Storage 24 Inspired by Gremlins and Spider-Man

Saturday afternoon at Kapow! saw Noel Clarke and Johannes Roberts (director of the impressive and underrated ) on a panel to talk about their latest sci-fi horror flick, .

The film - in which Clarke takes lead actor, writer and producer credits - sees a military cargo plane crash and spew its highly classified contents all over London. With all electricity down, a group of friends are trapped in a storage unit and it soon becomes clear they are not alone, as a terrifying predator is hunting them down.

The panel treated us to exclusive stills of huge explosions and wounded characters scrambling through air vents, as well as an exclusive clip, which gave the first look at the mysterious other-wordly creature tormenting the group. In the clip, Clarke’s character comes face-to-face with the alien – a 7-foot tall, bony monstrosity with bulging yellow eyes and a claw-like drooling mouth. As the alien closes in on a trapped Clarke, a yapping toy dog distracts him and Clarke is able to narrowly escape. The dog, sadly, isn’t so lucky.

For the look of the alien, Clarke was inspired by the Spider-Man villains Venom and Carnage. Unlike other creature features that keep the big nasty mostly off screen, Clarke and Roberts made a point of giving the creature a big personality and wanted him to be fully present as a terrifying being on screen. Roberts revealed that, to the cast, the alien was actually female and called Gertrude – something the Design Department really ran with, as Noel explained: “They made the suit with a huge vagina, and I saw it and was like, ‘That bit has got to go. This film is a 15.”

Talking about the film’s overriding genre, Roberts noted: “It’s very sci-fi. The whole movie is really retro – it almost borrows from and other '80s movies.” Despite these allusions, the panel went on to discuss Clarke’s desire to create something new, something that no one else is currently doing in the British film industry. There are obvious comparisons to 2011’s big-budget British alien horror but although it’s a similar genre, Clarke feels he has done something different with because of the disparity in budget. Clarke is keen to prove he can make entertaining big-spectacle movies to rival even Hollywood’s output of sci fi/horror, and for a fraction of the cost. Or, as Roberts neatly summed it up, “ is a f**k-sight better than .”

Talking about his upcoming projects, Clarke revealed that there are plans for a sequel to , currently being called . Both he and Roberts feel that his character and the creature are too good not to be used again. He’s also about to start writing the 4. 3. 2. 1 sequel - entitled 5. 4. 3. 2. 1 - but is refusing to give away any plot details just yet. On top of this he currently has six scripts on the go. His pace of work is impressive - last year he wrote three scripts in 55 days, and was one of them.

So it looks like you’d be mad to miss out on seeing when it hits U.K. cinemas on June 29. We’ll leave you with the same advice that Clarke gave to us when talking about the scariness of the film’s final scene – take a spare pair of pants.

Source : http://www.ign.com

Jonathan Ross: "I Pitched Quesada And Heard Nothing!"

Jonathan Ross, the writer of Turf and British TV celebrity, appeared on the Image All-Stars panel alongside fellow contributors Eric Stephenson, Nick Spencer and Bryan Hitch.

When asked what he thought of the industry right now, he shared, “I love the Marvel and DC stuff at the moment, but my first choice is to read the indie books. The Avengers helped everyone, as long as you can bear the noobs coming in. It’s a great time to be reading comic books.”

Elaborating further about his relationship with Marvel and DC, he revealed he once pitched an idea to Joe Quesada…but didn’t hear anything back. Despite this, when asked whether he’d still like to work for them he said, “Not if it meant I couldn’t do my stuff for Image. I would love to do something for them because I love those characters. Marvel operates on a very different scale though; Image works on a very human level.”

Ross has no plans to abandon his other projects just yet though, saying he’s working on a Channel 4 show as well as a new film show pilot. He apologised for not having more comic book stars on his chat shows, but said he felt it wasn’t really the right place. He did, however, reveal that his future projects may be more appropriate for them, saying, “I might be doing something new on the radio soon and I might be doing a comic podcast as I do have a good number of contacts and I have a very pointless knowledge of comic history.”

The rest of the panel shared their extensive expertise with budding artists and authors, advising them how to make it in the industry. Artist Bryan Hitch reassured many attendees that the hardest thing to draw was often quiet scenes, as the action scenes practically leap off the page. He said it was important to make sure that the eye moved about the page smoothly, while Ross asserted that any budding writers should be kind to themselves. He shared his wife’s advice that the hardest thing to do is bash out a first draft, but said it makes everything so much easier to edit.

Ross then provided an alternative way in for anyone struggling with their writing, saying “My advice for anyone trying to get into comics is to marry someone who can write better than you can.”

All the panel members revealed they were fans of the Game of Thrones TV series, with Bryan Hitch in particular saying it boded well for the future of comic adaptations. He said, “budgets are finally catching up; they definitely couldn’t have made Game of Thrones 10 years ago.”

So, what’s next for Image? While there were no big reveals, Ross did say that he kept writing down ideas that he later looked back at slightly bemusedly. He shared his desire to force Hitch to help him make a comic focusing on Russian soldiers vs yetis before, undeterred by Hitch’s lack of enthusiasm, pulling out his phone and reading, “evil saw-like idea; pranks get out of hand, and escalate.”

Keep your fingers crossed.

Source : http://www.ign.com/articles/2012/05/21/jonathan-ross-i-pitched-joe-quesada-and-heard-nothing

Kapow! DC: All Access Before Watchmen Panel

A panel of DC executives admitted they are suffering from anxiety in the run up to the launch of Before Watchmen at a DC All Access panel at Kapow! Comic Con in London today.

“To say we’re excited would be an understatement,” admitted Senior VP of Sales at DC Entertainment Bob Wayne, “But, to say we’re nervous would also be an understatement! I think we can let the product speak for itself, and hopefully everybody will enjoy what we’ve got.”

“We went to a lot of trouble to assemble the talent, to make sure we had the right people working on it,” explained Dan DiDidio co-publisher of DC, “Honestly, I can say this for every one of the creatives involved, that they’re doing some of the best work of their careers. They know how important this project is, and they know how much scrutiny it’s going to come under.”

They revealed several variant covers at the panel at the London Business Design Centre including an awesome S&M inspired Ozymandias cover, and a psychedelic Josh Middleton variant for Silk Spectre, the Before Watchmen arc that both DiDio and Wayne were very enthusiastic about.  “Silk Spectre is my personal favourite,” said Dan, “Darwyn Cooke is working with Amanda Conner on this one, and he really wanted to capture the spirit of Silk Spectre in a specific period of time. Darwyn wrote the basic plot and Amanda ran with it from there.”

“This is one of the quietest of the stories, but also one of the most heartfelt. It’s a coming of age story, with Silk Spectre discovering herself, and separating herself from her mother.”

The Rorschach series is fittingly being described as “the most violent series” of Before Watchmen with Brian Azzarello and artist Lee Bermejo recreating Time Square of the 1970s for the very first issue of the arc. “It’s pretty intense,” stressed DiDio, “as someone who lived in New York in that era, it’s as gritty as I remember.”

The panel went on to discuss the Curse of the Corsair, the pirate-themed companion piece that will preface each issue of the book run, promising 34 different cliff-hangers for each issue. “It captures the style and tone and the shifts in nature of the stories that are taking part in the main features. We hope it recreates that same feel that Tales of the Black Freighter did in conjuction with the original Watchmen.” said Wayne. “It’s a swashbuckling adventure that just gets darker and darker as the series goes on,” added DiDio.

The panel were keen to deflect questions about Alan Moore's much-publicised negativity towards the project at the start of the Q&A session, but were candid when it came to discussing how much freedom they had given all the creatives when it came to crafting a new backstory for the series.

“When we sat down with all the writers, everyone was very beholding to the source material. They all had a copy of Watchmen in front of them that was operating as their ‘bible’ for the creative process,” DiDio said, “But, the first thing we said everybody should be able to be their own story-teller. Everybody has a lot of freedom in how they approach the material, how the writing is, how the drawing will look, and they all approached it very differently.”

Editor Will Dennis reiterated, “We always said from very early on, we want to let these guys do what they do best. You don’t hire these guys to do what they do so well and make them do something else.”

You’ll be able to find out how successful they’ve been in bringing the classic Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons series back to life when the first issue drops in June. Be sure to check out our first impressions of Before Watchmen here.

Source : http://www.ign.com/articles/2012/05/19/kapow-dc-all-access-before-watchmen-panel