DC Comics

We're getting to the end of October, and that can only mean one thing for comics: pumpkin spice scratch n sniff Harley Quinn covers horror books. Lots of horror books. There are also spy books and fantasy books and sci-fi books (oh my!), but most of this week's comics are about monsters, murders and scaring the hell out of you.

After brief and rather scattershot theatrical run in late September and early October, My Little Pony: Equestria Girls - Rainbow Rocks is being released in a DVD/Blu-ray combo from Shout! Factory, and for streaming on Amazon Instant and elsewhere. Taking place directly after the events of Friendship Is Magic's fourth season finale "Twilight's Kingdom" while also picking up the threads from the My Little Pony: Equestria Girls, it's terrific on its own, and even more importantly, the Shout! Factory discs have an entertaining and informative commentary track featuring key members of the production team. Here are some of the highlights of that commentary!

Spoilers abound, of course.

Well, it beats "Russell Crowe's Foightin' Round the World." The Avengers 2 trailer will make its broadcast remember during next week's episode.

Sorry for the delay - caring for a sick wife has been a busy job too.

I bet you his hunger would have been satisfied if he'd taken a big delight in every bite of a HOSTESS Fruit Pie (TM).

Mixing Flash and Arrow last week didn't really work. Let's try solo.

Marvel.com

Okay, so he didn't make like the toys and do a green Darth Vader in tribute - but he Alex Ross'd the hell out of that original Marvel #1.

This is one of many variant covers for the debut of the new series, which transpires right after Episode IV. J. Scott Campbell, Joe Quesada and many more will be taking a crack at it, though I'm personally hoping for a Milo Manara variant that shows C-3PO crawling around doggy-style as Artoo prepares to probe him.

What, I'm the only one? Okay, carry on.

The Universal monsters were able to plug into any number of more family friendly spin-offs back in the day - Abbott and Costello comedies, General Mills cereals, Rankin-Bass stop-motion specials - but could their modern counterparts do the same?

In this video from the Key of Awesome and Barely Political, a Karloff-like Frankenstein tries to sing the classic movie-inspired monster dance hit, but finds himself just a tad appalled at the way the new guys (and one girl) integrate themselves. The makeup effects may not be state of the art, but the impersonations are good and the rhymes are solid. It still doesn't reveal what happened to the Transylvania Twist.

Inspired by a Penn and Teller idea to create a video game that would teach real-world skills, Desert Bus is a never-released simulator that involves driving a bus across the desert for eight hours, in real time, with no obstacles. If you finish, you get one point.

JR Ralls, last seen adapting the Jack Chick pamphlet "Dark Dungeons" into a poker-faced short film, has made the game - and wants to produce a tournament that will truly test the world's best cyber-athletes, with a cash prize worthy of their time and sanity. It's basically the video game version of Hands on a Hard Body, as anyone who lasts the full eight hours has to start again until only one is left. Players will have to be at the venue live and in person, playing with no distractions, while Ralls entertains the audience separately with musical acts and other entertainers.

Sure, your money could probably be better spent than donating to this Kickstarter, but if you love absurd things done just for shits, this seems like a worthier cause than the potato salad guy.

Sure, we can joke about how there's not much to Star Wars when you take away the cool sounds and visual effects, but deep down you know that's not true - if it were, you'd love Bayformers equally. There's a resonant story there that can transcend disability, and a recent one-day convention allowed the saga - and other nerd properties like TMNT - to be experienced by touch, smell and texture.

Co-founder JJ Lucia-Wright was inspired to help organise it after spending the past 10 years teaching a friend who is deaf and blind about Star Wars.

Communicating via taps on the hand, disabled fans could touch lifesize replicas of Chewbacca and Threepio, and, um..."sniff the scent of the Millennium Falcon."

I must confess I wonder what the scent would be. It's a small ship and I imagine Wookiees having pretty hellacious bowel movements.

h/t Gallen_Dugall

The first batch aren't even out yet, but DC Collectibles knows they have a winner on their hands with this upsized animated line aimed at collectors and sporting considerably more articulation than Kenner. At $25 each, they're also a bit harder on the ol' Bat-pocketbook, but they're branching out with the characters pretty quickly - Killer Croc and Baby Doll come together, while Harley Quinn, New Adventures Robin and the Creeper will join them on the pegs.

Though I was a big fan of the animated series, I am a true child of the '80s in that I like my cartoon-based toys to look more realistic and detailed than the animation, rather than an exact copy of it. I am in the minority in the modern world in that regard, I think. But for those of you who've long wanted and deserved better figures that look like Bruce Timm drawings - here ya go. They're due in stores next May.

Pee-wee's Playhouse - Before the late teens kicked in and I became pathologically unable to wake up before noon on weekends, Pee-wee Herman was the reason I was always up by 10 a.m. (and Ernest P. Worrell at 11) on Saturday. To this day I can still cite all the lyrics of the theme tune, name every member of the Playhouse gang, and vividly recall the day Paul Reubens essentially self-destructed, masturbating in a porn theater while sporting a hairstyle cribbed from Twin Peaks' killer Bob. As he had already stopped filming new episodes, it feels in hindsight like a deliberate move...though one that has been thankfully reversed over the years, as fans have forgiven and Reubens has re-embraced the role.

There aren't any commentaries on the new Blu-ray set, but there are multiple featurettes, and they even got the now-ultra-serious Laurence Fishburne to come back and discuss his Cowboy Curtis days. Today's secret word is..."BUY!" AAAAHHHHH! HAA-HAA! Heh heh heh.

Now, Pee-wee, make that goddamn Judd Apatow movie already.