Slouching Towards Bethlehamster

“Winter Is Coming” shirts are now IN THE STORE!!! [based on this comic]

Me, Randy Milholland, David Willis, Danielle Corsetto, Jeph Jaques, Rob Denbleyker and MORE will be at the Dragon’s Lair Webcomic Rampage panel/signing event on December 10th and 11th. It is always a good time. Austin Fancy Bastard should NOT miss it.

When I heard the new TV spot for Alvin & The Chipmunks 3: ~~Chips Ahoy~~ Chipwrecked (heard as opposed to saw because why would I look up?) I did the auditory equivalent of a double-take. Did Alvin actually just quote Charlie Sheen (and all of early 2011 America) by exclaiming, “WINNING!”? Was this anthro-rodent, intended for entertainment consumption by children repeating the mental instability battle cry that propelled one Mr. Carlos Estivez (AKA Charlie Sheen, AKA The Blood Tiger, AKA Charlie Llello, AKA The Hot Shot: Part Douche) into the hearts and fever dreams of the American media?

A few days went by and I started to think that I had misheard, so I went and dug up all five Chipwrecked trailers that have aired since July of this year. “Winning” did not appear in a single one of them. Not only had I completely lost my mind, but worse yet I had to think of a new comic idea. I Googled and Googled until my fingers bled. Then I came up with a search result that might just be the golden despair nugget I had been searching for. It was a Youtube video titled simply “Gaga, Shazam, Winning!” Before clicking the link, I called my lawyer and made sure those words would not only be the only words spoken at my funeral, but also emblazoned across my headstone in Comic Sans. Sure enough “Winning” was cut into a TV spot, but not any of the official trailers. I wonder if it actually appears in the movie. I wonder if Theodore marries a Kardashian or Simon reads from Mein Kampf.

COMMENTERS: What other despicable catch phrases or questionable celebrity acts could The Chipmunks glom onto? What completely inappropriate context could they be used in and what pop song would they sing immediately afterward? Feel free to re-subtitle the movie as well. Also, why did they bother to have celebrities voice all the Chipmunks and Chipettes only to pitch modulate them out of any recognizability?

Bonus Points for giving a premise and title to subsequent Chipmunks movies. Alvin discovers BSDM in Alvin & The Chipmunks 4: Whipmunks and Chains! You’ll BALL your eyes out from laughing until you GAG!

ANOTHER THING! I was a guest on Earwolf’s The Wolf Den Podcast. We talk about the beginnings of HE, The Experiment and making a living doing the thing you love doing. I had a fun time, and I think it was a pretty interesting conversation.

Behind Enemy Lines

Fighting Time Lords hoodies are at Sharksplode right now! Wibbly Wobbly Hoodie Warmy!

I was a guest on Earwolf’s The Wolf Den Podcast. We talk about the beginnings of HE, The Experiment and making a living doing the thing you love doing. I had a fun time, and I think it was a pretty interesting conversation.

The discovery of strontium in Peru’s water supply is only the most recent evidence of how the gays are trying to gay us all gay. It is well established that Josh is working his way up the ranks of the secret gay cabal that controls all media, the world banks, and the appletini industry. Call them what you will, The Body Builder-bergers, the Fierce Masons or The Illumi-naughty, they are out to remake the world in their image and frankly that image is just fabulous. If you want to know who’s really behind all of this, just follow the strontium. It goes all the way to the top. All the way to Big Molybdenum.

COMMENTERS: How are the gays gaying you gay? Heavy metals in your water? They keep putting cucumber slices in mine, and dammit, it’s working.

House Of Swine And Frog

Fighting Time Lords hoodies are at Sharksplode right now! Wibbly Wobbly Hoodie Warmy!

Randy from Something*Positive is offering a print of the “The Purring Sea” watercolor he did for this HE guest comic. GO BUY IT!

Speaking of Randy, he, I, David Willis, Danielle Corsetto, Jeph Jaques, Rob Denbleyker and MORE will be at the Dragon’s Lair Webcomic Rampage panel/signing event on December 10th and 11th. It is always a good time. Austin Fancy Bastard should NOT miss it.

While I must admit that I viewed it through rainbow connection colored glasses, having grown up with The Muppet Show, Fraggle Rock, Muppet Babies, and basically everything The Henson company put out in the 70’s, 80’s or early 90’s, The Muppets is essentially a perfect movie. When it is funny, it is REALLY funny. The first act as a good LOL at least every 2-3 minutes. Act 2 slows down a bit as we get to the emotional stuff (more of that later ) and act 3 finishes hilariously strong. When I wasn’t laughing, I just had a perma-grin from ear to nostril to nostril to ear. And it wasn’t just that it was funny. It was THE WAY it was funny. There was something genuine about the comedy. Like people of all ages and walks of life would laugh at these jokes because they were just plainly, humanly funny. The comedy was so relatable because it didn’t depend on current trends, or specific references (like HE does ((though HE is for a VERY specific audience)) ). It was universal and timeless.

When things got serious or emotional, it was hard to choke back the tears. When Kermit wonders if anyone really cares about The Muppets any more, you hear the humans behind (or beneath) The Muppets wondering the same thing. When Kermit and Piggy talk about their relationship it doesn’t even seem like a movie (much less one about felt frogs and foam pigs), but rather a real couple trying to figure out if they still need each other.

Jason Siegel and Amy Adams both do a superb job of anchoring the story to reality without getting in the way of the real stars. The humans in the story seem to live in a sort of absurdist reality that straddles the line between Pee Wee’s Playhouse and Pee Wee’s Big Adventure. It is a world that allows for Muppets to be real people and for song and dance numbers to break out at any time. Speaking of, all of the songs (penned by Flight Of The Conchords’ Bret MacKenzie) are good, and a few of them are great.

The Muppets is a 2 hour thank you to long time Muppet fans and a love letter to Jim Henson and his legacy, while still being accessible to new audiences. If you have kids that aren’t familiar with The Muppets, I would see it once without them to fully enjoy all of the call backs to Muppet history, then again with the whole family. Then see it again, just because it’s great.

Muppet nerd stuff:

The guy that took over Piggy and Fozzy from Frank Oz does a SPOT ON Piggy and a 90% perfect Fozzy. It was a little eerie.
This is the first post-Jim Henson Muppet production where I thought Steve Whitmire’s Kermit REALLY sounded like Kermit. His voice was soft, shaky, unconfident and revealed a character who’s had a couple of decades to reflect on his glory days.
They digitally removed all the arm rods! I could not stop looking for them.

I hear Frank Oz thinks they didn’t stay true to the characters. I also hear Frank Oz is a bit of a curmudgeonly dick these days. Does he think the later Star Wars movies were true to the characters? Sure Yoda had some lightsaber battles, but basically everything else was horrible. Frank, you passed the porcine gauntlet on 10 years ago. Stop being a cranky old coot and understand that Jim would have loved this movie and been proud of everyone that made it.

Side Note: There was a time in my childhood where all I wanted in the world was to be a Muppeteer. I practiced puppetry for hours at a time, I studied the techniques for performance that Henson had pioneered, I read books about his history and his work… I was obsessed. I saw in The Muppets the as ultimate escape. They were imagination personified in foam and fabric. I still consider Jim Henson to be one of my largest early influences and doubt I would be drawing silly internet cartoons for a living if not for the characters he created.

COMMENTERS: Did you see The Muppets? What did you think? Were you a fan as a kid? Any particular bits of Muppet history that stick out to this day? Pigs In Space? Veterinarian’s Hospital? Nanny’s crazy-ass socks?

Once You Get To Know Him…

Fighting Time Lords hoodies are at Sharksplode right now! Wibbly Wobbly Hoodie Warmy!

I guess Frank Miller views the Internet as one big, rickety porch he can sit on, balling his fists and shaking a rake at “those damn kids” while incomprehensibly ranting heavenward about “rapists” and “whores,” and “Islamicism,” and “lawns,” “getting off of said lawns” and “all the XBox’ing.” It’s a shame when you have to reevaluate your respect for art when you find out the artist is a bit of a deranged, racist prick. I suppose Frank Miller’s more d-bagged tendencies are well know throughout those that follow comics proper. I was well aware of his “influential comics dude” status, but more so with his name being attached to movies that I rather enjoyed. Maybe each of his adapted works should include an asterisk after his name.

Frank Miller’s* Sin City
*That guy is a cantankerous fuck

Frank Miller: Occupy Wall Street ‘Louts, Thieves & Rapists,’ Comic Writer Says

COMMENTERS: Feel free to post your general thoughts on Frank Miller’s OWS rant. Is it harder to enjoy art when you learn the creator is a rapist, thieving lout… I mean, an asshole?

I’m At The Pizza Hut. I’m At The Taco Bell.

Fighting Time Lords hoodies are at Sharksplode right now! Wibbly Wobbly Hoodie Warmy!

Pizza is a vegetable, pepper spray is a food product, rubber bullets are legumes and tear gas is just really enthusiastic onions.

COMMENTERS: Please find more “healthy” foods and weapons to put a “positive spin” on. Jelly doughnuts are fruit, tacos are salad boats with optional meat and a sniper rifle fired through a can of cheeze-whiz is a your recommended daily dose of dairy.