Wafflin' Wednesday

Random sharing of online oddities for you this morning... I'm midweek in my CCS teaching schedule and in Neil Gaiman book land every other available minute, so I'm just not in a blogging frame of mind this AM. Still, here's something or three to spark your day, if you're so disposed.

21st Century Goona-Goona

Battle at Kruger: "I can't stop watching it. I'm obsessed with these water buffaloes protecting their baby. Warning: If you're freaked out by wild animals attacking each other, you might not like this." - Sarah Stewart Taylor

Ever since the early 1900s, filmmakers amateur and professional have been cranking cameras to catch unique moments in the lives and deaths of wildlife from around the globe. The more exotic the animals, the more savage the action, the wider the audience. They used to call these 'goona-goona' films in the wake of the 1930 shot-in-Bali curio Goona Goona, and whether they were distributed by major studios (Dark Rapture, etc.) or roadshowed out of the back seat of huckster's cars (Ingagi, most elusive and once the most successful of all goona-goona), the animal action would back asses into seats. Well, OK, the native nudity helped. The Walt Disney True-Life Adventures, the 1970s wildlife features from Sunn International, cable TV Shark Week and Animal Planet and Fox TV fare like When Animals Attack are all part of this venerable tradition, and here's the most recent slice of

21st Century goona-goona to kiss my eyes, and this'll have you jumping out of your seat.

Thanks to fellow CCS instructor and vet mystery novelist Sarah Stewart Taylor for that link!

Say What -- ??

"Oh you gain flesh": CCS senior Penina Gal posted this incredible link, the most hilarious subtitling job imaginable on a familiar artifact of American pop culture,

and funny stuff whether you're an Arrested Development fan or not (I'm not). Fans of Hong Kong and Asian films have savored decades of insane subtitles, and we all have our personal favorites, but this case history beats 'em all!

Bissette Art on Ebay

I've held off posting ebay links for the various slices of my past that have popped up in the past few months -- they're not my auctions -- but here's a blast from the past you might wish to bid on if you get this in time (the auction ends later today). This is of interest, perhaps, as it's one of my rare wash comics works from the early 1980s, and one of my few Marvel Comics gigs I'm still pretty much proud of (except for a couple of really rushed pages -- brrrrrrrr, there's a couple of stinkers in this otherwise solid piece of work). Plus, it's going for cheap, so give it a look --

This vintage Bissette page (scripted by Steve Perry) from the Marvel Comics Bizarre Adventures story "The Blood Bequest" could find a new home today --

-- thanks to Mark for sending the link along this AM.

This particular page was completed with an assist from Rick Veitch (look like Veitch laid it out and likely pencilled the first panel), who lettered the entire story. This is also one of a handful of pages in this story directly referencing the Marv Wolfman/Neal Adams origin of Dracula story from Marvel's Dracula Lives! black-and-white zine. This was the last Marvel gig I completed before John Totleben and I began work on Saga of the Swamp Thing, and my last wash comics creation for any publisher except Scholastic: the shoddy, inconsistent quality of printing in those days destroyed the work that went into these pages.

OK, better blogging tomorrow, promise.

Have a woolly Wednesday, one and all...

MoCCA Morning!

Day One of MoCCA begins -- and here's a quick update on some of the other CCSer comics available there today (and soon online; links to follow, post-MoCCA), before today's interview marathon...

See last night's post -- below -- for a quick eleventh-hour update on Zombies (this handsome, horrible Accent UK anthology will be for sale at the CCS table!) and Sean Morgan's Capsule: The First Dose, with the Morgan/Bissette jam alien abduction story.

Though I won't be at MoCCA, much new (and old) work by yours truly is there -- and I made sure to sign and do a sketch in every copy of Capsule, sign all the Zombies covers, and sign and do a sketch in many copies of Sundays before they were packed up and spirited away to MoCCA for this morning's setup! Look for 'em, ask for 'em, buy 'em!

But enough on that, here's a quick wake-up call to some of the CCSers we didn't have time to interview (or post interviews for) who are at MoCCA this weekend with new work:

Penina Gal has two new comics at MoCCA:

THE is "a collection of short comics about how people react to snow, how trees react to people, scientists exploring dreams, and the race between a turtle and rabbit. Two books in one -- the mini's got a mini-mini! Screen-printed covers..."

Penina is also offering a second comic, Through the City -- "A short story (eight single-panel pages) about a man reminiscing while trying to make his way out of a city. Full color, written, drawn, and painted by me, with backgrounds photographed by

the insanely talented JP Rosa..."

These two Penina Gal creations are at MoCCA this weekend,

and available from I Know Joe Kimpel afterwards.

Ditto on Matt Young's The Good Catholic, his nifty solo anthology of stories and art, which is now on sale at MoCCA.

We've also got an interview with Matt ready to run, but I'm saving it for Sunday AM!

Here's the front cover of Sundays, photographed (by Joe Lambert) drying on the silk screen rack this past weekend.

Remember, the oversized anthology Sundays is at MoCCA -- if you're at MoCCA, rush to the Sundays table and snag a copy while they last. These will be a coveted treasure in the near future, lots of great reading and art!

Here's another shot from my Sundays page, "Mighty Tyrant in Slumberland" (and he is, too).

The full wraparound cover to Sean Ford's Only Skin #1, now on sale at MoCCA!

Sean's Only Skin cover is a reminder that we've already covered a lot of ground with these Myrant interviews, and I want to remind folks of the great books that are at the CCS, Sundays and other tables today.

They'll all be on sale via online venues, too, after this weekend, and I'll post that info as well as it's available.

As time permits this weekend, I'll also post links to all the CCS/MoCCA interviews I've posted for easier one-stop reference. It's been a heady couple of weeks, and it's all about today -- I'll get a new interview (three more to go!) up ASAP!

________________________

Here's the first:

First interview of the weekend: Bryan Stone generously provided an interview about the Sundays anthology, but I coaxed a solo interview from Bryan about his work. He and his wife Amanda Ann have made this year a really special one, and it's a pleasure to share Bryan's vision and voice with you via this venue.
_________________________

Bryan Stone:
Frogherder

SB: What's your background -- where you are from, Bryan?

BRYAN STONE: I actually grew up right on the dividing line of two towns in central Alabama, Munford and Coldwater. The area was, and is, pretty typical of the south.

I went to elementary and high school in Munford. After that I went on to a community college in the closest town and from there to a college called Jacksonville State University about an hour from where I grew up. The whole college thing was a slow and terrible process. Most of the time I was working and taking classes.

Photo: Amanda Ann's leg, Bryan Stone, beer, beer. What more does a man need?

SB: When did you first get into comics?

BRYAN: I first got into comics when I was really young, probably 5 or 6. There was a drug store close to the grocery store that we shopped at that carried some Marvel stuff. The first book that I can remember buying was a G.I. Joe comic with Stormshadow on the cover... I think it took place on an aircraft carrier. After that point I would grab any comics that I could get my hands on because stuff just wasn't available.

SB: How about making your own comics -- ?

BRYAN: I remember drawing comics type stuff off and on for most of my life. The first thing that I did that saw print was a one page story called "Mr. Smiley" which was about this guy who was some kind of super hero with something like a big smiley face for a head. I think he was half alien. That got printed by a local guy, Derrick Samuels, who was putting together a comics anthology called Sin. That was in 1996.

SB: You just completed your first year at CCS, and will be into your senior year in the fall. White River Junction is a long haul from Alabama; what brought you to CCS? How did you find out about the Center?

BRYAN: When I was in my final year at JSU I read about CCS in a design magazine -- How, I think. I had just gotten married and my wife, Amanda Ann, and my drawing professor and good friend Gary Gee were both incredibly supportive about the idea so we worked for a year to save as much money as possible and moved to Vermont.

Frogherder Stories

SB: We talked about Sundays earlier this week. What’s your latest solo work debuting at MoCCA?

BRYAN: My new comic is called Frogherder Stories. I'm hugely influenced by the stuff like the Fraggles [Fraggle Rock], anything of Jim Henson's for that matter, and Peyo's Smurfs. On the other hand I've always been a really big fan of science fiction story telling, hard sci-fi or space opera. I guess Frogherder is a result of those obsessions.

The Frogherder story is set on a planet called Noria which was discovered by a handful of humans after fleeing a dying Earth. On the planet exist several different races which were all categorized by the humans. Nor'landers are the race that Frogherder Stories focuses on, more specifically a single Nor'lander family with the surname Frogherder.

Frogherder Stories

The family name Frogherder, as with all Nor'landers, is the name of their profession. The Frogherder family members that I focus on in this book are Timo, who has discovered that he has the ability to affect the world around him, especially plants, and Timo's brother Doogan and his family which consists of his wife Sira and his two children Skip and Sparrow.

SB: Bryan, you’ve been working on this concept for a number of years -- let’s get into this a bit. Where did Frogherder come to you, and when did you initiate writing and drawing his adventures?

BRYAN: I was in college at JSU in Alabama when I started working on Frogherder so it was probably around 2002. Initially the story focused on the entire Frogherder family but Timo's character had to be on his own I guess. A while after that I got involved in a webcomics contest called The Daily Grind which is a competition between cartoonists to see who can keep up a Monday through Friday comics posting schedule. I finished about three hundred and seventy strips. I guess I'd still be going if I hadn't moved to go to CCS.

SB: Hmmm, we've got to get you Alabama cartoonists together for Frogherder Meets Montgomery Wart -- y'hear, Mark Martin? OK, now, you've also completed another solo book for MoCCA -- what is it?

BRYAN: The new book is called Ominum Gatherum. I think it's really an attempt at defining myself for myself more than anything. I had also, for a long time, wanted a venue for publishing different types of stories under one title. I'll probably do two of these per year, or maybe more, depending on how much material I generate.

SB: You've had a very active first year at CCS. What are the highlights in terms of the work you've done, solo and collaborative?

BRYAN: Yeah, it's been a busy year. I think I'm happiest, or maybe just surprised by, the quicker one and two page stories that I've done at CCS like the 'Mountain and Me' comics that we did for your class and some of the shorter stuff that we generated for James [Sturm]. It's always amazing when you are able to take something as time consuming as comics and condense the process into just a few hours. I'm also very proud of my Frogherder work from this semester which is in the Frogherder Stories book. I felt like those stories were a big step for me.

I've worked on a few collaborative projects. The ones that come to mind as highlights are the Taking Care anthology from the first semester which is no longer available and the Sundays book that we're wrapping up now. Both have been invaluable experiences.

Jurassic Park, Beating Around the Bush-style, by Corey McDaniel & Bryan Stone

SB: What else, outside of CCS, have you done in the way of comics, online comics and minicomics?

BRYAN: The Frogherder webcomic was a pretty big deal for me. When I started it I had been doing a weekly comic called Beating Around The Bush for a year or two with a good friend named Corey McDaniel.

One of Corey McDaniel's solo Beating Around the Bush strips

Before that I had several projects that I tried to get off the ground including a story for a ten issue comics series called 749 Pace St. that I wrote with a couple friends, Lee Jiles, Nick Phillips and Corey again. We actually got pretty far with that one. We put together a mini with all the character info and story previews and such and took it to a Wizard con in Chicago. After that life got in the way for all of us and nothing else ever happened with the story. Even further back I was involved with a guy named Derrick Samuels who, I'm told, is the 'creator' of one of the biggest video game console debacles in the history of the industry. The 'EVO Console', that's a long story.

Bryan thinks this photo is hilarious: Derrick Samuels and the EVO Console --
do not ask Bryan or I anything about this! We know nothing!

Before all that he was determined to publish comics and he did a few books over the years to which I contributed several strips and pages along with my good friend Donald Beck. Derrick actually published the book with my very first comics story, "Mr. Smiley."

Right: Donald Beck art, "Wolf"

SB: What are your future plans for Frogherder?

BRYAN: I'd thought about pursuing a monthly series but I think I'm leaning toward a couple seventy or eighty page books but honestly I'm just trying to let it do what it needs to do. I've still got a ton of story to tell and I'm working very hard on getting my writing up to snuff so I can do it service.

SB: Do you have any other continuous characters and/or concepts in the works?

BRYAN: There are several stories that take place on the same planet, called Noria, that the Frogherder stories do. They mostly deal with the fate of post-Earth humans that find their way there. There's another story about a robot named Issac that also takes place there as well. Other than that I've got a couple stories that I'm pretty far into. One of my favorites at the moment is called Onion Head which is about this amateur astronomer who has an onion for a head. I guess it's kind of a messed up relationship story. There's a science fiction story that I've been working on that's about plant people which was inspired by an Astro Boy story. I'm actually very excited about that one. There are several others, there's just not enough time to draw everything!

SB: If there were no hurdles -- no time, money or income constraints, venue in place -- what would your dream project be?

BRYAN: I'd probably work on a few of the Frogherder books. For a while I felt like I was trapped by the Frogherder stuff because I was working on it so much but now I've realized that I really love it. After doing a couple of those I'd probably move on to another story so I could come back to it later with a fresh perspective.

SB: Thanks, Bryan, and good luck this weekend!

________________________

For more of Bryan and his work, visit Bryan's website

and his blog, always offering something lively.

If you missed MoCCA, Bryan's work will be available at I Know Joe Kimpel, too.

Next up: Joe Lambert's mighty, mighty interview and mighty, mighty art and comics!

Get thee to MoCCA, though, and meet all these folks -- and their work -- face to face!

Have a great Saturday --

We're Not Quite Done Yet, and Already We're Nostalgic:
The Infection of Time, Or,
A Sunday Morning Peek at
Joe Lambert's CCS Photos --

As I spend the weekend pouring over an incredible array of final thesis projects from the Center for Cartoon Studies seniors and gifts of final projects from most of the CCS freshmen (soon to be seniors!), I'm moved to steer you to

Joe Lambert's pix of the May 2nd CCS Drawing Workshop session in my new backyard,

which was immediately followed that very afternoon with a drawing session from this miniature city we had constructed the week before -- a whirlwind of activity Joe has also documented via pix (scroll down to Joe's "Box City" photo album posting).

Left: Morgan Piellizilla. Hey, we still have to 'Godzilla' the city, guys and gal!

All of Joe's pix illuminate this old Myrant post on a recent Drawing Workshop exercise, if you want more context --

-- and although we're only two days past the completion of final projects (for both classes), I'm already revisiting and working on revised Drawing Workshop syllabus outlines to streamline and improve the whole two-semester effort for next year. Sigh. So little time, so much to draw and teach.

Joe's blog is always worth a visit, currently opening with photos from the CCS trip to Montreal (including a peek inside the Drawn & Quarterly offices, for those curious about that megalithic corporate universe) and other CCS activities. Thanks, Joe!

(More CCS in Montreal pix are here, compliments of fellow freshmen Penina Gal. Thanks, Penina!)

Here's a link to a venue for some of Joe's comics, too, which are -- well, excellent.

(Fair is fair: since I'm linking in thanks to Joe's sites, Penina's fine illos and comics creations are also visible here, and they're pretty damned good, too.)

Now, before I get into today's intensive reading, re-reading and note-taking from the thesis projects, I'm off to the flea market -- yep, it's that time of year.

Clear, sunny, but cold -- ah, flea market season in a new part of Vermont. What wonders await me?

Have a great Sunday, one and all --

Yip! Yip! Yip!

In
the
Realm
of
the
New
Cartoonists...

Hey, all -- Be sure to read the earlier post today (Bava! Tim! Donna! Below!), as that's the big news today (well, to me, anyhoot) -- but as promised, here's some more links to the CCS sites & blogs the students have created.

It's a wide-open dreamspace, doorways to much inspiration, hard work and new voices and visions.

Don't be shy, check 'em out, and please, let them know what you think!

The ever-humble, ever-drawing JP Coovert keeps the ink flowing and comics glowing here, though they're having a bit of a prob with the site just now -- still, go have a peek, and make yourself known.

A bit closer to the apocalypse, ink-slinging Sean Ford spices this site with his distinctive fusions of darkness and light, ink and white.

Here be Chuck Forsman, whose canine Cerberus seems to keep Chuck from posting much; don't mind the pup, his bark is worse than his blog! -- ah, heck, his dog is guarding the blog, like I said, but you'll be OK. Check it out!

Stripy Green Tomato is the reservation Penina Gal hangs at in virtual space, and her site is pretty inventive -- take some time to navigate it, you'll not be sorry!

More tomorrow!

See, Your Tuesday Is Already Better Than You Know...

Hallelujah! We've averted another potential catastrophe!

James Cameron unveiled the coffins, and the world did not end.

I need say no more.

Some of you frequenting this blog may recall

I didn't have much use for Neil LaBute's atrocious remake of The Wicker Man,

and despite the promise of an "alternative ending not seen in theaters!", I've had no desire whatsoever to revisit LaBute's atrocity on DVD. The only way to revisit the film, or sample its hilarity, is to do what CCS student Penina Gal does, and laugh heartily every single day at

this hilarious condensation of The Wicker Man remake highlights, including footage not in the theatrical cut I saw (the ludicrous bees-over-the-head sequence: "Not my eyes!")

The beehive-over-the-head bit is truly ludicrous.

I was still zonked with this cold yesterday, though by about 4 PM I was doing much better. Still in the zone earlier in the day, I caught The Number 23 matinee in Lebanon, and wasn't particularly impressed. Full review to follow as part of the ongoing Cine-Ketchup column, but suffice to say it's essentially a Hollywood

revamp of Lance Weiler's Head Trauma,

with family ties attached for optimum loss/redemption options in the final act.

Having completed prep for Peter Money and my big CCS Wednesday field trip (completing said final prep with Marge's help at our dining room table, studiously avoiding dining), Marge and I also darted out last night at her urgent request (she had a rough day at work yesterday) to see The Snake Pit (1947) at Bruce Posner's Cine-Salon screening series at the Hanover Library, and that was big fun. If nothing else, it put Marge's tough work day in stark relief as being a lot better than having a nervous breakdown over and over and waking up after repeated shock treatments to find months had passed and -- well, you get the idea. Marge claims not to know the function of horror movies, but whenever she needs a weepie like this one, it's clear she does understand fully, she just refuses to engage. Anyhoot, Olivia deHaviland's performance still engages, even if the sanitized view of big-city asylums (the 20th Century Fox madhouse still shocked audiences of its day; Frederick Wiseman's Titicut Follies exposed the real conditions of such institutions two decades later) and streamlined Hollywood take on psychiatry pitch into the risible when seen today.

I awoke this morning not wearing a water balloon filled with A-number-one snot on my neck, so the cold is at last passing.

On to Marge.

No playing hooky today -- full day of work, off I go!

Wugga-wugga and the CCS Sites!

Art: Alexis Frederick-Frost, from his glorious site, link below!

Continuing the CCS student site roster, with a little window-dressing.

Once again, in no particular order, the secret windows to those you don't-yet-know, but will one day be beholden to, those who will upset all applecarts and elect far better Presidents than you sorry suckers did:

BUBBLE!

... with delight,
blurbling like some half-frozen brook
all over your own stupid self,
as you allow your retina to dance
and your optic nerve to tangle
and your brain soup to flow
like radiant water over the

the Stone-Dead Stylings of Bryan Stone!

BURBLE!

... and coo like some moronic all-parakeet movie,
dropping your flip-flops and
burning your Birkenstocks
while groping for your credit cards
as you let your wallet flop out
and your pocketbook pop open,
eager to spend that which cannot be spent
and divine the most delicious salad
from the salad days of all mankind amid

the Stripy Green Tomato Veggie-Stand of the Particular Penina Gal (rhymes with 'all')!

GURGLE!

... as you peddle
that last mile
up that final Alp,
rock uselessly in your chair
like an autistic child
as the roller-coaster climbs, climbs, climbs
to the top of the arc
seconds before the plunge,
long for yeasty Parisian loafs of bread
and pine for times that never were
and never will be again,
evocative though they may seem
when rendered by the man
with the brush whose
serving stroke cuts through the air
like a Bruce Lee move,
dropping faint men in their tracks,
if, that is, they haven't already succumbed
to the bedazzlement that marks the

Eye-Popping Peculiarities of Ping-Pong Champ Alexis Frederick-Frost!

STUBBLE!

Hey, YOU!

You think YOU know everything, DON'T YOU?
You think YOU know how to
listen to music, surf the web, eat a taco??
You're soooooooooo fucking WRONG!
You don't know shit! Or how to shit!
You, you need guidance, love,
and the firm, stern hand of
a real man who knows how
to sling the ink,
plink the plink,
and lock the clink
to be your designated turnkey for LIFE!
You need to open your eyes,
stretch your ears
and break down the tight-ass gates of your fetid mind via

the Melodic Musings and Shamanistic Shamblings of Gasping Sam Gaskin!

STUMBLE!

...into the felt-green pleasures of Roosevelt Park,
as rendered and realized
by the Man with the Plan,
the Joe in the Know,
the Mike with his finger in the Dyke,
the Tom with the tom-tom toes,
the Henry all hanker for,
the Elmer Fudd of Spud,
the Dartmouth Grad unafraid to be a Dad
to any in need who can bleed and be freed,
so humble thyself and embrace

the Staff of Life itself, Adam Staffaroni,

and his amazing online CCS mini-comic shop, "I Know Joe Kimpel"! (who the hell is Joe Kimpel?)

C'mon, spend a little dough on some CCS comics, you slackers!

More later, gators, and have a great weekend!