First, let me tell you that Jared’s selection for the lamest catch-phrase imaginable is wholly intential.

Second, this comic is my excuse to draw Optimus Prime and I’m running with it!

I don’t know how much of a blog I can give you this morning because I’m wiped out after attending the Minneapolis FallCon comic book convention. I had a great time, met a lot of cool fans and got to hang out with my good friends Zach Miller and Taki Soma – creators of Joe and Monkey and the recently christened You’ll Never Die. Most of you who check this site are probably familiar with Zack’s work, but Taki is new on the web comic scene. Her comic is about a woman seeking personal revenge, and also to find out why her boyfriend was murdered. It’s crazy to think that I’ll get to see them again in less than a month at Wizard World Texas! Thanks to everyone who came out to visit us at FallCon this weekend.

Things have been hectic lately, so I’m kind of drawing back a little bit, regrouping and trying to figure out how I can approach Theater Hopper differently. Every time I go to a convention, I have these thoughts. I look around at all the great work on the floor and think about what I could be doing differently. I think after Wizard World Texas – after I’ve gotten "Theater Hopper: Year Two" off the ground – I’m going to make an effort to talk more with creators. Even though 2006 has been a great year for me, I think it may have been to the detriment of my personal relationships. I had my head down and did the work, but didn’t make the effort to connect with people like I should have and I think the site is suffering a little bit for it.

So, I’m going to try and scale back all of the talk surrounding my projects and get back to talking about movies. I think that’s what most of you would rather read, anyway.

I wish I could have had a chance to see The Departed this weekend so we really could have had something to talk about. I haven’t seen Infernal Affairs – the movie which it’s based off of. But I’m told that version is infinately better. Isn’t that always the case? Personally, I find it odd that Scorsese has to borrow against the filmmakers he likely inspired for his "back-to-basics" crime drama.

I think we all agree Scorsese could make gangster films the rest of his life and no one would complain. And although I liked Gangs of New York and The Aviator, I think he spent too much time away from the genre he knows best for too long. It’ll be interesting to see the final result of his homecoming. The $27 million the film pulled down this weekend is encouraging!

I’ll try and blog again later if there’s time! Talk to you soon!