Posts Tagged ‘ice cream’
4 items.
I’m not as adverse to Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson making kids movies as I depict myself in this comic. But I have to admit scratching my head in puzzlement when I first saw the trailer for The Game Plan. THIS was the guy that was supposed to replace Schwarzenegger? It might be a moot point. Truthfully, I don’t think we’ll ever see another era in action movies quite like what we had in the early 80’s. To that end, The Rock is smart for doing a kids movie – if it’s well crafted. As my good friend Joe pointed out, “one needs only say The Pacifier to know that even a successful family vehicle can stall an action heroes career.”
I think The Rock will emerge unscathed. I think that he moves quickly enough from role to role that audiences aren’t associating him with any one chracter – and that’s good. Plus, the guy has enough natural charisma, he won’t have trouble finding work.
People hold up Schwarzenegger as the pinnacle of action movie heroism but they kind of overlook the fact that action movies were all he was good for until he became bankable on name-recognition alone. Let’s face it – there’s not a lot of work for a near-mute, extremely musclebound guy in leading man roles. In many respects, Schwarzenegger had to pay his dues first.
Not much else going on at the moment. Although I want to remind you about the DVD giveaway I have happening right now. Two copies of Stargate Atlantis: Season Three. All you have to do is bookmark you three favorite Theater Hopper strips using the social bookmarking network of your choice and then e-mail me either a screen cap or a link to your profile page for the proof along with your name and mailing address to be entered. I can tell you right now that so far only FOUR people have entered the contest. So if you want some free stuff, your odds are pretty good. It’s a small way to help promote Theater Hopper and get something for yourself to boot.
I realize that Stargate Atlantis is probably a niche interest for some of you. But the next opportunity I get, I’m going to try this with a more popular selection and see if it sticks. Stay tuned.
I kind of got some bad news this week in regard to a site redesign I had been planning. I was trying to work with a local web design firm to help me impliment some air-tight comic archiving, blogging and content systems as well as helping me more fully integrate the site with social bookmarking networks. We had a few conversations over the phone, I met with them in person and outlined my thoughts, even the president of the company got involved to oversee things.
Then I get a note from them this week saying that they really aren’t equipped to partner with me in this way. Typically they design a site from concept to completion and don’t do much in terms of consulting. I was kind of pissed. I spent a month waiting for them to steer the ship in a certain direction and they totally bailed.
I’m very interested in taking Theater Hopper to the next level and I think a lot of that will rest of me elevating the design and interactive elements of the site to a competitive level. I need outside help to do this because I’ve been stewing in my own juices for too long.
Does anyone have suggestions? I want to work with a company. Not a freelancer. I need someone who will be accountable and on the clock if something breaks.
I’ve been fortunate enough to have some great people help me keep things running around here for a long time. I’m not discounting their efforts. But I want to build on their foundation and I don’t know where to go.
Part of me wonders if I should just switch everything over to WordPress and use the ComicSpace mod. I know a few people who have tried it and liked it. But the more I think about it, the more I’m convinced I need a customized buisness solution to meet my needs.
If you have any suggestions, please e-mail them to me at theaterhopper@hotmail.com.
Have a great weekend, everybody!
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Dec10
I got the idea for today’s comic when we were talking about Time Magazine’s publication of their Top 10 films of 2008 during The Triple Feature Monday night.. The ice cream analogy wasn’t discussed at the time, but the more I got to thinking about it, the more it fit.
On the whole, I don’t find much to disagree with in term of Richard Corliss’s picks. I think it’s a good mix of populist and obscure. That he puts Wall-E at the top of his list is a great harbinger of things to come. As much as I loved Iron Man this year (and wouldn’t shut up about it), Wall-E is who I’ll be cheering for come awards season. I really believe it’s a film that will stand the test of time and it accomplishes that in what is tantamount to a few, simple brush strokes (so to speak).
But back to Speed Racer and The Dark Knight. I don’t mean to characterize Speed Racer poorly. Although I was apprehensive of the film while it was in theaters, I fell in love with it once it was on DVD. The movie truly is an underrated gem.
But on Corliss’s list, it sticks out like a neon thumb. Glowing even brighter in the absence of the gothic gloom of The Dark Knight which was so perfectly assembled by Christopher Nolan that it is probably the most critically and financially successful film of the year. By leaving it off the list, Corliss is ignoring something important that happened in movies this year. A film like The Dark Knight doesn’t make A HALF BILLION DOLLARS from the domestic box office for nothing.
Certainly critical or financial success shouldn’t dictated prominence on an end of the year list. There is something to be said for expressing a personal preference. Judgments on art are always subjective anyway.
But despite Speed Racer’s hidden quality, he looks a little bit out of touch by promoting a film that was pretty my panned by critics and ignored by audiences at the start of the summer blockbuster season that cost three and a half times more to produce than it reclaimed at the box office against the first “comic book” movie that is generating serious buzz as an Oscar contender. In his pursuit to pick an unconventional choice, he leaves many readers scratching their heads.
Food for thought.
That’ll do it for me today. Thanks for stopping by and I’ll see you here on Friday! Have a great day!
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In today’s incentive image, Tom and Cami enjoy a refreshing summertime treat. Vote for Theater Hopper at Top Web Comics to see for yourself!
I don’t know how fair it is to compare Eddie Murphy’s Imagine That to Adam Sandler’s Bedtime Stories. The children’s imaginary world translated into a fantasy/reality situation. They weren’t the source of out-and-out business predictions like they are in Imagine That .
Still, it’s noticeable that there are two movies with such similar thematic elements coming out so close to each other.
Maybe it’s not so weird when you consider how different studios have outright stolen from each other and put competing films back to back over the years.
A Bug’s Life and Antz. Volcano and Dante’s Peak. Mission to Mars and Red Planet. It happens a lot. I’m sure there’s more if I actually sat down to think about it. Maybe you guys have some similarly-themed movies you can share in the comments section below?
I don’t have much more to share except we’re still trying to get to the problem of this malware error people are getting when they are trying to access the site.
From what we’ve learned, it seems to be only affecting Safari and Google Chrome users. I’ve been doing some searches online and have discovered we’re not the only one suffering this problem, but I’m not finding much in terms of solutions.
I’ve been bombed with e-mails and Tweets from people telling me that they can’t access the site. I feel personally responsible to everyone who notifies me of the error and is trying to help. But I can’t respond to all of you. I’m sorry. Please don’t take it as a snub. I’m just trying to focus my efforts on solving the problem.
I’m doing everything to update security on my own machine, we’ve combed through the code of the site, we’re trying to isolate ads from our network that could be causing the problem. We’re even looking through the THorum to see if it could be originating there. It’s a lot of trial and error, but it’s all part of the regular maintenance that goes into the site.
If it’s any consolation, please know that I am not DELIBERATELY trying to infect your machines with malware. Frankly, I’m not that smart (which is probably how the site ended up in this position to begin with.)
Please trust that we’re doing everything we can.
In the meantime, let me know your thoughts about Imagine That. Are you planning on seeing it, maybe taking your kids or a younger sibling? Or have you grown tired of Eddie Murphy’s family movie shtick and are secretly hoping he makes a sequel to Eddie Murphy: Raw instead?
Thanks again for everyone’s patience and have a great weekend!
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Sorry, guys. Today’s blog post is very short. I was up late last night working on the comic and had to be out the door early to go have my car worked on.
In the meantime, here’s a link to the comic where Jared – not Tom – smashed Shia LaBeouf’s hand with a hammer.
Also, if you’re somewhat new to the strip (or simply don’t remember the character) start here to get acquainted with David. He was introduced and killed off rather quickly. So if his appearance doesn’t ring any bells, I wouldn’t be surprised.
Beyond that, trust that this storyline is actually going somewhere and I might be back later in the day with some more updates.
Cheers!
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