Blogging the Unbloggable

Green Lantern Creator Dead

Martin Nodell, creator of the Green Lantern, passed away last Saturday. He was 91. Here is a full story on CNN.

I met Marty at a ComicCon before I went to college. My mom knew his daugher-in-law or something...

He was really approachable and he gave me a lot of good, basic advice about being a cartoonist/artist. He even drew me this picture of the Green Lantern that I have hanging in my living room. I think he was generally considered a nice guy, but some felt he took too much credit for the creations he was involved in. He was a likable, grandfatherly fixture at a lot of conventions.

For some reason, I was more blown away by the fact he helped create the Pillsbury Doughboy than the Green Lantern. (I guess that probably showed the direction my career would steer toward, eventually.)

Talking with him, he didn't seem so keen on his Pillsbury/agency days so I balked at asking him to draw what I really wanted: a picture of the Green Lantern fighting the Doughboy. In hindsight, I wish I asked him.

Wouldn't that have been a great drawing?

Favorite Shot from a Movie

Someone recently asked if I have to pick a single favorite shot of a movie, which would it be? I did not have a gun to my head but I still thought carefully about this one. I figured that I would want to get my money's worth with a long one....

It might seem a bit like the "Film School Elitist" type of choice but I really do love and cherish the super-cool 3 minute tracking shot at the opening Orson Welles' "Touch of Evil."

It sets up the whole movie with style and every director or movie who's tried a similar long tracking shot (most recently by Brian DePalma in the otherwise-forgettable "The Curse of The Black Dahlia,") got their inspiration from the prototype here. It's even been argued that Hitchcock had this movie in mind when he made Psycho.

I know the movie is sort of dismissed as the "Charlton Heston playing a Mexican?" film, but I love it. It's infected with a jazzy madness and indulgence that only Welles could conjure up (maybe David Lynch could...maybe.) Great characters, seedy locales, trashy explotation subject matter, Marlene Dietrich, Janet Leigh, Heston's fake tan, Orson himself as the villain, and the actual Jack Foley doing the Foley sound...what more could you want in a picture?

If some people think "Citizen Kane" is considered by many to be the greatest movie ever made then, it would follow that "Touch of Evil" has got to be the greatest "B" movie. Seriously. ("Plan 9 From Outer Space" loses by a nose because it's too slow-moving in parts.)

You can see it here....on YouTube

Skin Deep

Gary stared at his unusual visitor. At first glance, he just seemed like any other neatly groomed, self-possessed 30 year old guy. But, there was something bothering Gary deeply about this interloper. And it wasn't the fact he was working in Gary's garage.

It was his skin. It was absolutely blemish free. No moles at all. No warts, pimples, scars... nothing. An even skin-tone through out. Not even any dryness or wrinkles. Very eerie in its perfection.

Well, that would follow, Gary thought. If this guy truly was from the future as he claimed, then maybe they had wiped out all skin aliments with an array of futurisic creams, lotions, and ointments. Stuff we in the present could only dream of. Stuff that makes Neosporin look like the goddamn horse and cart.

Or maybe they didn't rely on fancy medicines exculsively. Maybe through evolution and genetic engineering it was possible to be born with perfect skin. And they could program tiny nanobots to roam thorough his blood stream searching out any sort of skin trouble like millions of microscopic roving dermotologists. Zap, there goes a clogged pore. Zap, there goes dryness. Warning! INGROWN HAIR NEAR LEFT SIDE OF THE NECK! ALL UNITS RESPOND!

Wow.

Gary tried not to stare further while his guest attemped to repair his damaged time-belt with the neighbor's decidely non-futurisitc tool set. Apparently his name was entirely unprononcible by Gary's primitive mouth so he called him "Bob."

Bob's hair was groomed in a perfectly managed buzz-cut too. They must use lasers, Gary mused. Bob's sideburns were triangular...which made Gary laugh and think "I guess, that's one thing that Star Trek got right about the future."

Another thing, Bob had a perfectly symetrical head. His nose pointed forward square and true. No odd parts in his hair. No eye higher than another. He kind of looked like a video game creation more than a real person. He even seemed to emit a glow. His lanky, sleek, muscular frame had not an ounce of fat on it and moved with the poise of a dancer and no wasted movement. Unbelieveable.

Still, Gary was not going to lend him 50 bucks. He wasn't quite convinced. Gary felt that Bob had better make some crazy future-shit with that "time-belt" happen first before any money would be shelled out.

New Site Stuff

Much like a bonsai tree, I prune, water, and sculpt my website contantly. Here are some of the new flowers of my efforts. Please peruse at your leisure:

Design Page: Specifically, check the new section featuring samples of my Flash work. I enjoy the WB Sylvester Kids Game especally. Tee hee...

Anime Page: Finally, a unified page of all the animated shorts I've done. I've even put up The Clan 2.0 on Youtube.com. Newer additions "Time Traveler" and "Pony" are up there as well.

Enjoy!