Sci-Fi Storm

I managed to get a copy of Amazing Spider-Man #36 yesterday, thanks to a generous local dealer, after search all over (one store had a 55 issue shipment go in a couple of days). This is the issue Marvel asked J. Michael Straczynski to address the events of September 11th. Well, the man did an incredible job. From the perspective of Spider-Man (and superheroes in general, several of whom make cameos in the panels), he addresses the thoughts towards the true superheroes, the police, firefighters, passengers, and everyday people who helped and who lost. For someone who was reluctant and doubtful he could come up with the words, he managed to come with some that I can even give an appropriate description of. Put simply, get this if you can; borrow it and read it if you can. If you can’t, I’m sure someone out there will transcribe it on the Net.

AntonyF writes “A new interview has been put up at B5LR.com with Mackenzie Gray. Mackenzie plays the mysterious Minister Kafta, the lead alien villain in the upcoming Babylon 5 telemovie “The Legend of the Rangers”, which airs on the US SCI FI Channel on January 19 2002. The race he’s from may just make the Shadows look like playground bullies! In the interview, Mackenzie talks about his role, life on set, and what it’s like working with his fellow cast members and JMS. You can read the interview by clicking here.”

Apple has made available the new trailer that is attached to the Harry Potter movie. It is entitled “Forbidden Love”, and apparently is something of a plot spoiler, so be warned. I can’t view Quicktime stuff at the moment myself…

Update: Don’t follow the link – they are somehow blocking referring links. Instead, copy the link location into the URL bar in your browser.

djryan writes “DelRey has just issued a press release on Jeanne Cavelos’ new Babylon 5 novel: “The explosive confrontation between one techno-mage and the evil power that spawned him”

Update: Rather than leave a huge-honkin’ spoiler for Book 2 in there, I took the official press release (kindly provided by Jeanne herself) and made it a separate web page. Be forwarned that the page still contains the spoiler. You can always order Book 3 and the others through out Babylon 5 Store.

Some little newsbits not worthy of an entire article: SCI FI has announced that 5 B5 fans – one in each of the biggest markets – have been selected to turn their cars into rolling billboards for The Legend of the Rangers. They didn’t say who; Lucasfilm has announced that Episode II will open May 16th, a day earlier than expected in an attempt at an international release; fans have petition online to keep Galactica alive, and original star Richard Hatch has put his support behind DeSanto’s attempts to keep it going; and Star Trek: Nemesis is set to begin filming on November 19th.

According to Celebrity News at IMDb, producer Robert Zanuck has said that they are tossing around ideas for a sequel to Planet of the Apes, but they are in no hurry to push it out and into theaters. “We want to take our time and get it right,” he said. Also, according to him he has a deal with Mark Wahlberg, who starred in the first film, for two films, contrary to previous reports that no one had a sequel clause in their contract.

Picked off of Coming Attractions: Wil Wheaton has confirmed on his website that his character, Wesley Crusher, will appear in Star Trek: Nemesis. This is surprising, even for him, given how he felt about the situation in his interview on Slashdot. He’s glad there can finally be closure with the character.

Bureau42 had it first, but because of our previous coverage it’s worth repeating – Yahoo has an article stating that Fox has put a hold on the new Galactica series because Bryan Singer is unavailable to direct the pilot, committed instead to X-Men 2. Apparently some internal squabbling between the TV and film divisions of Fox prevented him from doing both. Perhaps they should check on how many things JMS is up to nowadays… :^)

djryan writes “After what seems like ages it looks like JMS’ new Spiderman Comic will be hitting the newstands on Wednesday the 14th of November. This one’s special as it deals with the aftermath of the World Trade Centre disaster on September 11th. Expect it to be sold out fairly quickly. In other news, the hardback comic “Delicate Creatures” is reported to have been sent to the printers on the 9th of November and should be turning up in stores soon enough.” If you ordered Delicate Creatures from Amazon through our B5 Store and got a cancellation message, you may want to order again closer to its release.

Just got e-mail from Will Crawford at Mindshadow Entertainment. They have a new web site up for their pilot TV movie, Area 23. The premise is that Area 23 is a Psu Ops division of the Pentagon, dealing with paranormal and terrorist threats, “by any means necessary”. Sounds X-Men-ish, and we’ve already go Mutant X, but I’ve seen clones outdo the original before. They’ve got some genre-related names already – Virginia Hey (Zhaan, Farscape), Carrie Dobro (Dureena Nafeel, Crusade), Brandon Scott (Alien Quest), Maggie Egan (ISN Reporter in Babylon 5), Anson Dekker (remember the bald biker from Wierd Science?) and Christine Steel (Jenny Andrews, Team Knight Rider)