This wasn’t the comic I had planned on making 24 hours ago. Originally, I had something else in mind. That is, until I saw part of Brian Carroll’s Instant Classic over the weekend where he had introduced a new character. In his words, a “large, jockish, ignorant, sexist Bostonian version of Tom Brazelton from his comic Theater Hopper.” The Jay Leno jaw was a nice touch.
He also made his version of my character the boyfriend of one of his leads. So that means the Instant Classic version of Tom might be around for a while. As a matter of fact, he’s already appeared in a second comic, so you might want to check that out as well.
Brian totally nailed me with the first comic where IC-Tom talks about seeing a movie with Jared. “Actually, we didn’t even see a movie,” he says. “We just saw a poster for it in the lobby and made fun of it for a while.” Zinger received, sir.
You might get a little more mileage out of this mock-beef if you know a little bit about Brian as a person. I would share details here, but I don’t want to misrepresent him further than what I’m doing with this comic. The Orson Welles worship is something I think he would cop to, though. ;D
It’s all in good fun, of course. No animosity. Again, in Brian’s words, “Of course I don’t think Tom’s a bad guy – this is more to the tune of the celebrity guests on Extras where they play grotesque versions of themselves.
I think that’s a clever approach and one I would kind of like to explore. But at the same time, it’s weird. Because MY version of myself is already a grotesque caricature. Bending that image through the lens of another artist’s vision makes things even more bizarre and twisted. How far can we go before it loops back on itself, causing a space-time anomaly that forms a psychic feedback destroying our true sense of self?
Maybe I’m being a little over-dramatic.
Any way you slice it, we’re definitely flying by the seat of our pants. This isn’t something Brian and I worked out in advance. So it will be an interesting little tightrope walk.
Originally, I thought I would do one rebuttal comic, but now I’m starting to wonder if I can’t do a little story line with this! What do you guys think? Do you want to see Brian and I continue to warp and twist each other’s illustrated personas for our individual comics? It could be fun!
Leave your comments below. If you have any dirt I can use against Brian in my next comment, leave those in the comments section as well. ;D
What? Where?
It's Brian Carroll. He was in my film history class in college. He judges the worth of every film against Citizen Kane, dresses like a 1920's newsboy and is a total movie snob.
Oh, Tom! Hello! I say, I was just talking to my friend here about Orson Welleses decision to cast Charlton Heston in Touch of Evil!
WE'RE LEAVING
Dude, I dress like a 1920’s newsboy. I’ve got the hat n’ everything. AND I did a long-ass research paper on Touch of Evil in film class in college.
But as far as I’m concerned, I don’t compare every movie to Citizen Kane. My litmus test is “Night at the Roxbury,” thank you.
Sorry, demonfafa. But I just gotta laugh at your comment. Loved it!
Great new character! I’m really interested to see where the arc goes. Don’t worry about your exaggerated characterization of a film maker; on certain leves its true.
I lived with a film major during college & you should have been a fly on that wall for the conversations she had with other film majors: the only way to truly enjoy a movie is to sit in the front row, should a make corndogs a running theme in my movies, & Stephen Spielberg has a Peter Pan complex. Granted, I did learn a lot about film from her & her friends but there was a lot of innane film chatter to wade through to get there.
Sorry, meant to type “on certain levels its true.”
Huh, I always thought that Hitchcock did “Touch of Evil.” Now I know of TWO films that Welles did, outside of his guest voice for Unicron in “Transformers: the Movie.”
Just to be a jerk.
Welles didn’t cast Heston, Heston cast Welles.
Funny comic though, it’s nice to see you switch things up on occasion.
Knives,
I don’t understand what you mean. Welles wrote and directed Touch of Evil. How could Heston cast him?
Excellent, I was hoping something fun would happen when I saw Tom appear in IC. “That’s worth a hand up your shirt at least yeah?” should definately become and add for Theater Hopper.
Great comic!
Now, not to add prove your character right, I think I can provide some insight!
Heston was brought on to Touch of Evil when Welles was simply an actor on it, but the reason he signed on at all was because he thought Welles was directing. When Heston found out that Welles wasn’t the director – he demanded that the studio give him the job or he was going to walk.
Helluva guy, if you ask me.
Oooooo. You know, know that you mention it, I kind of remember that story.
My mind is hazy, though, because whenever I think about Touch of Evil, I think of Heston playing a Mexican – Welleses decision after he took over the picture, if I recall. He changed Heston’s nationality for the part, didn’t he?
I believe it was his decision, yes, because he rewrote the script when he came aboard – but I’m not sure why that seems to be people’s general perception of the film, and never commenting on Heston’s performance or the movie on the whole. Unless, of course, everyone who likes to say they’ve seen it is really just getting their opinion from the awful Welles “cameo” in the film “Ed Wood.”
Which is a huge shame because Marlene Dietrich’s performance is one the best in the film and I’m pretty sure not that many people even know she’s in the movie
I’ve seen the film and think it’s one of Welleses best.
I think the perception comes from the fact that Charlton Heston is about as American as they come. So making his character Mexican seems questionable if not borderline culturally insensitive.
Welleses became known as a recluse who made weird choices in his later years (Transformers, the Paul Masson commercials). Making Heston a Mexican reinforces that belief. Despite how good the film is, I think people like to look at it as his swan song – his decent into cartoonish excess.
I love the new character. I hope he spouts out useless facts like “Welles was the first to think of selling snacks at the cinema.” or other such crazy things.
Well, Brian’s not exactly a new character. It’s more of a back and forth he and I are engaged in right now. Nothing really long term in terms of cannon, or anything.
But, actually, outrageous Welles facts were something I was considering if things extended beyond today’s comic. It looks like it will!
I think a story arc would be awesome! 😀 could be the next “Jimmy loses his job”.
This could be entertaining….
Sounds fun, a little cross comic strip rivalry never hurt anyone.
Tom, you go ahead and stick it to Brian, we’re rooting for you!
In Soviet Russia, Heston Cast YOU!
Probably not what you were going for, but thanks Tom for bringing me back to Instant Classic. I used to read it back when he was doing the ‘prologue’ story but long creator disappearances, hiatus hell’s and cancellations made me give up and subsequently forget about it. It rocks now and he’s even updating!
Not what I was going for? Not sure what you mean. I’m as excited as anyone else that Instant Classic is updating again. I’m very happy to direct people to the comic again!