot to steal something from a place for some reason. The only one of these Maguffin elements that’s actually discussed in the book is that they’re going to Oregon, and so after Wheeljack’s unfortunate assertion that they’re going to “give the Decepticons a taste of their own lubricant”–yes, really–they’re off for what I foolishly assumed would be an intense round of Robot-on-Robot Violence.

Instead, they just kind of stand around reading from the filecards on the back of their boxes for three pages.

Eventually, though, enough ad copy is recited to appease Marvel’s sinister licensing paymasters, and at this point, something has to happen, and mercifully, it does. But instead of a throwdown between two giant robots and two even more giant robots that are made up of twelve other giant robots that would level buildings–a scenario that would come perilously close to something that would actually be exciting to read about–they decide to settle things in the cut-throat world of multiplayer video games, recruiting a young bystander to blow the loser up with a controller from an Atari 2600.

Given the combative nature of the Transformers and the constant assertions that their battle would be so furiously devastating that property damage and human casualties are a foregone conclusion, one would assume that they’d be duking it out in a game built around fighting or war or lumberjacking, but instead they end up getting doppelled into something that looks a lot more like Kirby’s Dream Land, where the most threatening obstacle comes in the form of plant life:

When you were a kid, did you ever go over to a friend’s house to hang out, but they were playing video games and didn’t want to share so you just ended up watching them play for a while? Remember how boring that is? Well, then you’ve got a pretty good idea what the next five pages are like, only with the added bonus of reading to make sure that the children of the ’80s stay firmly interested.

Eventually Optimus Prime kills Megatron, but Megatron drops some Game Genie shit on him and comes back to life, and then Optimus kills him again, but is so guilt-ridden by the fact that he accidentally threw some NPCs off a bridge that he asks the kid to blow him up.

Although to be honest, he does it in what is probably the most hilarious way possible.

And then the kid actually does it, which means that at the end of this issue, Optimus Prime commits suicide because he didn’t unlock the Pacifist achievement, a moral that’s dubious at best and doesn’t really seem like it would inspire anyone to buy an action figure, although it might have inspired children to stay away from video games out of fear that they would kill childhood heroes, which I guess would have the side effect of moving a few more Grimlocks off the shelf.

In any event, I’m assuming that it all turns out okay because the kid is able to save Optimus’s brain on a 5″ floppy disk, though it resulted in the tragic overwrite of his copy of Oregon Trail.

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Neatorama/~3/MGCTgONDAx8/

http://www.neatorama.com/?p=25082

Wouldn’t it nice if one dose of medicine could be used over and over? The was the premise behind the everlasting cathartic pill. It was made of metal, and leeched out antimony as it passed through the digestive system, aiding in the elimination of parasites. It was billed as a cathartic, or laxative as we would say today. And the pill could be recycled! According to a 1907 pharmaceutical guide:

The bullet was passed out, recovered from the feces and used over and over again. This, as Dr. J. A. Paris says, was economy in right earnest, for a single pill would serve a whole family during their lives and might be transmitted as an heirloom to posterity.

Some heirloom! Link

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Neatorama/~3/vhoYFvBO-ww/

http://www.neatorama.com/2009/07/11/kandors-the-miniature-kryptonian-city-in-a-bottle-by-mike-kelley/

Los Angeles-based artist Mike Kelley brought the bottle city of Kandors from the Superman comic series to life. If you don’t know, Kandors is a Kryptonian city miniaturized by Brainiac and kept in a bottle by Superman:

The exhibition of new works by Mike Kelley at the Jablonka Galerie features sculptures, lenticular lightboxes, and videos related to the fictional city of Kandor, the capitol of Superman’s home planet Krypton. According to the Superman mythos, Kandor is the only remaining vestige of the exploded Krypton, and the city is preserved, in a reduced state, in a bottle in Superman’s possession. Interestingly, the image of Kandor was never codified and the numerous representations of it in the comic book throughout the years vary widely in appearance. In this exhibition Kelley reconstructs ten unique versions of Kandor, with its enclosing bottle, which, despite obvious differences, purport to depict the same city.

John Struan over at Super Punch has more pics and a video clip from the
exhibit: Link - Thanks John!

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Neatorama/~3/tdpBE3kYt94/

http://www.neatorama.com/2009/07/11/tower-block-musical/

Anton Hecht, who brought us Blinking Balet (a wonderful YouTube clip of old people dancing in the street to Prokofiev’s Dance of the Knights posted before on Neatorama) is back. In his new clip, Anton interviewed the residents of an apartment tower in Newcastle, England … in the form of a musical:

Five residents were interviewed and their words turned into a short song. Each resident was then filmed in their flat singing their words to camera with a small live band accompanying them. This was edited together to form the full song that moves between the flats of the singing residents with the band accompanying them.

The guys are delightfully off-key and seem very sincere. I wonder what my life would be like if it were a musical … Hit play or go to Link [YouTube]

http://superherohype.com/news/ironmannews.php?id=8500

http://www.smbc-comics.com/index.php?db=comics&id=1574

http://www.overheardinnewyork.com/archives/019797.html

White girlfriend to Asian boyfriend intentionally blocking the door: What are you, 12 years old?
Asian boyfriend: Only from the waist down.

--76th & Columbus

http://scifiwire.com/2009/07/eurekas-allison-and-co-cr.php

Eureka star Salli Richardson-Whitfield and series co-creator Jaime Paglia stopped by the Syfy offices in New York this week and took a quick moment to answer fan questions in our exclusive video, above.

Salli Richardson-Whitfield discusses what it was like being pregnant on the show and in real life. Paglia drops some hints on a possible "musical" episode of Eureka.

http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap090710.html

What lights up this

http://ahzthecat.blogspot.com/2009/07/halfway-there.html

http://superherohype.com/news/greenlanternnews.php?id=8499