Previews and Reviews that are Z's Views
The house slippers in the photo above belonged to Abraham Lincoln.
Abraham Lincoln!
Mr. Lincoln wore them often and right up until the day of his assassination. These slippers were so well-known to Lincoln scholars that Steven Spielberg had a pair recreated for a scene in his movie Lincoln.
Abraham Lincoln’s slippers now reside in the Rutherford B. Hayes’ Presidential Museum.
Source: Neatorama.
If Sherwood Texas isn’t on your comic pull list, it should be.
Created by writer Shane Berryhill with art by Daniel Hilyard and characters designed by Andrew Robinson, Sherwood Texas is a modern day retelling of Robin Hood as a “biker epic… through a Quentin Tarantino lens.”
If that’s not enough to get you on board (and it should be) perhaps the one buck price tag for the first issue will get you to take a look. After that Berryhill’s story and Hilyard’s art should keep you coming back for more.
Still not sold? Then check out CBR’s interview with Shane Berryhill and Andrew Robinson [and much larger versions of the art above plus more art from the series]!
Next stop… Sherwood Texas.
The Zombie Apocalypse is coming.
What will it reveal about your true character? Will you become a leader, a follower, someone who takes advantage of the weak, or a zombie’s lunch?
As the sign says if you take the quiz Which Walking Dead Survivor Are You? there could be spoilers…
For the record… I got Rick.
Source: Buzzfeed.
Hey! Did you see the new teaser trailer for the final season of Sons of Anarchy?
You know how on some days you really feel like listening to some music by The Monkees and –
What’s that? You don’t? Ok… let me rephrase that.
You know how on some days I really feel like listening to some music by The Monkees? Well, today is one of those days.
Thanks to Do You Remember, we can listen to The Monkees 7 Greatest Hits.
If you’re a Terminator fan you’ll probably enjoy this fan-made film, Final Transmission: John Conner.
Hit Men.
Paid assassins. They’re the things of movies and crime novels.
So it’s shocking to realize that hit men are also real-life professions for cold-blooded killers. Men like Sammy “The Bull” Gravano and Richard “The Iceman” Kuklinski are just two of the names of hitmen that most of us know…
Here are the names of 10 of the Deadliest Hit Men You’ve Probably Never Heard Of.
Source: Listverse,
Stephen King.
King is one of the world’s most successful writers… not only at getting his books published and into the hands of his millions of fans, but also at getting his novels adapted into movies and television events.
Den of Geek recently posted a list of Every Stephen King Movie and TV Show in Development.
There’s a lot of potentially fun/good stuff on the list. Here are my top five (in no particular order:
11/22/63
The premise of this show is as Stephen King as it gets: a guy must go back in time and stop the Kennedy assassination. Anyone who’s familiar with The Dark Tower series andThe Dead Zone will recognize a recurring theme: altering the past before it affects the future.
In 11/22/63, a guy named Jake steps through a pantry that magically transports him back to 1958 — plenty of time to stop Lee Harvey Oswald from killing the President. As expected, Jake discovers on his journey that some things are better left in the past.
J.J. Abram’s Bad Robot production company has acquired the rights to adapt this novel into a TV show. Jonathan Demme (The Silence of the Lambs) was working on the script, but he dropped out over disagreements on the direction the show should take. Bummer.
Cell
This is King’s big zombie story. He’s written a couple of other short stories, including the great “Home Delivery” from Nightmares & Dreamscapes, but this is the one he will be remembered for. The zombies in Cell aren’t your typical brain-eating monsters. Instead, it’s a strange cell phone signal from an unknown source that turns most of humanity into a zombie hive mind, whose goal is to turn the remaining humans into zombies. Sure, it’s all chaos at first, but the monsters begin to organize in a weird way, kind of like in George A. Romero’s Land of the Dead.
Eli Roth (Hostel) talked about adapting this novel into a feature film a few years back, but that didn’t happen. Instead, it’s currently in production eyeing a 2015 release. It stars John Cusack, Samuel L. Jackson, Isabelle Fuhrman, and Owen Teague. The film will be directed by Todd “Kip” Williams (Paranormal Activity 2), with King and Adam Alleca (Last House on the Left remake) writing the screenplay.
The Dark Tower
If there was a Stephen King cinematic universe, The Dark Tower would undoubtedly be its Avengers. The series of books ties most of King’s book together in a very large web of monsters, magic, and alternate timelines. Inspired by The Lord of the Rings trilogy and spaghetti westerns, King created the anthem of all geekdom. The books are full of magic, gunslingers, sorcerors, battles on horseback, time-travel portals, evil A.I., vampires, demons, werewolves, and giant parasite-infested robotic bears. Why haven’t they made a movie already?
Ron Howard (A Beautiful Mind) has been trying to make this movie for years. At one point, he even tapped Javier Bardem for the lead role of Roland Deschain, the last gunslinger, who must travel to the eponymous Dark Tower in order to stop the Crimson King from tearing fabric of reality apart.
Now it looks like Russell Crowe (A Beautiful Mind) might play the role of Roland along with Idris Elba (Pacific Rim) in an unspecified role. Aaron Paul (Breaking Bad) has also met with Howard about a part. Writer Akiva Goldsman and producer Brian Grazen, both ofA Beautiful Mind fame, are also attached to move this adaptation along.
The big problem is getting a studio to finance such an ambitious project. The idea includes film and TV series that would tell the entire story in the most faithful way possible. Universal almost bought into it at one point and HBO had the television rights. Now it’s rumored that Media Rights Capital will produce the film. Who knows anymore.
The Shop
Remember when I mentioned that whole business about how cool it would be to start movie franchise revolving around The Shop? Well, they’re getting their own TV series thanks to TNT. What is in it’s most basic form a sequel to Firestarter, will undoubtedly branch out to tell other Shop stories involving new characters with supernatural powers.
Charlie McGee will be back, once again running from an even more powerful Shop. Luckily, she’ll have a guy named Henry Talbot, a former Shop employee, to guide her through her life as a fugitive.
The project is written by Robbie Thompson (Supernatural) and produced by James Middleton (Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles), Jaime Paglia (Eureka) and Thompson.
The Stand
A superflu called “Captain Trips” wipes out most of the world’s population in King’s mangum opus. It’s all about surviving the apocalypse for the main characters in this monstrous novel. But it’s not just a pandemic the survivors have to worry about. There’s real evil out there. Enter Randall Flagg, the most notorious villain in the King universe. The evil wizard hippie dude has shown up in many of King’s books and stories to f*** things up for the main characters. But The Stand is the best of those books, a true examination of good and evil.
Josh Boone is directing and writing this one, too. Nat Wolff (The Fault in Our Stars), who has already worked with Boone, is rumored to be in the cast. The film would be a 3-hour movie adaptation — plenty of room, but it probably won’t be as expansive as the 1994 TV series.
Frank Sinatra.
Whether you love Sinatra, hate him or fall somewhere between, you’ve got to admit he lived an interesting life. Sinatra was a recording star, a movie star, the leader of the Rat Pack, a Vegas headliner, who hung with stars, politicians, and mafiosos.
Did you know that Frank Sinatra was once arrested for “seduction and adultry,” hated Marlon Brando, that his friendship with the Kennedy’s got him in hot water with the mafia, his son was kidnapped and had to loan the kidnappers gas money, or that Frank Sinatra’s friendship with Joe DiMaggio soured when Sinatra introduced (DiMaggio’s wife) Marilyn Monroe to the Kennedy’s… and DiMaggio blamed them for Monroe’s death?
Check out 10 Strange Stories About Frank Sinatra and you’ll learn all the details… and more!
Source: Listverse.
It’s been a while since we did a quiz… so, let’s see how well we would survive the zombie apocalypse.
Let me rephrase that, Will You Survive the Zombie Apocalypse?
See, I’ve already taken the quiz and I’m going to easily survive. I’m hoping the best for you.
Really, I am.
The trailer for Reach Me is here!
Yesterday’s Steranko paperback cover was such a hit that I thought we’d follow up today with one of Steranko’s Shadow covers.
Back in the early 80’s when I was collecting original art, Steranko sold off the detailed pencil drawings he used in creating the Shadow covers. Steranko called them pencil paintings. They were beautiful.
I was still in college and $225 was a ton of money, but I purchased one. It was the pencil painting to cover #8 shown above. Sadly, I don’t have a copy of the pencils to share, but looking at the cover, you can imagine Steranko’s beautiful art.
When I was heading into my college senior internship, I decided to sell off my art collection. I was going to be teaching full time (but with no pay – internship, remember) and the money from the art sale would make things more manageable.
The Steranko piece is one of those that I have missed most over the years.
Steranko is known for his groundbreaking work in comics. We shouldn’t forget the stellar paperback covers he also created.
Shirley Jackson’s short story The Lottery is considered a modern horror masterpiece. Surprisingly when it was first published reader reaction was far from universally positive.
Here are 11 Facts About Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery” that may surprise you.
Source: Mental Floss.
Today we have the poster and trailer for The Equalizer starring Denzil Washington and directed by Antoine Fuqua.
Can I buy my ticket now?
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