161


Lots of hub-bub yesterday about Andrew Garfield – the star of the new series of Spider-Man movies – talking about something that’ll never happen in a million years: the possibility of making Peter Parker gay.

I shouldn’t say that. It’s a possiblity it could happen, it just seems improbable. I’m betting there’s a guy wearing a pair of mouse ears that’ll shut that whole situation down pretty quickly.

But, as always, internet dwelling comic fans came out of the woodwork in the aftermath of Garfield’s statement to show how tolerant and accepting everyone is of all different types of people.

Wait.

No they didn’t.

Listen, I’m an angry, judgemental asshole and a comic book fan. I don’t have any gay or non-white friends, I barely leave my house and I’m a registered Republican. I’m a step away from being one of the guys in the comments section talking about how liberals are stealing my characters, etc. My first fanboy-ish reaction to the Garfield thing was a knee-jerk “How dare he?!” But it comes less from a bigotted place and more from a geek place. Spider-Man/Peter Parker has been around for 50 years, stop fucking with him!

Then I stop. I think. I rationalize.

First of all, it’s fiction. Who gives a shit?

Second of all, if Peter Parker were gay, would it change the core of his character at all? Absolutely not. If anything, it strenghthens his core. Peter Parker, growing up in the exact same way that has been present in countless retellings of his origin, but homosexual to boot? Nothing really changes. If he’s out, perhaps he gets bullied more in school. He was already bullied, maybe this pushes him further toward his goals. Uncle Ben & Aunt May support him and love him unconditionally, his sense of self is more centered when he gets bitten. Everything plays out the way it does, he becomes Spider-Man, one of the greatest fictional heroes ever. He just also happens to like dudes, as well. Nothing is different about what and who Peter Parker is. In fact we play this all the way out to a straight Doc Ock taking over his body and wackiness ensues!

Fuck it, let’s retcon this shit. Peter Parker is gay from here on out.

I mean, it’s not like we’re presenting the character as someone who won’t go out of his way to save people from danger because he was raised to believe that he should just let people die, and in the process of battling, I dunno, say Venom or something, actively causes the destruction of two cities and murdering thousands without so much of a thought, let alone regret. And then, I dunno, say he kills Venom or something even though he had multiple chances to properly end the battle without any loss of life, but just didn’t care to.

I mean, that would really fuck with the core of that character and change everything about him that makes Spider-Man who he is.

160


Batman phone home.

159. Ultraman


This may have been the guy in that Man of Steel movie.

158. Black Panther


Seriously guys, this paper is really nice. Once I was done drawing the cover, I turned the comic over and there was a whole ‘nother blank side. I just couldn’t NOT draw on it.

Man, I hope this guy who’s never seen my artwork doesn’t hate it.

157. Black Panther


A while back I did a sketch cover for my pal Joe on the blank sketch cover variant of Green Arrow #17. I loved the cardstock that the book was printed with and loved drawing on it and the feel of drawing on it. If I could draw on that type of cardstock all the time, I would.

Part of the reason that I love it is that when Marvel started this whole blank cover sketch variant gimmick, they were using glossy cardstock, or not even cardstock, just glossy cover stock. It was terrible to draw on: pencil, ink, or color.

So when I was then commissioned to draw Black Panther on the sketch variant of New Avengers #1, I was kind of wary that it would be the same cheap-ass Marvel cover stock.

It seems Marvel has smartened up and have switched to the fantastical wonderful cardstock that DC has been using. Seriously, I love this paper.

So anyhoo, I was commissioned to draw this Black Panther sketch by a guy I had never met and who had never seen my artwork before. So, we’ll see how this pans out.

156. The Baron and Baroness


This was a long delayed commission for Matt Brassfield of his television characters Baron Von Porkchop and The Baroness (Baroness Von Porkchop? I’ve only heard her referred to as “The Baroness”. I think Hasbro and Larry Hama might have something to say about that) from Terrifying Tales of The Macabre, a local horror host program.

Last night, I watched a movie which maybe could have used a host. It’s called The ABCs of Death. It’s a 2 hour and 10 minute anthology in which 26 directors from all over the world were given a letter of the alphabet and made a short film based on that letter, as long as it somehow involved death. Most anthologies tend to run about 3-6 short tales, and even then some of them are fantastic and some of them are turds and then a couple mediocre ones. This movie has 26 stories. The law of averages on this movie is not great. So basically, there’s about 8 good films here and the rest are just so-so or terrible. Also, there are 26 stories! I can’t even remember what the sketch is above here.

It’s mostly foreign directors from all over and a lot of the tales have little to no dialogue. Some are clearly meant to be comedic, some are dark and twisted, a few of them are literally cartoons. But they are all just jumbled together in a way that is incredibly jarring. Such as the comedically animated “Klutz” followed immediately by the insanely dark and disturbing “Libido”. There’s also quite a bit of toilet and scatalogical topics throughout the film, so I guess foreigners think bathroom stuff is super-hilarious or disturbing? I dunno. It was just a weird trend I noticed. I recognized the names of a few directors involved. Nacho Vigalondo (Time Crimes), Adam Wingard (A Horrible Way to Die, V/H/S), Angela Bettis (an actress mostly, has directed one other movie I’ve never seen called Roman), Jake West (Doghouse), Ti West (House of the Devil, The Innkeepers), Xavier Gens (Frontiers, Hitman), Jason Eisener (Hobo with a Shotgun), Jon Schnepp (Metalocalypse) and Kaare Andrews (most notably a comic book artist who did a fantastic run of Hulk covers during the early 2000s, but apparently has directed a couple things I’ve never seen).

Of that list, Vigalondo, Wingard and Schnepp were among the most memorable of the films (“Apocalypse”, “Quack”, and “WTF?” respectively). But seriously, if the phrase “Mixed Bag” could be singularly defined, I would point to this movie. I can’t recommend it, but I can’t not recommend it either. Watch at your own risk.

I also remember hearing about this movie a while back. I think the creators of the concept reached out to a lot more than just 26 filmmakers. I recall comedian Paul F. Tompkins starred in a entry for the letter “T” and was asking his fans to vote for their film. It did not make it. “T is for Toilet” – a claymation story about a toilet – did.

So there you go. That should probably make your decision for you on whether you want to see this or not.

155


I’m not a fan of the 4th of July. The American Empire has been crumbling for about the past 14 years or so (possibly longer) because… all Empires fall. We’re in a constant state of Us vs. Them, a philosophical civil war that will not end civilly. America will collapse in on itself within my lifetime and as far as I’m concerned this is nothing to get happy and excited about. There is nothing to celebrate right now, patriotically. For ever small bit of progress the country makes toward, I dunno, making the quickly slipping American Dream a reality for EVERYONE, we take about 100 steps back and fuck over another large portion of the populace.

Non-politically, I fucking hate fireworks. I’m not 6. I’ve seen them before, there’s nothing new here. Honestly, when I watched Land of the Dead and they called fireworks “Skyflowers” and used them to distract slack-jawed zombies, I’ve pretty much turned off on them. It certainly doesn’t help that my neighborhood is full of white trash pieces of shit that will set these goddamn things off whenever they feel like it – 4th of July, 10th of May, 26th of September, whenever – as long as there’s a cube of Bud and a roadtrip to Indiana, they’ll set off fireworks, ruining the “specialness” of it. Even if I liked fireworks, there’s a limit. Starting the “festivities” at 6pm and not stopping ’til after Midnight – that’s far too much. Fucking redneck assholes. Some of us have jobs and need to be up at 5am.

Also, no one invited me to any kind of cookout.

I did watch Waxwork though, in between explosions. Pretty fun, goofy horror movie that gets to be all sorts of different horror movies in one. Plus, it’s got Billy from Gremlins in it, not in a Gremlins movie, and the bad guy from Tron. And a midget/dwarf/whatever.

154

153


I doodled this on the back of a receipt at the Sprint store while waiting to get a new phone and my contacts were being transferred.

152. Phantom of the Opera


If a city could be my arch-nemesis, that city would be Yellow Springs, Ohio. It’s dirty and full of dirty, pretentious fucktard hippie fucks with their hackeysacks, dreadlocks, bongs and the reeking stench of patchouli. I’m an angry, judgemental person, but never in my life have I ever encountered such a large grouping of angrier, more judgemental, snobbish fucking assholes than the entire community of Yellow Springs. I don’t give a damn that Dave Chappelle hides there, I don’t find him that funny. Dark Star is the second worst comic shop in the Dayton area (sorry Mavericks). Have I mentioned the dirty hippies yet? Fuck that place. Fuck that place and burn it right off the fucking map.

The only bright spot is that my friend Juliet hosts a radio show out of Yellow Springs called Kaleidoscope. Last Wednesday, Juliet interviewed my friends Jason and Brian about small press and indie comics – mostly the ones they make and publish. I got to hang out during the show with my pal Matt, who asked me to draw Lon Chaney’s old man as The Phantom of the Opera while we sat around.

It was fun, the live band was great and Jason and Brian’s interview was pretty darn good. I don’t know if the show will be available as a streaming thing or download or not, but if it ever is, I will definitely be linking to it.

And then when we left, Jason, Brian and I got lost and almost died. That’ll teach us to tempt the fates and enter the evil hobbitville known as Yellow Goddamn Fucking Springs.