Richard Thompson's Blog, page 41

The Complete St. Patrick's Day Poor Almanacs

Collected here for the first time. Enjoy it while you can. On Sunday they're going back in the vault.

The latest Alice

Here's a preview of the first strip I've inked since circa 19-aught-12. It's a Sunday page and it took me 14 hours of concentrated effort just to do the head. Note the generous slathering of white-out to disguise the places where things went south (this was supposed to be Petey, I don't want to talk about it).

This Week's Cul de Sacs

At the drawing board this week is Mr. Lincoln Peirce, who knows how to do a kid strip better than anybody seeing as how he's been drawing Big Nate since 1991. The best comic strips are those that appear to happen spontaneously; the person whose name appears as its author just follows the characters around and transcribes events as incisively as possible. That's what Big Nate is and that's what Lincoln does, only of course he doesn't. He has to invent everything, all of Nate's manias and frustrations, and he makes it look large as life and twice as natural.

And he's doing it in Cul de Sac this week and doing a masterful job. Which is great, if you're a reader. But it sure raises the bar for those of us who have to sit at the drawing board in the near future.

I'm particularly fond of this strip. I liked the flying monkeys, the witch scared me silly.

The Scottish Play for Fifth Graders

There's not much going on here right now. You should go read my wife's blog on teaching Shakespeare to fifth graders the fun way - with sword fights, murders and Haka dances! Kids today have all the fun.

A Visit to the Library

I scanned these so I might as well post them.

This Week's Cul de Sacs

Is this great or what? I should've taken time off from the strip years ago! Because look who stepped up to pinch hit this week - one of my cartoon heroes, the polymathical comics virtuoso, Ruben Bolling!

I first saw Ruben's work in the late 90s when the Washington Post Weekend section started running his weekly strip, Tom the Dancing Bug. And I didn't get it at all. The first strip the Post ran baffled me (I don't remember what it was). But the second strip to run knocked me over and made me laugh out loud, something cartoons rarely do (I don't remember what it was either).  Tom the DB always seemed out of place in the Weekend section, a refugee from the alternative papers on the last page of the Post's goings-on-about-town section; its natural habitat would be in the DC City Paper between Shawn Belschwender and Lynda Barry. And not just for its wide-open format, but for its incredibly sharp sense of satire and parody. Tom the DB covers politics, economics, religion, sex, the law, pop culture, etc, etc, with devastating logic and, that rare thing, a truly funny sense of humor.

It's obvious to anyone looking at Ruben's work will notice right away that he's got a fondness for comics of almost any genre. From superhero to talking animal, he can parody them all, but none so well as the newspaper comic strip. So when he agreed to steer Cul de Sac for a week I worried: would Dinkle the Unlovable Loser show up and steal Dill's kidneys? But my fears are probably unfounded. Ruben can write for characters with irony and affection (go see his strips dealing with hapless, clueless middle-schooler Louis Maltby). I think Cul de Sac's in safe hands. And that Dill's-kidneys gag would work great as a Sunday page with Dill's brothers doing the stealing.

Here's one of Ruben's greatest hits from a few years ago, ironically not drawn by him-

Oh...

So I guess this explains that headache I've got.

This Week's Cul de Sacs

This week's strips come to you courtesy of the mighty drawing & writing hand of the Fake Rockstar himself, the man with the Angriest Eyebrows in the business, Mr. Corey Pandolph. In just 40 short years Corey has produced enough good comic strips to circle the Earth twelve times. But that's the tip of the iceberg. Let's look at his resume, which I've here shortened because it was intimidating me-

•14 years experience in cartooning for print and on the web.
• Worked on syndicated newspaper comic strips with both United Media & Universal/Uclick.
• Successfully put two books of strip collections into print through self publishing and sales.
•At one time, successfully wrote and produced 4 separate daily comics for print and web.
• Used my knowledge and experience to realize a dream of regularly contributing to MAD and The New Yorker magazines.
• Often referred to as the "Johnny Cash" of comics.
• 10 years experience writing and editing comedy for web and print media outlets such as, The Bollard, Casco Bay Weekly, Drink at Work.com, Macgasm.net and The Adirondack Daily Enterprise.
• Produced, wrote and directed sketch comedy shows at several venues in Portland, ME.
• Continue to perform original storytelling on stage at several storytelling shows in NYC,
including Adult Education, RISK! and Family Hour with Auntie Sara.
• Current producer and host of my own monthly storytelling show at Luca Lounge in NYC.
• Retweeted by celebrities daily.
• I built my own house.

Speaking as cartoonist I find the last item galling. I'm comfortable with the stereotype of the cartoonist as a clumsy schlub so flummoxed by the basic laws of physics that any task more complex than changing a light bulb reduces him to a puddle of flop sweat. But this Corey guy looks like he bats out a few dozen strips, plays with his dogs, sells a cartoon or two to the New Yorker, gets a little drunk and builds his own house. In the Adirondacks. With a lovely view. Also, John Hodgman once bought him a drink.

I so need a life, or a view.

More Oscar Memories

Below are two old Oscar Almanacs, from 2005 and 2008. Some of my predictions came true. But not the one about Michael Bay's career. Ah, well.

Quick, While There's Still Time!

For Oscar viewing-

From an old Almanac. I hear this really works!