Press Release
Arcana Comics is pleased to announce that at booth 2415 at San Diego Comic Con from July 20th – 24th, you will find not only Arcana Comics, but Platinum Studios’ Cowboys and Aliens.
Category Archives: Platinum Studios
TRAILER: New Cowboys & Aliens trailer arrives
Though the first half of the latest Cowboys & Aliens trailer is content we’ve already seen before, the last half kicks it up a notch, and we see plenty more alien ships attacking the settlers of the West.
TRAILER: Cowboys & Aliens
Yet another trailer for Jon Favreau’s Cowboys & Aliens movie has hit the Intardwebz, featuring more goodness than before.
TRAILER: Cowboys & Aliens
There’s a new trailer for Cowboys & Aliens available for you to peer at with a keen eye.
When this movie was first announced, I had very little interest in seeing it, but now, a couple of trailers later, I’m getting psyched to see it when it arrives July 29, 2011.
MOVIE: Top Cow and Platinum Studios team for Vice flick
According to Deadline, Platinum Studios and Top Cow Productions have teamed up to bring the comic Vice to the big screen.
Vice tells the story of hard-core teen felons who join the FBI’s Critical Response Unit as a way to clear their records. Their bad attitudes and formidable powers make them as dangerous as the bad guys they pursue.
Andrew Lazar will produce with Scott Mitchell Rosenberg, while Marc Silvestri and Randy Greenberg will serve as executive producers.
Take a look at Jon Favreau’s Cowboys and Aliens
With the casting of Cowboys and Aliens wrapping up and shooting about to get underway, the first image emerges from director Jon Favreau. It’s not much, a silhouette of “someone” dressed up in cowboy duds. The camera test at least lets us know the Platinum Studios adaptation is really happening, and not a bunch of hype.
Magdalena movie still in the works
Platinum Studios and Valhalla Motion Pictures have hired Ryuhei Kitamura to direct the movie adaptation of Top Cow Productions’ Magdalena property.
The Magdelena character, which first appeared in 1998, is a descendant of Jesus Christ and Mary Magdalene. She has the ability to see into the human heart to give people a choice to redeem their sins.
Holly Brix has been tapped to write the screenplay.
Aphrodite IX Goes 3D
Aphrodite IX, the sexy cyborg assassin, is getting the 3D treatment for the upcoming feature film.  Platinum Studios, Threshold Entertainment, and Top Cow Productions are teaming up to bring the comic to the silver screen.
Threshold’s Larry Kasanoff and Platinum chairman and CEO Scott Mitchell Rosenberg are producing. Top Cow CEO Marc Silvestri and former Universal Pictures exec Randy Greenberg of the Greenberg Group are execu¬tive producers. Top Cow president Matt Hawkins and Platinum’s Rich Marincic are co-producing.
If this is going to be 3D, I wonder who the target audience is going to be. This could certainly be the Heavy Metal of its time if done in a way to traget the adult male demographic.
Atlantis Rising Seeking Screenwriter
Dreamworks has announced it is making an adaptation of Platinum Studios Atlantis Rising, and currently has Len Wiseman attached to direct the sci-fi action flick. The film will be produced by Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci, and Platinum Studios CEO Scott Mitchell Rosenberg.
In “Atlantis,” an underworld civilization is discovered after seismic rumbles announce its presence. Hostilities with Earth’s land-dwellers ensue.
“In all the classic versions of this kind of movie, the threat is always from the stars,” Orci said. “The idea that it’s somehow our cousins who went off in a different path of evolution who have been here, literally, underneath our oceans. … That’s fascinating, the idea of secrets right under your nose.”
Currently Joby Harold is wooing the studio and producers to write the adaptation. Harold is currently writing the adaptation of Frank Miller’s Ronin for Warner Bros.
Hero By Night Gets Television Treatment
DJ Coffman’s website is mysteriously silent on the announcement that DJ Coffman has weighed in on the announcement Platinum Studios has struck a deal with IM Global to turn Hero By Night into a live action television series.
Under the agreement, IM Global will handle worldwide distribution for the project and will produce Hero By Night through their IM Global Television banner run by television veteran Gavin Reardon, who brokered the deal along with the Rigberg Entertainment Group.
Hero By Night, created by 2006 Comic Book Challenge® winner, DJ Coffman, tells the story of young landlord, Jack King, who uncovers the lair of the legendary Hero by Night . Determined to make a little extra cash, Jack auctions the Hero’s journal on eBay. His plans backfire when he attracts the attention of Hero by Night’s old arch-enemy. Jack must now embrace a buried legacy to stop a madman from completing his diabolical schemes.
I liked Hero By NIght when it debuted a couple of years ago, and respected what DJ Coffman was doing with his series. With all the smack talk he’s been spreading about Platinum Studios, I don’t know if he’ll gain financially, but at least it will get his name out there for any other project he is working on.
With IM Global behind the deal, we might actually see this series be made. But, we have to be somewhat realistic about any television series announcement. The IM Global could market this oversees only, or the show will fall into syndication hell, where it will be near impossible for the average viewer to find.
Quote of the Week
“That last one is really sad to think about. To think workers at Wal-Mart are making more than people inside Platinum right now? I mean… well, maybe that’s saying a lot on it’s own. At least they are being paid something, because the last I heard nobody was being paid anything at all.â€
This from DJ Coffman, former friend and creator for Platinum Studios on the announcement the company is now paying their employees minimum wage.
WOWIO, now wow, oh no…
When Heroic Publishing first began sending me solicitations about its titles availability on WOWIO, I was pretty excited. A free (or nearly free) digital comics distribution system that paid creators because of internal ads/sponsorships is a pretty great idea. I was able to access new content, or in the case of some of my favorite Clockwork Storybook folk (Bill Willingham, Matthew Sturges, Mark Finn, Chris Roberson) get stuff that is out of print circulation.
When it was announced Platinum Studios was buying WOWIO and “retooling” the entire system, I was a bit hesitant after the debacle with DJ Coffman (search our site, you’ll see DJ’s original praise for Platinum, that has now turned into hate). I let it slide at the time because the WOWIO system appeared to be working fine for everyone, in some cases earning creators upwards of $50,000 a year in royalties – not too shabby. Or should I say, not too shabby for the creators. According to WOWIO/Platinum the model wasn’t making them any money.
Platinum Studios is not a newbie to controversy, especially when it comes to creator rights, burning through captial, and that whole Cowboys vs. Aliens ranking issue that got the ire of many a LCS. So when word started filtering my way that WOWIO, now owned by Platinum Studios, had not been paying creators on time under the new contract, it wasn’t a surprise and has become the straw that broke the camel’s back.
Comic Book Resources has an excellent summary of what is going on with WOWIO, or as I’m calling them now – Wow, Oh No, and how the changes are affecting everyone.
What’s more, the creators say that Platinum’s new Wowio contract leaves something to be desired. Originally, Wowio provided users with free sponsored downloads and compensated their creators with a share of the ad revenue. While this option remains in place, the new deal instituted a pageview function which allows users to view any and all of Wowio’s e-books in their entirety in low resolution on the web, an option for which the books’ creators only see 20% of the generated ad revenue.
In otherwords, “Why download or purchase, when you can read online for free?” Not too shabby for Platinum Studios, who now gets a bigger piece of the pie.
As much as I like the stuff Heroic Publishing keeps sending us, and want the indie publisher to succeed, I think I’m turning my back on covering anything about WOWIO until somebody gets a half a brain and gets the Wow, Oh No house in order.