THE CRAZY COMIC CON COUNTDOWN CONTINUES BACK TO 2010!!!

And we are back!  It's Week 2 of our CRAZY COMIC CON COUNTDOWN, so rather than give a long drawn out intro, I figured we'd just jump right in!  Sound good?  Great!  But first, a little reminder about the Team Cul De Sac Charity Art Auction at Heroes Con this weekend in Charlotte, NC...

If you love original art and wanna help give Parkinson's Disease a swift kick in the butt, then head on down to Heroes Con in Charlotte this weekend and bid on some pieces in the Team Cul De Sac Art Auction!  It's all for a good cause AND you get the chance to own some original CRAZY art!  Pretty cool, eh?  For more info, check out the Team Cul De Sac blog!

Alright, on with the show!  Comic Con 2010, here we come...

 

The fairly cool Playstation booth.  Of all the gaming companies represented at Comic Con, Sony's the only one that doesn't do a free lounge at one of the hotels.  Nintendo and Xbox have them, but Sony's like "Nah!  Y'all gotta have a badge if y'all wanna see our goods!"  Actually, Xbox's lounge was only free once in all fairness, but still!

If there's one thing the Star Wars prequels gave us, it was plenty of colorful new models of Stormtroopers to marvel at!

The actual Red Fraggle Muppet!  Loved Fraggle Rock so much as a kid.  Too bad The Hub Network dropped the ball big time with it!

I am deathly afraid of heights, but the pursuit of swag makes me do some pretty wild things!  I think this 50ft climb netted me a cardboard shield!

An unused custom title belt meant for the Rock sometime between 1998 and 1999.  Notice the "F" has been filed out of the WWF attitude logo.  It's a nice design, but not fitting of a world championship.  That's my biggest gripe with title belts today.  They look like friggin hood ornaments!  They just don't make them like the classic winged eagle belt anymore.

I know this is from an anime, but don't know which one.  Still, the prop is really cool!

All of Downtown San Diego gets into the spirit of Comic Con!  Even the trolley system, which changed the station signs into Klingon!

This nifty booth was promoting the Alien BluRay release.  People could actually lay inside these things and get the crap scared out of them!  As much as I enjoy a good scare, the line was insanely long.  Plus, some people literally got the crap scared out of them, so it just didn't seem like the cleanest thing to lay down in!

Always cool to see the hotel wraparounds in the Gaslamp!  Most of the movies and games that are promoted on these flop, but they're still fun to look at!

A human My Little Pony!  Little did anyone know that the rebooted show would come out a few months later and unleash an unheard of horror upon society!

Ghostbusters in the Gaslamp!  They ain't scared of no reboot!

The doomed Battle LA experience was one of the first times a studio took advantage of the grassy park areas of the Gaslamp Quarter to give folks who couldn't get in to Comic Con a free experience to enjoy.  The movie may not have been great, but it's the thought that counts!  Now this grassy area has all sorts of events take place at it!

Glad to see these two getting along!

I forget what this was promoting, but it sure looked cool!

And that was Comic Con 2010!  One of my favorite cons ever!  It was the first time they had free events outdoors for all to enjoy, the highlights being The Hub Pavilion at the Marriott and the Clash Of The Titans conquest in the Hilton Park.  These free events have grown since and only continue to get better!

Well, that's all for now folks!  Next week, we travel back to Comic Con 2011, so be sure to come on down and see what hidden gems I've unearthed from that con!  Until then, take care and I'll catch y'all later!

THE CRAZY COMIC CON COUNTDOWN COMMENCES!!!

As spring turns to summer in San Diego, and the hot winds roll in, they bring with them spirit of hope, the spirit of bravery and the spirit of fun.  Yes, my CRAZIES, it is THAT time of year again.  COMIC CON IS COMING!!!  And this year, we here at the CRAZYVERSE are trying something a little different.  Instead of just a few weeks devoted to the event leading into it, we're devoting two whole months to the inspired insanity that is San Diego Comic Con!  So grab a Mountain Dew, put on a clean pair of Spider-man underoos and grab a chair, because the CRAZY COMIC CON COUNTDOWN is a go!

But first, I have a little something to talk about that's going on at another con next week.  Something that could help a lot of people.

As many of you know, I was a huge fan of the comic strip Cul De Sac by the late Richard Thompson.  It was a very sweet little comic that was also hysterically funny and a pleasure to read.  Sadly, Mr. Thompson suffered from Parkinson's Disease and fell to the illness last summer.  For the last few years, his friend, Chris Sparks, has held a charity art auction at Heroes Con in Charlotte, NC in an effort to raise money for research on a cure.  I wanna see this awful disease go away as badly as anyone and so I present to you all this piece for the auction!  In it, Alice and her big brother Petey watch as giant versions of the her class pets Mr. Danders, the guinea pig and the usurping Hermit Crab battle it out Kaiju-style!  I had a lot of fun working on this one as the Petey's love of monster movies and the bickering of the class pets were two of my favorite tropes of from the strip!  For any of you CRAZIES going to Heroes Con from June 16-18, it'll be up for auction!  Be sure to bid on it and the many other great art pieces that will be up for sale!  Help give Parkinson's Disease a knockout punch and let the legacy of Richard Thompson live on!  For more info, check out the Team Cul De Sac blog!

And now, on with the CRAZY COMIC CON COUNTDOWN!!!  We set the Wayback Machine all the way back to 2009, my first Comic Con after college!  Anyway, enjoy...

Count Dracula and Rob Zombie go way back!

That was me seven years and roughly 40 pounds ago happily sandwiched between two green women!  It was so hot in the exhibit hall that weekend that their makeup was melting!

I think Angelina Jolie agrees with this sentiment!

The Black Hole, Disney's misguided attempt at doing a scary Sci-Fi movie.  It has it's moments, but it made the mistake of coming out right after Star Wars and Alien which raised the genre to unheard of levels in the public eye!  It also didn't help that the predecessors had far better special effects which is pretty amazing considering that both films were low budget while Disney spared no expense with its production.  Quality should always win out over quantity.  I'll say this for The Black Hole; it does feature some of the most gruesome death scenes ever for a Disney movie!

Captain Jack has a way with the ladies!

Would a group of Predators be called a herd, a gaggle or a collective?

Nice to see Wario behaving for a change!

Mad props for doing Planet of the Apes cosplay!  Lord only knows how hot those suits must have been!

The franchise killer.  At least the poster looked cool.

Castle Grey Skull...  Someday, I will have a mansion and it will look just like this!

Harley and Ivy...  Heaven help us!

My pal Riki Medina (Max Sterling for all the gamers out there) chilling with a Sailor Scout.  It ain't Comic Con without a Sailor Scout!

Sorry Thor.  I haven't seen any Frost Giants lately!

Bounty Hunters!  We really do need that scum at the show!

And that was Comic Con 2009!  Honestly, the show is kinda fuzzy now as far as memories go.  I remember it being the first time I actually had money to spend at the show.  I had just graduated from college and as a result, could work instead of dealing with Summer School.  I honestly don't know how I pulled it off all those other years being flat broke, but I did!

And so ends week one of the countdown!  We got eight more to go so get comfortable as we'll return next week with a look at 2010's show!  Until then, take care and I'll catch y'all later!

TOP OF THE WORLD MA!!!

We've come to it at last, the end of the Yellow Brick Road and, coincidentally, the month of May.  But we can't end our trip to Oz without visiting Dorothy now, can we?  Of course not!  So let's dive in and see how traumatized this poor kid is after going through all that!  Enjoy...

As I mentioned last week, I think Dorothy should've figured out a bit sooner that the Wizard was a fraud!  Then again, he had the entire world convinced he was a powerful sorcerer through nothing more than smoke and mirrors.  Maybe the Wizard was smarter than he let on to?  Either way, Dorothy was probably better off not going with him, given his track record.  Frankly, she should've been even more pissed after learning Glinda could've sent her home right from the start as opposed to sending her on a trip through a dangerous forest with three complete strangers while a psychotic witch tried to kill her over a pair of shoes.  Surely there are easier ways to teach kids that a boring home life isn't so bad?

And that's a wrap on our stroll through the Marvelous Land of Oz!  Sure hope y'all enjoyed this CRAZY take on these beloved figures of literature!  Come back next week as we take another break from art for something VERY special!  What is it you may be asking?  Oh, only the kickoff to the CRAZY COMIC CON COUNTDOWN!!!  Nine weeks straight of past fun at the best show on Earth!  So be sure to come back!  Until then, take care and I'll catch y'all later!

RUBY RED EMBARRASSMENT!!!

We are back and better than ever!  How do I know this?  Because my Better-Than-Everometer" told me so!  We've almost reached the end of the Yellow Brick Road, but one obstacle still stands in our way; literature's original badass, the Wicked Witch of the West!  So let's dive in cannonball-style and splash her away!  Enjoy...

And here I thought red went with everything!  It's always been a sticking point with me over how the witch was killed.  A simple drop a water causes witches to melt!  If I were Dorothy or her pals, I would've been super pissed to have gone through all of that only to find out we could've spit on her in Munchkinland and been done with it all!  And further more, shouldn't Glinda or the Wizard have known that she was easy to kill?  The Wicked Witch of the West's death should've been the dead giveaway that the Wizard was a fraud!  And also, why the hell would you wanna wear a pair a shoes made of solid gemstones?!?  They couldn't possibly be comfortable?  Not to mention, their street value could've made the witch a millionaire!  Who cares about Dorothy and pals when you're rich?  Wow!  Those are some huge plot holes that need filling in!

And that's all for today!  One more post to go in our Oz countdown, so be sure to come back next week to meet a kid who's gonna need a bit of counseling once she gets back to Kansas!  Until then, take care and I'll catch y'all later!

COWARDICE IS COURAGE!!!

And we're back!  Midway through May and still off to see the Wizard!  Today we meet a cat who's afraid of his own shadow, the Cowardly Lion!  Why is he always so scared?  I'm gonna go out on a limb and say traumatic childhood experience.  But enough with the phony diagnosis.  I'm not Dr. Phil after all!  Let's get on with the show!  Enjoy...

Hmmm...  Well, it's either a traumatic childhood experience or he's just a straight up wuss!  The Cowardly Lion has long been a favorite among the Oz faithful, maybe because he makes us feel better about our own insecurities?  Regardless, it's not an Oz art month without him, so laugh, if you will, at his irrational fear of everything!

Another week down!  We'll be back next time with a look at a woman whose desire to steal a pair very impractical shoes leads her down a steep slope of self-destruction!  Until then, take care and I'll catch y'all later!

THE HEART OF THE MATTER!!!

Welcome back CRAZIES!!!  Our trek down the Yellow Brick Road continues with the original Iron Man, the one and only Tin Woodsman, or Tinman for those that only watched the movie.  So let's cut the chit chat and dive right in!  Enjoy...

I don't think that heart's gonna work dude.  On the plus side, studies prove that dark chocolate IS good for the heart, so maybe Tinman's on to something?  I chose to go with the book depiction of the Tinman because I always found that version of him to be more whimsical.  As much as I love the classic MGM film, I always felt the Tinman's look was a bit of a let down compared to the Scarecrow and Cowardly Lion.  These days, it'd be done with computers, although 1985's Return To Oz achieved the effect through puppetry created by the group that would eventually become the Jim Henson Creature Shop.

And that's all for today!  We'll be back next time with a big cat that's sorely lacking a little bit of courage.  Until then, take care and I'll catch y'all later!

IF HE ONLY HAD AN ESCAPE!!!

It's March!  Can't believe we are two months into 2017 already!  So much is coming up, but I gotta stay focused!  We'll start with the art.  That's always a good route to start with!  And this month, we're on the Yellow Brick Road to the marvelous land of Oz!  With a bump or two in said road.  Anyway, enjoy...

Easy there Batman!  That's the wrong Scarecrow!  This one only wants a brain, not extended cameos in Christopher Nolan films!  Two years ago, the Daily Doodle did an entire Oz week.  Having long been a fan of the movies and books, I jumped at the opportunity to draw some Oz art.  As soon as they announced the theme, I knew exactly what I wanted do with my Scarecrow art.  Just couldn't pass up an opportunity to have the Dark Knight wreak havoc upon one of Oz's most beloved citizens!  Luckily, no brain means no concept of pain!

And that's that!  Week one of March is in the bag!  We'll be back next time with another new pal that Dorothy met on her trip to see the Wizard.  Until then, take care and I'll catch y'all later!