Paramount's optioning of the comic book The Bad Guy may be 'counter-programming' in the face of Hollywood's current wave of superhero films.

In spite of the obvious success that comic book-based films have had in Hollywood over the past year, and despite the fact that fellow AOL/Time Warner company DC Comics has an enormous roster of characters, Warner Brothers has been unable to pull the trigger and squeeze off another round in the battle of cinematic superheroes.

The largest comic/pop culture convention in the U.S. just keeps getting bigger. This year, exhibition space for the San Diego Comic-Con International grew by 25% to 350,000 square feet.

In comics, Spidey still holds three of the Top 10 Cool Comics in June, with the Kevin Smith-penned Spider-Man/Black Cat #1 in the top slot.

Initial piece orders from comic stores on the top comic titles in July were buoyed by the addition of two first issues that both sold well over 100,000 copies, Transformers Armada #1 and Battle of the Planets #1, at the number one and number three positions respectively.

Twentieth Century Fox has moved the debut of its Daredevil motion picture from Jan. 17 to Feb. 14, 2003. The move wasn't caused by any delays in the production of the Daredevil film -- it's Spider-Man's mega-grosses that are behind the switch.

Tim Davis, owner of Alternate Reality in Chicago, Illinois, said of FCBD in his store, 'I saw 3 to 4 times the number of bodies that I normally see on a Saturday.'

Fox News is reporting that Quentin Tarantino is set to produce a film version of Larry Hama's Mort the Dead Teenager . Unlike Spider-Man , the X-Men , or The Hulk , Mort is no superhero--just a teenager who loses his head (literally) in a train wreck.

Marvel Comics used its conference call with the comics press today to outline plans for three new reality-based comic series.

The Punisher has received a green light from Artisan as the second film in its fifteen-property deal with Marvel.