Weekend Reading: SOPA, DC, Toth and Redshirts
Posted by Tom Mason Categories: Editorials, Reviews, DC Comics, Independent, Marvel Comics
Welcome to the weekend! Let's see what the internets hold for us!
Tom Spurgeon at The Comics Reporter speaks out against SOPA, the Stop Online Piracy Act. It really is a terrible bill that does more harm than good and Tom makes a strong case to do everything you can to stop it from being passed.
Mark Evanier doesn’t like the proposed law either.
If you’re an aspiring fantasy/sci-fi writer, the Clarion Workshop is accepting applications, according to Boing Boing. You can find a list of Clarion alumni here.
And award-winning sf writer John Scalzi provides even more details and words of encouragement about Clarion.
Click to continue reading Weekend Reading: SOPA, DC, Toth and Redshirts
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Weekend Reading: Frank Miller, Star Wars, Ghost Rider, Deathlok
Posted by Tom Mason Categories: Editorials, Movies
Everyone enjoying the new year so far? So’s the internet, so let’s see how:
Tom Spurgeon at The Comics Reporter wrapped up two weeks of holiday interviews with a pile of interesting creators. Even if you’re not specifically into their individual works, you should read them all. It’s a fascinating look at lots of creative people in the biz. I especially enjoyed the chats with Kim Thompson, Art Spiegelman, and Todd DePastino on Bill Mauldin.
Is there a worse piece of entertainment than the Star Wars Holiday Special? What about its book tie-in?
If you’ve been interested in the Gary Friedrich/Marvel/Ghost Rider lawsuit, Daniel Best at 20th Century Danny Boy has the judgment paperwork to read.
Click to continue reading Weekend Reading: Frank Miller, Star Wars, Ghost Rider, Deathlok
Weekend Reading: Ajax, Tintin, Chaykin & Barreto
Posted by Tom Mason Categories: Editorials, Interviews, Movies, Reviews, Television
It’s not just the weekend, it’s a long holiday weekend into a whole new year. Have a happy one with a few links to read.
Beau Smith writes a wonderful tribute to his friend and frequent collaborator, Eduardo Barreto.
If you’re tracking the future of digital comics, Appy Entertainment’s Paul O’Connor has an interview with the guy behind Operation Ajax, Daniel Burwen.
The writer Lance Mannion goes to see Tintin. There have been lots of reviews over the internets already, but I’m partial to this one. “In fact, The Adventures of Tintin [is] as good an Indiana Jones movie as Indiana Jones and The Last Crusade. In parts, it’s as thrilling and new as Raiders of the Lost Ark. Throughout, it’s much better than Kingdom of the Crystal Skull and a reminder that as great as the young Harrison Ford was what made the movies was the spirit of adventure that infused them, and that spirit was a boy’s (and girl’s) spirit.”
Click to continue reading Weekend Reading: Ajax, Tintin, Chaykin & Barreto
Trucks & Skulls: Best iPhone Action Game
Posted by Tom Mason Categories: Editorials, Video Games
My pals over at Appy Entertainment make games for the iPad and the iPhone and whatever lower case iProduct is coming up.Click to continue reading Trucks & Skulls: Best iPhone Action Game
The Cape Not Booted Yet
Posted by Tom Mason Categories: Editorials, Television
The Cape, the new NBC series about a wrongly-accused cop who dresses up as a Batman-like hero to fight corruption in the mythical Palm City, has debuted.
Trained by circus people – that's right; he has all the powers of the Big Top – cop Vince Faraday (played by David Lyons) uses his cape like Cirque de Soleil uses ropes.
He's got a regular villain too, because the evil businessman who framed him also moonlights as the series' bad guy. Plus, Firefly's Summer Glau is also on hand.
NBC needs a big hit, or even a little hit, following their fall to fourth place in a 4-network race. So how did the debut actually do in the ratings?
Click to continue reading The Cape Not Booted Yet
Appy Entertainment: Trucks & Skulls Wins Again
Posted by Tom Mason Categories: Editorials, Video Games
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As everyone knows, Trucks are good and Skulls are evil. And when they get together…it's smashing. I'd read a comic book called Trucks & Skulls; I'd watch a movie called Trucks & Skulls; and I'd give my kids a bunch of toys called Trucks & Skulls.
What Trucks & Skulls is right now, though, is a game app for the iPhone and the iPad.
It hasn't been out for much longer than a month and already it's racking up the awards, the great reviews and the downloads.
The reason I pimp for this (again!) is that the game comes from Appy Entertainment and its Secret World Headquarters north of San Diego.
Click to continue reading Appy Entertainment: Trucks & Skulls Wins Again
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Trucks & Skulls For Your iPad!
Posted by Tom Mason Categories: Editorials, Video Games
Do you like Monster Trucks and Laughing Skulls? And stuff that blows up real good?
Then you’ll want to play iPad’s Game of the Week: Trucks & Skulls!
It was created by the gang at Appy Entertainment, which is run by a couple of friends of mine (Chris Ulm and Paul O’Connor) who are both comic book industry veterans. Ulm is the guy who came up with the idea for the Ultraverse, and O’Connor wrote several dozen comics back in the go-go 1980s.
Click to continue reading Trucks & Skulls For Your iPad!
Appy Entertainment: Zombies In A Box
Posted by Tom Mason Categories: Editorials, Reviews
Do you still love the Zombies? I do.
I get a kick out of them when they’re done well, like when my pal Max Brooks writes about them (World War Z totally scared me) or when I’m reading The Walking Dead, while waiting for the new TV show.
Now it’s October, the month of Halloween, and a great time for Zombies. Especially when their blood, guts and goopy brains are on sale.
My buds at Appy Entertainment, Paul O’Connor and Chris Ulm, are putting Zombies on sale this month. It’s an iPhone app of theirs called “All-In-1 ZombieBox,” a 10-zombie-app for less than one sweet dollar.
Appy’s ZombieBox has 10 apps from 10 different indie developers: Zombie Invasion (Conniption Entertainment); Defcon Z (Monkey Armada); Draw Slasher - Dark Ninja vs. Pirate Monkey Zombies (Mass Creation); Zombie Saw (L*U*K*E); Zombie Pizza (Appy Entertainment); Zombie Nombie (Smudgy Games) Apocalypse Zombie Fish (The Binary Mill); Zombie Karts (Cascadia Games); Zombie Apocalypse Manual (PALIANTech); and my favorite name of all time: Zombie Whale Hole (Cervo e.U.)
Click to continue reading Appy Entertainment: Zombies In A Box
Chris Ulm’s Zombie Pizza
Posted by Tom Mason Categories: Editorials, Reviews
Halloween is coming and it’s the favorite time for witches, ghosts and everybody’s favorite: zombies. I love the undead, you love the undead, and so does Chris Ulm. But who’s Ulm? He was one of the co-founders of Malibu Comics back in the day, the originator of what became the Ultraverse and co-creator of Rune with Barry Windsor-Smith. He’s now one of the founders of Appy Entertainment, which creates games for the iPhone.
Working from their Secret Worldwide Headquarters, and just in time for Halloween, the Appy boys have released Zombie Pizza. The game has you racing against the clock to make pizzas with disgusting ingredients - brains, guts, bones, eyeballs, etc. Fill the orders fast enough or your undead customers will smash through the restaurant doors and take a thick slice out of your head.
According to Ulm, Zombie Pizza is “a fast-paced, light-hearted horror puzzle game where lightning-quick reactions are all that stand between you and a grisly fate at the hands of the ravenous undead.”
Zombie Pizza is available at the iTunes store for just 99¢, about 1/4 the price of a regular comic book these days.
Click to continue reading Chris Ulm’s Zombie Pizza
Read More | Appy Zombie Pizza via Appy Entertainment
CHRIS ULM: The Ultraverse and Appy Entertainment
Posted by Tom Mason Categories: Video Games
Chris Ulm was the guy who came up with the idea of the Ultraverse. I should know - I watched him do it. When Bob Jacob merged his Acme Interactive with Malibu Comics and became co-president with Scott Rosenberg, he wanted some ideas about what Malibu could do in its post-Image Comics years. “And bring me steak, not sizzle!” he demanded like a little kid who wanted the biggest piece of birthday cake.
Ulm pitched a couple of ideas. One was “Hire Jim Shooter” (which the company almost did, 2 1/2 times over the years). The second was the idea that became the Ultraverse (though its working title was the Megaverse, until we discovered that it was already a trademarked universe). Ulm served as Editor-In-Chief of the Ultraverse and co-created Rune with Barry Windsor-Smith.
After Marvel bought Malibu Comics, Ulm and took a look at his employment agreement and realized he could do something else. He went north and jumped into video games at Oddworld Inhabitants (check out Abe’s Exoddus and Munch’s Oddysee!). After Oddworld, he went to work farther south and joined the game company Sammy which later spun off into his own High Moon Studios (where he worked on the Bourne franchise and created the Darkwatch vampire western video game). Last year, he stepped away from Sammy and with some of his Sammy pals, including one-time comic book writer Paul O’Connor, launched Appy Entertainment – a game company that makes applications, apps, for the iPhone.
Click to continue reading CHRIS ULM: The Ultraverse and Appy Entertainment
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