Category: Talented People Suck

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My Moebius Obsession

Besides creating a shitload of brain-melting comics, Moebius (Jean Giraud) contributed storyboards and concept designs to numerous science fiction and fantasy films, including Alien, Tron, The Fifth Element and The Abyss. I’ve been on a big Moebius kick lately, and I’ve settled on “The Long Tomorrow” to share with you bastards.

According to the man himself …

I drew “The Long Tomorrow” in 1975, while I worked with Alexandro Jodorowsky on a film adaption of “Dune.” Originally Douglas Trumbull was to do the special effects, but that was not to be so Jodorowsky hired Dan O’Bannon to replace him. Dan came to Paris. Bearded, dressed in a wild style, the typical Californian post-hippie. His real work would begin at the time of shooting, on the models, on the hardware props. As we were still in the stage of preparations and concepts, there was almost nothing to do and he was bored stiff. To kill time, he drew. Dan is best known as a script writer, but is an excellent cartoonist. If he had wished, he could have been a professional graphic artist. One day, he showed me what he was drawing. It was the story board of “The Long Tomorrow.” A classic police story, but situated in the future. I was enthusiastic. When Europeans try this kind of parody, it is never entirely satisfactory, the French are too French, the Italians are too Italian … so, under my nose was a pastiche that was more original than the originals. A believer in parody, Dan continued that tradition. As the story was very strong, I immediately asked if he would allow me to play around graphically, with complete freedom, without conventional pyrotechnics, to refocus on the floating point of view. Pete Club’s costume, for example, was almost ridiculous, far from the traditional raincoat of Bogart. It was the same for most of the visual elements. I scrupulously followed Dan’s story. One day I wish we could publish our two versions side by side. As the strip has pleased everyone, I asked Dan about a sequel, but it did not get his attention, so was simply an adventure I never designed.

This story heavily influenced everyone from writer William Gibson (Neuromancer) to Ridley Scott (Blade Runner) to George Lucas (Empire Strikes Back). If the launchpad sentinel looks familiar to Star Wars fans, it’s because Lucas lifted its design in toto for the probe droid. O’Bannon did a ton of stuff later on, but is perhaps best-known for writing Alien and directing Return of the Living Dead.

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LOVE DEATH + ROBOTS

Yes, please!

New and completely bonkers sci-fi series from Tim Miller (Deadpool) and David Fincher (Fight Club, Zodiac, Mindhunter). On Netflix March 15, you magnificent bastards. 18 animated stories, allegedly in a kind of Heavy Metal format.

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John Byrne’s Studio

Okay, so I have a John Byrne obsession, so what? He’s still got some pretty cool shit in his studio …

John Lindley Byrne (/bɜːrn/; born July 6, 1950) is a British-born, Canadian raised, American writer and artist of superhero comics. Since the mid-1970s, Byrne has worked on many major superheroes, with noted work on Marvel Comics’ X-Men and Fantastic Four and the 1986 relaunch of DC Comics’ Superman franchise, the first issue of which featured comics’ first variant cover. Coming into the comics profession as penciller, inker, letterer and writer on his earliest work, Byrne began co-plotting the X-Men comics during his tenure on them, and launched his writing career in earnest with Fantastic Four (where he also served as penciler and inker). During the 1990s he produced a number of creator-owned works, including Next Men and Danger Unlimited. He scripted the first issues of Mike Mignola’s Hellboy series and produced a number of Star Trek comics for IDW Publishing. In 2015, Byrne and his X-Men collaborator Chris Claremont were entered into the Will Eisner Award Hall of Fame.

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The Morbid Story Behind The Red Ceiling

Fascinating and sad.

According to the Oxford American …

The house in the photograph belonged to a man named Tom “T. C.” Boring, a dentist born and raised in Greenwood, whom Eggleston has described as the best friend he ever had in the world. He was the scion of a well-respected Delta family, a sharp and promising Southern archetype who glided his way through the University of Mississippi, Loyola University, and the Navy before coming home to Greenwood and gradually, ungracefully losing his mind.

Full article here. As always, enjoy or don’t.

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Look Around You

*checks notes*

Yep, talented people still suck.

Look Around You is a British television comedy series devised and written by Robert Popper and Peter Serafinowicz, and narrated in the first series by Nigel Lambert. The first series of eight 10-minute shorts was shown in 2002, and the second series of six 30-minute episodes in 2005, both on BBC Two. The first series of Look Around You was nominated for a BAFTA award in 2003.

The humour is derived from a combination of patent nonsense and faithful references and homages. For instance, fictional items that have a passing resemblance to everyday objects are shown and discussed. Such items include the “boîte diabolique”, a box at the top of a piano scale which housed the “forbidden notes”; and “Garry gum”, a performance-enhancing chewing gum which has the unfortunate side-effect of inducing diarrhoea, necessitating the consumption of “anti-Garry gum”. Each episode begins with a “countdown clock”, similar to the one used on ITV Schools programmes from 1979 to 1987. The music that accompanies the countdown is in the same spirit as the original, but is played on a solo guitar, and at the beginning of the “Brain” module, the guitarist can be heard tuning.

The module subjects are distorted beyond recognition; for instance, germs are described as coming from Germany, and whisky is said to be made by combining water with nitrogen. The maths module features a distorted and inaccurate version of the ancient ‘seven cats’ puzzle by Ahmes. Additionally, subjects are mixed: for example, a chemistry experiment about eggs (In the episode Water) turns into a French language lesson. Each episode follows a general format, beginning with an introduction to the subject, followed by a series of silly experiments performed by the hapless (and normally mute) scientists, played by Popper, Serafinowicz and Edgar Wright, among others.

This is “Music,” episode 6 from the first season.

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Fuck Me, Don’t Tell A Soul Is 30

Released February 1, 1989. This makes me feel older than turning 50. To put it in perspective, this post is the equivalent of the 20-year-old me in 1989 talking about an album that came out in 1959.

Wiki-wiki-wikipedia says …

Don’t Tell a Soul marked the debut of Bob “Slim” Dunlap, who replaced founding guitarist Bob Stinson. The album was recorded at Cherokee Studios in Los Angeles and produced by Matt Wallace and the band. It was mixed by Chris Lord-Alge, who decided to give the record “a three-dimensional, radio-ready sound”. However, singer and guitarist Paul Westerberg was not satisfied with the new direction, commenting: “I thought the little things I’d cut in my basement were closer to what I wanted.”

To celebrate, let’s all take a moment and watch one of my favorite rock ‘n’ roll moments.

As explained by a lesser blog …

Before the show, they were told they needed to change the line, “We’re feeling good from the pills we took.” Well, fittingly, Westerberg did no such thing, and the censors were obviously ready for it, as the tape goes silent during that section of the song. What the censors at ABC didn’t anticipate was this: Near the conclusion of “Talent Show” the lyrics address the time when the band hits the stage and there’s no retreating: “It’s too late to turn back, here we go” is repeated twice on the album version, but here Westerberg has changed the line to “It’s too late to take pills, here we go”—ha! The censors missed it and they’ve pissed everyone off again! To add insult, the line is sung three times.

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I Really Want To See This

And I don’t care what you say.

Laurel & Hardy, one of the world’s great comedy teams, set out on a variety hall tour of Britain in 1953. Diminished by age and with their golden era as the kings of Hollywood comedy now behind them, they face an uncertain future. As the charm and beauty of their performances shines through, they re-connect with their adoring fans.

The tour becomes a hit, but Stan & Ollie can’t quite shake the specter of Laurel and Hardy’s past; the long-buried ghosts, coupled with Oliver’s failing health, start to threaten their precious partnership. A portrait of the most tender and poignant of creative marriages, they are aware that they may be approaching their swan song, trying to rediscover just how much they mean to each other.

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The Muck Monster

When I was a kid, my mom would take me grocery shopping. I would practically run to the magazine stand and then she’d collect me after check out. What she still doesn’t know is that I read TONS of inappropriate shit, from Creepy to Creem and whatever else you can think of. On one of those trips, I came across this story. Me being me, it had a profound effect. Unfortunately, I could never track down a copy as an adult, not knowing the artist, story name, or publication. Occasionally, I would ask other horror fans about it, but no one ever knew what I was talking about.

Of course, after I gave up looking, I accidentally found it online. According to some comic historian with a blog, “The Muck Monster” was originally published in the September 1975 issue of Eerie (#68) as a color insert. Comix International then reprinted it in October 1975, and then, a few years later in November 1979, it was reprinted in black & white for issue 113 of Creepy. (Which is when I must have initially read it.)

So here it is, pretty much as I remembered it. I uploaded the color version because it’s higher resolution, but the black & white version is much more impactful. I should have guessed Berni Wrightson was the artist and writer.
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Check Out These Early Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse Animatics

So sayeth animator Alberto Mielgo …

As I mentioned before, I was hired to direct the animation test for the new Spiderman film.

Here you can see my original storyboards and animatics that I produced for such a test. My main intention was to explore the language of comics and cinema and merge them together. We finished only 4 of this shots. And everyone ended up pretty exhausted!!!
The shots that we produced with an incredible technical team were some of the most amazing thing Ive seen, and Im extremely proud of them and the team involved. With those shots we open a door to a pipeline and possibilities and help to estimate the overall film.
I hope Sony will allow me to share the finished shots some time in the future .

Im really happy to see that most of my shots on this early boards made it to the final film. Again I would like to congratulate the whole team that finished the final film for preserving the compositions and the original intention of these shots. It shows that everyone felt inspired and that they really cared for this particular vision.

As you can see the 3 versions are very different in tone. It was early and I was not too sure yet what would be the final mood of this film yet.

I work with pencil, photoshop, I do the comp in After FX and my edits in Premiere, with my own sounds and all bunch of crap in Audition… Did I ever say how much I love adobe?

Music on this obviously temp score just for the edit.

My pick temp track artist:
v1: SON LUX
v2: LEFTFIELD
v3: MAXIMONO

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You Get Nothing

Anybody ever heard this?

Willy Wonka is usually a very pleasant (albeit eccentric) chocolate tycoon. But when Charlie Bucket and Grandpa Joe steal the fizzy lifting drinks, he succumbs to a maniacal fit of rage and informs them that they get NOTHING!