MooUA-Ha-ha-hA!

COVER BY: ALEKSI BRICLOT
WRITER: BRIAN MICHAEL BENDIS
PENCILS: BILLY TAN
LETTERED BY: COMICRAFT

Having produced universe shaping crossover event after event over the last few years, Marvel Comics have at best become deep, rich and insightful and at worst convoluted and/or confusing - mostly the previous I’m happy to report.

While important events such as House of M, Civil War, Annihilation and now Secret Invasion have rewritten the rules on the Marvel (616) Universe, some fans are too intimidated to jump back into this beautiful technicolor Soap Opera for fear of feeling lost or out of touch wthin a familiar environment. Such a pity. While Marvel has consistently produced a plethora of high quality source books and free one shots that bring new readers up to speed as best they can, I recommend curious readers do like we used to when we were (robo) kids - pick up a comic and read the fucker - you’ll figure out the score eventually.

Needless to say, New Avengers is one of those consistently great books that is very much at the epicenter of the major goings on in the Marvel Universe right now and is a great place for new readers to start. Probably the best consistent example of the “Post Civil War” Marvel landscape.

With the Secret Invasion in full swing and Scrulls infesting nearly every power structure in the world - New Avengers 46 delves into their (attempted?) infiltration of the Hood’s Criminal Syndicate while delving deeper into the Hood’s demonic origin and powers. Bendis has done great job of developing this b-lister into a real force to be recconed with and with the events of issue 46, I get the feeling that he will only continue to get bigger and badder.

This one is very much worth your $2.99 and as always provides a close and interesting tie in to the Secret Invasion saga. Huge props for the last page of this issue featuring one of my favorite often overlooked baddies in the mighty Marvel Pantheon - when this guy shows up, you know some serious shit is about to go down. It also leads me to believe that if the Scrull’s will truly be defeated (which I don’t think will be the immediate outcome) the baddies may have a much larger role to play than I previously thought.

Find it at your local comic book store today folks.

Well, surfing the beloved internet I stumbled across the most amazingly cool jack-o-lantern site that also proves that not only do I have too much free time, but pumpkin carvers do as well…

All we need now is a Arnold pumpkin…

Some of us robots get together now and then and put together short films in our spare time. This one was put together in about five hours, we got less then 200 hits on youtube, So we are posting it again! Why not.

It’s funny.

It'll take more than big ol' boobies and magic pony's to float this boat.

Was it the hype, the drastically different art style, the sporadic release schedule? Or was Ultimates 3 simply a bland an convoluted story that was crushed under the weight of our impossible expectations? I’m not sure, but I’m sorry to say that developing Ultron into a full fledged villain was maybe the only highlight that I can recall at the moment. I have to say that the wind has been taken out of my sails as we “March on Ultimatum” - or rather, shuffle, mosey, shamble, or at best - stride on Ultimatum. Seriously, did I miss something or was the payoff really just Magneto getting really mad and Dr. Doom stealing a sinister photo-op?

Am I alone in this sentiment? Because as i look back through the last decade of Ultimate Marvel goodness and often greatness, I see events far more epic and exhilarating story arcs that could have and maybe should have functioned as the universe wide turning point that Ultimatum is intended to be. Ultimate Galactus and Ultimates 2 come to mind first and maybe the zombie stuff in Ultimate Fantastic 4 - If you haven’t read them yet, you are missing out on some super-hero gold - Perfect 10’s those ones. Ultimates 3 on the other hand, I’ll gratiously round it up to a 5.

Seriously lets take some inventory here examining only The Ultimates 1,2&3:

Captain America:

Volumes 1&2 - Single handedly disarms a nuclear missile - Kicks the Hulk’s ass after dropping a tank on him - Impales Nazi alien on the tip of a fighter jet - Kicks Hank Pym’s ass while 60 feet tall - Drops a couple dozen Shield agents in a cemetery after being shot with about 100 tranquilizer darts - “DO YOU THINK THIS LETTER ON MY HEAD STANDS FOR FRANCE!?” - Saves the world - twice.

Volume 3 - Plays dress up with T’Challa

Hulk:

Volumes 1&2 - Attempts murdering Freddie Prince Jr. - Drinks a truck full of beer - Destroys an armada of alien spaceships with his bare hands - Beats Nazi alien to a pulp, eats him and shits him out - gets blown up by an nuclear bomb - Steals a pair of pants from a fat man - Kills Abomination.

Volume 3 - (Cricket noises…)

Thor:

Volumes 1&2 - Battles entire Ultimates team - Destroys alien armada with a hammer - goes crazy - Summons an Asgardian army into battle - kills his brother - saves the world - drinks lots of beer.

Volume 3 - Bangs Valkerie.

You see where I’m going here, sure punches were thrown, people died stuff happened (sort of) but good God did Ultimates 3 ever come up short. I can only hope that Ultimatum provides a decent segue for Mark Millar to pick up the pieces next year and bring some order back to this here town.

Anyway - that’s just one bot’s opinion, what did you all think of Ultimates 3?

We’ve all seen movies like The Departed where a good guy has to go undercover and the world no longer appears as black and white as it once did. Its a great idea and has been used in many books and movies but, what happens when a villian has to go into witness protection and is stuck trying to be good day after day after day? Can you really live a normal life after years of knowing that rules don’t apply? What happens when two guys that have worked on some awesome comics and won all kinds of awards get together and try to think of something different? You get Icognito.

“Incognito is a project that I’ve been waiting to do for some time now,” said Brubaker. “Where Sean and I previously explored a good guy pretending to be bad and losing sight of the difference, Incognito is the flipside.  The story of a bad guy forced to be good, and what happens when he starts to go stir-crazy from the monotony of normal life.  It’s a dark look at good and evil and pulp and noir all in one hard-hitting package.”

If you don’t think this sounds fucking awesome, Marvel has been so kind as to give us a little preview of the awesomeness to come.

Yeah its awesome, but we are going to have to wait till December to read it.

What with the annihilation of the Ultimate Marvel Universe as we know it just weeks away, one must pause and ponder as to what will follow. And in an interview with Newsarama, fan favorite beer swilling Scottish socialist Mark Millar gives some insight as he preps to scoop up the ashes of Earth 1610 and tackle the “Most ambitious Ultimate title so far”. Ultimate Avengers will be a special event miniseries title the likes of Civil War/Secret Invasion which will encompass and affect the entire Ultimate Universe, expanding the (Super Villian) playing-field while consolidating actual published titles - Never exceeding 5, so why not collect them all?.  Lean, mean and never floundering, what else could you ask for?  Super secret A+ list artists forthcoming.  I’m crossing my fingers for Art Adams - even robots can dream.

If you don’t care about Millar’s return to the Ultimate Marvel Universe, you are hereby invited to never pick up a super-hero comic again. This is going to be great.

Mike Mignola's Hellboy

Hellboy as must watch TV? I think I’d set my internal alarms to show up for that. Still only an early stage rumor, but fun to imagine what could be. Would they stick with Ron Perlman? or do they get someone new for the TV version? I admit I didn’t realize that Perlman is closing in on 60 years old. He looks fantastic, and the makeup helps, but would he want to do heavy makeup on a daily basis? He also just started up on the “Sons of Anarchy” series for FX. We’ll monitor things and keep you posted.

I first became a huge fan of Illustrator Scott Tolleson after loving his illustrations and seeing his first ‘Dirty Detention Girl’ statue called Heather Hartlace. As an avid pinup art and statue collector, I immediately had to have it. The best part about it is that he’s planning to do a whole series of these pinup statues based on his sexy art. I’m hooked for all them.

Scott has also recently released a great vinyl toy called Tricycle Terror, as well as a very cool solid resin figure named Doc Von Block. It is in a limited run of just 25 and would be a great addition to anyones statue or vinyl toy collection.I had the great opportunity of meeting Scott at the Comic-Con last week. He is a very nice guy who even did a large sketch for me. You can see much of his artwork on his blog http://stolleart.blogspot.com/

Featured below is a sneak preview of his next Dirty Detention Girl which he was kind enough to let us take a picture of:

Stay tuned as we will be posting an interview with Scott as well as many other Cool Creators.