For my latest Nexus Graphica column, I explore my new found interested in the works of Jacques Tardi.

I discuss the reasons why the new Fantagraphics edition worked for me and how Tardi "managed to worm his way into my consciousness."

Check it all out at SF Site.

(The title of the piece comes from a Kim Thompson quote about Tardi. "I’d almost have to go outside the world of comics and say he’s maybe like the Martin Scorsese of European comics. ")

Considering the short month, lots of goodies coming from Netflix. Four classic Universal monster flicks, the only Michael Moorcock story ever filmed, several geek-oriented TV series, Hellboy, Benny Hill, and an excellent remake of a beloved 80s hit all make their premiere this month.

* denotes streaming for the first time via Netflix.

Premiering February 1:

*3rd Rock from the Sun: Seasons 1-5
The Amityville Horror (1979)
Amityville 3-D
Amityville II: The Possession
*And Soon the Darkness(1970)
The Avengers (1998)
Bedazzled (1967)
*The Best of Benny Hill
*Blood from the Mummy’s Tomb
*The Bride of Frankenstein
*Circus of Horrors
*Demons of the Mind
*Dreamcatcher (2003)
Enter the Dragon
*Fear in the Night (1972)
*The Final Programme (The Last Days of Man on Earth)
A Fish Called Wanda
The Good Son (1993)
*Martial Arts Master: The Life of Bruce Lee
*The Martian Chronicles
*Miracle on 34th Street (1994)
Night Watch (2005)
The Thaw
*The Towering Inferno
*The Wolf Man (1941)
*Wendy Wu: Homecoming Warrior
Xanadu

Premiering February 4:

Apollo 13
Breakfast of Aliens
The Golden Blaze

Premiering February 7:

*Superman/Shazam!: The Return of Black Adam

Premiering February 8:

*American Experience: Dinosaur Wars

Premiering February 11:

Amazon Warrior
The Champagne Club
Devil’s Gate (2003)
Freaky Circus Guy
*Ghost of Frankenstein
Gulliver’s Travel (2006)
The Initiate (2001)
*Jason X
Julie & Jack
Marker (2005)
Point of Contact
Popcorn (1991)
The Ritual (2000)
Shredder (2003)
*Son of Frankenstein (1939)
The Thing (1982)
The Valley of Tears (2006)

Premiering February 12:

*24: Season 8

Premiering February 15:

*The Chinese Connection (Fist of Fury)
*Indie Sex
*Kyle XY: Seasons 1-2
*Legend of the Seeker: Season 1
*Men Behaving Badly: Series 1
A Monkey’s Tale
*Reaper: Seasons 1-2

Premiering February 17:

*The Karate Kid (2010)
*Me and Orson Welles

Premiering February 19:

*The Spy Next Door

Premiering February 23:

Happy Gilmore

Premiering February 25:

*Daybreakers

Premiering February 26:

*Hellboy

Info courtesy of FeedFliks.

Over at Moving Pictures, I reviewed the Simon West/Jason Statham remake of the classic Charles Bronson thriller The Mechanic.

My morning started with a rumor that the extraordinary Dark Horse edition of Blacksad was out of print.

After being convinced by me that she *needed* the Díaz Canales/Juanjo Guarnido masterpiece, my friend went to a local shop, only to be told that the book was out of print and Dark Horse had no plans to reprint the edition.

It was only last month that I anointed Blacksad as number 4 on my annual Nexus Graphica best graphic novels of the year countdown.

The beautiful Dark Horse hardback volume collects the first three adventures at an affordable $29.99. Considering the amazing quality of the work combined with the fact that the previous English-language editions of the first two tales were selling in the neighborhood of $100 each and that this edition contained the FIRST English language edition of the third story "Red Shoes", this book was a steal. No wonder it’s in high demand.

My friend messaged me about her disappointment. Surprised, I contacted Dark Horse Publicity Coordinator Jim Gibbons directly about the rumor. He promptly replied:

That makes me (and my friend) happy. She ordered a copy online and I’m now free to once again to continue recommending Blacksad with abandon!

Let’s take a quick look to see what’s arrived at the Geek Compound.

Let Me In

Promo copy:

From Matt Reeves – the writer/director of Cloverfield – comes the new vampire classic that critics are calling “chillingly real” (Scott Bowles, USA Today) and “one of the best horror films of the year” (Cinematical). In bleak New Mexico, a lonely, bullied boy, Owen (Kodi Smit-McPhee of The Road), forms a unique bond with his mysterious new neighbor, Abby (Chloë Grace Moretz of Kick-Ass). Trapped in the mind and body of a child, however, Abby is forced to hide a horrific secret of bloodthirsty survival. But in a world of both tenderness and terror, how can you invite in the one friend who may unleash the ultimate nightmare?

Based on the Swedish novel, Let the Right One In, “Let Me In is a dark and violent love story, a beautiful piece of cinema and a respectful rendering of my novel for which I am grateful.” (John Ajvide Lindqvist, author).

I haven’t seen this one yet, though I loved the Swedish version Let the Right One In. Fellow reviewer Derek Johnson said over at SF Signal: "As remakes go, it’s certainly one of the better ones." Good enough for me. Perhaps I’ll check it out.

Ryder on the Storm Issue 2
Written by: David Hine
Illustrated by: Wayne Nichols
Cover Art by: Francesco "Matt" Mattina

Promo copy:

Ryder learns the truth about his heritage and Charles Monk’s mysterious Order of the Sacred Blood – and what he must do to stop the Dantons from rising to power. After discovering that a Daemon hive queen still lives beneath their city, Monk and Ryder enter the catacombs to exterminate the queen and her brood – but when Ryder takes the fight to Rebecca Danton, he learns of a terrible secret that will shed new light on the mystery of his murdered brother.

Bloodshot
by Cherie Priest
Cover by Jae Song

Promo copy:

VAMPIRE FOR HIRE

Raylene Pendle (AKA Cheshire Red), a vampire and world-renowned thief, doesn’t usually hang with her own kind. She’s too busy stealing priceless art and rare jewels. But when the infuriatingly charming Ian Stott asks for help, Raylene finds him impossible to resist—even though Ian doesn’t want precious artifacts. He wants her to retrieve missing government files—documents that deal with the secret biological experiments that left Ian blind. What Raylene doesn’t bargain for is a case that takes her from the wilds of Minneapolis to the mean streets of Atlanta. And with a psychotic, power-hungry scientist on her trail, a kick-ass drag queen on her side, and Men in Black popping up at the most inconvenient moments, the case proves to be one hell of a ride.

Cowboy Angels
by Paul McAuley
Cover by Sparth

Promo copy:

The first Turing gate, a mere hundred nanometers across, is forced open in 1963, at the high-energy physics laboratory in Brookhaven; three years later, the first man to travel to an alternate history takes his momentous step, and an empire is born.
For fifteen years, the version of America that calls itself the Real has used its Turing gate technology to infiltrate a wide variety of alternate Americas, rebuilding those wrecked by nuclear war, fomenting revolutions and waging war to free others from communist or fascist rule, and establishing a Pan-American Alliance. Then a nation exhausted by endless strife elects Jimmy Carter on a reconstruction and reconciliation ticket, the CIA’s covert operations are wound down, and the Real begins to wage peace rather than war.

But some people believe that it is the Real’s manifest destiny to impose its idea of truth, justice, and the American way in every known alternate history, and they’re prepared to do anything to reverse Carter’s peacenik doctrine. When Adam Stone, a former CIA field officer, one of the Cowboy Angels who worked covertly in other histories, volunteers for reactivation after an old friend begins a killing spree across alternate histories, his mission uncovers a startling secret about the operation of the Turing gates and leads him into the heart of an audicious conspiracy to change the history of every America in the multiverse–including our own.

Cowboy Angels is a vivid, helter-skelter thriller in which one version of America discovers the true cost of empire building, and one man discovers that an individual really can make a difference.

Earp: Saints and Sinners Issue 1
Created by: Matt Cirulnick & David Manpearl
Written by: M. Zachary Sherman
Illustrated by: Mack Chater & Martin Montiel
Cover art by: Alex Maleev

Promo copy:

In a world where the American economy has collapsed, bandits roam the country and the law is as corrupt as the criminals its sworn to stop, one lawman remains a steadfast moral compass for the people: WYATT EARP. After a violent assignment claims the life of his brother, Wyatt sets out to forge a simple life in the only boomtown left: Las Vegas. Though Earp no longer wears a U.S. Marshall’s badge, his past is about to catch up to him. With nearly everything to lose, Earp will have to beat the odds stacked against him in order to bring old-fashioned justice to Sin City.

Let’s take a quick look to see what’s arrived at the Geek Compound.

Homefront: The Voice of Freedom
by John Milius and Raymond Benson

Promo copy:

HOME IS WHERE THE WAR IS

America may be reeling from endless recessions and crippling oil wars, but hack reporter Ben Walker never expected to see his homeland invaded and occupied by a reunified Korea—now a formidable world power under Kim Jong-il’s dictator son.

The enemy’s massive cyberattack is followed by the detonation of an electromagnetic pulse that destroys technology across the United States. Communications, weapons, and defense systems are rendered useless; thousands perish as vehicles suddenly lose power and passenger jets plummet to the ground.

Fleeing the chaos of Los Angeles, Walker discovers that although America’s military has been scattered, its fighting spirit remains. Walker joins the soldiers as they head east across the desert, battling Korean patrols—and soon finds his own mission. Walker reinvents himself as the Voice of Freedom, broadcasting information and enemy positions to civilian Resistance cells via guerrilla radio.

But Walker’s broadcasts have also reached the ears of the enemy. Korea dispatches its deadliest warrior to hunt the Voice of Freedom and crush the ever-growing Resistance before it can mount a new war for American liberty.

John Milius?!?!

Heart of the Exiled
by Pati Nagle
Cover by Gene Mollica

Promo copy:

The Bitter Wars left a world divided. Now the ælven governors convene a Council at Glenhallow, while the savage kobalen gather in numbers not seen in five centuries. Vastly outnumbered, the ælven clans will send barely trained guardians to confront the kobalen, and a young female warrior, Eliani, will be entrusted with the most crucial mission of all: to reach distant Fireshore and learn why their governor has not responded to the call to war. Bound to her lover Turisan by the power of mindspeech, Eliani will feed vital information to the Ælven Council across vast distances. But Eliani cannot see the dark force watching from the Ebon Mountains. There, Shalár, the ruler of exiled Clan Darkshore, has given the mindless kobalen both power and a plan to cut off the ælven from their brave and gifted mindspeaker—and to reclaim for Shalár’s nearly extinct vampiric clan their ancestral land: Fireshore. But Shalár guards her secrets carefully, and even Eliani cannot know what terrible purpose lurks in the heart of the exiled.

Star Wars: Knight Errant
by John Jackson Miller
Cover by John Van Fleet

Promo copy:

An original adventure featuring Jedi Kerra Holt—star of the hot new Dark Horse Knight Errant comic series

A thousand years before Luke Skywalker, a generation before Darth Bane, in a galaxy far, far away . . .

The Republic is in crisis. The Sith roam unchecked, vying with one another to dominate the galaxy. But one lone Jedi, Kerra Holt, is determined to take down the Dark Lords. Her enemies are strange and many: Lord Daiman, who imagines himself the creator of the universe; Lord Odion, who intends to be its destroyer; the curious siblings Quillan and Dromika; the enigmatic Arkadia. So many warring Sith weaving a patchwork of brutality—with only Kerra Holt to defend the innocents caught underfoot.

Sensing a sinister pattern in the chaos, Kerra embarks on a journey that will take her into fierce battles against even fiercer enemies. With one against so many, her only chance of success lies with forging alliances among those who serve her enemies—including a mysterious Sith spy and a clever mercenary general. But will they be her adversaries or her salvation?

Includes a special, full-color excerpt from the Dark Horse comic Star Wars: Knight Errant

Midnight Riot
by Ben Aaronovitch
Cover by Wes Youssi

Promo copy:

Probationary Constable Peter Grant dreams of being a detective in London’s Metropolitan Police. Too bad his superior plans to assign him to the Case Progression Unit, where the biggest threat he’ll face is a paper cut. But Peter’s prospects change in the aftermath of a puzzling murder, when he gains exclusive information from an eyewitness who happens to be a ghost. Peter’s ability to speak with the lingering dead brings him to the attention of Detective Chief Inspector Thomas Nightingale, who investigates crimes involving magic and other manifestations of the uncanny. Now, as a wave of brutal and bizarre murders engulfs the city, Peter is plunged into a world where gods and goddesses mingle with mortals and a long-dead evil is making a comeback on a rising tide of magic.

Let’s take a quick look to see what’s arrived at the Geek Compound.

The Curious Case of the Clockwork Man
by Mark Hodder
Cover by Jon Sullivan

Promo copy:

CONTINUING THE HIT STEAMPUNK SERIES!

It is 1862, though not the 1862 it should be…

Time has been altered, and Sir Richard Francis Burton, the king’s agent, is one of the few people who know that the world is now careening along a very different course from that which Destiny intended.

When a clockwork-powered man of brass is found abandoned in Trafalgar Square, Burton and his assistant, the wayward poet Algernon Swinburne, find themselves on the trail of the stolen Garnier Collection—black diamonds rumored to be fragments of the Lemurian Eye of Naga, a meteorite that fell to Earth in prehistoric times.

His investigation leads to involvement with the media sensation of the age: the Tichborne Claimant, a man who insists that he’s the long lost heir to the cursed Tichborne estate. Monstrous, bloated, and monosyllabic, he’s not the aristocratic Sir Roger Tichborne known to everyone, yet the working classes come out in force to support him. They are soon rioting through the streets of London, as mysterious steam wraiths incite all-out class warfare.

From a haunted mansion to the Bedlam madhouse, from South America to Australia, from séances to a secret labyrinth, Burton struggles with shadowy opponents and his own inner demons, meeting along the way the philosopher Herbert Spencer, Isambard Kingdom Brunel, Florence Nightingale, and Charles Doyle (father of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle).

Can the king’s agent expose a plot that threatens to rip the British Empire apart, leading to an international conflict the like of which the world has never seen? And what part does the clockwork man have to play?

Burton and Swinburne’s second adventure—The Clockwork Man of Trafalgar Square—is filled with eccentric steam-driven technology, grotesque characters, and a deepening mystery that pushes forward the three-volume story arc begun in The Strange Affair of Spring Heeled Jack.

Black Halo (The Aeon’s Gate, Book 2)
by Sam Sykes
Cover by Paul Young

Promo copy:

THE TOME OF THE UNDERGATES HAS BEEN RECOVERED…

…and the gates of hell remain closed. Lenk and his five companions set sail to bring the accursed relic away from the demonic reach of Ulbecetonth, the Kraken Queen. But after weeks at sea, tensions amidst the adventurers are rising. Their troubles are only beginning when their ship crashes upon an island made of the bones left behind from a war long dead.

And it appears that bloodthirsty alien warrior women, fanatical beasts from the deep, and heretic-hunting wizards are the least of their concerns. Haunted by their pasts, plagued by their gods, tormented by their own people, and gripped by madness personal and peculiar, their greatest foes may yet be themselves.

The reach of Ulbecetonth is longer than hell can hold.

Wolfsangel
by M. D. Lachlan
Cover by Paul Young

Promo copy:

The Viking king Authun leads his men on a raid against an Anglo-Saxon village. Men and women are killed indiscriminately, but Authun demands that no child be touched. He is acting on prophecy—a prophecy that tells him that the Saxons have stolen a child from the gods. If Authun, in turn, takes the child and raises him as an heir, the child will lead his people to glory.

But Authun discovers not one child, but twin baby boys. After ensuring that his faithful warriors, witnesses to what has happened, die during the raid, Authun takes the children and their mother home, back to the witches who live on the troll wall. And he places his destiny in their hands.

So begins a stunning multivolume fantasy epic that will take a werewolf from his beginnings as the heir to a brutal Viking king down through the ages. It is a journey that will see him hunt for his lost love through centuries and lives, and see the endless battle between the wolf, Odin, and Loki, the eternal trickster, spill over into countless bloody conflicts from our history and our lives.

This is the myth of the werewolf as it has never been told before and marks the beginning of an extraordinary new fantasy series.

In her latest Comics Wrap-Up, disappointed RevSF Comics Editor offered some unflattering opinions of Nate Neal’s Sanctuary.

I have no opinion on the book since I have yet to read it, but even if I found it to be brilliant, I would honor and respect her views. Apparently Mr. Neal doesn’t feel the same way and took great offense by Sarah’s commentary. So much so that he fired of this missive which found it’s way to former RevSF Comics Editor Jay Wilson (which he shared with the other RevSF editors).

Art by Nate Neal

For all you burgeoning professionals out there, this is NOT how you respond to a negative review. I don’t care if previously Moses, himself, came down from the mountain and anointed you as a genius. When you reply to a negative review you disagree with, no matter the perceived quality of the reviewer, I guarantee the only one who will look bad is you. There is no other option.

Of course, Mr. Neal doesn’t agree with her. It’s his baby. And perhaps he’s correct about Sarah’s "ill-informed, unjustified, confused and caustic little comments." (though I doubt it. A comics pro and reviewer for several venues, Sarah displays some keen insights). Regardless, this is the wrong tact.

We’ve all had our share of negative (or less favorable) reviews. Hell, RevSF, where I serve as an editor-at-large and who hosts this blog, gave my book Geek Confidential a less than glowing review, probably the worst one it received. Was I disappointed. Perhaps a little, but did I squawk? Of course not. Not everyone is going to enjoy everything I produce. That’d be absurd. And awfully boring.

Yes, Mr. Neal, I realize you worked hard on this book and it was a labor of love (aren’t they all?), but get over yourself. There is no such thing as a universally beloved creation. All of them have received a negative review or two. The best thing to do when someone writes a negative review of your work, is to shrug and move one. Same with the good ones. If you have confidence in what you’ve created, it doesn’t matter what others think.

Joe R. Lansdale, in his infinite wisdom, sums it up best: If you believe the good ones than you have to believe the bad ones, too. That’s no way to be. Just do the work.*

*(Or some such. Joe’ll say it with a lot more color and panache. But you get the idea.)

Columbia Pictures releases the first image of Andrew Garfield as Spider-Man.

For the folks over at Moving Pictures, I reviewed The Green Hornet.

Check out my full review at the Moving Pictures.