I have to apologize for two things.

First, apologies for the comic being posted later this evening on Monday.

Second, my apologies for the random violence in today’s strip. I’m of the firm belief that violence for the sake of violence is usually an indicator of poor writing. This might be the case with this strip. It certainly turned out a lot darker in tone than I originally envisioned.

Fortunately, there’s an excuse for both of these issues!

Last week, a link to Lackadaisy’s tutorial for drawing expressions made the rounds in webcomic circles. It. Is. Phenomenal. If you’re an illustrator of any capacity, you need to check it out. It’s very thorough and very informative.

Anyway, I spent the week digesting the information and really wanted to put what I learned into practice. So I grabbed a small hand mirror and started making goofy faces to use as reference in today’s comic. That’s why the strip is late.

As for the violence… I dunno. I was trying for extreme emotion and I guess I’m just an angry dude?

As for Natalie Portman, I do think it’s funny that she follows the most wildly heralded performance of her career in Black Swan with an Aston Kutcher romantic comedy. It kind of reminds me when Eddie Murphy followed his Oscar-nominated performance in Dreamgirls with Norbit.

I don’t think the bloom is off the rose for Portman, though. No Strings Attached opened in first place with tepid, but not toxic reviews. Even if the movie tanked, she’d be the last one to take the blame. They’d lay it at the feet of Ashton Kutcher or director Ivan Reitman before they ever thought about pointing fingers at Portman.

Besides, Portman’s long been championed as a lock for a Best Actress Oscar and we all know the Academy loves giving those awards to Americans. The field could be choked with Tilda Swinton, Judi Dench and Cate Blanchett playing some kind of Elizabith I Super Beast. They’d still give the award to Sandra Bullock for playing a no-nonsense Mom with three kids.

I guess we’ll know what the field looks like tomorrow when nominations for the 83 Annual Academy Awards are announced tomorrow.

I plan on posting the nominees on the new Bonus Materials blog here on the site, for what it’s worth. I mean, it’s not like you can get that information anywhere else, right? But maybe you want to check in tomorrow and we can talk shop. Share with others your opinions of the nominations and who you think will win.

Should we put together some kind of Oscar betting pool?

Have you guys had a chance to check out the Bonus Materials blog yet? I only ask because I’ve been linking to some of the articles I’ve writing through the Theater Hopper Facebook account and one person asked me if I could add the articles to the site somewhere. They were having trouble finding them.

That’s why I slapped that “NEW BLOG!” graphic up there with the arrow pointing to the new navigation link. I don’t want you guys to miss out.

I’ve been trying to post at least one article daily, depending on what’s going on in the world of movies. Sometimes I post trailers or photos from upcoming films. Sometimes I talk about what’s going on right now.

For example, earlier today I posted an article about all the flack Kevin Smith has been catching from the blogger community after his new film Red State premiered at Sundance last night. It’s provoking some interesting responses.

My hope is that you guys check the blog often. But more importantly, I hope you contribute. I know more comics is always better. But until I can figure out a way to bump up production without killing myself, these blog posts are a way to create content and it isn’t much skin off my back.

So, anyway. Check it out and enjoy.

Oh, and if you didn’t notice, I added some social media links under the navigation to Theater Hopper’s Facebook, Twitter and RSS feeds. If you want to check those out, that would be a real ego boost for me.

In the meantime, if you want to chat up Natalie Portman’s new sexy-time phase of her career, you can do that here, in the comments below.

HAVE AT IT, QUEEN AMIDALA FANBOYS!