This is a webcomic. It doesn’t involve any rockets… yet.
Remember to (Savannah knows what the other motto is. And why it’s so
important that THIS one supplants it.)
Embrace the Ridiculous!
All material and characters ©2006-2009 by Scott Alton-Thomas Burns all rights reserved
7/14/09
Have you ever watched this show?
The original was a riot… it was from Japan, and had voiceovers in English; two chefs
had to prepare dishes in one hour and then be judged. One of the chefs was a
regular, the “Iron Chef”. The new, American version is slicker and in some ways
better, but in either direction it always reminded me of… well, did you see Studio
60 On The Sunset Strip? A TV show with Matthew Perry. One of the big drawbacks
to the show was that a lot was made of the starrette, Sarah Paulson (“Harriet
Hayes”) and how wonderfully talented she was; effortless, once in a generation
star quality; wow, we all wish we were her… here she comes now! And then she
pops in and, well, like Marilyn Monroe tried to tell people, “Jesus, fellas, at
the end of the day I’m just a girl, what are you expecting?” Too much hype on
the intro and you’ve forced yourself to deliver. You can say how smart a
character is all you want, but if you do you’re going to have to show it
somehow. (Oh, and I know Amanda Peet was kind of supposed to be the starrette
here, and they also had a young girl who was supposed to be the hot babe, or was
Amanda the hot babe, or was it Sarah? The show kind of died not delivering on
any of the setup, the biggest flaws being:
1. Do not do a show about a comedy sketch show that isn’t funny. You’ve got a
natural fifteen minutes of filler or more; even Dick Van Dyke filled with the Allen
(Alan?) Brady material sometimes
2. No matter how much it’s on your mind, don’t start trying to build bridges between the intellectuals and the religious right unless you’ve got a handle on the issue yourself. No one wants to see you flounder your way toward an answer, and honestly, NO ONE REALLY WANTS A BRIDGE YET. Although we are getting closer, if it makes Aaron feel any better…)
Which brings us back to the Iron Chef. I know these guys are all good at that chef thing. The regulars and the challengers alike. It just all smacks of Sarah Paulson in Studio 60; or the tendency of little boys to arrange their green plastic army men in hierarchies of deadliness. “The grenade guy could take out the bayonet guy EASY but he could never beat the Mortar Guy.”
“You’re crazy, the grenade guy rules!” “Oh yeah!?” “YEAH!! Mortar guy sucks, he can’t move around!”
7/11/09
Notice the tilt of her right foot (her right, not your right). She’s not going to let this drop.
7/8/9
I did this one AGES back, and I really like the sketch… it caught something I shot at; the high cheekbones of Barbie Mom, the effect of culture on beauty. Marilyn Munster, Ellie Mae Clampett. Put her in a baggy dress and who KNOWS if she’s sexy. What bothers me about it, though, is the number of people who don’t get it. I mean really, this one has lost more people a few notches on the Primate Advancement Index than I care to recall.
I had ideas for a whole series of these; Banque du Soleil, Ecole du Soleil. When I drew this I had no idea they’d have those SuperChurches which resemble this more than somewhat. Now featuring your new pastor, Rev. Michael Bolton. Maybe it’s a good thing they haven’t gotten the trampoline/acrobat idea…
7/7/09
This was an idea generated by Joe and me… The hardest thing to work out sciencewise was the fireproof pants. It’s interesting to me to think of “wait for it” as the official motto of the future; I love the future, but I’m telling you if the Mayans were right and 2012 is IT I’m probably okay with that. My reaction to time is like “Is this shit ever going to STOP?!” I mean, really, how high does one need to count? Can we get a rollover here?
This is the design for a t-shirt… unless I decide that I don’t like it and want to try again. (Which event I suspect of happening soon.)
7/7/09
The sign on the wall announcing the restaurant: “Islamic Yee-Ha! Middle Eastern/Southwestern fusion.” I went through a phase where people were eating things; this one is still “Ewwww” but it doesn’t have the extra exclamation points that many of these inspired. I swear to god, Z-san, that was NOT supposed to be a rat.
Oh, and yeah, to those who read the original story here, that is in fact Gabby out to dinner with Officer Phil.
7/6/09
This idea is just a different delivery of a gag in Girl Genius (on the Links page)… a mad scientist is reminiscing about how he’d let the children out of their containment tanks on Christmas, and in the flashback panel he’s in a Santa suit with a big bag labeled “HO3”. I liked the idea of it being “Clausium”. I wonder what properties it’d have…
This idea occurred along with a few others: The Carolina Gullibility Index, which was developed by my friend Deborah. It was originally intended for use in holistic/alternative medicine; a test you could take on coming into the office so they would know whether, for example, you’d be willing to accept the idea of Iridology or having your “aura cleaned”. (Using the new vacuum, Aural B.)
On one end of the scale you’d have a 10; “believes that the cartoons on TV are real people you can meet in theme parks”. At the other end, a 0, you’d have “doesn’t even believe they themselves exist”.
In combination with that idea, I came up with the Primate Advancement Index. It kind of tends to go hand in hand with the CGI. At one end you have lemurs. Humans are not a 10, as you might think; there are Brights, Indigos and the Enlightened above the 7 that is us. (In case you were wondering what we were slowly evolving toward.) Between the PAI and the CGI, you have a nice palette of stereotyping.
☺
7/03/09
The virgin there seems to be pretty rigid; probably too much Botox. It must have been a pretty serious overdose, as it seems to have affected her hair.
There was a good sketch on Mad TV (the comedy show) where they were spoofing film noir, and the Sam Spade guy was talking to the hot Chinese client, and she said, “I’m on fire and I need someone to put it out,” and he said, “Well, I don’t know, do you think I’ve got enough hose?” and she said, “Oh, shut up and get over here! Put your big hose in my hoo-hoo!” and the voiceover said, “I could tell she was kind of new to this innuendo business…”
6/28/09
Punctuation is EVERYTHING….
I saw the first two on someone’s whiteboard, and drew this up. I have this thing where my brain evaluates as many ways of misunderstanding as it can generate in a reasonable length of time and then weighs them for probability of what was meant.
As far as Lily being “nothing” without Herman, you have to admit it’d have been a pretty boring show without him.
6/24/09
The tattoo on his arm says “Born Extinct”. It’s one layer tougher than Born to Lose or Born to Die. He also has a penis piercing… it’s the real reason the dinosaurs died off. There’s a warning for us all in there somewhere. You can get attention if you decorate it enough but no one’s gonna let you put that in them.
I look around me and see lots of people deploying attention getting devices; talent, drama, maybe just a really annoying voice or a willingness to eat bugs on TV. But what I don’t see is anyone having a real reason to draw attention.
Okay, I’m watching… what’s your message? What do you want me to know? Sadly, all I seem to be able to get is this dirty depressing image of glorious mankind, willing to sell their own mothers if you get them desperate enough; throwing each other under the bus seems all we have left sometimes. (Note, and I mean this seriously, when you feel this way remember you’re looking the wrong direction. There’s a lot of great stuff in us still. You have to abandon the idea of somehow turning everything into a moneymaking juggernaut, and you have to IGNORE THE GODDAMN MEDIA. If you only believe what you actually know about people you actually meet, you’ll find a lot more balance than we advertise. We’re surrounded but you know, we don’t have to listen.)
6/23/09
The early bird also gets why the French think Jerry Lewis is a genius. He doesn’t necessarily agree, but he gets it. I run into that all the time…
6/21/09
Intelligent design: there is a god, and he’s not the guy in ANY of those books. I think we definitely ought to teach it in the schools.
6/20/09
Factoids:
There are a number of species of cod that are not cod; but since we’ve overfished them for so long, we’ve agreed to call certain other fish that taste roughly the same “cod”. This particular cod is based on Murray Cod, an Aussie wannabe if I’m not mistaken. (Sometimes I am; not all that often about animals though. I lived on wildlife books growing up.)
The MasterCod idea came up while I was paying for my fish dinner with… you guessed it… my Visa. (Oh, did you not guess it? Sorry.) But it also came from this fact: There’s a mutation that occurs occasionally among the true cod, where the headbone grows into a vaguely crown shaped lump. These fish were prized among the Norwegians, and are called “king cod”. There’s a legend/tradition/cultural meme among them that, if you hang the king cod on a string from your ceiling, you can predict the weather by the way the cod points. This is actually true; but it’s the string, not the fish, that’s magic. You’re making a primitive hygrometer. It works as well if you hang a typewriter.
Interesting to me (only?): When fish develop a massive skeletal anomaly, we crown them king. Maybe The Elephant Man was just a king trying to happen.
Yeah, I know, it didn’t look much like a crown; but maybe he wasn’t DONE yet. Have YOU ever tried pushing a crown out your skull from the inside?
Little did we know. That’s not a hat.
6/19/09
This is a picture of a new species they’ve discovered. The “crystal frog”, a see through amphibian. I’m thinking it’s a clever response on the part of the frog world to our desire to dissect them. “Hey, you don’t have to cut me up! You wanna see my heart? HERE. Look, it’s even beating. Never seen that before did you? Now put down the damn knife. You don’t even have to pin me to the table. Here, watch, I’ll eat a fly for you…”
I also picture Kermit standing nearby, handing him that jestery looking collar and saying, “Christ, man, put some damn clothes on or something.”
6/18/09
Yeah, yeah, I KNOW I’m a big cornball. If Hee Haw was still on the air, I’d audition.
This evening I was driving home and I decided to take the interstate home; well, in the course of pulling onto the ramp, I see a small obstacle in the middle of the road, and I avoid. As I scoot past, I realize it’s two baby skunks playing in the road. When I say baby, I mean DISNEY cute baby skunks. Awwww…
It reminded me of my brother’s pet skunk. When he lived in Portland Oregon the guys there had a pet skunk. He claims it was a chick magnet. And that reminded me of a story from Deborah’s husband Pete; he was on the beach in NC and there was a guy strolling along with an 8 foot python draped around his neck. When he came near, Pete said, “If you don’t mind my asking, do you find that thing attracts or repels women?” Well, the guy thought about it for a while, and then said, “It’s about 50/50, but I’ll tell you what. The ones it attracts are real interesting.”
I kind of wonder about what kind of girls the pet skunk attracted. Chick magnet indeed; if you think of people as having polarities.
☺
Note: I find most people real interesting.
A phrase I use a lot. This sums up my position on where we’re at right now, we Americans. Now, we can forgive this guy for not figuring it out; he is, after all, a monkey. I’m not quite sure what our excuse is, though…
I LOVE the look on his face. I nailed what I was shooting for; it’s not the panic look that might have been more appropriate if this were entirely about being obvious. It’s a blend of struggle, and surprise, and skepticism, and just maybe the beginning of anger. He can’t BELIEVE he’s not going to get the cookies. He’s pulling really HARD. Man, you pull and pull your whole life and do you have anything to show for it? NO. Jeez.
On another note, I really like the classic pen and ink stuff… I’m likely to stick with that for a while. I really enjoyed the “one lineweight” that works so well on airplanes… only two utensils and neither of them look deadly… not like that lady next to me who was knitting a circle pattern like socks or something, and who had eight incredibly pointy sticks with her to do so. Jackie Chan could have slaughtered a small army with those things. They’re taking away my liquids over 3 oz. (okay with me, I didn’t have any anyway, I travel very light) in case I might be MacGyver but all I need to do to bring on sabers and guns is dress up as an old lady and knit with them.
(Okay, I’m overreacting. I know. But you didn’t see these things; knitting needles are bad enough, but these looked like she brought them straight from the Teriyaki Chicken Skewers at the chinese buffet.)
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Well, I think I’m finally getting the format figured out. I have no clear idea how often I’ll update, or how often I’ll move this pseudo-blog to archive status, but it’s my intent to put material here and to those who care, I’ll send you a message.
All archive material and miscellaneous stuff is on the Links page.
6/14/09
I did mention how much drawing you can get done on an average flight, didn’t I? If you’re going to dabble in cartoons, it’s best to either fly a lot or get sent to prison. I recommend flying; the odds of dying there are somewhat lower.
The glowing locked box is labeled “My Soul”. Just in case the pixelly goodness has made that less clear.