Studios attempting to steer clear of the Spider-Man 3 juggernaut (which dropped 60% in it’s second week, but was the fifth film in history to cross the $200 million mark in 9 days) didn’t release many new films of interest this weekend, but of the new offerings, 28 Weeks Later came in second with $10 million. Not to bad. It’s been getting good reviews to boot.

I was kind of at a loss for the sketch I should do for today’s post. At first I tried my hand at drawing a crazed person diseased with the rage virus running at you. It didn’t turn out too well. Then I remembered the excellent marketing campaign 28 Weeks Later came up with in advance of the movie. Those great posters about “maintaining the quarantine” that they slapped up to make your local googleplex look like a totalitarian state. Excellent, eye-catching design. Almost like propaganda. Anyway, I remembered those and decided to try my hand at drawing some dude in a gas mask.

I’ve always found gas masks scary. Obviously they imply an unsafe environment where the air is unclean. That by itself is pretty frightening. But then you get those cloudy lenses, the protruding breathing apparatus and then deep, shallow gasps of filtered air. You think about those elements and it was no wonder Darth Vader scared the crap out of people before he was Hayden Christensen.

Kind of at a loss for words today, so I’ll wrap things up early. Two bits of news, though. The contest for Dreamgirls and Diggers is currently over with. I received my give away copies in the mail last week and sent them out on Saturday. So hopefully the winners will be receiving those soon. No new contests in the immediate future, but hopefully that turns around soon. Keep your eyes and ears peeled.

Oh, and speaking of keeping your ears peeled, be sure to tune into The Triple Feature talkcast tonight over at Talkshoe at 9:00 PM CST. Tonight it’ll be just me and Gordon McAlpin from Multiplex. Joe Dunn from Joe Loves Crappy Movies won’t be able to make it. We’ll probably be talking about 28 Weeks Later, but since I didn’t see it, a lot of tonight’s show is on Gordon’s shoulders. If you want to make our job easier by calling in and participating, that would be great!

One last thing before I forget. This one is for the local fans. Well, local if you’re from Iowa.

I will be at the I-Con Comic Book Convention at the 4-H Building at the Iowa State Fairgrounds this Saturday, May 19 from 10:00 AM to 5:00 PM. This will be my first convention appearance of the year and I’m really looking forward to it. I went to I-Con for the first time last year and the event organizers really put on a good show. From what I’ve heard, it’ll be even bigger this year. So I hope to see you there!

Going to conventions gets me psyched and it’ll be interesting to see how many people locally will recognize me now that my comic has been regionally syndicated in Juice. I’m willing to bet it’ll be up to four people as opposed to three people last year. I made a slew of free buttons for the show, but I still need to print up fliers that I can give to people and entice them to check out the site. Now that I know what you guys think are some of the best strips, I have a good sample to choose from.

Wizard World Chicago in August will be my next convention and my hope is to have Theater Hopper: Year Three available by then. I’ve started doing the layout and I’ll probably have that done this week. After that, it’s writing and proofing. It’s always a lot of work, but a lot of fun.

I’m kind of holding my breath, though. I don’t know if I’ll actually end up producing the book this year and if I do, it’ll be a small print run. To be perfectly honest, I still have a bunch of copies of Year One and Year Two that I want to get out of the door before going to Chicago. They’re $15 a piece, in full-color and loaded down with content. Almost 200 pages each. If you guys want to help me move a little inventory, that would be great. Buy both books together and save five bucks. Bundle a book with a shirt and save, too. Or, help me think bigger. Does anyone have suggestions as to who I could sell a large quantity of books to? I’ve sold a few to local comic shops, but sending the books through Diamond Distribution to get them into stores outside of Iowa wouldn’t be profitable for me. I need to make some one-on-one sales.

Any suggestions?

Talk to you soon!