The Green Hornet Coming to Theaters

I guess that I'll believe it when I see it. At least this one has a better chance of getting made, since the previous attempt at a Green Hornet movie was keelhauled by Kevin Smith's anxiety over doing such a large budget movie.

Of course the question that remain is: Does the Green Hornet, as a property, really have that much juice when it comes to the movie going public? Sure, there will be a hard-core geek following, but we've already seen more than once that just isn't enough to keep a movie up and going at the box office.

Only time will tell, but still I will wait until I see that the project has gotten past the pre-pre-development stage before I start to think that this might actually happen.

The Green Hornet Coming to Theaters

There's a new buzz in Hollywood: Columbia Pictures is bringing comic-book hero The Green Hornet to the big screen.

Arnold Drake: 1924-2007

The man who created my all time favorite team of comic book super-heroes (The Doom Patrol) and one of the coolest super-heroes ever (Deadman) has died. Another of the greats of the old days is gone. This is a sad day.

Arnold Drake: 1924-2007

He wasn’t as well known as say, Bob Kane or Siegel and Shuster, but if you read DC Comics produced in the ‘60s and up, you surely read some of the work of Arnold Drake, who died today, after a short bout of “a touch of pneumonia” and other complications for which he was recently hospitalized. News of Drake’s death came via writer and comics historian, Mark Evanier.

Though his comics writing career spanned thousands of stories and pages, fans will likely best remember Drake as the creator of Deadman and The Doom Patrol, as well as Stanley and His Monster.

Providence: Following the footsteps of a horror icon

I received this link from a couple of different people. Obviously someone thinks that I would be interested in a Lovecraft tour.

Providence: Following the footsteps of a horror icon

Horror writer H.P Lovecraft so identified with this New England city that the headstone on his grave reads: 'I AM PROVIDENCE,' a phrase taken directly from one of his letters.

The author, now viewed as one of the great horror writers of the 20th century, grew up near Brown University. Some of his best-known works are set in the colonial homes near downtown Providence, and his grave is in a historic city cemetery.

A visit to Lovecraft's hometown is a must for American culture buffs and fans of the author of 'At the Mountains of Madness,' a famous novella about a doomed archaeological expedition. Visitors can stroll the same streets where Lovecraft imagined stories about dormant gods returning to torment or annihilate mankind.

Several Lovecraft walking tours are being offered March 17-18 along with a 'Pulp Uncovered' festival, March 15-18, that will include discussions of the writer's legacy. The events coincide with the 70th anniversary of the writer's death. The tours will be led by the Providence Preservation Society and the Rhode Island Historical Society. The festival is being hosted by Brown University's Public Humanities Program.

But you can also do a self-guided tour of Lovecraft sites.

'It's amazing how many of the sites he described in his stories still survive in Providence and are in better condition now than in his day,' said Lovecraft biographer and archivist S.T. Joshi, who is expected to speak at the 'Pulp Uncovered' event. 'It's very much as Lovecraft knew it, so when you go there you are stepping back to his time.'

Doctor Who Serial Title Generator

Doctor Who Serial Title Generator

Emprint from RPGnet has created this cool title generator. It also creates titles that would work really well for Pulps.

Whispers From the Abyss: On the Subject of Horror

Ben Monroe's got a new blog, and his first post is about the crap that are called Horror films today.

Whispers From the Abyss: On the Subject of Horror

And that brings me to the point. Horror films today are basically porn. Seriously, think of the fundamental relationships between a 'romantic comedy' film and your average porn movie. The romantic comedy is about the relationship between the characters. It's about the emotional resonance created by the interaction of two people. Porn is about the act. Nothing more, nothing less.

Serbian vampire hunters prevent Milosevic come-back...With A Stake

I see this as the plot seed for a Hellboy game:

Serbian vampire hunters prevent Milosevic come-back

Serbian vampire hunters have acted to prevent the very remote possibility that former dictator Slobodan Milosevic might stage a come-back - by driving a three-foot stake through his heart.

According to Ananova, the politically-motivated Van Helsings, led by Miroslav Milosevic (no relation), gave themselves up to cops after attacking the deceased despot in his grave in the eastern town of Pozarevac. Milosevic popped his clogs back in 2006, while on trial in a UN war crimes tribunal for various unsavoury activities connected with the disintegration of the former Yugoslavia.

It Was 'Elf Defense' (Just Spelled With A 'C' Instead)

Well, at least this time it is Shadowrun.

It Was 'Elf Defense' (Just Spelled With A 'C' Instead):

A man accused of a stealing underwear from a shop in a knifepoint raid believed he was a female elf at the time, Belfast Crown Court has heard.

Captain America Dies on the Page

Well, since Bucky isn't dead any longer I don't think that Cap should really have all that much to worry about. If you ask me, it is just a gimmick to sell books. I wonder if "Reign of the Captain Americas" is going to follow and a "World Without Captain America."

Captain America Dies on the Page:

Captain America has undertaken his last mission at least for now.

The venerable superhero is killed in the issue of his namesake comic that hit stands Wednesday, the New York Daily News reported. On the new edition's pages, a sniper shoots down the shield-wielding hero as he leaves a courthouse.

It ends a long run for the stars-and-stripes-wearing character, created in 1941. Over the years, some 210 million copies of Captain America comic books, published by New York-based Marvel Entertainment Inc., have been sold in 75 countries.

Stephen Colbert weighs in on the topic:

Internet Hammer Enterprise - Review: True20 Companion

Here's a review of the upcoming book in Green Ronin's True20 line, the True20 Companion. This toolkit will help GMs be able to fine tune their True20 games.

Internet
Hammer Enterprise - Review: True20 Companion

Green Ronin’s True20 Companion, the toolkit of a book for Narrators, has finally been released in PDF form, and enterprising Narrators with desire to tinker will find plenty of goodies in the 128-page sourcebook. The five-chapter book begins with a chapter on role creation, allowing for expansion of the three heroic roles in True20 Adventure Roleplaying. Following that, the remaining four chapters address custom rules, additional material, and other extras for the “major” roleplaying genres: fantasy, space, horror, and modern adventures.

Pretty Hate Campaign

Ok, I admit it...I am probably falling for the viral marketing around Year Zero, the new release from Nine Inch Nails that is supposed to be coming out in April. The leaked MP3s that I've heard have sounded pretty good to me, and the weird websites and strange marketing is tickling my weirdness bone.

I want to come up with a game around these concepts, this is obviously a "for fun" type of thing. That plays off of some of the ideas. Check out the link, even if it is to the MTV.com website, because it is an interesting story.

Pretty Hate Campaign

A dystopian civilization in the throes of extinction. A government poisoning its own citizens through the drinking water. Military police raiding private residences. The end of civil liberties. The creation of a Church-State. Mind control.

The contents of some conspiracy theorist's personal manifesto? The plot of a rote first-person shooter? The results of a quick jaunt through Snopes.com? Actually, it's all part of the elaborate (and somewhat terrifying) concept behind Nine Inch Nails' upcoming Year Zero album (due April 17), details of which are currently being disseminated through a series of increasingly spooky — and downright odd — Web sites.

I really think that an alternate reality game model, married with a very light ruleset would let this sort of game really rock. Particularly if you could work people from other parts of the country (or even the world) into things, so that you could more fully flesh out the world and play than you can in an ordinary RPG.

This is just something that I am thinking of right now. Maybe something will come of it, maybe not.