Superhero news roundup:

• I'm watching the HD-DVDs of the TV show Heroes in my third attempt to try getting into this series, and now I like it okay. My main objection still stands, in that it has too much bloody graphic violence -- the villain of the series, Sylar (played by Zachary Quinto, who is set to portray young Spock in the next Star Trek movie), kills the heroes by cutting their heads open and eating their brains in order to take on their powers. Lovely! I guess there is no other way to drive home the point that this superhero production is definitely not for children. But hit prime time shows about superheroes are a rare breed, so I will stay on for now.


• It was announced this week that famed Australian director George Miller (who created the Mad Max and Babe movies and, more recently, Happy Feet) is going to helm a big screen adaptation of the Justice League of America comic book [see some members above in a panel from 40 years ago]. This is being fast-tracked for release in 2009, with the next Superman movie being shelved to make room. Remains to be seen what version of the characters they will use, and if any of the actors from Smallville or the recent Batman and Superman movies be involved. As far as I'm concerned, the perfect adaptation was already done with the Justice League Unlimited animated series a couple of years ago.


• Speaking of animated DC superhero TV programs, the season premieres of both Legion of Superheroes and The Batman were shown this morning... I missed the first ten minutes of Legion and forgot to TiVo it, so I don't know why all the characters were redesigned to look older and thus different from the millions of Happy Meal toys recently distributed all over the country. The Batman show, now in its fourth season, had its first appearances of Superman, Lois, and Lex. They used the same voice actors for those characters carried over from Justice League Unlimited, although they all got a redesign, just like Batman and all his villains did in this series (although Robin looks about the same as he did in the Teen Titans series). However, they are changing the history of the characters too much on this show... Batgirl existing before Robin, Batman being a member of the Justice League before Superman comes along, etc. I don't like it.


• Yet another new version of Superman arrived this week in the DVD world premiere of the Superman Doomsday animated movie. The infamous Death of Superman saga happened in the early 1990s when I wasn't into superheroes as much (I was out living a real adult life -- imagine that), so I'm not concerned that the adaptation isn't very faithful. I am miffed, though, that they went with different voice actors and character designs for this. I'm not just being some cranky old goofball saying "back in my day, this is how it used to be..." What I'm saying is that now, here in 2007, there are at least five different versions of Superman in movies and TV: the one in last year's Superman Returns (who may or may not ever be seen again), young Superman in the Legion of Superheroes cartoon (two different versions in two seasons), young Superman on the Smallville show (now that Justice League Unlimited is over, this is my favorite currently produced version, although they also stray too much from established mythology), the version sometimes seen on Krypto the Superdog animated series (is this thing still on?), and now the one on the Superman Doomsday DVD... which also has a preview of a Justice League: The New Frontier animated movie featuring yet another Superman! Now how can my sons be expected to keep up with all these different concurrent versions of the same character?


• Which calls to mind why I seem to care about superheroes as much now as I did 30 years ago... The day I met Drew five years and five months ago was the day we went to see the first Spider-Man movie. He was already into superheroes before I met him, and is only just now starting to wind down... though his little brother is carrying on for him. Benjamin might have got his name from Benjamin J. Grimm a/k/a the Thing of the Fantastic Four, you know.... (I like Superman and Batman, but not the names Clark or Bruce for my son... guess I could have taken a cue from what actor Nicolas Cage did and named him Kal-El instead!) Anyway, it's a different world for superheroes now than it was 30 years ago. Superman: The Movie was just around the corner, so before that all I had to supplement my comics were the very lame Superfriends cartoon, the lame Batman reruns, and the boring Superman reruns.... no toys or video games at all. These days, you can't go anywhere without running into superhero stuff... including hit songs inspired by them!

Drew and his mom five years ago... when he was just a little older than Ben's current age!