Geeking Out

After the jump check out a list of which which comics, graphic novels, toys and other pop-culture merchandise will arrive at your local comic shop via Diamond Comics Distributors.   Please check with your retailer for availability. Read more »

I should have just made this a meme contest. Trying to keep up with complicated storylines for Matrix reboots is exhausting. One of the keys to this contest was that I said you could revive the Matrix property any way you liked. That may explain some of my choices. whoiseyevan saw an opening for a Morpheus connection. nix.nightbird had one I think would make Rob proud. Ignoring #2 and #3, we begin with Neo finding out that the "real world" he was told about is actually another Matrix within the Matrix, and that the "real world" Matrix is actually a world within a computer on the Grid, from Tron. Before long, Neo escapes the Matrix-Matrix, and discovers that he is just a program written by Kevin Flynn... He always was. Everything that happened in The Matrix was happening in a Matrix (or in a Matrix-Matrix) within the Grid. Together, Sam Flynn and Neo take on Clu and his army. Meanwhile, Trinity teams up with Cora to deal with a threat in the real world: Dillinger's kid is planning to erase the Grid and get rid of Flynn's influence once and for all. Will Morpheus find Tron in time to save everyone? Will Dillinger Jr. release fear toxin and terrify Gotham City? It's all the bullet time, neon, skin-tight pleather, and electronica music you can handle! Whoa! I realized someone else had a similar idea after I posted this. I'm leaving it up for the heck of it. ComradeDread1 had two pitches I liked Mine would be a television series. There is a fragile peace. Humans and machines have begun the hard process of ending the war and moving forward to rebuilding their shared world. That is the purpose of the Reclamation and Reconciliation Project. It is a human-machine shared project to clean the planet and the atmosphere from the devastating war of the past and build diplomatic ties between the two factions. To this end, they have built the shared town of Genesis (on the world's surface) where humans and machines live together and work at restoring the planet. When a terrorist blows up a Reclamation factory and its crew, tensions rise. The human ambassador and his machine counterpart convince their governments to jointly investigate the crime instead of shutting down RRP entirely. Agent Carter is teamed with human Detective (and recent Matrix occupant) John Ng to hunt down the perpetrators of this crime. Agent Harrison Carter: A sentient program, who formerly hunted free humans. Since the peace, he is a soldier without a job, wondering what his purpose is, why he continues to exist surrounded by people he dislikes who hate him. So he descended into the world of vice, and was working as a bouncer for a bar, when he is recruited again by his former masters for a new purpose and given an android body so he can exist in the real world too. Carter has a disdain for humans, but isn't fond of his fellow machines either. His existential crisis is not in becoming human, but in finding a new purpose in a world that no longer needs him. Detective John Ng: A former resident of the Matrix and its NYPD. He was recruited by an old flame shortly before the attack on Zion, and went from a world he knew, to a hellish, blasted landscape. He was understandably angry about the whole thing, realizing that his entire life was a lie and everything he ever did never mattered. Compounding the matter, his love left him, when she became convinced that he couldn't move on and blamed her for it. The two would navigate between Genesis, Zion, and the Matrix from week to week, dealing with various incidents and crimes involving humans and machines against one another. They would deal with factions that wanted the war to resume. They would also encounter a group of transhumanists that want humans and machines to merge into a new lifeform and have been creating machine bodies and 'liberating' their transmachinist programs from the Matrix.Thus they would eventually add a third member of the team in Jane, a hacker and cyborg (more so than the Matrix p

Just got this in my email from Bruce J. I never realized Halo fighters now carried violins. Check out Devin Super Tramp and Lindsey Stirling’s Halo medley with actual Halo fighters in action. Lindsey’s dance moves come in handy in this battle around 3:25 in the video. William Joseph also adds a killer touch to the music. Thanks Bruce! [Devin Super Tramp]

Today, many popular wrestling stars are taking turns on the silver screen and have caught the acting bug! Here, we’ll look at these action heavyweights and highlight some of their top on-screen moments, including Randy Orton, starring in 12 Rounds 2: Reloaded as Nick Malloy. A twisted genius and a good man are going head-to-head in the ultimate game of cat and mouse!  Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment and WWE Studios unveil a brand new chapter in its thrilling action franchise with 12 ROUNDS 2: RELOADED. The second installment, starring WWE Superstar Randy Orton, debuts on Digital HD on May 21 and on Blu-ray and DVD on June 4 – just in time for Father’s Day. As paramedic Nick Malloy, Orton jumps into overdrive in this pulse-pounding, thrill ride filled with gripping suspense! Malloy receives a terrifying call from a vengeful psychopath connected to his past, and the maniac (Brian Markinson) threatens to unleash a murder spree unless Nick can complete a series of 12 challenges without involving the cops or missing a single deadline. With no time to spare — and his own wife’s life on the line — Nick must piece together cryptic clues and hunt down the killer before it’s too late! But Randy Orton isn't the only wrestler to kick ass in film, check out some of his fellow superstars who built a second career in front of the camera and learn how to win a copy of 12 Rounds 2: Reloaded on Blu-ray! Read more »

An anonymous reader writes "When in early 2010 Google shared with the public that they had been breached in what became known as the Aurora attacks, they said that the attackers got their hands on some source code and were looking to access Gmail accounts of Tibetan activists. What they didn't make public is that the hackers have also accessed a database containing information about court-issued surveillance orders that enabled law enforcement agencies to monitor email accounts belonging to diplomats, suspected spies and terrorists. Whether this was the primary goal of the attacks as well as how much information was exfiltrated is unknown. current and former U.S. government officials interviewed by the Washington Post say that the database in question was possibly accessed in order to discover which Chinese intelligence operatives located in the U.S. were under surveillance." Read more of this story at Slashdot.

This was supposed to be live in the a.m., but I could not for the life of me get it to run at apple.com in any browser. Then other sites offering embeds turned out to be showing the exact same trailer as last time (falsely referred to as the "final" one, which I bet even this is not). But this pretty picture is selling more of a Verbinski vibe - subtly telling viewers, I think, that even if you find westerns boring (as I did when I was a kid), don't worry - this is a cartoony version. Trivia: did you know the Lone Ranger is supposedly the ancestor of the Green Hornet? So be happy you didn't get Seth Rogen in this. Trailer after the jump Continue reading "New Lone Ranger Trailer Is Finally up and Running" >

An anonymous reader writes "Seth Ladd has an excellent write-up of Dart: 'When Dart was originally launched, many developers mistook it for some sort of Java clone. In truth, Dart is inspired by a range of languages such as Smalltalk, Strongtalk, Erlang, C#, and JavaScript. Get past the semicolons and curly braces, and you'll see a terse language without ceremony. ... Dart understands that sometimes you just don’t feel like appeasing a ceremonial type checker. Dart’s inclusion of an optional type system means you can use type annotations when you want, or use dynamic when that’s easier. For example, you can explore a new idea without having to first think about type hierarchies. Just experiment and use var for your types. Once the idea is tested and you’re comfortable with the design, you can add type annotations." Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Ellen McLain is a total badass! Not only is she the voice of GLaDOS in the “Portal” video game series, but she is also an opera singer and will appear in this summer’s Pacific Rim. And now, in the Kickstarter video below — in which she’s baking a cake! No lie! — she’s asking for monetary help for an upcoming independent film that starts shooting this summer. The movie, Winning Dad, is about a homophobic father who gets lured on a camping trip with his gay son, Colby. The twist, though, is that Colby has also invited along his boyfriend Rusty, a man who Colby’s father believes is his son’s heterosexual business partner. McLain plays Colby’s mother, and if someone pledges at the highest level — $7,500 — McLain will throw that person a party and bake them a cake, personally! The video will also be posted on YouTube and Vimeo and you’ll get to party with the rest of the cast and crew! Pledging ends on Father’s Day, appropriately enough! [Winning Dad - Kickstarter Page (Donate!) / via The Mary Sue]

If you aren't spending the weekend glued to Netflix's return of Arrested Development, this week's new titles might be one of the best yet.  Among the must see's are The Last Stand, Schwarzenegger's relentlessly entertaining return to action films, Side Effects, the latest film from the awesome Steven Soderbergh, two films from Hayao Miyazaki (including my favorite anime, My Neighbor Totoro), the first season of The Aquabats Super Show!, the LEGO Batman film, some new tv releases including Perception and three DVDs of classic episodes of The Lone Ranger.  Plus there's also Parker, based on the Richard Stark novel, The Hunter, starring Jason Statham and much more. As always, fire up that queue and prep that shopping cart and check out this weeks' latest releases! The Last Stand Sheriff Ray Owens (Schwarzenegger) moved out of Los Angeles and settled into a life fighting what little crime takes place in sleepy border town Sommerton Junction. But that peaceful existence is shattered when Gabriel Cortez (Eduardo Noriega), the most notorious, wanted drug kingpin in the western hemisphere, makes a deadly yet spectacular escape from an FBI prisoner convoy. With the help of a fierce band of lawless mercenaries led by the icy Burrell (Peter Stormare), Cortez begins racing towards the US-Mexico border at 250 mph in a specially-outfitted Corvette ZR1 with a hostage in tow. Cortez' path: straight through Summerton Junction, where the whole of the U.S. law enforcement, including Agent John Bannister (Forest Whitaker) will have their final opportunity to intercept him before the violent fugitive slips across the border forever. At first reluctant to become involved, and then counted out because of the perceived ineptitude of his small town force, Owens ultimately rallies his team and takes the matter into his own hands, setting the stage for a classic showdown.  Extras include featurettes, making of and deleted and extended scenes. Side Effects One pill can change your life.  From Academy Award-winning director Steven Soderbergh (Traffic) comes this suspenseful and provocative tale of intrigue starring Channing Tatum, Academy Award nominees Rooney Mara and Jude Law, and Academy Award winner Catherine Zeta-Jones. After her husband (Tatum) is released from prison, Emily (Mara) begins suffering from terrifying anxiety and turns to psychiatrist Dr. Banks (Law) for help. But when Banks prescribes an experimental drug for her, the side effects have chilling and deadly consequences.  Extras include featuettes, viral website and commercials. Parker To get away clean, you have to play dirty.  Parker (Jason Statham) is a professional thief who lives by a personal code of ethics: Don't steal from people who can't afford it and don't hurt people who don't deserve it. But on his latest heist, his crew double crosses him, steals his stash, and leaves him for dead. Determined to make sure they regret it, Parker tracks them to Palm Beach, playground of the rich and famous, where the crew is planning their biggest heist ever. Donning the disguise of a rich Texan, Parker takes on an unlikely partner, Leslie (Jennifer Lopez), a savvy insider, who's short on cash, but big on looks, smarts and ambition. Together, they devise a plan to hijack the score, take everyone down and get away clean. Also starring Michael Chiklis.  Extras include featurettes and commentary. Read more »

New submitter QuantumPion writes "The Environmental Protection Agency released draft guidelines last month that could significantly relax radiation hazard standards in the case of a radiological event in the United States by using risk-based decisions. The goal is to have limits that make sense in an emergency that are different from the limits in day-to-day life. From the article: 'Currently, the only guidance are the extremely strict standards that apply for EPA Superfund sites and nuclear plant decommissioning, which are as low as 0.010–0.025 rem/year, far below the natural background levels in the U.S. of 0.300 rem/year, and even well below the average amount of radioactive materials that Americans eat each year. And these guidelines aren’t really different from the 1992 PAG, except in the area of long-term cleanup standards and, perhaps, standards for resettlement. What’s the big deal here? As radworkers, we’re allowed to get 5 rem/year. 2 rem/year doesn’t rate a second thought. ... No one has ever been harmed by 5 rem/year, so setting emergency levels at 2 rem/year is pretty mild and more than reasonable. ... Think of it this way. The situations covered by these new guidelines are similar to someone dying of thirst who has the chance to drink fresh water having 2,000 pCi per gallon of radium in it. While the safe drinking water levels are 20 pCi/gal for Ra, 2,000 pCi/gal is of no threat, especially if you’re going to die from imminent dehydration. Of course, a bag of potato chips has 3,500 picocuries, so go figure.'" Read more of this story at Slashdot.