DVD new releases Aug. 25, 2009: Smallville 8! Adventureland! Untouchables! Here's Lucy! Cheap Trick does Pepper! Wanted Dead or Alive! Billy Jack!

New releases of note this week. If any of these items are of interest to you, please consider clicking the titles and ordering them from Amazon, as part of the proceeds help support this site!


Smallville: The Complete Eighth Season


Adventureland


The Untouchables - Season Three, Vol. 1


Here's Lucy: Season One


Sgt. Pepper Live ~ Cheap Trick


Wanted Dead or Alive: The Complete Series


The Adventures of Robin Hood: The Complete Series


The Complete Billy Jack Collection (Born Losers/Billy Jack/The Trial of Billy Jack/Billy Jack Goes to Washington)


Batman: The Brave and the Bold, Vol. 1

Upcoming Disney Comics collections from Boom! Studios

Along with a batch of new monthly comic book titles, Boom! Studios is exercising it's license to produce Donald Duck and Mickey Mouse comics with a number of upcoming collections featuring classic and more recent Disney comics material. Here's a look at all the info I've been able to find to date. Click the title links to pre-order discounted books from Amazon.

Walt Disney's Christmas Classics Vol.1
128 pages, Nov. 3, 2009
Don't be a Scrooge McDuck this Christmas season! It's the perfect present! BOOM! Kids has raided the Disney publishing archives and searched every nook and cranny this Christmas season to find the best and the greatest stories from Disney's vast comic book publishing history for this "best of" compilation -- Disney's universally appealing characters starring in stories written and drawn by creators who are legends in the field! A timeless classic from the world's most iconic characters that should be on every shelf, Walt Disney's Christmas Classics are an essential this holiday season for family fun! Featuring artists such as Carl Barks, Walt Kelly, Floyd Gottfredson, Daan Jippes and legions more!

Walt Disney's Valentine's Classics Vol. 1
128 pages, Jan. 19, 2010
Love stories from the world's most famous couples -- Mickey and Minnie and Donald and Daisy -- in some of the greatest (and most painful) romances ever told! Romantic, suave, debonair- all these words and more have never been used to describe Donald Duck! Check out how many humiliating ways he can ruin a nice night out with Daisy! Mickey has better luck, but he's a hopeless romantic at heart, and everyone knows that's nothing but trouble... Featuring the industry's greatest all-time talents like Carl Barks, Walt Kelly, Daan Jippes, and more on the world's most well-known characters!

The Life & Times Of Scrooge McDuck: Volume 1
By Don Rosa
112 pages, February 2, 2010

Donald Duck Classics: Quack Up
112 pages, March 2, 2010

Wizards Of Mickey: Mouse Magic
112 pages, March 2, 2010

Mickey Mouse Classics: Mouse Tails
112 pages, February 2, 2010

The Life & Times Of Scrooge McDuck: Volume 2
112 pages, April 6, 2010
By Don Rosa

Mickey's Hero Squad
112 pages, April 6, 2010

Mickey Mouse Classics: Mouse Mayhem
112 pages, May 4, 2010

Donald Duck and Friends: Double Duck
112 pages, May 4, 2010

Wolfman movie pics

Here are some images from "The Wolfman," starring Benicio Del Toro, Emily Blunt and Sir Anthony Hopkins.

Pop links: Wally Wood times two

See Wally Wood's original artwork for a Fireball XL5 lunchbox.

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And here's some 1970s Wally Wood-illustrated jokebook covers.

Beatles' Yellow Submarine re-make in the works

According to EMI, a remake of the Beatles' 1968 animated "Yellow Submarine" is planned for 2012.

From the press release:
The Beatles' seminal 1968 animated film 'Yellow Submarine' is to be re-made by Back To the Future director Robert Zemeckis, Variety reports.

Just as the original was a visionary work, Zemeckis hopes that his revolutionary performance-capture 3d techniques (used in his recent Polar Express and Beowulf movies) will also make the new version similarly ahead of its time.

Release date is being tentatively pencilled in for Summer 2012 to coincide with the London Olympics.

Cast members announced for Disney's John Carter of Mars

English actors Samantha Morton, Dominic West ("The Wire") and Polly Walker ("Rome") has signed on for Disney's live-action adaptation of Edgar Rice Burrough's "John Carter of Mars."

Actor Taylor Kitsch will star as John Carter, a U.S. civil war veteran mysteriously transported to an inhabited red planet. According to The Hollywood Reporter:

Morton plays Sola, the daughter of Willem Dafoe's Tars Tarkas, who must hide her softer side from her warmongering race.

West plays Sab Than, prince of the Zodangans who believes he is entitled to rule Mars.

Walker plays Sarkoja, a merciless, tyrannical Thark.

Video find: The Remo Four perform "The Peter Gunn Theme"

British surf!

Video find: The Crazy Rockers perform "The Carioca"

Pulp Picture Parade: Various sci-fi pulp covers

Video find: The Jokers perform "Sabre Dance"

Pulp Picture Parade: Infinity Science Fiction magazine covers

Video find: The Astronauts perform "Rock the World"

Pulp Picture Parade: Infinity Science Fiction magazine covers

Upcoming Justice League Unlimited figures: Shazam Family! Crisis!

Here's a look at a couple of upcoming DC Comics-based figure sets:


Shazam Family Four-Pack
* "Shazam!" — the WORLD'S MIGHTIEST MORTAL
* Mary Batson — his heroic sister
* The Wizard — keeper of the magic word
* Black Adam — evil user of the magic word


DC Universe Infinite Heroes Crisis
* Dying Supergirl — inspired by the famous cover of Crisis on Infinite Earths Issue 7
* The Monitor — the mastermind of the Crisis
* Speed Force The Flash — capturing Barry Allen as he heroically sacrifices his life to save the Multiverse
* Psycho Pirate with Medusa Mask — servant of the evil Anti-Monitor

Video find: The Chantays perform Pipeline on the Lawrence Welk Show

There's some awesome choreography on display here.

New comics Aug. 18, 2009: Batgirl! Bizarro Super Friends! Marvel Team-Up! Spidey and Mary Jane!

Selected items in shops this week. Click the links to order discounted items from Amazon:


BATGIRL #1 DC is hinting there's someone new behind the mask. Will this issue reveal who? I'm slightly curious, but doubt that it's Babs Gordon--the only Batgirl for me.


BATMAN STREETS OF GOTHAM #3 This is a really basic Batbook to date. Solid, but not earth-shattering scripts and decent art. I'll likely hang in there for the remainder of this first storyline, as I enjoy a regular Batfix. But I don't know about after that. The backup feature, starring Manhunter, hasn't hooked me at all.


SUPER FRIENDS #18 My 6-year-old daughter is becoming a major comic book fan and loves this title. This ish features the Bizarro Super Friends. Great! My little girl will be Bizarro-talking just as she enters Kindergarten! That am good!

WEDNESDAY COMICS #7 Another ish of DC's fun weekly anthology.


ESSENTIAL MARVEL TEAM-UP TP VOL. 3 Spidey teams up with a whole bunch of folks in tales from MARVEL TEAM-UP #52-73, #75 and ANNUAL #1.


SPIDER-MAN AND MARY JANE: YOU JUST HIT THE JACKPOT Classic Spidey and MJ tales, including MJ's awesome "unveiling" as depicted on the cover. Features stories from AMAZING SPIDER-MAN (1963) #43, #259, #291-292, #309 and Annual #19; UNTOLD TALES OF SPIDER-MAN #16; the AMAZING SPIDER-MAN: PARALLEL LIVES Graphic Novel; and AMAZING SPIDER-MAN (1999) #50.