Archive for ‘Blog’
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Apologies for the lack of an update or any forewarning on Monday. After being with my family for a full weekend, Cami and I both pretty much crashed Sunday night. Monday was reserved for doing darn near next to nothing.
It’s dissapointing to me in a way because I always trick myself into thinking "Oh, boy! A holiday! Time off from work! I’m gonna get SO MUCH STUFF DONE for the site!" and then it never happens because prior commitments and exhaustion set in. Right now, I’m so thrown off my routine, I don’t know what’s what…
There will be a comic on Wednesday. I promise.
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As promised, I wanted to come back in today and blog about Cami’s reactions to Sin City.
We hunkered down with a big bowl of popcorn last night and watched it together. It was a lot more violent than I remember. I think when I watched it for the first time back in April, I was more under the spell of it’s visuals. Anyone who reads comics knows its probably the most literal adaptation of any franchise put on film. At that initial viewing, I think I was geeking out so hard, I kind of glossed over how brutal it actually is.
So as this revelation comes to me, I’m thinking to myself “Cami’s hating this. It’s gory. It’s too grotesque. She’s hating this.”
As the credits rolled, I sheepishly asked her “What’d you think?”
“I liked it.”
Imagine my surprise! I asked her what she liked most about the movie.
“The yellow blood!”
Looking back, Cami was pretty engaged in the whole thing. She would ask me questions throughout.
“Wait, wasn’t that girl dead?” “Why is that guy yellow?” “How come Elijah Wood is sitting on the porch when he was killed earlier?” She seemed pretty engaged.
Turns out she liked the segment with Bruce Willis the best. That was my favorite part, too. I think it’s the most poetic and probably the best use of Willis as an aging action star yet.
Of course, for pure vicreal thrills, nothing beats watching Mickey Rourke as Marv lay waste to a bunch of no-name cops. Watching him bust through that windsheild? Man, I get chills just thinking about it!
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Tomorrow is New Year’s Eve and before I partake in the libations that will help to wash away what was 2005, I like to take a moment to look back, take stock and examine where things started and how they ended.
2005 was a difficult year for me in a lot of ways. Lots of personal stresses. Cami got a new job. We sold our first home and bought our second home. Moving… THAT’S never fun. I lost my Grandpa and tried to guide my family through the aftermath of that. Still have a few relatives in the hospital. Somewhere in there when I was stressed out to the point I was banging on the steering wheel in traffic (it happened!), I decided to make a change in my personal health, started working out and lost 25 pounds.
So, yeah… lots of personal change. So it feels good to have moved beyond it.
As far as the comic is concerned, I don’t know if I was as dedicated to it as I could have been this year. Looking back through the ’05 archives, I’ve had more guest strips this year than any other. And while I’m proud that Theater Hopper is at the level where there are enough readers and other creators aware of the comic to help support me through a rough patch… honestly, that shouldn’t be happening to that degree.
Then again, I only blew off two updates this year. One was because my monitor fried on me, and the other one was just this week because I was still coming down from Christmas. So that’s not bad!
2005 was a year for milestones. We celebrated our 400th comic, our 3rd year anniversary and our 500th comic. All big successes. Incidentally, our 400th comic was also the introduction of our first new character in a long time – Charlie. Which could be considered successful or unsuccessful depending on your level of patience for slowly-unfolding storylines…
In the spirit of further transition, 2005 was the year that Theater Hopper moved away from Dayfree Press – the web comic collective we helped to establish – and onto greener pastures with Boxcar Comics. As much as I learned from the Dayfree guys – and I respect all of them – I think the camaraderie I have at Boxcar is a little more tightly knit as I was already good friends with Zach, Mitch and Joe. So it was a pretty smooth transition. Incidentally, I had a blast with those three jokers at Wizard World Chicago this year and hope to do it again next year!
Probably our biggest success this year wasn’t even something I did. The proper accolades go to Dave Buist from Taking the Bi-Pass for helping get our content the most organized and efficient it’s ever been. And I mean EVER!
Dave devised a new archiving system for the comics and the blogs built off keywords. So now you guys can search for your favorite strips, characters and movie references with greater ease. This has been something I’ve wanted for A LONG time. Not only for you guys, but it was even getting hard for ME to find the comics I was looking for. And I created the dumb things.
But Dave took his work one step further by also developing our Movie Review Database – and application so brilliant, I’m still grinning over it’s potential. I haven’t talked about it in a while because I’m still adding to it all the time. New movies, images of posters, cast information, links to the Internet Movie Database, plot descriptions, the works.
The idea is amazingly simple. All you have to do is create an account through the THorum. One you’re logged in, you can search for any movie that you would like to comment on and leave your own review! How cool is that! Like I said, I’m adding movies all the time. Eventually, the hope is that you can leave your two cents on virtually every movie Theater Hopper has ever referenced! How many other web comics are doing that!
There’s still a few layout glitches in the database that Dave and I are working on. Cosmetic stuff. Nothing serious. The guts of this thing work like a charm and it’s all thanks to Dave’s expert code knowledge. Once again, Dave – thanks from the bottom of my heart!
I think 2006 is already shaping up to be a great year. With my personal trials out of the way, I have more time to dedicate myself to the comic and push some projects through that I’ve been wanting to accomplish for years. I’ve designed the initial layout of the FIRST THEATER HOPPER book which will collect the first 52 strips in one handy volume. Eventually there will be two more volumes and the entire set put together will represent the first year. I plan on producing books in a similar fashion for Year Two and Year Three.
It might sound odd to offer three volumes for the first year, but I’m going that route to help me keep costs down. When it’s all said and done, the individual books will only be $9.99. When compared to other web comic collections I’ve seen, that’s pretty cheap. I want to make sure you guys get a copy for yourselves because it’s going to look really nice. More news on that in the future.
In the meantime, I want to thank all of you for sticking around and making Theater Hopper the success that it is. I’m continuously humbled by your interest in my work and only want to bring you more and better work in the time ahead.
Happy New Year and best wishes to you and yours!
THANK YOU!
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Wednesday’s comic will be delayed because I am a moron and forgot to upload it to the server.
I have a doctor’s appointment at 5:00 PM, so don’t expect to see it until early this evening.
Sorry for the screw up, guys. But it’ll be worth the wait. I’m really happy with how the artwork turned out on this one!
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Wouldn’t you know it? Just as soon as I sit down and invest a bunch of time into drawing a strip about Steven Spielberg directing a remake of Mary Poppins, a spokesperson for the director has to come forward and squash the rumor.
Here’s how it all went down according to the Internet Movie Database’s Movie News page:
Spielberg Quashes ‘Mary Poppins’ Rumors
Steven Spielberg has played down rumours he is planning to remake Mary Poppins. The Saving Private Ryan director was linked to the project by Sir Richard Eyre, the director of the London stage show of Mary Poppins. He said, "Spielberg wants to make a new film of Mary Poppins and we’ve talked about it a lot. "It will be hard to outdo the original but kids love the story and I’m sure that the remake will be a real success." But Spielberg’s representative Marvin Levy counters, "I never heard of this and couldn’t imagine Steven ever doing a remake of a classic – and a (Walt Disney) classic at that. "There’s a Broadway show from Disney but nothing involving us in any way."
This always happens. Go to the trouble of spoofing a Wizard of Oz sequel starring Drew Barrymore? Talks fizzle out. Quentin Tarantino might direct the next installment in the Friday the 13th franchise? Nope. He says that was never going to happen.
So, are there any projects in the pipeline that you guys want me to put a stop to? Because I’ll do a comic about it and that’ll be all she wrote!
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With 2005 come and gone, there have be a lot of "Best of…" and Top 10 lists.
…and Theater Hopper didn’t earn a spot on any of them.
But I don’t care about that! Because, my friends, I earned a spot on the only webcomic-related list that really matters. The Top 15 Most Hot Webcomic Artists of 2005!
Clark Gable? Oh, yea! Suck on that, you critically acclaimed posers! I’M HAWT!
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Something I forgot to mention that Theater Hopper is involved with is the new comics-for-your-video-iPod service Clickwheel.
A few of my contemporaries are involved, but I’ve been slow to get on the horse. The process is simple. All you need to do is go to the site and choose your favorite comic. Check out the episodes they have available and download it. The best part about it? IT’S TOTALLY FREE!
Even if you don’t have a video iPod, it’s worth it for you to check out. Any time there’s the opportunity for web comics to cross over into another medium, I think we should be there to support it.
Right now Theater Hopper only has one episode uploaded to the site. It’s a version of comic #500 and the introduction of evil movie theater floor manager Victor Kresh. I plan on uploading the other two strips in that story arc soon.
Bookmark Clickwheel now and keep checking back for new episodes uploaded to the site. If it proves popular, I might start uploading Clickwheel-exclusive content. Not full strips, or anything. Maybe additional sketches or small one-panel jokes. It’s my hope to eventually work forward enough on the comic that you can go out there and download a strip before it posts to the site. But in three and a half years I’ve never worked ahead on anything, so the odds of that are probably small.
At any rate, check out Clickwheel!
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For those of you wondering if the sale I announced in the store is for real or not, I have a dozen packaged orders sitting in my office that say "Oh, yeah. We’re for real, baby."
Now maybe you’re thinking to yourself. "Twelve orders? That’s not very much." I urge you to keep in mind that this was the first day of the sale and we’re working from a limited inventory. So if you’re thinking of ordering anything, DON’T WAIT. I can’t stress this enough. I’ve already had to tell a couple of unfortunate souls that the shirt they wanted was no longer in stock. This saddens me as much as it saddens them. Mostly because I have to refund their money. DON’T LET THIS HAPPEN TO YOU!
Remember that all t-shirts are $9.99, all baby-doll tees are $14.99 and all hoodies (or should I say "hoodie?") are $24.99. Our sale ends two weeks from now on February 6. If I’m already having to be the bearer of bad news in regards to diminished inventory on the first day, you don’t want to be caught out in the cold on the second to last day of the sale with nothing to show for it. Prices will not be this low again for a very long time.
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For those of you who might have been holding out on your order today due to my post from last night, I wanted to let everyone know that the inventory reflected in the store is up-to-date and accurate. There should now be no confusion regarding what designs are left, so you won’t have to worry about ordering something that someone else may have snatched up first.
We have several styles and sizes still left, so I encourage you to get in there while the gittin’s good! It’s my hope to burn off the remainder of my inventory so I can start fresh with new projects in the future – namely, the Theater Hopper: Year One book! So that means you’re unlikely to see discounted prices on these shirts for a long time to come.
Our sale ends on February 6, so ORDER AWAY!
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I just wanted to pop in and say how awesome you guys are with ordering stuff from the store. I put the call out, and you totally answered.
But I also want to give everyone a heads-up that I haven’t been able to process today’s orders just yet. It’s possible that some of you may have ordered items that were snapped up by someone else and I have to adhere to a first-come-first-serve basis.
I’m hoping that’s not the situation we find ourselves in for the majority of you, but it’s happened a couple of times already. So like I said, just a head’s up.
If someone has already claimed the item you want, I will follow up with you personally and let you know. I’d be happy to either refund your money or apply it as store credit toward the purchase of another design. It kind of sucks, but that’s the stuff you run into when you’re working with a limited inventory.
I’ve been able to keep up with updating what’s in stock. I’m just saying it’s not happening tonight. I have a wicked head cold and I need to get to bed. Plus, I just got the estimate back on my banged up Element and it was $1,800. Yeah. That doesn’t help much, either.
But you guys are great! Thanks so much for your support!
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