Working on this week’s comic and I’l almost done. It’s another extended strip. I seem to have forgotten how to write four panel comics. Then again, I’m not really writing jokes at this point – it’s all story. So I tend to go on a little bit. Oddly, though, I’m not using and dialogue. Chalk that up to it featuring Victor.

I promise there will be lots of action after this week’s comic. So stay tuned for that!

In the meantime, please enjoy this guest strip from Jesse Kiefer. Jesse writes a comic called Tank-Monkey that you should really check out. If you like monkeys and you like tanks, Jesse pretty much has you covered!

I thought his guest comic was appropriately sweet and actually very close to a strip I planned on doing later on feature Truman.

People keep asking me if we’ll see Truman before it’s all over and I calmly reassure them, “Yes, he will be back.”

It’s one of the great mysteries of my “career” how much people love Truman. I get requests for comics with him in them all the time. I can’t figure it out. He doesn’t do much. Mostly just sits there. We’ll, accept for that time he piloted a bi-plane, which Jesse cunningly references the fourth panel of his comic. You can see that what he’s referring to here. In fact, here are the other two Truman comics he references: “Sexybark” and “Legally Stoked.”

People used to love that gag with Truman in a purse. That drawing was actually one of our first t-shirts back in 2003! Wow, man. Time flies.

One parallel between Truman and Theater Hopper I can think of is how close both came into my life. We brought Truman home in April of 2002. I started Theater Hopper a few months later in August. So, in many ways, he grew up with the comic. I know I wrote my fair share of blog posts about him. Maybe that’s why he resonates with fans? You grew to love him the same time I did? It’s kind of cool when you think about it.

At any rate, that’s it for today. Thanks again to Jesse for the very sweet guest comic and everyone be sure to visit Tank-Monkey. It’s got tanks, it’s got monkeys… DOOOOO IT.

By the by, if you’d like to contribute to the fun, I’m still looking for guest strips to put up on the site. Feel free to chip in by sending your comics to theaterhopper@hotmail.com. They need to be 525 pixels wide, JPEG format and relatively free of obscenities. Nothing your Mom would be embarrassed about. If you’re down for that and would enjoy a moderate bump in traffic as Theater Hopper ends its run, we’d love to have you!

Until then, hang tight and stay tuned for a new comic tomorrow!