Mark Olsen
Filmmaker Werner Herzog — German-born, having made films in the Amazon, the Sahara, Wisconsin, Antarctica, all points between and most recently a resident of Los Angeles — belongs to the world, and should be cherished accordingly. An intrepid explorer of the dark corners of the soul, he is,...
Mortgage rates are moving fast in one direction this summer -- sideways.
Freddie Mac's weekly survey, out Thursday, showed the average rate for a 30-year fixed-rate home loan was 4.12%, practically unchanged from last week's 4.13%.
At that rate, a borrower with a $300,000 mortgage would have to pay $1,454 a month in principal and interest.
In the month before the latest surveys, Freddie reported the following averages for the 30-year loan, the most widely used home-financing option: 4.13%, 4.15%, 4.12% and 4.14%.
The survey by the government-sponsored mortgage finance firm asks lenders about the terms they are offering to low-risk borrowers who pay less than 1% of the loan amount in upfront fees and discount points.
The 30-year average edged above 4.5% back in January. It hit 4.2% once in June, but has not been above that level since May.
Lenders told Freddie Mac they were offering 15-year fixed loans this week at an average of 3.23%, down from 3.26%. Start rates on adjustable loans also were little changed.
Where are the rates headed next? The yield on the 10-year Treasury note is a common proxy. It shot higher on Wednesday afternoon, right after Freddie Mac wrapped up this week's survey, in reaction to a report that the economy expanded 4% in the second quarter.
@ScottReckard watches mortgage trends for the L.A. Times
Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles TimesMark Olsen
Filmmaker Werner Herzog — German-born, having made films in the Amazon, the Sahara, Wisconsin, Antarctica, all points between and most recently a resident of Los Angeles — belongs to the world, and should be cherished accordingly. An intrepid explorer of the dark corners of the soul, he is,...
Mark Olsen
Filmmaker Werner Herzog — German-born, having made films in the Amazon, the Sahara, Wisconsin, Antarctica, all points between and most recently a resident of Los Angeles — belongs to the world, and should be cherished accordingly. An intrepid explorer of the dark corners of the soul, he is,...
"The Continent," the directorial debut of Chinese writer and race car driver Han Han, took pole position at the mainland box office last week, earning $48.5 million. Meanwhile, "Transformers: Age of Extinction" finished out its strong run with nearly $300 million.
"The Continent," the directorial debut of Chinese writer and race car driver Han Han, took pole position at the mainland box office last week, earning $48.5 million. Meanwhile, "Transformers: Age of Extinction" finished out its strong run with nearly $300 million.
"The Continent," the directorial debut of Chinese writer and race car driver Han Han, took pole position at the mainland box office last week, earning $48.5 million. Meanwhile, "Transformers: Age of Extinction" finished out its strong run with nearly $300 million.
Faced with several consolidated class-action lawsuits in federal court, the NCAA has agreed to spend $70 million on concussion testing and diagnosis for current and former college athletes dating back 50 years.
The settlement, announced Tuesday, will also include educational initiatives and $5 million for concussion research.
"We have been and will continue to be committed to student-athlete safety, which is one of the NCAA's foundational principles," said NCAA Chief Medical Officer Brian Hainline. "This agreement's proactive measures will ensure student-athletes have access to high-quality medical care by physicians with experience in the diagnosis, treatment and management of concussions."
If a U.S. District Court judge approves the agreement, athletes who competed at an NCAA member school over the last five decades may be eligible for a physical exam, neurological measurements and neurocognitive assessments.
The NCAA has also agreed to a series of guidelines -- some of which have already been enacted -- for diagnosis and treatment. Those guidelines state that trained medical personnel be present at games and available during practices. Athletes will undergo baseline concussion testing and, if concussed, must be cleared by a physician before returning to play.
The association said it will establish a process by which schools report concussions.
"The NCAA will continue to identify advancements to address head injuries in NCAA sports," Donald Remy, NCAA chief legal officer, said.
Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles TimesAmazon.com made its boldest move yet into the electronics hardware business by entering the fiercely competitive smartphone market earlier this month with the release of the Amazon Fire Phone.
The Amazon smartphone is suited with top-of-the-line components and priced to compete with other high-end devices. The Fire Phone is a perfectly capable gadget, but it isn't so remarkable that Apple or Android owners will jump ship. At best, the device is a convenient choice for devout Amazon shoppers, but at worst, it's just another fish in a sea of smartphones.
The Amazon Fire Phone looks like an oversized black iPhone with front and back glass panels, curved corners, and a narrow, rectangular build. But it diverges in a couple of ways. The Fire Phone has rubber side edges, prominently features the Amazon logo on its back and it includes a speaker on both its top and bottom sides for stereo sound -- a rarity among smartphones.
But the Fire Phone's most distinguishable feature is its four infrared LED sensors located on each corner of its front panel. These "ultra-low power specialized cameras," as Amazon calls them, work together to detect where a user's head is relative to the phone. Amazon calls this feature Dynamic Perspective, and it's used to add 3-D effects to the device's interface as well as give users another way to control their gadget. For example, with the photo app, users can prompt the Fire Phone to display the date of each picture and video by moving their head to the left or right of the device. Third-party developers can also implement Dynamic Perspective into their apps, and some already have. In the video game "Lili," users can look around the 3-D world by moving their faces around the screen in real life. It's a neat feature, but it's very gimmicky. Unless more developers find useful ways to implement it into their apps, most users will likely forget Dynamic Perspective exists.
Another unique feature on the Amazon Fire Phone is called Firefly. It uses the device's camera and microphone to detect text, products, movies, TV shows and music. The feature is activated by holding down the camera button on the left side of the device. Once on, users point the phone at whatever they want to detect. You can aim it at a business card to add a phone or email address to the phone rather than typing it out; using Firefly while watching a TV show will pull information from IMDB.com; and if you aim Firefly at a product, the Fire Phone will call up the Amazon Web page for the item, making it easier for you to buy it.
And that takes us to the most annoying part about the Fire Phone -- its main purpose is to spur more Amazon sales. The Fire Phone's interface is designed so that it is constantly recommending more things for you to buy. Swipe to a recently used app, and you'll find app suggestions. Go to a recently heard song, and the device will offer other songs it thinks you'll like and should buy. Amazon makes similar recommendations on its Fire TV streaming player and its Fire tablets, but they don't feel so invasive on those devices because you have a lot of real estate to work with. On the Fire Phone, you're only looking at 4.7 inches of screen, and though it is a crystal clear screen, it feels cramped. The recommendations are on by default, but fortunately, users can go turn them off in their settings, giving their home screen some breathing room.
If you're not sure how to turn off the recommendations, you can swipe down from the top of the screen then tap the Mayday icon to turn on Amazon's helpful customer service. Mayday will kick off a video call with an Amazon representative who is trained to answer any question you may have about the device. Amazon introduced this feature in 2013 with some of its tablets, and it's nice to see the company carrying it over to more devices.
The Fire Phone runs on Amazon's version of Android, meaning it looks and feels nothing like the software Google makes. Instead, the main screen features a carousel that displays apps and content in the order you most recently used them. You can "pin" your favorite items to the front, but navigating this way isn't too effective. Fortunately, there are other ways to get around. Swiping up from the bottom will pull up your apps, which can be rearranged however you want. If you quickly tilt the left side of the phone toward you, you'll prompt a menu that offers shortcuts to content apps, like your Amazon music, movies and audiobooks. Tilt the right side of the phone toward you, and you'll see another menu containing information Amazon thinks you'll find helpful. Mine included the weather in Los Angeles and the status of my latest Amazon order. These tilt gestures were included to make it easier for users to navigate their device using one hand, and they play a prominent role in Amazon's various apps. Tilting from the right while in the text messaging app will pull up recently shot photos, speeding up the process of sending a picture.
Those pictures are also very high quality. The Amazon Fire Phone uses a 13-megapixel rear-facing camera that shoots sharp videos and photos, but that's standard for a high-end smartphone. What's unique is that Amazon will automatically back up every picture you shoot with the Fire Phone in the cloud. This is very helpful when you're at an event, like a music festival, and you run out of space on your device -- you can delete your photos knowing Amazon's got a copy you can access later and keep snapping more. This is also a money saver. By comparison, Apple only offers customers 5 gigabytes of cloud storage for free. After that, Apple users have to pay for more space.
Users who buy the Fire Phone also get a year's membership to Amazon Prime, which includes access to Amazon Instant Video, Prime Music and free, two-day delivery on certain items -- worth $99. But the gadget itself won't come cheap. Consumers can buy the phone with no contract for $649 with 32 gigabytes of storage or $749 with 64 GB. The device is available on a two-year contract from AT&T for $199 for 32 GB or $299 for 64 GB. Customers can also pay for the device on a monthly basis using the AT&T Next payment system.
If you love shopping on Amazon, the Fire Phone might make sense for you. But if you shop from various websites and you're already entrenched in the Apple or Android ecosystem, none of the Amazon Fire Phone's features -- not Dynamic Perspective, Firefly, or even the unlimited photo backups -- are enough to warrant a switch.
Wanna chat? Send me a tweet at: @sal19
Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles TimesAmazon.com made its boldest move yet into the electronics hardware business by entering the fiercely competitive smartphone market earlier this month with the release of the Amazon Fire Phone.
The Amazon smartphone is suited with top-of-the-line components and priced to compete with other high-end devices. The Fire Phone is a perfectly capable gadget, but it isn't so remarkable that Apple or Android owners will jump ship. At best, the device is a convenient choice for devout Amazon shoppers, but at worst, it's just another fish in a sea of smartphones.
The Amazon Fire Phone looks like an oversized black iPhone with front and back glass panels, curved corners, and a narrow, rectangular build. But it diverges in a couple of ways. The Fire Phone has rubber side edges, prominently features the Amazon logo on its back and it includes a speaker on both its top and bottom sides for stereo sound -- a rarity among smartphones.
But the Fire Phone's most distinguishable feature is its four infrared LED sensors located on each corner of its front panel. These "ultra-low power specialized cameras," as Amazon calls them, work together to detect where a user's head is relative to the phone. Amazon calls this feature Dynamic Perspective, and it's used to add 3-D effects to the device's interface as well as give users another way to control their gadget. For example, with the photo app, users can prompt the Fire Phone to display the date of each picture and video by moving their head to the left or right of the device. Third-party developers can also implement Dynamic Perspective into their apps, and some already have. In the video game "Lili," users can look around the 3-D world by moving their faces around the screen in real life. It's a neat feature, but it's very gimmicky. Unless more developers find useful ways to implement it into their apps, most users will likely forget Dynamic Perspective exists.
Another unique feature on the Amazon Fire Phone is called Firefly. It uses the device's camera and microphone to detect text, products, movies, TV shows and music. The feature is activated by holding down the camera button on the left side of the device. Once on, users point the phone at whatever they want to detect. You can aim it at a business card to add a phone or email address to the phone rather than typing it out; using Firefly while watching a TV show will pull information from IMDB.com; and if you aim Firefly at a product, the Fire Phone will call up the Amazon Web page for the item, making it easier for you to buy it.
And that takes us to the most annoying part about the Fire Phone -- its main purpose is to spur more Amazon sales. The Fire Phone's interface is designed so that it is constantly recommending more things for you to buy. Swipe to a recently used app, and you'll find app suggestions. Go to a recently heard song, and the device will offer other songs it thinks you'll like and should buy. Amazon makes similar recommendations on its Fire TV streaming player and its Fire tablets, but they don't feel so invasive on those devices because you have a lot of real estate to work with. On the Fire Phone, you're only looking at 4.7 inches of screen, and though it is a crystal clear screen, it feels cramped. The recommendations are on by default, but fortunately, users can go turn them off in their settings, giving their home screen some breathing room.
If you're not sure how to turn off the recommendations, you can swipe down from the top of the screen then tap the Mayday icon to turn on Amazon's helpful customer service. Mayday will kick off a video call with an Amazon representative who is trained to answer any question you may have about the device. Amazon introduced this feature in 2013 with some of its tablets, and it's nice to see the company carrying it over to more devices.
The Fire Phone runs on Amazon's version of Android, meaning it looks and feels nothing like the software Google makes. Instead, the main screen features a carousel that displays apps and content in the order you most recently used them. You can "pin" your favorite items to the front, but navigating this way isn't too effective. Fortunately, there are other ways to get around. Swiping up from the bottom will pull up your apps, which can be rearranged however you want. If you quickly tilt the left side of the phone toward you, you'll prompt a menu that offers shortcuts to content apps, like your Amazon music, movies and audiobooks. Tilt the right side of the phone toward you, and you'll see another menu containing information Amazon thinks you'll find helpful. Mine included the weather in Los Angeles and the status of my latest Amazon order. These tilt gestures were included to make it easier for users to navigate their device using one hand, and they play a prominent role in Amazon's various apps. Tilting from the right while in the text messaging app will pull up recently shot photos, speeding up the process of sending a picture.
Those pictures are also very high quality. The Amazon Fire Phone uses a 13-megapixel rear-facing camera that shoots sharp videos and photos, but that's standard for a high-end smartphone. What's unique is that Amazon will automatically back up every picture you shoot with the Fire Phone in the cloud. This is very helpful when you're at an event, like a music festival, and you run out of space on your device -- you can delete your photos knowing Amazon's got a copy you can access later and keep snapping more. This is also a money saver. By comparison, Apple only offers customers 5 gigabytes of cloud storage for free. After that, Apple users have to pay for more space.
Users who buy the Fire Phone also get a year's membership to Amazon Prime, which includes access to Amazon Instant Video, Prime Music and free, two-day delivery on certain items -- worth $99. But the gadget itself won't come cheap. Consumers can buy the phone with no contract for $649 with 32 gigabytes of storage or $749 with 64 GB. The device is available on a two-year contract from AT&T for $199 for 32 GB or $299 for 64 GB. Customers can also pay for the device on a monthly basis using the AT&T Next payment system.
If you love shopping on Amazon, the Fire Phone might make sense for you. But if you shop from various websites and you're already entrenched in the Apple or Android ecosystem, none of the Amazon Fire Phone's features -- not Dynamic Perspective, Firefly, or even the unlimited photo backups -- are enough to warrant a switch.
Wanna chat? Send me a tweet at: @sal19
Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles TimesRising profits and corporate moves nudged the U.S. stock market higher in early Tuesday. Major indexes in Europe and Asia climbed ahead of a string of U.S. and Chinese economic reports later this week.
KEEPING SCORE: As of 10:20 a.m. Eastern time, the Standard & Poor's 500 index was up five points, or 0.3 percent, to 1,984. The Dow Jones industrial average rose 68 points, 0.4 percent, to 17,050, while the Nasdaq composite picked up 21 points, or 0.5 percent, to 4,466. With most of July behind it, the S&P 500 has gained 1.2 percent.
STILL CLIMBING: This week marks the half-way point for second-quarter earnings, and the overall results look solid. Second-quarter earnings are on track to climb 8.8 percent over the year. At the start of the earnings season, analysts predicted an increase of 6 percent.
A DOUBLE: A large sale and a tax benefit helped Merck & Co. more than double its second-quarter profit, easily topping Wall Street's expectations. The drugmaker also raised its profit forecast for 2014. Its stock climbed 86 cents, or 2 percent, to $58.84.
OOPS: A warning of lower profits from United Parcel Service knocked its stock down in early trading. Early Tuesday, UPS said spending on technology to improve its service during the upcoming holiday season will take a cut out of its full-year earnings. The shipping company also said its second-quarter earnings fell 58 percent, though shipments and sales picked up. In early trading, UPS sank $3.56, or 3 percent, to $99.08.
BIG WEEK: Nearly a tenth of the big companies in the S&P 500 are turning in second-quarter results Tuesday. The heavyweights include American Express, Pfizer and UPS.
HOUSING: House prices in 20 major U.S. cities fell slightly in May, according to the closely watched S&P/Case Shiller index. Economists had forecast a tiny gain over the previous month. Over the past year, however, housing prices have climbed 9.3 percent.
EUROPEAN MARKETS: By late afternoon in Europe, Germany's DAX was up 0.7 percent while France's CAC 40 advanced 0.8 percent. Britain's FTSE 100 rose 0.6 percent.
RUSSIA WATCH: The market's cautious gains may be tested later if Western powers go ahead with a new round of sanctions against Russia. On Monday, the White House said the United States and European Union plan to impose more sanctions this week, including penalties targeting key parts of the Russian economy. The EU had previously refrained from stepping up sanctions in the wake of the shooting down of a Malaysian jetliner over a rebel-controlled region of Ukraine, killing 298 people.
ASIA'S DAY: South Korea's Kospi reached its highest level since August 2011, rising 0.6 percent, boosted by the new finance minister's recent announcement of economic stimulus and measures to support the housing market. Hong Kong's Hang Seng finished 0.9 percent higher while China's Shanghai Composite gained 0.2 percent.
MORE DATA: On Wednesday, the U.S. will release gross domestic product figures for the April-June quarter. The world's largest economy is expected to pick up after severe winter dampened growth the previous quarter. The Federal Reserve is scheduled to issue a statement after wrapping up a two-day policy meeting on Wednesday. On Thursday, a report on China's manufacturing industry will give investors an update on the health of the world's factory floor. On Friday, the U.S. will release its monthly jobs data. Analysts estimate that the U.S. labor market added between 235,000 and 255,000 jobs in July.
ANALYST'S TAKE: William Leys, sales trader at CMC Markets, said investors were cautious before the impending rush of economic news. "Caution is the pre-eminent theme across global markets at the moment, as investors anticipate a spate of key economic data due later in the week, amid a backdrop of persistent geopolitical concerns," Leys said in a commentary. "With a variety of weighty announcements looming, the stage is set for an action packed end to the week."
OIL: The price of oil fell, with benchmark U.S. crude for September delivery down 51 cents to $101.16 a barrel.
Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles TimesA suicide bomber killed Afghan President Hamid Karzai's cousin Tuesday morning in Kandahar province, officials said.
A spokesman for Karzai confirmed the attack, and said the president condemns the killing. He added in a statement: "Afghans die every day in terrorist attacks in the country and the president's family is no exception."
Hashmat Karzai was greeting visitors at his home for the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Fitr when an attacker blew himself up while embracing Karzai, the Associated Press reported, citing a provincial government official.
According to the AP, Hashmat Karzai was a major supporter of the Afghan president and was instrumental in the presidential campaign for candidate Ashraf Ghani to succeed Hamid Karzai.
His death comes amid a continuing election crisis, in which rival candidate Abdullah Abdullah has alleged widespread fraud that favored Ghani. Earlier this month, U.S. Secretary of State John F. Kerry helped broker an agreement between the candidates that will allow all 8 million votes from the presidential election to be recounted.
Ghani tweeted Tuesday that he was in "immense shock" at the news of Karzai's death. "His loss has left a void," Ghani wrote. "We'll not succumb to coward acts of the enemies of Afghanistan. Every loss of Afghans reminds us that we must stay united to overcome the challenges."
James B. Cunningham, the U.S. ambassador in Kabul, also condemned the attack, saying those responsible must be brought to justice.
Karzai's family members have been targeted before. The president's half brother, Ahmed Wali Karzai, was shot and killed by his bodyguard in his home in 2011.
For more breaking news, follow me @cmaiduc
Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles TimesFCC should help reach deal to end Dodgers TV standoff, lawmakers say
Joe Flint
A group of Southern California lawmakers wants the Federal Communications Commission to broker a deal to end the bitter standoff between Time Warner Cable and other pay-TV providers over distribution of SportsNet LA, the new channel that is home to the Los Angeles Dodgers.
FCC should help reach deal to end Dodgers TV standoff, lawmakers say
Joe Flint
A group of Southern California lawmakers wants the Federal Communications Commission to broker a deal to end the bitter standoff between Time Warner Cable and other pay-TV providers over distribution of SportsNet LA, the new channel that is home to the Los Angeles Dodgers.
FCC should help reach deal to end Dodgers TV standoff, lawmakers say
Joe Flint
A group of Southern California lawmakers wants the Federal Communications Commission to broker a deal to end the bitter standoff between Time Warner Cable and other pay-TV providers over distribution of SportsNet LA, the new channel that is home to the Los Angeles Dodgers.
FCC should help reach deal to end Dodgers TV standoff, lawmakers say
Joe Flint
A group of Southern California lawmakers wants the Federal Communications Commission to broker a deal to end the bitter standoff between Time Warner Cable and other pay-TV providers over distribution of SportsNet LA, the new channel that is home to the Los Angeles Dodgers.
Hostilities resumed Sunday in the Gaza Strip after Palestinian militants unleashed volleys of rockets at Israel and the Israelis declared an end to a temporary humanitarian truce. Once again, huge explosions reverberated across the coastal enclave and plumes of black smoke stained the horizon.
The fighting, now in its 20th day, has killed more than 1,000 Palestinians, most of them civilians, with at least eight more deaths reported Sunday. At least 43 Israeli soldiers have died in the conflict, representing the country's largest loss of life in a military operation in nearly a decade. Three civilians have died on the Israeli side.
In a statement, the Israeli government blamed "incessant rocket fire" for scuttling Israel's unilateral 24-hour extension of Saturday's daylong cease-fire. During that lull, Palestinians dug about 150 bodies from the rubble of ruined districts and carried away what they could salvage. Many sobbed when they got their first glimpse of destroyed homes.
"I didn't even know which house was mine," said 24-year-old Ibrahim Mohammed, who ventured Sunday into the heavily bombed area of Beit Hanoun. "One person's wardrobe was blown into another person's house. Everything was mixed up."
On Sunday afternoon, Hamas called for another 24-hour pause in fighting, beginning at 2 p.m. local time -- which would span the final iftar, or the meal breaking a fast, of the holy month of Ramadan, and the start of the festive Eid al-Fitr. By nightfall, the two sides were firing on one another again, while exchanging verbal barbs. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told CNN that Hamas was violating its own cease-fire
Israel's Iron Dome missile defense system has intercepted many of the rockets fired by Palestinian militants in Gaza, with most others falling in open areas, although a rocket on Sunday injured a woman living in Israel's south when it crashed through the ceiling of a room where she was sleeping. But Israelis, long accustomed to the rocket threat, have been considerably more alarmed by the revelation that Hamas has constructed a sophisticated network of tunnels under Gaza, some extending under the frontier to Israel and meant for use in terror attacks.
Diplomatic efforts to forge a weeklong cease-fire, with negotiations to be carried out in tandem, have so far failed despite nearly a week of intensive talks. U.S. Secretary of State John F. Kerry arrived in the Egyptian capital last Monday and has spent days shuttling to meetings in the region and then holding a day of talks in Paris, none of which bore fruit.
Hamas spokesman Sami Zuhri said Sunday that the militant group would not accept a truce that allowed Israeli troops to remain inside Gaza, and also demanded that tens of thousands of Palestinians displaced by fighting be allowed to return home.
Palestinian frustration boiled over Sunday in the southern Gaza town of Khan Younis, where the International Committee of the Red Cross said dozens of angry residents broke into the ICRC office and set it on fire. They were apparently angry that the organization could not assist them, said Ran Goldstein, a spokesman for the ICRC in Israel.
In Israel, there was growing resistance to a longer-term cease-fire until the tunnel threat has been dealt with. Israeli troops have destroyed around a dozen underground passages and discovered dozens more beneath Gaza.
"A permanent cease-fire now is the wrong thing," said Haim Yellin, the mayor of the regional council of Sdot Negev, in Israel's south, which has borne the brunt of rocket fire and is near the militants' infiltration tunnels. "We are asking the government to give the army all the time it needs to remove this threat from beneath our feet."
Israel blames Hamas for building the tunnels in densely populated areas, saying it put Palestinian civilians in harm's way by doing so.
Special correspondent Sobelman reported from Jerusalem and staff writer Zavis from Gaza City. Staff writer Laura King in Cairo contributed to this report.
July 27, 8:28 a.m.: This post has been updated with comments from a shelling victim and from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, as well as with additional information.
This post was originally published at 4:06 a.m.
If Jon Hopkins' moody, muscular dance music leaves fans feeling a little dazed, that's no accident. The London-based producer practices autogenic training (a kind of brain-clearing mental yoga) and director David Lynch's brand of Transcendental Meditation.
If Jon Hopkins' moody, muscular dance music leaves fans feeling a little dazed, that's no accident. The London-based producer practices autogenic training (a kind of brain-clearing mental yoga) and director David Lynch's brand of Transcendental Meditation.
An apparent agreement between the Malaysian government and pro-Russia separatists to secure the crash zone of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 has come to naught as fighting continued in the area of eastern Ukraine where the jet went down.
Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak said Sunday he had reached an agreement with Oleksandr Boroday, one of the self-proclaimed leaders of the so-called Donetsk People's Republic, to allow investigators to reach and explore the site unharmed.
But just a few hours later, a delegation of about 30 unarmed Dutch investigators, accompanied by international monitors, said they were turning back from a mission to examine the crash because the area remained too dangerous.
"We can't control the risks," a spokesman for the monitoring group, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, said after the investigation team reached the city of Donetsk near the crash site.
Ukrainian officials said Sunday they continued to make gains in fighting in the area against the separatists. A spokesman for Ukraine's National Security and Defense Council said that with advances north of Donetsk and in other areas, the army has now seized two-thirds of the territory controlled by separatists at the start of the conflict.
The fighting also scuttled, at least temporarily, a plan by Australia to dispatch a team of as many as several dozen unarmed officers to investigate the crash zone.
Razak's announcement had offered reason for optimism because of Malaysia's previous success in extracting concessions from the separatists, who control the area. Negotiations in recent days produced a pledge from Boroday to turn over the plane's flight recorders, which were then given to Malaysian representatives at a pageant-filled ceremony.
Part of the issue with the crash-site negotiations, analysts say, is that there are several factions among the separatists, and even a good-faith effort by one group to cease fighting might not be honored by another.
There is also a strategic disincentive for separatists to halt fighting in the crash area, a swath of territory considered crucial because it links the group's western front with potential supply points in areas near the Russian border in the east.
Further muddying the waters is the fact that the line between areas considered inside and outside the crash zone is extremely thin; the central battleground of Donetsk, for instance, lies just a few miles from the western edge of the site, and shelling around the city may compromise the safety of investigators even if technically taking place outside it.
The site remains inaccessible to investigators 10 days after Flight 17 was shot down by a missile believed fired from separatist-controlled territory. Anecdotal reports have said that remains of some of those aboard and wreckage from the jetliner still sit at the site, though separatists have sifted through and carted off some of the material.
The Ukrainian government said it does not wish to conduct a more wholesale military operation at the crash site because doing so, though securing the area, would compromise much of the evidence any investigation would need to preserve.
"If you do that, all the traces will be disrupted," Ukraine Foreign Minister Pavlo Klimkin told CNN on Sunday when asked about a military intervention specifically aimed at securing the site.
Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times
Actor Seth Meyers and co-creator/writer/executive producer Michael Shoemaker appear on a Comic-Con International panel about Hulu's "The Awesomes." (Jerod Harris / Getty Images)
Seth Meyers has recruited some of his famous friends to guest star in the 10-episode second season of his Hulu original show "The Awesomes."
Amy Poehler, Maya Rudolph and Will Forte are taking on roles in the show about a group of subpar superheroes attempting to replace some more venerable counterparts (loosely based on DC's Justice League).
The trio joins a group of current and former "Saturday Night Live" actors who have enjoyed turns on the series, including Taran Killam, Bill Hader, Kenan Thompson, Cecily Strong, Bobby Moynihan, Rachel Dratch and Colin Quinn, who plays a highly intelligent but racist ape.
The casting news came at the "Awesomes" Comic-Con International panel Saturday, at which Meyers was joined on stage by his fellow writer/executive producer Mike Shoemaker; actor and Seth's brother Josh Meyers; head writer Dan Mintz, who also writes for the animated Fox show "Bob's Burgers"; and Killam.
PHOTOS FROM COMIC-CON: The scene | Cosplay
"The thing about 'Saturday Night Live' is you do it once and it's broadcast out there. The cool thing about animation is that we can do it five different ways, then trust these guys to choose the right one," said Killam, who plays Frantic on the show.
Playing Prock, the son of the legendary Mr. Awesome, Seth Meyers described how he was forced to sing in an episode, and although Prock's singing was meant to be off, the late-night host took it to a new level.
FULL COVERAGE: Comic-Con 2014
"My character was not supposed to be able to sing, but my bad singing was so bad that I would just look through the glass and see this," the actor said, miming the movement of an engineer taking off his headphones and looking at the people next to him in disapproval. "They'd look at me and say 'You want to try it one more time?' "
Meyers touched on his upcoming gig as host of the Primetime Emmy Awards, saying that he had shot some video segments for the televised ceremony — he did point out that the "Awesomes" would not be making an appearance. He went on to say that the subversive animated show had found a good home at Hulu.
"This show wouldn't have worked on a network — we don't have to chase ratings with this model," said Meyers.
– Jevon Phillips | @storiz | @LATHeroComplex
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"Saga," by Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples, has won Eisner, Harvey and Hugo awards. (Image Comics)
"Saga's" Alana and Marko, lovers from warring alien races, may always be on the run with their daughter, but the truly out-there science-fiction adventure was once again welcomed with open arms at the Eisner Awards.
Brian K. Vaughan's and Fiona Staples' Image Comics series continued to dominate in its second year as a contender, winning its second consecutive awards for continuing series and writer, and adding the painter prize for Staples.
Responsible for bringing the CBS show "Under the Dome" to television and also a former "Lost" producer in addition to his comics work, Vaughan told the crowd Friday night at the Hilton San Diego Bayfront's Indigo Ballroom, "People always ask, 'What have you learned working in film and television?' I guess I've learned that comics are not an equal medium — that we are a vastly superior medium."
Trying to be heard over thunderous applause, he added, "No offense to our sponsors." (The ceremony was presented by Showtime.)
The 26th Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards, presented along with the four-category Comic-Con International Awards, honored works that were unafraid to experiment, including writer Scott Snyder's and artist Sean Murphy's time-hopping, dolphin-featuring, ocean-monster mystery "The Wake" (DC/Vertigo), which won for limited series and penciller/inker, and an issue of an Avengers solo title told from the point of view of a pizza-loving dog.
"Hawkeye" No. 11. (Marvel)
Writer Matt Fraction, accepting the single issue (or one-shot) award for his and David Aja's "Pizza Is My Business" story from "Hawkeye" No. 11, thanked everyone at Marvel who didn't fire the team when they said, "The dog solves a crime." He also thanked his wife, fellow writer nominee Kelly Sue DeConnick ("Pretty Deadly," "Captain Marvel"), "who when we rescued a little mangy dog, decided it'd be OK if we kept it."
It was a big night for Fraction, who also accepted Aja's second consecutive cover-artist award for "Hawkeye" and shared the best new series prize for his and artist Chip Zdarsky's Image Comics sex-comedy-adventure series "Sex Criminals," about a couple whose orgasms literally stop time, a power they use to rob banks (for a good cause).
Fraction thanked "literally every retailer who was like, 'Yeah, "Sex Criminals" — we mean the good one.'" Zdarsky (the comics nom de plume of Canadian newspaper cartoonist/columnist Steve Murray) thanked "my mommy" for teaching him to draw, adding, with the sense of humor so evident in the acclaimed series, that she "said to me back then, 'you're going to draw so many dildos.'"
Though "Saga" and "Sex Criminals" totaled four wins for Image, which exclusively publishes creator-owned titles, the company that won the most Eisners was IDW, with six: Two for Darwyn Cooke's adaptation work on "Richard Stark's Parker: Slayground," and four for its archival work, including Dean Mullaney's three – the night's most for any individual – for his Library of American Comics imprint. IDW's Scott Dunbier extended his winning streak in the comic books archival collection/project category to five years with his editing work on "Will Eisner's The Spirit: Artist's Edition." Dunbier had three of the category's five nominations.
Noting that a Will Eisner book was winning an Eisner Award, Dunbier said, "What could be more appropriate?"
Dark Horse won four Eisners, including its fifth total and third straight anthology victory with "Dark Horse Presents," plus Aaron Conley's Comic-Con International Award for most promising newcomer for his work on "Sabertooth Swordsman." Fantagraphics claimed three awards, including one each for brothers Jaime Hernandez (writer/artist) and Gilbert Hernandez (short story), both for work in "Love and Rockets: New Stories" No. 6. The top two bestselling publishers, Marvel and DC, each won two awards — the two "Hawkeye" wins for the former, the two "The Wake" wins for the latter.
The ceremony featured two nods to early African American comics creators: "Black Comics: Politics of Race and Representation," edited by Sheena C. Howard and Ronald L. Jackson II, won for scholarly/academic work, and comics historian William Foster gave an emotional speech in accepting a Hall of Fame award on behalf of Orrin C. Evans, who in Philadelphia in 1947 self-published "All-Negro Comics" No. 1, considered "the first comic book produced by African Americans for African Americans," Foster said, adding that the 15-cent comic showed "a full range of characters" and was "a far cry from the overwhelming negative stereotypes that blacks in comics were mired in at that time."
Faith Erin Hicks' "The Adventures of Superhero Girl." (Dark Horse)
Foster wasn't the only one to be overwhelmed on the dais. Faith Erin Hicks, whose "The Adventures of Superhero Girl" won best publication for kids, choked back tears and said, "I'm sorry — comics are very difficult for me to make, and this is proof that the work that I do is good."
Jordie Bellaire won for perhaps the largest body of work – her coloring prize was for work on no less than 11 titles across seven publishers. Her partner, Declan Shalvey, accepted on her behalf, and in one of the show's lighter moments, noted that "Jordie is my collaborator on a few projects, and also in the bedroom."
Matthew Inman, who won the digital/Web comic statuette for "The Oatmeal," got one of the night's biggest laughs when he said, "I write jokes about bears that poop a lot, so it's really great to get an award for that."
"The Wake." (DC/Vertigo)
Tom Lennon ("Reno 911!") had some fun with Snyder, pointing out after the writer's "The Wake" acceptance speech thanking his wife – a doctor who the "Batman" writer asks about possible injuries to Bruce Wayne – that Snyder should ask him, because he's Batman's doctor (as seen in "The Dark Knight Rises.")
Snyder himself got some laughs, including by refusing to read his collaborator Murphy's text-messaged acceptance remarks: "I'm not going to say it because It's awful," the writer said, instead offering that Murphy is "one of the bravest, riskiest artists … one of the greatest world-builders, one of the most imaginative people out there."
The show had its more somber moments too.
Former Marvel editor in chief Marv Wolfman accepted one of Comic-Con's Bill Finger Excellence in Comics Writing awards – presented by Mark Evanier and, for the first time, Athena Finger – on behalf of Bill Mantlo. The writer, after co-creating characters including Rocket Raccoon and Cloak and Dagger, had segued into a career as a public defender before being permanently brain-damaged in 1992 when he was struck by a car while rollerblading; he lives under supervised care.
Wolfman said Mantlo "saved Marvel in the 1970s" with fill-in scripts done at a quick pace and high standard to avoid reprinting comics under new covers, and credited him with being unafraid to take on licensed comics of toy properties, turning "ROM: Space Knight" and "The Micronauts" into well-written hits.
The award, which recognizes under-appreciated writers, will be sent to Mantlo's brother.
A full list of Eisner Award and Comic-Con International Award winners is below. All the Eisner nominees are listed here.
EISNER AWARDS
Continuing series
"Saga," by Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples (Image)
"Sex Criminals." (Image Comics)
New series
"Sex Criminals," by Matt Fraction and Chip Zdarsky (Image)
Limited series
"The Wake," by Scott Snyder and Sean Murphy (Vertigo/DC)
Digital comic
"The Oatmeal" by Matthew Inman
Writer
Brian K. Vaughan, "Saga" (Image)
Writer-artist
Jaime Hernandez, "Love and Rockets New Stories" No. 6 (Fantagraphics)
Penciller/inker or penciller/inker team
Sean Murphy, "The Wake" (DC/Vertigo)
Cover artist
David Aja, "Hawkeye" (Marvel)
Painter/multimedia artist (interior art)
Fiona Staples, "Saga" (Image)
Coloring
Jordie Bellaire, "The Manhattan Projects," "Nowhere Men," "Pretty Deadly," "Zero" (Image); "The Massive" (Dark Horse); "Tom Strong" (DC); "X-Files Season 10″ (IDW); "Captain Marvel," "Journey Into Mystery" (Marvel); "Numbercruncher" (Titan); "Quantum and Woody" (Valiant)
Lettering
Darwyn Cooke, "Richard Stark's Parker: Slayground" (IDW)
Graphic album – new
"The Property," by Rutu Modan (Drawn & Quarterly)
Graphic album – reprint
"RASL," by Jeff Smith (Cartoon Books)
Single issue (or one-shot)
"Hawkeye" No. 11: "Pizza Is My Business," by Matt Fraction and David Aja (Marvel)
Anthology
"Dark Horse Presents," edited by Mike Richardson (Dark Horse)
A page from "Vader's Little Princess." (Jeffrey Brown / Chronicle Books)
Humor publication
"Vader's Little Princess," by Jeffrey Brown (Chronicle)
Reality-based work
"The Fifth Beatle: The Brian Epstein Story," by Vivek J. Tiwary, Andrew C. Robinson, and Kyle Baker (M Press/Dark Horse)
Short story
"Untitled," by Gilbert Hernandez, in "Love and Rockets: New Stories" No. 6 (Fantagraphics)
U.S. edition of international material
"… This War!" by Jacques Tardi and Jean-Pierre Verney (Fantagraphics)
U.S. edition of international material – Asia
"The Mysterious Underground Men," by Osamu Tezuka (PictureBox)
Adaptation from another medium
"Richard Stark's Parker: Slayground," by Donald Westlake, adapted by Darwyn Cooke (IDW)
Archival collection/project – comic books
"Will Eisner's The Spirit Artist's Edition," edited by Scott Dunbier (IDW)
Archival collection/project – comic strips
"Tarzan: The Complete Russ Manning Newspaper Strips, Vol. 1," edited by Dean Mullaney (LOAC/IDW)
"Battling Boy," by Paul Pope. (First Second Books)
Publication for teens
"Battling Boy," by Paul Pope (First Second)
Publication for kids
"The Adventures of Superhero Girl," by Faith Erin Hicks (Dark Horse)
Publication for early readers
"Itsy Bitsy Hellboy," by Art Baltazar and Franco (Dark Horse)
Publication design
"Genius, Illustrated: The Life and Art of Alex Toth," designed by Dean Mullaney (LOAC/IDW)
Comics-related journalism
Comic Book Resources, produced by Jonah Weiland
Scholarly/academic work
"Black Comics: Politics of Race and Representation," edited by Sheena C. Howard and Ronald L. Jackson II (Bloomsbury)
Comics-related book
"Genius, Illustrated: The Life and Art of Alex Toth," by Dean Mullaney and Bruce Canwell (LOAC/IDW)
COMIC-CON INTERNATIONAL AWARDS
Bill Finger Excellence in Comics Writing Award
Robert Kanigher; Bill Mantlo; Jack Mendelsohn
Bob Clampett Humanitarian Award
Joe Field
Will Eisner Spirit of Comics Retailer Award
All-Star Comics of Melbourne, Australia; Legends Comics and Coffee of Omaha, Neb.
Russ Manning Most Promising Newcomer Award
Aaron Conley
– Blake Hennon | Google+ | @LATHeroComplex
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Todd Martens
'Hey," the kid said. "I can get you out of jail." I politely said no. Standing in lockup, after all, was a rare photo opportunity. The kid shrugged and walked off, and there I stood alone in my cell, Big Thunder Mountain Railroad in front of me, the Mark Twain Riverboat docked to my left.
Todd Martens
'Hey," the kid said. "I can get you out of jail." I politely said no. Standing in lockup, after all, was a rare photo opportunity. The kid shrugged and walked off, and there I stood alone in my cell, Big Thunder Mountain Railroad in front of me, the Mark Twain Riverboat docked to my left.
Re-creating characters for a niche audience is always a slippery slope, and doing it for a cadre of collecting superfans is an even more daunting endeavor. But for 20 years, Sideshow Collectibles has been making detailed, scaled-down versions of monsters, heroes, comic book characters, movie icons, television legends and original creations.
Located in Thousand Oaks, Sideshow sells sculptures – some of them are poseable figures but most are not – to discerning collectors through its website, through comic book and collectible stores, and through conventions like San Diego's Comic-Con International. The pieces are made by committees of conceptual artists, sculptors, painters and more, and are not particularly mass-produced, averaging about 200 per order, so that they are coveted pieces of art.
FULL COVERAGE: Comic-Con 2014
"We produce everything from 12-inch figures, retailing at $125, through to life-size figures, which retail for $5,000 to $7,000. The costs depend on size, materials, character/license, electronics, specialty accessories, etc. Our average sale is $300," says Greg Anzalone, president of Sideshow. "From the stunning Legacy Effects' Alien Queen bust, recast from the original molds by the actual project artist, to replicas of the Battle Damaged Predator's Mask, taken from the original KNB EFX archive master, our unique collaborations allow collectors to own a piece of Hollywood film history created in part by the original artists and effects houses that worked on them."
Sideshow began as a production company offshoot in 1994 that was commissioned by set and creature designers to create scale models for use in filming and conceptual work for movies and television projects. Starting off as a group of five people working out of a pool house/garage in Woodland Hills, many of the people now at Sideshow also worked with the greats like Stan Winston, Rick Baker and more. Guillermo del Toro is such a fan of the company and the product that he wrote the foreword for "Capturing Archetypes: Twenty Years of Sideshow Collectibles Art," a book of detailed images of many of the company's creations.
A Han Solo in Carbonite. The life-size figure is part of a giveaway at the Sideshow Collectibles booth. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)
"We were a motley mix of sculptors, a painter, a designer and a smart guy great with numbers. To pay the bills we took on sculpture work for commercials, video games and special effects in films before CGI. However, in the evenings we worked creating model kits, busts and figures for others like ourselves who wanted to capture moments from films that inspired them," says Robin Selvaggi, vice president of e-commerce.
The Sideshow booth at Comic-Con is usually one of the busiest at the event. The group spends months planning the booth — from the architecture and layout of the area to which figures to bring or unveil. It's not only a physical undertaking, but also a virtual one.
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"In addition, we have an online Comic-Con event that runs simultaneously to the physical show so that the hundreds of thousands of people from around the world that cannot attend the show can still experience it from home through our site. Our interactive designers work on virtual booth tours, videos and live feeds for our audience at home. It takes an incredible amount of time when you consider we do not really sell any product on the show floor. Our SDCC appearance is focused on connecting to the collectors, where we not only share our products with them but they share their experiences with us. Sideshow staffers also take the opportunity to meet with new sculptors, emerging comic book artists and writers, our licensors, distribution partners, and our friends in film at the show," says Anzalone.
The lobby at Sideshow Collectibles' Thousand Oaks' headquarters. (Sideshow Collectibles)
The company has created products for "Star Wars," Marvel, DC Comics, Disney, "Terminator," "The Lord of the Rings," G.I. Joe, "Avatar," Halo and many more. No longer operating out of a pool house, it has a 40,000-square foot facility housing dozens of artists. The figures themselves are strikingly intricate, and often incorporate specific identifying movements or poses. Finding that right look is as much a creative endeavor as creating the figure.
"The key is generally a pose and composition that helps to communicate an action or attitude that the final piece is looking to convey. We are generally trying to tell a story in a single static piece, and so the correct pose is essential," says Jason Eastman, vice president of design and development.
PHOTOS: Comic-Con 2014 | The scene
"While we definitely look for iconic moments, the challenge is to find a design that also works as a three-dimensional piece. We try to strike the balance of evoking that scene while delivering the narrative in a single pose. It is similar to trying to encapsulate an entire film in a single movie poster image."
With the breadth of characters they've covered, and projects like a life-sized Darth Vader in the planning stages, the company is now branching out to original character creations with its "Court of the Dead" line. The story line behind the series: "'Court of the Dead' is about a war between heaven and hell with the underworld stuck in the middle. The leader of the underworld, Death, has assembled his own army with the goal of defending mankind and ending the war," says art director Dave Igo.
Comic-Con attendees' faces are reflected in a glass case holding a Superman figure. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)
There have been some characters released from the line, with many more planned, but the draw to the booth and the company for now is their renditions of established characters like Superman. Patrons and passersby at the booth all have their favorites, but the creators are fans, too, and came together to discuss a general favorite in sifting through thousands of their creations.
"Our collective creative team is proud of the results of our original Dr. Doom premium format figure. This figure was also met with tremendous fan appreciation. It was one of our first opportunities that we had the privilege of re-imagining such an iconic character while staying true to what fans have grown to love about Dr. Doom. All the key character features are still there, but our interpretation of him created a great presence and attitude through pose and composition, a new costume look, and a detailed throne setting," says Igo.
Though Weta Digital, the New Zealand-based production company associated with Peter Jackson and the "Lord of the Rings" franchise, also has a Comic-Con booth with similar offerings, a world-conquering genius would seem to be a good fit given Sideshow's place in the industry.
– Jevon Phillips | @storiz | | @LATHeroComplex
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Noah
Paramount, $29.98; Blu-ray, $39.99
Available on VOD Tuesday.
Director Darren Aronofsky's version of the biblical story generated controversy this year, with faith-based audiences complaining that "Noah" isn't true enough to Scripture and action-fantasy audiences complaining that there's too much in the movie about God. Nevertheless, "Noah" did well worldwide because, like Aronofsky's last surprise hit, "Black Swan," his "Noah" is both an awesome spectacle — with Russell Crowe playing a man who risks his sanity and his family to build an enormous boat, with the help of giant creatures made of rock — and a personal meditation on where the line is between devout faith and madness. This isn't one of Aronofsky's most focused or visionary films, but it's an undeniably lively piece of work. The DVD and Blu-ray add behind-the-scenes featurettes.
The Other Woman
20th Century Fox, $29.98; Blu-ray, $39.99
It's easy to want to like this because it's the rare Hollywood adult comedy that's written by a woman and led by a female cast — with Leslie Mann, Cameron Diaz and Kate Upton playing ladies who become good friends after they realize that they're all with the same lousy man. But the PG-13 rating sandbags the cast, preventing them from being as frank and funny as they could be; and as the characters move toward a "9 to 5"-style revenge plot, the film becomes less about sisterhood and more about slapstick. The women cease to be complex individuals and instead just do whatever's convenient for the story. "The Other Woman" DVD and Blu-ray tack on deleted scenes and self-congratulatory outtakes of the actresses cracking one another up.
Finding Vivian Maier
MPI/Sundance, $24.98
Vivian Maier worked as a nanny in the Chicago area for years and left behind hundreds of thousands of artful photographs of ordinary people when she died. The photos were found by chance and have been auctioned off to people like John Maloof, who along with filmmaker Charlie Siskel made this fascinating documentary, which looks into the mystery of who Maier was. Her story is remarkable: She's a woman who knew a lot of people but didn't really let anyone get to know her. Art historians have used her pictures to help piece her life together and as a record of life on the streets of Chicago in the mid-20th century. Each intact roll of Maier's film is like a miniature portrait of how one feisty, independent woman spent her days.
Herzog: The Collection
Shout! Factory Blu-ray, $159.99
One of the most impressive Blu-ray sets of the year, Shout! Factory's limited-edition set contains 16 of German New Wave stalwart Werner Herzog's best films, including classics like "Aguirre, the Wrath Of God," "The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser" and "Fitzcarraldo," joined by commentary tracks, interviews and documentaries. It's a deep dive into the life's work of a filmmaker drawn to larger-than-life characters — explorers, industrialists, outsiders — who then re-creates the circumstances of their stories so realistically that his feature films have the quality of documentaries, while his documentaries often feel like fantasy. The films here are among the best and most significant of the 1970s and 1980s.
And…
The Big Chill
Criterion Blu-ray, $39.95
Cuban Fury
Koch/E1, $24.98; Blu-ray, $29.98
Curtains
Synapse, $19.95; Blu-ray, $24.95
On My Way
Cohen, $24.98; Blu-ray, $34.98
Twin Peaks: The Entire Mystery
Paramount Blu-ray, $129.99
calendar@latimes.com
Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times"American Vampire: Second Cycle" writer Scott Snyder told the "Vertigo: Defy Conventions" audience at Comic-Con on Thursday evening that one of the joys of his and artist Rafael Albuquerque's series is "we're able to explore different moments in American history and … talk about American culture and why things are monstrous or heroic at different moments."
Coming up: a space race tale that involves — naturally — astronaut chimps who become vampires. That arrives in No. 6, but before that readers will get a look at the background of the deadly enemy known as the Gray Trader in a tale set during the Gold Rush.
It's all part of giving the series' second half the "biggest, craziest war we can create between different species of vampires, different species of monsters — you're going to see everything from mummies, werewolves, demons, everything all together in this big crescendo," the writer said.
Another ambitious Vertigo project from the writer, "The Wake," with artist Sean Murphy, finishes its 10-issue run next week. But is it the end? Snyder joked to editor Shelly Bond that he'd soon be pitching a spinoff series starring "Wake's" dolphin and robotic parrot.
"Fables" No. 142. (Vertigo / DC Entertainment)
The long-running, acclaimed fantasy series "Fables" is also closing in on its end, set for the 150th issue. Bond said the two words she'd use to describe what writer Bill Willingham (not present) has coming up are "body bags." Its longtime principal artist, Mark Buckingham (present), said his two would be "nervous breakdown."
The as-it-turns-out-not-so-late Bigby Wolf is back and dangerous, and Buckingham said the final story arc concentrates on the two key relationships of Snow White and husband Bigby, and Snow and sister Rose.
Bond said that on conference calls with the creative team Buckingham often politely disagrees with the upcoming deaths Willingham has plotted.
Buckingham is also writing an arc of sister series "Fairest" that focuses on the Farm, where Fables who can't pass as human are housed, not always to their liking. It picks up on dissatisfaction that the Farm denizens have over never getting Prince Charming's campaign promise of glamour to let them appear human and leave the Farm. It stars Reynard the Fox, and is a chance to explore characters including the Sunflower Kid and a detective duo of Sgt. Wilfred and Clara the Raven.
"I must admit the other reason in the great scheme of things why I was quite happy that this happened now at this final moment in 'Fairest,'" Buckingham said, "is because, knowing how Bill is and how he was slowly working his way through the population of Fabletown with a big cleaver, I felt, well, if I take over the Farm and I write it, he can't kill them all."
Until No. 150, Bond pointed out.
"I might kill Willingham in 149," Buckingham replied.
Vertigo, DC's mature-readers imprint, also offered details on other ongoing and upcoming series.
"FBP: Federal Bureau of Physics" is in an arc set in a different reality in a small Alaska town, writer Simon Oliver said. Nos. 14 and 15 look at how Cicero became part of the FBP and shows the agency's academy. It also details why the long missing and much sought Professor Hardy is important not just to his son Adam, the book's main character, but to Cicero too.
Editor Will Dennis said "The Names," coming in October from writer Peter Milligan and artist Leo Fernandez, will run eight or nine issues and is a thriller in which a woman seeking revenge for the death of her husband attempts to figure out the cabal controlling the financial world.
"The Kitchen," from writer Ollie Masters and artist Ming Doyle (with Jordie Bellaire on colors and Becky Cloonan on covers), is set in the 1970s in New York City's Hell's Kitchen neighborhood and is about the wives of Irish gangsters, Dennis said. When their husbands go to prison, the women take over the rackets. And when their husbands are released, they may not be willing to give them back. The first issue arrives in November.
A look at "Bodies." (Vertigo / DC Entertainment)
Bond described "Bodies," which debuts next week, as "four eras, one body." The story of a time-traveling serial killer is written by Si Spurrier is set in 1890, 1940, 2014 and 2050, with detectives in each era dealing with the same body turning up on the same London street. Artist Tula Lotay said she based a "scatty but kick-ass" amnesiac female character on actress Janet Munro's "sassy" style. The book's colors are by Lee Loughridge, who is taking care to differentiate the periods, Bond said. Each issue has a different cover artist, including Paul Pope, Francesco Francavilla and David Finch.
Lee Bermejo said his "Suiciders," due out next year, is in the '80s science-fiction mold of "Escape From New York" and the Mad Max movies. Set in Southern California 30 years after a cataclysmic earthquake, it follows one person from the walled citadel of New Angeles and another from the stuck-on-the-outside Lost Angeles. In the more desirable area, the big sport is a gladitorial game that is "UFC mixed with the Danger Room from the X-Men," Bermejo said.
Comic-Con, with an estimated crowd of 130,000, continues through Sunday at the San Diego Convention Center.
– Blake Hennon | Google+ | @LATHeroComplex
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George R.R. Martin. (HBO)
His name may be mostly associated with fantasy these days, thanks to HBO's "Game of Thrones," but George R.R. Martin and comic books go way back. Way, way back.
"I'm actually the first comic book fan," Martin told the crowd at a Comic-Con panel dedicated to his comic book work on Thursday.
As a young comic fan in 1964, Martin attended the first comic book convention ever held in New York City, attended by what he remembers as 30 people. He met Flo Steinberg and Steve Ditko there, but more importantly, he said, he was first in line and received a badge designated "#1."
"All of you are my children," the author told the crowd. "God help me."
George R.R. Martin's 1989 novella "Skin Trade" has been adapted into a comic book by Avatar Press.
While the discussion never strayed into the current status of "The Winds of Winter," the highly anticipated sixth book in the "Song of Ice and Fire" series, Martin did reveal that he's always been tardy when it comes to handing in his stories.
In fact, back when he was a mid-level writer in the late 1980s, he blew the deadline to get his novella "Skin Trade" finished for the anthology "Night Visions," which was also scheduled to include new work by Stephen King.
"I blow deadlines all the time," Martin said. "It's nothing new."
Martin was there to discuss "Skin Trade" and a second novella, "In the House of the Worm," which have both been adapted into comics by Avatar Press.
"Skin Trade" was described by Martin as being about a "detective werewolf in a decaying Midwestern city." "Worm" was heavily influenced by Jack Vance's "Dying Earth" stories and is set in a "far, far future" where the last remnants of humanity have retreated into a vast underground bunker.
The author is currently a worldwide celebrity, but he didn't spend a lot of time talking about his present career during his panel appearance. Instead, he reminisced about his early fandom and lamented the fact that he couldn't walk the convention floor of Comic-Con anymore without security.
"I don't want to complain about that," he was quick to add. "Most writers would give their left leg to have that."
And Martin himself was no doubt one of those writers at one time. In fact, while reminiscing about "Skin Trade" he recalled his decade working as a TV writer in Hollywood, from 1985 to 1995, when he worked on "The Twilight Zone," "Beauty and the Beast" and several shows in development. But he always remembered how he thought he had it made in the late '70s and early '80s, when he was a hot, young writer winning awards. Then his second novel, "The Armageddon Rag" sold extremely poorly, and suddenly, his literary career was over.
"You'll be the cutting edge and suddenly you'll be yesterday's news," he said.
– Patrick Kevin Day | @LATHeroComplex
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Pope Francis will make his first visit to the U.S. as pontiff next year, attending a conference in Philadelphia, according to the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops.
The pope is to visit Philadelphia in September 2015 for the World Meeting of Families, an event aimed at strengthening families, according to Sister Mary Ann Walsh, a spokeswoman for the Conference of Catholic Bishops.
The Catholic News Service first reported that Philadelphia Archbishop Charles J. Chaput said on Thursday that the pope had accepted an invitation to the meeting.
However, as of Friday morning, the Archdiocese of Philadelphia refused to confirm the visit. A papal visit to Philadelphia has been widely anticipated for some time.
It's not clear yet whether the pope will visit additional cities in the U.S., Walsh said.
Francis' visit would mark the first papal trip to the U.S. since Pope Benedict's 2008 meeting President George W. Bush in Washington. Benedict also visited New York during that trip.
Contact Matt at matt.hansen2@latimes.com or @mtthnsn
Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles TimesJuly 25, 9:26 a.m.: This post has been updated with a statement from the Archdiocese of Philadelphia and information from other reports.
This post was originally published at 8:33 a.m.
Pope Francis will make his first visit to the U.S. as pontiff next year, attending a conference in Philadelphia, according to the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops.
The pope is to visit Philadelphia in September 2015 for the World Meeting of Families, an event aimed at strengthening families, according to Sister Mary Ann Walsh, a spokeswoman for the Conference of Catholic Bishops.
The Catholic News Service first reported that Philadelphia Archbishop Charles J. Chaput said on Thursday that the pope had accepted an invitation to the meeting.
However, as of Friday morning, the Archdiocese of Philadelphia refused to confirm the visit. A papal visit to Philadelphia has been widely anticipated for some time.
It's not clear yet whether the pope will visit additional cities in the U.S., Walsh said.
Francis' visit would mark the first papal trip to the U.S. since Pope Benedict's 2008 meeting President George W. Bush in Washington. Benedict also visited New York during that trip.
Contact Matt at matt.hansen2@latimes.com or @mtthnsn
Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles TimesJuly 25, 9:26 a.m.: This post has been updated with a statement from the Archdiocese of Philadelphia and information from other reports.
This post was originally published at 8:33 a.m.
Talks were scheduled to continue Friday between the U.S. Olympic Committee and a Los Angeles contingent hoping to bring the 2024 Summer Games back to the city for a third time.
Mayor Eric Garcetti traveled to USOC headquarters in Colorado Springs, Colo., on Thursday for what was billed as a low-key, informational session. He was accompanied by other city officials and influential businessman Casey Wasserman, sources close to the meeting said.
The USOC has tried to keep the early stages of its bidding process informal to keep a lid on costs for the candidates.
The current round of meetings will include the three other short-listed cities -- Boston, San Francisco and Washington.
Los Angeles previously hosted the Games in 1932 and 1984.
The USOC has yet to decide whether it will present a formal American bid for 2024. The International Olympic Committee will not select a host city until 2017.
Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles TimesWith his victory in the British Open last week, Rory McIlroy needs only a Masters win to complete a career Grand Slam.
And he might turn to an amateur golfer for help in that quest.
Jeff Knox is regarded as the best player among Augusta National's membership and sometimes fills in during the tournament when an odd number of professionals make the cut. This year, he ended up playing with McIlroy during the third round.
He finished with a score 70 that day. McIlroy came in at 71,
"He's the best I've ever seen on Augusta's greens," McIlroy said this week.
The golfer from Northern Ireland was so impressed that, according to the Augusta Chronicle, he sent a letter to Knox after the tournament, suggesting they get together at Augusta a few times before the 2015 Masters.
"It's just taken me a few years to figure out the greens and figure out where you need to miss it and some different little shots that you might need that week," McIlroy said.
Talking about Knox after the British Open, McIlory reiterated that "I might have to take a couple of trips up before it next year and have a couple of practice rounds with him."
Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles TimesWith his victory in the British Open last week, Rory McIlroy needs only a Masters win to complete a career Grand Slam.
And he might turn to an amateur golfer for help in that quest.
Jeff Knox is regarded as the best player among Augusta National's membership and sometimes fills in during the tournament when an odd number of professionals make the cut. This year, he ended up playing with McIlroy during the third round.
He finished with a score 70 that day. McIlroy came in at 71,
"He's the best I've ever seen on Augusta's greens," McIlroy said this week.
The golfer from Northern Ireland was so impressed that, according to the Augusta Chronicle, he sent a letter to Knox after the tournament, suggesting they get together at Augusta a few times before the 2015 Masters.
"It's just taken me a few years to figure out the greens and figure out where you need to miss it and some different little shots that you might need that week," McIlroy said.
Talking about Knox after the British Open, McIlory reiterated that "I might have to take a couple of trips up before it next year and have a couple of practice rounds with him."
Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles TimesWith his victory in the British Open last week, Rory McIlroy needs only a Masters win to complete a career Grand Slam.
And he might turn to an amateur golfer for help in that quest.
Jeff Knox is regarded as the best player among Augusta National's membership and sometimes fills in during the tournament when an odd number of professionals make the cut. This year, he ended up playing with McIlroy during the third round.
He finished with a score 70 that day. McIlroy came in at 71,
"He's the best I've ever seen on Augusta's greens," McIlroy said this week.
The golfer from Northern Ireland was so impressed that, according to the Augusta Chronicle, he sent a letter to Knox after the tournament, suggesting they get together at Augusta a few times before the 2015 Masters.
"It's just taken me a few years to figure out the greens and figure out where you need to miss it and some different little shots that you might need that week," McIlroy said.
Talking about Knox after the British Open, McIlory reiterated that "I might have to take a couple of trips up before it next year and have a couple of practice rounds with him."
Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles TimesUkrainian Prime Minister Arseny Yatsenyuk abruptly resigned Thursday afternoon as Kiev's ruling parliamentary coalition fell apart.
In a brief statement, Yatsenyuk told Parliament, "I announce my resignation in connection with the collapse of the coalition and the blocking of government initiatives."
He criticized lawmakers for gridlock that he said had interfered with the body's ability to pass measures on issues such as energy and military financing.
The resignation came on the heels of news that Ukraine's governing European Choice coalition had collapsed as several parties withdrew from the government. Among the parties pulling out were Udar, the pro-European party of former boxer and current Kiev Mayor Vitali Klitschko; nationalist party Svoboda; and Fatherland, the party of Orange Revolution leader and failed 2014 presidential candidate Yulia Tymoshenko.
Under Ukrainian law, President Petro Poroshenko will now have the right to set new parliamentary elections. Those elections already had been expected to be held earlier than a scheduled 2017 date, but the collapse of the coalition will further hasten voting.
The events took some observers here by surprise. There was little overt indication of fundamental discord in recent weeks, particularly in the last week as the government dealt with the geopolitical and logistical fallout from the crash of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 and as it continues to battle pro-Russia separatists in the east.
Yatsenyuk was one of several government ministers front and center in these crises, giving an impassioned news conference Monday in which he called Russia a country "on the dark side."
Considered a rising star in Ukrainian politics, Yatsenyuk, 40, served as economic and foreign minister in previous regimes. His stock surged after the exit of pro-Russia president Viktor Yanukovich earlier this year. Yatsenyuk met with President Obama in a high-profile White House visit during the Crimea crisis in March.
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Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles TimesNew home sales plunged in June after two months of gains.
Sales of recently built single-family homes dropped 8.1% from May to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 406,000, the Commerce Department said Thursday. Sales for May and April were revised downward.
"This was a dismal report," IHS Global Insight economist Stephanie Karol wrote in an analysis. "Sales dropped throughout the country."
The Northeast saw the largest decline, as sales fell 20% from May. The West, a major home building region, posted the smallest drop: 2%.
Economists had expected sales to fall last month after a sharp increase in May. However, June's numbers were worse than expected.
One reason for the drop could be that recent construction is "poorly located" and more previously owned homes have come up for sale, Karol said.
"When choosing between a new house in the middle of nowhere and an existing home in a better location, buyers are likely to choose the latter," she said.
The new home report, however, follows signs that the housing market is heating up after starting to cool last summer amid higher prices and mortgage rates.
Sales of previously owned homes, the largest portion of the market, reached their highest level since October last month, the National Assn. of Realtors said earlier this week.
"New home sales were weak in June ... But the recent softness is at odds with other data," Gus Faucher, senior economist at PNC Financial Services Group, said in a statement. "The housing market is gradually getting better."
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Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles TimesIt's strange but true: "Weird Al" Yankovic, the pop-song parodist who seemed to peak in popularity in the mid 1980s, finally scored his first No. 1 album this week.
"Mandatory Fun," Yankovic's 14th studio disc, topped the Billboard 200 chart Wednesday with sales of 104,000 copies in the week that ended July 20, according to Nielsen SoundScan.
"If you'd told me 30 years ago this would happen, I never would've believed it," the singer wrote early Wednesday on Twitter. "If you'd told me 2 WEEKS ago, I never would've believed it."
As Billboard's Keith Caulfield points out, "Mandatory Fun" is the first comedy album to hit No. 1 on the tally since 1963, when Allan Sherman's "My Son, the Nut" -- made famous by "Hello Muddah, Hello Fadduh! (A Letter from Camp)" -- spent eight weeks there.
With parodies of well known tunes by Lorde, Pharrell Williams and Robin Thicke, among others, Yankovic's album arrived accompanied by a series of music videos that earned widespread attention on the Internet last week. The clip for "Word Crimes" -- a grammar-inspired redo of Thicke's "Blurred Lines" -- has been viewed over 10 million times on YouTube.
Behind "Mandatory Fun," Jason Mraz entered the Billboard 200 at No. 2 with his latest set of mellow folk-pop ditties, "Yes!," followed by the Chicago punk band Rise Against at No. 3 and "Kidz Bop 26" at No. 4.
Twitter: @mikaelwood
Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles TimesSuper Bowl-winning coach Tony Dungy elaborated Wednesday on his controversial comments regarding the St. Louis Rams' Michael Sam, the NFL's first openly gay player.
Dungy, now an NBC analyst, spoke at length about the Sam situation on "The Dan Patrick Show," a day after issuing a statement to clarify his comments about Sam in the aftermath of the NFL draft. Those comments were to the Tampa Tribune for an article published Sunday.
Dungy told the newspaper: "I wouldn't have taken him. Not because I don't believe Michael Sam should have a chance to play, but I wouldn't want to deal with all of it.
"It's not going to be totally smooth ... things will happen."
On Wednesday, Dungy said he made the comments shortly after he learned Sam was planning to be the focus of a reality TV series that chronicled his experiences.
"I think the actual first quotes were from an interview with a gentleman at the Tampa Tribune [columnist Ira Kaufman] right after the draft," Dungy said on Patrick's show, according to ProFootballTalk.com. "We were talking about draft and distractions and it was when the Oprah Winfrey show was talking about doing a reality show on Michael Sam and that's when the discussion came out about distractions as related to draft choices. ... We were talking about the show, and I think that was something people didn't anticipate. And those things were going to happen and are going to happen, and that's what I was discussing and what we're talking about."
Dungy made a comparison between the Sam situation and that of San Francisco's Jonathan Martin, the former Miami Dolphins tackle who walked away from that team after being bullied by fellow linemen.
"I talked to some general managers," he said, "and they said that Jonathan definitely has the talent to play in the league, but would they want the distraction of everybody's following the story, and people asking their players over and over, 'How are things are going?', 'What's going on with Jonathan?', 'Who's saying what to him?' And because of the fact that they didn't view him as a difference maker, they probably wouldn't want the distractions. And I guess that's my point in the whole thing. If we substitute Jonathan Martin for Michael Sam and have the same quotes and the same comments, nobody's gonna replay those quotes two months and three months later, and try to say that there's any more to it than what was actually said."
Meanwhile, on ESPN's "Mike & Mike," Rams Coach Jeff Fisher disputed the notion that Sam was a distraction.
"Let's define distraction," Fisher said. "There were a couple extra cameras during the early OTAs, there may have been an extra camera yesterday as the rookies reported and went on the field for the first time, but no, it's not."
Calling Sam "a very passionate athlete" who is "very focused on trying to make this football team," Fisher said the Rams want to give him "every opportunity" to make the roster.
Speaking to reporters at St. Louis' training camp on Tuesday, Sam said he still respects Dungy and that everybody is entitled to their own opinion.
But Sam added of Dungy: "Thank God he wasn't the St. Louis Rams coach."
Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles TimesSuper Bowl-winning coach Tony Dungy elaborated Wednesday on his controversial comments regarding the St. Louis Rams' Michael Sam, the NFL's first openly gay player.
Dungy, now an NBC analyst, spoke at length about the Sam situation on "The Dan Patrick Show," a day after issuing a statement to clarify his comments about Sam in the aftermath of the NFL draft. Those comments were to the Tampa Tribune for an article published Sunday.
Dungy told the newspaper: "I wouldn't have taken him. Not because I don't believe Michael Sam should have a chance to play, but I wouldn't want to deal with all of it.
"It's not going to be totally smooth ... things will happen."
On Wednesday, Dungy said he made the comments shortly after he learned Sam was planning to be the focus of a reality TV series that chronicled his experiences.
"I think the actual first quotes were from an interview with a gentleman at the Tampa Tribune [columnist Ira Kaufman] right after the draft," Dungy said on Patrick's show, according to ProFootballTalk.com. "We were talking about draft and distractions and it was when the Oprah Winfrey show was talking about doing a reality show on Michael Sam and that's when the discussion came out about distractions as related to draft choices. ... We were talking about the show, and I think that was something people didn't anticipate. And those things were going to happen and are going to happen, and that's what I was discussing and what we're talking about."
Dungy made a comparison between the Sam situation and that of San Francisco's Jonathan Martin, the former Miami Dolphins tackle who walked away from that team after being bullied by fellow linemen.
"I talked to some general managers," he said, "and they said that Jonathan definitely has the talent to play in the league, but would they want the distraction of everybody's following the story, and people asking their players over and over, 'How are things are going?', 'What's going on with Jonathan?', 'Who's saying what to him?' And because of the fact that they didn't view him as a difference maker, they probably wouldn't want the distractions. And I guess that's my point in the whole thing. If we substitute Jonathan Martin for Michael Sam and have the same quotes and the same comments, nobody's gonna replay those quotes two months and three months later, and try to say that there's any more to it than what was actually said."
Meanwhile, on ESPN's "Mike & Mike," Rams Coach Jeff Fisher disputed the notion that Sam was a distraction.
"Let's define distraction," Fisher said. "There were a couple extra cameras during the early OTAs, there may have been an extra camera yesterday as the rookies reported and went on the field for the first time, but no, it's not."
Calling Sam "a very passionate athlete" who is "very focused on trying to make this football team," Fisher said the Rams want to give him "every opportunity" to make the roster.
Speaking to reporters at St. Louis' training camp on Tuesday, Sam said he still respects Dungy and that everybody is entitled to their own opinion.
But Sam added of Dungy: "Thank God he wasn't the St. Louis Rams coach."
Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times
