When Disney bought Marvel Comics last year I saw a lot of great mashups of Avengers with Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck and Goofy. Still, to me, Mickey and Minnie and the animal cast of characters aren’t who come to mind when I think of Disney. I think of Sleeping Beauty, Alice in Wonderland, even the Hunchback of Notre Dame before I think of Pluto. Disney hasn’t been making movies with those guys for a long time. It’s all fairy tale princesses and princes. As a guy who does a comic strip about princesses and princes, I was more interested in giving some Marvel characters that treatment. So here are my versions of the X-Men, Captain America (and Falcon) and Peter Pan/Parker. The X-Men and Cap are not supposed to be references to particular Disney movies, just the in-house style.

Reality TV is not something I’ve gotten into. I have never seen a whole episode of Survivor, The Amazing Race, American Idol, Wife Swap, The Bachelor, Jersey Shore, or any of those other smash hits. However, there are two that I enjoy.

One is Mantracker, where a dude on horseback  tracks two contestants through the Canadian wilderness for two days, trying to catch them before the hit the finish line. I love watching all the tracking tips he gives because they help me understand how Kate and Locke can track everyone on Lost. Since I used to be a player and organizer of urban manhunt (also how I met my wife), I also obviously enjoy a good chase.

 The other show is Project Runway. Unlike American Idol that searches for raw talent, Project Runway looks for professionals who are already making a career for themselves. They find 16  fashion designers and make them compete in challenges, like making a new bridal gown out of a divorced woman’s old bridal gown or using potato sacks to make a cocktail dress in 24 hours. I appreciate the skill level of the contestants, the eye into people’s creative processes and the limited level of personal drama. Probably the clincher though is Tim Gunn. He’s a design teacher at Parson’s School of Design, which means he has the chops of a proper teacher. He’s the anti-Simon Cowell. He isn’t mean. He’s helpful. Gunn provides a professional critique of each of the works in progress, helping the designer funnel their thoughts and energy in the rights direction. Knowing how to present criticism is a skill very few people have and is clearly absent from most tv. Dramatic flare ups between strong personalities seem to be what other shows strive for. I much prefer a thoughtful consideration of pros and cons. And the outifts are often really exciting. Anyway, a couple weeks ago I drew while watching the show, trying to catch a quick likeness of each of the contestants left. Some are pretty successful and some are the terribles.

For V-Day this year my wife decided to make me stuffed animal. I’m decidedly jaded about advertising. It’s so everywhere that I’ve grown to hate it like a garderner hates weeds, even the ones like dandelions that you can make a nice salad out of. Yet the commerical featuring an orange puppet who tries to tempt dieters with food puts a smile on both my wife’s and my face. I love the muppets and in an age of computer generated everything it was great to see puppets again. That’s where Henson and Kermit got their start I believe, in commercials for Wilkins Coffee. It’s nice to know my wife is still “hungry for your love”.

As for my gift, aside from flowers, I also got her a call from Batman. Our favourite internet video is one of Batman at a poetry slam. It’s got some cussing, so it’s not for all ages, but it is hilarious. Actor acquaintance, Jon Blair, who played Batman was kind enough to phone my wife and read her a special valentine’s day poem in his Batman voice, on my behalf. Later that night I took her to to see him as part of the comedy group the Sketechersons preform Sunday Night Live which was really killer. It made me regret not going to see live comedy for often. If you live in the Toronto area check them out!

I hope your February 14th was full of great goodness as well? Who else got or gave something grand?

Before I drew the Snowman holiday card I made this one. I dind’t think it was funny enough so I didn’t send it out but just for the heck of it I’m sharing it with you all here.

A couple weekends ago, Michael Cho and Steve Manale and I drew pictures for tykes at a bank’s Christmas kid’s party. They hired out a building at the Canadian National Exhibition (CNE) and filled it with a ferris wheel, a rock climbing wall, go karts, Santa Claus and enough inflated monsters and castles to make their own Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade. This is just a small wedge of the hall:

I was hired after one of the bank’s employees saw me at TCAF doing hideous cariactures. I drew him and his whole family and they got a real kick out of it. Unfortunately most of the kids (well, moslty their parents) at this event were not excited to be made into monsters. Fortunately we all still enjoyed the drawings of kids as princesses and super heroes.

Mike doesn’t really do likenesses of kids but drew awesome superheroes for them instead.

Here’s Steve drawing a couple of ladies, which was a nice change from when we had to draw babies who wouldn’t keep still. I think maybe we needed a policy and sign “For ages 1 and up”

We had a long line up most of the time so hopefully we’ll be brought back next year for more fun or for your corporate event.

During the lunch break we found a unicorn that had wandered over from the Princess Planet that looked happily wounded with its legs in the air that wanted us to jump up and down on it’s belly.

And I thought this was weird. Want to find a bathroom from a distance in the big busy hall? Just look for the universal symbol for washroom: two grey squares, one with a smaller blue square, of the same value , inside it. ???

In the summer I picked up a few more doozies from the dollar bins to share with you all…

Not to be confused with Marvel’s Bullseye who would show up a year late, this blue guy with a target on his chest works for the FBI. “The doom skulls of Professor Death”? You can’t beat that kind of ridiculousness!

What is Hulk fighting? Monsters designed by a two year-old? This monster has the lack of coolness and imagination that is also absent in my drawings of cars. This guy must really not like drawing monsters.

I was excited by the egg headed man only to realize he isn’t an egg-head but a whale! Wow! Tobias Whale, who like any good whale-monsterman shoots water at you… from a hose. Not a blowhole, a hose. He’s shooting it so hard that the phone only has 9 buttons. Whoosh!

Seriously, I’ve been enjoying Dagar. It’s well drawn and each issue is a tight little story with a nice hook. Getting a copy of a book onto which some child has drawn a ballpoint pen Van Dyk is to be cherished! CGC has got comic grading all wrong. This one has history. This was Steven Huns’ Dagar! Also awesome: little Dagar in the corner ready to backstab the dragon’s tail like a nasty Great Gazoo.

Last year my wife and I got the previous year’s special edition Hanukkah Jones Sodas and did a taste test.

APPLESAUCE

Not bad. It taste like apples. I said I would have it “a more”. Not more. I mean amore, like love! Not really. It’s just okay.

CHOCOLATE COINS

This was interesting. It somehow tasted exactly like cheap chocolate kids get for Hanukkah gelt or Easter eggs. Despite not having any milk in it, it tasted like milk chocolate too. Super weird. If you like those supermarket-quality chocolates for some reason, you should try this

 JELLY DONUT

I guess this is better for my heartburn than sufganiyot. To me, this soda just tasted like cream soda and watermelon. Not particularly strange. Like bubblegum icecream I wonder “which flavour of jelly/bubblegum are we talking?” Luckily it didn’t have anything like the consistency of drinking jelly.

LATKE

Fried potatoes. I love ‘em but this tradition of eating fried foods to celebrate the lasting of the oil is heck on my acid reflux. I saved the weirdest for last. Geughk! This was gross and fizzy. There was no potato flavour. No grease flavour. Just salty and carbonated. It’s naaaaahhhsty! Even sour cream wouldn’t make these latkes taste better. Latke fail!

 Overall: fun but never again, like trying sea cucumber.

Enjoy this snowmanorah! (I’m off on vacation for a week so I won’t be around to answer emails/validate comments after tomorrow but posts will continue via the wonder of automation!)

On Monday of this week I had a Letter to Toronto published in the National Post. It’s probably relevant if you live in any big city and worth a chuckle or two if you want to have a quick read.