Microsoft’s new KIRILL series: Great show, not-so-great marketing

So about a month ago, we were approached by the folks behind the new series Kirill, a sci-fi drama being showcased on the web. The show is a collaboration between MSN UK and Endemol UK, and stars British actor David Schofield as the lead character. (You might be familiar with his work in Pirates of the Caribbean and Gladiator.)

Here’s a teaser trailer for the show:

Now, I will be the first to admit that I’m automatically skeptical of anything that Microsoft had a hand in. My laptop runs Vista and I use MS Office, but other than that I avoid Microsoft pretty much all the time.

The show, however, is really very interesting.

I’d love to give you a summary of what the show is about, but that’s a bit difficult to do. From what I can gather, Kirill, the lead character (who interestingly shares his name with Kirill Tatarino, Corporate Vice President of Microsoft Business Solutions) is living alone in an underground bunker, trying to send a message to the outside world to warn them of some coming apocalyptic event.

There are five 2-3 minute episodes available on the Kirill Uncovered blog. Those are the only ones I’ve seen so far.

The sixth episode was available as of Tuesday, but I haven’t seen it yet, despite wanting to know where the story is going. Why, you ask? Well, Microsoft apparently wants to use the show to demonstrate Silverlight, which is basically Microsoft’s answer to Adobe Flash. Which is fine, but in order to view episode 6, you have to download Silverlight, which I am loathe to do.

It seems to me that Microsoft is using the show as sort of a proverbial dangling carrot to get us to download their product, which seems a little bit shady to me. If the product is good on it’s own merit, I’m sure there will be buzz about it and I’ll be persuaded to download it without needing a pseudo-bribe to do so.

In short, Kirill is a very well-put-together and interesting show so far, but I think it’s being marketed poorly. Which is really a shame, in my opinion. It would suck if something that cool got a bad name just because the folks at Microsoft don’t know their audience well enough to put together a good social media campaign for their products.

If Kirill wants to survive as a standalone show, they’ll have to stop alienating viewers and continue to showcase all the episodes in a more user-friendly manner.

Despite my misgivings about the show’s marketing, I encourage you to view at least the first five episodes that I linked to above, and then judge for yourself wheter or not you want to download Silverlight to view the rest.

New STAR TREK Trailer

As you probably know, a new trailer for J.J. Abrams’ upcoming Star Trek was released over the weekend.

I wanted to take a minute and talk a little about it.

(You can watch it here, if you haven’t seen it.  Go ahead, I’ll wait.)

All set?

Okay, let’s go.

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HIGH MOON

I’ve never been really big on webcomics.  There are a few good ones out there, but for the most part, they don’t appeal to me.  It’s nothing against any of the creators– it takes dedication and a lot of hard work and love.  There are exceptions, of course.  FreakAngels is one.

High Moon is another.

High Moon, by David Gallaher, Steve Ellis and Scott O. Brown, just celebrated its first anniversary at Zuda Comics.  (Zuda, by the way, is the webcomic division of DC.)  The on-line graphic novel follows a Pinkerton agent turned bounty hunter in the Old West.  High Moon takes a premise that might sound a bit ridiculous in theory and turns out to be fantastic in execution.

Part western and part horror (with just a dash of steampunk for good measure), High Moon is well-written with art that’s reminiscent of Tony Moore.

We had the opportunity to talk to David Gallaher about the hit series.

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What I Bought [11.12.08]

Kind of a light week, so let’s get to it.

The Stand: Captain Trips #3 (of 5) (Marvel) - I picked this up for Christina (she’s a huge fan of the novel– I’ve never read it), but I’m digging it so far.  Mike Perkins’ art is phenomonal, though I’m not really qualified to judge Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa’s adaptation skills.

3.5/5

100 Bullets #97 (Vertigo) - I think Azzarello’s trying to end each issue with a mysterious death.  I’m not complaining.

4/5

Justice Society of America: Kingdom Come Special: Superman (DC) - It’s nothing more than background information for Kingdom Come.  There’s a statue of Jack Knight in one panel.  That was my favorite part of this book.

1/5

Action Comics #871 (DC) - More fallout from Superman’s rescue of the Bottle City of Kandor as over 100,000 Kryptonians make Earth their home.  Luthor’s working with Lois’ not-quite-dead father to kill them.  I’m not terribly interested.  Oh, Doomsday shows up and is killed by a group of Kryptonians led by Superman and Supergirl.  Let me say that again:  Superman participates in a killing/murder.

2/5

Trinity #24 (DC) - More alternate reality goodness.  Trinity is one of the most consistently entertaining comics published today.

4/5

Green Arrow and Black Canary #14 (DC) - Judd Winick’s last issue is fairly quiet.  Ollie tries to help Connor readjust after his abduction and coma, leaving Connor something of a blank slate for future writers.  Not bad, but I wish Winick hadn’t left.

3.5/5

Manhunter #36 (DC) - Manhunter’s the other consistenly entertaining comics.  Of course, now it’s being canceled.

5/5

Casting Couch - AVENGERS ASSEMBLE

Going to try something a little different this time around– casting a movie in development before the cast is announced.

Premiering in September 1963 (the same month as the X-Men), the Avengers were Marvel’s response to the Justice League.  Made up of most of Marvel’s solo heroes at the time– the heroes drawn by Jack Kirby– the Avengers have long been the ideal every hero on Earth aspires to.

The Avengers

The Avengers

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Four Color Politics

Tomorrow is the election for the next President of the United States of America.  In honor of this, I thought I’d put together a brief history of politics and comics.

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Politics: The Blathering

As you all know (unless you live in a very remote area of Siberia without any outside contact whatsoever, and in that case, how the heck are you reading our blog?), the US Presidential Elections are being held this Tuesday, November 4th. This election is extremely important for America, and it’s imperative that we all get out there and let our voices be heard. Because when you don’t vote, you make Hulk angry. And you won’t like him when he’s angry.

But now that we’ve preached about the importance of voting and threatened to send a huge, green, irradiated mutant after you if you don’t, let’s lighten things up a little, shall we?

One of our favorite snarky bloggers and LiveJournal excommunicants, MightyGodKing, does a lot of Photoshopping. And not the lame kind where you stick Sarah Palin’s head on a redneck bimbo’s body. No, this kind of Photoshopping actually has meaning.

Relevance.

Hilarity.

I give you the world’s next great card game: Politics: The Blathering!

Click to view a few more.

Happy Halloween From Jack Chick

Read the whole thing here.  Hope you all have a great Halloween!

WATCHMEN Script Review

Obviously, a lot of people have Watchmen on the brain.  With the release date looming closer (if Fox’s lawsuit doesn’t screw that up), I thought I’d show you a couple of the previous attempts at adapting the classic graphic novel.

(Obviously, there be spoilers.)

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New WATCHMEN Trailer

New STAR TREK Trailer

As you probably know, a new trailer for J.J. Abrams’ upcoming Star Trek was released over the weekend. I wanted to take a minute and talk a little about...

Casting Couch - AVENGERS ASSEMBLE

Going to try something a little different this time around– casting a movie in development before the cast is announced. Premiering in September...

WATCHMEN Script Review

Obviously, a lot of people have Watchmen on the brain.  With the release date looming closer (if Fox’s lawsuit doesn’t screw that up), I thought...