April
17 New York Comic-Con goes deeper for third outing

The New York Comic-Con is about to kick off its third edition, and while I won't be there this year, the events and programming planned for this year's con move it one step closer to being the No. 2 show in the land after Comic-Con Intl.: San Diego. (Disclaimer: The NYCC is run by Reed Exhibitions, a sister company of Variety parent Reed Business Information.)

The programming this year has a much stronger Hollywood flavor than the previous two years — a function both of the show now having enough of a track record in pulling in attendees for studios to promote their wares to and moving from February to spring dates that are ideally positioned in advance of the summer movie season. (The double good news is that those who are attending won't have to face the freezing river wind walking over to the Jacob Javitz Center.)

Among the goodies: Fox will have a panel on the just-named "The X-Files: I Want to Believe" movie; Disney has panels on Pixar's "Wall*E" and "The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian"; Universal will be playing up "Wanted," "Hellboy 2: The Golden Army" and, in collaboration with Marvel, "The Incredible Hulk"; WB has "The Dark Knight" and "Speed Racer"; Lucasfilm will talk about "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull" and "Star Wars: Clone Wars"; Lionsgate is bringing in Frank Miller and Eva Mendes for a panel on "Will Eisner's The Spirit"; and a pair of New Line panels spotlight "Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay" and "Journey to the Center of the Earth in 3-D." On the TV side of things, Sci Fi will again have a big presence promoting "Battlestar Galactica" and "Doctor Who"; Nick and ABC also will be on hand.

If you're a fan of older comics, this is a great convention for meeting some of the the folks who started this crazy business. Joe Simon, co-creator with Jack Kirby of Captain America and recently profiled in The New York Times, will be on hand, as will Golden Age artists Irwin Hasen and Leonard Starr. It will be almost impossible to miss Stan Lee, who will be accepting a "Legend" award, appearing at a VIP reception sponsored by Virgin Comics and Pow! Entertainment tonight at the Virgin Megastore in Times Square, and promoting his collaboration with Hiroyuki Takei on the manga "Ultimo" for Viz. There also will be a screening Saturday of the documentary "Will Eisner: Portrait of a Sequential Artist," followed by an Eisner tribute panel. Mark Evanier will host a  panel about the late-great Jack Kirby, tied in to his recent biography of the master artist.

The show also is marking the announcement of business deals, with TOKYOPOP having three right out of the gate: A multiplatform development deal with Spacedog Entertainment, whose manga "eV" has already come out from TOKYOPOP; a deal with game-maker Blizzard Entertainment to produce three years of manga based on such popular titles as Warcraft and Starcraft; and the company's deal with mobile partner GoComics has been made exclusive.

Meanwhile, Devil's Due is bringing in "Heroes" actor Milo Ventimiglia and producer Russ Cundiff to sign autographs and announce a new comicbook project. Autograph signing schedules also are full; the best resource for those lists is, as always, Heidi McDonald at The Beat.