Have you seen Kick-Ass yet? If not, why the hell not? It’s an awesome movie and everybody should go to the cinema to watch it (see my review here). If you have seen it and thought it was as awesome as I did, you might want to get your hands on this movie/comic tie-in (actually… on second thought, you should go and get the comic first, read that, and then this).

Kick-Ass: Creating The Comic, Making The Movie is a gorgeous book about how both the comic and the movie were developed. Mark Millar mainly tells the tale of the entire process, but throughout the book you get snippets from tons of others who were involved in the comic or the movie. You get to read about the collaboration between Millar, Matthew Vaughn and Jane Goldman, how they created the movie script while the comic wasn’t even finished yet. How the casting went for all the different characters. And how the look for the movie and the comic was created.

Visually this book is full of eye candy. There’s early concept art for both the comic and movie, from costume design to set design (it’s fun to see the thought processes behind the difference between the comic and movie outfits of Big Daddy and Hit Girl). Pieces of storyboards and sketches. Photos of the sets and during the shooting. There’s tons of it.

I had as much fun reading this book, as I had watching the movie and reading the comic. It’s not a boring read at all, which admittedly a lot of movie tie-ins are. It’s great to discover what goes into making a comic/movie like this, yet how different it was because it was independently made without a studio. One thing though: there are spoilers in this book for the movie and the comic (specifically the differences in plot between the two); I suggest reading this once you seen/read both.

If you loved Kick-Ass as much as I did, then this book is a must-have for your library. It’s a great read, and something every Kick-Ass fan should own.

Kick-Ass: Creating The Comic, Making The Movie is available on Amazon.co.uk for £9.79 and on Amazon.com for $13.20.

Episode 166: “We built a wall, we built the pyramids”

I love singing along with TV theme songs; I still know the words to many theme songs of cartoons I used (Captain Planet, he’s our hero, gonna take pollution down to zero… ehm, but I digress). So this TV theme medley with 21 songs is just brilliant:

Do you recognize all the songs? Here’s the list:

0:01 Two and a Half Men
0:22 The Simpsons
0:36 O.C
1:00 Naruto
1:11 Family Guy
1:41 Married with Children
1:57 Cheers
2:16 That 70’s Show
2:41 Big Love
2:58 Freaks and Geeks
3:18 Malcolm in the Middle
3:35 X-Files
3:55 Firefly
4:09 The Office
4:24 The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air
4:44 Scrubs
4:54 True Blood
5:27 Charles in Charge
5:38 The Big Bang Theory
5:55 How I Met Your Mother
6:05 Mission Impossible
6:14 Friends

Via Collider.com

Most of you should have seen this trailer by now (it was a trending topic on Twitter last week when it was released), but for those of you haven’t I thought I’d share it with you to cheer you up this Monday morning. I’ve been looking forward to this movie for some time now and featured it in my Top 10 Most Anticipated 2010 Movies.

It’s about Scott Pilgrim (Michael Cera), a 22 year old bass guitarist for the band Sex Bob-omb, who meets the girl of his dreams Ramona Flowers (Mary Elizabeth Winstead). Before he can be with her though he has to defeat her seven evil exes. It’s directed by Edgar Wright who previously did Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz, so it’s sure to be fun!

Here’s the trailer:

Awesome, don’t you think?

Interesting links for March 11th through March 27th:

• Carey Mulligan Interview – Mulligan talks about (possible) upcoming projects like My Fair Lady, Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Effie and Never Let Me Go.
• Unreality – The Most Badass Alphabet Ever – Awesome alphabet! Just look at entry "J" to be convinced.
• Tron Legacy Set Interview: Jeff Bridges | /Film – We're still 9 months away from the release of this movie, but I'm already excited for it! Great interview with Jeff Bridges about the differences between this movie and its predecessor.
• Cecilie Harris Blog: Photographer editing challenge – Cool experiment where 19 photographers edited the same image. The result: 19 different versions of one photo.
• Ultimate sci-fi TV pilot guide: Your favorite shows of the future – Ooh, more sci-fi shows! While not all of these will be picked up, there are a couple of interesting-sounding ones among them I hope we will see.

I’ve always liked the idea of movies and comics telling different parts of the same story, but I can’t think of many that have pulled it off properly (the one that comes to mind that didn’t work was Southland Tales. That movie doesn’t make sense at all, but apparently you have to have read the prequel comic before it…).

With Star Trek we first got the sort of prequel comic that explained the events before the movie (but still set in the future). It worked out great, giving a more detailed backstory for the fans who wanted to hear more about it, without it being a prerequisite for the movie. Now a new graphic novel is being released titled Star Trek: Nero following the character of Nero and his crew in the time between the destruction of the USS Kelvin and the reappearance of the Narada in the new timeline (so pretty early on in the movie).

Thanks to the wonderful guys at Titan, I’ve gotten a couple of copies to give away to my dear readers! To enter fill in the form below with your details and answer the question “What is your favourite Star Trek show or movie?” (Don’t forget to hit the Submit button!) Sorry to disappoint my international readers, but this competition is UK only. Entries must be in before Tuesday March 30th 16:00.

I’ve never really watched the original (never had the patience for it), but have seen most of everything else. My favourite was Deep Space 9, despite never watching it completely, cause the Dutch channel it was on messed up the programming (showing episodes in the wrong order, going on breaks and then starting up again without any announcements, causing me to miss episodes… and no internet to find out what I was missing). I always thought I’d watch it properly once I had the time, but still haven’t got around to that. Birthday present idea for next year perhaps?

Predators: Starring Adrien Brody and Laurence Fishburne, this movie follows a group of elite warriors who come to realize they’ve been dropped on an alien planet… as prey. With the exception of a disgraced physician, they are all cold-blooded killers – mercenaries, Yakuza, convicts, death squad members – human “predators” that are now being systemically hunted and eliminated by a new breed of alien Predators. This looks like fun! I loved the first movie, and this sequel looks like it could be a worthy follow-up. Release Date: 9 July 2010 (US), 22 July 2010 (UK)

Bluebeard (Barbe Bleue): I love fairy tale movies, and this French retelling of Bluebeard looks great. The fairy tale it’s based on is pretty dark, and not the most obvious one to turn into a movie. Based on Charles Perrault’s tale, Bluebeard tells the story of young Marie-Catherine, child bride to an aristocratic ogre with a reputation for murdering his wives. Marie-Catherine must employ all her cunning to outwit her husband and escape the most unpleasant of fates.

The Last Airbender: I’m still not convinced by this yet; but then I’m so attached to the cartoon version of this, I might be a bit too bias to judge this properly. Like in this trailer, the main thing that annoys me is the voice of Aang. It’s completely not right! But yeah, I guess anyone who hasn’t seen the cartoon won’t have a problem with it. Release Date: 2 July 2010 (US), 13 August 2010 (UK)

Despicable Me: After 3 short teaser trailers, that didn’t really show that much, we finally get a full length trailer of this 3D movie. It looks like it could be fun, although I don’t think it’s something I’d go see in the cinema. Release Date: 9 July 2010 (US), 15 October 2010 (UK)

The Switch: A smart, fun-loving single woman (Jennifer Aniston) decides it’s time to have a baby, with a little help from a charming sperm donor (Patrick Wilson). But, unbeknownst to her, Kassie’s plans go awry because of a last-minute switch that isn’t discovered until seven years later when her neurotic best friend Wally (Jason Bateman) finally gets acquainted with Kassie’s cute–though slightly neurotic–son. Release Date: 20 August 2010 (US)

Megamind: After super-villain Megamind (Will Ferrell) kills his good-guy nemesis, Metro Man (Brad Pitt), he becomes bored since there is no one left to fight. He creates a new foe, Titan (Jonah Hill), who, instead of using his powers for good, sets out to destroy the world, positioning Megamind to save the day for the first time in his life. Hmm, based on the description it could be fun, but this teaser trailer seems a bit… simple. Release Date: 5 November 2010 (US), 3 December 2010 (UK)

A couple of weeks ago I was asked whether I’d like to try out the game Animal Kororo for the Nintendo DS. Sure, I thought, it looks a bit cutesy, but it’s a puzzle game and looks like fun. Surprisingly it’s actually a pretty tough puzzle game, despite the fluffy animals and pastel graphics.

Title: Animal Kororo
Type: Puzzle, Nintendo DS
Number of players: 1-2
Cost: £10-£20 (depending on where you get it)

Animal Kororo is a puzzle game similar to Bejeweled or PuzzleQuest, where you have to match up same coloured objects. Here those objects are cute fluffy animals; you’ll have pigs, blue polar bears, frogs and all other types of cutesy critters. The idea is to roll the animals across the board and make them bump into identical animals to make them disappear. It’s touch screen controlled, so it’s simply tap on an animal and send them rolling in the whatever direction you want. You can’t stop an animal halfway a roll though, once rolled it will continue until it bumps into anything (so wall, other animal or obstacle).

To make it even trickier (and believe me the above is already tricky enough), the directions you’re allowed to roll are always in the same order: up, right, down, left. On the right hand side of the screen, is a bar that shows you what  direction is up next. So it’s not just a matter of rolling animals when you want, but figuring out what the next roll is going to be.

There are three types of modes (Attack, Challenge and Battle), each with varying levels (Easy, Normal and Hard). In Attack Mode, you get a list of which and how many of each animal you have to eliminate (see the top line in the above picture). In Challenge Mode, obstacles appear to make the levels more complex. And finally in Battle Mode you can play against a friend through single or multi-card play. In Attack and Challenge mode you also earn points, which can be then used to purchase items for a virtual house. It’s a bit silly, but the creatures are soo adorable, it kind of makes sense they added the tamagotchi element to it.

Animal Kororo is a cute little game, yet surprisingly tricky. I know I’ll be able to waste a good number of hours on this while on the tube or plane. And the animals are cute!

Animal Kororo is available for £12.00 on Amazon.co.uk.

I keep coming across cool jewelry lately! This Geek necklace is cute:

It’s $29.50 on Etsy.

Via Wonderland

As I mentioned last week, the famous tennis star Jacques d’Azur went missing a couple of weeks ago. He was flying to his Tahiti home, where he set sail on his yacht ‘Bridgette et Anna’. The last reported radio contact from him was the message, but no further contact was made with him since. After an extensive search with no result, the mystery man of Cannes is now presumed dead.

His last will and testament included an heir to his lavish weekend at the Cannes Film Festival, but the name of the rightful heir on the will is illegible. Now an extensive search is under way to find the rightful heir to take Jacques’ place at this year’s Festival.

It could be anyone! Even you! Check out the details of the search to find out more information.

This blog post is sponsored by Stella Artois 4%.

Love this:

A striking shelving unit designed to maximize display areas through a variety of spaces. Irregular and asymmetrical shelving sections opens up the possibilities for a less traditional display of objects.

I think it’s more designed to hold ‘objects’. You know, one of those sitting room pieces for people that doesn’t actually contain that many books, but more “stuff”, like cases and pricey art? But still I can imagine having this bookshelf filled completely with actual books. The taller compartments would be perfect to larger comic books, or a stack of books on their side.

The downside? It’s $3975.