Christmas is nearly upon us and the Twittosphere regulars are beginning to plug their festive offerings. Though we're still waiting for the Xmas Radio Times to pour over, highlighter pen in hand, black-clad Goth hero Neil Gaiman announced that he's got a movie premiering on Sky over the period: "My short film, STATUESQUE, starring Bill Nighy & @amandapalmer, music by @sxipshirey goes out in the UK on SKY1 on Xmas Day at 10:00pm," he Twittered. Doctor Who and Captain Britain writer Paul Cornell too alerted us that he's got a festive Who story ready for publishing: "Just finished a Doctor Who story for Christmas, for the 12 Blogs of Christmas," wrote SFX's former columnist. "It'll be up at my blog on December 13th." We'll pencilled it in, Paul.
Cornell's fellow ex-SFX columnist Simon Pegg has been spending these cold British days in sunny LA, editing his new sci-fi road movie Paul. Co-starring Nick Frost, it also headlines Arrested Development (and Teen Wolf Too's) Jason Bateman, and Pegg seems to have developed a man crush on his American co-star. "Jason Bateman's a handsome devil. I could watch him on the monitor all day. Dreamy!!!" he cooed. The next day, he added, "Right now, in the Paul edit 'dreamy' stakes it's a coin toss between Bateman and Jane Lynch", before following it up with, "Great day in the edit. Excited to see the movie taking shape and many happy memories of a magical Summer in New Mexico. Lotsa luv. Simon.x"
Pegg's cohort Edgar Wright meanwhile has been ensconced in England and has caught a screening of Shaun Of Fhe Dead on ITV last week. "I came home and flipped on the TV to find SOTD on ITV1. Amazing to see 77 f words left intact on a network showing. No c word though. Still, we've come a long way since the TV version of RoboCop!" Well done, that man!
With The Road currently wowing critics Stateside, Star Trek and Lost man Damon Lindelof Twittered that he was impressed with the movie and indicated that it's not a laugh-a-minute motion picture: "A woman behind me wept throughout," he wrote. "Nowhere near as good as the book, but every bit as depressing." The League of Gentleman's Jeremy Dyson was also caught up in Cormac MacCarthy mania and shared a link to an interview with the author: "Terrific Cormac McCarthy interview in Wall Street Journal. Chock full of wisdom about writing and life http://bit.ly/2vbTI3 ". He also replied to a follower asking if Dyson's fellow Leaguer Mark Gatiss was yet on Twitter. "Mr Gatiss is not on Twitter I'm afraid," he opined. "He prefers The Telegraph."
Prolific comic book scribe Andy Diggle gave British thirtysomething comics fans a harsh dose of 21st Century reality when he Twittered about a recent talk he gave to a class of ten year-olds. "Spoke to the art class about 2000 AD," he wrote. "No one had heard of it." He added, solemnly, "One thing I learned today: 10-year old British kids love Simpsons & Spongebob comics. Superheroes, 2000 AD etc not so much." Sad face...
Stan Lee, on the other hand, has also turned to lecturing and, typical of the 86 year-old, is having a whale of a time: "Since I never went to college, lecturing at one gives me a big kick," The Man wrote. "I've become expert at pontificating about things I know nothing about!" Steve O'Brien
