Chris Hardwick's Blog, page 2265

Is YOUNG JUSTICE Heading Back to Comics as Well as TV?

Today, maybe more than ever, we need a dose of good ol’ fashioned Comics Relief. To start things off this week, we have speculation of whether or not one of DC’s favorite teams is maybe heading for a comic book comeback. Read on for all the details.

Could Young Justice Return to Comics, Too?

Earlier this week, fans rejoiced at the news that beloved DC Comics animated series Young Justice was getting a long-awaited season three, following three years off the air filled with tons of petitions and online pleading for its return. With the show making a much heralded comeback, is it safe to speculate that a DC Rebirth version of the team is coming as well to actual comic books? The new Teen Titans series has removed such YJ players as Red Robin, Wonder Girl, and Superboy. Could these characters possibly be reserved a new Young Justice comic series? With the popularity of the cartoon, this one seems like a no-brainer.

Chris Claremont’s Marvel Work Collected in Oversized Omnibus

Although Marvel Comics has him under exclusive contract, it seems they don’t really want legendary Uncanny X-Men writer Chris Claremont writing any actual comics for them. Why that is we don’t really know, but we do know that Marvel is still celebrating Claremont’s many contributions to the overall Marvel Universe with a new Omnibus Edition, called Chris Claremont’s Marvel Universe. Coming in the summer of next year, at $125 and 1,144 pages, this tome will collect Claremont’s work on characters such as Dr. Strange, Man-Thing, Captain Britain, and even Big Hero 6. The oversized omnibus is due in August. [Bleeding Cool]

Winners Announced for Canadian Shuster Awards

Most comics fans know the American Eisner or the Inkpot Awards, but Canada has their own ceremonial celebration of the comics industry, too. Named for Superman co-creator Joe Shuster—a born Canadian!—The Shuster Awards represent the best of the Canadian Comic book world. This year’s winners were announced this week and saw Jeff Lemire nabbing Best Writer, and Steve Skorce taking home Best Artist. For the complete list of nominees and winners, click here. [Comics Beat]

Marvel Releases Monsters Unleashed One-Shot Tie-Ins

Marvel’s 2017 event Monsters Unleashed has four new tie-in one shots which have just been announced. These include new one-shots for Doctor Strange, Champions, Uncanny Inhumans, and All-New X-Men, and are all scheduled to be released in February, with the numbering of #”1.MU” behind each title. They join the previously announced Spider-Man/Deadpool #1.MU and Avengers #1.MU scheduled for January. A still-undetermined amount of one-shots are scheduled to be announced for March, two ongoing titles spinning out of the early 2017 event.

Doctor Strange #1.MU is by writer Chip Zdarsky and artist Julian Lopez, and up next is writer Jeremy Whitley teaming up with Ro Stein and Ted brandt on Champions #1.MU. All-New X-Men #1.MU is also coming from Whitley, with Carlo Barberi on art. Finally, Uncanny Inhumans #1.MU is on tap by the creative team of Paul Allor and Brian Level. You can see the cover for Doctor Strange: MU #1 above. [Newsarama]

New Art from Rejected “Rockabilly Batman” Comic

Current Red Hood/Arsenal artist Denis Medri released cover art from a rejected “rockabilly Batman” series to fans this week, a title he and longtime DC Comics writer Scott Lobdell pitched to DC back in 2015. The book was going to be based on the artist’s series of fan-art, which—you guessed it!—mashed-up Batman and his related characters with a rockabilly sensibility.

Medri said, “at the begin of 2015 Scott Lobdell proposed me to work together on a miniseries inspired by my old ‘famous’ concept Rockabilly Batman, a six-issue miniseries called Batman: Rebel Yell. We proposed to DC Comics months ago, but we never got feedback.” You cans the cover for the rejected pitch above. [Newsarama]

Jim Starlin, Alan Davis Team Up for Guardians of the Galaxy Mini-Series

Marvel’s longtime #1 cosmic writer Jim Starlin—a man who’s written for space-faring characters like The Silver Surfer, Thanos and Adam Warlock—is about to return to the Guardians of the Galaxy. Teaming up with veteran artist Alan Davis, for a new mini-series featuring the ragtag cosmic crew, this will be their second outing together, having previously worked on a mini-series with these same characters called The Infinity Entity.

With the five-part series Guardians Of The Galaxy: Mother Entropy, the Guardians “are entrusted with an important but seemingly straight-forward delivery, nothing can go wrong, right? Right! Until everything starts going very wrong. Things might get a little more chaotic when the team meets the mysterious Mother Entropy: Who is she and what is her business with the Guardians?” We’ll find out sometime in 2017. You can see art from The Infinity Entity, the previous Jim Starlin and Alan Davis collaboration, above. [Bleeding Cool]

Marvel Releases Five New Variants for Amazing Spider-Man: Renew Your Vows

This week, the latest new comic series featuring everyone’s favorite friendly neighborhood wallcrawler is set to come out, with the newest series Amazing Spider-Man: Renew Your Vows, which unite Spider-Man Peter Parker, his wife Mary Jane Watson, and their daughter Annie in an alternate universe series where all characters are superheroes.

This series is coming from Gerry Conway, who is returning to write the book, together with artist Ryan Stegman. For this comic, Marvel has teamed up with five comics retailers to produce unique variant covers for the first issue. The five variant covers can bee seen in our gallery below.

Images: DC Comics / Marvel Comics

Love, Alexi #43: Noël Wells

Noël Wells (SNL, Master Of None) & Alexi talk social anxiety, love, body dysmorphia, parental validation, kanye, kim k, drake, rhianna, self-loathing, meditation, synchronicity, beach goth, SNL, Master of None, mushrooms, Woody Allen, following your intuition, the micro aggressions that women endure, & writing/directing her first feature film. Enjoy! PS: send emails to the show so i can read them ON AIR – DearLoveAlexi@Gmail.Com

Follow @alexiwasser on Twitter and check out imboycrazy.com!

This Superhero Halftime Show by OSU Is a Glorious Comic Tribute

Can you imagine being a football player out on the field during a big college game? It’s a frightening thought, being out there with 11 players built for bringing the pain, all ready to pulverize you. That is unless… your team was made up of superheroes! Or even better: If you didn’t have to go out on the field at all, and could just watch a marching band form a bunch of cool superheroes from via the safety of not being a football player.

If that second option sounds pretty sweet, then you’re in luck! During a recent game between the Ohio State Buckeyes and the Nebraska Cornhuskers, the Ohio State Marching Band put on a dazzling halftime show that celebrated a bunch of the Avengers, as well as the dynamic DC duo (why not call them that?), Batman and Superman.

The video above, which comes via Laughing Squid, shows the OSU marching band form into eight different superhero-inspired logos and characters, including: the Avengers logo, Thor (who brings down the hammer on the Michigan Wolverines), Captain America’s’ shield, Iron Man, the Batman logo (plus the Joker!), Superman, the Hulk, and, marching band drum roll please… Spider-Man. Seriously, the Spider-Man formation (at 5:25) is so cool. He shoots a web and everything:

Even though the marching band members may not be the people you’d want on your side in a football game or in a Captain America: Civil War airport-type fight, they do appear to have super coordination powers, which would make them ideal for battling… the villains of good rhythm!

What do you think about this OSUMB halftime show? Is this the craziest marching band display you’ve ever seen? Let us know in the comments below!

Images: BuckeyeTV Channel 19/YouTube

How superheroes actually phase through objects

A Fan Made This POKÉMON Battle Demo for Augmented Reality Glasses

Pokémon Go has been great for showing off how a Pokémon game can function in augmented reality, and while it does a lot, like show creatures in the real world and allow players to capture and collect them, there’s still a lot the app can’t do. There’s no meaningful battle system like in the main line of handheld RPGs, and since you’re looking at the Pokémon through your phone, there’s still a great disconnect between them and the world around you.

One industrious fan wanted to see what a full-fledged, Pokémon-battling title could be like, so he went ahead and created PokeLens, a demo for the Microsoft Hololens, the company’s augmented reality glasses.

The edges of the demo could definitely use some polish, considering it was created by just a pair of fans, but we’re super impressed. The way they imagine it working is like a sort of hybrid between Pokémon Go and the Pokémon RPGs: You encounter a translucent outline of a Pokémon, and after engaging it in battle, you choose one of your own Pokémon to send out. Then, like in the games, you choose which moves to use in an effort to drain its HP until it faints or until it’s low enough for you to capture the Pokémon successfully.

The demo only includes Pikachu and Pidgey, but at the very least, it’s a strong proof of concept that shows that if fleshed out, this idea could be made into something really fun, and perhaps as overwhelmingly popular as Pokémon Go during its peak.

Featured image: KennyWdev

Foo Fighters Mail Fan New Guitar After His Is Stolen

Have the Foo Fighters ever done anything bad… ever? They just replaced a fan’s Fender guitar for no real reason other than that it sucks to lose one. Charli XCX and Rostam from Vampire Weekend dropped an equally-happy remix this week, too, plus a Simpsons metal band inspired by Ned Flanders has a hilarious video, Martin Shrekli streamed that one-of-a-kind Wu-Tang Clan LP on the internet, and Cloud Nothings dropped a freaky music video. The music world may save us, after all.

Image Credit: Fender

Have you ever had your instrument stolen? It sucks, big time. Lucky for Leeds musician Sinclair Belle of the band Happy Daggers, he had a bit more luck replacing his lost guitar. This September, someone took his Telecaster Deluxe out of his car. Sad, he posted about the loss and Chris Shiflett, the guitarist for Foo Fighters, got a hold of the news. Why? Because that Telecaster Deluxe got its name from Shiflett. “Hey Sinclair. I read about your guitar getting stolen. Bummer! I’d be happy to send you another. Nothing worse than getting your guitar ripped off,” he wrote in a Facebook message. And then, a few weeks later, a brand new Telecaster Deluxe arrived in the mail with a simple note: “I hope it serves you well my friend.” Foo Fighters, you always know how to warm our hearts. [Consequence of Sound]

Producer Jim-E Stack recently released “Deadstream,” a single that now gets a vivacious remix thanks to Charli XCX and ex-Vampire Weekend member Rostam Batmanglij. The groovy dance tune sees new positive angles with both people singing over it. Their verses, touching on heartbreak and distance, take a hold of the other’s pitch and run off with it, twisting and turning until the song becomes something so bright that you forget whatever it was you listened to before it. Ah, powerful songwriting and remixing in fine form. Check it out above. [Rolling Stone]

The Simpsons will never die and neither will its gags, even the ones the producers don’t come up with. One of the many things the show has influenced is bands, and a heavy metal band called Okilly Dokilly has taken the whole “inspired by” thing pretty far. The name, clearly, comes from the show’s laughable neighbor Ned Flanders. The group dresses in similar attire to the character and keeps his rhymes alive, though their songs are a bit, er, harsher than Ned would probably like. In their new video for “White Wine Spritzer,” they wear Ned’s green sweater and pink collared shirt outfit. It’s a nice look for the Phoenix band. Maybe we should all try it on for a size. [Rolling Stone]

Everyone’s favorite real-life villain, Martin Shkreli, is back in the spotlight. Last month, he promised to release the one-of-a-kind Wu-Tang Clan album he purchased for millions of dollars… if Donald Trump became the president. Turns out he’s true to his word. Shkreli revealed clips of Once Upon a Time in Shaolin over the Internet by streaming bits online. You can watch some above. Note the irony of it all: There’s a Bernie 2016 sticker on an amp behind him because, well, he would. [Consequence of Sound]

If you’re looking for an escape from the election, then look beyond next year into the future. We’re talking the far, far, far away future. Cloud Nothings dropped a music video for “Modern Art,” the lead single off their upcoming LP, Life Without Sound. In it, the band mourns the loss of its drummer, Jayson Gerycz, only they’re very very old. It’s a funny look for the band, but maybe it gave them reason to shed the weariness to prep for a full tour. They hit the road on the album’s January 27 release and skip around America and Europe after that. But for now, think of the distant future and how old Cloud Nothings will be by watching the music video above. [Consequence of Sound]

See you back here on Friday for another Music Dispatch!

Image: Ringo/Nasty Little Man

Happy Carl Sagan Day: Let’s All Listen to a Soothing Voice of Sanity

Just as there are billions and billions of stars in our Milky Way galaxy, there are billions and billions of voices here on our little home planet, Earth. The voices swarm the airwaves, our televisions, social media, and of course, our heads. And while it can all be a bit overwhelming at times, there is one voice out of those billions, which, while no longer with us in body, will forever sooth us in spirit. And that is the endlessly optimistic, sane, and scientific voice of astronomer, physicist, and science communicator, Carl Sagan.

On this day in 1934, Sagan was born in Brooklyn, New York, and now is the perfect time to celebrate the great scientist’s body of work—and his indefatigable hope for humanity—by tapping into one of the many gifts he was born with: his deeply comforting voice.

Here are three clips and quotes from Sagan’s Cosmos series, based on his eponymous book, both of which are monumental contributions to scientific literacy, and to the pursuit of scientific truth:

“The Cosmos is all that is or ever was or ever will be. Our feeblest contemplations of the Cosmos stir us… We know we are approaching the greatest of mysteries.”

“Those worlds in space are as countless as all the grains of sand on all the beaches of the earth. Each of those worlds is as real as ours and every one of them is a succession of incidents, events, occurrences which influence its future.”

“We humans appear on the cosmic calendar so recently that our recorded history occupies only the last few seconds of the last minute of December 31st.”

How are you celebrating the day one of the greatest scientific educators in history was born? Are you as happy as we are to have his sane voice to help combat all of the insanity out there? Let us know in the comments below.

Images: Wikimedia / JPL

FREQUENCY’s Peyton List Says Curtis Armstrong’s Debut Will Change the Show

Genre icon Curtis Armstrong is about to make his debut on Frequency, and the introduction of his character will leave The CW’s remake of the film for TV forever changed.

In Wednesday nnight’s episode, “Deviation,” Raimy (Peyton List) meets a strange character named Karl (Armstrong), who claims that—just like her with her ham radio that contacts her father Frank (Riley Smith) in 1996—he speaks to himself in the future with his own communication device. The wrinkle: he’s in jail for murder because he claims his future self told him to kill his victim for the greater good. Does Raimy believe this convicted killer, or will she just consider him a lying, desperate man trying to be released from prison?

“He’s so good,” List told Nerdist on set in Vancouver about having Armstrong (Revenge of the Nerds, Supernatural) on the show. “I remember we had one day where he had a lot to say and it was kind of a treat for me because I just got to sit back and watch him. He made so many brilliant and interesting choices and I just felt kind of spoiled. It was a really fun day of work actually. Maybe not as fun for him, he had to talk a lot, but it was really, really cool.”

While Armstrong is only a guest star on the show, his presence as Karl will affect Raimy’s own understanding of the timeline and how her ham radio works on a very important level.

“I think a lot of times, with Raimy and with Frank, dealing with the idea of the ham radio and what it allows them to do, they’re forced into a lot of situations where they can go down so many different roads with it and they kind of have to prioritize, to a certain degree, where you take in so much information,” List says. “Where you go, ‘You know what? If that’s not pertinent right now, throw it out, move it along.’ He does float that idea of, ‘How do you know you’re not the only one?'”

She continues, “I think, for them, they’re going, ‘I just can’t think about that right now because we haven’t even begun to figure out how to control the situation that we need to control. That is something we can’t control. We’re not gonna worry about it right now.’ But is a very interesting sort of wrench to throw in because, all of sudden, if you have other people messing with the timeline, it’s a bit of a problem.”

On a personal front, Raimy is going to continue to pursue her former fiance Daniel (Daniel Bonjour) in this new 2016 timeline where he doesn’t have any memory of their relationship, even though she has a new love interest forming in Kyle (Rob Mayes).

“It’s interesting because this other love interest is a surprise to her,” List says. “She doesn’t even remember it until she remembers it in the most embarrassing way possible. What’s been interesting to me, taking on those episodes with the Daniel character, is remembering to forget the life that they had together because that life will never come back. It’s gone forever. She can remember all of those wonderful memories she shared with him, but there’s no way [she can get that back]. You can’t reset to exactly where you started.”

She continues, “For me, it’s been hard to be like, ‘Okay, that’s completely gone.’ And there’s no throwbacks to those times because he’ll have no idea what she’s talking about. They’re very different, those relationships, and I think that she’s a different person, or a different woman, with either one of them. That’s an interesting dilemma for her because she was absolutely 100 percent certain when she was with Daniel in our original timeline, and throwing in somebody else, all of a sudden she’s questioning things she never questioned before. But, then again, she has to start her relationship with Daniel all over again.”

Because of the fact that Daniel has no memory of their original relationship, that means that Raimy has to hold back “a lot” in their new relationship for fear of scaring him off.

“She’s already terrified him,” List says with a laugh, noting that she has basically been “stalking him” in the new timeline. “At a certain point, you just realize it doesn’t matter how many times I tell you that we’re perfect for each other, you won’t know until you feel that. So, I think she holds back a little bit, as to not come off crazy and say all these outrageous things, but, at the same time, there’s this part of him that always brings out this side of her that’s a little bit less guarded and a little bit more relaxed and herself. And I think she still has that.”

What are you excited to see from tonight’s Frequency? Tweet me your thoughts at @SydneyBucksbaum!

Frequency airs Wednesdays at 9 p.m. on The CW.

Images: The CW

This Thermal Camera Offers Whole New Way to Enjoy a Hydraulic Press

We are fairly certain that we will never grow tired of watching things get needlessly flattened by a hydraulic press (or, as we now and forever hear it in our heads, a “hoo-drawl-ic” press), but we have to admit we are way more excited than normal to watch the latest power destruction video because it was filmed with a thermal camera, and it turns out it is even cooler to see what happens when you crush things in infrared.

The wonderful YouTube account the Hydraulic Press Channel is back with a special “Thermal Camera Edition” that features them once again seeing how some steel objects hold up under all that pressure (spoiler alert: poorly), but with the added bonus of letting us see what it looks like for the Predator.

Watching a steel ball completely demolished into a pancake with the naked eye is an impressive enough way to show just how much energy is involved in this type of event, but getting to see it with the thermal camera really highlights just how much energy is really transferred in a second or two. The ball instantly looks like a glowing orb of fire. Even seeing the differences between the hollow tube and the hollow square is a great way to see how the shapes of the objects greatly influence where and how it holds its structural integrity.

We make no apologies for how much we enjoy these videos on a pure entertainment level, but we also love how much we can learn from them too, and seeing it in infrared gives us a whole new way to take something useful away.

Plus it’s just really cool looking.

What did you think of this video? Should they film all of them with a thermal camera going forward? Tell us in the comments below.

Images: The Hydraulic Press Channel

 

CHANNEL ZERO: CANDLE COVE Recap: “Guest of Honor”

Editor’s Note: this is a recap, which means major spoilers! Read at your own risk.

Eventually we were going to get some answers from Channel Zero: Candle Cove, and this week’s fifth and penultimate episode, “Guest of Honor,” gave us a lot of them, which made for a far less insane—though still very creepy—episode than last week’s installment, but it did set up what should be an even more bonkers finale.

The previous episode showed us what appeared to be the puppets used to make the actual show, but Mike (played by Paul Schneider in his best, most subtle but crazy performance yet) quickly–and fortunately–put an end to that early on, proving that supernatural forces really are at work here.

If this whole thing had just turned out to be a troubled man dealing with the metaphorical demons of his past and a pack of murderous children being led by their evil teacher…well, that still would have been cool, but the revelation that Candle Cove didn’t create Eddie, but that Eddie had created Candle Cove was a great twist. Sure, a child born with unfathomable powers isn’t a new idea, but in this context it perfectly explains why a kid’s puppet show was at the center of all of this. It was created by a child’s mind, so it manifested itself in a child’s format.

We also learned more about Mrs. Booth and why she’s doing all of this. Not that there seemed to be much mystery around it after last week, but sure enough Mrs. Booth did sacrifice her son Jacob to Eddie back in 1988, after Eddie stopped her seizures and sent her to the apparently magical land of Candle Cove.

The great remaining mystery is whether or not the Toothchild we saw her tenderly feeding teeth a few weeks ago—and who seemingly is still working on her and Eddie’s behalf after he/she/it took Lily—is Jacob or not. With the soul/essence/being of Eddie working towards overtaking Mike and his body (one of the best developments yet), it is not out of the realm of possibility to expect some sort of return of Jacob either. There has been too much focus paid to him recently to not expect a pay off.

Speaking of Mike, if Eddie making him carve “Come Home Mike” into his arm wasn’t enough to get him to do what he wants, kidnapping Lily and bringing her into that ever-present cave should do the trick. Beyond being unsettling and making it clear Mike is someone to root for, revealing Eddie as the center of all of the evil going on makes us less sure that Mike will survive all of this. And with what happened to poor Jessica, whose murder seems to have been a result of Eddie’s long held jealousy, there’s no reason to expect anyone to survive. The better question might be whether Mike lives and finally escapes this hell, Eddie lives on in Mike and it never ends, or Mike has to die to save everyone.

Regardless of who survives or not, we’re looking forward to seeing how this all wraps up. This first season of Channel Zero has been entertaining, completely mad at times, and always creepy. So long as it doesn’t turn out all of the kids are just angry they boarded up the local water park, it should be a great ending to a very solid debut season.

But what do you think of tonight’s episode? And what are your predictions for the finale next week? Take a bite out of our comments section below to share your thoughts with us.

Images: Syfy

Nerdist Podcast: Anna Kendrick Returns

Anna Kendrick (Pitch Perfect, Up In The Air) returns to the podcast to talk about killing house plants, what inspired her to write a book Scrappy Little Nobody, and how honesty translates to actors and writers. They then get in a deep conversation about how they take care of themselves, making themselves better people and their affects on the people around them!

Image: Frazer Harrison / Getty