X-Files Movie

Is anyone else getting excited about the new X-Files movie? The more shaky, fan-filmed versions of the movie trailer I see, the better, I say! Still very few female tv role models can hold up to the scientific Scully, and I love David Duchovny in his role as Mulder.

In other news, the second-rate Japanese anime version of Witchblade is making me impatient for TNT's Witchblade non-anime movie and seris to come out on DVD, already! I guess the anime version's Sara is okay, but Sara Pezzini as the tough-talking cop who defied the always-bustier-wearing comic stereotype was better.

Ten tips for great short stories

I'm not a fiction writer, but I think these are helpful tips, whether you're writing for a literary or a sci-fi audience:
http://io9.com/366707/8-unstoppable-rules-for-writing-killer-short-stories

Poetry, Robots, and Post-Apocalypse: an Interview

Think poetry and post-apocalyptic anime landscapes have nothing to do with each other? Check out this interview at the Poetry Foundation:
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/journal/feature.html?id=181239

Teaching a Class on Mythology and Comics

I'm going to be teaching two weeks straight - two weeks of junior high kids who come to this site to learn to do art, to dance and to act in a play and make puppets out of wax and, with me, learn about the many connections between poetry, mythology, and comic books.
I grabbed up a bunch of illustrated mythology guides in case the kids didn't have much of a background - one illustrated Greek and Roman, one illustrated Norse, and a giant 40-pound World Mythologies Guide, which include everything from Egytpian, Native American, East Asian, etc, to African and Celtic, with lots of fascinating pictures. I'm debating whether to bring in a beautifully illustrated "Tales of Genji" I found in the Manga section, but it does have some female nudity, so it's probably fof the list.
Then I was trying to decide which comic books were safe enough - that is, free of blood-and-guts-and-nudity - to bring in for these junior high kids (who will be chaperoned, so I really can't break the rules.) Astonishing X-Men? Some new Gail Simone Wonder Woman? Fray? Buffy? Even the ones I consider pretty safe have a surprising amount of adult stuff in them.
Recommendations? Ideas?
I'm going to have them do some writing exercises every day, including writing their own creation-type myth, two persona poem in the voices of a villain(ess) and hero(ine), a character sketch of a comic book character that includes some archetypal realtionship to a mythological character...some fun, right?
Thank you, Centrum Young Artists Project, for setting something like this up. Should be a blast!