Archive for May, 2011
9 items.
First things first, I have to apologize for the lateness of this comic.
I started working on it Sunday night and was distracted by world events. I’m sure you know of which I speak. I tried picking up the pencil again on Monday night and was wrestling with the damn thing for so long, finishing it became impossible.
I’ll say this – trying to figure out how to draw someone about to swing a hammer with two fists is not something my brain is wired for. It’s like drawing feet for me, or something.
Of course I figured out entirely too late that looking at reference photos of baseball players would have been perfect. But I managed to finish the comic Tuesday night. And here we are! I’m actually kind of pleased with how it turned out. The art, I mean. I don’t know exactly what’s going on with the script. Just another comic where I mess around with wordplay for no real reason.
Not to belabor the point, but it’s not acceptable for me to be late with these comics and it makes me feel sick that it went down this way. I’m doing one comic a week. ONE! I used to do three comics a week, sometimes five – many of them much funnier than this one.
Sure, my life is much different now than it was 8.5 years ago when I started this thing. I didn’t have kids. I was still in my 20’s. I could stay up until 2:00 in the morning and bounce back, ready for work the next day on 4 hours of sleep. Not anymore, man. That’s for sure.
But still, there’s no reason that I can’t use the week prior to a comic to develop an idea, sketch it out in stages and finish at a more leisurely pace. If anything, the wider berth between comics should result in IMPROVED quality.
Basically it comes down to poor time management. I need to do a better job of looking forward and setting aside time to draw during the week so I don’t get caught in a situation where I’m scrambling to put something together 2 hours before it’s “due.” That’s a bad habit I developed from back in the days when I was producing 3 or 5 comics a week. Running and gunning it because I had to, but also because I could.
I wish I could relate to you the low-level of depression I experienced Monday night when I knew I wasn’t going to be able to finish the comic. I’ve been doing this for so long, blowing deadlines is more than just letting you guys down. I let myself down and it sucks. Producing this stuff should have gotten easier over time, not harder.
I think what makes it particularly pathetic is that on Monday, I renewed the TheaterHopper.com domain name for another 2 years. I posted as much on Facebook. Casually, in fact. I posted that otherwise meaningless bit of information because I literally had nothing else to talk about.
32 people “liked” that update. 3 people commented their enthusiasm. It made me feel good, but undeserving.
I’ll confess something to you. I don’t know how long I can continue to do Theater Hopper. Originally I thought 5 years would be a nice, round number. Then I thought I would stop after I had kids. By August of next year, I will have been doing this for almost 10 years. Maybe that would be a good time to stop?
If I had my druthers, I’d do Theater Hopper every day. I have fun doing it. But life gets in the way more than it used to and I still feel chained down by “rules” I established for myself when I first started this thing nearly a decade ago.
Yeah, the comic moves and breathes and changes along with my ability and circumstances. But it doesn’t mean I still don’t get bummed out when I can live up to the promises I’ve made to myself and to you. I look at these failings (which have been happening more and more lately) and I wonder if I deserve to be in the game.
But at the same time, I think to myself “If I can just hang on a little longer. The kids will be older, maybe a little more independent and there will be more time for these things.” I don’t know if that’s wishful thinking or not.
Part of me wonders if Theater Hopper is the right venue for me to express myself anymore. I don’t see very many movies these days. Commenting on them makes me feel inauthentic. For years I’ve toyed with the idea of doing a journal comic. I think it would be freeing to write comics about my life, unencumbered by scheduled updates. But my Midwestern upbringing makes me feel like a journal comic would be narcissistic and shallow.
I’ll tell you this much… not only did I renew Theater Hopper’s domain on Monday, but I renewed the domain of the journal comic I’ve been dreaming about for the last few years. I don’t know if I’ll ever do anything with it. I guess it’s just nice to know I have it. Like insurance, or something.
I’m sorry about this. I don’t know what I’m doing here. I feel like I’m dumping my problems in your lap. But if feels good to write this, to get it off of my mind. Writing it down will go a long way to help me from continuing to beat myself up about it. I guess it doesn’t leave a lot of room to talk about Thor, but I’m not too upset about it. Are you?
Thanks for hearing me out. I’ll try to do better going forward. Thanks for sticking with me.
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The following is a supercut of each of Bill Paxton’s lines as Pvt. Hudson from James Cameron’s Aliens condensed into one handy YouTube video.
Considering that the summation of Paxton’s performance can be distilled to roughly 6 minutes, I think it’s a compliment to him as an actor that he could create a character so indelible in our minds that people are still quoting “Game over, man! Game over!” over 25 years later.
When you think about it, there are very few protagonists that experience the character arc that Hudson does in traditional action movies. Most characters from that era were either superheroes or cannon fodder. Hudson was a little bit of both. Chest-puffing bravado at the outset, a pants-wetting fatalist after the first attack and a hero resigned to his fate by the end. In many ways, Hudson would act like we would in that situation and I think that’s why Paxton’s interpretation of him stays with us.
God be with you, Pvt. Hudson, you glorious coward.
Thoughts?
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Gotta give a shout out to Joel Watson from Hijinks Ensue who pulled me out of bog with some great suggestions for this comic.
I was painfully stuck on an idea Sunday night and couldn’t make it work. The original set up had Jared pointing out that Thor was an American comic book about a Norse God who was portrayed by an Australian actor in a film directed by an Irishman.
And then it just kind of died on the vine. I couldn’t think of anything more. No ying to the yang, so to speak. The punchlines that I did come up with were so bad, I scarcely remember them now. I think I was trying to tie the movie to the Swedes and their reaction to their Viking heritage being co-opted by Hollywood so poorly. At one point it was going to be something like “My Chinese sneakers are more Swedish than this film.”
Yeah. It was clumsy and bad.
Joel took the original comment and kind of steered it in another direction. He also came up with some of the more clever definitions for “Aussie Washing.” My particular favorite is “The old Vegemite paint job.”
So kudos to Joel for the assist! I appreciate it, buddy! Please be sure to visit Hijinks Ensue immediately after you finish reading this blog! 😉
I didn’t get a chance to see Thor over the weekend because I was pretty busy with a couple of other social engagements on Friday and Saturday evening. By the time Sunday rolled around, it didn’t sound like a particularly bright idea to see Thor on Mother’s Day. I’ll probably see the film sometime tonight.
I’m looking forward to Thor, but was kind of surprised that it only did $66 million over the weekend. I guess general audiences aren’t that familiar with the character. Iron Man managed to pull down $98 million in it’s opening weekend and the only thing people talked about for months before the movie hit theaters was how obscure and unknown Iron Man was.
I guess the other thing that kind of has me wondering is the reaction I measured online this weekend. Everyone seemed to agree that Thor was entertaining – and funnier than they expected it to be – but no one seemed to be over the moon about it. Apparently is was very adequate. People didn’t have much to complain about, but they didn’t have much to celebrate, either.
Did you have a chance to see Thor over the weekend? If so, what did you think? Leave your comments below and let’s all talk about my raging xenophobia against Australians while we’re at it!
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Last night I had an opportunity to see Thor, which I was excited about because the last film I saw in the theater was Cedar Rapids and that’s kind of pathetic.
On the whole, I would say that I found Thor extremely entertaining and it was perhaps helped by my diminished expectations of the film.
I will say that at nearly 2 hours long, the film never dragged for me. And despite the final conflict feeling a little slapdash, I definitely wanted to see more!
I’ve talked with a few people in the comments section of the last two comics about my concerns the Thor is another set up for The Avengers in a similar vein to Iron Man 2. It is and it isn’t. The film tells a crafty origin story that is unfortunately a little light on Asgardian ass-kicking. A little too much time spend on Earth in civilian clothes is good for character development, but it didn’t exactly send my geek heart racing.
But, like I said, the film is entertaining and well-crafted. I can’t criticize it for what I wanted it to be. I can only criticize it for what it is. And I would say it’s pretty darn good!
The following are some random thoughts and observations about Thor. Let’s see if any of them ring true to you, shall we?
- It’s easy to see why Chris Hemsworth was cast as Thor. He is confident, likable and not at all the dumb jock that I kind of think of Thor as being.
- That said, whatever color they dyed Hemsworth’s beard and eyebrows was really distracting in close ups.
- I kind of wish they had Hemsworth wear Thor’s winged helmet for more than one scene.
- Director Kenneth Branagh did an admirable job with the direction, providing a few fake out moments and non-linear storytelling devices that kept me engaged throughout.
- Let it also be known that Kenneth Branagh never met a Dutch angle he didn’t like. This film is littered with them, but it works. It adds to the aura of comic book dramatics without going overboard like Ang Lee’s Hulk did.
- People credit Branagh for bringing “Shakespearean gravitas” to the movie. But the fatherly themes in the plot are so pronounced, I wonder if anyone would be making that observation if, say, Martin Campbell were directing.
- Natalie Portman is very, very pretty.
- Why the hell is Natalie Portman in this movie? I mean, I know she’s no stranger to big-budget science fiction and fantasy (Hello, Queen Amidala!) but at this point, a movie like Thor seems a little below her station, don’t you think?
- There is almost no need for Kat Dennings’ character except to provide comic relief, but she makes the most of every scene she’s in and damn near walks off with this movie. I was more interested in the things her character had to say than anything Natalie Portman’s character had to say.
- I love that Clark Gregg’s Agent Coulson is running around in the background. Gregg plays him perfectly with a touch of playful impatience.
- Everyone caught Jeremy Renner’s cameo as the future Avenger Hawkeye during the scene where Thor first tries to reclaim his hammer, right?
- Jeremy Renner kind of looks like Daniel Craig’s younger brother to me. They both have a heavy brow.
- Even though I know Ray Stevenson (who most recently played The Punisher) was the actor who played Volstagg, every time I saw him on screen, I was convinced it was Chris Noth.
- Hey, is that Renee Russo as Thor’s mom? Long time, no see!
- Yes, Anthony Hopkins kills it as Odin. But he could do a role like this in his sleep.
- I feel like I’m supposed to say something about Tom Hiddleston as Loki. He did a good job making him a sympathetic villain at the outset, but kind of tipped over into cartoonish super-villainy at the end.
- The Destroyer is awesome and I want an action figure, please.
- RE: The Destroyer “Is that one of Stark’s?” “I don’t know. That guy never tells me anything.” The humor in Thor was pretty sharp.
- Bonus points for the Donald Blake reference – Thor’s mortal alter ego in the early comics. Kudos for the writers for not getting bogged down in that and telling a straightforward original story. Well, as straightforward a story about inter-dimensional warriors using weapons crafted with equal parts magic and science as you can.
- I was also very impressed with how the effects department brought Thor’s unique powers to the screen. They could have easily had him hitting stuff with his hammer or call down lightning and leave it at that. But having him take flight, carried behind Mjolnir was very well done. Similarly, Thor twirling Mjolnir around by the strap was something I didn’t think they’d be able to translate from the comics as well as they did.
- Production design for this movie is off the charts. From the costumes, to the Frost Giants, to the rich detail and rendering of Asgard – these images were truly otherworldly and God-like.
- With this in mind, the fictional town in New Mexico where Thor lands looks faker than fake. In fact, I’m not sure there were even any roads that lead to or from that town. It literally looks like it sprung up overnight by a Hollywood construction crew.
- Did anyone else find the use of the Foo Fighters song “Walk” over the end credits completely out of place?
- Stick around after the credits for a bonus scene. I probably don’t have to tell you that, but it doesn’t hurt to remind you.
That’s all I’ve got on Thor. It’s quite a bit, actually! What are your thoughts? Leave your comments below!
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Cami and went to see Bridesmaids this weekend and at one point before the movie started, Cami actually leaned over to me and said “Thank you for seeing this movie with me.” I thought it was kind of odd at the time because 1.) I was already excited to see this movie and 2.) When do we ever get to leave the house to do ANYTHING together anymore?
Then again, she might have also been thanking me for letting her drag me around to a couple of department stores to look at blouses and shoes between our dinner and showtime.
* insert sound of whips here *
That said, I really enjoyed Bridesmaids and think it’s wholly deserving of the praise and strong reviews it’s received. If you haven’t seen it yet, I encourage you to check it out.
Produced by Judd Apatow and directed by Paul Feig, Universal Studios has marketed Bridesmaids as the female response to films like The 40 Year-Old Virgin or The Hangover. If you’ve seen the TV spots, they all seem to be preoccupied with a scene where the girls contract food poisoning. It leads you to believe that you’re in for an outrageous, scatological good time.
As bombastic an hilarious as that scene is, I’ll go on the record right now and let you know that Bridesmaids is NOT that kind of film. It’s not interested in strictly using shock tactics to generate laughs. It has a lot more on its mind than that.
There’s a lot of needless controversy in comedy circles (mostly driven by sexism) about whether or not women are funny. For the record, I think women are hilarious. That said, Bridesmaids clearly has a different temperament than most big studio comedies. The audience is the benefactor from this shift in tone because the humor frequently derived from character motivation rather than misunderstandings or unfortunate circumstances.
That’s not to say that Bridesmaids don’t lean on these tried and true comedic devices. But the humor is amplified by our familiarity with the characters, their needs and limitations.
As Annie, Kristen Wiig has created a great comedic punching bag – a tragic character who lost her cake shop in the recession and has been falling further and further behind ever since. But catharsis doesn’t come easily for Annie because she is truly the architect of her own misery. She can’t be free of it until she confronts her role in it.
Of course, it’s Melissa McCarthy as the bawdy Megan that wakes her up to her reality. In an excellent exchange near the end of the film, Megan gleefully slaps Annie around. Encouraging her to “Fight! Fight for your crappy life!” McCarthy is a comedic powerhouse in this movie and practically steals it out from under the rest of the ensemble.
I guess if I could register any complaint against the film is that it doesn’t fully take advantage of the talent it has at its disposal. Wiig, McCarthy and Maya Rudolph all get sufficient screen time. But Wendi McLendon-Covey from Reno 911 and Ellie Kemper from The Office are almost completely squandered. In fact, I think Rebel Wilson and Matt Lucas as Wiig’s inconsiderate roommates get more time on screen. So the film is not quite the ensemble piece it bills itself to be.
But overall the film is smart, honest and touching. On the surface, Annie’s problems and her reaction to them felt more akin to a directionless 20-something rather than how a former small-business owner approaching 40 would handle them. But, in context, it indicates how hard Annie has been thrown for a loop. Annie is an anomaly among female comedic archetypes, but a welcome one. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if Bridesmaids became a game-changer for chick flicks, which I would celebrate.
Look, a little bit of Sandra Bullock or Kate Hudson is fine. But their movies fail to take risks and avoid any suggestion that the lives of their heroines (who, for some reason, always seem to be marketing executives) is anything less than perfect. Bridesmaids takes those risks and should be rewarded for it.
Did you see Bridesmaids this weekend? If so, what were your thoughts? Leave your comments below!
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I’m not as blasé about Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides as I present myself in today’s comic. Actually, I’m kind of excited to see it. Cami is, too. Although, admittedly, I’m not excited for the reasons I’m probably supposed to be excited.
I guess I will say – at this point – Johnny Depp’s Keith Richards impression has worn a little thin on me.
I totally recognize that Depp has created an iconic film character – one that will be imitated (poorly) at Halloween parties for years to come. But that doesn’t mean I find it either as cute or charming as I once did.
Truthfully, the big draw for me is Ian McShane as Blackbeard. I’ve heard his role in the film is not pronounced, which is a shame. I mean, the man practically looks like a pirate by default. And he makes a great villain. Actually, he makes a great protagonist, too. He’s just great, okay!
Someone has got to fill the void Sean Connery left behind and I nominate McShane. Done! Written! One for the books!
The one thing the Pirates of the Caribbean movie have been exceptional about is characterization. Capt. Jack Sparrow, Barbossa, Davy Jones… even Norrington. Great characters, each.
Of course, leave Keira Knightley’s Elizabeth Swann and Orlando Bloom’s Will Turner out of the equation – which the fourth movie thankfully does – because they bore me to tears. I’m sure they have their fans. I’m just not one of them.
The Pirates of the Caribbean movies also have great production design. Amazing richness in detail – a stylized world I can believe in, a place I want to spend two hours in.
If the Pirates of the Caribbean movies have any failing is that they tried too hard to force continuity on the audience with the last two movies. They tried so hard to manufacture an epic legend, it ended up smothering the proceedings.
Of course it didn’t help that At World’s End devolved into a swirling cauldron of nonsensical special effects at the end. You could almost see Gore Verbinski looking at the dailies near the end and saying “I don’t know what the hell is going on anymore! THROW MORE MONEY AT IT!”
To that end, I’m glad that On Stranger Tides is more of a self-contained story. My hope is that it will recapture some of the pep of the first movie because the last two were completely exhausting to sit through!
With luck, Cami and I will be able to sneak out of the house sometime this week to check things out.
What about you? Have you already seen it? Also, why hasn’t the trailer for the new Muppet movie shown up online, yet? I demand answers!
Please feel free to leave your comments below!
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There’s so much I want to say about this trailer. But if you haven’t seen it yet, I don’t want to be the guy that ruins it for you.
Sit back, relax, watch the trailer and then wonder silently why Hollywood hadn’t gotten around to making a movie like this sooner.
Leave your comments below because I DESPERATELY want to talk about this trailer with someone! SPOILERS AHEAD!
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After generating some buzz a few months ago, a trailer for Conan O’Brien Can’t Stop finally hit the web this week.
The film is a documentary lensed by director Rodman Flender capturing O’Brien’s 32 city music-and-comedy “Legally Prohibited From Being Funny on Television Tour” from last year. Flender is a friend of O’Brien’s, but from what I’ve heard, the documentary is not a whitewash of the events that transpired after Conan left The Tonight Show. It’s supposedly a very real look behind the scenes at the frustration and depression that motivated Conan to throw off the shackles of convention and do his own thing, lest he be remembered as a late night footnote.
One of the reasons Conan O’Brien has so many fans is because his experience is relatable to a lot of people who have had something taken away from them. It stings like a mother and a small part of you wants revenge.
While the trailer creates the false narrative that Conan’s tour has the potential to fail (C’mon, really? It sold out in record time.) It looks like it does a good job of capturing Conan’s anxiety as a performer. Can he pull it off? For his own sanity, he has to. But is this need to perform as altruistic as it appears on the surface or is Conan forcing himself back into the limelight to fill a void within himself?
I’m personally really looking forward to finding out. Conan O’Brien Can’t Stop hits theaters on June 24. You can visit the official web site here.
What’s your take? Leave your comments below!
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Today’s comic might be (fairly) criticized as one of the laziest comics in web comic history. But it came together in a really beautiful way and I want to tell you how.
I was kicking around a comic idea to make commentary about The Hangover Part II’s $86.5 million dollar opening weekend. Numbers like that pretty much guarantee another sequel and there’s already talk that it will be set in Amsterdam.
I wanted to make a joke that it’s not very challenging for the writers to come up with crazy adventures for Bradley Cooper, Ed Helms and Zack Galifianakis to get wrapped up in when the setting is a notorious party city like Amsterdam. They should try to challenge themselves by setting it in Duluth, or something.
A quick aside: I mean no disrespect to the citizens of Duluth. But when the first syllable in your city’s name is basically “dull,” I’m sure images of an exciting nightlife don’t immediately spring to mind.
Hey, I sympathize. Critics of my hometown have been calling it “Dead Moines” for years.
Anyway, back to the original joke… it wasn’t exactly strong and I knew it. How bad was it? I had originally forgotten it and went to Twitter to express as much.
“I had an idea for a comic, but didn’t write it down. Something to do with The Hangover II. Maybe it wasn’t a very good idea?” I said.
This was a little bit of meta-comedy because, as you probably know The Hangover Part II’s is being accused of recycling the same jokes from the first movie and – as such – was probably not a very good idea.
Shortly after that tweet, I received a reply from H. Caldwell Tanner. You may know him from his work on Loldwell or, more likely, from his work for College Humor.
“Just remake an old comic and add a “Part II” to it instead,” he suggested.
It was too good of an idea not to pass up and here we are.
Of course, the joke in this comic – stealing from oneself – doesn’t really work if you haven’t read the original comic. To that end, I am providing this link for your reference. There. Now no one can claim I did not perform my due diligence.
What do you want from me? Tomorrow is Memorial Day here in the states and I’ve got the day off from work!
Don’t worry, though, I saw Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides this weekend and will have a review up in the Bonus Materials blog in the next few days. That should make up for things, hopefully.
In the meantime, help me fill in the blanks. Did you see The Hangover Part II? I have no interest in seeing it considering that I have The Hangover on Blu-ray and can watch that if I’m interested in jokes about roofies. But what did you think? Is it the retread everyone is claiming it is? I’ve heard there’s another photo montage at the end that nearly salvages the movie, even if it’s the same joke from the first movie. Let me know your thoughts in the comments below!
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