Monday News: Tiny figures with pipes and hammers edition

It's been some time since I've done any news but there's more than a few good reasons for it, of that you can be sure. Anyway, we're slowly making the transition over to the new title of Planned Banter though having to squeeze time away from work to do business cards and e-mail addresses and what-have-you is not a fast process especially the second time around. That's not going to stop me from yakking about all the stuff on the show that can't really sustain a conversation outside of more than two of us though.

Well, they didn't goof off when it came to the collector's edition it seems

One of the most legendary pieces of Vaporware finally appeared in real life as every territory excluding the US has already seen the release of Duke Nukem Forever. It drops here on the 14th but so far, the reviews have not been exceedingly kind as you can see here, here and here [Source: Joystiq, PC Gamer and IGN]

If you're in the mood for some positive press about the Dukester, you can head over to either Newton Gimmick's site Infinite Hollywood or to Poe Ghostal for reviews of NECA's action figure of him. I'll probably get one at some point if not just to pilfer his cigar for my Marvel Legends Thing and Nick Fury figures. [Source: Infinite Hollywood and Poe Ghostal's Points of Articulation]

More After The Jump

Tuesday News on the run

Well the news is on Tuesday this week because I was a total slacker and cruised around looking for toys on my day off. Generations Wheeljack is not going to find himself guys, ok?

So have you guys seen some of the stuff Lego's been putting out lately? Damn y'all. Just damn.

The closest we'll ever get to toys for John Christopher's Tripods Trilogy. Unless Gregor Jordan ever makes those movies. So yeah, the closest we'll ever get.

These Alien Conquest sets are just crazy. The higher end sets even have sounds! That's not even going into the craziness of the Pharaoh's Quest sets or even the really cool Pirates of the Caribbean series that just came out.

The inside of this thing is just ridiculous

On top of that, the Lego store online has some pretty sick exclusives including an entire village for the Castle theme and that amazing looking Emporium for the City sets pictured above. I'm coveting the Space Shuttle set they have on there as well; take a look in the store underneath 'Exclusives' and 'Hard to find' for more surprises like the Death Star set.  [Source: Lego]

I'm a long way away from the $100 for this though

Honestly if you really cared about the Muppets, you'd have seen through this immediately. Why? BECAUSE YOU'D HAVE BEEN FOLLOWING IT FROM THE GREENLIGHT.

 The trailer for The Muppets was attached to prints of Pirates of the Caribbean: On stranger Tides this weekend, but Disney's released it online for all you people who didn't make it to the theater this weekend. It was really funny to see Twitter blow up about it yesterday as everyone seems to be getting angry that you're revealing the "surprise" of the trailer by saying it's for The Muppets. Honestly, you can see a picture of Kermit in the background long before they show up and it's not like the casting of Jason Siegal and Amy Adams in the movie was some big secret. Anyway, it's a cute trailer that sells the idea to parents/adults but will likely cause kids to ask some questions where Elmo and Grover are. One of the kids at work asked me if Jim Henson was directing the movie which made me really, really sad; not for the unawareness but for the fact that I knew Henson died before the kid was even born. BLECH. [Source: Latino Review]

Please come out where I can watch you without having to convert a PAL VHS tape.

Speaking of movies, there's a few new shots from the CG Animated Asterix movie coming out over at Bleeding Cool, one of the few sites in English that seems to be covering the movie in any detail. I've got pretty high hopes for this; I've never been able to see any of the live-action Asterix films but the animated ones from before the 90's (basically stopping at Asterix and the Big Fight though please don't get me started on Asterix conquers America) were some of my favorite movies ever as a kid. Every time a friend of mine goes to Europe I always ask if they can bring me back The 12 Tasks of Asterix on Blu-ray. Anyway, this new film is being made by one of the studios that worked on Despicable Me and it's based on The Mansions of the Gods which was a favorite despite having a lot to deal with real estate humor. [Source: Bleeding Cool]

Hey look! It's the Infinity Gauntlet! I can't wait to get asked by a certain dweeb at work if the Cosmic Cube is related to it!

There's a few images from the Art of Thor book out now, including some detailed shots of the easter eggs in Odin's vault. I wanted to start picking up the books with the art of the Marvel Movies but the fact that The art of Iron Man was softcover and The Art of Iron Man 2 was hardcover was something of a deterrent. Maybe I'll start fresh from here despite the $50 MSRP. [Source: Comics Alliance]

As a followup to something we discussed on the show, Deadline has an article about how Pirates being in 3D actually might have hurt the grosses. As someone who works in a theater, I can say it's not just kids who hate wearing the glasses; I've had adults crab about that as well. Honestly, people don't seem to care about the price as much as they do the annoyance of running into 3D constantly; it's been obscenely overexposed and people are tiring of it in a big way. It's a lot harder to sell people on a movie they're already iffy on if it's in the format (trust me, I've tried) and no one seems to be learning from the atomic payload that was Mars needs Moms. Sure Gnomeo and Juliet did well but that was a freak accident resulting from a vacuum in the family market early in the year. They need to take 3D out of 5th gear as some people are starting to reject movies based solely on the fact that they have a release in the format (See most of Ebert's recent reviews).   [Source: Deadline]

Well that's all I'm going to be able to get out for now; the dark hand of work beckons to me and sadly, I must obey. The LMS isn't going to map itself for Hangover Part 2 and Kung Fu Panda 2; though I don't doubt that isn't something they're working on...

Monday News Cheap Thrills

[Source: NASA]

I've had a pretty busy day already, what with getting up to watch Endeavour launch for the last time and helping with some errands (as well as sneak a peek at the new Transformers 3 and Captain America toys); as a result, I've only been able to go through some (mostly) movie news so you're gonna have to deal.

The first trailer for the Fright Night remake is out and it's got a surprising amount of emphasis on the horror but not the comedy. Strange to me, in light of how I think of the old movie as being more funny than I do scary but I guess we won't really know until it hits in August, bravely battling it out for screens with Spy Kids 4 and Conan the Barbarian during a weekend I can only think of as being 3D-MAGEDDON(TM)! You get a good look at everybody excusing David Tennant as Peter Vincent; the focus is mostly on Anton Yelchin and Collin Farrel as the new Jerry Dandridge (or as my brother used to call him, Disco Dracula) [Source: Deadline.com]

In exciting poster news for movies I deeply hope do not turn out awful despite some questionable production choices, the first one-sheets for The Muppets and The Adventures of Tintin: the Secret of the Unicorn have appeared, part of the theater businesses continual attempt to lure me into hanging around forever. The former is ok I guess; I'm not blown away with evocative imagery but it does show the characters well which will hopefully get kids asking their parents about them. I find it funny that the only picture anyone's got of it has that lens flare as people are mistaking it as part of the poster; I already have some on the way to work so I'm amazed that no one else has a better image yet since we usually get stuff last (if at all). As for Tintin, I'm already highly covetous of both versions though I admittedly prefer the international version, pictured below.  The US is getting really screwed over as the international Thor posters were a damn sight better than the domestic final, something I will never let go. The domestic version is here though ignore Harry's commentary as he's an idiot. I'm really excited to see anything from Tintin despite disliking the majority of it's cast (yeah you heard that right) and being iffy on how the characters have translated from those pictures in Empire last year. Still, everyone's talking about the Tintin posters on most of the sites I've seen with varying levels of accuracy/excitement. A special credit goes to Nordling at AICN for actually admitting he knows nothing about the source material. I appreciate your honesty! [Source:  Ain't it Cool News]

Cool... sure wish I got a shot at one Paramount

Speaking of cool stuff that totally relates to the movies that I never get to see despite working at a theater, here's a look at one of the SHIELD Field Agent Test Kits that Marvel and Acura were using to promote Thor. Sure, it comes as part of a story about how it was mistaken for a bomb but that's a little cathartic for me since I'll never have one. [Source: Comics Alliance]

Takara announced what the 10th Masterpiece Transformer was going to be: a new mold of Optimus Prime, trailer included this time and meant to better fit the scale of MP Rodimus and Starscream. Where that leaves MP Megatron and Grimlock, I'm not sure; if they want to redo Megs though I'm definitely not going to protest as mine has the tarnishing issue on top of how he's the weakest of the Masterpiece TFs. In the meantime, I'm hoping Hasbro gets their act together and puts out the MP Rodimus and Thundercracker, all features intact; not looking forward to springing $200 on the new Rodimus 2.0 that was just released. Anyway, the irony of how this comes out after the original MP-01 Prime mold was highly touted as being retired is not lost on anyone. One thing's for sure though: I'll be glad to finally have an Optimus with a trailer! I may even import him so I can have my highly illegal long smokestacks... [Source: Seibertron.com]

Ruminating on ridiculous US toy regulations aside, I'm done for now; I have to catch up on the sadly canceled The Chicago Code before trying to squeeze some enjoyment from my precious, precious day off. Don't worry though: I'm sure some jackass will send me into a rage at work tomorrow for your guys future enjoyment on the show.

Monday News Void: Mostly Comics Edition!

It's been a slow week for entertainment, what with everyone bracing for the release of Thor. Jaysun gave you some of the skinny on what kind of numbers we're looking at for the Odinson's first real media endeavor yesterday but I'm going to try and resist giving away what any of us thought (other than that it was excellent and you should see it) while giving you a little news. 

I have a love/hate relationship with Ain't it Cool News; they have some excellent contributors with good reporting or insightful opinions. They also have Harry. Anyway, Nordling went to visit Pixar and talk to John Lasseter, lucky guy that he is. There's some cool pictures and a little bit of info on what we should expect Cars 2 to feel like in comparison to the first one. [Source: Ain't It Cool News]

Hey! Speaking of AICN, they also write that F. Gary Gray is directing The Last Days of American Crime! What's funny here is they forget to mention it's based on a comic by Rick Remender and Greg Tocchini; I've never read it but I remember when it was released a few years ago. I also seem to remember an episode of Word Balloon where Remender was talking about it being optioned. Remender's a writer I have virtually no experience with, though I hear great things about Fear Agent and people seem to be enjoying his run on Venom with Tony Moore. The only comic I ever read by him was a 2 issue fill-in on Booster Gold and I don't want to get into that here; maybe I'll save it for if we do a Book of Whatever on something by him. [Source: Ain't It Cool News]

I'm sure many of you have seen, but for those unaware, Mattel announced their SDCC exclusives, somehow expecting AOTS to give them enough air time to feature everything when G4 viewers likely couldn't care less. Queen Marlena (with a pseudo-articulated Cringer) for MOTUC turned out to be the "figure with multiple parts" they hinted at, with the ability to change switch her into her Earth Astronaut outfit for those who care. A somewhat awkward looking Swamp Thing is the DCUC get for the year, coming with the now trademark roleplay item packaging. The middle finger for those of us who can't attend the con this time arrives in the form of a pair of Un-men for Swampy and a cardback variation for Marlena. They also showed a huge mixed-materials Staypuft Marshmallow Man but at $70 and questionable construction/playability I'm ducking out. There's a Movie Masters of the absolutely awful Kilowog design from Green Lantern and a 6-inch scale Voltron figure as well. I'd be in for Voltron if he fit with my Revoltech collection but there's something off about him I haven't examined yet; maybe it's because he's $30. Strangely, I find the POP Polly Pocket figures very endearing and the mystery of the Back to the Future item is intriguing despite it's already insane price point. [Source: Poe Ghostal's Points of Articulation]

Put this and the Silver Surfer back in print already! Also, mix up the variant dustjackets in both markets!

Bleeding Cool picked up on some interesting solicits for future omnibus editions and we all know I can't resist that sort of thing. Apparently the first Silver Age Avengers omnibus is already on Amazon which means it'll likely be out before the movie next year. Marvel's pretty sharp about doing omnibuses around what's being released as a movie so I wonder if this means that a second volume will be ready for next May; I love SA Marvel but there's a huge period of Avengers I often tell people is an acquired taste (namely the issues after Hank Pym rejoins as Goliath all the way until Hercules shows up as a member). This is following where the Fantastic Four by John Byrne and Amazing Spider-Man by David Michelinie and Todd McFarlane volumes were recently revealed earlier in the week among others, like a whole slew of 90's X-Men crossovers. Marvel's getting really aggressive about these editions which worry me that they're going to be going out of print that much faster now.

Anyone have a bibliography yet?

DC has a few as well though I'm not sure what the Spy Vs. Spy omnibus is going to contain that isn't already in the first softcover from a few years ago; I'm sure it'll have all the material by Prohias but I'm hoping there will be something new to better justify my temptation. Most of the DC omnibuses are much smaller at a similar price; these are more akin to Marvel's seemingly departed oversized Hardcovers of which I was so fond. The Absolute editions are likely the best counterpart for Marvel's omnibuses though neither of those explains why we don't have some fancy version of 52 yet. Either way, step the paper quality up DC and I may bite. [Source: Bleeding Cool News]

Anyone reading Batman Inc.? I haven't! I can appreciate some of the ideas that Morrison is working with though. That's neither here nor there though; the real news is that the Internet's foremost Batmanologist and recent Orccacast guest, Chris Sims has a cameo as a corpse in the upcoming Batman Inc. #6! [Source: Comics Alliance]

That's all I have for now; I'm off to watch yesterday's Game of Thrones while pretending I managed my time well today.

Oh, I'll pimp some stuff too. Because I'm shameless like that.

UPDATED! The Price's Are Alright- ORCCA Box Office Results Week One, and Top Ten Grossing Movies for May 6-8, 2011

     Greetings, salutations, and welcomes, this is Jaysun. This is the first installment of Summer Box Office Prediction Roundup Bonanza Game Deal...Thing. Starting with The Spectacular Summer Movie Spectacular on Friday, the members of ORCCA are predicting the opening weekend results of new releases throughout the summer, that would be the last weekend of May. Of course, we are not paid analysts (maybe I should be!) so this is super fun happy time for us, and since we don't follow sports, this is the closest we have to competition. As usual with an ORCCA fame, the rules are slightly more complicated than most prediction games and I will explain that here. Each week, for every wide release, a member of ORCCA will give an opening weekend gross prediction based on any factors that the estimator chooses. I, Jaysun, will record these numbers, and on that Sunday will give preliminary results based on Sunday morning estimates. These will hold until Monday night, when revised numbers come up and final tallies are made.
  This is the game part, everyone begins with 1000 points. If a member's estimate falls BELOW the actual gross, a point is deducted for every million dollars under the actual amount, rounded to the closest amount. If a member's estimate is HIGHER than the actual gross, two points are deducted from the score. Because, as we know from the Price is Right, it's better to be under than over in number prediction...mostly. If a member guesses the CORRECT amount (within $900,000 of the same amount i.e. if I guess Thor at 66 million, and it makes 66.9 million) than 5 points are ADDED to the score. Sometimes an entrant will choose not to predict an amount because they cannot get a handle on it, this is an automatic 5 point loss. Highest score on August 29th wins. Right now the game consists of Jaysun, Richard, Michael, and Chris. Marshall may choose to join next week at a handicap. And maybe a guest will play sometimes for exhibition. This will also be a Sunday post so you, our esteemed listeners, will have a great place to see box office results before you hear them at many other places. My sources will include Boxofficeguru.com, Deadline.com, and Boxofficemojo.com

So, GAMETIME!

Opening Points:
Jaysun- 1000
Chris- 1000
Richard-1000
Michael- 1000

THOR: 65.7 million (66)
Jaysun- 68 million: -4
Chris- 75 million: -18
Richard- 72 million: -12
Michael- 80 million: -28

SOMETHING BORROWED: 14 million
Jaysun- 12 million: -2
Chris-  12 million: -2
Richard- 12 million: -2
Michael- $1: -5

JUMPING THE BROOM: 15 million
Jaysun- 6 million: -9
Chris- $1: -5
Richard- 4 million: -11
Michael- $1: -5

New Scores and Rankings:
Jaysun- 985
Richard- 975
Chris- 975
Michael- 962

Jaysun is in the lead for now, not much difference yet, but by the end of May, expect some WILDLY divergent numbers.

So what was the Top Ten?

1. Thor: 66 million. Nearly expected by the studio. Don't see this as a sign that the public doesn't want to see Thor, they just don't know much about him or the stars. This opened on the same level as The Incredible Hulk, attendance wise. But Hulk is a MAJOR comic character, with a popular television series and cartoons, bigger stars as well. Marvel should see this as a major victory, much like Iron Man (with huge movie stars involved) opened near Spider-Man numbers. Trust me, the studio will be VERY happy with these numbers, and you should too. I expect better legs than Hulk, so a higher overall take.

2. Fast Five: 32.4 million. -62% drop. Pretty much expected, but officials on Friday night believed a $40 million weekend was possible. This feature had huge buzz from it's opening weekend, so this will more than likely be the biggest drop it takes during it's run. It's looking like a final of $190-200 million to me. Will make it the highest grossing in the franchise. Seriously, how many franchises get their second wind at movie 4, and movie 5 is the biggest? I will investigate this for our next episode, I expect not many but maybe a horror franchise.

3. Jumping The Broom: 15.2 million. Out of no where. But welcomed by the studio, Sony is DESPERATE for profit. And this will make it, it's budget was in the 6 million dollar range, so it's already doubled. A good standard to see is if a movie triples it's budget, it enters profit (with advertising and distribution costs factored AFTER budget). Good for it though, good counter-programming. UPDATE: Huge 2 million difference in estimates vs. finals. WTF Rentak?!

4. Something Borrowed: 13.1 million. Yea, not much to say or see here. Average opening. Kate Hudson can't sell movies, can't and won't happen.

5. Rio: 8.5 million. -43% drop. This is not taking in as much as I and many others thought. It had a decent opening, and a great second weekend, but since then has not been too kind.

6. Water for Elephants: 6.1 million. -35% drop. This is performing as I expected, solid but not great. Just too early in the year for it. September or October would have been a benefit for a movie like this. Looks to end at around 52 million.

7. Madea's Big Happy Family: 4.2 million. -58% drop. So, not even the Madea movies can pull what they once did. Big drops week after week, I believe it is time for Mr. Perry to enter a new phase of his career, his movies have saturated the market and people are waiting for them to be on television by now. Two movies a year is silly. To Tyler Perry- Of course your studio wants them quickly, they have to think in short term, since you make profits. But it is killing your name and brand and integrity. Slow down, make it on your terms. There are TONS of movies, not every director needs a movie a year to be remembered, those days are long gone.

8. Prom: 2.2 million. -53% drop. Why was this a theatrical release again? Keep it on cable movie of the week. Know the difference.

9. Soul Surfer: 2.3 million. -32% drop. Wow, this movie over performed. No expectations can do that though. Congrats to the team behind this, filmmaker and marketers. Sony needed this to break even very badly, and might end up making a little money after home video release. Cool poster too.

10. Hoodwinked Too!: 2 million. -50% drop. HA! Sorry, that was mean, I will giggle under my breath from now on. Look, 50 million (well 51 if I remember) from the first movie is good, but it was released in JANUARY of 2006. It had no competition. Do kids want to see crappy animation at the same time Rio and Rango are out? Have a brain people. Yes, it is intentionally crappy looking, but that's why releases in dead months would work. Plus advertising was non existent for this. Quick, painful death for this movie, and franchise. Don't expect overseas to help much.

Concluding the first Box Office post of the summer season. Congrats to the winners, and sorrow for the losers. Or something like that. Remember to check back on MONDAY for updated numbers and scores, as it will not be the top post of the day. We will, of course, discuss the results on the next episode of ORCCAcast, and follow on Twitter for updates during weekends. Happy Mom Day! You know who else' day it is? MY MOM!!!!

S7: Spectacular Summer Movie Spectacular 2: Reloaded Quickening Boogaloo Harder

It's summertime and you know what that means, gonna go out to the theater gonna watch some movie things, gonna make up guesses and hope our list is right...

Forsooth! The solstice hath (almost) ended! Summer is finally here and for the second year in a row where going to go over what's coming out and how we think it's going to do in the grand scheme of the ever important movie industry; week by week you'll get all the cheers and jeers we think are appropriate for a quarter where Marvel and DC will be tested as brand names,  3 huge sequels open practically on top of each other and 3D inundates most of the releases. You'll laugh! You won't cry! You'll laugh again when you hear some of my predictions! Listen and thrill for yourself! (TM)

Monday News Desperation

So, in my eternal quest to keep this thing timely as well as not consume too much of my time with extraordinarily verbose normal entries, I’m once again going to bring you some exciting news that hopefully you’re not already too aware of. Let the regurgitating commence!

You guys have listened to Episode #48, right? Since I know you did, you heard us talking about Sonic Generations and the plan (this year) for Sega to reinvigorate their mascot franchise. Some interesting details emerged that we didn't have time to cover, the most striking of which is that 'Classic' Sonic will be speechless. I haven't gotten around to playing Sonic Colors on the Wii but apparently Generations will be taking some of it's cues from it. Despite hearing Colors is a quantum leap in quality over any Sonic game in the past decade, I pretty much hear that every time there's a new Sonic game. Either way, I'll be waiting for the inevitable reduction to $10. [Source: TSSZnews.com]

Blink and you'll miss him

There's been a lot of talk lately about John Constantine returning to the DC Universe proper but Bleeding Cool got the straight skinny from Peter Milligan at the Hellblazer 25th anniversary panel. The Vertigo character, aging in real time for his 25 years, will remain that: a Vertigo character. Rather the version showing up in the mainline DC books will be a separate entity so all the Constantine and DC fans can have their cake and eat it too. Why John gets the special treatment of multiple incarnations while other Vertigo characters entering Earth-1 have had new projects canned remains a mystery to me; I suspect it's because the real time aging is too difficult a mechanic to address for them. Either that or it may be that Hellblazer is the longest running title at Vertigo. Constantine has actually had a few DCU cameos over the years after the Vertigo split, most recently at Green Arrow’s bachelor party, so that may have played a little into the decision as well. [Source: Bleeding Cool News]

For those of you out there that use the Playstation Network, I'm sure you've been riveted by all the crazy developments related to it's total inability to work recently. Sony has copped to the fact that it was an external attack on their network but full details about what's been affected have yet to emerge. Personally, I'm not sure what to think of this whole thing; I'm sure there's some hacker out there who just can't wait for all the kudos he'll be getting at DEF CON though. [Source: PCworld.com]


Hey let's talk about something only I care about! Or at least something where I'm the only person I've met who cares!

Viz Media LLC recently had a stealth announcement that the manga Gin Tama would cease its English publication after volume 23, one that we're only aware of because that volume has 'final volume' printed on the back. Since the series is currently at 39 volumes and counting, I imagine you can see my disappointment. I never expected to get anything fancy here, like the light novels, but the halt of the manga is a worrisome development in the eating-itself-from-inside-out American fandom. Gin Tama actually outsells 20th Century Boys, the title I referenced last week, but it seems safe because of Eisner prestige. Anyway, there's a surprising (to me at least) number of YouTube videos of people railing against Viz so someone else out there cares. Just don't misdirect your fury guys and remember the real enemy: the shrinking global marketplace brought on by you know what. 

The Avengers starts shooting today if you hadn't already heard from every news outlet on the planet. I'm thrilled, you're thrilled, we're all thrilled. But with that in mind, I thought I'd leave you today with something that left me less than thrilled: the final poster for Thor

Sorry, it's a slow news day