Matt Groening is launching a comics publishing company called Bapper Books that will put out a Disenchantment: Untold Tales, a collection of stories based on the show Disenchantment. Groening’s Bongo Comics closed earlier this year after 26 years.
Despite every headline you’ll see, Mad Magazine is not shutting down. Instead, Issue #9 will be the last on newsstands with issue #10 available from comic book retailers and subscriptions. Future Mad magazines will feature reprinted classic MAD pieces with the only new content coming in its end-of-year specials and occasional one-off features.
The Walking Dead comic surprise twist is the comic is done with issue 193. “The Walking Dead has always been built on surprise. Not knowing what’s going to happen when you turn the page, who’s going to die, how they’re going to die… it’s been essential to the success of this series. It’s been the lifeblood that’s been keeping it going all these years, keeping people engaged. It just felt wrong and against the very nature of this series not to make the actual end as surprising as all the big deaths.”
The Hollywood Reporter says a TV series based on Neil Gaiman’s Sandman comic will be produced by Warner Brothers Television for Netflix. It’s reportedly the most expensive TV series DC Entertainment has done. Allan Heinberg (Wonder Woman, ABC’s The Catch, Grey’s Anatomy) is set to write and serve as showrunner. Gaiman will be one of the EPs.
Lego-owner Kirkbi Invest is teaming up with Blackstone and the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board to buy Merlin Entertainment, which operates the Legoland theme parks, as well as Madame Tussauds wax museums. Lego opened the first park in 1968 in western Denmark and then sold its parks to Merlin in 2005.
According to NPR, Connie Monsees told ABC News Start Here podcast about how Google Maps navigated about 100 drivers into a muddy dirt road. Monsees was stuck in traffic on the way to the Denver airport. Monsees followed Google Maps advice to exit to get around the backup and ended up on a dirt road which recent rains had turned into mud causing many of the cars to get stuck. Monsees had a four-wheel drive and was able to take two other people whose car was stuck with her. Google said the road was not marked private and while it does account for road size, “issues can arise due to unforeseen circumstances, such as when weather conditions affect the quality of roads.
Ford and VW expand their alliance to work on electric and Autonomous Vehicles, YouTube launches new tools for creators to monetize live streams, and Microsoft releases Microsoft Teams user numbers.
Amazon plans on retraining 100,000 US employees by 2025, France approves a 3% tax on digital companies making 750 million euros of revenue, and Toronto’s Sidewalk Labs project press release gets Twitter Bot’ed.
In this episode, we discuss: