After a 10 year court battle between Neil Gaiman and Todd MacFarlane over the ownership of several characters, we are finally seeing the ramifications and fallout. Angela, a character created for the pages of Spawn (an Image comic), will make her debut in Marvel Comics in the final chapter of the Age of Ultron event currently playing out at newsstands and comic shops.

The lawsuit, started in 2002 by Gaiman, ended in a settlement at the start of 2012. It was clear that things were going in Gaiman’s favor as he won motion after motion and came out on top for several important rulings on other characters. In the end, the settlement left both men with 50% ownership of the Angela character. What we are seeing here is that it may have been a bit more specific than that. It could be surmised that Gaiman was awarded 100% ownership over the name and character, whereas MacFarlane got ownership over the look and design. This would explain the high-profile overhaul that Joe Quesada has given Angela.

Say what you will about Quesada as an editor, but the man was and will always be a great artist. I think the new design captures the character pretty well while dispensing with some of the goofier parts of her attire. After Ultron, she will be following Gaiman over to the Guardians of the Galaxy series with Brian Michael Bendis and art by the extremely talented Sara Pichelli.

Press Release after the jump
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It’s Star Trek the original series versus the JJ Abram Trek universe as Leonard Nimoy and Zachary Quinto try to outdo each other in this automobile ad that has something for Star Trek fans of any stripe. More after the jump!

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Remember that TV show Captain Planet? Created by Ted Turner in the early 90s, it starred a group of kids known as the planeteers who had special rings based upon the 5 elements. By putting their rings together, they summon a blue-skinned superhero known as Captain Planet who battled pollution. It was basically one big environmental PSA in animated form. Surprisingly, it was enjoyable, and it’s themes resonated well with audiences both old and young. Not only did it handle environmental issues, it dealt with heavier subject matter such as racism, drugs, and even HIV (and this was the first children’s program to deal with HIV too). It lasted 6 seasons, and contained celebrity voices such as Whoopi Goldberg, Sting, and Meg Ryan. Of course the obligatory video game tie-in followed. While the TV show was cool, it’s too bad we can’t say the same thing about the game.
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I know what you are thinking. Man-Thing? How on earth is he going to make this connection?

I’ll be honest. I had to do some research when I came home after seeing Iron Man 3. There was a scene that piqued my curiosity. Do you know the scene I’m talking about?

Join me after the jump as I take you on a magical origin filled journey! (spoiler free!)
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Eternal Darkness was a Gamecube classic, and a rare M-rated exclusive for a Nintendo system. It’s centuries-spanning storyline, spellcraft system, and sanity effects helped make it one of the best entries in the survival-horror genre. Ever since then, fans have been clamoring for a new entry in the series, and it looks like their prayers have been answered. IGN has just revealed the first details on Shadow of the Eternals, a spiritual successor being developed for Wii U and PC, and it’s developer, Precursor Games is seeking $1.5 million for development via crowdsourcing. Precursor is composed of developers who have worked on the 2002 classic, including Silicon Knights founder Denis Dyack. The game’s plot will be told via 12 episodes, and will span over 2,500 years of history. The crowdfunding campaign will begin on Monday May 6th. So how about it? Are you excited for what is essentially Eternal Darkness 2? I certainly am, although I’m a bit apprehensive after the performance of Silicon Knight’s last 2 titles, X-Men: Destiny and Too Human.

May the 4th be with you this Saturday at Free Comic Book Day! Local Comic Shops around the world will be celebrating this unofficial holiday with free comic books, parties, costumes and all around love for comic book characters and stories. At least, thats what they do around here.

Some comic shops put a limit on the number of free books you can get, so its not always easy to choose what books you want on the spot with the crowds waiting for you to move on. And since FCBD is kind of a big deal around these parts of the internet, we decided to put together a guide for all the books that will be available this weekend.

Join us after the jump for the full lowdown!
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Even though he’s made more in his career than most of his contributors will make in a lifetime combined, CBS Schoolbreak Special one-time guest star Zach Braff has successfully raised the more than the requested $2 million dollars to complete his new indie film that he terms as a spiritual successor to his decade-old feature film Garden State.

The erstwhile SeanOrange doppleganger admitted in his video that he was inspired by the $4 million success of the Veronica Mars movie Kickstarter campaign, a film which unlike Braff’s new film has major studio backing.

“‘You would think a big star like me would just have $2 million squirreled away for just such an occasion… but really, I don’t,’ Zach Braff in no way said, but at least I’d imagine he’d say it,” said Sean “The Orange” Corse. Sean embarked on a failed YouTube campaign in 2008 to call out Braff for growing the same kind of patchy, fuzzy beard-like facial hair for the final season of what Corse terms as “the ‘Real’ Scrubs”.

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