Zombie Dogs!

The Dead Live!

The story by itself is strictly scientific and intriguing, but the picture they include with the article title is terrifying.

Joker Casting

There's not a lot I can add to this news that isn't in the article I sourced it from, so I'll just come out and say it:

Sean Penn is rumored to be the one Nolan is pursuing to play the Joker in the next Batman.

AICN makes good points about this interesting bit of casting. The first is that Penn was introduced as the penultimate joker in Fast Times at Ridgemont High. The second is obviously that he has since lost his sense of humor so utterly that some believe he may function as a "black hole," actually drawing humor around him into his dark dense center where it collapses on itself.

The best example took place during the Oscars, at which host Chris Rock asked, "Why is Jude Law in every movie I go to see? He's playing gay, he's playing straight, he's British, he's American...!" To which Penn replied later, "Forgive my compromised sense of humour but I want to answer our host's question about who Jude Law is - he's one of our finest actors.."

It's a more interesting choice than more obvious choices like Mark Hamill or Crispin Glover, anyway. It's interesting the same way that Jack Nicholson must have been interesting, had I known who he was back when the first Batman was released.

Family Guy movie

This might be old news to some of you, but it was new to me.

The Family Guy movie about Stewie's true father is going to be released straight to DVD on September 27th.

It's always interesting to see if a normally 1/2 hour cartoon can sustain a premise for an entire 1.5 hours. What has happened with these sorts of attempts in the past? They pretty much just up the animation quality and write an "important" story, about cancer or losing your job or something, and introduce a lame new character. Why do that rather than three complete new episodes? Still, I'm curious to see it. It'll probably be a lot better than the Simpsons movie, anyway.

Thanks, AICN.

Batman Begins (2005)

Loved it! Very well done.

And it looks like they're completely recreating the Batman mythos on-screen. I wasn't sure if they would try to make them fit with the other Batmans (at least Burton's), but they've completely divorced themselves. And while they did alter a lot of Batman's back-story from the comics, it worked and I didn't mind.

I couldn't help but compare it to the Batman: Year One graphic novel by Frank Miller as I watched, and while that's still my favorite Batman story and characterization, Batman Begins stands solidly on its own two feet. (I would have liked to have seen Gordon as the bad ace he was in Year One, instead of the rattled and nervous Gordon of Begins. Oldman does a fine job with him, but his character didn't seem very strong. I'm sure he'll get stronger as the movies progress.)

Nolan gave a very good treatment of the villains. I can't wait to see what he does with The Joker. It will be interesting to see other reinterpretations as well, though I imagine he'll stay away from the more fanciful ones like the Penguin and Mr. Freeze. Villains more psychological in nature, like The Joker and Two-Face, will work well in this new universe.

Superman chucks a ball

Check out this video:

Sunset, Superman, baseball.

It's one of Bryan Singers' video diaries. Nice to see them using practical effects!

I made my own lemon cannon with the help of my physics teacher uncle, Jonathan. Mine runs on combustion and not compressed air, however. We use engine starter in a can. It's pretty dang fun, and my house in Carlsbad is ideal for it. We have a big canyon behind our house that we can fire into with impunity.

Mike probably remembers firing it. I remember that was the day he brought over his limited edition Ghost Obi-Wan, which is about as nerdy a memory as you can have. Do we balance out the nerdiness with our use of internal combustion cannons? You decide.