Some news from Hollywood

Variety is reporting Columbia Pictures is planning a second installment of Ghost Rider that would be written by David Goyer and starring Nicolas Cage (again...). For some reasons, sequels are generally worse than their first chapter, and the first Ghost Rider was really disappointing... Let's see if something better comes out of this.

A slightly better news from MTV News... Clive Owen has "heard from a very good source" that Sin City 2 may be put into production "some time next year". I kind of liked the first movie and I'm curious to know what the sequel will look like... It's supposedly going to be based on Sin City: A dame to kill for. Very exciting, and the second 300 movie is coming too!

Marathon read

I’ve done it; I’ve finally gone through the 7 Sin City trade paperbacks… This is quite a big chunk of a read, and the collection occupies quite a bit of real-estate on my shelves.

I remember picking them up from Amazon.com… They had like a “grab bag” promotion at the time which allowed me to get the complete story for less than USD90 shipped (and that’s a good deal considering I live half-way around the world). I was saving big on shipping; that was basically the main reason why I ordered it.

“What do you mean?” is my friend Pedro asking… What I mean is I know everybody says it’s an awesome story, I know it’s Frank Miller, I know they made a movie out of it BUT it’s black and white… Now this would have been OK if it was a re-re-re-reprint of some uber-long series that had started a long time ago (a bit like Essential Wolverine) but I always preferred comics that were in colours. So what I really mean is the decision making criteria was the attractive price tag.

For the exact same reason (and maybe also because it is quite bulky and would request some commitment to read the whole story in an acceptable time), the books just sat there for a while before I decided reading them… And it really is an awesome read. Frank Miller really deserves his reputation and he can surely draw a woman’s body… Or actually, maybe not, they’re never that perfect… So let’s say he can surely perfectly draw a man’s idea of a woman’s body.

Anyway, if you’re like me and are kind of hesitating when it comes to black and white comics, don’t pass up on Sin City, it’s a beautifully drawn and very well written story that’s intensified by the fact it is black and white… It may even convert you to only read black and white comics!

Aren't you a bit old for this?

A few weeks ago, a British/Spanish friend of mine came over to my house for lunch. One of the many topics discussed was what we were doing during our spare time, and when I mentioned I liked reading comics among other things, his immediate reply was:

“Comics? Don’t you think you’re a bit old for that? Most people stop around 12 years old…”

This is such a typical answer (that I get quite often) that I shouldn’t even care anymore… But I do. In the past, I usually went on naming titles of comics that have been used in the movie business such as 300 or Sin City as the common mortals they are usually don’t know they were comics to begin with… I would then go on telling them that the word “comics” doesn’t necessarily equals to “super heroes in tights” and that there are many other genres out there (that’s usually when I throw in some of Brian Wood’s work)

Well I am happy to say that I’ve finally found a book that will make everyone agree that a comic book reader can be someone else than 10 years old little Timmy from Kickapoo, Missouri. Batman: Arkham Asylum has become my weapon of choice when it comes to fighting heretics who stopped reading comics as they “grew up”. This book is pretty disturbing and I believe would make anyone feel uncomfortable while reading it… The art conveys that discomfort feeling very well, and if it has such an effect on adults, why would we give it to read to some pre-pubic almost teenager kid?

Back to the book itself…It is really good, the art is amazing, mixing oil painting, photographs, pencil scribbles, but what I really loved was that even the whole book is super depressing, it ends on a high note that gave me a laughter… Really smart way to end the story in my opinion.