Today’s comic was almost sacrilege in my house. Cami is a dyed-in-the-wool, hard core Mike Myers fan from way back. So I Married An Axe Murderer is one of her favorite movies.
I’m not without my loyalty to Myers. I’ve often enjoyed his work all the way back to his days on Saturday Night Live. Like everybody else, I was totally swept up in Austin Powers-mania, doing horrid impressions each summer a new movie was released.
But as time goes on, one begins to realize that Myers has consistently cannibalized his own work. Despite his great ability to introduce and engrain catchphrases and characters into the pop culture lexicon, he will often grab hold of a concept or a character and ride it into the ground. I can’t tell you how disappointed I was to watch Shrek and hear the voice of Fat Bastard coming out of his mouth. You couldn’t do, like, a squeaky voice, or something?
Things get complicated in that respect when you learn that Myers originally recorded all his dialogue for Shrek WITHOUT the Scottish accent and later convinced the producers to let him re-recorded the character WITH the accent. This was done at great expense to the animators eventually costing the production millions of dollars to reanimate the main characters lips.
Most don’t know that Myers has a reputation for being difficult – an exacting perfectionist. That rumor gained steam during the pre-production of the failure Dieter project, which Myers walked off of due to what he thought was a sub-standard script. Both Universal Studios and producer Brian Grazer sued. Eventually it was settled out of court.
Things must be peachy-keen between all three players now considering Myers is their lead in the big screen adaptation of Dr. Seuss’ The Cat in the Hat. I don’t know if I care to see it this weekend or not. Frankly, I still have a bad taste in my mouth from Jim Carrey’s outing in The Grinch, and most of the art direction crew on that film has returned for The Cat.
There’s something about the make up in these movies that just unnerves me. That funny snout apparatus on the actor
GUEST STRIP – INDIGO
September 24th, 2012 | by Tom- Comics »
- Comics »
- Guest Strip
(1 votes, average: 10.00 out of 10)
I realize that I was MIA last week and I feel pretty lousy about it. In some ways, I feel like I’ve completely lost my momentum, which sucks, because I’m still excited about the story I have to tell!
It’s pretty much a problem with the process at this point. I knock out the pencils and inks no problem. But once I bring the comic into the computer for coloring, shading, background and lettering… everything s-l-o-w-s d-o-w-n.
Honestly, I’ve never been a fan of that part of the comic-making process. But lately, I’ve been fussing with it too much in an effort to make the last few comics good and I’m approaching burnout.
My mentality is that I don’t want the last 10 comics to look like crap. Makes sense, right? But since I don’t particularly enjoy the finishes, it’s become a convenient excuse to draw out the conclusion of the comic. It’s inefficient and a little selfish.
Although, honestly, things were much easier when it was just a couple of talking heads against a green background. These last few comics have been all fire, smoke, sparks, glowing lights, textures, different costumes, action, etc… a real challenge.
But enough about my whining. Let’s take a look at this fantastic guest strip from my good friend Indigo! Indigo’s imagining a time in the near future where Tom and Cami are pregnant (remember that was the genesis of this “good bye” arc back in January?)
Incidentally, she’s not too far off from how I reacted when Cami was first pregnant with Henry back in 2007. 2007, people! Can you believe it’s been almost 6 years?
Indigo is a classy lady, by the way. A great confidant and listener. We chat from time to time on teh Twitterz and she always knows what to say go get me into gear. Great resource for a reality check when I need one.
She produces her own comic as well. It’s called Orchid Coloured Glasses and you should check it out. She pulls no punches. It’s great stuff!
Looking forward, you’ll be pleased to know that I have the pencils, inks and color flats down for this week’s Theater Hopper. I hope to do the shading, background and lettering tonight.
Thanks again for everyone’s patience. I’m trying to avoid limping across the finish line, but the last few months have been hard. You guys are very awesome for putting up with it!