If you’re checking the comic late on Sunday, please vote for Theater Hopper at Top Web Comics. It’s the start of a new month, so that means all the vote tallys start over again. I’d like to try and crack the Top 10 just so a few more people are aware of our existence. If you could help me with that, I would appreciate it.
I’ll probably mention this again first thing on Monday just because I know more people will be reading. Please don’t think less of me.
If any of you are interested in learning more about Pixar and their chain of blockbusters over the years, it would interest you to watch 60 Minutes II tonight on CBS at 9:00 EST, 8:00 Central. They’re going behind the scenes to talk to the animators and writers to see what they do best. Here’s a quick synopsis of the story.
Personally, I’m very interested in learning about their new animation studio out in Emeryville, California. If you watched any of the commentary lead-in’s for Monsters, Inc. you got a pretty good look at the facility and how they do business there. The place is like summer camp for artists and I’ve always been a big fan of corporations who use alternative tactics in motivating employee creativity. It should be a good show.
I wanted to get everyone’s attention and have them visit It’s All Been Done today. Not because their most recent strip was a subtle homage to Theater Hopper, but because Eric is closing things down and it looks like this week will be their last.
It’s always a shame when such a good comic ends so quickly. IABD had it all – great writing, great art, fleshed out characters from the word “Go” and one of the best site designs I’ve seen.
But Eric has decided to take a crack at syndication with another comic he’s putting together and I say “Good for him!” We all wish him the best.
Visit It’s All Been Done before it’s all been done.
Is everyone understanding the Planet of the Apes reference in today’s strip? Just making sure. It’s a pretty old movie, y’know.
Man, who would have thought that a storyline that started out making fun of The Matrix would end up here? Sometimes you gotta go where the muse takes you… kicking and screaming…
As far as The Matrix Reloaded is concerned, I think I’m seeing it tonight. At least, I hope that’s the case. I don’t know how crazy the lines will be. I gotta squeeze in Down With Love at some point as well. I’m a big fan of those old Rock Hudson/Doris Day romantic comedies. Pillow Talk is a great flick.
But I digress. Back to The Matrix. It’s been getting some mixed reviews. Some critics are complaining that the film is hollow, that there is no human element and that it’s drowning in special effects.
I can’t decide if I’m going to give two squirts of piss over this or not. I mean, I’ll be honest. The first movie didn’t really clobber me over the head with it’s philosophical ramblings and peppering of Eastern mysticism. I thought it was cool they were aware of it, but audiences acted like The Wachowski Brothers (TM) freakin’ invented it!
In my opinion, it’s the concept that propels The Matrix. And granted, it’s probably lost a little bit of its power since the Y2K heebie-jeebies everyone was worried about in 1999 proved to be nothing but a technical boogeyman. The climate has changed. Perhaps our reaction to this material will change as well.
I also have to give the benefit of the doubt that the movie I see this weekend is only PART of the finished whole. I feel like most negative reactions should be put on pause until The Matrix Revolutions comes out in November. Until then, the jury is out.
Whatever the outcome may be, it’s evident that these movies have tapped in to a “trust no one” facet of the youth zeitgeist that has not had an outlet up to this point. I foresee The Matrix spawning all sorts of extra multimedia to support the mythology. They’re already off to a rousing start with The Animatrix and the video game Enter the Matrix which both expound deeply into the lore of the series. Pretty soon you’re going to start seeing cheap-ass novelizations. R.A. Salvatore, I’m looking at you!
If you haven’t already checked it out, we now have a forum and it’s off to a strong start. I encourage you to sign up. It’s going to be a lot of fun.
You may also notice that I stripped the images from the navigation bar up top and replaced them with text links. As the site progresses, I’m becoming more and more conservative when it comes to bandwidth consumption. I’m starting to dump some of the frills and setting my sights on more fluid design and download times. We’ll see what emerges.
I’ll be back later if I can think of more garbage to spout…
I received a few e-mails yesterday regarding the vote system at Top Web Comics. Apparently, many of you were trying to vote for Theater Hopper and were being turned down.
I don’t know what went wrong over at TWC, but everything appears to be okay now. So VOTE VOTE VOTE to your heart’s content! We’re sneaking up on the Top 10. It’s only a matter of time!
Thanks, by the way, not only for voting, but for e-mailing me to let me know there was a problem with the voting. That shows special care!
Well, I finally got off my keister and have launched the forum. I’m not sure how much fanfare I’ll surround the occasion with, opting rather to let it evolve organically. If you’d like to sign up, I encourage it. I think we’ll have a lot of fun with it.
It was totally a coincidence that Carrington was having trouble with his forum and decided to plug my efforts to bring a community to Theater Hopper – I swear to God!
But I appreciate the support none-the-less!
I just wanted everyone to stop what they were doing and check out a great new web comic called Bug and Slug.
The site just launched this Saturday, but I can confirm with the utmost authority that I have NEVER seen a web comic look this good right out of the gate. You should do yourself a service and check it out. Need more prodding? It’s got aliens!
Bug and Slug is created by a very talented fellow named Tim Andress – an enthusiastic young lad I consider to be a friend of Theater Hopper. You should be his friend, too.
Something I totally forgot to do last week when this would have been, y’know… relevant – was post a link to www.iisageek.com. It’s a great new web comic resource that keys the audience in to the “behind-the-scenes” aspect of making comics.
Theater Hopper was the featured strip last week and I totally fell asleep on the job. But it’s not too late to check it out! Expect it to be added to the permanent links section soon!
Yes! I just cast the vote that put us at #15 on TWC. That’s just ahead of NPT! Rock it!
I’m becoming concerned that Theater Hopper may be getting a little too big for it’s britches. I checked my server statistics for April, and we’re pressing up against 12GB in bandwith transfer. My account is only alotted 15GB.
A lot of the drain is due to the information that appears on the left and right hand side of the comic. Every time a page is called, it’s reloading that information. And while the images there are less than 1k in size, after 300,000 reloads, it all adds up.
I’m beginning to think the site will need to undergo a redesign soon. I’m reluctant to do it because I’ve yet to re-enter all of the blogs from when we converted to PHP about a month ago.
If anyone out there is proficient in web design or perhaps has some database knowledge, please contact me. If you have any tips or tricks to help me reduce bandwidth consumption. I am eager to hear those as well.
