Posts Tagged ‘alcohol’
2 items.
This isn’t the first time I’ve depicted Jared as having the sauce and sometimes I wonder if that’s fair. But it’s not like I’ve made it a dominant character trait, so I don’t lose much sleep over it.
I only express mild concern because Jared the comic character is based off a real person and I don’t want to offend him. Secondly, I always second guess comics where I introduce alcohol or other adult themes because I like to believe that Theater Hopper is accessible to a younger audience.
Obviously the comic isn’t sunshine and lollipops all the time (do kids still care about lollipops?) but my rule is never to go any further than what you might see in Prime Time TV. I think we’re still in safe territory here.
SIDEBAR: I just took a closer look at those comics I linked to earlier and the look like friggin’ cave drawings compared to what I’m doing now. I’m not trying to brag, I’m just shocked at my own evolution and am racking my brain a little bit trying to remember when and exactly how I started to change my style. Fun.
I suppose along those lines I can mention that I’m working on Theater Hopper: Year Three. I originally started laying out the book in late Spring with the hopes of taking it to Wizard World Chicago in June, but that didn’t happen and I ended up putting it on the back-burner.
Well, now it’s on the front-burner and I’m half-way through the commentary. You’d think writing commentary for the strips wouldn’t take that long. I essentially do it every Monday, Wednesday and Friday in the present. But there’s something about revisiting that period three years ago that makes it difficult to remember where I was at creatively and what things were important to me back then.
Remember, this is before Henry was born and I feel like a completely different person now.
But the Year Three book is something I want to get right. It was the first year I started to experiment with longer story lines. It was the year I wrote the arc where Jimmy lost his job. It was also the year that I introduced Charlie. I know a lot of people who have written me and talked about how they’ve enjyoed those stories. So I want the behind-the-scene revelations to be satisfying for them.
I generally consider Year Three to be the make-or-break year for Theater Hopper. I started taking more risks creatively and the audience began to solidify. In some ways, it was the high water mark of the strip and I would really like to try and capture that again. But if things hadn’t turned out the way that they did, I probably wouldn’t have continued to pursue the comic.
At any rate, I’m working on it. I’d like to have it out by the holidays, but it’s already mid-November, so that doesn’t seem likely. I know I want to have it in my hands when I go to the Emerald City Comicon in Seattle this April. So keep your eyes peeled for a pre-order opportunity sometime in the new year.
In the meantime, I’m not sure I’ve shared this here or not, but if I have, I’ll post it here again. This is the cover for Year Three:
That’s it for me today. Planning on seeing Quantum of Solace tonight. Cami says she’s not interested in seeing it, so I’m going solo – which is a shame. She really liked Casino Royale. Oh, well. I’ll tell you what I thought of it on Monday.
See you then!
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You’ll noticed Jared left Repo Men out of his negative assessment of Hollywood’s new offerings this week. I’m reserving judgment on that one. It looks like goofy, dark futuristic fun in the vein of Paul Veerhoven. The jury is still out.
But, yeah. Diary of a Wimpy Kid and The Bounty Hunter look like limp noodles to me.
I know I should probably be in Diary of a Wimpy Kid’s corner, considering the genesis of Jeff Kinney’s creation was as a webcomic. But kind of how I don’t think of Penny Arcade as a webcomic anymore, Diary of a Wimpy Kid has become something else entirely. It’s a brand.
Certainly I don’t begrudge Kinney his success. We should all be so lucky. But having moved beyond webcomics, Kinney’s brand just isn’t for me anymore – if it ever was. I mean, it really is more for pre-teens anyway. The movie looks like no exception. My question is why no one know professionally is talking about it?
People are talking about The Bounty Hunter, though – and for all the wrong reasons. The Bounty Hunter looks like the kind of movie stars like Gerard Butler and Jennifer Aniston either make at the beginning of their career or at the end of it. Butler can kind of be excused, though. He’s clearly trying to balance his tough-guy roles with romantic comedies. I’m not really buying him in these romantic roles, but he gets an “E” for effort.
Poor Jennifer Aniston, though. She looks like she’s grasping at straws. She’s never really been in a movie besides The Good Girl or maybe The Break-Up that anyone has taken seriously. All of her projects seem to be one notch slightly above a movie you’d see in Lifetime: Television For Women. I’m curious if her fan base would continue to support her if she hadn’t been so mercilessly dumped by Brad Pitt.
This is an utterly stupid point to make, but I’m going to make it anyway. Aniston has basically become a figurehead for rejected women and equally helping and hurting her career. People like to root for her, yet she continues to make crappy films – which only makes people root for her more. It’s a weird stigma she’s living with that excuses crappy performance. Consider it the “Aww, you’ll do better NEXT time, honey”-Factor. I have to imagine that it feels fairly condescending.
I don’t know what I would do differently if I were in Aniston’s shoes. Probably try to do some straight-up comedy. Play to your strengths. I mean, I know she has comedy movies in her past, but they each have romantic elements. I’m taking straight-up goofball comedy. Think Kevin Smith or Judd Apatow. Something edgier. Something that doesn’t require a marshmallow ending.
It seems like she kind of avoided comedy for a while because she didn’t want to be type-cast as Rachel from Friends for the rest of her career. These days? I think there are worse things to be associated with. Just my two cents.
As for the St. Patrick’s Day, it would be fun to go out and celebrate. But, the truth is, I’ve never really been a fan of fighting the crowds at a bar on the holiday. I did it a couple of times when I was in my 20’s but got tired of it pretty quickly. What’s the point in going out for St. Patrick’s Day if you have to wait in line for 15 minutes to get a beer? I might as well get drunk at home, you know? It’s much easier to identify signs of alcoholism sitting on your own couch.
I guess maybe you have to show up for those tent parties early to get properly blitzed before the Regular Joe’s get off work at 5:00. I’ve known real-life Jared to take a day off from work in the past to do exactly that. I don’t know. Maybe he had the right idea.
That’s it for me. If you have any thoughts about Diary of a Wimpy Kid, The Bounty Hunter, Gerard Butler, Jennifer Aniston or St. Patrick’s Day, please leave your comments below!
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