Evan Dorkin's Blog, page 10

That Time I Almost Wrote a Popeye Vs. Mars Attacks Comic

Originally posted to my Tumblr, figured I'd drop it in here for those who only follow me on the LJ:

Weird day in a freelancer’s life: A little while back I got a call from IDW about a project that I didn’t think I’d have any ideas for, let alone any desire to write — Popeye Vs Mars Attacks (!@$&!!???). Now, okay, I love Segar’s Popeye like nobody’s business, and the Mars Attacks cards are crazy fun, but, c’mon, WTF, right? ‘Ja think I’m a Dr Frankenstein? Let’s show a little dignity, some common sense, let’s not go license crazy now, this way lies madness, etc.

Anyway, I turn it down, tell Sarah about it, we laugh, we agree comics is crazy, and I go take a shower. An hour later, I send IDW a pitch. Because comics people are as nuts as comics. And, hey, IDW digs it, we set up a rate and a schedule, and I’ve got a crazy gig, and then, hey, whuh-oh — for reasons I won’t go into in any real detail on — within a few more hours I’m out of the gig. I went from offer-to-pitch-to-acceptance-to-hired-to-gone in about seven hours, a new one in my book. I had and have no hard feelings with IDW over it, it wasn’t a situation they brought about, there was something in the equation that tossed a monkey wrench into the works as far as my participation went, and it was my choice to drop out. Crazy. Anyway, here’s the pitch letter I had sent IDW— nothing genius, but not a terrible approach for a headscratcher of a premise, imho:

I took a shower and, as always seems to happen in these situations, I had ideas for something I thought I had no ideas for. So I guess here’s a rough pitch, or at least a batch of thoughts churned up:

Popeye doesn’t believe in Martians, so the invasion prompts a Well, Blow Me Down response as saucers loom over town in a big panel. Base a bunch of panels/bits on the cards, include any martian machines/bugs/monsters that might work, but concentrate on the aliens/soldiers. Popeye barely reacts to the invasion beyond it being an alienistikal nuisance/bunch of thugs needing whipping. Everyone else would be up in arms. Roughhouse’s diner is burned and the stink permeates town like the black death cloud in War of the Worlds. Castor Oyl tries to profit off the invasion fears by selling people anti death ray outfits (sacks), ointments and masks, etc. Maybe a page or two done as “daily strips” with punchlines to break things up and add a little something to the mix. Popeye proves to be impossible to kill and a stubborn destructive force but the Marian forces are too big, the elongated affair  gets settled with a boxing match between Popeye and a huge, mutant multi-armed Martian. The match lasts days, highlights told through trading card-style panels, describing the back and forth punch-em-up the way the Mars Attacks cards describe the invasion/counter-attack. Maybe the Martians cheat and the Jeep or somebody lends a hand. Ultimately, Martians sent packing.

Need some business for Wimpy, Olive Oyl, etc, if possible. Maybe Wimpy is a traitor/collaborator for a while, need to re-read the strips to see how he behaves in similar situations. I think there’s a sceintist character in the strip, we could use him like one of those 50’s-scientist types who babbles about the menace, and is of no use whatsoever. But mostly a Popeye vehicle, one of those situations where he’s half dead half the time and just keeps going as the obstacles pile up and get crazier. Again, this is off the cuff stuff, but as a one-shot with these weird parameters I think it kind of needs to be fairly straightforward, boom boom boom (with jokes).

Fun fact: A fantasy project I used to carry around in my head for some time was to do Popeye comic with Stephen DeStefano. I’d get dumped off that one, too, if it ever happened. Arf arf arf.

Eltingville Club #2: Train Wreck in Progress

Asbury Park Comic Con - April 12th & 13th

We'll be appearing at the Asbury Park Comic Con next month at the Berkeley Oceanfront Hotel in Asbury Park, N.J. The show has expanded to two days and has a larger guest list this year, I assume that will mean more exhibitors (they'll be posting exhibitors soon, I believe). It's a really fun show, all about comics, sort of a cross between Heroes and SPX. Sort of. Whatever.

The guest list mixes old and new, mainstream, new mainstream, not-so-mainstream, alt/indy, etc. Here's a sampling: Peter Bagge, Chris Claremont, JH WIlliams III, Ann Nocenti, Don McGregor, Greg Benton, Stephanie Buscema, Jim Steranko, Bob Fingerman, Cliff Chiang, Box Brown, Mark Schlutz, Bob Camp, Jay Lynch,...it's that sort of crazy mix of people. You get underground cartoonists, mainstream creators, silver Age veterans, indy/alternative heroes and upcomers and a cosplay competition. Crazy.

There will also be panels and...after checking the page it appears the panel that Sarah and I were asked to be on has been dropped. Which is a-okay with me. I talk enough already without being asked to.

Anyway, the show has a great vibe and Asbury Park has good food on and around the boardwalk and the awesome Silver Ball Pinball Museum arcade is there. Kathleen Hanna's band The Julie Ruin is playing Asbury Lanes on the 12th (and there's probably other local shows going on, I assume), so there's a lot of reasons to take the trip out and do the funnybook show thing at Asbury in a few weeks.

We'll be hauling books and art and whatever odds and ends we can find so we can attempt to trade them to people for money. I wish The Eltingville Club #1 was going to be out (April 23rd), but we will have copies of the new Beasts of Burden: Hunters and Gatherers one-shot (FYI: House of Fun and Beasts of Burden: Neighborhood Watch are out of print and gone, so we won't have those at the table anymore. Someday, they will be collected. Yes. Someday.)

Hope to see some of you folks in Asbury Park next month.

Hopefully it won't snow.

HOF Art Auctions Now Up on eBay

We have some original pages and illustrations up on eBay as part of what will likely be a prolonged attempt to sell off a bunch of our stuff to help raise some money while 2014 kicks us around some more. The first offerings include a M&C page, a page of FUn Strips, a Yo Gabba Gabba Comic Time page, some Mad illos, etc.

You can see the auctions listings here.

We're going to be also unloading some collectibles and stuff as well as more art in the near future.

The Nightmare Almost Realized: The Eltingville Club Complete HC Collection

Twenty years after I vomited up the first Eltingville Club strip in a no-talent fit of anger the entire bloody mess is poised to be collected by Dark Horse this October in an over-sized hardcover matching the Milk and Cheese and Beasts of Burden books. There's never been a domestic collection of this material before, so, hey, that's something, I guess. $20 bucks for the works, including three Eisner Award-winning train wrecks of fandom gone wild, the color zombie crawl strip from DHP/HOF, the one-off alternative/indy Northwest Comix Collective piss-take, some notes about the 2002 Welcome to Eltingville Adult Swim pilot, and  -- if things work out -- some production and storyboard art done for the pilot by me and Stephen DeStefano. So, there's that.



Cover by me and Sarah Dyer.

Murder Your Ears, Burn Your Brain: Comic Book Jones Podcast Ep #70

After the Beasts of Burden: Hunters and Gatherers signing at Comic Book Jones this past Wednesday, I sat down with the cast and crew for their weekly podcast recording, which has just been posted. This podcast is not safe for work, maybe not safe for rational-minded human beings, no one was on their best behavior as far as I can recall, and it's a long one. Just so you know.

Listen -- if you dare -- to WCBJ episode 70, "We Don't Have Room For Gamera"...here.

P.S. My thanks to all the Jones Clan members, the HOF Faithful and the just-plain-curious who came to the signing on Wednesday. The store was already humming because it was Wednesday but I signed a few dozen books and did some drawings and had a great time talking with folks -- especially Anthony (aka "Marvel" Jones), one of the sweetest kids and comic fans I have ever met. I drew a zombie Daredevil for him and he promised to draw me a zombie Power Man, which I will hold him to. What a great kid.

P.P.S. The signing went really, really well, we went over six hours before rolling into recording the over two-hour podcast. If all goes well I'll be back at Comic Book Jones to sign copies of The Eltingville Club #1 next month, on April 23rd. More on that asap, hopefully.

Newsarama Interview on Eltingville, Beasts of Burden

I spoke to Chris Arrant at Newsarama about wrapping up The Eltingville Club, how my tendency towards clutter affects the scripts for Beasts of Burden and other topics that don't exactly shake the heavens of North American pop culture (of course, as you may well remember, I'm huge in the tiny Republic of Togoland). You can read the interview here if you wish to. Go, go on, it's not very long, I'll wait here until you come back.

FYI -- one of my answers didn't make it in so the interview carries a mistake, Eltingville wasn't created while Iw as working at Jim Hanley's Universe and wasn't based on my woeking in comic shops. Here's the stuff that was dropped, possibly in the middle of follow-ups and clarifications we were doing:

"The idea for Eltingville actually came out of a phone conversation I had with my then-publisher, Dan Vado. Dan was writing for DC Comics at the time and was getting a lot of crazy fan hate mail and death threats and bullshit because he killed off a character in a Justice League story. Some of the mail was incredibly vicious and all of it was incredibly stupid, I mean, we're talking about people losing their shit over fake, not-real, make-believe fictional characters, corporate intellectual property, concepts that never actually go away or "die" because if they really disappeared for good the company loses the rights, and they'll never let that happen. This is what some people write death threats and hate rants about, about nothing that really means anything in the long run because the characters always come back -- and then these ding-dongs go crazy that they changed their costume or skin color or something else that doesn't or shouldn't matter. Anyway, that's where Eltingville came from. Hatred of bad fandom, filled in with my own experiences as a fan, retailer and comic book making loser. And Twiki jokes."

Speaking of Beasts of Burden, which I was just doing with my manager -- who many of you may remember is a stuffed owl -- the first new issue in quite some time drops tomorrow at comic book shops that decided to order it. I guess it'll be available digitally this week or next week or this Spring for those who are shit out of luck, LCS-wise.

I'll be appearing at my local stomping grounds (I really do stomp there, stomping is such jolly good fun, eh,wot?), Comic Book Jones, signing copies of Hunters and Gatherers from 3 -6, possibly longer, possibly until closing, and then I may possibly be doing the CBJ podcast that evening and eating White Castle "hamburgers" and regretting everything I ever did up to that point. Hey, CBJ's got a 0 off all back issues sale going this month, there's always that. And free coffee. I don't drink that, it's bad for you, unlike White Castle "hamburgers".

See you, very likely wish I could be you.

Edited to add: I didn't realize cutting and pasting the interview segment meant there'd be a big dumb-looking white space around the text. I hope all of you left who still follow this blog will excuse my computer dumbness and the ugly, dumb-looking white space around the text. I'd try to fix it, or ask Sarah to help me, and my fucking OCD is screaming at me to re-type it so it will all look clean and be better and not look as dumb, but I want to eat dinner, instead.  This is an ugly, nothing-looking POS blog, anyway, so, I should just pretend it's supposed to be some rough-looking crap that's taking a stance against slick BS. Bleagh.

Signing at Comic Book Jones This Wednesday, March 12th

Hey, I was at our local comic book shop with Emily yesterday and they asked if I was interested in coming in next week to sign copies of Beasts of Burden: Hunters and Gatherers and so just like that I have a signing to debut the one-shot. Yay and huzzah, I feel like as one alive.

The signing starts at 3 P.M. and I will be there until at least 6 pm, maybe staying, maybe leaving to drive the comic book kid home and then maybe coming back to sign some more and do the CBJ podcast that evening. I'll be handing out Beasts of Burden signing cards and doing sketches in books and whatever, feel free to come by with a sketchbook if you're anywhere near Staten Island that day.

The event flyer with information is below, the Comic Book Jones website is here, hope to see a few folks there next week in support of our new Beasts of Burden comic. Thanks in advance.

Comic Book Resources Interview - Beasts of Burden/Eltingville

You can read it here. I had fun doing it and appreciate Steve Sunu taking the time and having the interest in speaking with me. I took some of his questions very seriously and others I didn't take very seriously at all, and most of you have probably heard me say these kinds of things before, but they asked about the Beasts of Burden movie and there are some Hunters and Gatherers preview pages to look at, so, hey, children, y'know, it's just a click away. If you skip it there's another one coming up any day now for Newsarama, although both interviewers touched on different things so you might want to check 'em both out because these are clearly the end times. Ha ha, I kid.

One thing I wanted to touch on was that in the interview I mention both Dan Slott and Anita Sarkeesian receiving threats from fabs because of their work, and there's a hyperlink to a piece about Slott but no link about the situation Sarkeesian faced. I realize the Slott link is to a related CBR article, also written by Sunu, and it makes sense linking to it as a matter of course. But, I have to say if it was up to me I'd have also put in a link to something about what happened -- and continues to happen -- to Anita Sarkeesian.  I think her situation was worth highlighting in the same way Slott's was, and if CBR articles can link to non-CBR sites like Act-I-Vate or Facebook or Twitter, I figure they could have easily enough sent eyes here, or here, or just here.

Just saying.

Interviews I Forgot to Link To

Last year I was a guest on the Super Live Adventure Podcast, recorded live in front of a live, semi-interested live audience at the Full Cup here on Staten Island, NY. The interview ran Super Live Long -- go figure -- and was presented in two parts. Alcohol greases the wheels in part one, and we talk about a bunch of things, maybe even comics and animation crap I've worked on.

Here's part 1 for your listening irritainment.

Here's part 2 -- where co-host Chris gets Super Live Liquored Up (and I get a little sloppy, as well) and we make even less sense than in part one, iirc. Apparently we talk about some pretty dopey stuff.

Here's a very short interview at Wired.com about the Bill and Ted comic I did for Marvel back in the day.

Blah blah blah.