Behind the scenes of Henry Selick’s adaptation of Neil Gaiman, another of many articles on why ‘The Daily Show’ beats real news, and a trailer with some familiar touches.

Ever since picking up the Sandman series during the peak nerdiness of junior high days, I’ve been a Neil Gaiman fan. I’ve continued to follow his output with reactions varying from casual enjoyment to genuine excitement. No matter what I think of each project, at the very least, they always give the impression that he relishes the telling of stories.

Coraline, his novella aimed at young adults, may not be my favorite of his books — no longer being so young of an adult myself — but it was certainly a pleasant read. Then word leaked a year or so ago that it was being turned into a film by Henry Selick, animation genius behind The Nightmare Before Christmas. Now we’re talking something I can get behind; a favorite author who specializes in the fantastical, paired with an animator who specializes in bringing fantasy to life. This could be the case of a decent book being transformed into a marvelous movie.

Now IGN has a five-part behind-the-scenes look at Coraline, with plenty of clips throughout that show how it’s coming along.

What may have been missing for me as an adult reading the book was the level of imagination required to construct such a vivid world on my own. But combining the original story with Selick’s creative vision, which brings every scene to life with such rich detail, results in images much more arresting than anything I could conjure up. It’s a good thing there are adults who can still flex their fantasy muscles for the delight of the rest of us. Based on these early glimpses, I’m looking forward to seeing the final product.

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As an equally loyal The Daily Show fan, it’s always nice to see Jon Stewart getting some good press coverage for the continually excellent job he does skewering the nonsense that passes for governing. I’ll read any piece on him or the show I come across.

One of this week’s most-shared/blogged articles on the NY Times site was a nice article on how they’re covering the elections, called “The Most Trusted Man in America?”

Of course, as a long time follower, I quickly realized that the article felt awfully familiar. As in, it sure sounded a whole lot like almost every other article I’d ever read about Jon Stewart. Start with a description of how the show works (as if we didn’t know by now), provide a little walk-through of how a typical day plays out in the Daily Show offices, sprinkle with a few insights from Stewart on what he sees as their mission and place in the “news” world, and close with some poignant remarks referencing the emperor’s new clothes.

It bears an uncanny likeness to this Rolling Stone cover story from two years ago, which I remember enjoying at the time as well. They even used Rolling Stone’s clever sub-header as their title. But then there’s this Newsweek article from 2003. Even shades of this earlier NY Times piece which predates the rest. Hmm.

Now I would never turn down the opportunity to hear some laugh lines or pearls of wisdom from one of my favorite TV personalities, even if they come via well-worn premises for feature articles. But it does seem ironic that as his show increasingly focuses on the media’s misplaced attentions and mismanaged agendas, here comes another big publication proposing the shocking idea that maybe this jester is the one revealing the most truth.

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Before seeing Pineapple Express last week, we were also treated to a look at the trailer for Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist. It looks suitably adorable, crammed with indie pop, and Michael Cera-tastic to be worth giving a try this October, so that’s all well and good.

It did smack at least a little bit of trying too hard to be hipstery in this post-Garden State era of young romantic films, but that sure won’t stop a sensitive, nerdy indie rock fan such as myself from enjoying it. I was however just a tad bugged by their blatant reuse of certain design elements from last year’s sleeper indie hit Juno.

At first I thought I was crazy, but Film School Rejects noticed this as well. I mean, I’m okay with Cera playing essentially the same character — why shouldn’t he, he fucking owns that character. But do they have to use the same quirky, blocky font and bold colors to really drill into our heads just how sure they are that we’ll like this movie if we liked Juno? It may be nitpicking but it seems so lazy and/or sleazy. If I were Fox Searchlight’s poster design company I would be making some angry calls to MTV Pictures’ art department right now; this cannot be a coincidence.

Oh wait, one has a right-sided hand-drawn drop shadow and the other one goes left. Nevermind, it’s all good.