I'm In the Band

I'm working on a couple of different story projects right now, including a comic involving musicians. Here's my first attempt at giving the characters a bit of a life. I had a lot of fun with this drawing but found it WAY too time consuming for my deadlines (the drums alone took me about an hour), so I decided to simplify things a little bit.

The story I'm planning takes inspiration from/draws heavilyfrom/blatantly mimics Scott Pilgrim, so I figured:


Let's just make them all LOOK like Scott Pilgrim a bit.

Introducing the Dead Poets' Sorority:

June on lead guitar and vocals grew up in a household where the classic poets were more important than the daily cartoons (that's her picture of Robert Frost up on the wall), so she decided to share her love of poetry through the irresistable power of crappy garage rock.

Samantha on bass would be perfectly content to just sit on the front porch and play music all day. In fact, that's what she was doing when June asked her to join the band. She's probably still playing right now. Seriously, someone needs to encourage that woman to get a hobby.

Kenny plays the drums. He's very obviously not a girl, but June didn't know any girls that could play the drums. So she picked Kenny. She also picked the name of the band. So Kenny is the drummer for the Dead Poets' Sorority. But he's not a girl. He's 100% man, baby, and he wants YOU to know it.

Look out, world, here comes Dead Poets' Sorority, ready to pound culture into your skulls with hits like, "Rocking By Woods on a Snowy Evening," "Because I Could Not Rock For Death," and, of course, "O Captain! My Captain! (Of Rock)."

BONUS

Because someone out there asked for it (no, really):

Human Centipedes and Synchronized Swimming: A Night of Improv

Well, technically, two nights, but still.

I keep saying that I need to just compile a list of my all-favorite improv scenes - the brilliant little gems of pure comedy that keep me so excited about this hobby that dominates my weekends. Best way to handle it will probably just be to document them as they happen.

This past weekend, there were two DOOZIES:

1 - Friday, January 21

The game is Fast Forward/Rewind, wherein the MC gets to stop the scene at any point and either fast forward or rewind. It's one of the more physically demanding games in our repertoire.

Our scene suggestion is Human Centipede - which, apparently, is a movie. I'd post a link to the Wikipedia page, but, after reading what the movie is about, I actually feel a little sick. You can research on your own, but prepare to be disgusted if you do.

STAY AWAY

I start the scene off alone onstage, miming an experiment with various unidentified chemicals in a laboratory. From behind me, Tony (one of our bright young students) comes in.

"Guess what?" he says excitedly.

"Careful," I say, "I'm performing a delicate experiment with transformation enzymes and centipede... monacles."

"No, but listen," Tony says, and he shakes me. Now doused in the chemicals, I start to transform, flicking my fingers out by my sides to indicate legs sprouting from my body as I twist and twitch down to the ground. Tony screams in terror and steps back.

"Pause," yells Blake, the MC. "Fast forward."

I convulse and collapse to the ground. Tony runs away as I scramble towards him. He runs around the stage, then he runs up behind me and shakes me. I bobble wildly back and forth.

"Pause," yells Blake. "Rewind."

We do the whole thing in reverse - the bobbling, the running, the crawling, even the transformation. I make loud sucking noises as the centipede legs retract back into my body.

"Play," yells Blake.

Tony busts into the room. "Guess what?" he says excitedly.

So we do the whole thing again. Blake continues to fast forward and rewind through the transformation (he told me later that he really liked to watch me bobble). Finally, he lets us play through the end of the transformation.

"You tried to kill me!" I yell, then I make to eat Tony (I'm a human centipede monster at this point, remember?).

"Freeze!" Blake yells, and then, "Skip scene."

So I stand there, stomach distended, as if I'd just finished eating Tony. Then, from behind, Tony dives out on stage, as if he'd just somehow broken through my stomach.

Blake storms out on stage, triumphantly yelling, "And that's our game!"

As fun as it was to get shaken around so much (I'm not sure "fun" is the word I want), without a doubt, Tony picking up on the cue that he had been eaten and busting out of my guts was a FANTASTIC moment of improv. Kudos to Tony the Quick-Witted. I was proud to be in the scene with him.

2 - Saturday, January 22

We had a lot of great games this night. I think it'd be a shame not to mention the fantastic round of What Are You Trying To Say? that I played with Andrew (set in a Dance Dance Revolution competition, no less). For me, though, the best moments came in scenes with Brady.

Brady and I have actually been friends pretty much our whole lives. Brady's mother was my teacher in grade school three years in a row. When it comes to working together and reading each other's intentions, Brady and I have a bit of an advantage, I guess, given our history. We showed off a little how in sync we can be during a game of Accents, when we both started yelling at each other in Italian and shaking our fists. Still, though, nothing will top our game of Half Life from this night.

The game requires two or three actors to perform the exact same scene repeatedly, cutting the time taken in half each time. We get our scene suggestion (Synchronized Swimming, something I've never seen work on stage before).

Brady and I step up to do the scene. We dive down onto the stage, rolling and kicking our legs at EXACTLY THE SAME TIME. I think we both had to keep an eye out and make sure we were following the other person precisely, but we actually made it look like we were swimming in unison.

Above: Me and Brady

I don't think I've ever been that in tune with what another improv performer had in mind, and the scene has definitely gone down as one of my all-time favorites.

Of course, I DID tear out the knees in my jeans, so it wasn't a PERFECT game, but still.

The Facts of Life: Beartato on Friendship

Friends are the best - everyone LOVES having friends, right?

Until you have too many. Then you have to get rid of the excess friends.

A lot of people I've spoken with recently (the single ones, at any rate) have expressed a lack of interest in making new friends. All of their socializing at this point is geared either towards strengthening the friendships they already have or finding a new relationship with the special someone that will let butterflies loose in their bowels (an idea that sounds, frankly, quite uncomfortable).

The unfortunate side effect of refocusing friendship energies to more romantic goals, though, is that personal growth tends to stagnate. Best friends are best friends for a reason, of course - with certain individuals we just seem to "click" to the point where we are no longer growing seperately but as a unit. The rest of those friendships, though - and here I mean the "shallow" friendships that come into our lives for a brief moment, then pass on as our paths diverge - also seem to be helpful.

Continuing with the (admittedly shaky) water metaphor, such sudden bursts of friendship help to wear off a couple of the rough edges that we maybe didn't know we had. Perhaps we suddenly realize that we've had something of a temper that our long-term friends have grown accustomed to. Perhaps we discover a new hobby. Whatever the result, the constant infusion of "new" keeps things light and interesting - even if the "new" comes in the form of brief, though meaningful, interpersonal relationships.

Would I LIKE to meet a special someone that will unleash fluttering insects in the pit of my stomach? Probably, but someone will have to come up with a better, less off-putting description of that sensation.

In the meantime, I'll take all the friends I can get. Which is probably two. Sorry, Kevin, but the position you've applied for is full right now.

(Anthony Clark writes Beartato comics, and the world is better for it. You can find more hilarious Beartato strips like the one above at nedroid.com)

The Church of the White Glove

Wish I Said It First #12

#12

After Sherlock finishes up with a particularly lengthy deduction.

John: "Fantastic."

Sherlock: "Meretricious."

Lestrade: "And happy new year."


Sherlock Episode 3, "The Great Game."

One Weird@## Dream

I present for your consideration last night's dream:

For some reason, I found myself chained to the dashboard of a stationary van. There were additional passengers in the backseat, screaming frantically. Whoever chained us inside the van planted a bomb inside, minutes away from exploding.

Luckily, our unseen captor didn't deem it necessary to deprive me of my gun, nor did he chain me so tightly that I couldn't SHOOT THE CHAINS OFF (in my dreams, I'm surprisingly hardcore). I escaped the vehicle and started herding the rest of the frightened passengers out... into the parking lot of a local WinCo supermarket.

Winco: The Supermarket and Terrorist Low Price Leader?

One single passenger was still trying to make her way out of the van: a poor mother with a broken leg in a comically oversized cast, trying to juggle crutches, a diaper bag, and a screaming baby. How often have we all seen that? Well, except for the bomb part.

I ran back to the woman and took the baby from her arms so she could finish getting out of the car - and I swear to you that the baby I help looked exactly like this:

It's full of stars.

It was the strangest thing - I immediately felt this sense of attachment to the child, like its survival was suddenly somehow the most important thing in the world. I put my hand gently under the baby's head and cradled it close.

Then the mom told me I was doing it wrong and snatched the baby back.

I'm not sure exactly what happened next. Presumably, the van blew up and we all went shopping.

What the Devil...?

As much as I love comic books, I don't care a whole lot for the X-Men. This isn't a universal dislike - I grew up on the X-Men animated series theme song, and the second X-Men movie is about the best comic book movie out there. Still, anything involving the X-Men nowadays just doesn't catch my attention. Not sure why.

(Actually, I know EXACTLY why, but that's a post for another time - if I decide I care)

So, yeah, they're making another X-Men movie. Here's a picture:


Well, okay, I doubt that this is actually an official photograph (it couldn't scream Photoshop anymore if it had lips), but the actors' pictures I think are pretty accurate.

Now, these teaser images (the legit ones, at any rate) are supposed to drum up excitement for the upcoming movie, pique curiousity, get the potential audience to ask questions.

So I have a question: Who the crap is this?


Apparently, this is a character named Azazel. I've never heard of him before - and I thought I had all of the X-Men collector's cards. Guess I missed a few.

Apparently, this guy's Nightcrawler's father(?). Also, he's a demon or something. Here's the summary from Wikipedia:

"Azazel claims that many years ago an ancient horde of demonic mutants from biblical times called the Neyaphem were in an epic battle with a group of angelic over-zealous mutants, named the Cheyarafim. They were victorious in the battle and vanquished the "evil" mutants to an alternate dimension for all eternity. The Neyaphem's leader, Azazel, was the only one who was able to breach the dimensional void for brief periods of time due to his teleportation powers. His only hope to return to earth was by impregnating women because his children are linked to his dimension."

So, yeah, the next X-Men movie will feature a guy who may or may not be the devil who ran around and impregnated as many women as he could?

Get me a ticket for the midnight show!

A Nice Night for Detecting

I've been watching a lot of Sherlock recently, which probably explains where this sketch came from.

Also would explain why the guy on the left looks a bit like Benedict Cumberbatch.

BONUS

I actually had a friend ask me to do a sketch of her, so I pulled her picture up on Facebook and copied it. So, yeah, that's where this came from.

Why I'm Still Single 26

"Bad Bad Leroy Brown" on Expert is surprisingly difficult.

A Night for Dancing

One year later, and I STILL have trouble with drawing women...

Wishful Thinking

I KNEW those days of playing Contra as a kid would pay off some day!

Fiction and Charity

"Ye are the light of the world. A city that is set on an hill cannot be hid.

Neither do men light a candle, and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick; and it giveth light unto all that are in the house.

Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven." (Matthew 5:14-16)

For the longest time (ever since a friend of mine told me I was "hiding my candle" when I didn't want to sing a solo in church), I've associated the above passage from the gospel of Matthew with the proper use of talents. Basically, my philosophy has been that people blessed with gifts should try to use those gifts to help other people.

Since my ultimate ambition in life is to be a FICTION writer, I've been trying to figure out how, exactly, someone who tells stories for a living can make a real, measurable positive impact in the world. Truth be told, I wasn't quite sure that it's possible (unless you totally sell out your religion).

Then I came across this news story:

In short, orphanages all over Japan started receiving donations from sources that identified themselves as "Naoto Date," the alter-ego of a fictional wrestler named Tiger Mask.

I did a little bit of research on the character: Tiger Mask played a "villainous" wrestlers (because, apparently, in professional wrestling, you have to choose a side) until he realized he was inspiring orphan children to also want to be evil. He then switched sides and started fighting for right... or something.

I don't know if the story of Tiger Mask in and of itself is so spectacular that it actually inspired people to go out and be charitable, but this particular slew of donations has inspired imitators, including donations made in the name of Japanese folk hero Momotaro.

Basically, this is like someone making a donation to charity and putting it under the name "Davey Crockett," WHICH IS AWESOME.

I've often looked at good fiction as being something that's just kinda "there," like a soft blanket - comforting, warm, reassuring, but not strictly necessary. Now, my opinion hasn't really changed, but I do have to say that it astounds me to no end that fictional characters can actually help compel people to do this kind of tangible good.

Seriously, beyond giving people tickets for one free admission to the Rapture, I doubt there's much more good fiction CAN do.

5 Best And Worst Songs from 2010

I took a look at the Billboard Hot 100 for 2010, and decided to compile a list of my favorite (and least favorite) songs of the year. 2010 is the first year I really spent listening to popular music on the radio since high school. Maybe I'm just getting old, but it seemed like a pretty bad year - most of the music I heard was AWFUL. Still, I did manage to find some songs that I really liked - which probably implies that I have terrible taste in music.

Basically, here's my sole criterion - if the song makes me feel like I need to dance while driving, then it made the list.

5 - Break Your Heart
Man, what a cocky song! Listening to this song is like having bullets of pure hubris fired into your ears. I don't know who sounds cockier - singer Taio Cruz or Ludacris. Either way, I got a kick out of it.

4 - DJ Got Us Fallin' in Love
I've never really been an Usher fan before now, but I couldn't help but get into the wild enthusiasm of this song. Actually, this song would probably be a little higher on my list if not for Pitbull's verse on the track. Man, that guy...

3 - Club Can't Handle Me
I don't know what it is - there's just some part of me that really enjoys Flo Rida's monotone swagger. Plus, I love the way he rhymes "business" and "ridiculous." It must be nice to live in a universe where that makes sense.

2 - Ridin' Solo
Here's a song that just hit me at the right time - I got to feelin' a little bit insecure about my single status. Then this song comes along and says, "Hey! It's okay."

I know, I know. Cheesy.

1 - Magic
This song is just about the most fun I've had listening to music since I don't remember when. I can't help but have fun when everyone else involved in the production so obviously is as well - and that's definitely a good thing.

***

You may have noticed I felt the need to apologize for most of the songs on my list. See, I feel like I maybe SHOULDN'T like those songs, but I do anyway. Unfortunately, I think that's a bad omen for what the rest of the year was like musically. Here are my least favorite songs:

5 - Haven't Met You Yet
I don't... DISLIKE Michael Bublé. Actually, he has a mighty fine voice. This particular song, though, just IRKS me. I think I saw the lyrics to the song on too many lonely-heart Facebook walls for me to take it seriously anymore.

4 - Fireflies
It's perfectly fine for a song to be sweet and syrupy, but this song just REEKS of calculated sincerity. Not to mention that it's annoying as a hair in your mouth.

3 - OMG
Putting this song here actually makes me feel a little better about liking Usher's OTHER song so much. The song's bland, monotonous, and, to top it all off, offensively weak. Some subjects make strong foundations for good music. Your last text message... generally doesn't.

2 - Tik Tok
Grrr... THIS GIRL. Everything about Kesha (and I refuse to spell that name otherwise) BUGS me, from her valley girl "Clueless" voice to... actually, it's mainly her voice (but her mall-brat-meets-trailer-trash wardrobe doesn't help things). It's like she's trying to make everything she says sound dirty. Her music seriously sounds like she's WINKING the whole time - and that doesn't even make sense. Her music makes my brain turn into nonsense.

I decided to only include one song from each singer on my list for least favorite songs of 2010 to add a little variety. If I were being 100% honest, my least favorite songs of the year would include no one but Kesha and...

1 - Teenage Dream
Katy Perry.

By my perception, Katy Perry has built her entire career on weak shock value and low-cut dresses. She's definitely not famous for her voice - she sounds more than a little bit like Slappy Squirrel. And then there's the song itself - a ballad to the "sweet euphoria of being a teenager in love." Maybe I'm the only one that thinks this, but teenage love SUCKED. It was all neck-snapping mood swings, raging hormones, and regret - pretty much the exact opposite of "Teenage Dream."

Holy crap... It just occurred to me that I'm complaining about how today's music leads teenagers to sex. I AM getting old.

(By the way, if you're wondering why I didn't include Lady Gaga on here, let me remind you that I've said all I'm going to say about her).

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have some kids to chase off my lawn.

The Book Club

Y'know, after all this time drawing these guys, I'm still not sure whether or not that robot actually WORKS or not.

Top 5 Pushing Daisies Episodes

I don’t think I’m overstating things when I say that Pushing Daisies is the heaven-sent pinnacle of prime-time television that literally spewed love and glitter from the screen. The thought of the show’s cancellation still short-sheets my soul, but I can lounge out with a little bit of luxury thanks to my seven-DVD collection. I’ve been going through the show again, and, with every episode, I find myself in a giddy fit of giggles over the eye-popping visuals, dazzling dialog, and utterly charming characters.

Picking favorites from among these televised gems is like having to choose a favorite child when all of your children are independently wealthy and incredibly generous with their love and riches. Still, here are my top five:


5 – Pie-Lette

Pushing Daisies, for me at least, works as a series because of the wild imagination brought to the little screen in every episode. That train of imagination left the station with a hearty burst of creative steam. Ned and Emerson team up to solve the murder of Ned’s childhood sweetheart. The first episode of Pushing Daisies brought us our first glimpse of lovably neurotic aunts Lily and Vivian Charles, the magic powers of Ned’s finger, and, of course, the life-loving enthusiasm of a girl named Chuck.

4 – Circus Circus

The second season of Pushing Daisies lost a lot of the charm the first season had (I suspect but can’t confirm that budget cuts may have been responsible). However, the second episode, focusing on a young girl’s suspicious disappearance and a string of murders surrounding a travelling circus group, proves that the show still had some mileage left to it. Too bad the same couldn’t be said for the clown car run off the road and the twenty or so gaudily-painted bodies inside…


3 – Bitter Sweets

Ned makes such a good super-powered private eye that it’s sometimes easy to forget that he’s also a business owner and talented pastry chef. This episode focuses on the business side of Ned’s life, as he is forced to compete with a pair of dastardly confectioners and their underhanded business practices. Bitter Sweets also highlights Emerson Cod’s personal ability and intellect, showing that, even without supernatural help, the man is a fine detective.


2 – Window Dressed to Kill

Another episode which takes our main characters and puts them in situations we’re not used to seeing them in. Ned, taking a break from resurrecting after experiencing some personal trauma, decides to “try on” a relationship with Olive while helping her former kidnappers flee the country. At the same time, Chuck and Emerson track down the murderer of a store window dresser as her devotees mourn her loss. All that, plus a resurrected rhinoceros.


1 – Fun in Funeral

The third episode of Pushing Daisies is the first one I ever saw, so my attachment to it is a little sentimental. That said, I still feel “Fun in Funeral” is the strongest episode of the entire series. When Ned decided to let Chuck live in “Pie-lette,” he let another man – a thieving funeral home owner, die. The moral consequences of Ned’s actions are difficult to sort through, but the show deals with it with its usual charm, humor, and sophistication, proving that the magic of the first two episodes wasn’t accidental.

***

Just about every episode is worth watching. Looking back over this list, I realize I’m missing a LOT of great moments from the series: Ned’s magician half-brothers, the polygamist dog-breeder, and pretty much every Olive Snook solo.

That said, there is ONE (and ONLY ONE) episode of this show that I can safely say I don’t like. Heck, I’d maybe even say that I HATE this episode. Going with the Sophie’s Choice analogy again, this episode is like the child that is independently wealthy and generous but has an unfortunate inclination towards serial murder.


:-( – Kerplunk

The final episode of the series actually works in a lot of ways – a fittingly over-the-top mystery, fantastic visuals, and the climax of one of the most significant plot threads of the series. However, since the ultimate fate of the show was, at the time the episode was written, unclear, a half-hearted attempt was made to wrap up EVERY dangling plot thread. In trying to wrap up the whole series in a pretty bow, they left a lot of gaping holes in the package. “Kerplunk” is the most dissatisfying conclusion to any show I think I’ve ever seen, and it downright sucks. Given another season, the show could have easily concluded without leaving any mysteries unexplained, and Pushing Daisies would have just been a fantastic bite of fairy-tale sugar. Sadly, this final episode leaves a bit of a bitter aftertaste.

Power Panels 3

Every comics fan out there should pick up the Flight anthology. Each volume contains a massive collection of short stories in comic form. Admittedly, not every story works, but the level of experimentation and creative energy that goes into these stories is admirable.

The second volume is probably my favorite of the bunch, and Sonny Liew's "Dead Soul's Day Out" seems to have made the biggest impression on me.

I've only read the Malinky Robot stories that appear in Flight. As near as I can tell, the stories center on two orphan boys, Atari and Oliver, who spend their days begging and scrounging up enough money to go watch their favorite science fiction giant robot movies.

Gripping, right?

Actually, these stories usually contain some surprisingly poignant moments. For a medium that allegedly doesn't do music well, "Dead Soul's Day Out" finds an effective use for musical lyrics. The story begins with Atari on the street, singing a song for coin:


Later, after finding some money on the ground and catching a giant robot flick, the boys find out their friend Misha is moving. Atari watches her leave just as the rain starts to come down:


In case you can't see it, the words to the apple song are hidden in the rain. The effect is surprisingly haunting - the music enhances the bittersweet atmosphere of parting with a dear friend. It's the closest I've ever seen a comics panel come to incorporating real background music, and it's surprisingly effective.

Karaoke Night

New Year's Writing

I started with my New Year's writing goal on Monday of this week. Three days in, and I already remember why I've had so much trouble with any novels I've planned in the past.

Writing prose is HARD WORK. Especially when you actually care about what you're writing.

See, for NaNoWriMo, what I wrote didn't really matter. The idea was to just write as much as I could, regardless of how good it was. I wound up writing a lot of garbage - flecks of gold in the middle, certainly, but there's a lot to be trimmed out.

I've been having difficulty figuring out how to incorporate character description into my prose, especially in the opening paragraphs, which are supposed to be engaging. For a bit of guidance, I turned to a book I read back in college, Disgrace by Nobel-prize winning author J.M. Coetzee. I wanted to see how he described his main character in the first chapter.

He didn't.

Oh, that's not to say the reader doesn't learn a lot about David Lurie. We learn about his divorces, his sexual history, and - most importantly - his attachment issues.

It's an uncomfortable read.

However, we never learn (at least in this first chapter) what exactly the main character LOOKS like. It kinda makes me rethink my assumptions on how important physical description IS.

I'm gonna have to take another look at the books I read and how the writing progresses. I'm new to prose fiction, so I'm still learning the mechanics.

This is gonna be fun.

The Game is Survival