The newest issue of Entertainment Weekly which is on newsstands already has this to report about the STORYLINE of the JUSTICE LEAGUE movie, the characters and what this means for Singer's SR sequel and the entire franchise:

* "Though the studio will still not officially confirm it, Warner Bros.' League feature is scheduled to begin production in Australia next February under Happy Feet director George Miller. But some Hollywood power players aren't taking it too well, given that the movie could hinder future plans for DC Comics film franchises, including the ongoing Batman and Superman series, and long-gestating theatrical takes on Wonder Woman and the Flash. Sources say that Warner Bros. was prompted to move quickly on Justice League by three factors: a screenplay that '’they flipped out over;’ an open spot in their summer 2009 calendar; and the increasing probability of an industry-wide strike that would shut down all productions by next July."

* "The plot revolves around villainous businessman Maxwell Lord and involves cyborgs called OMACs (One-Man Army Corps), who can take over humans and turn them into killing machines. There are epic battle scenes between Superman and Batman, as well as Superman and Wonder Woman, and League could spawn a slew of additional franchises if it's successful."

* "Christian Bale is not expected to star as League's Batman, and many in Hollywood are wondering whether this continuity breach will distract audiences who turn out for The Dark Knight next July. Director Christopher Nolan is reportedly unhappy that the studio is making League. (Nolan is currently ''knee-deep'' in production and unavailable for comment, according to his reps.) Sources close to director Bryan Singer say he had to be reassured that Man of Steel wouldn't be affected.

* "[Warner Bros.] declined to comment for this story, but according to one source familiar with their plans for League, '’Warner doesn't believe they are cannibalizing [these other franchises] partly because it's unlikely Brandon and Christian will be in it. They believe the movies can live in parallel universes.’ Sources say that concerns about hurting individual franchises are what kept Warner Bros. president and COO Alan Horn from greenlighting a multi-superhero movie for years."

WB already spoke to Singer about his sequel? And he was *okay* with JLA moving forward? I'd love to hear his official statement on it but I doubt he'd say anything very negative about it in public. It's not like he has any say in it, anyway. My fear is that they'd piss him off so much with their special "parallel universes" that he'd walk away from his own project.

( My thoughts on this )

Batman-On-Film agrees this isn't the right time for a JLA movie:

This idea that JUSTICE LEAGUE versions of Batman and Superman won’t affect those solo films is total and complete BS. Think about it, OK? Two Batmans played by two different actors at basically the same time? And Superman, you’ll basically have three! It’s asinine!

Despite the fact that he’s coy about it when asked, director Chris Nolan does plan to do a third BATMAN that, for all intents and purposes, will "complete" his Batman story. Why mess with that? Do you really want Nolan -- and probably Bale -- to walk after THE DARK KNIGHT? Don’t you think that this JL film -- just a year after TDK hits theaters -- will lead to “Batman overkill?"

SO. MUCH. WORD.

IESB.net also picked up the story. It's making the rounds already, things are happening, this movie is apparently going forward as we speak. The EW article didn't report much we didn't already know because the online insiders have been saying the same things for weeks. The Singer bit was interesting. But it's a fact JLA rumours are appearing in newspapers now and not just on the internet anymore.

The insider at Countingdown.com keeps delivering 'Welling in JLA' scoops, too. "I just got a call that a verbal agreement may have been reached today between WB and Gough and Millar that would allow Welling to make the switch to the big screen." So, the Smallville producers are no longer a problem? Welling might sign now? This is going to be very interesting indeed.

Here's another Reeve!Superman by Renato Guedes to cheer everyone up a bit. :)



Just look at that face. Doesn't it make you feel better already?

The only "positive" thing I can see from all this JLA mess is the mention of Singer and his sequel. Too bad it's just a small mention and nothing concrete or official about the project's status but it'll have to do for now. This is JLA time. *sigh* It looks like we'll have a JLA season over the Xmas and New Year holidays, eh? The new Superman, Batman and others are going to be announced by then.

What a great Xmas, right?

I promise to post more about Clark Kent soon. I'm in dire need of a Clark fix to feel somewhat better about this whole thing. Aghfefpjfeqwf.

Isn't it lovely to wake up to such a beautiful picture? Look, it's a Reeve-inspired Superman drawn by the talented Renato Guedes.

We don't often see comic artists base their Superman on actors so Guedes' early Superman art is a wonderful treat (it still is, of course, but there's less of a resemblance to Chris now).

Superman is looking at Lois in this picture. ♥



And he's bringing you some icons today! :) Here are 12 Superman comics icons I've just finished. They're mostly from Superman's Pal Jimmy Olsen from the 50s and 60s and there are a few from Byrne's Man of Steel, the Adventures of Superman issues, etc. I also animated one from Superman for All Seasons (Clark sitting by a tree in autumn).

Characters include Superman, Superboy, Clark, Lois, Supergirl, Jimmy Olsen and Lois' sister Lucy Lane. Hope you like them! Jimmy and Lucy dating = THE CUTE! And I couldn't resist another romantic Superman/Lois icon, I oh so love them...

01. 02. 03.

( SEE ALL THE ICONS )

Thank you and please comment if you're taking any! :) I always appreciate feedback.

Several things in this post! First, a sweet Supes picture I like very much. Reeve!Superman by artist Renato Guedes brings a smile to my face every time. ("Sweet Supes" reminds me of sayings like "Holy Batman!", haha! :) Like "Sweet, sweet Supes on a pogo stick! Sweet Supes on a cracker!" Mmm, cracker.)

(From Adventures of Superman #648)


I also have two scans I wanna share from the Action Comics Annual #10 from this year that had Richard Donner on the team. The pages show the profiles of Superman's greatest villains aka Superman's TOP 10 MOST WANTED. Love the art! I've seen lots of fans comment how obvious it is he doesn't have *that* impressive a villains' list, if you compare it to other superheroes' rogue galleries, anyway. See below.

( Superman's TOP 10 MOST WANTED )

( Luthor's been in four out of five Superman movies, Zod and Co. had been in two already... )

I kind of wish there were THREE villains in the next movie, including Luthor (if he has to be part of it again). When the writers said "There will be TWO villains", there was a bit of confusion amongst fans wondering whether that means Luthor and one more villain or two new villains but with Luthor in the background, as well? I'm hoping it's the latter but I have a feeling there will be only one new villain. ;_; Three bad guys definitely count as "going all Wrath of Khan on it" in MY book.

So, which villain would you pick for the movie and do you want the character to remain close to the comics version?

To complete this post, here are some simple icons I've made recently, feel free to use them in your ljs, just credit me in keywords/comments box when you upload the icons to your account, please. Just write something like "by houseofel" or "by houseoficons", both names are fine. I won't be uploading these to my icons journal for quite a while still because my posts are much bigger there and take more time to finish and my Superman journal is better suited for smaller batches like these. :)

Icons include Clark, Superman, Clark/Lois, Supergirl, Wonder Woman and Batman.

01. 02. 03.

( 6 more icons here! )

Please comment if you take any and enjoy! Thank you. :)

Earlier in August Superman comics fans were happy to hear artist Gary Frank will be joining the team on Action Comics starting in October. WOW, SOME GREAT SKETCHES THERE.

From the samples of art I've seen floating around I think he'll do an amazing job on Superman. I can't wait to see the more realistic approach that his art has, the characters just seem to breathe life and pop out the comic pages! We haven't seen much of that for a quite a while besides Pacheco's and also Guedes' work. I get the chills when we get art that is so life-like and the characters so real that it's easy to imagine them as real people, easy to think of them as breathing people such as actors on the tv screen, for instance. It's not everyone's cup of tea and not everyone prefers characters to look like actors, be it Christopher Reeve, Brandon Routh, Tom Welling or whoever. Many want the comics and movies to remain different. Movieverse should not mix with comics verse, yadda yadda. But I get a kick out of it, it's one of the reasons why I started reading American comics. It's really amazing because the comic art I used to dig the most was manga (both boys and girls manga). Superman comics opened my eyes to art I've been overseeing for so long.

Here is Gary Frank's Superman:


A huge brownie point to Frank whose Superman is based on Christopher Reeve and Lois Lane on Margot Kidder. *wipes drool off keyboard* Not an overly muscly Arnold Schwarzennegger Superman in any way, thank God, and I know that kind of style has many fans... But I prefer a more realistic look. Muscular and solid-looking but not like a pumped-up pro wrestler either. And the new Lois Lane is going to be fantastic! What an interesting and pretty BOLD look for her, seeing how she's always either extremely attractive or with a killer body but a weird short hairstyle or not pretty at all, depending on the artist. Her looks vary just as much as Superman's.
Actually, in recent incarnations I seldom thought she looked anything like a newspaper reporter... Maybe that's the writers' fault, too. I liked her look in Up, up and Away and she's ok in the current Last Son storyline but the super short hair bugs me.

Now I'm pumped for this new version and am seriously intrigued. Hopefully the end result will look close if not exactly like the sketches. Her eyes have just as much "steel" in them as her husband's...which is BEYOND AWESOME. *grin* Isn't it cool they both have expressive eyes? As if he was looking for a soulmate with eyes as piercing as his... Or almost. His peepers are sure unmatched in their intensity.

Says Gary Frank:

"I didn't want her to be this tall, voluptuous beauty that takes men's breath away when she enters a room. Geoff [writer] said that it was fine if no one noticed her when she entered the room, but after she had said her piece, all eyes would be on her when she left. For her build, I just wanted her to have strong, defined legs that looked made specifically for stomping in and out of editors' offices."

Awesome. I love her thinner lips and high cheekbones, too. She looks very much the strong Lois Lane I've envisioned. Beautiful, cool, collected one moment, and fiesty and boiling with excitement and energy the next. Lex is also spot-on and I would have liked Supergirl more if she wasn't so thin-looking (my fave version is that of Renato Guedes), though I like that Frank didn't overdo with the boobs on purpose to cater to fanboys and actually plans on drawing her gangly instead of just Paris Hilton stick-thin because that's apparently the most popular look for a girl's body from the point of view of many guys. >_>;

I still laugh whenever some guy online moans how Guedes' Supergirl is "fat". I can't believe he can't see how skewed his perception has become because the readers have been fed the starved, impossible stick-thin figure for 19 issues and think it's the norm for a real girl. It's probably the way Guedes draws her knees that make them scream FAT FAT because I can't see how other parts of her body are anywhere near fat. She's amazingly fat-free still, she's just not overly skinny and she has strong legs (and by strong I don't mean to imply "fat" at all, like saying "healthy" instead of "a few pounds too many"). She's NORMAL. But normal is fat now, apparently. God.

It's like fat and skinny are the only perceived body types but normal does not exist anymore. Gary's version goes back to the very skinny version of Supergirl but I sincerely HOPE she won't be like the Kara in her own issues because that one was a mess before Guedes hopped on board and he's only on for 2 more issues before another creative team starts their work. *sigh* Please, Frank, don't ruin Supergirl again!

Check out more of Gary's art at the above link. Can't wait for October.