Neil Patrick Harris Creates A 'Choose Your Own Adventure' Autobiography... I'm Officially Dropping Dead !!!

Neil Patrick Harris has lived a charmed life, and in that life he has had ups and downs. He started out as 'Doogie Howser, MD' on  ahit TV show, a 14 year old wunderkind teen who became a full fledged doctor. The show was a huge success, and elevated young Harris to the pinnacle of stardom. But like most teen stars, when the show ended... well, so did his ascension. He floundered in the mid 90s after the cancellation of Doogie, making appearances in TV movies and small guest roles on TV shows & movies. Nothing really popped for him... until he starred as a perverted version of himself in 'Harold & Kumar Go To White Castle' in 2004. Seeing NPH willing to embrace his campy status and make fun of the idea that he was an aging childhood star made tons of people love the guy. It probably helped him the next year when he went on to audition for a role in a little sitcom called 'How I Met Your Mother'. NPH got the role of Barney Stintson, and 'How I Met Your Mother' went on to a 9 YEAR RUN as one of the most successful comedic shows of all time. He parlayed his successful TV show into a bunch more cameos, indy projects, and hosting awards shows. He also excelled at genre work, specifically kid-centric fare and stuff for the nerds. He got leads in fluff (but money makers) like 'Smurfs' and 'Smurfs 2', did the voice of Dick Grayson (Nightwing) in the Batman animated film 'Under The Red Hood', and plays the lead role in Joss Whedon's internet classic 'Dr. Horrible's Sing-A-Long Blog'. Basically, NPH was down and out... but he has risen again. Now comes the announcement that he is ready to put out an autobiography, and in typical NPH fashion he is doing it in a very unique way. He is making the book a 'Choose Your Own Adventure' style novel. Any child of the 80s knows what that is.... a book that allows the readers to make decisions, and the story jumps through the pages based on the different things the reader chooses to do. NPH himself says this format works because of all the choices he faced in his career, some of the choices he made or didn't make, and all the ups and downs he had. I think it is a very great idea... and I for one can't wait. The book is due on October 14th, 2014... but you can PREORDER it here right now. Check out the full cover, in all its 'Choose Your Own Adventure' glory after the jump...

Like! Like? Volume #5

With all of the buzz around who may be the next Nolan casted 'Dark Knight' co-star, tumblr.com was abuzz with this unattributed work the posits CCD favorite Neil Patrick Harris as the next incarnation of Edward Nigma himself...'The Riddler' and noticeably Phillip Seymour Hoffman has made top billing...as 'Penguin' I presume. This work remains unattributed since it's probably been bouncing around since the first installment of Nolan's film trilogy. If you know who this creative son of a gun is...please feel free to let us, at CCD, know!

Justin Hillgrove has some chibi styled art over at his page that I dug. From 'Lord of the Rings' magic...

To a this great villain Birthday party....

Then he has this Star Wars Wampa getting his just desserts!....

...and these Star Wars Jawas getting there's!

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Get Ready For The Smurfs...

I'm an 80's baby, born and bread. My childhood saturdays consisted of waking up around 6 am, making myself cereal, plopping down in front of the TV and watching cartoons. He-Man, GI Joe, Dungeons and Dragons, Dragon's Lair, Spiderman and His Amazing Friends, Thundar the Barbarian, Thundercats, Voltron... you name it, I loved it. But there were a couple of shows that were more up my sister Oona's alley. Shows like the Snorks, the Wuzzles, and the Smurfs that were kinda cool, but as a boy you never wanted to admit you liked them. My sister Oona had a huge thing for the Smurfs, and she collected the little figurines that went along with it. She had hundreds of these blue fuckers, and she displayed them up on her shelves for show. I was not allowed to touch them, and that drove me crazy.

The cartoon was pretty cool, a village of little blue creatures being tormented by an evil wizard named Gargamel and his cat Azrael, who want to eat them and use their Smurf magic to make gold. The series is set in medieval times and started off as a companion to a sword and socery comic strip entitled Johan and PeeWee. The little magical creatures are all blue, they are all male except for Smurfette (who was an evil smurf made by Gargamel), and they all wear white pants and white hats. They also have distinct accessories to distiguish them, like Brainey wearing glasses or Hefty constantly working out with his barbells.

Well, like most things from the past, Hollywood is going to take a shot at turning this beloved Cartoon into a CGI/Live Action Trilogy in the vein of Who Framed Roger Rabbit. At first glance, I dismissed this as terrible. Why, good lord, why??? But then the voice cast and live character actors leaked out, and I began to get excited. Not only are the names great, but such good choices for each character... well, maybe this won't be so bad. I'm sure it will be a very entertaining kids movie, and as an adult with a child that all you can ask for so that you dont want to kill yourself in the theaters. Neil Patrick Harris will play Johan, the squire that discovers the magical creatures that live in the forest near his castle. Hank Azaria will be playing the evil wizard Gargamel... and thats awesome!!! Anything with NPH and Azaria will at least get a look from me. And now for the voice actors playing the Smurfs: Johnathan Winters will play Poppa Smurf, the leader of the village. Quentin Tarantino will play Brainey, the village know-it-all. Kevin James will play Hefty, the tough guy smurf, and Alan Cummings will play Gutsy, the bravest smurf. George Lopez checks in as as Grouchy smurf, and Katy Perry will voice the only female smurf, Smurfette. All in all, this is an interesting cast. As long as they look better then the guys above, the movie will be a win in my book. I am now looking foward to the movies, and want to shout out my man Jeff Bond for putting me on to this news. Long live the smurfs... now lets just hope Hollywood does not butcher the shit out of a beloved childrens franchise.