Cartoon Central

So, the current topic of discussion right now is the premiere of Webcomics Nation (WCN). Bob Stevenson mentioned how all the other “pundits” have thrown in their sentiments on the thing, and I figured I may as well, too. Especially since I haven’t had a “Snarkworthy” webcomic installment come to my attention for a while now.

I think it’s going to be huge. I think the support behind this is huge, and I think that the support will be even larger come September 1 when this thing is up and running. With so many people wanting to be able to voice their opinions and help make a difference in this era, they’ve been looking for their place to do so. Message Boards and Blogs had become the norm, but with some message boards, comics is not the main discussion anymore. I’m a comics activist, at least I like to think so, and I want to do my part. I love this industry, and I love writing, so I think it only fits that something like this really burned inside of me when I started thinking about it.

I went to Barnes and Noble afterwards to pick up a couple “graphic novels.” I ended up picking up World Without a Superman, The Return of Superman, and The Death of Clark Kent. All those added onto the ones from Wednesday…and that makes a busy list of night reading. And with that…I shall start. Goodnight.

He was a pilot, and had us all, my four brothers and me, take flying lessons. And several years ago we all got together ... father, four brothers and I ... and bought a Cessna 414, though my share is considerably smaller than the others, and we've had lots of fun with it. The interior is plastered with his Far Side cartoons. His favorite, enlarged and posted in the cockpit: Pilot says to co-pilot: "Say, what's a mountain goat doing way up here in the clouds?"

The brilliant title is not mine, it’s John Murrell of Good Morning Silicon Valley, and this post is really a plug for one of my favorite blogs. It’s more informative than CNet, funnier than Dilbert, and is best served with a cup of espresso.

Presenting the second installment of Narcissus the Snake. In this episode Narcissus reveals his caring side.

Garvin already was truly amazed and although I've been watching the movie together with Lewe he was faster than me commenting about it. I did not expect too much of a story but comedy from what I've seen previously so the average story did not bother me. Animation was well done - better than I expected. Some parts were really good, i.e. the beach itself, but other parts lack some detail (i.e. parts of the Zoo). The characters themselves could use some more polish characterwise. The movie comes to life simply through the sheer amount of slapstick comedy, nice mimics and funny quotes.

On July 4, my local comic book store had a 20% off sale. I swung by to pick up a stack of trade paperbacks I’d been wanting for a while, including the first collection of Warren Ellis‘ Global Frequency. Wired carried a story about GF a couple weeks ago, which motivated the purchase. The story was about how Warner Bros. transformed the comic into a pilot for television, and subsequently abandoned it. The pilot suddenly found itself spreading online via BitTorrent. More on that in a moment. First, the story itself.

These are some damn funny commercials and I had no idea there were 79 of them! I've listened to about 5 of them so far and was laughing out loud. Check it out...

Discovering that the guys who created Aqua Teen Hunger Force are total misanthropes.

New comic (notice I don't say "graphic novel," because it isn't): Freshmen, co-created by Seth Green.

I found a bunch of interesting new comics, too. I picked up Brodie’s Law, which I’m still in the process of reading, mainly because it looked interesting and the writer or artist (not sure which off the top of my head) seemed like a cool guy and was selling them for discount. I’m also anxiously awaiting the release of this Lovecraft comic. I’m a big Lovecraft fan, and I dig the mix of traditional and digital art they’re using. It’s the kind of stuff I want to see more of in comics. I’m also looking forward to a supposed special edition of Ascend (couldn’t find official site).

This weekend MWK and I went to the Houston Symphony's "Bugs Bunny on Broadway" show. It was a lot of fun, and he wrote about the show so you can read all about it.

We went to see Fantastic Four this weekend and it was awesome. Just like the Spiderman and X-Men men movies as well as The Incredibles this was what a super hero movie should be.

I was just thinking about the movie ‘Love Actually’ and i thought i’d put up one of the funny quotes [see below]. I need to get this movie! Anyway, I’m chatting with Syl and my dad. He can’t believe i actually went to pick up my Harry Potter book last night at midnight. What he doesn’t know is that Sylvia and i were the life of the party last night. We had everyone laughing their asses off. Lol! It really was such a blast.

Created a new Wiki page on Drawing Techniques - contains Line and Wash and Ink and Pencil at the moment - both techniques that anyone who’s done a bit of drawing would probably be familliar with, but I’m just learning all this myself.

I decided I needed to know a bit more about legendary Marvel Comics artist Steve Ditko. I found this site that’s going to take me days to crawl through.

Just yesterday I learned that the old Danger Mouse cartoons have been released in the US through a deal with A&E home video. I think that is very cool. I remember when DM was on Nickleodeon. It always amused me. It has that bizarre and dry British humor. Susie is a fan of DM too so we’re getting the first offering (seasons 1 & 2) on DVD. We look forward to the release of the the rest of the seasons in the near future.

I probably shouldn’t admit this, but I use the Wally Reflector on a fairly regular basis - As does nearly everyone I know. It’s usually quite justified.

Recently I have been reading more and more of this awesome web comic. It’s very addictive *shakes fist at drx for linking me to it*. So addictive that I have downloaded the entire archive of comics from 2002 til present using this rather cool shell script. As it stands the rar’d up directory is around 73Mb!

From now on, I’ll just link to the new comics, but this way you can just read through ‘em all.

i love parody, and i think its dangerously important. my recent fave is robot chicken, a stop-motion animation show that is part of the wonderful adult swim cartoon series (which includes cartoons that you must watch: aqua teen hunger force and sealab 2021).

First of all, lemme preface this by saying that I owned lots of comic books and comic book collector cards back in elementary school, so I tried to learn lots of stuff about Marvel Comics’ heroes and villains… Spider-Man was my favorite (of course), and the X-Men were popular and cool…but the Fantastic Four had been around for a long time and weren’t quite as popular anymore… Sure, they were a staple of comic book heroes, but they just weren’t that interesting for a kid in the 1990s.

I remember going through a friend’s blog with links to online comics. That reminded me of how I grew up with my very own collection of champak, amar chitra katha, raj comics and those billu and chacha chaudhary comic strips on the Friday paper. A trip to the city with my parents meant a new magazine or the latest in the series of Nagraj from the news stand at the bus stop.

A number of Pixar artists are premiering their own comic books at the upcoming Comic-Con Intnl. with a wide variety of styles and genres. They all look amazing, of course, and I plan to be making the rounds picking up copies of each an every one of them during the weekend. Names to look for during your visit to the show are E-Ville Press (short for Emeryville) at tables E3 and E4. They’ll have their anthology, “Afterworks” available, as well as “Colossus”, “Rose And Isabel” and some t-shirts, original art, etc.

Yesterday was spent cruising NYC with Grammatikos, which provided high entertainment. We grabbed lunch at Ben’s Kosher in Manhattan, which was freaking awesome (I haven’t had a salami burger or matzo ball soup in far too long), then wandered the City. After making sure to take Wolverine’s picture with the tree in Rockafeller Center (said picture will be posted soon, hopefully), I went and spent too damn much in various stores, including Midtown Comics. All in all, a productive day.

Where have I seen this before? In The Incredibles, superhero costume designer Edna Mode (the voice of Brad Bird) uses voice verification to gain entry into her secret lab. (She also undergoes an eye scan–see below.)

So I was wandering around her blog today and happened across something also unique and marvelous - a collection of online comics! She has them listed under the heading Funny Papers (what else?), way down through several screens of interesting stuff on the lefthand sidebar. It’s worth clicking over there and scrolling past the Archives, Categories, Blogs, Homeschooling Links, Places I’d Like to Go and the Reading List, because then you can click on a long list of comics websites such as Alley Oop, Andy Capp, Baby Blues, Calvin and Hobbes, Dilbert, For Better or For Worse, Katzenjammer Kids, Li’l Abner, Mother Goose and Grimm, Pearls Before Swine, Prince Valiant, Rose Is Rose, Tumbleweeds and many others.

I used to like Moronathon, until I heard that Beavis and Butthead marathons were called Moronathons. I was pissed – I mean, those two clowns steal my word?!?

Hope everyone had a lovely 4th. I was in bed with earplugs by 10:30 because I am a crotchety old lady. This does bring me to a question I have been wondering about though: Why are fireworks that don’t do anything but make a LOUD noise fun? I don’t get it. But if I put myself in the position of a 10 year old boy or Beavis and Butthead then I sort of get it. (fire + loud popping nose = fun) GOD, they are irritating though.

I have the day off next Saturday, so I'm definitely going to head down for this. I'm really looking forward to the Lost panel, the Superman Returns panel with Bryan Singer, Kevin Smith and Richard Kelly (woot!) together, Joss Whedon and company at the Serenity panel, Ray Bradbury, Ray Harryhausen, and Forrerest Ackerman, The Simpsons panel, Tenacious D, and Comic Book: The Movie. Whew! It's going to be a super fun day and I will definitely be getting some great pics, audio clips, and other good stuff!

Did you know? You can feel most handgun bullets passing near you, even when they don’t hit you. The wake of their passing through the air creates a cone of disturbance behind them, drawing a shockwave much wider in diameter than the bullet itself. Some of them also make a distinct buzzing sound as they pass. The singing ricochet you hear in movies and cartoons is exceedingly rare, and is more like a zip than a whine if it’s close to you. Most of the time, bullets impacting make the same sound as a blow from a small hammer. On concrete, it’s just a “splat.” I know, because I’ve experienced it first-hand, though I won’t describe the circumstances. Military stuff, you see.

Grooms pays homage to Cubism by bisecting space, revealing multiple views of the same object, and disproportionate scale. The overriding influence is doubtlessly the comics - from the humor of the Sunday funnies to the bite of political cartoons. Those who experienced Ruckus Manhattan, a city within a city, witnessed a reflection of themselves and their environment. People can be taken out of their routine by encountering something different or by seeing themselves in a mirror that exaggerates their everyday experience…Grooms’ acute satire also provoked serious thought about one’s own personal environment.

Update: Jay Taylor sends me a link to this hilarious Doonesbury cartoon about stealing Wi-Fi signals.

went to airport last night to pick up my sister. she bought me a spongebob squarepants boxer while on vacation. maybe i’ll pick up more chicks after wearing this. ha ha ha.

Today, DW is gone. But your choice of covers is not. The new license holder, IDW, revealed two variant covers for their upcoming book, Transformers #0, which will be available this fall. Comics Continuum posted their own feature on the re-emerging book, revealing still two more alternate covers. Further, there will be at least one BotCon exclusive cover as well!

I am almost inclined to believe this is some kind of prank, especially since the poster, someone named “Gord” appears to have completely bought the Japanese right-wing nationalist narrative of the colonial period in Korea. Perhaps his love for comics eventually led him to spend a little too much time with the illustrated books by Japanese fascist writer Kobayashi Yoshinori.

Neil Gaiman, creator/writer of the Sandman comics, will be signing books and doing some reading from his works. Check out his itinerary here (scroll down to see his schedule in the Philippines).

Satsuki and Mei Kusakabe are the main charactors from Japanese animation Tonari no Totoro or My neighbor Totoro in theater in Japan in 1988 (last 17 year) by Studio Ghibli directed by great Japanese animator, Hayao Miyasaki who is the inspiration of animator around the world, including Pixar studio studio creator of Toy story

I don’t know how many of you read Dilbert Comics but if you work in a corporate environment where there is an endless line of management and blue tape B.S. on top of you. The comedic genius becomes ever so much more realized and funny. The writers have a way to hit upon the things that happen daily in our office and make light of them. If not more than twice a week there is some Dilbert comic brought around that you would swear someone in the office had to write it because it is so on. Oh well I might try and find a way to post Dilbert comic of the month on this site, that might be cool.

This past Sunday I was watching the Simpsons on Fox. It was actually a pretty unusual event, due to the fact I normally just watch repeats during the week and haven’t caught it on it’s official time in… probably about a year. Before the episode was a parental advisory that read:

This episode contains discussions on same-sex marriages. Viewer Discretion is Advised.

Loooooooovely animation. It’s why we won’t bother with disney/pixar etc. in a few years time - everyone will just be making this stuff themselves. Duel.

Once again, Hollywood is shocked that their box office gross has slumped? For a record 18 weeks, the box office revenues have dwindled. It’s at its worst levels since 1981. But should we be surprised? The question comes to mind? Is the product or is it the buyers? Herbie Love Bug—modern remake, Star Wars( trilogy, a series), Land of the Dead (another series), Bewitched ( a remake of a tv series) and Madagascar( another line in same genre Finding Nemo, Mulan, Toy Story), an animated feature filled with every other star in Hollywood. Remakes, remakes–the same stuff. This is what is driving the audience way. No one is fooled. Hollywood is just trying to get another blockbuster instead of making a good movie.

I dont know why as of late, all this funny topics just keep ringing in my head. After talking on how you clean your buttocks after your "warring session", something just kept beaming in my head. Then something struck me. Why do people feel ashamed after farting? Well of course for my good friend, its an exception, he comes to my place and farts everywhere. To him, its like "coughing", the only thing is , the tune of the sound, and the smell. He will be sitting on the couch, making funny fart sounds. Cheeky fool.