This trailer is a vast improvement over the first one! Enjoy!

This is posted mainly for those of you outside the Salt Lake City/Park City area, but we’ve been invited by IN Magazine (which is a local weekly) to provide a weekly column about comics. For those of you in the area, you should support the magazine and Big Shiny Robot! by picking up copies. For those outside the state, we’ll start posting them up here on our site in .jpg format after the columns hit stands.

I’ll provide links weekly for their online version (like this one), but below is the way it appears in the magazine.

I kicked off this column, but we’ll be seeing other robots get their place in the sun. (Next week, Clang! Boom! Steam! takes on Marvel’s Siege!)

(As always, click for a bigger version of the picture below)

It actually seems like the first ten years of this new millenium have been absolute heaven for all of nerds and geeks out there. Whether you are into comics, superheroes, movies, books, television, or music something awesome has happened in the last decade that has just made you absolutely exstatic. As much as we would like to give you a “Best Nerd Stuff of the Decade” list it would just take too long – that, and we are a group of surprisingly lazy robots.

Instead, a few of us bots have compiled an extremely abbreviated list of what we consider to be our favorite “nerd goings ons” of 2009. Of course, this is just simply our opinions and events that stuck out to us over the last year in the world of comics, television, movies, etc. Sound off in the comments section and let us know what YOUR favorite nerd thing/event of 2009 was!

Zombietron

• Borderlands – This was a huge sleeper hit of 2009 in video games.
• Batman Arkham Asylum – Best. Batman game. Ever.
• Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 – Does this really need an explanation?

Proletariatron

• Scott Pilgrim Vol. 5 – Simply put, the best book/graphic novel of 2009.
• Better off Ted – Best new sitcom of 2009. Funny, smart, and only 30 min.

Swank-mo-tron

• Cad Bane – This has been perhaps one of the most interesting and amazing contributions to both the nerd world and the Star Wars universe.
• JJ Abrams’ Star Trek – The new movie has helped introduce an entirely new generation to the world of Star Trek and did it in perhaps the most entertaining way possible.
• Avatar – I haven’t seen it yet, but the process of HOW they made the movie will change the way movies of this size and spectacle will be made forever.

Dr. Simulcast

• “Cheap Geek” – Bad economy makes for good geek times! Why? Because companies that cater to a nerd crowd recognize that they pay for what they can afford in really hard times. Even the most hardcore collectors, when left with ten bucks to buy a comic or ramen noodles, will buy the ramen to stay alive and read old issues. A lot of items went down in price this year, and we’re not just talking average DVD sales. Two of the most prominent of the year… The Playstation 3 (once originally priced at $700), now just $299. Where most stand-alone BluRay players are around $250, an extra fifty bucks gets you a top line game system with it. So what if there’s no clock on the front? And the second… the standard iPhone becoming just $99. Originally priced at $300 just last year (before the bug fixes), you now have a multi-purpose phone with thousands of free applications ready for download at an affordable price. Other objects that went down in price from January to now… flat screen televisions, the Wii and 360 (although minor), graphic novels, storage devices and media players.
• “Gooferine” – I’ll keep this one simple. Make all the horrible jokes that you want, Disney buying Marvel was probably one of the best decisions the company could have made, and in turn will probably benefit Marvel as a whole more than vice versa. My only case in point… Marvel’s 90’s cartoons. Finding an audience after the animated Batman series became big, Marvel went all out and made several series into cartoons. X-Men, Spiderman, The Hulk, Iron Man, Silver Surfer… and they were somewhat ideal… but the quality lacked. If you think I’m full of shit, please, do me a favor, click pause on this podcast and go sit through an episode from any of those series in full, and then come back and tell me it was golden. Many were thrown together in haste, chopping up footage and using every animation trick in the book to stretch a 1960’s ten minute read into twenty-two minute 1990’s update. Now for a brief moment, Family Guy joke aside, picture the Disney animation department doing the work instead of Saban. How good would that old X-Men series be? Forget the films and the merch and everything else Disney probably bought them for. I believe a new dawn is on the horizon for Marvel and animation, where an actual effort will be put behind the content. …Now if only Marvel could hire some good writers to adapt the stories for television without pulling random material out of a hat. (I’m looking at you Wolverine & The X-Men)
• “The Great Internet Crash” – While not viewed so much as geeky on the surface, delve deeper into these two subjects and you’ll find greater value for the tech savvy. The death of Michael Jackson and the Iranian Riots. The internet, while a valuable tool for millions, has been viewed more as a “play thing” over the years (insert porn joke here) than a mainstream source of information. One look at a Wikipedia article can tell you that. But over the summer two events changed MANY opinions. Jackson’s death, started as a simple text message, brought many search engines to a screeching halt within hours and forced many providers look at how they not only delegate service but examine what improvements the US (and the world in general) needs going into the future. While Iran’s election and subsequent revolution was documented in full… on Twitter. With updates and information coming in faster than some news organizations could keep up with, and continued to provide info long after many news crews were threatened with being shot if they didn’t shut down their reporting. While much more could be said on these subjects, in the ideal of keeping it short and sweet we’ll leave it at this. I believe its fair to say that 2009 was the year that the internet finally grew up, came into its own as a major source of information, and officially became a necessity as opposed to a commodity.

Botasaurus

• Zombieland – Because life with zombies is epic. Woody Allen killed it and Bill Murray is hilarious.
• Ontario Math Scholars – Writing a mathematical thesis on the chances of the world surviving a zombie apocolypse using older zombies that are slow, not the new super zombies.
• Jim and Pam Get Married – I’m a girl and I was waiting for it for what seems like forever.
• Dexter Season 4 – Holy cow!!! That was so freaking amazing. Quite possibly the best season yet.

Kill-tacular-Tron

• Ghostbusters – Ghostbusters merchandise, Ghostbusters anniversary, Ghostbusters videogame, Ghostbuster 3 movie news! It was a great year to be a fan of Ghostbusters!
• Netflix on Xbox 360 – A great addidtion to the Xbox 360 dashboard. Sign up and stream TV shows and movies straight to your TV via your gaming console!
• Saberforge Lightsabers – Best lightsaber replicas! You can actually hit stuff with them and they don’t break!

Arse-bot

• LOST Season 5 – This show has been absolutely addictive and this was a great season leading up to the finale season.
• DC Feature Length Animated Movies – DC release two really solid feature length animated movies in 2009, Green Lantern: First Flight and Batman/Superman: Public Enemies. Both of these feature Bruce Timm involved to some degree and are great animated flicks to check out.
• (500) Days of Summer / UP – My two favorite movies of 2009. Joseph Gordon Levitt and the cast of (500) Days of Summer execute a great script and story perfectly and Pixar does it again with another amazing entry to their library of films with UP.

Budgetron

• 70 Minute Phantom Menace review – Your heart knew the Phantom Menace sucked as soon as the “new car smell” wore out and you were left with nothing but a 3 year wait for Attack of the Clones, but you never knew exactly why you hated it so much. Well, don’t worry, you’re about to give your brain a blow-by-blow of why your heart was right about the Phantom Menace. You may be thinking, “Yeah, it might be fun, but 70 minutes?”, yeah, I thought that too…but if you’re any kind of Star Wars fan, this uber fan’s review of the film is a thoroughly entertaining and insightful MUST WATCH.
• Swank-mo-tron’s Reaction to the 70 Minute Phantom Menace – And as much as I loved the 70 minute review of Phantom Menace, nothing, and I mean NOTHING, could have prepared me for the level of seething hatred Swank-mo-tron had for the creator of said review. Without even WATCHING the review, Swank furiously hit the internets with a purpose; oh yes, he was going to take the whole internet to task with an eye single to the glory of George. You would have thought the murderer of his children was getting set free, but no…someone just made fun of Star Wars. It was great.

There’s our list for 2009! Tell us what your favorite Nerd/Geek thing/event of 2009 was in the comments section below!

Also, be sure to check out our December Big Shiny Podcast where we break down some nerd news from December and highlight some of the items from our “Best Nerd Stuff of 2009” list!

It’s that time again! It’s the end of the month so once again some of us nerds from BSR! felt compelled to tell you what we thought about some of the nerd goings ons from the month of December!

In this episode we cover more shitty Spider-Man 4 rumors, spend some time talking comics, and wrap up a few videogame releases as well as look ahead to what will be released in 2010! We also spend some time at the end of the podcast talking about some of our favorite (“best of”) nerd events of 2009! There is a corresponding “BSR Best of 2009” article that will be going live this weekend, so be sure to check back for that full list!

Be sure to subscribe to us on iTunes and rate us if you like (or hate) what you hear!

December Big Shiny Podcast

• iTunes
• BSR mp3

Due to a clerical error on the part of my comic book store, I missed out on the last 4 issues of the post-Ultimatum relaunch of Ultimate Spider-man.  I read the first issue upon it’s released and it raised some interesting questions but I wasn’t completely impressed.  It was competent, Brian Michael Bendis is always good to read.  David LaFuente was certainly a switch in style and no Stewart Immonen, but the art was serviceable, albeit aimed at a younger audience.

At the close of the Ultimatum story arc, Peter is presumed dead in the flood and a tear-jerking obituary for Spider-Man is written by J. Jonah Jameson.  It seriously almost made me cry.  The advertising leading up to Ultimate Spider-Man Vol. 2 was filled with, “Who’s Spider-Man” and “What happened…?” kind of innuendo and I was dying to know what happened.  Was Peter dead?  I’ve been invested emotionally in Ultimate Peter Parker since it’s launch more than a decade ago and Ultimatum, if nothing else, raised the stakes for this particular book and character.

The first issue of Volume 2 opens with Peter working at a fast food restaurant as though nothing has happened.  Six months have passed since Ultimatum and things seem to have gotten back to normal.  Jessica, his clone, who played such a pivotal part in the end of Volume 1 is nowhere to be seen and I thought she would be filling in until we found out what it was exactly that happened to Peter.

Time passed and I’d sort of forgotten about the book.  Like I said, due to an unfortunate clerical error, the title stopped showing up in my hold and it wasn’t until I asked for it back and tracked down all the back issues that I realized that I was 4 issues behind.

I just finished reading them and I have to say, “Wow.”

I really like the direction Bendis (and Mark Millar in Ultimate Avengers) are taking the Ultimate Universe.  Sure, I’m upset that there’s a lot of characters who are dead, missing or whatever that I would like to see back in this universe, but it’s not the end of the world.  This arc is remaking the world in a way that would have been unthinkable during the books launch and it makes sense that Bendis has made a lot of the choices that he has.  Take Peter’s fast food job, for example.  He has to work fast food because the Daily Bugle has folded.  Where in Volume 1 we would be privy to newspaper headlines catching us up to speed, we’re treated to websites.  The school newspaper that Mary Jane is working for is now just a website and instead of getting the story, the editor is obsessed with “getting the video for the webcast”.  Watching Peter Parker of all people struggle with the changing media landscape is incredibly interesting to watch.  And it’s not forced down your gullet, Bendis is incredibly subtle about it and I like it.

As for a villain, this arc sees Mysterio who, during recent events, killed Wilson Fisk (better known to you ugly mugs as “The Kingpin”) and now wants to take over the world for himself.  Of course the only thing standing in his way is everyone’s favorite neighborhood wall-crawler.  They’re still getting the character on his feet, so there isn’t much depth to him other than the fact that he’s angry and willing to kill, so we’ll see turns out.

The thing I liked the most in this new Ultimate Universe is the way mutants are being treated and that a lot of young super-heroes that were based in New York (which is most of the Marvel U., Ultimate or otherwise) have lost their families, places to stay, etc.  at the end of the first issue, Johnny Storm, in shock from losing his father and the events of Ultimatum, shows up on the Parker’s doorstep looking for a place to stay.  The house is already crowded with Aunt May, Peter and Gwen Stacy (who is his girlfriend at the moment), but they bring him in with open arms.  Things get more complicated when Kitty Pryde brings over another stray.  Already on the verge of getting expelled from school for being a mutant, Kitty Pryde’s mother simply can’t take in another stray mutant and Bobby Drake (Iceman) has no school (since Xavier’s school is as dead as Xavier himself) and his parents are mutant-phobes who have kicked him out of the house.  These young mutants have nowhere to go.  And Kitty brings them to Aunt May’s.  Aunt May has started sort of a half-assed boarding house for wayward mutants and this could prove to be terribly interesting.

The story here is as good as it’s ever been during his tenure on this book and LaFuente is a fine artist, a bit too Eastern-influenced for my tastes, but good.  My point is though, that as I read through these issues, all of the questions I had lingering from Ultimatum were answered with a simple, “Who cares?”  I’m getting Spider-Man stories that I like and are interesting, taking me into some territory I’ve never seen out of Spider-Man before and it’s entertaining the hell out of me.  If they go back and answer some of those questions I had, great, if not, I’m along for the ride.

Issue Six hits stands on January 6th and now that Mysterio has a sample of Peter Parker’s blood to screw with, I’m going to be there with bells on.

You can order all the Ultimate Spider-Man you can shake a fist at on Amazon here.

I took it upon myself to sit down with Shannon from the Geek Show and we recorded a commentary for The Phantom Menace. As some of you may know, I love the prequels and Shannon, well… He vowed never to watch them again. So we thought it would be fun to get back into our debate and do a joint commentary of The Phantom Menace, he with his disagreements and me with my able defenses. This was planned almost a year ago and we’ve finally got around to getting it together.

We’re making this something of a fundraiser as well. Shannon has spent the last year as a student teacher and has a lot of bills to pay, so, that’s why we’re asking for a $1.99 donation for the file.

So, click the paypal link and I’ll email you the download link.

Then all you need to do is pop in The Phantom Menace, get yourself a bowl of popcorn and prepare to have some fun.

(Bear in mind, it’s not safe for work….)

Avatar, James Cameron’s brand new movie designed to blow you away. Well I watched it, and I’ll tell you one thing. I was not blown away. Especially when the story can be so concisely  wrapped up as, “The Last Samurai on Mars.”

The first hour of the movie was regrettably the most awesome. Establishing the world that we are going to be viewing for the next hour and a half. But even then, I can’t say really just how rich the story was, sure the Aliens were original enough (if you don’t count Native Americans), but most the concepts in this movie have been seen before. (Anyone remember Fern Gully?)

That said, it wasn’t anything resembling a waste of my time. The movie was pretty good, I wish everyone thought about their movies as much as James Cameron did. Although I think he is horrible at writing dialog. Referring mostly to Colonel Miles Quaritch, but not stopping there. A great example would be when James Cameron pays homage to himself, having one of his marines say, “Get some!” Much like when Michael Bay paid homage to his own film, Bad Boys II, in the midst of Transformers II.

I’ve heard a lot of people talking about the soundtrack being similar to other soundtracks, but as a barely capable listener, I didn’t think the soundtrack stood out as good or bad. The person sitting next to me had to elbow me and say, “There’s music playing.” because I was none the wiser, I said, “Ah.” which they confused with appreciation for the visuals.

Which brings me to my next point, the visuals. Eh!…Breathtaking? I guess so, sometimes…Was it worth 300 million? Nope…Was it worth watching in 3-D?…Not really. Honestly I thought the Dark Knight felt more visually stimulating, not to mention Pan’s Labyrinth. Some of the creatures were really cool, but honestly some of them didn’t make sense to me. The marines were the biggest let down though. Personally for action and cool technology, I would have to give the award to district 9 over Avatar, and for $30 Million dollars.

The last thing I want to get off my chest, is the dangerous forest. I hate that they made it as “Dangerous” as they did, with all the creatures they showed in the first hour. Then as soon as they establish how dangerous it is, it’s no longer dangerous ever again. It bugged me a little when the same thing happened after the first season of Lost, but I think it really stood out as annoying in this movie.

Also I would like to bring light of the fact, that the six creatures of Pandora, awesome as they were, didn’t feel like the inhabitants of an entire world. They should have designed tons more creatures. They were so shamelessly stealing characteristics from Earth animals anyway, why not transmute a few more? A six legged anything else. And maybe some water.

To wrap the whole thing up into a pretty bag. This movie is better than most the movies that you see in the theatre, but far from perfect. The story isn’t spectacular, the science is nothing special, the characters barely function, and the dialog is dumb. Bring your kids, it’s James Cameron’s second best film! Definitely worth watching once. I’m giving it a whopping 7/10!

I don’t need to comment much about this at all.  The Red-Band trailer for Kick-Ass is over at IGN and Hit-girl is the star.  This movie is going to explode the heads of a lot of conservative folks.  I’m impressed there’s not been any controversy yet.  Maybe we’re all just bracing so much for controversy that when none happens we’ll all be surprised.  In any case, this trailer looks great.

Due out March 2010, Capcom is doing the 8-bit thing again for another installment in the Mega Man series.

I’ve finally heard someone complaining about these 8-bit titles, Zombietron had the argument of: “Who wants to spend good money on a game that doesn’t look good?” The answer is, of course, the good doctor. Mega Man 9 was awesome, one of the best in the entire series. As it made fun of itself, and was in on the joke, it was about as well-balanced as a Mega Man game can be. It introduced innovative new concepts to the series without loosing the classic look and feel. Basically it felt like a brand new game, that would have been worth the full cost of a video game, but I was only being charged for a $10 dollar download.

Hence my excitement for Mega Man 10. It looks like they are doing the same thing, but in a way that seems even more aware of what people are asking for. Namely me, the good doctor. They are boasting a new easy mode, as well as the ability to play proto-man without an additional download.

I was already completely sold on the idea of Mega Man 10, but after watching the video below, I have to say I have considerably raised my expectations. Watch it now!

So, I think we can all safely get excited now. As a true robot, how can you not be? (Maybe even Zombietron?) As a reminder, it is coming out in March!

On a small digression, because it is so close to robot Christmas: for some reason Amazon dropped the price on Zelda Spirit tracks $10 dollars, and still in time to get it for Christmas. So buy it on Amazon for only $25 dollars!

The IRON MAN 2 trailer was just released… get to watching!!!

I just watched… and… no words… none.  I’m not going to guess at story- i’m not going to critique… I’m just going to watch this movie… probably several times.