A MAN CALLED SLOANE Revisited

A few years back, I started a separate blog for my interest in over-the-top spy films and television shows, the not-so-cleverly-titled Spy-Fi Channel. I posted a lot of stuff there in 2009, but over the next few years, as my interests turned more toward my 70s sci-fi nostalgia and the Space: 1970 blog, the spy site sort of slowly died. In fact, it was one of a couple of blogs that I gradually stopped updating - like my Guns In The Gutters site, devoted to my reviews of crime comics.

Anyway, I've been thinking I needed to a.) update this site more often and b.) clean up my online presence, so I'll be taking both of those zombie blogs offline. However, because I did put a lot of work into the material on those sites, I'll be taking some of that content and re-posting it here. This means that this site (which also has, much to my dismay, been too-infrequently updated of late) will be somewhat more lively in the coming months as I mix in a bunch of my spy-fi-related material (and crime comics reviews!) with any new personal and pop culture topics that may catch my fancy.

Which brings me to A Man Called Sloane.

A Man Called Sloane was a half-season adventure series that aired on NBC in 1979. It starred Robert Conrad (The Wild Wild West, Baa Baa Black Sheep) as Thomas Remington Sloane III, the (only) Top Priority agent for a secret organization called UNIT. Though the format harkened back to the 60s and shows like The Man from U.N.C.L.E., it was still very much a product of its time, with ludicrous plots, lots of cheesecake, and Conrad's patented macho swagger. Needless to say, I loved it as a kid.  Back in '09, I got my hands on a set of bootleg DVDs and reviewed all twelve episodes of the show. That represented a lot of time and work, so rather than let those posts disappear into the digital aether, I'll be re-running those reviews here over the next few months.

Of course, I'll be editing them a bit and adding a few new thoughts and observations (as I've watched most of the episodes more than once now). I even plan on writing at least one new article for the series, as I never reviewed the original T.R.Sloane TV pilot film (a/k/a Death Ray 2000), which starred Robert Logan as superspy Sloane.

As I mentioned above, it won't only be reruns here; I'll be getting back to posting those "Wednesday Covers," and will almost certainly have a Halloween post or two. I'll also continue to keep you updated on my various comics projects and will continue posting about cheesy B action movies, comic strips, etc.

Look for the first Sloane review on Monday.

Three Years In SPACE

My 1970s sci-fi nostalgia (or, as I prefer to call it: pop culture archeology) blog, Space: 1970, just celebrated its third anniversary. Three years of  writing about the science fiction films and television shows - and related memorabilia - of the 1970s and early 80s (closing rapidly on 700 entries now)... and people seem to like it. Stop by if you get a moment.

Space: 1970 in GEEK Magazine

One of my other (and more popular) blogs, Space: 1970, has received a positive, brief write-up in the latest issue of GEEK magazine, a very slick publication on newsstands now.

I find it interesting that they refer to the "retro-hipness" of the site, when the material I cover over there certainly wasn't considered very "hip" or cool when it was new. I got called lots of unpleasant names ("geek" being among the least offensive) back in the 1970s for liking that stuff. I also got beat up on occasion and had lots of comic books, Star Trek paperbacks and Starlog magazines stolen from me and torn up in my face. More than a few adult authority figures berated me for my interest in science-fiction and other escapist entertainment, calling me stupid for wasting my time with it.

It's nice that I've lived to see a day when there is such a thing as "geek culture," when Star Wars and Star Trek are undisputed mass-market, mainstream entertainments and big-budget super-hero films have become Hollywood's most anticipated blockbusters. And it's way cool that my own silly little ramblings online are considered a notable (or foot-notable) part of that pop cultural shift.

Still, it would be nicer if I hadn't had to get beaten up so much back then....

Just a quick note to remind folks about my Space: 1970 site, a 70s nostalgia blog devoted to the sci-fi movies and television shows of the polyester decade. Space: 1999, Battlestar Galactica (the original), Quark, Logan's Run, Star Wars, Buck Rogers In The 25th Century - all of these are covered at Space: 1970, along with many more shows and films.

I've seen a huge increase in traffic over there since New Years, and I've been posting new stuff there almost every day. If you grew up during the 70s - or just have an interest in / fondness for the genre - you should check it out.

New Blog: Movie Poster Vault

My wife and I love movies... and movie posters. And I thought it would be fun to collect scans of amazing movie poster art on a site for our own enjoyment. But we wanted there to be some sort of unifying theme, so we decided that we would only post the theatrical posters for movies we actually own on DVD, Blu-Ray or Laserdisc. As we possess over 3,000 titles... and counting... this may take a while. Especially since we only post a batch of posters to it every once in a while.

If you've ever been curious about what my video collection looks like, well, the Mills Movie Poster Vault should give you an idea of the variety of films that my wife and I (though most of the posters so far are from movies that are more "mine" than "ours.") have collected. 

I probably should have set it up on Tumblr, since it seems to be a more image-oriented service, but I'm used to Blogger, so I set it up there. Check it out if you're interested.

Atomic Pulp Updates

Hey folks - just a reminder: any news items about upcoming Christopher Mills comics or other projects are posted at my constantly updated Atomic Pulp homepage.

I've been really busy the last few months with professional and personal work, so I haven't been posting much here, but anything important that comes up - like appearances, books being solicited or released, or new projects being announced - will be posted in a timely manner on my homepage, so check in there often.

Thanks - and I hope to get back to my usual pop culture ramblings here soon!

And don't forget that I publish DVD & Blu-Ray reviews regularly at my DVD Late Show website, and have been very active at my 70's sci-fi nostalgia blog, Space: 1970.

Monday Morning Musings

Been a damned busy month. The biggest thing was building and launching my new DVD Late Show 2.0 website, especially the finding, revising and re-posting of over 350 reviews, dating back to March of 2005. I think I've got nearly all of the DVDLS reviews up now except for about a dozen that need more extensive reformatting. And, of course, I'm trying really hard to keep new reviews coming on a weekly basis.

If you haven't been by the new site yet, please take a few minutes and drop by. There will be at least five new reviews posted on Tuesday, and I'll be announcing the first new free DVD giveaway of 2010 the same day.

I'm also busting my ass to try and wrap up any outstanding writing commitments before Spring. I'm determined to get ahead on the Kolchak comic and wrap up the short stories I've been asked to write in the next few weeks. Then, hopefully, I can get going on some new projects that have been percolating, both creator-owned and work-for-hire.

Anyway, health-wise, I'm doing better than usual, and have lost ten pounds or so since New Year's. The house is cold, the pets are fine. Financially, things are still pretty crappy, but the wife and I are taking some steps to rectify that, and, if all goes well, things should be getting better on that front this year, too.

I actually managed to get out to the theater last week to see Sherlock Holmes with Robert Downey and Jude Law. Overall, I liked it quite a bit; a few quibbles, but nothing major.

I found a theater in the area that's showing Avatar in 3-D, so I'm hoping to persuade the wife to go with me to see it this week or next. I'm really not all that excited by what I've seen and heard about it, but if I'm going to see it, I at least want to see it in 3-D.

Not much else to report. If you're on Facebook, look me up.

DVD Late Show 2.0

After five years of posting my DVD and Blu-Ray reviews at other sites - first at filmmaker Kevin Smith's Movie Poop Shoot, then Quick Stop Entertainment, and, most recently, at Forces of Geek - I have finally decided to publish them exclusively on my own, dedicated website. As of Monday, DVD Late Show Version 2.0 will officially "launch" at www.dvdlateshow.com.

Now, the official launch date is Monday, but the site is "live" now. On Monday there will be a slew of new reviews, however, including looks at the Blu-Ray releases of the technochiller Hardware, the T&A classic Screwballs, Mike Judge's Extract, and the sci-fi horror film Pandorum. And maybe more. :)

There are a number of reasons for this. Among them is a general dissatisfaction with how the "column" version of DVDLS had evolved, and the fact that it didn't really seem to fit in stylistically with the other features at FOG. Also, I confess that I had trouble maintaining the regular schedule. One reason for that was my self-imposed requirement to have a certain word count per installment, and sometimes it took too long to get the necessary number of reviews done to fill a column. Sometimes, there would be a drought of review material, which also made keeping the schedules difficult to keep. And, finally, sometimes I had more pressing assignments that had to take priority over the unpaid gig.

Well, no longer. In the new incarnation, I will be posting reviews as they are completed rather than waiting to fill out a column, which means more frequent overall updating. I will also be free to include Amazon links for the convenience of my readers, in case anyone wants to purchase the reviewed titles. And most importantly, I will be able to archive all my DVD Late Show reviews - several hundred of them, going back to early 2005 - in one place. This last one is very important to me; those reviews represent a whole lot of hours' investment, and I didn't like the fact that the earliest ones were effectively lost.

I am currently moving all of those reviews to the new site. I have over 130 in place now, and I have a lot more to go, but I'm getting there!

PLEASE check out the site, and if you find it entertaining and/or helpful, bookmark it, and make it a regular stop. Spread the word, link to it. If I'm going to need a lot of traffic/hits to make it feasible and keep it going. (This also means pretty much no more DVD reviews on this blog, though I'm sure I'll continue to cross-post on occasion.)

Thanks, guys.

Here's the LINK again.

New FEMME NOIR Review

Yep, even at this late date, people - or at least this guy - are still writing about the Femme Noir: The Dark City Diaries paperback collection.

In an industry that seems to rate it's heroines less on how badass they are and more on how little they wear, Femme Noir is a welcome breath of fresh air. She's a lady who'll kick your ass five ways from Sunday, can shoot blazing, twin-pistol death with the likes of the Shadow or the Spider, and doesn't have to dress like the Phantom Lady to battle evil.

Thanks, Stacy!

Oh - and since this is my shameless self-promotion blog (see, it says it right up there in the header): It's not too late to treat the mystery or comics fan on your Christmas list to a copy of the Femme Noir trade paperback! It's still available from Amazon and In-Stock Trades, among other dealers.

And, as I've mentioned before, my friends in marketing keep telling me that nothing helps sell books these days more than positive reviews at Amazon. If you've read and enjoyed the book already, I'd appreciate it if you took a moment to post a short review on the Femme Noir product page.

As for those of you who have already done so, please know that you have my gratitude.

Yet One More Blog....

Yes. It's true. I have created yet another blog devoted to one of my many pop culture obsessions. A new addition to the "Atomic Pulp Network." This one is a bit different, however, as - for now, anyhow - I have no intention of writing anything new specifically for it.

It's called Cheap Thrills, and it's a one-stop archive for any and all reviews I have written of classic cliffhanger movie serials on DVD. The items there are all recycled from my DVD Late Show column (and, in some cases, blog posts you've already read here), so it's not essential reading for anyone. But - if you're interested in old serials on DVD and want to easily read one fan's opinion of some of the titles available... well, you'll find them here.

Now, I said above that I won't be writing anything new for the blog, and that's true. But, I do still have some old reviews in my files that I'm polishing up and will post on the site eventually, and any new articles I write of discs I receive in the future will also be posted there as well as in my column. For the time being, though, it's strictly a dedicated archive.

So... check it out if you want. :)

New Blog - Space:1970

Because it turns out that I like having specific forums for specific pop culture obsessions, I've started up yet another blog. This one's called Space: 1970 and is dedicated to the sci-fi films and television series of the 1970s.

Stuff like Star Wars, Space: 1999, the original Battlestar Galactica, Space Academy, Jason Of Star Command, Buck Rogers In The 25th Century, and The Planet Of The Apes were hugely important to me as a kid, and while I have written about some of that here at Atomic Pulp, I discovered with my Spy-Fi Channel blog that sometimes it's preferable to have a special place to write about a single subject.

So, in any case, if you're interested in that kind of material, I hope you'll check it out.

New Blog: Spy-Fi Channel

Yeah, so, I've created yet another blog that I won't post to nearly as often as I'd like to. This one's devoted to one specific fanboy obsession (of many): my love for spy movies and fiction, or as I generally refer to it, "Spy-Fi."

It's called Spy-Fi Channel, and like the Guns In the Gutters blog, it will be updated on an highly irregular schedule, as I feel like I have something to say on the topic. To kick it off, I've cross-posted some older posts from this site – the Lightning Bolt and Return of The Man From U.N.C.L.E. DVD reviews, among others – but I've also started writing about individual episodes of the old 1979 Robert Conrad spy series, A Man Called Sloane, and intend to review spy fiction as well, beginning with the Alan Caillou "Ian Quayle" novels of the mid-80s.

Why another blog? Well, like my crime comics blog, it's a subject I like to write about occasionally and I wanted to have a special place to do so. It doesn't mean that I won't ever post spy-fi reviews and stuff here, because I probably will. But most of that material will be relegated to the new site. Of course, most likely, it will be like the crime comics blog, with infrequent bouts of prolific posting followed by months and months of inactivity. But, hey – that's me.

So, if you're interested, check out the new blog here.

Guns, guns, guns, guns!

I managed to make some time yesterday to do a little posting over on my Guns In The Gutters blog, so anyone who's still interested at this point, might want to swing over and check it out.

I was originally inspired to create that blog by Rob Kelly's vast array of specialized comics blogs, specifically, All In Black & White. Sadly, he's retiring that particular site, and it's motivated me to again make an effort to try and update mine more often.

I intend to post any news I come across about upcoming crime/adventure comics, including those that might be on their way to film. I've also got a handful of new reviews written and they'll be posted over the next few days.

I've no idea how long I'll be able to keep it up, but for the next week or so, anyway, there will be some new stuff there.

Brain-Fried

Sorry I haven't been posting much lately. Just sort been feeling sort of distracted and brain-fried and trying to finish up some stuff.

I did get my comp copies from the printer of Femme Noir: The Dark City Diaries #3 last Friday, though, so it should be on sale a week from Wednesday.

Anyway, while I may not have been posting much, my wife's been posting a lot in her new pop culture blog. Maybe you should check it out.

Just a thought.

The Lost Bond Theme

Over at Tim Lucas' Video Watchblog site, he has a fascinating post about the original, unused theme song for the independently-produced 1983 James Bond film, Never Say Never Again, which featured Sean Connery reprising his immortal role of Agent 007.

Personally, I've always liked NSNA – it's superior to most of the "official" Bond films of the era (even if it is a remake of Thunderball), and has a top notch cast, including Kim Basinger, Klaus Maria Brandauer and Bernie Casey. Granted, the pacing is a little too leisurely at times, but it's the uninspired (and uninspiring) musical score by Michel Legrande that really wounds it.

The song, which is vastly superior to the tune used, was composed by Stephen Forsyth and Jim Ryan and performed by Phyllis Hyman, and you can hear it here.

Lucas' blog (always a fascinating read) explains why it was replaced in the finished film by an inferior song by NSNA composer Legrande and singer Lani Hall.

Blogolution

Those of you who read this blog here, at it's own site rather than on a RSS feed like my wife, may have noticed that I've been tinkering a bit with the layout and features.

Nothing earth-shattering, but for a while I had neat little Amazon widgets over on the sidebar with direct links to some of my books, and a link to my Amazon Wish List. Well, after a short trial run, they're gone. Aside from the utter shamelessness of the Wish List's presence on my blog, the links to Amazon seemed to really slow down the loading of the page, and for me, anyway, seemed to cause my browser to lock up sometimes. Besides, I already have text links to Amazon in the "Buy My Books" section over there, so the widgets seemed to be overkill.

Today I added a couple of new widgets, though. I think these will be helpful to you guys, especially if you have any interest in what I may be posting over in my Guns In The Gutters or Planet X Production Blog. These widgets display the headlines of my most recent posts to those blogs, so you can quickly see from right here when I've updated them and whether the new post is of any interest to you.

Anyway, I'm sure I'll be tinkering with this site off and on indefinitely, but I wanted to mention these new features and get your feedback on them, if you've got any.

Winter Bloggin'

Brandi and I caught up with some recent movies courtesy of a discount coupon from Hollywood Video this past weekend. We saw Live Free or Die Hard, 1408, Stardust, Hairspray, and Shoot 'Em Up.

The fourth Die Hard was entertaining, but, like the other DH sequels, just didn't live up to the original. 1408, based on a Stephen King story, was disappointing and non-scary. Stardust, based on a graphic novel by Neil Gaiman and Charles Vess, was actually a pretty decent fantasy film, with a great cast and solid story. I can only assume it didn't do better theatrically because it didn't have any CGI talking animals for the kiddies or pop songs. Speaking of songs, Hairspray was a fun musical version of the 1998 John Waters film, with very good retro-60's tunes and a surprising performance by John Travolta in drag (in the Divine role). It's always nice seeing Christopher Walken dance, too.

My favorite of the batch, though, was Shoot 'Em Up – an hysterical action film spoof with Clive Owen. Imagine a live-action Bugs Bunny cartoon turned gun porn. I loved every ridiculous, over-the-top minute of it. I'm going to have to pick this one up for my collection.

Writing-wise, I expect to be extraordinarily busy over the next six weeks or so – I've taken on a bit more work than I can probably handle, and all of my procrastinations have caught up with me – so I may be kinda scarce in these parts for the next month or so.

Nonetheless, I'll still try and post here whenever I have a few minutes and can think of something to write about, and even moreso at the Guns In The Gutters site (which I'm determined to update at least once a week) and Planet X Production Blog, both of which have new material today, so keep checking in, okay?

Back in the Gutters

Just a quick head's up: after three months of neglect, I've just posted a new review over in my crime comics blog, Guns In The Gutters.

Today I take a look at the 70's Atlas/Seaboard title, Police Action #1, featuring the hard-boiled exploits of forgotten crimebusters Lomax, NYPD and Luke Malone, Manhunter (by Mike Ploog & Frank Springer)!

I'll be making an effort to post reviews over there more frequently; I'm currently working on articles about James Hudnall's criminally short-lived series, Shut Up & Die!, and the late 90's Acclaim Comics miniseries, The Grackle, by Mike Baron and Paul Gulacy.

Check it out!

Giant Monsters Attack!

I recently stumbled across a great new blog, Giant Monsters Attack!

Blogger "Mysterious Pants" covers everything from giant creature features both vintage and new (Godzilla, The Host, D-War, J.J. Abrams' upcoming, as-yet-untitled film), videogames, and even comic books (including a review of the new – and treasured – Devil Dinosaur Omnibus from Marvel). Whoever this "Mysterious Pants" guy is, he really knows his stuff and his enthusiasm is contagious.

I love these specialized pop culture blog sites, and GMA! is a lot of fun.

Check it out!