You might recognize this picture of a rocket in the eye of the man in the moon. It’s from the 1902 French silent film - A Trip to the Moon (Le Voyage dans la lune) which is noted as the first science fiction film ever made. You can download and watch it from Internet Archive or just watch it here. If you only see 1001 movies in your life, this classic film must be on the top of your list.

On a similar note: I’ve always enjoyed the music video by The Smashing Pumpkins - “Tonight, Tonight” which is loosely based on this film.

On a side note: you might have noticed a banner image atop Old Man Musings was inspired by this film as well. I switch through those banners every few weeks, since I enjoy making them. How would you like to design the next banner?

I’m a big Pac-Man fan from way back. So when I see great Pac-Man stuff, I gotta share. Graphic artist Alex Mejia created this jammin tribute to the wonderful world of Pac-Man. Check out his site for more info. Where would the video gaming world be today without Pac-Man? There should be a church of Pac-Man… oh wait there is one.

I’m a big fan of Futurama and having heard that it has been scheduled to return to TV is great news. So while they’re working on making new episodes of Futurama, were lucky to have Toynami around to help us with our fanaticism for Futurama. Just look at these super collectible 6-inch plastic figures.

With this years show coming to a close, be sure to catchup on everything that happened. Some of the of the best coverage I’ve found on the web has got to be Comic Book Resources, Newsarama and Vinyl Pulse. I’ll make it there someday…

It looks like there’s another fun game coming to the U.S. this April - Final Fantasy Fables: Chocobo Tales. For fans of the Final Fantasy world (which includes Chocobos, Tonberries, Malboros, and Cactuars) this game is for you. It’s got action, puzzles, minigames and this entertaining game takes advantage of Nintendo Wi-Fi connection for some multiplayer fun. Kweh! I really dig the Chocobo theme.

Isn’t this steampunk keyboard mod just cool? I’m a fan of steampunk stuff and this keyboard is just so creative. I’d like to see an entire computer system steampunked.

The object of Virus 2 is to grow your colored Virus so that it takes up all the cells before you run out of attempts. (You’ll be clicking the colored cells on the bottom of the screen to play.) Your score is based on how many cells you control each turn, 1 point for each. Does it sound easy? Well give it a shot and you’ll find that it’s nothing to sneeze at. Just don’t stay up all night playing it, you might catch a cold.

El Tigre is Coming, El Tigre is Coming! This Mexican folk-art inspired cartoon with a spaghetti Western twist is the creation of artists Sandra Equihua and Jorge R. Gutierrez. We met them last year at the I Am 8-Bit Book Signing. El Tigre centers around a boy, Manny Rivera (El Tigre), who must follow in the footsteps of his superhero father or his super-villain grandfather. You might have seen some previews for it on Nickelodeon and perhaps an episode - “Night of the Living Guacamole“. El Tigre premieres Saturday, March 3 at 10am on Nick, so don’t miss it.

This classic ad mentions that these Plastic Pillows are the “most original Marvel merchandising masterpieces ever”. They sure are original, but why plastic pillows? What can you do with one? Sure their suggestions of “bang ‘em and toss ‘em” both sound like great ideas, but can’t you do that with most stuff? Stan Lee probably had a hand in writing this because of the use of his word forbush, which was a word he made up to refer to something puny or weak. Well, at least it is only $1.50 and it has full-color Thor and Spiderman on it. Plastic Pillow fight anyone?

Put B’Owl in the trunk of your car and forget it! Anyone can put up with B’Owl for - a few minutes. Some of you might find this Tim & Eric sketch to be pretty funny.

Enjoy a new Simpsons Movie trailer which includes just about every Simpsons character known. We’ve all been waiting for the Simpsons movie ever since we heard about it. The movie is in theaters July 27, 2007 - which is at about the same time as the start of the San Diego Comic-Con. I’m looking forward to a fun July!

New Simpsons Movie Trailer

Picture Pages, Picture Pages,
Time to get your Picture Pages,
Time to get your crayons and your pencils!
Picture Pages, Picture Pages,
Open up your Picture Pages,
Time to watch Bill Cosby do a Picture Page with you!

Now that you know the words, you can sing along - Picture Pages. Expect the song to happily stick in your memory.

Picture Pages was a short, educational TV show where Bill Cosby would interact with you, the viewer, doing fun activities in an activity book. Picture Pages originated on Captain Kangaroo in the 1970s and then it spun off to its own show. You could get your Picture Pages puzzle booklets from local supermarket chains or send away for them. It was fun working with silly Bill Cosby (and his Mortimer Ichabod marker) as you completed each activity together. The way he interacted with you as you went through the activity book was like he was on the same page with you and in fact he was - Picture Pages.

You can play with Picture Pages,
Fill your day with Picture Pages,
‘Till Bill Cosby does another Picture Page with you!

If you were lucky enough to have experienced this show first hand, wasn’t it great?

The Japanese site for Final Fantasy XII : Revenant Wings looks great. The game is released in Japan late April and the rest of the world will just have to wait. At least we can enjoy the images and info about this awesome looking game for the Nintendo DS.

One of the latest campaigns aimed at the youth market by the Newspapers Association of America (NAA), promotes reading more newspapers. While I agree reading more is important for everyone, I just don’t believe that it should be limited to just reading more newspapers. I know you can read your news online and that newspaper subscriptions have been decreasing over the years, but what about reading a book? I guess the NAA does have a larger budget than your local library or comic shop. Besides, I bet you’ll probably find more Transformers related material online, in a book or a comic than you will in a newspaper. (Unless you’re talking about the newspaper inserts for Target promoting the latest Transformers toy line.)

If you’re one of the lucky few folks able to make it to the show next week, I hope you have fun (please take pictures). For everyone else, you can check out their free audio and video podcast coming from the event (February 23-25, 2007). Remember that the show is more than just comic books. It’s the East Coast’s largest pop-culture event with comic and graphic novels, anime and manga, toys and games, movies and TV, video games and art.

It’s also only a few months before the San Diego Comic-Con. You better get ready!