Archive for December, 2011
17 items.
First things first, see that little graphic to the left? That’s a button you can use to vote for Theater Hopper at Top Web Comics. As a reward, you get an incentive image that I’ve drawn. I polled my followers on Facebook and Twitter for ideas and someone thought it would be interesting to see a Muppet version of Cami. So that’s what you can expect to find if you click on that link.
I’ve flirted with Top Web Comics several times over the years and I’m giving it another spin for a couple of reasons. I was probably prompted by nostalgia since I’ve been busy adding transcripts and cleaning up the archives lately. I’ve been neck-deep in posts from 2003 and there are a lot of references to Top Web Comics from that time.
I also saw Paul Taylor from Wapsi Square pointing his readers to Top Web Comics recently and it made me a little homesick.
I’m not necessarily under the impressing that we’ll make much of a dent in the Top 10 especially since I’m only updating once a week now. But I like the ritual aspect of it. Drawing the comic, then drawing something ancillary to it. I have a stack of these sketches left over from the last time I attempted this in 2009 and I’m thinking I might add them to the Theater Hopper store soon. If someone wants to buy them, great. If not, no big loss, either.
By the way, Storenvy, my storefront generator recently announced some new discount and promotional options built into their site. So keep an eye out for some good deals there in the future. I’ve got way too much inventory right now that I want to get rid of. I’m prepared to get drastic.
Anyway, onto the comic.
First, I have to apologize for the comic being late this week. But I have good reason. The reason is two feet tall with pigtails.
Pearl turned 2 years-old on Saturday and (as I am wont to do on my children’s birthdays) I wanted to share a picture with you here.
I had mentioned Pearl’s birthday on Twitter over the weekend and I received several messages from people who couldn’t believe how fast time had gone by. Lots of people commenting on how it was like I just announced she was born yesterday… and now she’s 2!
Believe me, I empathize. The time has gone by very fast.
We had a great time celebrating with Pearl over the weekend and I want to thank everyone for their well-wishes.
The birthday fun didn’t stop there, though. Oh, not at all! On Sunday, we celebrated my father-in-law’s birthday. So between the two of them, I didn’t have much time to think about anything else. By the time Sunday evening rolled around, I was shot.
BUT THE COMIC!… We still haven’t talked about the comic, have we?
I knew when I put director Garry Marshall’s New Year’s Eve in my sights, I wanted to do something to the comic I did about his previous film, Valentine’s Day. That comic was very well received and – to be truthful – it’s a blast coming up with the oddball celebrity choices to list on the fake IMDB page.
My problem, however, was not wanting to recycle the same joke. I didn’t want to be guilty of plagiarizing myself. So, I went to Twitter with my problem.
Most people said the same thing: “The producers of New Year’s Eve didn’t show any originality with their new film. Why should you?”
But I got to give it up to Josh Anderson from Sketch Layer who came up with the idea to have Tom show up as a cast member in the film.
I decided to ad a little bit of a paranoid spin to the concept and sneak the cameraman into the last panel. But the genesis of the idea was all Josh. So thanks, Josh!
I don’t know if I have much more to say about the comic than that. But talking about the comic last night on Twitter gave me some ideas going forward. We’ll see what happens.
In the meantime, I would really appreciate it if you used the li’l old ShareThis links below this post to help spread the comic around. Since it was late, it helps to let people know that the site’s been updated.
Thanks again for your patience. See you soon!
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For those of you who are concerned that the last panel of today comic is a little graphic or bleak, would it comfort you to know that David Seville was with The Chipmunks at the moment of impact?
Vote for Theater Hopper at Top Web Comics to see what I’m talking about. There’s an incentive image related to this week’s comic waiting for you if you do.
And speaking of Top Web Comics… can I tell you guys how awesome you are? Since I threw the link back up on the home page last week, you guys have responded PHENOMENALLY. Theater Hopper was ranked somewhere like 4,000th on the list of comics in their database. But after one round of voting, we’re positioned now at 138. That’s not easy to do in one week’s time – especially when Theater Hopper only updates once a week!
So I wanted to say thanks to everyone who visited the site more than once last week and placed their vote. I want to encourage everyone to do the same. I know it’s hard to remember to visit when there’s no new content to greet you, but if you could swing by once a day and click on that link, it helps me out a lot.
Let’s see if we can break into the Top 100 this week!
As for this week’s comic… yeah, I’m sorry. Sort of. No I’m not.
LOOK… I don’t like The Chipmunks. I didn’t even like them when they were popular in the 80’s. As a 30-something man child, you’d think that would give them an automatic pass. It doesn’t.
That said, I really, really, REALLY don’t like the current CG version of The Chipmunks. I’m still upset that Alvin prominently ate fecal matter in the trailer for the first film!
I mean, I understand the movie are for kids and poop jokes are supposed to be funny. But let’s try to elevate the bar a little, please?
Still, you gotta admit that it’s at least a little bit impressive that the franchise has been around this long. Who would have guessed that a novelty song that was recorded in 1958 would spawn all these television shows and movies over a half-century later. Not me.
But then, as H. L. Mencken said, Nobody ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American people.” To that end, the third Chipmunk movie “Chipwrecked” seemed like the perfect opportunity to end it all.
Do you agree? Disagree? Did today’s comic go too far? Did it not go far enough? Leave your comments below! And – as always – thanks for reading! I’ll see you here next week!
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It’s been almost a decade since the disappointment that was Men In Black 2 (hey, that’s what you get when you cast Johnny Knoxville as comedic relief!) so it seems weird to me now that they’re unfolding Men In Black 3 next year.
More importantly, is it not weird to anyone else that neither Will Smith or Tommy Lee Jones have aged that much in the last decade?
Then again, it seems like Tommy Lee Jones has been perpetually 55. At least since The Fugitive in 1993. So he probably made a deal with a warlock, or something.
Check out the new trailer below.
Josh Brolin’s impersonation of Tommy Lee Jones looks to be spot-on. But between this and his performance as President George Bush in Oliver Stone’s W., I wonder if he’s becoming concerned that he’ll be typecast as an impersonator of Texas-bred celebrities.
I certainly would be.
What’s your reaction to Men In Black 3? The mystery element has me intrigued. The time-travel component screams pure “trope” to me. Will Smith seems to be delivering the same smarm act that he’s been peddling since he punched an alien in Independence Day.
I’m kind of wondering if they didn’t introduce the time-travel idea and Josh Brolin into the story as to give Tommy Lee Jones less screen time and prevent the audience from asking questions about his potential dealings with age-defying warlocks.
Just a theory.
Leave your comments below!
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When G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra came out in 2009, I wanted to like it, but it was basically a live-action cartoon. Granted, when Channing Tatum is the lead, that pretty much happens by default. But, overall the movie was just too goofy.
Case in point:
But today, Paramount has released the first trailer for G.I. Joe: Retaliation and the result seems a little more… grown up.
First of all, any movie that draws Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson away from Disney kiddie movies automatically gets my approval. And from what we can see in this trailer, he appears to be in full bad-ass mode.
Second, it really seems like the sequel has done a good job of eliminating the elements from the first movie that didn’t work. Sienna Miller and Marlon Wayans, I’m looking at you. Or, rather, I guess I’m NOT looking at you!
Lastly… OMG – they’re going to give Snake Eyes something to DO?
I’m feeling… strangely optimisitic about G.I. Joe: Retaliation. What’s your take? Leave your comments below!
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Yesterday the trailer for Rock of Ages came out and I was sufficiently underwhelmed. I pretty much tuned out the minute the title card read “From the director of Hairspray.” That is, unless their talking about John Waters.
Spoiler Alert: They’re not.
I know the appeal of Rock of Ages is supposed to rest on the car crash appeal of watching Tom Cruise slum it a little bit. He rarely does comedy, so it should be fun to watch him flail around for a bit, right?
Let me tell you right now that I saw a touring production of Rock of Ages earlier this year and it is easily the most mindless two hours I’ve ever spent in a theater. Basically, it was a bunch of singers and dancers performing in a show FAR below their ability, singing karaoke versions of Whitesnake songs.
Don’t get me wrong. I love that music. But that’s not a show. There’s no story here. If I’m going to sit through a “musical,” I want at least ONE original song, ‘kay?
By the way, what the hell is going on with that “We’re Not Gonna Take It” / “We Built This City On Rock and Roll” mash-up at the end. More importantly, why the hell is “We Built This City” showing up in so many trailers this year? It was in the first trailer for The Muppets as well.
It’s even on the soundtrack.
Don’t most intelligent people consider “We Built This City” to be one of the worst recorded songs ever? Blender and VH1 did in 2004. A 2011 readers poll in Rolling Stone concluded the same thing. Evidently Bernie Taupin is blackmailing Warner Bros. and Disney executives with some rather incriminating information.
What’s your reaction to Rock of Ages? Fun-time musical or limp noodle nostalgia trip? Leave your comments below!
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The first trailer for The Expendables 2 came out yesterday. It’s so manly, I want to run my fingers through its chest hair.
For a big action movie, this trailer’s a little week. Just a buncha name. Then again, it’s a teaser trailer and the actual movie doesn’t come out until August 17, so what do you want?
It’s funny that I bristle at stunt casting in movies like Valentine’s Day and New Year’s Eve. But I’m TOTALLY okay with a movie that stars Sylvester Stallone, Bruce Willis, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Chuck Norris, Jean-Claude Van Damm, Dolph Lundgren, Jet Li, Terry Crews, Randy Couture, and Liam Hemsworth.
Okay, maybe not Hemsworth. I can take him or leave him.
Actually, I think I’m probably most excited about seeing Dolph Lundgren on screen. Yeah, I know he was in the first one. I just love that crazy Swede!
Who’s YOUR favorite Expendable? Leave your comments below!
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A few months ago, the teaser for Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance -ahem- lit the internet on fire with it’s depiction of a gleeful Johnny Blaze urinating napalm over some unsuspecting victims. This time Nicholas Cage and his crazy wigs are back with a new trailer.
It’s a lot more plot-heavy and serious in tone than the first one. I don’t know if I’m on board with it, or not. Especially now that I know that rescuing a kid from becoming the Anti-Christ is the main plot point.
It looks a little euro-trashy, doesn’t it? If I’m not mistaken, they did a lot of filming in Romania.
But you know what? The action scenes look sick. Speed. Power. Authority. Those were the words that kept coming to mind for me while I was watching this. Whoever decided to give the Rider that charred look hit the nail on the head. I’d rather the film be trashy but serious instead of trashy and goofy like the first one.
What’s your take on the least-likely superhero movie sequel since Rise of the Silver Surfer? Leave your comments below!
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I was having a little bit of trouble coming up with an idea for the Top Web Comics voting incentive sketch for today. So I kept it pretty simple and just drew a picture of Tom Cruise. It’s a little wonky, but not too bad for 5 minutes at the drawing table. Vote for Theater Hopper at Top Web Comics to check it out.
Before I get into today’s comic, let me just take a moment to talk about last week’s comic. I was worried that it was a little too dark and gruesome, but you guys proved me wrong. Support for last week’s Chipmunks comic was phenomenal. You guys did a great job sharing the comic on Twitter, Facebook and StumbleUpon and the result was one of Theater Hopper’s HIGHEST traffic days in MONTHS.
Not only was last week’s comic one of the most shared and visited on the site, it was also the HIGHEST RATED comic on the site.
I don’t know if you guys have seen it, but there’s those little stars between the comic and the blog post that you can use to let me know how much you like or dislike that week’s comics. As of this writing, there were 49 votes and an average rating of 9.89 out of 10. That, like, NEVER happens. That’s pretty much like 48 people giving the comic ten stars and one guy giving it one star. Crazy-unheard of.
I’m sure the ranking of the comic will flatten over time. But it was just another indicator of how well that comic connected with you guys and I appreciate it. I guess I didn’t realize there was so much latent Chipmunk hate out there! Thanks again!
As for this week’s comic, it started out as something completely different. I abstained from seeing Mission: Impossible 3 because I was feeling very much anti-Tom Cruise at the time. I kind of regret that now as several friends have told me that M:I 3 was very, very good. I should have know this because Phillip Seymour Hoffman is in it. So… duh.
I suppose there’s nothing keeping me from seeing it now except for time and availability. If Netflix offered it through streaming, I probably would have seen it by now. Alas, that’s not the case.
At any rate, the comic was basically going to be about how I was planning on seeing Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol, but how Tom Cruise was the absolute LAST reason I was seeing it.
And that’s true.
For me, the primary reason to go is to see how director Brad Bird (The Incredibles, The Iron Giant) handled his transition from animation to live action. That doesn’t happen very often – if at all. I guess I can’t think of a lot of animators who have made that leap, can you?
Bird has a very action-oriented style to begin with and he also has a cynical sense of humor. I wanted to see how much of that could be infused into the Mission: Impossible franchise.
Probably the SECOND reason for me to see Ghost Protocol is for the preview footage they’re showing of The Dark Knight Rises in IMAX. We’re luck enough to have an IMAX theater in town and they’re showing it. That’s a big draw for me.
From there, I’m interested in seeing Jermey Renner and Simon Pegg. Tom Cruise falls somewhere below that. Really, if you’re the 5th most important reason to see a movie, does it matter where you actually rank? Probably not.
Look – I want to like Tom Cruise again. He’s got a lot of charisma and he generally picks good projects. But somewhere along the line, his enthusiasm and intensity wore me out. Tom Cruise will be 50 years-old next year. FIFTY! Anyone who acts like Tom Cruise does at 50 is either in gross denial or is running away from something. Maybe if I have millions of dollars to insulate myself from reality, I’d see life more like Tom Cruise sees it. But as of right now, it’s clear to me we’re not sharing the same planet.
I guess the thing that trips me out about the M:I franchise the most is that they’ve been making these films since 1996. That’s nearly 20 years. In some ways, it’s a very unlikely franchise that seems to propagate itself purely on Tom Cruise’s ambition to prove that he can still do his own stunts.
If Cruise had opted out after the first or even the second movie, they might have continued making cheesy direct-to-DVD flicks or maybe even rebooted it again completely by now. But when you start talking about an action franchise that’s approaching the 20 year-mark, you’re talking about James Bond-level longevity. Is it any wonder that Jeremy Renner is being groomed to take over for Tom Cruise after he leaves?
Follow the money, people. Follow the money.
That’s all I have for this week. Next week’s comic might be delayed due to the Christmas holiday. I’ll try to work in advance, but you know how that usually goes.
In the meantime, thanks for your continued support. If you liked today’s comic and want to share it with your network, don’t forget the ShareThis buttons below the blog post. You can use them to share this comic with friends through Twitter, Facebook, StumbleUpon or even e-mail!
If you have any comments about Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol, be sure to leave them below. I’m curious if anyone saw it in IMAX this weekend and what they thought of The Dark Knight Rises footage? C’mon! Spill!
Until then, have a safe and happy holiday! See you next week!
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If you missed the new trailer for The Dark Knight Rises yesterday, you must have been in a coma or trapped under a heavy boulder. In that case, welcome back to society! You should probably watch this right now.
I don’t know if there’s much that I can add to the commentary swirling around this new trailer. The internet is dissecting it six ways from Sunday at the moment. But I will say this…
Give Michael Caine the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor right now. Oh, I know he’ll never get it. He’ll never be nominated. But the way he delivered that line about protecting Bruce… I don’t know. It’s the one part of the trailer I keep watching over and over again. Even more than the football field collapsing.
What was your favorite moment from the new trailer? Leave your comments below!
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If you know me, you know I am an unabashed fan of Will Ferrell. Hey! I saw Semi-Pro in the theater. I have credibility.
So when the teaser trailer for Ferrell’s Casa di mi Padre hit the web last week, it got an immediate thumbs up from me.
The trailer keeps it pretty close to the chest, but apparently Ferrell speaks in broken Spanish throughout the whole movie. The concept seems so totally bizarre, I can’t picture a scenario where it doesn’t work.
Need another reason to see this movie? Ron Swanson himself – Nick Offerman is in it. And it will be glorious.
I think what’s most hilarious about the movie is the synopsis. If you read it, the film comes across like your standard-issue telenovelas.
Armando Alvarez (Will Ferrell) has lived and worked on his father’s ranch in Mexico his entire life. As the ranch encounters financial difficulties, Armando’s younger brother Raul (Diego Luna) shows up with his new fiancée, Sonia (Genesis Rodriguez). It seems that Raul’s success as an international businessman means the ranch’s troubles are over as he pledges to settle all debts his father has incurred. But when Armando falls for Sonia, and Raul’s business dealings turn out to be less than legit, all hell breaks loose as they find themselves in a war with Mexico’s most feared drug lord, the mighty Onza (Gael Garcia Bernal).
If they decide to play it completely straight, the comedy will basically come from the juxtaposition of seeing one of the whitest white men imaginable mix it up in this context. Kind of meta but totally brilliant. I’m on board.
Because I love you, I’m also uploading the poster for the film. What’s your take on this bold (and bizarre) new project for Ferrell? Leave your comments below!
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