Xean's blog

Firefly Panel

2012-07-19T16:34:19Z

We had the opportunity to attend a press conference for Firefly, and heard from the cast about their love for their characters and each other. We also found out about Browncoats Unite, an upcoming a world premiere anniversary special exploring the FIREFLY phenomenon debuting November 11 on SCIENCE. This hour- long special will include interviews with the cast and crew, exclusive footage from the Comic-Con 10-year anniversary panel, and will give fans an inside look at the series they've loved for so long.

Seeing the cast together was an amazing moment for those of us in attendance. We are all huge Firefly and Serenity fans, so not geeking out was a bit of a trial. The cast was super sweet and there were many laughs at the expense of themselves and each other. Q: Have you ever dressed up as your character as a cosplay thing?
A: (from Joss) The real question is have you ever dressed up as your character in your NEW series? (super pointed looks from everyone at Nathan Fillion because he did, in an episode of Castle, dress up as Captain Reynolds.)

There were so many great moments, including Nathan Fillion starting to tear up a bit when talking about how amazing it was to be a part of something so beloved by so many. But, far and away my favorite part of the interview was when someone asked if they would consider voicing themselves in an animated version of Firefly, and everyone seemed to be okay with it...maybe something to hope for?

Interview with Uglies Writer Scott Westerfeld

2011-07-26T18:44:32Z

We sat down to chat with writer Scott Westerfeld, writer of the Uglies series, about the upcoming Leviathan movie, and to pick his brain about Steampunk, and bringing the future into the past. He even showed us a photo he had taken of a couple he'd met earlier, in full steampunk glory (we found them later and took our own picture, how cool!). We even got a sneak peek of the new Uglies Manga (photo included). Check it all out below!

Sena and Scott sit down for a chat
Scott had their picture, so we had to get our own!
Sneek peak at the new Uglies Manga

W: The question posed at the end of the Leviathan trailer: "Do you oil your war machines or do you feed them?" cuts to the heart of the two opposing viewpoints in the book. Can you talk about your inspirations for the Darwinists and the Clankers creatively speaking?
SW: I was a philosophy major in College, and took a really cool course called the Philosophy of Biology. That really kick started my love of biology and evolution and that type of thing. I had a girlfriend who was an immunologist and she had lots of cool Biologist friends, and listening to them talk made want to write biology books. Of course Peeps is about biology. So when I started to construct the world of Laviathan, I just thought it would be cool to have a biological aspect to Steampunkieness. And just as regular steam punk takes computers and science and those things and takes them into the past and makes them more advanced than they were then, but still to have that old timey feel, I thought it would be cool to do the same thing with Biology.

W: One of your readers posted on your website that "the time in the books are like the future, in the past.." is that what you strive for when writing?
SW: Yea, I mean I think the future is something that changes every few years. The way we see what the future will be, is always changing. In the 50s the dominate science of the future was rockets. It was all about rockets and going to other planets, now it's all about information sciences. More than 100 years ago it was steam. We tend to only focus on only one type of technology, whatever is big at that time.

W: At what point in the writing process did you begin to collaborate with illustrator Keith Thompson? How much direction did you give him for the WWI Steampunk visuals
SW: I had written 8 chapters I think, and then I put it aside for a while to focus on other things. When I came back to it I realized something was missing. I started to do more research on books of the time, and how they felt. That's when I realized that books back then always had illustrations, especially ones for kids. I really wanted to do something that looked like a book from that period. So that's when I went in search of Steampunk artists, and actually Googled it, and found Keith. He wasn't on the first page, so kids when you're searching go past the first page (though he probably is on the first page now). I usually send him 3-4 chapters at a time, so he gets the chapters in a first draft form. I never give him any direction at the beginning, I wait for him to respond first. Then we have some emails back and forth. He's a better engineer than I am, so he sees whatever it is in his head before he draws it. He knows how big it has to be for four people to fit inside. After he's drawn it, I'll ask him questions about the parts and how they work, and then rewrite in order to help him. So I'm influencing what he's drawing, but he's also influencing what I'm writing.

W: So when does your third book Goliath debut? Will there be another volume? Have you detirmend how many will be in the series?
SW: It comes out September 20th, and there will only be three novels in the series, but there is going to be a 4th book which will be an art book and come out next August. We have done lots of art that didn't make it into the books. There are deck plans for Leviathan, cut aways from the Storm Walker, and they're all in color and were great for planning the world. It will be large format, color, not a lot of text, just something to be special for the fans. It will probably be called "The Manual of Aeronautics" which is the book Darren carries around, so it will be THAT book.

Interview with Boneville writer Jeff Smith

2011-07-26T17:23:15Z

We had the opportunity to sit down with Jeff Smith, the author of the Bone comics, before his signing at Comic-Con this year. We spoke about the upcoming Bone movie, and his newest creation RASL. We even had him sign some books for us, so look for those in an upcoming giveaway!

W: Will you be releasing a full color collection edition soon?
JS: Yes we are, here at Comic-Con we are debuting a collectors edition; one volume in color with lots of little extras like a documentary, little Bone figures, cover galleries, lots of extra bells and whistles. In the fall we'll do a hard cover slip case one volume edition that will be the whole thing in color.

W: Can you give us a hint about what the movie might look like? We're thinking Lord of the Rings meets Roger Rabbit.
JS: Oh, that's not bad, although it won't be live action, it will be all animated. It will be CGI, and in 3d. I was at Warner Brothers about a month ago and they showed me a 4 min Bone short they had made with voices. It was very funny and they did a really nice job. They're walking in the desert and you see Ted the Bug bouncing around, and it's all in 3D so you're looking over cliffs and waterfalls. I was pretty excited, it looks pretty much like the comics.

W: Twenty years in comics, any big time Anniversary plans for yourself?
JS: Yes actually, Scholastic is throwing a big party for me this year at Comic-Con. They throw a very good party, so we'll have a lot of fun.

W: How is the new book, RASL, doing with fans, as compared to Bone?
JS: It's doing very well with fans, but I mean as compared to Bone...you just can't. Bone will probably overshadow everything I do, and I can't really complain about it. I love Bone, it's very personal and I'm very proud of it. The new book is getting good reviews and respectable sales.

W: Do you think Bone fans are moving over to RASL, are you getting a lot of crossover?
JS: I think they're beginning to. When it first started up it was difficult to figure out what I was up to. I think now that I've got 3 of the 4 books completed I can tell that the story is starting to catch people's interest.

Thursday at the Con

2011-07-22T00:01:31Z

We had so much fun today; there were costumes, cast members, amazing artists and so much more. We even had the chance to chat with Bone writer Jeff Smith. He was amazing and signed some books for us (check back for giveaways!). The interview will be up later and we'll post pics as soon as possible! Check back at the Comic-Con Wiki for more updates!

Roku 2 Launch Party

2011-07-21T05:09:38Z

We spent some time with the Roku gang celebrating the release of Roku 2. A new line of video players, with new and improved features and looks, it's SUPER small.

Roku 2 Has:

Casual gaming (we spent some time LOVING Angry Birds)
Blue tooth motion sensing remote
USB and Ethernet ports not available on cheaper models
Ability to play 1080p full high def video
Nearly 300 channels like Pandora, Neflicks, Hulu, Amazon Video, and more...

The best news? They were giving away swag bags with plush Angry Birds, and we will be passing those on to some lucky Wikian once we return.

Such a great day for a party
View from the party (rooftop FTW)
Hanging out, drinking, and watching Angry Bird's on the big screen
Get the PIGGY
One of these lil guys could be yours, check back post Con.

Roy Thomas Interview

2011-07-11T21:27:31Z

I chatted with Roy Thomas earlier in the week to talk about his most recent Conan project as well as the upcoming Comic Con. I wanted to hear from someone who has been there since basically the beginning and get their perspective on the changes to comic books and the Con itself. And to be honest, I also just wanted to lord it over everyone I know; I had the chance to chat with Roy Thomas. The interview is below, but for those who want the inside scoop, here's something you might not know. Roy and his wife have a small herd of Scottish highland cattle on their property, which is kind of awesome. While we were chatting Roy told me that earlier he'd been walking a mile of fencing to make sure the storm hadn't caused any damage and allowed cows to escape onto the nearby highway (which has happened before).

1. You've been writing comics for almost half a century. In that time, how have you changed, as a writer? How have you altered your methods through the years, the way you write a script, the way you deal with artists, etc.? One of the main changes in recent years is that nowadays I more rarely get a chance to deal directly with artists, which is a throwback to the way things used to be before Stan Lee brought us together. Now we often go through an editor as a sort of middle man, and it may be the case that I never actually meet or work or communicate directly with the artist. As far as writing itself, it evolves. I have to keep up at least marginally with what is going on in the field, but at this stage of my life I write what I write and if editors like it they take it and if not that’s fine. I write what I enjoy writing. I don't read a lot of today’s comics, so I'm naturally not going to write in that style, except perhaps superficially. It’s not that I feel the comics of today are necessarily inferior to those of decades past; they’re just not written for me. Every generation gets comic books they deserve, and I’m not who today’s comic books are being written for.

2. During your long tenure at Marvel, you created some of the most memorable characters there (The Vision, the Dane Whitman Black Knight, Havok, Iron Fist, Ultron, Ms. Marvel, and the list goes on). Are there any characters you're particularly proud of?

I don’t think I created a lot of major characters, but I’m happy with those that I co-created. In many cases I was trying to work with characters and concepts that were pre-existing so that I wouldn’t create characters that I wouldn’t end up owning a piece of. The thing I’m happiest about was being the co-creator of Wolverine; I never wrote him but I gave him the name and a few physical and character traits to writer Len Wein, who carried the ball from there. It was nice to see two of my co-creations (Havok and Banshee) in the recent "X-Men" movies. That was nice because the film was reasonably faithful to my characters, especially Banshee. Stan had me make Banshee a man because the X-Men couldn’t always be beating up on a girl. It's that old saying about never picking on anyone smaller than yourself: "If you win, you're a bully--and if you lose, you're a jerk." So we made him an adult Irish male who smoke a pipe.

3. How much attention do you pay Marvel and DC's current books? What stories or modern characters impress/surprise/disappoint you?

I check out recent comics, but only occasionally buy them. I am glad to see comics doing as well as they do now, especially after the problems of the 90s. What I really like, even if I don’t read many comics, is the wide variety in the field. I’ve always liked superheroes but I’m very happy to see other topics being covered in comics and graphic novels. Stan and I and others always thought comics should be as open to subject matter as any other type of genre. Nowadays you have a little bit of everything, which is the way it should be. One of the reasons the superhero genre was so popular in the past is because comics were the only place you could do it well until recently. I’m hoping for good things from the Captain America movie, Marvel has had a run of good luck with adaptations of Blade, X-Men, Spider-Man, etc. Thor wasn’t exactly the version of the character I wanted to see personally, but it was fairly good. X-Men: First Class had an enjoyable story (though setting it in 1962 was odd, since even the comic didn't come out till 1963!), and Green Lantern was nice visually even if the story didn’t hang together well. In Captain America they have him using a gun, which I never really liked, but he did use them occasionally in the 1940s comics (as well as in current ones), so it follows his background pretty well. I'm planning to see it in 3-D. I've loved 3-D movies ever since the 50s, glasses or no.

4. The Marvel Wiki had the opportunity to interview Steve Englehart a while back, and one of the things they asked him, since he wrote the character shortly after the change, is why Beast became grey and furry. His recounting was that it was your idea, part of an effort (alongside Sub-Mariner getting a black, leather costume) to make them more visually striking and make him seem more like Werewolf by Night and some of the other Marvel monsters debuting at that time. Is that how you recall it? If not, what's your recollection of it. If so, is there any more to the story than that?

It’s true, except I’m not sure if it was my idea or Stan’s idea to turn the Beast dark and furry. Whoever had the idea, I thought it made sense. By the end of the current movie, Beast looks like that grey furry version, but I don’t want to take credit for it because I suspect Stan suggested it while I carried it out with writers Gerry Conway and Steve, and the artists of course. We wanted to make the character visually interesting, I was always interested in finding ways to keep X-Men around during the several years between the end of their first series in 1969-70 and their revival in the mid-70s. Stan always felt that, even if a character couldn’t carry a book on his/her own, they could always be part of a group or be the guest star. For example, The Vision was a star in The Avengers who was almost good enough for his own book, but he was better as part of the group.

5. How do you feel about on-screen adaptations of your works such as the 1984 Conan the Destroyer? How much have you collaborated on with the newest reboot of the Conan series? I haven’t had anything to do with the new one; they contacted me recently to do something for the documentary portion of the DVD. I’m looking forward to seeing it. It was a bit silly to call it Conan the Barbarian; seems to me they should have given it another name, if it's not a remake--and I sure to Crom hope it isn't! The Conan movies of the 80s didn’t have enough special effects for my taste--they didn’t live up to their potential, not even the first one, so I’m hoping for good things from this upcoming movie. I saw a trailer, and it looked very good--but then, so had Green Lantern's! I’m just happy to have had a part in Conan and in writing him in so many types of mediums--comic books, comic strips, movies, record albums. I enjoy the character, but I'm not really a sword-and-sorcery fan; I just liked the character, and Robert E. Howard's writing. Originally I was just going to bring the hero to Marvel and have someone else write it, but I swiftly grew to enjoy it. I’ve written several hundred Conan comics, but not in the past decade, so it’s taken me a while to get into the new series for Dark Horse. But it's nice to be back, even if just for a year's run.

6. Stan Lee loves doing cameos in the Marvel movies; would you ever want to do a cameo in Conan or any of your other works? I was actually surprised because I didn’t see Stan in the recent X-Men movie. Back in the 80s I'd hoped Gerry and I would get to watch the filming of some of the second Conan, but they filmed the whole thing down in Mexico--and anyway, we were off the picture by then, after suggesting Grace Jones for the role of Zula. It would have been fun to do, but I’ve never had any great desire to be an actor. I did appear in high school and college plays and sang rock and roll on weekends in the 60s, so I do enjoy performing. I’d be up for it, but no one has ever asked.

7. What are you looking forward to about Comic Con this year? I’m really looking forward to getting together with some old fan-friends, who 50 years ago really helped us launch the notion of comics fandom and fanzines. I’m not sure that many of the attendees of Comic-Don will have any awareness of this history. How much interest or knowledge do they have about the history of comic fandom? I mean, it’s been 50 years since the original comic fanzines--ALTER EGO (by Jerry Bails and me) and COMIC ART (by Don and Maggie Thompson; she's now editor of COMICS BUYER'S GUIDE) came out. I feel that a field should always keep sight of its history, of the comic books themselves, but also some little knowledge of the fandom and where all these things came from. 1970 was the San Diego Con with a few hundred people, and my first was in 1972--a far cry from what it has become now! We are celebrating 50 years of Comic Fandom and of fanzines like ALTER EGO, which is a descendent of the fanzine Jerry Bails started with my hep in 1961. That’s one of the things that’s being celebrated--the birth of the fan movement.