Mickey Spillane IS Mike Hammer... in HD!

On October 14th, Scorpion Releasing presents the 1963 film, The Girl Hunters, starring author Mickey Spillane as his own hardboiled P.I. hero, Mike Hammer, on Blu-ray and DVD. The Blu-ray version will be a limited edition and will be sold only on the Kino-Lorber website. It will feature a brand new 16x9, 2:35 HD master, as well as an audio commentary with Max Allan Collins, and vintage on-camera interviews with Mickey Spillane and Shirley Eaton (Goldfinger). MSRP for the Blu-ray is a hefty 29.95, while the DVD edition will retail for 19.95.

I am deeply annoyed that this will be an expensive Limited Edition online exclusive, but I'll have to get it anyway. I'm a big fan of the movie, and it'll be nice to finally have a quality video edition

Interesting note: back around '95, when I was working at TeknoComix as editor of the comic book series, Mickey Spillane's Mike Danger, I gave Mickey my personal VHS bootleg of this movie because he didn't have a copy and said he hadn't seen it in a decade or two!

Now, if only somebody could release the 1982 version of I, The Jury on Blu-ray...

Wednesday Cover(s): Chaykin's BUCK ROGERS

So, Hermes Press has just collected their Buck Rogers miniseries by Howard Chaykin. I didn't read the individual comics, but I pre-ordered it in trade, and expect it to arrive in a week or so. I don't always like Chaykin's comics, but when I do, I tend to like them a lot. In the 80s, I adored American Flagg, and the writer/artist is responsible for creating one of my all-time favorite comics characters - Atlas Comics' The Scorpion. I also dug his 80s Shadow miniseries (and will probably pick up his recent return to the character eventually), among many other titles.

I've read online that this version of Buck Rogers hews more closely to the original Philip Francis Nowlan pulp novellas, Armageddon 2419 A.D. and The Airlords Of Han.... and I think that's a great approach. Hey, I love the 70s TV series as much as anyone (and more than most), but it's about time to get back to the character's roots.

Here are Chaykin's covers for the four issue miniseries.

The Expendabelles: MERCENARIES Trailer

Here's the trailer for Mercenaries, The Asylum's distaff take on the uber-manly Expendables franchise. The trailer looks pretty good - promising, even - but as it's an Asylum picture, I'm not letting my expectations get too high. The studio hasn't had a great track record for quality in any genre, really, and has fared especially poorly with action fare (stunts are expensive).

Cool to see Brigette Nielsen as the Big Bad, though it is disappointing to see that Cynthia Rothrock appears to have a non-fighting role. I'm hoping that Zoe Bell and Kristina Loken can raise the bar here. It can't hurt that Zoe can do her own stunts.

We'll see....

James Garner, R.I.P.

Damn. I was just about to shut down the computer and head to bed when I read that James Garner has passed away at age 86. It's a shock: hell, it was only a month ago that I was reading his autobiography. 

Garner has been one of my favorite actors for as long as I can remember. His iconic portrayals of Bret Maverick and Jim Rockford are indelibly imprinted in our pop culture memory, and even if those were his only accomplishments as an actor, he'd be a legend. But he was more than that. A fine, thoughtful actor, a veteran, a charming curmudgeon. 

I miss him already.

Femme Noir Vs Grendel

My Femme Noir collaborator, Joe Staton, will be appearing at the Baltimore Comic-Con, September 5 -7. At the show, they’ll be distributing a charity Yearbook with art by the guests. Those artists with creator-owned characters were asked to draw them interacting with Matt Wagner’s character Grendel. This is Joe’s contribution, with colors by Matt Webb, pitting The Blonde against the Hunter Rose incarnation of Grendel, among the rooftops of Port Nocturne.

I’d love to see this crossover become a reality… but only if Wagner writes it.

Wednesday Cover: The City Outside The World

The City Outside The World is one of Lin Carter's Mars Novels, a four book cycle of  homages (or pastiches, if you prefer) of Leigh Brackett's own stories set on the Red Planet. It's also the only one in the series I don't yet own. Still, I'm featuring it here because I find this cover painting (by an artist I haven't identified as yet) quite handsome and evocative of the Interplanetary Romance genre.

A Birthday Comics Bounty

As I am not steadily employed, and comic book trade collections can be so pricey, I can usually only afford to get new comics twice a year - on my birthday and at Christmas (pending familial largesse). Well, my birthday was last week, and the family was very generous this year, so I hit Amazon and started carving away at my Wish List. This is this year's birthday bounty: two Astro City trades, the third (and final) volume of the great Russ Manning's classic Magnus Robot Fighter, The Rocketeer & The Spirit: Pulp Friction, and two Conan volumes (only one pictured above). Still have some catching up to do with those Dark Horse Conan books, though...

Of the comics I got in that Amazon order, I'm most looking forward to reading this one. DC has finally collected the 1988 four-issue miniseries Cinder And Ashe. This crime comic is one of the best things Gerry Conway ever wrote for the medium, and features utterly gorgeous artwork by Jose Garcia-Lopez.

I bought three of the four issues when it first came out, but could never find issue #4 (and I've searched a lot of back issue bins since '88!). 

I can't tell you just how eager I am to find out how the story ends... after 26 years!

And just to put some frosting on that comic book bounty goodness, I was surprised today to find yet another box of comics in the mail -- a package of books by my friend, comics writer Chuck Dixon, who very generously gifted me a bunch of his recent work, including a couple of G.I. Joe: Special Missions trades. Now, I've never really been a fan of the G.I. Joe franchise, but Dixon is a master at military-styled action adventure comics, and it turns out that these are drawn by Paul Gulacy, one of my favorite comics artists, ever... so I'm actually eager to check them out.

And speaking of all-time favorites, Chuck also sent along the first Airboy Archives volume from IDW. Back in the 80s, Airboy was one of my top three comic series (along with Grimjack and Scout), and I'd been wanting to get the new collections for my library, but was daunted by the cover price. 

What can I say? It's good to have friends, and while my so-called comics career has always been spotty, at best, it has made me a lot of good friends. Thanks, Chuck!