PTG Episode 82 is brought to you by Pirate Rap. Specifically, we want to direct your attention to those guys with the hooks you see in the image above, Captain Dan and the Scurvy Crew, who along with Marc with a C, Emergency Pizza Party, Krondor Krew, and Sci-Fried rocked Club 57 West back on January 2nd for New Year’s Geek. We spend some time in this episode reporting on those proceedings and what we witnessed (while we were lucid, at any rate), and during the broadcast I mentioned that we’d be posting links to where you could download Captain Dan and the Scurvy Crew’s stuff. Well, you can find them on MySpace by clicking HERE and also you can preview their tracks on iLike by clicking HERE. Do beware though, me hearties: Explicit lyrics ahoy!

(Also, apologies to Emergency Pizza Party for not mentioning them during the broadcast–I missed their portion of the show, plus quite a bit of the night is a blur at this point …)

Gonna keep this blog entry short–also in this episode we review Daybreakers, the new vampirism-takes-over-the-world movie in theaters starring Ethan Hawke, Willem Dafoe, and Sam Neill, and spotlight two great DC Comics books from last week: Blackest Night: Wonder Woman #2 by Greg Rucka and Nicola Scott and Superman: World of New Krypton #11 by Rucka, James Robinson, and Pete Woods. Hope you enjoy, and don’t forget, on this week’s show we’re happy to welcome “the man” pictured with me below, The Man from Slacker and the Man as special guest co-host for both hours! Should be a GREAT show, so be there Saturday night to catch it live!

Originally posted at PrimeTimeGeek.com.

PTG Episode 81 is brought to you by 2010. According to the Wikipedia entry for 2010, we’ve got a lot to look forward to this year. Of particular interest to me is the Total Lunar Eclipse we’re supposed to have on my birthday, December 21st. It will actually be visible in North America right after midnight of the 21st, so I’d say that’s good reason for me to stay up late, wouldn’t you? Might even throw a party and make sure it runs nice and late so we can all see it. I think I’ve got lots of time to plan.

Just one hour of PTG recorded this past week, so this will be this week’s only podcast, but we’ll be back to our regular 2 hour time span this upcoming Saturday. It’s been slow as far as geek news these past few weeks, but that’s certainly going to change by the end of the month. Dollhouse rolls on this week, Smallville returns on January 22nd, 24 begins Season 8 on January 17th, as does Fox’s new series Human Target, based on the DC Comics series of the same name. In terms of movies, we have Daybreakers, the vampire thriller starring Ethan Hawke and Sam Neill, debuting this week, The Book of Eli, the very promising-looking post-apocalyptic drama starring Denzel Washington, coming January 15th, and Legion, the “angels are coming to destroy us” movie starring Paul Bettany and Dennis Quaid, coming January 22nd. Lots out there in the many realms of geek to cover and review, so do stick with us!

In this episode we run down PTG’s New Year’s Resolutions for 2010, which is basically a list of all the things we hope to bring to you this coming year in terms of changes and improvements to the show, so you’ll want to give that a listen and maybe give us some feedback on what we’re hoping to do. Also we bring you reviews of a few really fun path board games, last year’s Spiel des Jahres (Game of the Year-Germany) winner, Dominion, from Rio Grande Games, and Smallworld, from Days of Wonder. We wrap the show with a Blackest Night Spotlight on last week’s only new comic book release, Blackest Night #6 by Geoff Johns and Ivan Reis. No spoilers, in case you haven’t read it yet, but seriously, if you’ve been reading this series and you haven’t read this issue yet, what the heck are you waiting for? Read the issue, THEN listen to this episode! Enjoy!

Originally posted at PrimeTimeGeek.com.

PTG Episode 77 is brought to you by the wonderful world of audio editing. Yes, through the miracle that is Adobe Audition 3, we here at PTG can bring to you 1) a version of Episode 77 that is not only 7 minutes shorter than the original broadcast version (much closer to the 1 hour that we should be clocking in at every week); 2) an episode highlighted by music from guitar god Joe Satriani, specifically selections from his 2nd and 3rd studio albums, Surfing with the Alien (1987) and Flying in a Blue Dream (1989), respectively; and 3) an episode free of the host’s breaking of the fourth wall and actually stopping the show and getting up from the host’s chair to see what could possibly have agitated the dogs at the SomaCow compound (one dog in particular whose name starts with a ‘C’) to such an extent that she sounded hoarse from barking. If you listen closely to this podcast, you can probably still hear the barking during the first ten minutes of the show during moments while I’m talking, however–the software is good, but it’s not THAT good. Ah, well.

So in this episode we talk about some of the major announcements that came out of DC Entertainment last week. As promised, here are links to the announcements themselves at DC Universe: The Source:

• DCU in 2010: “The Return of Bruce Wayne” hits in April
• DCU in 2010: Welcome to Earth-One
• DCU in 2010: The “War of the Supermen” Begins

There were quite a few more stories posted that week in The Source that we didn’t cover in the broadcast that you might want to check out, including the announcement of noted TV writer Marc Guggenheim, most recently of FlashForward, taking over as the full-time writer of Action Comics, and Wonder Woman renumbering to celebrate her 600th issue. The cover to what will be Wonder Woman #600, provided by none other than George Perez, is the definition of “classic”-head over to the story and check it out!

Also in this episode we continue our 3-part “Best of 2009″ series with what were, in our somewhat-less-than-humble-opinions, the Top 5 New Comic Series of 2009. Now once again, we limited our consideration to titles we reviewed during our broadcasts and to titles that specifically started in 2009, whether they were limited series or ongoing series. All five of our choices are pictured in the image below:

Agree? Disagree? Know a title that would have made our list had we actually read it? Leave your comments and your feedback in comments, please–look forward to reading them!

Originally posted at PrimeTimeGeek.com

PTG Episode 70 is brought to you by The Cult of Negativity. I’m taking this opportunity to let each and every one of you know that as of today, I’m taking a stand against casual, habitual cynicism. Western society–in particular American society within a certain age group–is in love with cynicism and negativity, and has been for a long time. Somewhere along the way in the last, oh, 20-30 years it became “cool” to be casually and habitually cynical. My generation (and perhaps the generation that preceded mine) learned during the formative years that perhaps the fastest way to win friends and influence people if you weren’t cover model gorgeous was to verbally knock everything in sight, including the supposedly-vacuous cover-model gorgeous people. I personally picked up on this sometime during my junior year of high school; up until that time, I was as unpopular as one can get. Once I realized, however, that the key to making people warm up to you, find you interesting, engaging or least tolerate you to the point where they don’t dump their garbage on top of your barely-eaten lunch is to let them know that you’re just as miserable as they are with their lot. Show them that you, too, believe that school sucks and teachers suck and jocks suck and cliques suck and classes suck and parents suck and music sucks and politicians suck and the president sucks and the world just GENERALLY sucks and you’re gold. Show your peers that you can comment on that suckage in a way that makes people feel a little bit better about things and your path to relative popularity, or at least detente with those around you, is set.

Now maybe that’s fine for high school life, but what I believe it sets a precedent for is a pattern of behavior in which people as adults are FAR more likely to look for ways that something new–a book, a movie, a song, a law, a government policy, the way someone on the street walking by dresses, walks, or talks, ANYTHING that they become aware of in the course of leading their everyday lives–might possibly SUCK, as opposed to looking for the positive in said item. We no longer, as witnesses and participants in the constant evolution of pop culture, seek to examine a given thing’s purpose and evaluate it based on how well it achieves its purpose, but instead simply regard it on an arbitrary scale along with everything else we either like or dislike in order to say that either “it sucks” or “it’s frickin’ awesome!” It’s a propensity that I certainly admit I’ve been guilty of more than once–make no mistake, I acknowledge that fact. But no longer. I’m done with taking the easy path, because let’s be honest here: it’s a WHOLE lot easier (and funnier to most people) to hate on something for what it ISN’T or what we might think it failed epically to be, rather than accept something for what it is and be positive about however it might have succeeded.

It’s time to jump off the bandwagon, time to pick up the fallen standard and fight the impossible fight against The Cult of Negativity that gains new members each and every day. And I don’t mean to fight this battle by suddenly walking through life wearing blinders to all that’s wrong in our world, to view the events of our collective lives and experiences through those oh-so-cliche rose-colored glasses. I’m talking about first looking at something new, no matter what it may be, and before knee-jerk judging it based on whether or not it fits within my own range of tastes or opinions actually determining what its purpose was or is and THEN judging it based on how well or how poorly it achieves its purpose. What this will lead to (hopefully) is either accepting something for it is and crediting it for achieving its purpose, or giving relevant, thoughtful, constructive critique regard how it fails to achieve its purpose, and it avoids simple wholehearted acceptance or rejection based on personal biases and one’s own degree of cynicism. It’s time to end the love affair with hating on things simply for the pleasure and entertainment value of hating on things.

If you’re still reading this, you might be asking yourself, “Why is he going on about all this?” Well, Episode 70 starts off with a review of last week’s No. 1 film at the box office, 2012, which earned, for the most part, the scorn of movie critics across the country (37% rotten rating at RottenTomatoes.com). That in and of itself doesn’t bother me or even surprise me, and I happen to believe that professional critics, ones that make their living writing reviews that are published in mainstream media, really DO evaluate films based on their opinions on how successful or unsuccessful a film is at achieving what it sets out to do. What bothers me to NO end is the number of people, some of whom are my dear friends and/or listeners to this program that I consider to otherwise be thoughtful, well-reasoned human beings, whether they’ve seen the movie or even just the previews of the movie declare it to be the worst kind of stupid, mindless, Hollywood tripe because it’s unrealistic, because the “science” behind the film’s concept is laughable, because the script or the acting is less-than-Oscar worthy, etc, etc. To them I give you the words of movie critic Roger Ebert, who gave the film 3.5 out of 4 stars: “[2012] delivers what it promises, and since no sentient being will buy a ticket expecting anything else, it will be, for its audiences, one of the most satisfactory films of the year.” (for his full review, click here.) Key words there: no sentient being will buy a ticket expecting anything else. Well, it’s quite clear he was wrong on that score, because quite a few people apparently went into that film expecting Lawrence of Arabia-like film-making genius, or Memento-like air-tight logic.

Reality Flash: Writer/director Roland Emmerich never, to my knowledge, has claimed to be the second coming of David Lean. And 2012 does not aspire to be anything else but ridiculous disaster-movie fun, the disaster movie to end ALL disaster movies. In my perhaps not-so-humble opinion, it succeeds. If you go into ANY disaster film, but especially into an Emmerich-directed disaster film (he brought us Independence Day, the ’90s revival of Godzilla, and The Day After Tomorrow) expecting anything more than that, then you need to 1) lighten up; and 2) have your head checked.

Maybe you can already tell what I personally thought of 2012 from what I’ve written here, but to hear my full review, listen to the podcast. Also in this episode, a “true” Flash TV Reviews segment covering FOUR shows (V, Heroes, Fringe, and FlashForward), and a Blackest Night Spotlight on last week’s latest BN tie-ins and feature books, including Green Lantern Corps #42, R.E.B.E.L.S #10, and Booster Gold #26. Hope you enjoy!

Originally posted at PrimeTimeGeek.com.

PTG Episode 57 is brought to you by Heroes Landing in Clermont, FL. Their grand opening on Saturday was, by all accounts, a HUGE success, and we at PTG are very happy that we could be a part of the festivities. We could not have asked for more gracious and accommodating hosts than Todd and Stu, who made sure we had everything we needed throughout the afternoon and kept the store open just a bit longer so that we could finish the second hour of our broadcast at about 7:15PM. Check out the pictures below to see more from the day’s events–thanks to Rob Trotman from the 501st Legion (you’ll see him in the photos wearing the Imperial Guard uniform) for providing links to the pictures they took throughout the day, and for their help with a rather troublesome microphone stand that we were trying to get to behave during our setup process!

In this episode we talk to Stu from Heroes Landing about his long friendship with his business partner, Todd Merrick, and how they came to decide they were going to follow their dreams and do something related to something they both loved: comic books. We also review Superman/Batman: Public Enemies, the latest episode of Smallville, entitled “Metallo”, and spotlight the two latest Blackest Night titles, Green Lantern #46 and Blackest Night Titans #2. It’s a pretty darned good episode, I think–hope you think so, too. Enjoy!

Originally posted at PrimeTimeGeek.com

PTG Episode 56 is brought to you by Superman/Batman: Public Enemies, now on blu-ray and DVD. (Support Prime Time Geek by purchasing it through Amazon with the link provided!) Well, I’ll say this much for Warner Premiere’s latest direct-to-video animation offering: it’s by FAR the best of the bunch, especially in terms of how well it brings to life the source material, in this case the bestselling comic series and graphic novel by Jeph Loeb and Ed McGuiness. Trouble is, of course, that calling it “the best of the bunch” isn’t saying a whole lot. Be sure and check out this weekend’s live broadcast of PTG from Heroes Landing in Clermont, FL for our full review of the feature, but I’ll just say this one last thing about it for now: if you were a fan of the Superman and Batman animated series of the 1990s, and you recall with as much nostalgia as I do the iconic renditions of Supes and Bats by Tim Daly and Kevin Conroy, respectively, then there’s much to enjoy for you in this movie.

So Episode 56 is all about Superman, because in my opinion its a great time to be a Superman fan. Yes, I know, there’s no Superman feature film even remotely on the horizon, but aside from that, with the great ongoing writing and artwork to be found in the current line of Superman and Superman-related comics, as well as Smallville returning for its 9th Season (yeah, I know, maybe not such a good thing) and the aforementioned “Superman/Batman: Public Enemies” now on store shelves, there’s lots out there to enjoy and be excited about. In this hour we cover a great deal of all that, plus talk a bit about the images of Nicolas Cage’s supposed “costume test” for the thankfully-never-filmed “Superman Lives” project that producer Tim Burton threatened to unleash upon movie audiences in the 1990s, a project that certainly would have had us Superman devotees and aficionados fleeing theaters in droves while trying to tear out our own eyeballs to make the burning stop. IF the image that made its way around the internet is, in fact, genuine, (see below!) then its even more proof that we were all better off with this nightmare never taking flight, and those folks out there who decry Superman Returns might wish to be a bit more thankful that THAT was the movie we got a few years later, rather than Burton’s “vision.”

Chilling, isn’t it?

PTG Episode 47 is brought to you by Smallville Season 8 on DVD. Yup, this past season, which turned out to be a LOT better than I expected it to be going into the season, came out on home video yesterday, which means the new season of Smallville will be starting up very soon, on Friday, September 25th, to be exact. What THAT means is that the “Smallville Smackdown” segment of PTG will be making its return that weekend, so if you’re a Smallville watcher and you don’t like spoilers, be sure and watch each new episode BEFORE downloading or listening to PTG’s live broadcasts! Despite how silly the end of last season got, I am STILL looking forward to the start of Season 9 and what the show runners, including new producer Tom Welling (Clark Kent), have in store for us this year. What can I say, I’m an addict.

In this episode Ericathepimp and I review Inglourious Basterds, the latest film offering from Quentin Tarantino, which dominated the box office last weekend with a $37.6 million dollar haul, over $12 million better than Tarantino’s previous opening weekend best, Kill Bill Vol. 2 back in 2004. Not sure what word of mouth is going to do for ‘Basterds’ this weekend–I’ve heard just as many people say they hated it as liked it, and I can understand that because the movie is definitely not for everyone. One thing I will say for the film in addition to what’s said in the podcast is that Tarantino has once again created two unforgettable characters in Lt. Aldo “The Apache” Raines (Brad Pitt) and Colonel Hans “The Jew Hunter” Landa (Christoph Waltz). Waltz won a “Best Supporting Actor” award at Cannes for the role, and Pitt … well, sometimes with all the tabloid crap you can forget how talented the man is as an actor. As over the top and ridiculous as Raines is as a character, Pitt breathes so much zany life into him that you’re simply riveted whenever Raines is on-screen. He owns every laugh-out-loud moment in this movie without question. Yeah, the movie is too long and he’s not in enough of it, but it’s still worth seeing JUST for him, no joke.

One last note about Cure for the Run: Check out this interview shot by Michael Poley of OETV (and often the camera operator and video editor of PTG’s videos) highlighting last Saturday’s wildly-successful charity event benefiting Rock for Hunger. Can’t give enough kudos to Michael for the job he does on these video segments, even the ones that don’t have me in them. OETV(Orlando Event TV) is Michael’s independent arts preview program/website, and we wish him the best of luck with his future projects.

PTG Episode 45 is brought to you by the Cure For the Run. Yes, SomaCow’s day to help the homeless and hungry in Orlando is this weekend, and there’s still time for you to get involved. Registration for the event begins at 4PM at Wall Street Cantina in downtown Orlando, and the event itself starts at 5PM, so if you’re local to Orlando and you want to help out, come on down, walk the 164 ft., and hey, get a free vodka drink from the Cantina for your efforts! If you’re NOT local to Orlando, you can still help by making a donation at the event website. Just click on the links in this article, hit the “Donate via PayPal” button, and you’ve done your good deed for the day. All proceeds go to Rock For Hunger. Thanks to everyone who has already donated!

In this episode, Mad Mario, EricathePimp, and I talk about last week’s announcement that director Bryan Singer has been tapped to direct a big-screen adaptation of Battlestar Galactica, one that will have no connection to the TV series we’ve all came to know and love, and compared it to other “Worst Ideas Ever” this year. We also hit on last week’s Blackest Night issues from DC Comics, and in our new “Mad Mario Potpourri” segment, the Destroyer of Worlds reviews Coraline and Watchmen on blu-ray and looks ahead to The Beatles Rock Band. It’s good stuff, but you knew that, ’cause it’s Mad Mario in the studio, and he always brings it when he joins us in the studio. Thanks again, dude–can’t wait until your next visit.

Oh, and speaking of games, just one last bit–Sony announced yesterday that FINALLY they’re dropping the price of the PS3 by $100 on all existing models AND introducing a new model, the PS3 Slim, in September that, among other neat things, uses 34% less energy. So what I want to know now is this: Any chance Sony will start a trade-in program for older PS3 systems so that we can get more “green” and use less energy as a gaming community? I mean, yes, we want those bigger hard drives, too, but seriously, it’s more about the lower electric bills and the environment! (Yeah, I know, not very likely, but you never know until you ask …)

PTG Episode 36 is brought to you by the Blackest Night. Yes, the prophesied apocalypse of Black Power Ring-bearing zombies craving flesh and the emotion within living, beating hearts is upon the DC Universe and its devoted readers, and starting this week, PTG will feature reviews of Blackest Night core stories and tie-ins in the Blackest Night Spotlight. Judging from issue #1, it’s going to be one hell of a horror story coming at our heroes, and all bets are off as to who will survive …

Aside from the brand-spanking new Blackest Night Spotlight, the episode also features reviews of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (excellent!) and, in the Eat More Geek segment, a review of Taco Bell’s new Bacon Cheesy Baked Potato Burrito (horrible!). While attempting to consume said burrito without ralphing, The Lovely Erica turns on her never-before-used mic to help me break down some other fast food train wrecks in recent memory. McPizza, anyone?

Oh, and just want to say thank you once again to everyone who showed up to the 1st PTG/SomaCow karaoke-tweetup last Saturday night. Got to hang out with Jamie and Nos from The Experience once again, Mickey came out to represent SomaCow, and got to meet some cool new people as well (Tiny, Chico, Sue, Chris, yes, I do mean you!). Despite some technical problems besetting the karaoke DJ, good times were had by all, so much so in fact that :: drum roll :: PTG is happy to announce …

The PTG/SomaCow Karaoke-Tweetup, Part Deux!

This time we’ll be meeting at Colonial Lanes in Orlando, off of Colonial Dr. and Primrose Ave., on Saturday, August 1st, at around 11PM. Same drill as last weekend: PTG will air in its normal slot on Saturday 8-10PM, then immediately afterward we’ll pack up and head out to Colonial, which features a full-service restaurant as well as a lounge and one of the best bowling alleys in town. Best of all, the whole building is non-smoking, so those of you who missed out last time in part because you didn’t want to bring children into Mugshots’ carcinogen-laden atmosphere, you’re all clear this time! Hope to see everyone that came out last time come out again and to see some folks we missed last Saturday. More details to come!

I just need to say this right now: Dan Didio and DC Comics, just this once, I apologize for doubting you.

Months ago, prior to MegaCon, I complained in this space about DC Comics robbing Blackest Night of some emotional impact by allowing the identities of certain Black Lanterns to surface long before the comics reached the hands of readers. I looked at the revelations of Earth-2 Superman and Martian Manhunter as Black Lanterns as a catastrophic misstep, because what other revelations could they possibly throw at us that could match the heart-rending reveals of Kal-L and J’onn J’onzz to Earth’s heroes as the Blackest Night descended upon the DCU?

Yeah, well, shows what I know.

Unless you’ve somehow had access to Geoff Johns’ scripts or Ivan Reis’s sketches, Blackest Night #1 is certain to leave you in shock. Everything we’ve seen to this point–the emergence of the other Corps, the Sinestro Corps War, even the prophesy of Cosmic Revelations at the end of that story arc that first revealed the coming of ‘the Blackest Night,’–will do NOTHING to lessen the impact of the events that unfold in these first pages. Think back to when you read the Sinestro Corps War Special that kicked off that story, when all the villains, all of the Anti-Monitor’s heralds, stood revealed, and the dread you felt in that moment, the fear you might have felt (along with the need to see what happened next).

I promise you, Blackest Night #1 will top that feeling.

In terms of the art, Ivan Reis is at the top of his game here. Due to the sheer number of DC characters we see in the course of the issue, the fact that everything is coherent and every panel delivers emotional impact, is truly astounding. Add to those pages several double-page splash images that give the proceedings a “widescreen” feel, much like the work of illustrator Bryan Hitch did in his Ultimates work for Marvel. Any one of those splash spreads would make a great poster or gatefold cover, and no doubt at least one of them will when this issue gets into reprints. If he’s able to keep this book on time and it’s his work throughout all eight issues, Reis will have established his claim to succeeding George Perez as THE ‘epic’ artist at DC Comics.

But of course, none of it would matter without Geoff Johns’s seemingly-effortless forays into the minds of his main characters. We as readers experience the events of this issue through the viewpoints of a number of characters, and each of those viewpoints, each of those narrative voices, feels separate and distinct. Of course, its to be expected with Hal Jordan, who Johns has guided in his journey since “Green Lantern: Rebirth.” But the other voices that tell this tale are just as effective and riveting.

Now, seriously, if you’ve been waiting for this as long as most DC fans have been, the chances that you weren’t going to enjoy the story were, in my opinion, quite slim. But so many people picked up Blackest Night #0 on Free Comic Book Day not because they were Green Lantern fans or DC fans, but because it was FREE. It’s to those readers out there who might have been impressed with that issue but still not inclined to grab Blackest Night #1 tomorrow because they’re not fans of Green Lantern or DC that I say this:

Pick this book up. Trust me, you’re going to love it.