• Yet again, some amazingly cool items are up for the highest bidder at Auctions Askew. How’d you like to own the “If you Plan to Shoplift” sign from the Quick Stop in Jay & Bob? How about that hilarous Ben Affleck tabloid from the same scene? A signed Clerks cartoon pilot script? Walt Flanagan’s Mallrats cap? That and more are now available, in yet another exciting week of auctions at View Askew. As always, bid carefully, good luck, and may the person with the deepest pockets win.

• You can now find a blurb and cover shot of Kevin and Stan Lee on the cover of the new Monsters, Mutants and Marvels DVD at the official Spider-Man movie website, under the Daily Bugle section.
• This coming Wednesday, May 22, the Discovery Channel will air a two-hour special called “Inside the CIA”, hosted by Ben Affleck.
• If you missed Vanilla Sky in theaters, check out Jason Lee in this flick on DVD and VHS — It hit the rental shelves yesterday.
• Congrats to the Drop Dead Roses cast and crew — Their flick took Honorable Mention at the UC Davis Film Festival.
• The J&SBSB DVD was mentioned in an article on the DVD Creation website for its robustness in extra detail. Check that out HERE.

• Newsarama has leaked some unscripted Black Cat pages from issue one, along with details on the book. It really looks fantastic, we can’t wait to see that trademark Smith text bubbling up on the pages:

SPIDER-MAN/BLACK CAT: THE EVIL THAT MEN DO #1

Cover by Terry & Rachel Dodson

Kevin Smith/Terry Dodson/Rachel Dodson

THE SCOOP: Movie and comics king Kevin Smith takes the reins of comics’ hottest character — Spider-Man — in an all-new four-part story that will send the wall-crawler on a collision course with his old flame, the Black Cat!

THE STORY: The mysterious disappearance of an old friend brings Felicia Hardy to the Big Apple in search of answers. But, as luck would have it, a certain web-slinger — who also happens to be her ex-lover — is following the same trail! How long will it take before they do some… catching up?

THE CREATORS: You know he’s a famous moviemaker and comics writer, but wait until you see Kevin Smith cut loose on the one-and-only Spider-Man! And is there a more perfect artist to draw the shapely Black Cat than Terry Dodson (Harley Quinn)?

THE FORMAT: The first issue of this four-part series is 32 pages, with ads.

Printed on glossy paper with a cardstock cover.

Thanks to Newsarama!

• On yesterday’s episode of Oprah, they discussed children’s exposure to sex, violence, and the like through television, and, of all things, aired a shot of the little boy screaming and then Jay beating up the Easter bunny (from Mallrats) as an example. Hey, at least her producers didn’t forget one of the most overlooked View Askew flicks!
• In his, as always, hateful review, Mr. Cranky slams Attack of the Clones but then mentions how an Episode III might be if Kevin were to direct.
• Clerks is mentioned in a new Film Threat article (positively) titled “THE 10 STUPID THINGS INDIE FILMMAKERS DO TO MESS UP THEIR MOVIES”:

Read it all HERE.

• And more Star Wars related stuff — cast your vote on who would win in a Jay & Silent Bob vs. C3P0 R2D2 battle at the Dream Battles website.
• If you’re into seeing how the UK Jay & Bob DVD differs from the one here in the States, if at all (nice teaser, eh?) — Check out the UK Askew website www.ukaskew.co.uk for their review.
• Don’t own the View Askew DVDs yet or want another set for when yours wear out? Word has it prices are dropping on Clerks and Chasing Amy, as low as $12.99 some places. Get ‘em if you don’t got ‘em!
• This new Yahoo discussion area is for chatting Indie Film, has a poll about View Askew (members only though) and a link to News Askew — Always a good way to get a mention here.
• It seems that Jay and Silent Bob have at least one fan in the miniature painting community, as shown by this scratchbuilt mini-diorama tribute to the two.

• Who might the next leading actress for a Kevin Smith film be? It might be a new face for View Askew Productions, that of Jennifer Lopez, who is currently in negotiations to star opposite Affleck in “Jersey Girl”:

This all completely explains the reason that casting was looking for both latina and caucasian actresses for the part of the daughter, and tells us that Lopez must be pretty close to signing on board. It also confirms Carlin for the father role. Now we’re cookin’!

Jersey Girl starts filming this August, likely in Toronto, though nothing’s definite on that one just yet. Thanks to Yahoo and The Hollywood Reporter for the story.

Those votes at the Tonight Show website are piling up in Kevin’s favor! He’s currently in the lead with 43%, let’s see if we can get him to hit the 50% mark!

You can vote for Kevin as your favorite Leno correspondant by visiting their official website at http://tonightshow.msn.com. Cast your vote on the left sidebar (scroll down a bit). If you haven’t taken a second to put in your vote, get goin’! We’ll be back with more news tomorrow.

• Got LOTS of mail on this small Clerks reference at the Slashdot website (their latest poll topic):

Contractors is currently running away with it, too.

• This coming week, A&E’s “Biography” will be showcasing Star Wars cast members. Mark Hamill will be profiled on Tuesday, May 21 at 8 PM ET, with Carrie Fisher at the same time on the following night. No word on whether they’ll mention either one’s role in J&SBSB.
• CNN ran this article/interview with Alanis Morissette discussing the production process of her latest album. She attributes her piquing of interest in producing to the track she contributed to the Dogma soundtrack.
• If you’re missing affleck.com, you may wanna visit the new Afflecktopia , a well put together Ben fansite with all sorts of nifty stuff. They’ll likely cover DareDevil much more in depth than us.

• Because you loved her first brilliant piece so much, here’s some more Page Branson artwork — It’s nice stuff again, some stills dedicated to each of Kevin’s 5 films, and a couple extraneous pieces as well featuring Askew folk. Check them all out above.

• Important stuff here! Kevin’s currently featured in an online poll at the Tonight Show website, where you get to choose your favorite correspondent for the show — Let’s show our support and get over there, help Kevin win this thing! Kevin’s got just 8% of the votes at presstime, get over there and help get that total up. You’ll find the Quick Poll on the left side of the website at http://tonightshow.msn.com/. Kevin should easily beat the likes of Howie Mandel. Go, go go!

Don’t Forget: Kevin is on Leno TONIGHT to wrapup his visit to Florida with the Roadside Attractions crew. The last edition was an absolute riot, we can’t wait to see where Kevin heads next. As far as we know, he’ll as always be on the show in person to introduce the clip. Now, go get those votes in, and don’t forget to tune into NBC tonight for the big show.

• Easily the top number of scoops on this one today — That now famous on the net Daredevil pic, featuring the first shot of Affleck in the suit. Looks pretty slick, yet still sort of silly thinking it’s Affleck back there. Kevin makes it tough to take the guy seriously with some of the stories he tells. Still, early word on the flick is great! A small image was released, but thanks to JoBlo, we’ve got the FULL size version of the shot above, just click to check it out. Thanks also to USA Today and Dark Horizons.
• Small mention in this CNN article on Mark Hamill as one of the original Star Wars cast members:

• On the Filmwise website today, the Visual Quiz shows a shot from Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back. The picture is of the two babies who grow up to be Jay and Silent Bob – The question is, “What inseparable pair did this pair of cuties grow up to be?”
• You can find more photos of those Buddy-Christ like Jesus figurines HERE.
• And finally today, just to show you how WRONG the Internet can be a lot of the time, the very incorrect www.fametracker.com reports in “The Asterisk”:

Kev’s at his own computer pretty much daily and the View Askew offices are more wired than ever.

• Well tomorrow’s the big day, Episode II hits the big screen! The best theater in town isn’t doing the midnight show, so we’re stuck checking it out tomorrow – If you haven’t already checked out the internet bootlegs, enjoy! The movie will likely do some good business, but can it touch the incredible two weeks of Spider-Man? And how much will Spidey hang onto this week? It’ll likely be one of the biggest moneymaking weekends in box office history, for sure.

We had a blast at WizardWorld this past weekend, though wow, was it ever a hectic day. So much to do, so little time! You’ll find our wrapup and some exclusive pics now online, new Auctions Askew items, and the usual bunch of interesting little NewsBites in today’s update. Oh, and by the way, Chris is looking for a “RETURN OF THE LIVING DEAD” movie poster — If anyone’s got a line on one, drop him a line.

Let’s get started here…