We're back, safe and sound after the big, bad Y2K rollover.

Hollywood and the rest of the world are still intact, which means we

have lots of news for you. First up we have a clarification of last

week's Tick story, straight from the production office. We've got a

field report from our pal Andy Mangels on the Faust movie. Lot's of

X-Men rumors, as usual. Ben Affleck talks about Batman. Kevin Smith

talks about Daredevil. There's much, much more so, read on.

THE TICK TV SHOW

It appears that last week's report regarding alleged problems with the

scripting of the live-action TV version of The Tick was off-base.

Comics 2 Film spoke with a source at Sonnenfeld/Josephson who told us

that the picture painted by the recent NY Post article was "completely

wrong."

The article stated that the Tick creator Ben Edlund and his co-writers

were struggling with how to scale down the outrageous comic/cartoon

concepts for live-action TV series. Our source corrected this saying

that there are no co-writers, Edlund is developing the pilot script on

his own and "he's not struggling."

FAUST

Longtime genre movie journalist Andy Mangels sent us an update on the

upcoming movie based on David Quinn and Tim Vigil's Faust. Here's what

Mangels had to share about the project:

"The Faust movie is nearing completion of filming. I talked to Jeffrey

Combs (for an article in the February British Star Trek Monthly

magazine) about it a few weeks back, and he had just done five weeks of

shooting in Spain. It has been significantly toned down from the comic,

though there is a shower love scene.

"Brian Yuzna is directing, and there are basically three movies in one:

the dark super-hero Faust part, the dark psychological thriller with the

woman, and a noirish crime plot. A British actor named Mark Frost is

Faust; newcomer Isabel Brook is the lead; Andrew Divoff (Wishmaster)

plays the satanic M, with bleached white hair; Jeffrey Combs plans

police Lieutenant Dan Margolies."

No release date has been set for the movie, which is titled Faust: Love

of the Damned.

X-MEN

The Sir Ian McKellen website has posted a photo of the actor in an early

version of the Magneto costume. The same page also features two set

photos and the Magneto design sketch which surfaced late last year on

the internet.

Thanks to PGF.

The Countdown To X-Men website scored a couple of cool scoops this week.

According to Lincoln, who runs C2X, We can look for the X-Men trailer,

presumably in theaters, on January 28th. Previous speculation was that

the trailer may air during Superbowl, which would be on the 30th.

C2X also reports that a new teaser poster will roll out at the same

time. The "B" teaser is said to feature Rogue and Professor X along

with the X door which was seen in "A" poster and on the official

website.

Finally, C2X also features what is alleged to be a blow-by-blow

description of the trailer. According to the report, the trailer will

use Rob Zombie's Dragula for it's soundtrack. Viewers will see

computer Rogue, Storm, Cyclops, Mystique, and what sounds like a cool

action shot of Wolverine squaring off with Sabretooth. The site promise

that the trailer will be available for download in the near future.

BATMAN 5

Speaking to fans via his website's message board, Ben Affleck has

debunked the most recent recurrence of the rumor that he would play

Batman in an upcoming sequel.

Labeling the recent NY Post/London Mirror story as "pure fiction"

Affleck told fans, "As I'm sure most of you might infer, this story is

absurd. There is no Batman script, no movie being planned, they have not

called me or my agent and Gwyneth is much more the 'Elektra' (Daredevil

reference) type..."

As for the source of the rumor the actor commented, "I really have no

idea where they get this stuff. It is as if someone sits in a room and

quite literally invents it."

Thanks to SCCComics and Dom for the tip!

JOE PSYCHO & MOO FROG

Joe Psycho & Moo Frog Cartoonshow is the latest animated project on the

slate for Fox Kids according to a recent article in Daily Variety. Once

a comic book from Goblin Entertainment, Joe Psycho now entertains

netizens from his animated website.

The article describes Joe as "a round-headed freak who works with his

level-headed best friend Moo Frog at a local TV station" in the

fictitious town of Spleen, Ore.

STONE, SKELETON KEY

A recent article in The Hollywood Reporter indicates Sony Wonder is

developing Whilce Portacio and Brian Haberlin's Stone as a kids TV show.

The project will be offered at the NATPE trade show. Stone is being

packaged as 52 episodes of 11 minutes each. The comic tells the story

of a TV actor who must take up the role of real-life action hero to

"protect a set of magical stones from evil."

Also being offered by Sony Wonder is Andi Watson's Skeleton Key. The

article describes this animated show as being "about a 16-year-old girl

who escapes her small-town high school and discovers a parallel mystical

world." Our friends at Sunbow, who have been developing this project,

tell us that comic and TV writers Evan Dorkin and Sarah Dyer have been

hired as writers for the show.

DAREDEVIL

Hot on the heels of reports that Stephen Norrington is in talks to

direct a Daredevil movie, Dark Horizons reports that Marvel

Entertainment is also considering Kevin Smith (Dogma) for the job.

Smith penned a successful run on the newly restarted Daredevil comics.

Supposedly fan reaction to that has Marvel contemplating hiring the

writer/director.

However, if Marvel is considering it, they haven't mentioned it to Smith

yet. Responding to fans from the message board of his View Askew

website, Smith answered the question about his involvement with a

Daredevil movie, "I've never been asked, nor have I ever asked myself,

to direct a DD [movie]."

BRUCE WAYNE

Harry Knowles of Ain't it Cool News reports that he's received a copy of

Tim (Iron Giant) McCanlies' script for the planned Bruce Wayne TV

series. According to the report, Bruce Wayne is depicted as still

trying to find his way in life. He's a martial arts expert who can kick

any bad guy's ass at will, but he hasn't yet been driven to his war on

crime. The initial script also features a mentoring Alfred, police

detective James Gordon, a 13 year old Barbara Gordon, a young Selina

Kyle and a still-in-law-school Harvey Dent.

HARSH REALMCinescape has confirmed recent reports that the FX channel will air all

eight episodes of Harsh Realm, the failed TV show based on Andrew

Paquette and James Hudnall's comic of the same name. In addition, Fox

is also said to be offering a screen credit to the creators. Last

October, Hudnall and Paquette filed a lawsuit against Fox, Chris Carter

(who developed the show) and Harris Publishing. One of the issues in

the suit was the absence of an on-screen credit for the concept they

created.

Following up on this report, Rob Allstetter of the Comics Continuum

spoke to the creators to see how the move effects their lawsuit.

According to Hudnall, the issue of credit is not yet settled. The

network made a token gesture on the third episode of the show, with a

blink-or-you-miss-it mention in the closing credit.

"Fox is offering us a more prominent credit, but it is still an

'inspired by' credit. So we haven't settled yet. There will undoubtedly

be a credit to us on the show from now on, but the form it will take is

something we still haven't agreed on," Hudnall told Allstetter.

Paquette told Allstetter that, even by Hollywood standards, giving

Carter a "created by" credit and while the comic writers get an

"inspired by" credit is wholly inappropriate. "It is strictly forbidden

by Writer's Guild policies to allow a 'created by' credit to be given

when source material exists. Not that the Writer's Guild is above

quashing the rights of their constituency in favor of the more well-

heeled studios. They do it all the time; they did it with us, with The

Visitor (adapted by Emmerich and Devlin from work by Jerry Burns), with

Earth: Final Conflict (definitely not developed from Roddenberry's

notes, but under litigation so I can't disclose true authors at this

time), and many others."

SPIDER-MAN

According to a recent report from Ain't it Cool News, Jan de Bont

(Speed, The Haunting) is in talks to direct the Spider-Man movie.

Beyond that, no further details are given.

Recent reports indicated that Sony had narrowed the field down to Chris

Columbus (Bicentennial Man) and David Fincher (Fight Club). However,

those same reports claimed that the studio would close the deal with one

of the two before the end of 1999. We here a Comics 2 Film are still

keeping our fingers crossed for Fincher.