Cartoon Central

Alamat Comics compiled the comic book, titled simply WASTED in 1998, and we had our launch at Cybercafe in Robinson’s Galleria in February 13, a date somehow strangely fitting. When no one came with knives and pitchforks to burn me at the stake, it was then I realized just how much, and in what way, it has affected other people.

Went to see The Simpsons Movie last night at midnight. Now. I know that it's fashionable to talk about how the Simpsons isn't as good a show as it once was, and how Family Guy and South Park have edged it out as the envelope-pushing animated sitcoms, but dammit, give me Homer any day. The thing that is unspoken in all the talk about the Simpsons' decline is that it's no longer novelty.

First looks have been given to films such as “Beowulf,” due out in November. Steve Carell’s next film, the “Get Smart” remake, Disney/Walden’s “Prince Caspian,” the next film in the Narnia franchise, as well as the Pixar entry titled “Wall-E.”

The Hollywood Canteen was founded by Bette Davis & John Garfield, modeled after broadways ‘Stage Door Canteen’. Hollywood’s finest hour. It wasn’t about money — it was about providing an unforgetable experience for more than 3,000,000 servicemen.

Michael Bay’s big-screen treatment of Transformers reworks the venerable 1980s cartoon and comic book series as an effects-laden thrill ride for the digital age, while hitting enough of the right notes to please the purists.

So, Marvel Comics has killed and buried one of it's pre-emanate characters in Captain America...

Today is the penultimate DITKO WEEK! entry. It’s back to Marvel as I take a look at a terrifically fun character who is going through a depression. I’m also going to take a more in-depth look at a pattern that’s popped up so far in all these neat Ditko entries. Join me, will you?

Ratatouille is a pretty good movie. While it is not in the same league as The Incredibles and Finding Nemo, it is still a pretty darn good movie.

There is something in the kitchen for everyone in Ratatouille. Although the film might not reach the international box office heights of The Incredibles–then again, maybe it will–the film does represent another huge leap in CGI technique and imagination by the Pixar folks. My compliments to the chef…

Director Brad Bird has emerged as Pixar’s top filmmaker, starting with his pre-Pixar traditional cel animation feature, The Iron Giant (1999), and again with his first Pixar film, one of their best, The Incredibles (2004). Ratatouille only ups his batting average to 100% (okay shaky statistics there, but you get the point). Pixar has had the market cornered on the best animation design quality and effects, notable in even some of their weaker films, like Finding Nemo (2003) or their fairly wretched Cars (2006). But actually, after Cars, I had to wonder if they still had the market cornered on quality versions of traditional Hollywood narrative films.