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Tag Archive: San Diego Comic-Con


Crowdfunding–Wynonna Earp Season 1 home release coming only via Indiegogo

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June 12, 2017

In a strange twist to the home video release marketing strategy, IDW Entertainment, the company behind both Wynonna Earp the comic book series and the Syfy Channel television series, is well on its way through what looks to be a successful Indiegogo crowdfunding campaign to bring Wynonna Earp Season One directly to its fans.  The first season will only be released on Blu-ray–no DVD–and only via the Indiegogo campaign.  Discs are expected to ship around September 2017.

Wynonna Earp follows Wyatt Earp’s great-granddaughter as she battles demons and other creatures in a town called Purgatory.  With her unique abilities, a demon-killing gun named Peacemaker, and a posse of dysfunctional allies, only she can bring the paranormal to justice.

Although fans and new viewers can also watch each episode of the first season on Netflix, as Wynonna Earp begins its second season (with the premiere episode of the season airing on Friday nights beginning last Friday, June 9), it’s going to be a little bit harder for the new viewer who would otherwise be willing to buy the first season to get caught up, especially if they missed the Syfy Network recap this Memorial Day weekend.  But this likely will really only have an effect on the fans of the show who would ordinarily pay to have Season One in-hand closer to the start date of the next season.  Will this be the next regular marketing method for shows that would otherwise not justify a home release to still be able to make fans happy?

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Liew, Thompson, Staples, Cain highlight 2017 Eisner nominees

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May 3, 2017

   

Named for legendary comics creator Will Eisner, the Eisner Awards will see their 29th year, to be announced at this year’s San Diego Comic-Con in July.  This year’s nominations have been selected, resulting in a banner year for Fantagraphics and Image Comics with 22 and 21 nominations, respectively.

We at borg.com never align with the Academy Awards, but always are happy to agree on Eisner accolades.  Artist Jill Thompson is nominated in three categories this year.  Her Wonder Woman: The True Amazon was our pick for 2016’s Best Graphic Novel, and is a nominee for the “Best Graphic Album-New” Eisner Award.  Beasts of Burden: What the Cat Dragged In was our borg.com pick for Best Single Issue last year, and Thompson, Evan Dorkin, and Sarah Dyer are up for the Eisner for Best Single Issue.  Thompson is also nominated for Best Painter/Multimedia Artist.

   

Kudos go to our friend, writer Jason Aaron, for his nomination along with artist Russell Dauterman in the Best Continuing Series category for The Mighty Thor (Marvel).  Other notable nominees are Chelsea Cain and Kate Niemczyk for their Mockingbird series (Marvel) plus Cain’s nomination in the Best Writer category for that series.  The highest number of nominations went to Sonny Liew and his The Art of Charlie Chan Hock Chye (Pantheon), netting nods for Best Graphic Album–New, Best U.S. Edition of International Material–Asia, Best Writer/Artist, Best Coloring, Best Lettering, and Best Publication Design.  Archie Comics received nominations for Erica Henderson and Ryan North for Best Publication for Teens and Best Humor Publication for Jughead.

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Gentle Giant creates jumbo Dianoga for Star Wars 40th anniversary celebration

Filed under: Con Culture, Fantasy Realms, Movies, Sci-Fi Café — Leave a comment
April 4, 2017

Star Wars Celebration 2017 is almost here.  This year the convention will take place in Orlando, Florida, April 13-16 at the Orange County Convention Center.  Hundreds of exclusive licensed collectibles will be available at this year’s show in light of the franchise’s 40th anniversary celebration.  But Gentle Giant wins the nostalgia award for its choice of throwback exclusive ideas–a reproduction of the Dianoga from the 1978 Star Wars Death Star Space Station playset in a jumbo format.

First unveiled at the Gentle Giant booth at San Diego Comic-Con in 2010, the toy company began to re-create the original line of 3 3/4 Star Wars Kenner action figures in the size of the original large-sized action figures–about 12 inches tall.  The company releases limited numbers of each figure with card backs and packaging reflecting the style of the originals.  The company creates the jumbo figures from digital scans of the small figures.  So if you fondly remember your first figure was C-3PO, you could purchase a giant version of the figure to display, or play with, at home.  We at borg.com awarded Gentle Giant’s prototype, rocket-firing jumbo Boba Fett the best action figure release of the year here back in 2013.

So taking the first Star Wars creature toy ever released and offering it again in this anniversary year is inspired.  The Dianoga was the only included figure in any of the regular release original Star Wars playsets–all others had to have been purchased separately (the only other “monster” from the movie to be made into a toy in the early years after Star Wars would be the Dewback).  The Dianoga came with its own “garbage”–three sheets of yellow, blue, and white Styrofoam broken into bits, to soften the fall of Luke, Leia, Han, and Chewbacca from their famous fall into the trash compactor.  Gentle Giant advertises this new exclusive release, too, will include foam garbage.

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Happy Birthday! borg.com reaches five year anniversary

Filed under: Backstage Pass, Comics & Books, Con Culture, Fantasy Realms, Movies, Retro Fix, Sci-Fi Café, Superheroes, TV — Leave a comment
June 10, 2016

Meeting Lee Majors

Hey, looks like we made it!

Five years ago today, Elizabeth C. Bunce, Art Schmidt, Jason McClain, and I had already spent a few months talking through the technical details for the launch of borg.com.  What should it look like?  What should we write about?  How do we get to there from here?  Then it all came together on June 10, 2011, and I sat down and just started writing.  Should this be a weekly thing?  Once I started I just couldn’t stop and we cemented borg.com as a daily webzine.  And readers started showing up every day.  Soon we had hundreds of followers, and hundreds of thousands of visits per year.

The best part?  Working with friends and meeting new ones each year.

We’ve had plenty of high points.  Cosplay took off in a big way in the past five years.   Elizabeth and I hit the ground running at San Diego Comic-Con in July 2011 with our Alien Nation/Chuck mash-up and you can find us all over the Web in photos taken by others at the show.  Our years were dotted with the random brush with coolness.  A retweet by actress Alana de la Garza, coverage of Joss Whedon visiting the Hall H line at 3 a.m. outside SDCC in 2012, Zachary Levi calling out Elizabeth for her cosplay at Nerd HQ, interviewing the stars of History Channel’s Vikings series, our praise for the Miss Fury series appearing on the back of every Dynamite Comics issue one month, tweets from Hollywood make-up artist family the Westmores commenting on our discussion of Syfy’s Face Off series, our Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (negative!) review featured on the movie’s website, that crazy promotion for the Coma remake mini-series, planning the first Planet Comicon at Bartle Hall and the Star Trek cast reunion, attending the first Kansas City Comic Con and the first Wizard World Des Moines Con, hanging with comic book legend Howard Chaykin, Rock ‘n Roll Hall of Famer Darryl McDaniels, cast members from Star Wars, The Lord of the Rings, The Hobbit, and Star Trek, bionic duo Lee Majors and Lindsay Wagner.  And borg.com gained some well-known followers (you know who you are) along the way.

sdcc-whedon-c shot

We’re grateful for some great Twitter, Tumblr, Facebook, and other feedback over the years from Felipe Melo, Mickey Lam, Michael Prestage, The Mithril Guardian, Francesco Francavilla, Adam Hughes, Judy Bunce, Mike Norton, Jack Herbert, Mike Mayhew, Rain Beredo, David Petersen, Rob Williams, and Matt Miner, and for creators we interviewed including Mikel Janin, Penny Juday, Tim Lebbon, Kim Newman, James P. Blaylock, Freddie Williams II, Jai Nitz, and Sharon Shinn.

Bunce Alien Nation cosplay x

What did readers like the most?

We amassed an extensive archive of hundreds of book reviews, movie reviews, reviews of TV shows, and convention coverage, thanks in part to the good folks at Titan Books, Abrams Books, Lucasfilm Press, Weta New Zealand, Entertainment Earth, Dynamite Comics, IDW Publishing, Dark Horse Comics, Image Comics, BOOM! Studios, and several TV and movie studios and distributors.

McClain and EC Bunce

My own favorites?  Sitting down to come up with my own five all-time favorite characters with the borg.com writing staff.

Schmidt and Bunce at PC 2015

Thanks to my family, my friends, especially my partner in crime Elizabeth C. Bunce, Art Schmidt and Jason McClain, my support team, and William Binderup and the Elite Flight Crew.

Onward and upward!

C.J. Bunce
Editor
borg.com

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Paramount releases new round of character posters for Star Trek Beyond

Filed under: Movies, Sci-Fi Café — Leave a comment
June 2, 2016

Star Trek Beyond Kirk poster    Star Trek Beyond Krall posterSince the first Star Trek reboot movie Paramount Pictures has presented fans with some attractive individual character posters.  In 2008 hundreds of fans waited at the Paramount booth at San Diego Comic-Con to land a set of four featuring Kirk, Spock, Bones, and Uhura.  The marketing team followed up with two sets of character posters for the 2013 sequel Star Trek Into Darkness, including action shots for each of Kirk, Spock, Uhura, Scotty, Chekov, and newcomers Khan and Carol Marcus.

The character posters are back again.  In this 50th year of Star Trek, Paramount has issued a new set of movie posters for display at movie theaters and other public display areas for the 13th film in the franchise, Star Trek Beyond, this time featuring Kirk, Spock, Bones, Uhura, Scotty, Chekov, and new featured aliens Sofia Boutella’s Jaylah and Idris Elba’s Krall.  This is in addition to a teaser poster, a Star Trek: The Motion Picture-inspired poster that appears to be the official standard release poster, and an international release poster reminiscent of one of the posters for Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country.

Note that the Sulu and Uhura posters have a pretty glaring error.  Can you spot them?  Will it have an impact on their collectability and future value?

Star Trek Beyond Uhura poster    Star Trek Beyond Sulu poster

These are pretty sharp and definitely the style we’d expect as giveaways at Comic-Con.  The world premiere will be at Comic-Con this year, Wednesday, July 20, 2016, at Embarcadero Marina Park, shown in IMAX.  The San Diego Symphony Orchestra will perform the score and the cast will make an appearance.  Follow the San Diego Comic-Con website for details and a chance to get tickets.

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San Diego Comic-Con–Still the greatest show on Earth

Filed under: Backstage Pass, Comics & Books, Con Culture, Fantasy Realms, Movies, Retro Fix, Sci-Fi Café, Superheroes, TV — Leave a comment
July 8, 2015

SDCC 2012 Overnight crowdSan Diego Comic-Con 2015 begins tonight at the San Diego Convention Center, officially remaining the home of the greatest convention in the world for the next few years now that the city has signed new agreements with Comic-Con International.  This past week you may have seen the annual feeding frenzy of naysayers, grumps, and fogeys, many from the mainstream press, who come out of the woodwork each year to talk about “the good old days,” why they aren’t coming back to Comic-Con this year, why they won’t come back again, how “crazy” Comic-Con visitors are, and posting their annual lists of all the reasons Comic-Con is somehow a bad or odd thing.

Don’t believe any of it for a second.

Maybe these folks didn’t score tickets, maybe they truly think a quaint small-town Con with merely a handful of guests and attendees is the best thing since sliced bread, maybe they forget that the good ol’ days weren’t all that good, or maybe they just don’t understand how pervasive pop culture is in the 21st century.

I’ve been to some great San Diego Comic-Con weekends over the years and wouldn’t swap them for anything.  And don’t get me wrong, local and regional Cons are great, but make no mistake, nothing compares to the excitement, energy and all-out fun you can only have in a venue full of 130,000 like-minded people.  You can’t get that anywhere else.

Comic-Con image b

Let’s dispel some Comic-Con myths:

Comic-Con Badges are Too Difficult to Obtain.  The badges required to attend Comic-Con are no harder to get than tickets to anything the excited masses want to attend.  They are no more difficult to obtain than tickets to the Super Bowl, the World Series, the Olympics, the World Cup, the All-Star game, tickets for [insert the name of the current greatest pop or rock band here]… you get the point.  Should attending the big annual nerd and geekfest of the year require any less effort than the biggest sporting event or best music show?  If can follow basic instructions, the SDCC process for purchasing tickets is straightforward.  And you don’t need to attend last year’s show to be able to get into this year’s show–a myth still perpetuated on the interwebs by those not-in-the-know.

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Marvel Comics preview of Comic-Con highlights

Filed under: Backstage Pass, Comics & Books, Con Culture, Movies, Superheroes, TV — Leave a comment
July 20, 2011

Although the initial news earlier this summer was that Marvel Comics seemed to be pulling back its presence from the San Diego Comic-Con this year, you wouldn’t know it from the line-up.

First off, Captain America: The First Avenger will have its world premiere Thursday at Comic-Con.  The movie will play exclusively at the UA Horton Plaza with Captain America-themed festivities happening throughout the day. Paramount and Marvel will host a free fan screening at 10 A.M. with the movie’s star Chris Evans hosting the screening.  Swag for moviegoers at the Con will include RealD® 3D collector’s glasses and a limited edition poster. A grand prize package of Captain America merchandise and other Marvel items will be given away to a select audience member at each screening.

More free swag and for-purchase Marvel items available at the Marvel booth:

·          Art.com limited edition posters given out during special signings by Joe Quesada, Jonathan Hickman, Mark Waid, Greg Pak, & Humberto Ramos

·          S.H.I.E.L.D. Pins, Captain America Pins, Daredevil pins, Ultimate Spider-Man pins-lots of pins!
 
·          Peavey Guitars (www.peavey.com) – All weekend long, Marvel will be giving away exclusive guitars featuring Marvel characters (Check out the photo below!)
 
·          Captain America Shield iPhone 4 Phone Cases
 
·          Marvel’s The Avengers Eye Patches
 
  
And there are plenty of big names scheduled for the four days at Comic-Con, including writers, editors, artists, moviemakers, and actors:
 
Thursday:
 
10:15-11:15 Marvel: Breaking into Comics the Marvel Way— With talent scout C. B. Cebulski, artists Skottie Young (Ozma of Oz) and Humberto Ramos (Amazing Spider-Man), and Marvel SVP of brand planning & communications Mike Pasciullo (Room 6DE)
 
12:00-1:00 Spreading The Darkness: From Comic Book to Video Games and Entertainment— The Darkness creator Marc Silvestri (X-Men/Dark Avengers: Utopia) and team members from Digital Extremes and 2K Games discuss not only the comic but the upcoming video game, The Darkness II (Room 9)
 
1:00-2:00 Marvel Digital: What’s Next?! Comics…and Beyond!— Members of the Marvel Digital Media Group (Room 7AB)
 
1:00-2:00 Stan Lee, Yoshiki, and Todd McFarlane panel—Indigo Ballroom, Hilton San Diego Bayfront)
 
4:00-5:00 Breaking and Staying In— Andy Schmidt (X-Men, Five Days to Die, Comics Experience founder), writer Mike Costa (G.I. Joe: Cobra) and artist Zander Cannon (Top 10) (Room 30CDE)
 
4:30-5:30 Marvel: Next Big Thing— Panelists Greg Pak (Incredible Hulks), Jonathan Hickman (Fantastic Four), Jim McCann (Marvel Zombies Christmas Carol), Nick Spencer (Ultimate X), editor-in-chief Axel Alonso (Room 6DE)
 
Friday:
 
12:30-1:30 Marvel: Year of the X-Men— Writers Marjorie Liu (X-23), Rick Remender (Uncanny X-Force), and Chris Yost (X-Men: First to Last) and editor-in-chief Axel Alonso (Room 6DE)
 
1:45-2:45 Marvel: Amazing Spider-Man and His Avenging Friends— Creators Zeb Wells (Avenging Spider-Man), Rick Remender (Venom), Mark Waid (Daredevil), Greg Rucka (Punisher), Humberto Ramos (Amazing Spider-Man), senior editor Steve Wacker, editor-in-chief Axel Alonso (Room 6DE)
 
4:00-6:30 Sony showcase—

Ghost Rider-Spirit of Vengeance — Live on stage: directors Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor (Crank) and stars Nicolas Cage, Idris Elba, and Johnny Whitworth.

The Amazing Spider-Man — Appearing in person are producers Avi Arad and Matt Tolmach, director Marc Webb, and new Peter Parker and Gwen Stacy — Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone.

 

Saturday:

10:30-11:30 Marvel Television— Marvel’s head of TV Jeph Loeb, a first look at the premiere of The Avengers: Earth’s Mightiest Heroes season two (Room 6BCF)

2:00-3:00 Spotlight on J. Michael Straczynski (Thor movie comic, Superman Earth One, World War Z movie, Babylon 5) (Room 7AB)

2:00-3:00 Hasbro: Marvel—Thor, Captain-America: The First Avenger, Spider-Man and Marvel Universe lines (Room 9)

2:45-3:45 Marvel: Cup O’ Joe—Marvel’s chief creative officer Joe Quesada (Room 6BCF)

Sunday:

12:30-1:30 Marvel: Fear Itself—Greg Pak (Alpha Flight), Cullen Bunn (The Deep), Nick Spencer (Iron Man 2.0), editor-in-chief Axel Alonso (Room 6DE)
 
Have fun!
 
C.J. Bunce
 
Editor
 
borg.com
 
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DC Comics reveals hardcover 52 compilation, San Diego Comic-con preview

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July 19, 2011

DC Comics revealed Monday that it will publish a compilation of the first 52 new DC Comics #1 issues from its September re-launch in December.  If you’re like me and you skip regular issues and wait for the trade paperback version, this may be for you.  The book will sell at $150, but for that you get all 1,216 pages. 

Starting July 20, at Comic-Con and retailers nationwide, DC Comics will be debuting a guide to the new re-launch titled DC Comics – The New 52.  It will be available for free and will include a six-page guide and reprints of all 52 relaunch #1 covers.

DC Comics also revealed several Comic-Con giveaways and exclusives that had not yet previously been disclosed:

  • DC will have a green screen where guests can get a photo with the new DCU Justice League.
  • DC will give away its own oversized swag bags featuring the Justice League.
  • DC will give away various “Wayne Manor” casino chips.  DC did not mention whether these have any value or will be exchangeable for anything or whether it is just a Comic-Con collectible treasure hunt item.  The chips will be available in six colors and denominations up to $100.
  • Also available: DC 52 postcard checklists, posters and pins.
  • Limited edition portfolios featuring DC 52 covers for $39.95.  Only 520 copies of each volume will be available per day.
  • Limited character action figure “Zoom” from the Flashpoint series.
  • The full panel schedule including DC Comics speakers can be found here.

DC Comics also has revealed several Issue #2 covers for the 52 re-launch, including this one for Green Arrow. 

I have to ask: Since when did Wolverine become Green Arrow?  What’s with the weird stubble/sideburns?  I’m also not a fan of the suit.  He looks more like Connor Hawke from the last issues of the original run of Green Arrow, not our Ollie Queen.

Hrm…

C.J. Bunce

Editor

borg.com

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