Crying Purple Gorilla Comics.

Today's topic, by Nathan Schreiber, is "monkey reading comics".

Back in the day at DC Comics, someone in editorial (I'm not sure who, but I think it was Julius Schwartz) noticed that comics with covers featuring either (a) a gorilla (b) the color purple or (c) someone crying experienced an otherwise inexplicable boost in sales. Supposedly, these attributes were each allowed to appear on only one cover a month so as not to generate internal competition amongst the company's titles. That restraint is to be commended, but imagine the sales on an issue of Crying Purple Gorilla Comics. I mean, I'd buy it.

BTW, Alan Moore did this joke in the background of Top 10. I'm totally ripping him off.

Firefly day: Captain Mal Reynolds

It's "Firefly" day here on Drawbridge, not "Inara" day, just sayin'. Someone had to draw the Captain, and that someone was me.

So here's how Firefly day came about: we all love Firefly here at the Drawbridge studios. LOVE IT. But especially me.

A while back, the old fogies with whom I share this blog wanted to do a "Space 1999" day, which was some old sci-fi show from before my time. It meant nothing to me, so I asked, "Couldn't we do a 'futures of the past' day instead? You could draw Space 1999, and I could do, like, I don't know, 1984 or 2001: A Space Odyssey or something?"

"NO", said they, "It's Space 1999 day. Suck it!"

"Suck you!" said I, and drew this Firefly piece instead, because, as mentioned, I LOVE Firefly. And lo and behold, my Firefly piece got a whole lot of hits, way more that their Space 1999 pieces did, because people love Firefly. So then, as we all love Firefly, we figured, let's make a whole day of it.

And there was much rejoicing, hallelujah!

iPad vs Kindle-- the battle continues...

See? All they needed was a common enemy.

Anthems for a 17 Year Old Girl

Today's topic was "your favorite song". This isn't necessarily my end-all, be-all favorite song, but certainly it's one of my favorites.

"Favorite song" was my idea-- I really enjoyed making a comic strip of another of my favorites when we did "Radiohead" as a topic a few weeks back, and I wanted to try it again. I might make this a series, who knows?

Liz Taylor's Eyes...

...were violet.

I know, scientifically speaking, this was because she had blue eyes and a surplus of vascular tissue running through them, making them violet, but still-- Violet eyes. Pretty cool.

I was sorry to hear of her passing, even though, given my age bracket, I first knew her as that older lady who got married a lot that Michael Jackson would hang around with. As I grew out of my callow youth, I learned the true depths of her star power. Rest in peace, Ms Taylor.

The original Karate Kid

No, I'm not talking about Ralph Macchio here (although he is todays' warm-up topic).

I'll swoop your leg, sucka!

Created in 1966 by a then-13-year-old Jim Shooter for the Legion of Superheroes, Val Armorr of Earth is a master of every form of martial art that will be invented by the 31st century. In his initial appearance, he convinces the Legion of Superheroes to allow him onto their team when he uses his "super-karate" to beat up on Superboy. Despite that impressive feat, he's pretty far from my favorite member of the Legion, and I think he unofficially holds the record of having been killed off the most times. Some writers (Keith Giffen) just hate this guy.

Although the movie character has almost nothing to do with Val here, if you watch there is a prominent credit thanking DC comics for the use of their character's name. So now you know.

Happy St Patrick's Day!

Decided to draw a whole comic explaining the story of St Patrick's day.

Check out here for another in my extremely occasional true history comics, this one about Benjamin Franklin.

Whedon Wednesday- Buffy

It's Joss Whedon Wednesday on the 'Bridge, and and the topic is "Buffy the Vampire Slayer".

Someone had to draw the slayer, and that someone was me. Penciled this on the train ride over, and inked it in the studio. Not the best likeness of Ms. Summers ever committed to paper, but you all get the point.

G.I.Joe: Cobra the enemy.

Today's topic is "G.I.Joe"

What a difference a few years makes.

We're not all that dissimilar in age here in the studios, just a handful of years separate us all, really, but the 12 inch G.I.Joe of Simon and Tim's was like an urban legend for me growing up. We knew it had existed-- grownups were always telling us G.I.Joe was this big when they were growing up, yet none of us had ever gotten a good look at one. There was a pit in the local woods where I grew up that contained the melted and mutilated remains, impaled on a tree stump, of a 12 inch Joe that we would go view on occasion. But for me and my friends, G.I.Joe was a little 3 and 3/4 inch team of guys with cool nicknames and specialties. Even better, they had a team of enemies, Cobra, who were all much cooler than the Joes. I definitely sided with the bad guys.

I was never a big fan of the cartoon which existed to sell us the little plastic men, but I was a huge fan of the comic, which was written by Larry Hama and had art by such talents as Michael Golden, Herb Trimpe, Russ Heath and others.

Bizarro Superman!

I LOVE Bizarro. One day I'll draw a comic with him.

Check out my earlier warm-up I posted of Bizarro, too.

Darna and he arch-nemesis, Valentina

Today's warm-up topic was "Darna", the so-called Filipino Wonder Woman.

I really didn't know much about Darna, so I had to google her. In an awful lot of the pictures that came she was standing next to an evil-looking Medusa lady. Further googling revealed the Medusa lady to be her arch-nemesis, Valentina, so I drew the two of them in mortal combat. Just can't resist drawing a snake-haired lady.

Firefly: So what does that make us?

Big damn heroes, sir!

Ain't we just.

The topic today was actually Space: 1999, a show I've never seen, had barely heard of, and care nothing for. I tried to convince the fogeys I share a studio with to maybe, oh, I don't know, choose a topic that actually occurred in my lifetime or something, to no avail. So rather than draw their old timey space show I drew Firefly, which is set in 2517, and therefore that much better.

Happy Birthday, Will Eisner!

Nobody, and I mean nobody, could draw a donnybrook like Will Eisner. I would wish that more people could draw like him, but then I would be depressed. Hell, I didn't even look at reference for fear of being disheartened, so apologies if the Spirit is off-model.

Salsa: Now in three different varieties

Today's topic is "salsa".

Hope everyone brought some corn chips.

Chimera

Today's topic was "Chimera"

Well, I am kind of the mythology guy round hereabouts, so why not draw the original Chimera, the one from Greek myth? Well, Tim did a version of it that I can't touch, which hearkens back very closely to the (kinda sorta goofy) ancient depictions. But as luck would have it, I designed my own take on the  Chimera as part of a pitch for a spin-off series from Olympians that is currently languishing in non-development. I was fiercely proud of this somewhat more realistic take (if something like the Chimera could ever be considered realistic)  and was kind of saddened that there's a good chance it will never see the light of day otherwise, so why not share it here? So, as I was on the move all day, here's my crappy little subway doodle of the Chimera:

and as an added bonus, here's a sliver of art from that ill-fated Olympians spin-off pitch I mentioned, showing my Chimera and the Greek hero Bellerophon.

Hellboy go Boom!

Today's topic was Hellboy.

Mike Mignola is one of my favorite artists, the influence his work had had on mine is both significant and apparent. I love his character Hellboy, a character who was just created to be drawn in sharpies and papermates (as I've done here). I also love the way the character is written, especially his tendency to yell "boom" as he smacks things with his big right hand of doom. Fun stuff.

Got home, took one look at this, and realized that I absolutely must rotate the image like so:

warm-up: Ms. Jane Russell

I really didn't know much about today's topic, Jane Russell, who just passed away recently; this is no reflection on her status as an icon, but rather more a reflection on my status as a philistine.

According to the info page on her that Tim Hamilton sent around with the topic email this morning, Ms. Russell had been discovered working as a receptionist by that craziest of rich guys Howard Hughes, who was conducting a nationwide search for a sexy lady to star in a western he was directing called The Outlaw. What's more, to quote the site :

"Hughes had his engineers design a seamless underwire brassiere, a breakthrough in bra science to lift Russell's 38-D breasts, leaving no visible support lines to interrupt the under-blouse contour of her bosom. It was the first practical "lift and separate" push-up bra, but Russell later said she did not wear the uncomfortable contraption during filming. Instead she wore her own bras, adding a layer of tissue paper over the cups to eliminate unsightly support lines. Hughes, despite directing the picture himself, never knew the difference.'

Fascinating stuff, to be sure. Here's a drawing I did of Ms. Russell as she appeared in The Outlaw. I'll leave it to you to determine what sort of support she's using.