Bad Milhouse

When Sammy Harkham first talked to me about doing a Simpson's Treehouse of Horror story for this year's issue, he mentioned something about the idea of taking one character and really turning them inside out, really getting inside their head. Something like that, he worded it better than I am here. Anyway, instantly I thought of Milhouse and the film Bad Ronald. There were lots of parallels to draw on - Milhouse and Ronald were both nerdy outcasts with glasses, living with single, bitter divorced parents, and capable of unintentionally disastrous bumbling often combined with poor decision making. I plotted out the eight page story and sent thumbnail layouts to Sammy, who said he couldn't understand any of it. Above is the thumbnail for page 1.
My apologies for the early posting on the progress of the page, I should be able to repost about process after the story comes out. In the meantime, check out today's (June 24) Diamond Previews and have your local comic shop reserve your copy of this year's Treehouse of horror comic.

Go Wings, Part 2

Here's another print from college, this time of Chris Osgood, who'll be tending goal for the Red Wings in tonight's game 7.

Go Wings

Tomorrow night the Red Wings play the Penguins in game 7 of the Stanley Cup Finals, so here's a print I made back in college, of one of my favorite players, Dino Ciccarelli.

Gracias, España

Although I took seven years of Spanish back in high school, I didn't take any more classes in Spanish after my freshman year of college, so naturally it was all very little help at the Barcelona International Comicon. Fortunately, most of the people at the festival spoke some English. In fact, a lot of Europeans seem to speak several languages, whatever that may say about myself, the American education system, or the geographic proximity of a wide variety of languages there. In any case, the Festival also had translators on hand to help out with some of the interviews and panels. It's kind of fascinating to watch - they would repeat the question to me in English, then as I answered they would write out notes and symbols before repeating my answer back in Spanish to the questioner. I felt by the last interview some of my Spanish was coming back to me, but not nearly enough that I didn't need the help. This is a page one of my translators made for my answer to the question, 'What are you working on next?'

Thanks to David Macho and everyone else who worked so hard for the festival, to Montserrat and José at La Cupula, and to all the other guests and artists I had a chance to meet and talk with, for making it a great experience.

Change-Bots Fan Club Drawings

Over on Top Shelf 2.0, you can see a few of the drawings I did for the original Change-Bots fan club offer. I just finished the drawings for the new limited offer, which is 30 spots, each getting a hand drawn trading card. The trading cards are actually panels which make up a story called 'Balls On Patrol' that will appear in the Change-Bots sequel next year (hopefully next year, anyway).

More and More Interviews

I did a long audio interview with the website Geekocracy, and you can listen to them now: Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five. You can also find them on itunes at The Geekocracy Talk Cast. I don't remember what I said, but I'm sure a lot of it was nonsense.
If you'd prefer to read the nonsense online rather than listen, there's interviews up at Curio Comics and Newsarama.
Or, if you'd prefer a good old fashioned print interview, the new issue of Filter just hit the stands with a short interview and featuring a little of my recent non-comics illustration work.

Incredible Change-Bots Trailer