Author: ÜberSciFiGeek

“Batman Beyond” Continues!

from Things from Another World:

Terry McGinnis — the Batman of the future — and an elderly Bruce Wayne — the original Batman — are the sworn protectors of Neo-Gotham, but when someone targets The Dark Knight’s old foes, the new Batman must begin a case that reaches back into Bruce Wayne’s past and puts Terry’s future directly in danger!

This summer heralds the long-awaited return of the popular Batman Beyond franchise! The six-issue Batman Beyond miniseries will be penned by Emmy Award-nominated animation writer Adam Beechen (Batman: The Brave and the Bold) with art by Ryan Benjamin (Batman & the Outsiders).

Fans of Batman Beyond won’t want to miss the Superman/Batman Annual #4 from writer Paul Levitz and artist Renato Guedes starring the Batman Beyond characters!

Pre-order Batman Beyond #1

Log In & Set Up a Batman Beyond Series Subscription

Pre-order Superman/Batman Annual #4

Find Out What It Takes to Make It to the Top as a Manga Creator in the New Shonen Jump Series “Bakuman”

from VIZ Media:

VIZ Media, LLC (VIZ Media), one of the entertainment industry’s most innovative and comprehensive publishing, animation and licensing companies, has announced the upcoming release of the manga series Bakuman. The series, rated “T” for Teens, will be released on August 3rd under VIZ Media’s popular Shonen Jump imprint and will carry a MSRP of $9.99 U.S. / $12.99 CAN.
Previews for the series will start to run in the May 2010 issue of VIZ Media’s popular monthly manga anthology — Shonen Jump magazine which is on stands now.

Bakuman is written by the author of Death Note, Tsugumi Ohba, and the artwork is by Takeshi Obata, the artist known for series such as Death Note, Hikaru no Go and Ral Grad. The story follows average student Moritaka Mashiro, who enjoys drawing for fun, but when his classmate and aspiring writer Akito Takagi discovers his talent, he begs Moritaka to team up with him as a manga-creating duo. But what exactly does it take to make it in the manga-publishing world?

In the opening volume, Moritaka is hesitant to seriously consider Akito’s proposal because he knows how difficult it can be to reach the professional level. Still, encouragement from persistent Akito and the motivation from a girl he has a crush on help push Moritaka to test his limits!

“Bakuman is an outstanding, behind-the-scenes manga about manga, and the artists who create it, written and drawn by the creative team that produced the Death Note series,” says Elizabeth Kawasaki, Senior Editorial Director at VIZ Media. “The series is a great read for all manga fans, and especially fun for aspiring artists.”

Born in Tokyo, Tsugumi Ohba is the author of the hit series Death Note. The writer’s current series Bakuman is serialized in Weekly Shonen Jump in Japan.

Takeshi Obata was born in 1969 in Niigata, Japan, and is the artist of the wildly popular Shonen Jump title Hikaru no Go, which won the 2003 Tezuka Osamu Cultural Prize: Shinsei “New Hope” award and the 2000 Shogakukan Manga award. Obata is also the artist of Arabian Majin Bokentan Lamp Lamp, Ayatsuri Sakon, Cyborg Jichan G, and the smash hit manga Death Note.

For more information on this title, and other Shonen Jump titles, please visit shonenjump.viz.com.

The Complete Ouija Interviews

The Complete Ouija Interviews

Chances are that you’ve played with a Ouija board at some point in your life, as part of a childhood slumber party, slightly inebriated college gathering, or Hallowe’en dare. Typical of the majority of spirit board sessions, the answers to your questions were probably disappointingly vague, a “yes” or “no” interspersed with a bunch of random gibberish.

In The Complete Ouija Interviews, author Sarah Becan shows how interesting conversations with the dead can be when you’re lucky enough to make contact with ghosts who have good communication skills. Even more compelling, Becan reveals, “The collected stories in this book all come from actual Ouija board sessions, which occurred during the three years that my brother Jeff lived and worked at a hostel on Nantucket Island.” Who needs an Interview with the Vampire when you can read interviews with real otherworldly spooks?

The Complete Ouija Interviews was originally published as a short series of handmade mini-comics:

Sample panels from the mini-comics are posted at each of the links above, and an excerpt from the Ouija Interview #1 mini-comic is also available to read online, serving as a preview of the Ouija Interviews.

Assisted by a 2009 Xeric Foundation Grant, the mini-comics were then collected into one volume by Becan’s Shortpants Press, “an independent small press from Chicago dedicated to making unique, interesting, and really cool minicomics, zines, prints and art books.”

At the beginning of The Complete Ouija Interviews is a foreword written by Becan’s brother, Jeff, in which he gives a brief history of the Ouija board and the time the Becan siblings spent on Nantucket, including a description of a Ouija board session that may convince some readers that the toy really is a conduit to the deceased. The four Ouija interviews then follow, in the order that they were published as mini-comics. In the first interview, we’re introduced to Theo, who was murdered after getting caught cheating on his wife with a woman he gleefully describes as having “big knockers”. Despite being an unrepentant womanizer, it’s hard to dislike the villain in this tragic romance, as he claims to have sincerely loved both women, and takes full responsibility for the transgressions that led to his untimely demise. Next, we meet Chip, a young, gay ghost who’s a smart aleck with a penchant for telling truly tasteless jokes. It’s difficult to tell whether anything Chip says is serious or truthful, especially when he claims to have been reincarnated as a strawberry, but he does reveal some potentially intriguing information about the afterlife. Chapter three features a conversation with an adorable little girl who was murdered when she was only ten years old. Becan and her brother David sat at the board during this session, and Naomi indulges in a bit of shameless adolescent flirtation with David, telling him that she loves him. Naomi’s story becomes less light-hearted, though, when she’s asked about the identity of her murderer, and her answers imply that she was killed by a pedophile who was known to her and her friend. The fourth installment in the Ouija tales, the longest and most in-depth of the interviews, takes up about a third of the book, and is also the darkest and saddest of Becan’s stories. The brother and two sisters interviewed were murdered by their father, who killed their mother, as well. As if that weren’t horrifying enough, it slowly becomes clear, to the reader’s discomfort, that murder wasn’t the only crime committed against one of the sisters. It’s Agatha’s story that will haunt readers most, long after the final page of the book is read.

In addition to the main stories, the book includes a half dozen mini-interviews, bonus material brand new to The Complete Ouija Interviews. Scattered throughout the compilation, these vignettes spotlight ghosts who pop in to offer brief, yet poignant, comments or words of advice to the living.

The Complete Ouija Interviews is a very professional-looking independent publication, the perfect-bound volume covered in a heavily textured feltweave paper that feels hand-made and is embossed on the front with an image of Theo. While it resembles, in size, the cute novelty gift editions sold as impulse items at bookstores, The Complete Ouija Interviews is distinguished by its elegant sepia-toned art and meaningful content. The presentation is deceptively simple, but effective: Pages consist of single panels with narrow caption boxes containing Becan’s interview questions running unobtrusively across the top. The interviewees float against a plain background that approximates a Ouija board with the numbers and letters wiped off, their answers printed in traditional comic strip speech balloons. Like in Peanuts, the characters manage to display a remarkable range of expressions and emotions with very few drawn lines. The minimalist ghosts, using slight head tilts and subtle eye and mouth shifts, are far more expressive than the fully rendered superhero figures found in big-name comic books.

If you’re looking for a comic that will truly touch your heart, then passing over The Complete Ouija Interviews would be a grave mistake, since reading it is sure to lift your spirits.

Recommended Reading Level: Young Adult and up (12+) for implied violence, adult themes, sexual content, and crude bodily humour.

Order directly through the Shortpants Press website, or check with your local comic book store.

The Complete Ouija Interviews is distributed by Shortpants Press. For more information on the book and its author, visit jakze.com. Shortpants Press may also be followed on Twitter.

ThinkGeek’s newest glowy umbrellas + $10 off

from ThinkGeek:

Dear Space Chimps,

Our intergalactic dreams came true when our monkeys toured NASA Goddard on Saturday and partied with some Stormtroopers and R2-D2 at Yuri’s Night. Timmy even got to kiss a rubber chicken and ride in a Tang purse.

But we know your squishy minion hearts are set on seeing certain April Fool’s Day items come to life. We are awash in a sea of your emails, tweets, and wall posts. Begging, pleading, crying delicious salty tears. No updates just yet, but we will say that some wishes will be granted…

Magical LED Umbrellas Usher in H2O Gravity Celebration
What’s that old saying about April showers? Oh yeah… it rains a lot in April but we’re supposed to be grateful for the rain because it makes flowers come out in May, if you’re into that kind of thing. But mostly, rain. It’s wet and it sucks to be out in it. Why not make your outdoor excursions simultaneously more dry AND awesome? Both of these umbrellas look like standard black umbrellas at first, but each has a special superpower. The Lumadot LED umbrella has dozens of blue LEDs that can be switched on to look like little glowy raindrops and the Blade Runner Style Umbrella’s LEDs are in the shaft, lighting the way through futuristic L.A. as you chase down replicants. Rain sucks, but don’t let it make YOU suck. That’s what we say. Battle rain in pure techie style right now.

Save $10 — The cure for the spring cleaning blues
Beautiful weather means spring cleaning, and spring cleaning means you now have less stuff! You know what that means, right? More room for newer, cooler stuff! How to Redeem: Add $40 or more of products to your cart now through 11:59 pm EDT on Friday, 4/16/10. Use code SCREWZPLUSTEN at checkout and your order will be automagically adjusted to reflect the discount and the free Screwz-All.

Find more What’s New items at ThinkGeek!

Spock is “Beaming” home to Vulcan, Alberta on April 23, 2010

from Vulcan Tourism & Trek Station:

On Friday April 23, 1010, actor Leonard Nimoy, best known for his portrayal of Mr. Spock in the original Star Trek series will be visiting Vulcan, courtesy of the Calgary Comic and Entertainment Expo. To mark this historic occasion, town officials have commissioned sculptor Nathan Scott to create a bronze bust of Mr. Spock that will be unveiled by Nimoy during his visit.

While in Vulcan, Nimoy will leave behind his iconic “live long and prosper” handprint that will be immortalized in bronze, and will present the Town of Vulcan two unique items on loan from his personal Star Trek collection. These items include: the Spock ears that he wore during the filming of the Original Star Trek TV series and a lithograph of the Original Star Trek cast, autographed by all of the original cast members. These unique memorabilia items will be on display at the Vulcan Tourism & Trek Station for the next year.

Schedule of Events:

2:00PM — Dignitaries begin to arrive and parade begins to line up at the Vulcan Tourism & Trek Station.

2:30PM — Mr. Nimoy arrives at the Vulcan Tourism & Trek Station (Good opportunity for photo and video footage).

3:00PM — Parade-style procession from Vulcan Tourism & Trek Station to downtown Vulcan.

See:

  • The RCMP lead off the parade in their Red Serge,
  • The County Central High School Concert Band performing music from Star Trek,
  • Vulcan’s Mayor and Council in their Star Trek uniforms aboard a Starship float,
  • Representatives from the Calgary Comic and Entertainment Expo, and
  • Mr. Nimoy as honourary Parade Marshall.

3:30PM to 4:15PM — Mr. Nimoy’s official “Welcome to Vulcan” Ceremony on stage in downtown Vulcan (Good opportunity for photo, video and sound bites)

  • Vulcan’s Mayor will present Mr. Nimoy with the Key and Transporter Coordinates to Vulcan,
  • Mr. Nimoy will unveil a bronze bust of Mr. Spock that the Town of Vulcan had commissioned in his honour, and watch him leave behind his famous “Live Long and Prosper” handprint,
  • Mr. Nimoy will address the spectators and Vulcan residents.

For a complete list of other celebrity guests who will be attending the 2010 Calgary Comic and Entertainment Expo on April 24 & 25, visit calgaryexpo.com.

“The Guild” Season 4

from The Guild:

We’re pleased to announce that Season 4 of The Guild is official — Microsoft has renewed the show for another season and new episodes of The Guild will be coming to Xbox, Zune and PCs this summer.

Felicia is putting the finishing touches on the script for Season 4, which will pick up where Season 3 left off. Pre-production is underway, keeping producer Kim Evey and Streamy Award winning director Sean Becker very busy as cameras are set to roll sometime in May. Seasons 1 through 3 are currently available on watchtheguild.com, iTunes, Amazon and YouTube.

Microsoft has sponsored The Guild since season 2. The Guild thanks Microsoft — along with all the fans — for continued support of the show.

–The Guild management

Be Like the Hero of Canton in this New Jayne Cobb “Troublemaker” Replica T-Shirt!

from Quantum Mechanix:

Troublemaker
Let's Be Badguys!

Jayne Cobb — whether he’s your crappy town’s biggest hero or the guy who just clothes-lined some pee yen lookin’ to ruin your day — he’s the best good guy to have by your side when it’s time to be bad guys.

What Jayne is best known for, besides naming large weapons after girls and having a girl’s name his own self, is his vast collection of awesome t-shirts. And best known of these shirts is “Troublemaker”, an apt title for the man who made it famous.

For the first time ever, QMx has created an exact replica* of Jayne’s Troublemaker t-shirt. Troublemaker is made from a custom fine cotton jersey ringer with full front and wing pallet sleeve printing. The original Troublemaker shirt was printed on a crew neck Old Navy t-shirt — a t-shirt that’s no longer available. So QMx had to recreate the t-shirt from the ground-up — from the weave to the custom dyes color-matched to the original screen-worn shirt.

The artwork is printed with a 5-color process using plastisol heat-cured, deep-penetration inks. The shirt was silk-screened to spec, based off one of the screen-used shirts now owned by Propstore.com.

Troublemaker is available in men’s sizes only from S-3XL and starts at only $26.95.

* Sweat stains not included. Afraid you’ll have to add those the old-fashioned way.

Win Trip to New Zealand plus Raygun Fabulatoria

from Weta:

Tri-dimensional Industrial Design Contests!

Win a trip to New Zealand (sharp left at Australia)

The good people at Grordbort Industries in cohorts with the clever buggers at InterGrid are introducing a contest for digital artists to contrive and loco-mote electro-phosphorous models based on rayguns from the Dr. Grordbort’s universe.

This shootout is aimed at inexperienced upstarts as well as seasoned computational artists who will use new-fangled contraptions monikered: “InterGrid’s innovative Cloud rendering system, the Green Button”, to multidimensionalise and locomotate their creations.

Hong Kong braintrust Cyberport’s Digital Media Centre (DMC) will support the competition by making technological wizardry and remote meteorological computational bric-a-brac available to the contestants via The Green Button.

Monthly rewards for the most accomplished and acclaimed entries will be selected by Grordbort Industries and InterGrid lackeys. The supreme over-achiever and celebrated winner shall be announced in the month of October and the Grand Prize is a trip to New Zealand to meet Richard Taylor Esq. and Greg Broadmore (the Buffoon) at Weta Workshop, the designated manufacturing facility for some of Grordbort Industries’ designs.

For more competition ephemera, please visit raygunshootout.com.

But that is certainly not all! Create your own Alien!

Weta and frisky fresh-faced fraternisation phenomenon Frenzoo are likewise launching a competition. The honour here will be bestowed upon those who create the most outrageous extra-terrestrial life forms and far-off lands. Again in more than just a handful of dimensions. All and sundry can enter this contest and contestants could win monthly prizes from the Weta range of trinkets and collectibles.

For more information, visit frenzoo.com.

Go forth and create! Hazzaah!

Read the full press release in 21st Century English — PDF file (53kb)

Dark Horse to Kick Off New Gold Key Comics Program at C2E2!

from Dark Horse Comics:

Dark Horse and Classic Media announced today that this weekend’s C2E2 convention will be the launch for the much-anticipated new Gold Key Comics program. Fans will have the chance to meet Dark Horse President Mike Richardson and creator Jim Shooter, and gain insider information on what to expect from this summer’s upcoming releases. News of the line was first announced at San Diego Comic Con International 2009, and fans have been anxiously awaiting details ever since.

“Jim and I share a great affection for these terrific characters. We have some very exciting ideas on how to introduce them to a whole new generation of fans.” said Mike Richardson, president of Dark Horse Comics. “C2E2 is just the beginning.”

“I’ve done this long enough to know when it feels right — and it does — so there’s a chance, at least, that it is. I stand on the shoulders of giants like Manning, Newman and Du Bois,” said Jim Shooter. “On top of that I’ve had terrific support from Mike Richardson and Senior Editor Chris Warner, plus great art from Bill Reinhold and Dennis Calero. Overture, curtain, lights…!”

In addition, throughout the C2E2 weekend, Dark Horse will announce the creative teams and more titles in the works for Gold Key. Then, the new line will kick off in print only a few weeks later, on Saturday, May 1st, as part of Free Comic Book Day, and fans can look for exciting promotional Apps on iTunes in early May.

Doctor Solar, the first title in the line, will arrive in stores this summer!

Fantastic Adventures and Alien Worlds Await in Four New Science Fiction Releases from VIZ Media’s Haikasoru Imprint

from VIZ Media:

VIZ Media, LLC (VIZ Media), one of the entertainment industry’s most innovative and comprehensive publishing, animation and licensing companies, has announced the upcoming release of four new science fiction novels under its Haikasoru imprint. Slum Online, by Hiroshi Sakurazaka, and The Stories of Ibis, by Hiroshi Yamamoto, will hit stores on April 20th. Loups-Garous, by Natsuhiko Kyogoku, and The Next Continent, by Issui Ogawa, will be released on May 18th.

Haikasoru publishes some of the most compelling contemporary Japanese science fiction and fantasy stories for English-speaking audiences. The imprint launched in North America with a dedicated focus on Japanese science fiction.

Slum Online by Hiroshi Sakurazaka
Price: $13.99 U.S. / CAN $18.99
Available April 20

Etsuro Sakagami is a college freshman who simply drifts through life, but when he logs on to the combat MMO Versus Town, he becomes Tetsuo, a karate champ on his way to becoming the most powerful martial artist around. While his relationship with new classmate Fumiko goes nowhere, Etsuro spends his days and nights online in search of the invincible Ganker Jack. Drifting between the virtual and the real, will Etsuro ever be ready to face his most formidable opponent?

Author Hiroshi Sakurazaka published his first novel, Wizards Web, in 2003. His 2004 short story, “Saitama Chainsaw Massacre,” won the 16th Japan SF Magazine Reader’s Award and he has also been nominated for the prestigious Seiun Award, a Japanese literary honor that recognizes exemplary science fiction. Sakurazaka’s other novels include Characters (co-written with Hiroki Azuma) and All You Need Is Kill (also published in English by Haikasoru).

The Stories of Ibis by Hiroshi Yamamoto
Price: $15.99 U.S. / CAN $19.99
Available April 20

In a world where humans are a minority and androids have created their own civilization, a wandering storyteller meets the beautiful android, Ibis. She tells him seven stories of human/android interaction in order to reveal the secret behind humanity’s fall. The tales Ibis tells are science fiction stories about the events surrounding the development of artificial intelligence in the 20th and 21st centuries. At a glance, these stories do not appear to have any sort of connection, but what is the true meaning behind them? What are Ibis’s real intentions?

Hiroshi Yamamoto was born in 1956 in Kyoto and began his career as a writer and game designer. He gained popularity with titles such as February at the Edge of Time and the Ghost Hunter series. Yamamoto’s first hardcover science fiction release, God Never Keeps Silent, became a sensation among science fiction fans and was nominated for the Japan SF Award. His other novels include Day of Judgment and The Unseen Sorrow of Winter. In addition to working as a writer, Yamamoto is active in several literary capacities serving as editor of various classic science fiction anthologies and as president of To-Gakkai, a group of tongue-in-cheek “experts” on the occult.

Loups-Garous by Natsuhiko Kyogoku
Price: $16.99 U.S. / CAN $23.00
Available May 18

In the near future, humans communicate almost exclusively through monitors connected to online networks — face-to-face meetings are rare and the surveillance state nearly all-powerful. Even school children are only allowed to meet in the flesh in designated communication centers. So when a serial killer starts slaughtering junior high students, the crackdown is harsh. And despite all the safeguards, the killer’s latest victim turns out to have been in contact with three young girls: Mio Tsuzuki, a certified prodigy; Hazuki Makino, a quiet but opinionated classmate; and Ayumi Kono, her best friend. As the girls get caught up in trying to find the killer — who just might be a werewolf — Hazuki learns that there is much more to virtual reality than meets the eye.

Natsuhiko Kyogoku has won many literary awards for his works including the 1996 Mystery Writers of Japan Award for Grave of Goblins, the 1997 Izumi Kyoka Award for Laughing Iuemon, the 2003 Yamamoto Shugoro Prize for Inquisitive Koheiji and the 2004 Naoki Prize for Going Around a Hundred Stories, the sequel. His novel, The Summer of the Ubume, was also published in English in 2009. In addition to working as a writer, Natsuhiko Kyogoku established his own design studio and still works as an art director, designer, and bookbinder for various projects. He’s also an expert in yokai (monsters and ghosts of Japanese folklore).

The Next Continent by Issui Ogawa
Price: $16.99 U.S. / CAN $23.00
Available May 18

The year is 2025 and Gotoba Engineering & Construction, a firm that has built structures to survive the Antarctic and the Sahara, has received its most daunting challenge yet. Sennosuke Toenji, the chairman of one of the world’s largest leisure conglomerates, wants a moon base fit for civilian use, and he wants his granddaughter Tae to be his eyes and ears on the harsh lunar surface. Tae and Gotoba engineer Aomine head to the moon where adventure, trouble, and perhaps romance waits.

Issui Ogawa is known as one of Japan’s most prominent science fiction writers. His 1996 debut, First a Letter from a Popular Place, won the Shueisha JUMP Novel Grand Prix. The Next Continent garnered the 35th Seiun Award. A collection of his short stories won the 2005 Best SF Poll and The Drifting Man, included in that collection, was awarded the 37th Seiun Award for domestic short stories. Ogawa’s other works include Land of Resurrection, Free Lunch Era, and The Lord of the Sands of Time (published by Haikasoru in 2009). Ogawa is also a principal member of the Space Authors Club.

For more information on Haikasoru please visit the dedicated website at haikasoru.com.

J!NX: We’re in yer Interwebz, Chattin’ With Strangrz

from J!NX:

New J!NX Classic Tee: Catroulette
Unless you live under a rock and never turn on the computer or television, you’ve most likely heard of Chatroulette and all of the… interesting strangers that can be found there. It seems like everyone is chatting: moms, dads, grandmas, grandpas… it’s only a matter of time before the pets are at it as well. You might even encounter one who will sing a song about you. I can has chatz?

Super-Colossal Sale is Super-Colossal!
We’d like to send out a big THANK YOU to everyone who took advantage of our epic Super-Colossal sale last week and made it one of our most successful sales ever! If you missed out on the sale this time, make sure you’re signed up for our weekly newsletter and are following us on Twitter and Facebook to receive notifications and sneak-peaks for all our upcoming sales and promotions!

Neil Gaiman and Charles Vess — “Instructions” Book Trailer

from HarperKids:

Check out an animated book trailer for Instructions, the new book from Newbery Medal winner Neil Gaiman and illustrator Charles Vess!

Find more Neil Gaiman videos, games and books at mousecircus.com.

Trust Dreams.
Trust your heart,
and trust your story.

A renowned storyteller whose words have transported readers to magical realms and an acclaimed illustrator of lushly imagined fairy-tale landscapes guide a traveler safely through lands unknown and yet strangely familiar…

…and home again.