Little Stuffed Bull in a fez

Dave L. speaks words of wisdom on nerd culture

New promo clips for season 2 of The Variants (now with sexy Richard scenes)

New Adam WarRock Tracks, including an X-Factor EP

Did you know you can totally order totally order Write More Good, the @FakeAPStylebook book?

Write More Good: An Absolutely Phony Guide, the book created by the creators of FakeAPStylebook on Twitter, of which I am one, is out today!

Anyway…we wrote a book together, and it’s coming out on April 5th. This is what it looks like:

Now, unlike some other Twitter feeds that got book deals, we didn’t just recycle our existing material and package it into a book. No, this is an entire book of entirely original material. And, even if I do say so myself, it’s pretty damn funny. You can buy it direct from Amazon or for the Kindle or from from one of these other fine sellers.

Here is a sample chapter, to give you just a little taste of what’s in store:
Write More Good by The Bureau Chiefs – Excerpt

I’ll give you three guesses who wrote the gay jokes there, and the first two don’t count…

Here, for putting up with that blatant sales pitch, have an Ed Fury picture:

For Comics Snobs Who Won’t Read Superhero Comics
Absolute All Star Superman: Grant Morrison’s and Frank Quitely’s greatest collaboration to date, all in one nicely packaged over-sized hard-cover. The art has more character and depth than just about anything else on the market, and the writing is the sharpest look at just why Superman is a cultural icon you’re likely to ever come across.

For Superhero Fans Who Won’t Go Near Manga
Pluto: Naoki Urasawa’s retelling of an Astro Boy story has a lot of similarities to super-hero comics: big impressive fights, a reimagining of iconic characters, and intense melodrama. At eight volumes long the story is pretty meaty and of a nicely digestible length. That it’s also an emotionally mature and affecting story about robots and morality is a bonus.

For Anyone Who Won’t Read European Comics
Blacksad: Is it high art? No, but I think that’s to its benefit. It’s an unabashedly adult noir detective story that just happens to look remarkably like a Disney film. Will it change the mind of anyone who thinks that all European comics are just Heavy Metal-inspired soft porn. No, but it should broaden the minds of anyone who thinks they’re just Tintin, Asterix and impenetrable art comics.

For People Who Don’t Read Comic Books At All
Anything else. Seriously, would you get a vegetarian a subscription to the Steak of the Month Club?

For Size Queens
The Big Penis Book: A literally massive coffee-table book that is nothing but page after page after page of photos of men who have been…generously gifted. Most of the photos are from the 70s and 80s, and as a pictorical document regarding the history of, well, gay porn it’s actually pretty interesting.

For Those Who Insist That It’s Art, Not Porn
The Art Of George Quaintance: From the golden age of physique magazines, comes an exhaustive look at a pioneer of homoerotic art and cartoons. Pretty thoroughly overshadowed by Tom of Finland, Quaintance’s art is masculine and playful and oddly endearing. Never before will you see so many drawings of naked cowboys standing behind artfully placed cacti.

For The Gamer With Lots Of Free Time
Dragon Age Origins: Ultimate Edition: A nice mix of tactical and action RPG game-play in a game world that wears its “inspired by about a dozen grim fantasy novels” heart on its sleeve. Oh, sure, I could quibble that the only same-sex partners available to you in a game emphasizing player-choice are a bisexual assassin and a religious fanatic, but the overall experience is still deep and satisfying enough to be rewarding.

For Doctor Who Fans
The Brilliant Book of Doctor Who: A nice mix of episode guide and episode-specific “back matter,” there should be something here to please any fan of the show, provided that they’re slightly geeky and are the type of fan who goes “ooh, a map of Leadworth!” *ahem* There’s also interviews with all the major cast-members, behind-the-scenes stuff (including the nixed redesign of the Silurians), and some broad hints as to what happens in the next season. So, yeah, geeky.

For Those Who Bore You To Tears Talking About Those Vampire Movies and TV Shows
Being Human: A smart and funny show about vampires and ghosts and werewolves? One that doesn’t shove the sort of eye-rolling “romances” with “mortal women” down the audience’s throats? You’d almost doubt it was possible, and yet, here it is. With the added bonus of not forgetting that these are monsters and when, you get right down to it, vampires are pretty disgusting and despicable.
(Okay, yeah, it does play the “humans…are the real monsters” card pretty frequently…)

For Mystery Fans
Sherlock: A smart and sophisticated modernization of Sherlock Holmes that really had no right to be as good as it was. And I say that as a person who likes 80% of what Steven Moffat has done and 99% of what Mark Gatiss has done. Be prepared to get screamed at when the person you give this to gets to the end of the final episode, though.

For The Lapsed D&D Player
Castle Ravenloft: I’ll be upfront and tell you right now that I am not a fan of the current edition of Dungeons and Dragons, for a variety of reasons. But, as a modular co-operative board-game, the rules actually work. This is a big box with a lot of pieces inside it and should provide anyone who used to play, or wants to play but never has, with a pretty good mini-taste of what it’s like.

For Little Kids
This completely bad-ass dinosaur chomper thing. Seriously, it is awesome.

Here, for reading/putting up with all of that, you deserve a picture of Ed Fury:

Bit short of eye-candy, though, so here’s a shot of Paul Rudd:

Andrew is putting a Halloween spin on his usual features, including my personal favorite, Nobody’s Favorite.

Bully is focusing on the uncomfortable truth about Riverdale.

James Rolfe of Cinemassacre is doing a video review of a camp classic a day, starting with The Phantom Creeps.

There’s a distinct lack of beefcake in October films, so here’s a picture of Ed Fury.

Here’s a beardy, brooding Ryan Reynolds, star of Buried:

Since one of the films we looked at is Mark Wahlberg’s move back to comedy, The Other Guys, I thought I’d share a picture from the days when we had no idea he’d eventually star in a film about homicidal foliage.

So if you want to know what two random cynics on the internet think about big fantasy block-busters like The Last Airbender and The Sorcerer’s Apprentice or indie thrillers like The Wild Hunt or Jim Carrey’s attempts to play a non-offensive gay role in I Love You, Phillip Morris, you should head over there.