Those of you who spend all your time watching superhero cartoons made for tiny babies (and by that I mean me) may have noticed that there was a half-hour special late last year called LEGO Justice League: Batman Beleagured. If you missed it, it was a very blocky origin story for how Batman joined the Justice League, and it was actually pretty great -- especially the twist ending.
Now, it seems that they're following it up with a second special, and this time, it's about Bizarro arriving in Metropolis and doing... well, exactly what Bizarro does every time he shows up, which is screw things up on a catastrophic level and terrify the populace. And apparently, that's just the tip of a mixed-up iceberg that's going to involve an entire Bizarro League.
As regular readers will no doubt be aware, ComicsAlliance's most anticipated movie of 2015/ever is the upcoming live-action adaptation of the greatest glam-rock cartoon of all time, Jem and the Holograms. That said, there are a lot of rumors floating around about changes made in the transition from the small screen to the big screen. Some of them are interesting (possibly recasting Eric Raymond as a woman), some of them are worrisome (making an entire Jem movie without the Misfits), but they're all pointing at a Jem that's pretty different from the one we're used to. We just weren't quite expecting it to be this different.
As you can see from the video above, it seems like the live-action Jem has recast its stars as men who sing in Italian. So... that's unexpected.
Q: What's up with Rudolph's Shiny New Year? Is it so perfect there are no other New Years specials? -- @otherhoffman
A: I've talked about my pure, unconditional love for the various Rankin/Bass stop-motion Christmas specials in past columns, but let me tell you, "what's up with Rudolph's Shiny New Year" is a question I have asked myself on many occasions. I'm not sure if I'd call it perfect, but even stacked up against Santa Claus being raised by a lioness and fighting war against the goblins and an Ani-Magic redhead trying to seduce the Lord of All Vampires, it is downright bizarre.
Q: Why does everyone hate the "Christmas with the Joker" episode of Batman: The Animated Series? -- @tekende
A: You know, I'm not sure everyone does hate "Christmas with the Joker." I certainly don't, but then again, I can't really say that I like it a whole lot either. It's definitely one of those episodes that pops into mind whenever I start thinking of the worst episodes of the series, although it misses out on being the actual worst by a long shot. But that said, I don't quite know the reason why.
Q: What '80s or '90s cartoon do you think has the single best Christmas episode? -- @UncannyJay
A: Given the things I tend to write about in this column, it pretty much goes without saying that I absolutely love cartoon Christmas specials. I even wrote about a few of my favorites last year for ComicsAlliance, including the truly bizarre Christmas Comes to Pac-Land, in which a visit from Santa Claus makes it abundantly clear that Pac-Man's living nightmare of eating dots and being menaced by the vengeful spirits of the damned occurs on some kind of demi-plane that exists outside of the sight of God. That one has to be in my top three.
But beyond those three, there's definitely one Christmas episode in particular that I absolutely love: G.I. Joe's "Cobra Claws Are Coming To Town!"
I don’t really do escapism. It’s not that the media I consume isn’t described as such, nor even that I have something against the concept. I just rarely feel as though I….escape. I mean, I enjoy the books I read and the games I play. And I suppose they keep me from considering the quotidian details of my life as I engage with them. Like, no, in the most banal sense, I am not thinking about groceries as I play Portal. But there’s a power people invest in the concept of escapism—whether they celebrate or deride it—and I just never seem to get it. It’s not a big deal, really. It’s never a metric by which I measure anything. I shrug and move on.
This week, we're turning our attention to the only incarnation of the Teen Titans that matters: Teen Titans Go, which has shown us an ideal version of the DC Universe where the heroes are mostly preoccupied with burritos and where Batman bros down with Commissioner Gordon instead of fighting any actual crime. But who are the best guest stars? Watch and see!
Though 'Batman: The Animated Series' had its share of action figures back when it was on the air, the collectibles could hardly be considered more than children's toys. This year, to celebrate the 75th anniversary of Batman, DC Collectibles went back to the animated well for a new series of figures based on the now classic Bruce Timm designs.
Incorporating characters from the original 'Batman: The Animated Series' as well as the under-appreciated 'The New Batman Adventures', the figure line's aesthetic (more articulation and accessories, as well as a higher price point) is geared towards the adult collector. This series is aimed directly at those who spent their afternoons after school patiently waiting to see the latest episode, and who are now old enough to have disposable income.
Forgive me Gloria Steinem, for I have sinned: I love sexy anime. Panty and Stocking. Kill la Kill. The Woman Called Fujiko Mine. If it has booty shorts and the slightest patina of satire, I’m not just on board—I’m conducting the train. So of course I loved Sidera, a newly released short created by French team Catfish Deluxe and Japanese studio Yapiko Animation for the movie Lou! Journal Infime.
Listen, it's hard for me to get excited when comic book characters I love show up in mass media. I mean, I saw a movie this summer that just threw a hundred foot-tall, Jack Kirby-designed Exitar the Exterminator into a cameo for giggles, so just hearing a name that I recognize isn't enough anymore. In other words, I'm jaded as heck. Or at least I thought I was, until I found out that Carrie Kelly is going to show up in next week's episode of Teen Titans Go! and promptly lost my sugar.
If you've been following the show, and you should be, you may have notice that the Titans are actually pretty lazy and very rarely do any actual crimefighting, which is probably why Robin has another team made entirely of Robins.
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