by A.J. Focht

A year ago, NBC buried their Wonder Woman pilot and all hopes of seeing the Amazon princess during prime time. The CW, known for their superhero television series such as Smallville and the upcoming Arrow, is now in talks to revive her with a Wonder Woman origins series. The prelude to the legend of Diana of Themyscira’s is being penned by Allan Heinberg. The CW is only working on a script now; the pilot has yet to be greenlit.

Henry Cavill, who will be playing Superman in the upcoming Man of Steel film recently spoke about the project in an interview. He wasn’t able to relay much, but he did say that beyond making Superman easier to identify with, they wanted to take a realistic approach to the movie. It seems likely that Man of Steel will be the first feature in the new DC movie universe, leading into the Justice League movie, and there have been rumors that it may cameo other Justice League members – namely Wonder Woman. Man of Steel will premier in theaters in June 2013.

Kick-Ass 2 is bringing back most of the main actors from the first film, including Chloe Moretz, Aaron Johnson, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, and even Nicolas Cage. And a new big name has also joined the crew; Jim Carrey has been confirmed playing the part of The Colonel in the sequel. Kick-Ass 2 is set for a summer 2013 release.

With the release less than a year out, Star Trek 2 has wrapped up filming and is headed for post-production. In recent interviews, actors Chris Pine (Captain Kirk) and Zachary Quinto (Spock) both gave their opinions of the project. Pine insists he can’t give the movie enough hype, and that the threats are even greater this time around. Quinto said the project was more challenging, but bigger and bolder than the last. We will all know soon enough as Star Trek 2 is set to release on May 17, 2013.

J.J. Abrams’ new NBC series Revolution has released the full first pilot online early. The series deals with events fifteen years after a post-apocalyptic scenario where all electricity on earth shuts off. The pilot delivers tremendous performances and is a great hook into the series. It’s a must see for all fans of post-apocalyptic stories. That’s not all Abrams is working on though, he is also currently developing a ‘android buddy cop drama’ for FOX.

Last week’s premiere of Doctor Who, “Asylum of the Daleks” broke records for BBC America. The long awaited return of the Time Lord brought in record numbers, with 1.6 million tuning in to see the premiere. In a recent interview, Matt Smith discussed the upcoming season and the future of Doctor Who in general. On a final Doctor Who note, Neil Giman announced at his Hugo acceptance speech that he will be writing a second episode, which is slated for the second half of season seven.

by Fred Topel

“Working is vacation for me”
– Ashley Bell

Ashley Bell literally bent over backwards to entertain us in The Last Exorcism. The film marked her major movie debut in a leading role, and quite an impressive debut it was as a small down girl possessed by a demon. Even though it was called The Last Exorcism, they’ve made a sequel and Bell is back.

Bell also gets to step up her physical work in the film The Day. The post-apocalyptic thriller casts bell as Mary, the toughest most fierce survivor in the wasteland. It may have become a cliché to see a woman kick butt in an action movie, but Bell makes it primal and vicious. The film premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2011, where WWE Studios picked it up and is now distributing it.

Of course, that’s all acting. In real life she’s a total sweetheart. She even dresses up to meet reporters and look good on camera, even though her biggest roles have been stripped down and natural. Bell is a trained actor with a background from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts and Cambridge University, so she shared with us all her tricks and secrets in a sit down interview that could have gone on forever.

Read our exclusive interview with Ashley Bell on SuicideGirls.com.

by Damon Martin

For every Geoff Johns and Jim Lee in the comic book industry there are a thousand writers and artists just hoping to climb, scratch or claw their way onto the radars of a major publisher like DC or Marvel. The role of independent comics however has served as a rich creative breeding ground where there is no corporate bottom line to meet or concerns that stories are too graphic or gritty to land on the page. With that freedom also comes the kind of passion that is lost in the more mainstream comic world, since, as most independent comic book writers and artists will tell you, no one is making millions from self-publication.

Michael Easton is a life-long comic book fan and writer, who worked for DC/Vertigo when he co-penned the graphic novel The Green Woman with award winning author Peter Straub. As much as Easton loved working on that book, there is a certain freedom that comes with a self-published work like his 2008 graphic novel, Soul Stealer, which is a 500-plus page gothic story following an immortal warrior named Kalan, with wonderful art provided by Christopher Shy.

The freedom allowed Easton to tell the story in his own words, without worry that a publisher would tell him something was too graphic or that he needed to cut pages. He told his story to a very specific audience, but those that read it stuck by him, and that’s one reason why independent comics will always hold a special place in the industry.

“You end up having a lot of late night phone calls with Shanghai when you’re going through the printing process. You end up talking at 3 o’clock in the morning about how you want your color bleeds going. But we set this up because it was going to be a freedom issue. Nobody was going to let us do a 550-page, large format, hardcover comic book, but that’s where I think the independent business is going,” Easton said when speaking at San Diego Comic-Con. “Digital comics are great, but if you offer people something extra, you offer the large format, you put in sketches, you put in outtakes, you put in an audio track, posters, things like what were doing, I think you’ll get a collector audience.”

Those late nights also included writing sessions till all hours as he listened to Radiohead and Jeff Buckley for inspiration. The end result paid off because the collectors picked up on Soul Stealer and it has become a cult classic among comic book enthusiasts. Easton admits his book wouldn’t have been the same if he’d had to conform to certain standards required by many major publishers.

“Some of the comic companies now are having very specific regulations about what you can and can’t do. And with Chris, I mean he’s the ultimate graphic artist…you want somebody who’s going to bleed on the page with you. The horror has to be horrific, and the violence has to be violent, and the beautiful, passionate sexual element has to be there too. You can’t always do that when you’re worrying about some kind of censorship issue and things like that. We don’t have that, we have complete freedom,” said Easton. “We did the book exactly like how we wanted to do it.”

Part of the reason Easton is able to do the things he’s able to in his books is because writing is his passion but it doesn’t always pay his bills. During the daytime hours, Easton has been an actor for most of his adult life, working on several television shows including soap operas like General Hospital and One Life to Live. Not needing to bow down to the almighty dollar has given Easton the flexibility to tell his stories the way he wants to. It’s also allowed him to keep his stories personal. He’s never has to sell to the highest bidder because he had to make rent.

“I’m very fortunate to have a day job. This allows me to do everything the way I want to do it. We’ve had film companies come to us, and in another life I would have optioned this thing off a long time ago, but having the day job has allowed me the financial independence to say I’m waiting for the right people to look at this. Waiting until Christopher Nolan sees this or Ridley Scott or James Cameron, we really want to be turned down by all of those people before we would go somewhere else,” Easton commented. “You only get one shot. It really is a passion, and it’s a passion to take something like this to another level.”

With Soul Stealer now available in a special one-shot hard cover edition, Easton is moving onto his next story called Credence, about a New York City cop which he has described as “Californication meets The Bad Lieutenant.” Long-term, Easton would love to see his newest creation land on television alongside shows like Breaking Bad or Sons of Anarchy – the kind of edgy shows that push the envelope and have developed loyal and deeply involved fans.

“We’ve done about 135-pages, it’s going to be a long graphic novel…the story stops when it needs to stop. It’s got a real great, edgy feel. Everyone right now is talking about movies, but I love what’s going on with TV right now. Breaking Bad, Mad Men, Game of Thrones, Justified, Californication. and Weeds. I think it’s the most interesting storytelling,” Easton said. “I think if Shakespeare wrote today he would have written The Sopranos, he would be David Chase. He would tell the story the way he wanted to. So where Soul Stealer was this big epic film, Credence is going in the other direction. Let’s do a gritty little movie. I live in New York, so it has that ‘70s kind of French Connection feel to it.”

Easton hopes to debut Credence this October at the New York Comic Con, and if there’s one thing to say about this particular independent comic book maker – he’s definitely going to do it his own way.

For more on Michael Easton’s work visit: michaeleaston.com/

by Fanny Merkin a.k.a. Andrew Shaffer

The following is an exclusive excerpt from Fanny Merkin’s parody novel, Fifty Shames of Earl Grey. At this point in the story, the rich, sexy tycoon, Earl Grey, has just led college student Anna Steal into his “Room of Doom”…

The first thing I notice is the smell: Nag Champa incense and dirty laundry. The room is illuminated only by black light, but I can see enough to tell this is the kind of closet R. Kelly wouldn’t mind being trapped in. The room is tiny compared to the rest of Earl Grey’s apartment. There’s barely enough room for the waterbed. Whips, chains, ropes, riding crops, paddles, and iron shackles are hung up on the walls next to black-light posters — really trippy black-light posters. Room of Doom? More like the “Dorm Room of Doom.”

I feel Earl’s hand on my left shoulder. He’s breathing into my ear. “Welcome to my world, Anna.”

“Do you bring all your dates here?”

“I don’t know if I’d call them ‘dates,’” he says. “They are, more accurately, LARPers. ‘LARP’ stands for ‘live-action role playing.’”

“If they’re not dates, then what are they? Volunteers? Where do you meet them?”

Earl picks up an impossibly large, rounded red die off the nightstand and rolls it around in his hand. “There are women who LARP professionally,” he says. “They’re all over Craigslist.”

I laugh at the thought of him trolling for women on Craigslist. Surely someone as good looking and rich as Earl Grey doesn’t need to resort to picking up girls on the Internet! “You’re kidding,” I say.

He shakes his head. “I know, it just seems so dirty to meet women on Craigslist.”

“Dirty and gross,” I say.

“It’s just one of my fifty shames, Anna,” he says, lowering his head. “You don’t know the depths of my perversion.”

I’ve already seen him at what I figured was the depth of his shame, buying a Nickelback CD. Do I want to know how deep his perversions go? “And you use these . . . things on them? You torture them?” I ask, motioning to his toys.

“If the game calls for it.”

“And who decides that?” I ask.

“I do, with a little help from my trusty D-sixty-nine,” he says, rolling the die on the nightstand. “This is a sixty-nine-sided die, Anna. As the Dungeon Master, I use it to guide the action.”

The die rolls to a stop. “So you want me to role play with you?” I ask.

“Eventually,” he says, grinning.

“What do I get out of the whole deal? I don’t know if pretending I’m an elf being whipped is really my thing.”

“I see you as more of a faery than as an elf, but we can get into specifics later. What I get out of our arrangement is you, submitting to my every whim,” he says. “And what you get is Earl Grey.”

Wow. Somebody thinks highly of themselves.

“But we can ease our way into our LARPing characters with time. I don’t know what you’re doing to me, Anna: I don’t feel the need to pretend you’re a captive orc princess in order to get off. All I know is that I need you right now — any way I can get you.”

Oh my. Earl reaches a hand out to me. I take it in mine, and he leads me to the waterbed…

Continue reading the story in Fifty Shames of Earl Grey, available in bookstores everywhere! To locate a copy near you or find one online, visit 50shames.com.

Fanny Merkin lives in a Beverly Hills mansion purchased using the embarrassingly large advance she received for Fifty Shames of Earl Grey. She is a former Walmart employee who writes under the pseudonym, “Andrew Shaffer,” for publications as diverse as Mental Floss, Maxim and SuicideGirls. Andrew Shaffer is the author of Great Philosophers Who Failed at Love. He reviews romance, erotica, and women’s fiction for RT Book Reviews magazine.

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by A.J. Focht

This weekend is your last chance to see The Avengers in theaters. Disney is rereleasing the film for one weekend only. Avengers was playing on 142 screens last week. It is unknown how many more theaters will be picking the movie back up for the holiday weekend. Rumors of Disney releasing The Avengers with extra footage before the summer’s end surfaced months ago. It is unclear as of now if this weekend’s release will have that extra footage or not. Either way, it looks like Disney is determined to close the $40 million dollar gap to take the second highest grossing box-office record from Titanic.

ABC has officially ordered a S.H.I.E.L.D. pilot. Joss Whedon is co-writing it with his brother Jed Whedon, and Maurissa Tancharoen. All three are executive producers on the project. While Jed and Maurissa will be the show runners, Joss assures us that he will show up now and then to take credit for everything.

Rumors that Ben Affleck was being considered to direct the Justice League movie have been floating around for a while. He’s not alone on that list though as a handful of directors have been rumored for consideration. The list includes: The Watchowskis, Brett Ratner, Zack Snyder, Ruben Fleischer, and McG. There are also one or two more names in consideration that haven’t been released yet.

Sony has officially announced the Metal Gear Solid movie – again. The announcement was made at the Metal Gear Solid Anniversary event in Tokyo. Spider-Man producer Avi Arad is behind the project. Little more is known other than that the movie is currently in development.

Sony isn’t just working on videogame based movies, they are also working on a movie about the videogame console wars. Sony has registered a bunch of domains relating to the movie. The current rumor is that it will be like a Social Network for the gaming world.

If Morgan Freeman wasn’t already the voice you heard in your head as you played God over your LEGOs, he probably will be now. LEGO: The Piece of Resistance is a LEGO film that will star Morgan Freman, Elizabeth Banks, and Chris Pratt. Freeman will be playing a character named ‘Vitruvius’ who is described as ‘Gandalf meets Mr. Magoo’.

A few weeks ago David Duchovny gave an interview saying he wanted to make a third X-Files film, and now a third movie might indeed be underway. Gillian Anderson answered questions about it at the Toronto Fan Expo and said that things were looking pretty good, after having met with series creator Chris Carter. It looks like FOX is the only holdout now.

by Tita

The Metro Toronto Convention Centre welcomed thousands of comic devotees, anime enthusiasts, gamers, and SuicideGirls fans for the 18th annual Fan Expo Comic-con last weekend.

The largest of it’s kind in Canada, and third largest convention in North America, fans swarmed downtown Toronto, and queued for hours in the shadow of the CN tower to attend the event.

A selection of Canada’s finest SuicideGirls including Vesta, Vana, Renna, and Vellin were on hand to meet them, and sign shop items, including our sexy SuicideGirls Comic series.

“I was at the SuicideGirls booth on Friday. The comic is awesome! Thanks again. SuicideGirls RULE!” – @LemmonJig

Self proclaimed geek Vana Suicide was the resident cosplay expert, picking out her faves each day, and chasing them down for pictures. “There are so many awesome costumes! I love it!”

Vellin Suicide got in on the dress up action, making her own Power Girl costume and wearing it on Saturday. Sunday she came dressed as BabyDoll from Sucker Punch and literally stopped traffic on our way to the event.

“Amazing meeting the SuicideGirls! Very cool, smart, beautiful girls who can probably kick my ass” – @coryhotline

The event’s energy reached a fevered pitch when comic legend Stan Lee blew out the candles on a huge Spider-Man cake to celebrate Spidey’s 50th anniversary. You could actually hear a pin drop as he bent over the cake. This was followed by a cacophony of voices and cheers when the sugary confection started to be handed out. It was just one of many exciting scenes that took place, over the course of the 4 day event.

Bob & Doug Mackenzie would be proud. After all “He saw Jedi 17 times, eh”

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by Daniel Robert Epstein

“I like being someone else for just three months.”
– Jessica Biel

Jessica Biel actually flashed a little bit of stomach because she was showing off her vampire hunter belt. I thought it was so cool that innocent little Mary Camden was showing skin to a roomful of comic book fans there to interview her for Trinity.

In the third Blade film she plays Abigail Whistler, the illegitimate daughter of Kris Kristofferson’’s character Abraham Whistler. She is a vampire hunter that works with a team called the Nightstalkers that includes Hannibal King [Ryan Reynolds] and SuicideGirls’ favorite Patton Oswalt.

Read our interview with Jessica Biel on SuicideGirls.com.