President Obama sings “Born this Way” with help from YouTube poster
President Barack Obama smiles in the rain as he and French President Nicolas Sarkozy attend an event honoring the alliance between the United States and France and their efforts in Libya at Cannes City Hall, after the G20 Summit in Cannes, France. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak, File)
With the help of YouTube user baracksdubs, President Barack Obama sings Lady Gaga’s “Born this Way.” The mashup is created from clips from the president’s speeches.
The clip begins with a speech the president gave to the Human Rights Campaign in which he references Lady Gaga.
- Matt Price
Section Zero returns online
I was a fan of the now-defunct Gorilla Comics, which published great titles, including Kurt Busiek’s “Shockrockets” and Mark Waid’s “Empire.” One of the titles from the line, “Section Zero,” by Karl Kesel and Tom Grummett, is being revived online at Karl Kesel’s Mad Genius Comics.
The planned six-issue miniseries saw three issues released in 2000. Kesel will post the previously released, but tweaked and re-lettered, pages on his site, with new material to follow, Robot 6 reports.
“Tom and I are working on new SECTION ZERO material now, squeezing it in around our day jobs,” Kesel writes at Mad Genius Comics. “At the same time we’ll be posting all the previously published storyline— starting with today’s 5-Page Prologue, followed by 3 pages every Thursday. By the time all that’s posted, we’ll have a ton of new stuff ready. If you haven’t read these comics before, this is your chance.”
- Matt Price
Oklahoma comics creators launch web series “Howling at the Gates”
Two Oklahomans are working on a weekly webcomic aimed at bibliophiles with a love for classical history. With a strip that aims to mix high and low culture in humorous ways, “Howling at the Gates” introduces a mad scientist, her boyfriend, and their time machine.
Big crowds again expected at Comic-Con
Fans dressed as the Justice Society of America (Wonder Woman, Green Lantern, Flash, Black Canary and Hourman) at Comic-Con International in 2009. Photo by Matthew Price, The Oklahoman
Movie studios may cut back a bit at this year’s Comic-Con International in San Diego, but more than 125,000 fans are still expected, as comic-book companies and retailers prepare for the second half of the year.
Captain America gets hot; Robot Chicken Star Wars giveaway; Adrianne Palicki suits up for Lady Jaye; Tara Platt and Yuri Lowenthal prep superhero comedy
This week’s Planet 46 comics podcast features a Robot Chicken: Star Wars III giveaway! Just tell us your favorite Star Wars character for a chance to win.
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Yuri Lowenthal, Tara Platt to star in “Shelf Life”
Production Still from Season One of Shelf Life, featuring Tara Platt as Hero Lass, Travis Willingham as Hero Man, Yuri Lowenthal as Bug Boy and Bryan Enk as Samurai Snake! photo by Matthew Matt Swanson, from the Shelf Life facebook page
Yuri Lowenthal, Tara Platt, Travis Willingham, and Bryan Enk are set to star in the new live-action web series “Shelf Life,” which stars four action figures on a young boy’s shelf.
The series was co-written by comic book writer Paul Jenkins and Lowenthal. Jenkins will direct. 
Created and produced by Lowenthal (Terminator: TSCC, Ben 10: Alien Force, Legion of Superheroes) and Platt (The Gilmore Girls, Charmed, Afterworld) the series will follow the action figures’ irreverent antics.
The first season of Shelf Life introduces us to Hero Man (Travis Willingham: Thor, Transformers, Marvel Super Hero Squad), Hero Lass (Tara Platt), Bug Boy (Yuri Lowenthal) and Samurai Snake (Bryan Enk) and is set to debut in late summer.
It was produced under Lowenthal and Platt’s Monkey Kingdom Productions shingle in conjunction with Stephanie Thorpe’s (Elf Quest: A Fan Imagining, Night of the Zombie King, After Judgment) Ultimatum Entertainment. The series was shot at Monkey Kingdom Studios in downtown Los Angeles.
“It’s a high concept idea, and it was very important to us to have high production values and high quality scripts as well,” said Platt, who lived in Oklahoma from age 7 to 11.
Lowenthal said he wanted to make a show for nerds.
“Technology has made it easier and cheaper to shoot and distribute shows via the Internet, but we didn’t want to use that as an excuse for putting out a show that wouldn’t be competitive even if you were watching it on TV.” Lowenthal said. “I’m a nerd. I wanted to make the kind of thing that my friends and I would watch. It’s got the four S’s: Sex, Social commentary, Slapstick and Superheroes. It’s like Toy Story only we say (expletive deleted) a lot more.”
- Matt Price
Felicia Day: Nerdage’s #23 actress with geek appeal
Felicia Day in Dragon Age: Redemption
Felicia Day, who comes in at #23 on Nerdage’s “Actresses with Geek Appeal,” has almost-unassailable geek cred.
Is the username dying? Guest post by Josh Mackey
Josh Mackey
The following guest post by Josh Mackey of PeekYou takes a look at the growth of the internet and his theory that it’s time to leave usernames behind. What do you think?
Felicia Day’s “The Guild” tops iTunes, returns on web, DVD, in comics
Felicia Day
In just the latest sign that geeks rule the earth, Felicia Day has topped Katy Perry with the No. 1 best-selling pop music video on iTunes in the United States and United Kingdom.
On Aug. 4, “Game On,” a Bollywood-themed gamer anthem by Day and the cast of the Web series “The Guild” topped Perry’s “California Gurls” on the chart. It’s the second music video for the “Guild” crew, who last year released “Do You Wanna Date My Avatar?”
“The Guild” is in its fourth season online as a Web series; the third season was recently released on DVD. “The Guild” follows the wacky real-world antics of a group of gamers who play a “World of Warcraft”-like game.
In a recent interview with The Oklahoman, Day, who created, writes and stars in the Web series, talked about the differences between creating a Web series and a traditional television show.
“The privilege I have with a Web series is that it doesn’t have to be as episodic as TV would be, where characters kind of stay emotionally static, and they go through different ideas every week,” Day said. “I think it’s important that like, just in real life, people are changed by what happens to them.”
She also said because people tend to watch Web series on a browser, they need to stay shorter and more on point.
“You can’t have as much space or time to tell the stories,” she said. “So you really have to kind of be ruthless and say we have to cut down to the bone.”
At Comic-Con International, it was announced that further “Guild” comics would be released this fall, following the well-received miniseries written by Day. She talked about writing the “Guild” miniseries and how it focused on some of the drama behind the characters.
“The comic, especially the way it started, is a lot more dramatic than some people actually expected,” Day said. “Because to me, these characters do come from a place of loneliness, and that’s why they’re together. So there is a hint of reality and a little bit of sadness in everybody. And for me, that’s kind of the basis of everybody finding themselves online.”
Day said she was pleased with the response, especially from comic-book fans.
“The biggest compliment is when somebody who’s a hard-core comic reader (gives) me a compliment, because I feel like comic guys and geeks are the most hardcore of the bunch, and I know they aren’t going to cut me any slack,” she said.
This fall, five one-shots featuring the main characters of “The Guild” will be released by Dark Horse. The first one-shot, “Vork,” will be co-written by Day and Jeff Lewis, who plays the Vork character.
“There is a lot more to be told in that format; because the great thing about comics is you don’t have to worry about the production values or how expensive something’s going to be to shoot, you just write it,” Day said.
- By Matthew Price
From Friday’s The Oklahoman
DC Comics goes digital with comiXology, PlayStation Network
DC Comics has announced a digital platform, kicking off today, on the iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch, as well as a second app for the PlayStation Network.
“Today’s launch provides an additional opportunity to convert new readers and recapture lapsed readers while serving existing fans,” said John Rood, Executive Vice President, DC Entertainment, in the release at DC Comics’ Source blog. “We look forward to working with our partners in the industry—the creators, the retailers and the fans—as we experiment with our digital strategy, in a manner that remains additive to our traditional business models.”
Comics available include “Batman: Hush” and “Green Lantern: Rebirth.” Price points will range from 99 cents to $2.99. DC plans royalty payments for creators, and plans to work with existing print retailers.
“At DC Comics, it has been a top priority that DC forges a meaningful, forward-looking digital strategy,” said Jim Lee, Co-Publisher, DC Comics in the release. “As both a comic book creator and Co-Publisher, it was incredibly important that our plan includes not only creator incentive payments, but also an innovative component that supports comic shop owners. We see digital as an opportunity to grow our entire business.”
Probably the most surprising part of the announcement is that The Justice League: Generation Lost mini-series will be available through both platforms day and date with each issue’s print edition on-sale date, with both the digital and print editions priced at $2.99. It will be an interesting experiment to see if this helps, hurts, or has no effect on the print sales of the comic book.
- Matt Price
