The Skeletons of Cartoon Characters

i had come across these a long time ago and had forgotten about them. they came up again on tour for some reason, and i figured i’d post ‘em up here. i really love these, and natalie should use them for her anatomy project. *nudge nudge*

 

“Animatus” by Hyungkoo Lee

Bugs Bunny

Bugs Bunny

Bugs Bunny

Donald Duck and the nephews

Donald Duck

Huey, Dewey, Louie

Wile E. Coyote and The Roadrunner

Wile E. Coyote

The Roadrunner

The Roadrunner

 
Character Studies by Michael Paulus:

Hello Kitty

Hello Kitty

Charlie Brown

Fred Flintstone

Pikachu

Shmoo

Betty Boop

Bubbles

 

scott

Trains Are…Mint

Today, after rolling around until the mail came, I went to Chicago Comics (where the employees were pretty rude and the customers seemed to be stuck-up assholes… EG: I overheard one customer tell his less-enlightened friends very loudly in a condescending manner how Persepolis is something he discovered and it’s the greatest thing they’ve never heard of. Ughh). Anyway…Chicago Comics has a pretty great Small Press section along with a very substantial Self-Published section. I ended up buying Trains Are…Mint by Briton Oliver East. His writing is just okay, but his watercolors in a comic are fun to look at.

ninjagarden

-AM- Greatest Hits

Well, my semester is over and I just finished moving into my new place so I have time again. Time to write about nothing. I discussed GREATEST HITS collections with Allison Paynez awhile ago and now I’d like to talk about it some more.

Allison’s position was that they’re basically useless and I probably would have shared that sentiment a year ago. TODAY, however, I definitely see their value for a variety of reasons.

1) Prior to the 1960s, the ALBUM as a fully-formed, cohesive body of work was NOT the norm. Most albums prior to the 1960s were simply greatest hits albums with some filler added in, especially in genres like rock ‘n’ roll and its close relative country. So if you’re listening to music that’s 50 years old or older, you’re pretty going to HAVE to rely on compilations.

This isn’t even really an issue of time, either. Most hip-hop and electronic recording artists of the 1970s and early 1980s ONLY recorded singles. Hip-hop pioneers the Cold Crush Brothers never released a proper album but they’re historically significant and their compilation-only status shouldn’t be held against them. Similarly, almost all of the GOOD early Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five recordings were singles-only.

2) Not all artists make great albums but some of them make a whole lot of great individual songs. Perhaps the strongest example of this, ACCORDING TO MY TASTES, is David Bowie. Between Greg Guts and Ben Baierz I’ve heard several David Bowie albums in their entirety and I have yet to hear one that I really embrace as a whole. In spite of that, there are always a few songs on each album that I really like. Bowie has been a very prolific recording artist in his career and songs that I like by him have really piled up. Given that, I would be glad to listen to a Greatest Hits album by him, even if I don’t typically want to listen to complete albums by him.

3) My final point is that gReatest hitZ albums provide a snapshot of a band or even an era. This is especially valid for those that consider themselves serious musicians or perhaps musical historians of sorts. For example, old country or jazz recordings. For an individual that is slightly interested in 1940s honky tonk recordings but not wild about them, a nice, tidy little Hank Williams (Sr.) compilation provides a snapshot of the era provided by one of the best performers of the style.

What actually got me thinking about this topic (again) wasn’t even music but actually some comics I came across as I was moving out of my apartment this week. Since I was 10, I’ve had some interest in Dick Tracy comics by Chester Gould. A few years ago I decided to buy some book collections of his strips but they were all basically ‘greatest hits’ collections so I bought them reluctantly. A couple of years ago, IDW started printing ALL of the Tracy strips in sequence and I couldn’t realy hold interest. The Tracy greatest hits books reminded me that I might as well concentrate on the best stuff an artist creates rather than discount him or her or them because some of the lesser work is not as interesting. The End.

These are some writings on the same topic from DK Presents blog:

dkpresents.wordpress.com

I don’t necessarily agree with his lists but they’re well-reasoned.

kicknz

IMDBates: The Dark Knight

Here’s a link to a hilarious post on The Onion AV Club’s Link Blog, which presents some of the choicest debates raging within the forum on the IMDB page for The Dark Knight. It covers the contingent of women who think The Joker is sexy and how Maggie Gyllenhaal’s perceived lack of attractiveness almost ruined some posters’ enjoyment of the movie. So yeah, basically written by morons and parents-basment types. It’s long, but worth it:

 

http://www.avclub.com/content/blog/imdbates_the_dark_knight

 

miloprometheus

UPDATE . . . . . . Warner Bros. DC . . . ohhhhhhhh

Okay, I just watched Batman (like you’ve never seen him before) from 1989 and that is NOT an A movie. This throws my entire Warner Bros. DC list into doubt. I first saw this movie when I was 10 and loved it so hard I had sex with it. I’ve seen it many times but I guess maybe not for several years before tonight. I’m thinking I either watched it with a really critical eye for the first time or maybe The Dark Knight is just so good that this movie looks silly but whatever! The point is - this movie ain’t that great.

I can tell you what I loved about this movie when I was 10 - the Batsuit, the (few) hand-to-hand fight scenes, and Joker’s kewl one-liners. Well, now I realize that this batsuit is kinda clunky. For one thing, the head is really big. In the few shots where you can see Batman from the feet up, it’s pretty obvious as the head and shoulder pads are huge and then you look down and see Michael Keaton’s cute little chicken legs poking out from underneath the cape. The fights are pretty short and not as cool as they could be but they’re still okay. I’ll describe them now: 1) A swordsman swings his swords all over the place and Batman kicks him in the face. 2) In a cathedral, this dude does 30 backhandsprings before flying toward Batman with blades protruding from his boots (which is pretty cool) but Batman gets him in the nuts with his EXTENDING PALM . 3) A guy jumps at Batman and falls through the floor (pretty funny). 4) A big guy beats the shit out of Batman and then Batman’s Batchickenlegs pull him down a staircaise to his death.

The biggest issue with this movie is that it has no plot. I’ll sum it up for you: Gotham is turning 200 years old. There’s gonna be a party. Crime Boss’s Henchman is humping Crime Boss’s lady so Crime Boss sets up Henchman. Henchman becomes Joker, takes over crime and randomly does stuff that is bad. Batman randomly opposes him. Police do FUCKING NOTHING EVER. There’s a scene where Joker kills a dude on the courthouse steps and in the background you can see 2 cops just standing there doing NOTHING (and then they get shooted). Wait, is that part of the plot? In the newest movie, Joker basically does bad stuff randomly but at least he explains that he just thinks it’s fun. In this old movie, Joker seems half-crazy and half-just like any other crime boss.

This movie is campy, too, just like the old Batman TV show. When I was a kid I thought that the “new” 1989 Batman was dead serious and grim and awesome and the old show was silly but no, the 1989 movie is just silly in an ’80s way. I already mentioned the silly EXTENDING PALM on Batman’s glove. PS - Why did he implement such a feature? Was he really expecting to have to whack a guy in the nuts to avoid boot blades at some point? There’s a part where Batman flies in his Batwing jet and uses SCISSORS on the front of the jet to collect some parade balloons. ARGH! What was he planning for when designing the jet that he decided it should have scissors?

I dunno, man. This movie is a C.

kicknz

I very briefly grade all of the Warner Bros. DC Comics movies

* = I like it to some extent, even if has a bad grade

Superman: The Movie (A)
Superman II (A)
Superman III (C)*
Supergirl (C-)*
Superman IV: The Quest For Peace (D)*
Superman Returns (C)

Batman (A)
Batman Returns (A)
Batman Forever (C+)*
Batman & Robin (D)*
Batman Begins (A)
The Dark Knight (A+)

Steel (D)
Catwoman (F)
Constantine (B-)
V For Vendetta (B-)

kicknz

lol

I just watched the first half hour of CATWOMAN on YouTube. LOLOLOLOL Wow, it really lives up to the hype. It’s fucking awful. The script is awful, the acting is awful, the direction is just so self-satisfied. But it really doesn’t stop there, as there are inconsistencies in the audio mix, bad (but expensive) special effects, and silly computerized cinematography. Just stunning. I honestly believe that Batman and Robin and Superman IV: The Quest For Peace are much, much better films than this, and THAT’S SAYING SOMETHING.

Mirage Classics 4: TMNT short story collections

TURTLE SOUP (1986)
Mirage’s first forway into inviting indie creators to take a stab at a TMNT story. There were obviously no rules as many of the stories have very little to do with established TMNT continuity. A fun, random collection.

SHELL SHOCK (published 1989, collecting stories from 1985-1989)
Eastman & Laird and their cronies loved to create short stories featuring the TMNT. They shoved them anywhere they could: anthologies, benefit/charity publications, backpages in other creators’ series, etc. This awesome trade paperback collected all of those stories, plus some new ones from the likes of Stan Sakai and Michael Zulli. This might actually be more fun than the TPBs collecting full-length stories.

TURTLE SOUP VII 1-4 (1991-1992)
The Turtle Soup concept returns, featuring random, varied stories from the Mirage regulars, and guests like Mark Martin. IN COLOR OMG.

Mirage Classics Part 3: TMNT comics by Eastman & friends

After Eastman & Laird lost their interest in making comics together, Eastman occasionally recruited one of his friends/peers from the comics world to work on new TMNT stories with him. The results were always great, although the products reflect the influence of the guests much more than Eastman’s own style.

TMNT #18 (1989)
story: Mark Bode & Kevin Eastman
pencils: Mark Bode
inks: Kevin Eastman & Eric Talbot
The color reprint of this issue was the first Mirage comic I ever bought and it was sweet. Bode draws almost exactly like his famed father, Vaughn, but Eastman’s and Talbot’s inks give everything a ragged, hard edge that compliment the very uncharacteristic-for-Mirage story taking place in China and featuring a Bruce Lee wannabe.

TMNT #32 (1990)
story/pencils: Mark Bode
inks: Kevin Eastman & Eric Talbot
Another great issue that’s out of character. This time the Turtles go to Egypt to save April who, for SOME REASON, is a reporter, even though she’s a computer programmer in every other issue of the comic series. Huh?!

CASEY JONES: NORTH BY DOWNEAST #1 & 2 (1992/1993 Plastron Cafe Anthology, 1994)
story: Rick Veitch & Kevin Eastman
pencils: Rick Veitch
inks: Kevin Eastman
Veitch had been invited to work on some TMNT issues in the past but this time he undertook a Casey Jones solo story that originally ran, partially, in serialized form in an anthology title. The story is ridiculous - apparently there is a race of crab people living in the ocean. Who knew?!

BODYCOUNT #1-4 (1994, 1996)
story and pencils/roughs: Kevin Eastman
inks/finishes: Simon Bisley
Eastman’s pencils must have been really rough because the art looks 100% Bisley. Apparently, Eastman wanted to write the most violent, wild story he could and decided to include Raphael and Casey Jones. It’s actually a very fun, retarded story, with perfectly appropriate art by Bisley.

WATCHMEN: THE TRAILER

I know a lot of people here are big fans of Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’s seminal comic Watchmen. With that in mind, here is the trailer for the movie version directed by Zack Synder (300):

http://www.apple.com/trailers/wb/watchmen/

Discuss.

miloprometheus