POTTERING AROUND
There are a few films that are critic-proof, that have such a huge, loyal following that it doesn't matter what anyone says about it, its fans will see it regardless. Harry Potter is just such a film series. So when I went to see Harry Potter and The Half-Blood Prince, I expected something that would while away a couple of hours pleasantly enough and would then leave no impact on my brain after I watched it, just like the other Potter big-screen adaptations. But Half-Blood Prince was actually even less memorable than its predecessors. Clocking in at two and a half hours, the main problem with it is that tries to adapt a very long book and nothing really happens until the last twenty minutes when Potter and Dumbledore set off on a quest with a tragic conclusion in an attempt to thwart Voldemort for once and for all. It looks pretty as ever, it is competently directed by David Yates and the acting is decent enough, but it just doesn't engage the viewer. But as I said, the fanbase for Rowling's books is so huge that it doesn't matter what I or anybody else say. So if you're a huge Harry Potter fan, you'll see this anyway and if you're not, I'm sure you can find a better way to spend 150 minutes anyway…

ANNUAL ALMOST FINISHED
I couldn't think of a pun for this blog post. We are a few pages away from putting the TRIPWIRE Annual 2009 on the presses and less than two weeks until I see the final product. Putting a magazine today with such a small staff is very difficult and subbing the thing has taken weeks, with us constantly spotting errors. But it will be very satisfying to see the magazine at last. It is hopefully the best one we've ever published. People visiting San Diego Comic Con can come and find us on Small Press Table S07, where we'll have copies of the Annual for sale as well as for anyone looking for stuff for David Tennant to sign will be able to pick up copies of TRIPWIRE Annual 2008 at a knockdown rate. So I am getting excited about San Diego…

DAYLIGHT ROBBERY?
Michael Mann is a director, like Michael Bay, who is all about the surface. Since he got his start on slick Eighties TV series Miami Vice, that's not terribly surprising. Public Enemies, his biopic of bank robber John Dillinger with Johnny Depp in the title role and Christian Bale as his adversary Melvin Purvis, looked impressive when the trailer started doing the rounds at the beginning of the year. Now I've had the chance to see it, at a press screening last week, I'm afraid that it suffers from the flaws that nearly all of Mann's films possess. We are treated to a rather meat-and-potatoes account of how Dillinger, after spending years on the FBI's most wanted list and pursued by agent Purvis, played with nuance by Bale, is tracked down and brought to justice in quite a brutal way. Mann's film looks elegant and he manages to recreate the Thirties with style and pizazz but structurally Public Enemies is very much by the numbers. The law enforcement who try to apprehend him come across as incompetent and almost Keystone Cop-like in their lack of savvy and there is even a scene where Depp as Dillinger walks into the police station, wandering unimpeded amongst the police. Depp is quite charismatic on screen and you are left cheering for him but Bale, while his performance is understated and probably his best in years, doesn't have much to work with. There also isn't any chemistry between Bale and Depp and Public Enemies just isn't very thrilling as a cinematic experience. If you were to compare it to something like Arthur Penn's classic Bonnie and Clyde, it isn't even in the same league. Visually it is impressive but it is a hollow and unemotional experience and it makes you question just how versatile Johnny Depp actually is as an actor. In the hands of another director, Public Enemies could have been a modern movie classic but it falls so short that it is nothing more than an interesting curio with a solid but unengaging cast…

CHALK AND CHEESE
At the weekend, I ventured out of the house to go to LUC 176, a small press event held in Chalk Farm in North London. It was nice to get out after hibernating and working on the TRIPWIRE Annual but it has been exceptionally warm here. So I caught up with David Baillie, Dan Fish, Dan Lester, Leon Hewitt and a few other people at the show. It seemed to have a halfway decent turnout which was encouraging. It was organised by Oli Smith who used to put on the London Underground Comics thing at Camden market. We had an insane electrical storm as I was leaving Chalk Farm, where we got heavy rain, hail, thunder and lightning. In fact, the hail was so heavy that it sounded like there were golf balls hitting my car as I drove. So here are a selection of pics I took at LUC 176…

A NEW TRIP THROUGH THE WIRES
So we've finished the TRIPWIRE Annual 2009 and done our onscreen proofing so we are just waiting for a physical proof next week. It looks amazing and is easily the nicest and best package we've put together since we brought TRIPWIRE back. Here's the feature rundown:

•Stan Lee on Marvel's 70th anniversary plus a look at the future of Marvel movies
• Solomon Kane history feature including a look at Dark Horse's Robert E Howard line
•Guillermo Del Toro on his novel The Strain
•A look at the sleeper hit of the year, British low budget sci fi movie Moon with director Duncan Jones
•Joe Kubert on returning to Tor after years away
•30th anniversary of Alien feature
•Profile of Flesk Publications plus interviews with Mark Schultz and Gary Gianni
•A look at Tintin in the year of his 80th birthday
•Celebrate Batman's 70th anniversary with a look back at the character's history plus Frank Quitely interview
•Ian Rankin on Dark Entries, his graphic novel for the new Vertigo Crime line plus Vertigo's chief Karen Berger on the new line
•DC's Wednesday Comics series
•Bill Morrison talking about Bongo in the runup to The Simpsons' 20th anniversary
•Interview with fine artist and illustrator Phil Hale, the man who painted Tony Blair's leaving portrait for the House of Commons
•Bieng Human feature looking at the hit UK genre series
•Strips from Roger Langridge, Punx, Kevin Mullins and David Hitchcock
•The Power List 2009

Diamond US will not be carrying us over there because we didn't make their benchmark so US customers will only be able to get us 1) from Barnes & Noble, 2) At San Diego Comic-Con if they're lucky enough to be going or 3) order it from us directly.

In the UK, Diamond UK are carrying it and it'll be on sale in Borders as ever. If you live in Canada, it is been distributed through LMPI so will be on sale in Chapters.
So here are a few sample pages to tantalise you…

RADIO SILENCE
I realise that it's been over ten days since I last posted anything. That's because I've basically been hibernating in order to get the TRIPWIRE Annual 2009 done. Well, as I write this, I have 5 pages out of 156 left to design so I'm so close to finishing. I'll be putting up some page designs in the next couple of days especially as we found out Diamond US isn't going to be carrying us (we fell short of their benchmark) so we're trying to encourage US retailers to pick stock up from us directly at San Diego in about a month. In the meantime, here is the front cover (about 95% of the way there). Enjoy…

THE FUTURE'S NOT WHAT IT USED TO BE
I went to see Terminator Salvation about ten days ago. I saw it at Sony's screening cinema in Golden Square and I admit I have been putting off putting up a review of it. Well, I also went to see Moon at the same place last Thursday. So since both are science fiction films, admittedly of a different hue, I thought it might be appropriate to run a review that looks at both of them. So here goes.
I'll start with Terminator Salvation. Directed by McG and starring Christian Bale and name to watch, Aussie Sam Worthington, Terminator Salvation is intended to kickstart or reboot the Terminator franchise in much the same way Casino Royale did with Bond or it is anticipated that JJ Abrams' Star Trek will do with the crew of the Enterprise. Bale plays John Connor while Worthington is convicted killer Marcus Wright, who has been turned into a human/ machine hybrid and finds himself in the year 2018 (don't worry: I'm not spoiling anything: this is telegraphed about three minutes after the start of the film anyway and is blown in the trailer too). Bale is the future leader of the opposition against the machines, John Connor, and he encounters Wright, undecided if he is an agent for the machines or the last hope of humanity. Terminator and Terminator 2 were both important films as they portrayed a different view of a future dominated by technology. Cameron managed to inject both with enough humour and humanity that they were entertaining viewing. Terminator 3 was watchable but fairly forgettable. So is Terminator Salvation a new hope for the franchise? The biggest problem here is that there is a decent film fighting to get out but it is buried under a poor script and some of the corniest dialogue and dumbest directing seen for quite a while. Shouty Bale becomes annoying very quickly and the world run by the machines is so devoid of any hope or optimism that you almost feel like you should let them win. There is the odd decent visual flourish here, with a more stripped-down Terminator a nice touch and Worthington is entertaining to watch on screen. But ultimately it’s an empty and predictable experience, one that will leave your brain as soon as you vacate the cinema. It has made $131m to date, which means that it will probably cover its budget but it won’t be a massive success, so it is uncertain whether they will get to do another two movies as planned. If they do, here’s hoping they get a better director and an improved script…
Every now and again a film comes along that stays with you long after you watch it. In recent years, Hollywood mainstream blockbusters have become so bloated that nearly all of them are merely an exercise in technical expertise. Science fiction films are some of the worst culprits with franchises clogging up the big screen with their impressive but empty CGI, forgetting that it is script and direction that should drive a movie rather than how convincing your visual effects should be. Moon is a low budget British science fiction film, made for just under $5m and directed by Duncan Jones, son of David Bowie and promo director. It is Jones’ first feature film but it displays such a range of emotional depth and directorial excellence that this is sometimes hard to believe. Moon is a very simple film with a single character, Sam Bell, played by the peerless Sam Rockwell. Rockwell commands the screen whenever he is on it which is for the entire duration of the film and it wouldn’t have been as impressive an effort if it were another actor in his place. Set in the near future, Bell is the sole guardian of a helium processing facility on the moon and when he has an accident in one of the moon vehicles, he wakes up uncertain of what has occurred. Moon is such an immersive film that, from the first few seconds you watch on screen to its conclusion 100 minutes later, you forget that you are in a cinema and are by Sam’s side in his claustrophobic, bittersweet world of technology. Kevin Spacey is the voice of robotic unit Gerty and ironically he lends a certain air of humanity to the proceedings. The makers have stated their intentions to produce a film like Silent Running and Outland and they have succeeded in an unparalleled way. They have created a fantastic look for the moonbase, keeping everything very subtle and understated. Moon is far and away the best film released so far this year and probably the most exceptional science fiction film for some time to come. By the evidence here, Jones is a name to watch and Moon is a movie that will be remembered for many years to come. Hopefully it might lead to a British science fiction renaissance…