Gawker: neil gaiman

Disney's Marvel Deal Forces DC's Hand

Andrew Belonsky — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 03:51:23 EDT

In a battle between Mickey Mouse and Superman, most people would put their money on Superman. Well, that's almost true. Sure, Superman would definitely kill Mickey, but the Mouse has Disney power, and that Disney power forced Superman's company's hand.

Hoping to become more of a superhero power player in Hollywood, Warner Bros. has been quietly reorganizing its comic arm, DC Comics, to focus its energies on blockbuster hits. They claim they've been working on this for months, but Disney's announcement that it was buying Marvel accelerated things a bit.

Warner had intended to announce details about its plans for DC Comics in January, as it begins a 75th anniversary celebration of the DC brand, Barry Meyer, chairman and chief executive of Warner, said in an interview.

But the Disney announcement resulted in so many questions about the possibly heightened competition "that it would have been disingenuous for us to suggest that we had not been thinking about it." He added that the Marvel-Disney announcement "reconfirmed in us our strong belief in how valuable DC really is."

That remains to be seen. While, yes, DC has the strong Batman franchise and, to a far lesser degree, a burgeoning Superman series, it's also unleashed a slew of stinkers, like Catwoman and Watchmen, which failed to live up to its potential. Marvel, meanwhile, had the X-Men trilogy, keeps rolling out Spider-Man flicks, made three Blade movies, Iron Man and will no doubt make a splash with the forthcoming Thor, Avengers and Wolverine 2 big screen adventures.

DC will have to look mighty hard for characters who can stand up to Marvel's icons. Our suggestion? Neil Gaiman's Sandman. Why, oh why, has that not been adapted?

Image via Madolan's flickr.

On the Set of Neil Gaiman's Santa Claus

Richard Lawson — Tue, 27 May 2008 16:30:00 EDT

[Ruined singer Amy Winehouse at her London home yesterday; image via INF]

Neil Gaiman's First Movie That Doesn't Suck

Nick Douglas — Thu, 21 Feb 2008 17:00:37 EST

If you only know Neil Gaiman through his movies, you might think he's a hack. His script for Beowulf was overwrought; the film version of his novella Stardust was far sappier than the original. So thank god that Coraline, Gaiman's children's book, looks like such a fantastic film. Here's the teaser, and a clip from the film. Nightmare Before Christmas director Henry Selick has made some beautiful characters. The movie will be in 3D, which worked well for the animated worlds of Beowulf and Nightmare with only the occasional spear-pointing-out-at-you gimmick.

The teaser:

The "sneak peek":

Maybe Selick could do justice to Gaiman's famous literary comic series, Sandman.

Kiddie Book Scrotumgate: There Is A T-Shirt

Emily Gould — Fri, 23 Feb 2007 11:30:14 EST

In a small (but precious!) corner of the literary landscape, the controversy over those librarians who want to ban a children's book for mentioning dog testes hasn't yet died down. Scrotal expert and dark-arts assistant professor Neil Gaiman even weighed in: "I've decided that librarians who would decline to have a Newbery book in their libraries because they don't like the word scrotum are probably not real librarians (whom I still love unconditionally)." Mom, we're getting that Masters in Library Science after all! Anyway, this awesome cause now has a t-shirt, which you can purchase over at Bookshelves of Doom. They also have other literary shirts. We'd like to recommend that they add 'Ain't No Houellebecq Girl' even though it is sort of last year in many ways.

T-Shirt of the Week [Bookshelves of Doom]
In Absense of Scrota: Your Guide To Quality Literature [Neil Gaiman]
Earlier: Ballsy YA Author Stirs Controversy