Deer John

(Click image for a larger, clearer, more satisfying view.)

Bizarro is brought to you today by Cool Cops.

I used to go hunting with my dad when I was a kid and I admit that I really loved it. It wasn't the killing of animals that I enjoyed, it was the "man time" with my father that made it great. And, of course, the challenge of hitting a target appeals to a kid the same way a video game does.

As an adult, I have no tolerance for hunting for reasons other than immediate survival. Hunting in modern society is simply killing for fun. I can think of few things more reprehensible, with the possible exception of being a reality show producer.

From my current perspective, however, buying dead animals at the market is no better and arguably even worse. At least wild animals have a decent life before they get snuffed. The corpses in the deli case at the market were miserable from birth to slaughter. Since we don't need to eat flesh for health or survival, our only excuse is that it tastes good. It is difficult to argue that killing for flavor is any better than hunting for fun. We're just paying someone else to do the dirty work.

Sermons aside, I wrote this gag because I am a fan of cartoons that look like one thing but are revealed to be something different upon reading. I write those kinds of jokes every chance I get. The art on this one was fun to produce, too. Achieving the colors of twilight in the woods and the beam of the car's headlights was a kick. I like the way it looks on computer, but newspaper printing processes are not nearly as bright so this cartoon looked darker and murky in print. With something like this, it's impossible to get both to look good.

I hope you have enjoyed the few seconds you have spent reading my little blog. If you would like to read other entries, please do so now.

Monkey Covers

Sunday is Monkey Covers day here at YACB. Because there's nothing better than a comic with a monkey on the cover!

Casper frightens King Kong on the cover of The Friendly Ghost, Casper #218.

(Standard disclaimer about frightened giant gorillas not really being monkeys applies.)


Image courtesy of the GCD. Click on the image for a larger version.

Do These Shoes Make My Feet Look Big?

Bizarro is brought to you today by Unlikely Comedians.

At the risk of offending some of my readers, I will confess that I do not believe in "Bigfoot," "Sasquatch," "The Abominable Snowman," etc. There is simply not enough (or any) evidence beyond the personal accounts of woodsy folk tanked up on Bud.

I do not mean to say that I think it is alcohol that makes people see things in the woods, far from it. We all possess this very natural and useful tendency, no inebriation required. All mammals have evolved brains that see something where there is nothing, rather than nothing where there is something. It helps keep us alive. If you mistake a shadow for an intruder, no harm done, better safe than sorry. If you mistake an intruder for a shadow, you less likely to live long enough to reproduce this propensity for poor judgment.

So when we see something move in the wilderness, we have to make it into something. Our brain processes patterns and comes to conclusions, without our even trying. This alone explains the timeless, worldwide phenomenon of people seeing monsters in the woods, lakes, ocean, sky, snow. (It also explains our lust for conspiracy theories and our compulsion to invent gods. If we don't know the answer, we make one up to satisfy our minds. Without these answers, we go nuts. With an explanation, no matter how ridiculous, we are satisfied.)

If you're still not convinced there are no "Bigfoots" (Bigfeet?) ask yourself this: where are the bodies? How does this monkey-bear-human with size 29 shoes manage to hide not only itself and all of its kind from being adequately photographed, but its corpses, skeletons and fossils as well? We've found skeletons from mammoths and dinosaurs, for crying out loud, where are the giant skeleton feet of Bigfoot? And considering how many blood-thirsty apes of the human kind there are running around the wilderness wearing camo and waving guns, how is it none of these large, hirsuit, slow-moving targets have been shot? Hell, our species is infamous for shooting anything that moves and fairly regularly even shoots one another, which is why they wear those lovely orange vestments. So why are there no Bigheads proudly displayed on the walls of the dens of Alabama sportsmen?

Wait...now I'm beginning to see a pattern. Perhaps Bigfoots are smarter than we realize. Perhaps they dress in florescent orange camo, carry guns, drive off-road vehicles with gigantic tires and listen to Kenny Chesney. No wonder we've never photographed or captured one in the wild, they are living among us!

Friday Night Fights: Magnus vs. Robots

From Magnus Robot Fighter #2 (1991). Art by Bob Layton & Kathryn Bolinger. Colors by Janet Jackson & Karen Merbaum. Letters by Jade. Story by Jim Shooter. (click pic for larger)

One panel? SQUEEE!

Amazon Top 50

Here are the Top 50 Graphic Novels on Amazon this afternoon. All the previous caveats apply.

1 (N). Dilbert 2.0: 20 Years of Dilbert
2 (-). Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Last Straw
3 (-2). Watchmen
4 (-1). Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules
5 (-1). Diary of a Wimpy Kid
6 (-1). Star Trek: Countdown TPB
7 (+5). Secret Identity: The Fetish Art of Superman's Co-creator Joe Shuster
8 (+3). Stephen King's Dark Tower: Treachery
9 (+4). Mercy Thompson Homecoming *
10 (N). Huntress: Year One
11 (N). The Perry Bible Fellowship Almanack
12 (-2). V for Vendetta
13 (-5). Batman: The Dark Knight Returns
14 (-7). The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen Volume 3: Century #1 *
15 (-9). A Drifting Life
16 (-7). Batman: The Killing Joke
17 (+1). Blueberry Girl
18 (-3). Time of Your Life (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Season 8, Vol. 4) *
19 (+16). Serenity, Vol. 2: Better Days
20 (-3). Batman: Year One
21 (-7). Batman: R.I.P.
22 (+10). Maus I: A Survivor's Tale: My Father Bleeds History
23 (+1). The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, Vol. 1
24 (+15). The Long Way Home (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Season 8, Vol. 1)
25 (+4). Bone: One Volume Edition
26 (+14). The Saturday Evening Pearls: A Pearls Before Swine Collection
27 (-8). Batman: Arkham Asylum (15th Anniversary Edition)
28 (-1). The Sandman Vol. 1: Preludes and Nocturnes
29 (-8). Wolves at the Gate (Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season Eight, Volume 3)
30 (+12). Dark Tower: The Long Road Home (Exclusive Amazon.com Cover)
31 (+10). The Complete Peanuts 1971-1972 *
32 (N). Serenity, Vol. 1: Those Left Behind
33 (N). The Arrival
34 (-12). Ignorance, Thy Name Is Bucky: A Get Fuzzy Collection
35 (N). Unmanned (Y: The Last Man, Vol. 1)
36 (-16). Angel: After the Fall, Vol. 3
37 (-4). Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood
38 (N). Justice Society of America: Thy Kingdom Come, Part 3
39 (+5). The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, Vol. 2
40 (N). Maus II: A Survivor's Tale: And Here My Troubles Began
41 (N). Marvel Zombies 3 *
42 (-16). The Dresden Files: Welcome to the Jungle
43 (+5). Angel: After The Fall Volume 1
44 (N). Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art
45 (-22). All Star Superman, Vol. 2
46 (N). The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: The Black Dossier
47 (N). Batman: Heart of Hush
48 (-18). The Beats: A Graphic History
49 (-2). No Future For You (Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season Eight, Volume 2)
50 (N). Fables, Vol. 11: War and Pieces



Items with asterisks (*) are pre-order items.


Commentary:

* Another exciting week on the Amazon charts. The biggest news was the mysterious and sudden rise of Huntress: Year One, which earlier this week jumped up to the top of the comics chart and #10 on the overall books chart. It turns out that the author, Ivory Madison, had used Amazon to purchase and send out a bunch of review copies. A perfectly legitimate if unorthodox use of Amazon; all the copies were ordered and paid for. It does serve to illustrate the volatility of the Amazon bestseller rankings and how a short spike in sales can affect the charts. (Which really makes these weekly snapsots looks of mine rather pointless, doesn't it?)

* Speaking of short sales spikes, Dilbert 2.0: 20 Years of Dilbert is today's featured Gold Box deal on Amazon, with plenty enough people buying the book at 60% off to send it (momentarily) up to #1 on the comics chart and presently #6 overall.

* Even without the sudden Dilbert bump, Watchmen would have fallen from its coveted #1 slot this week, as its sales finally dipped below that of the latest Diary of a Wimpy Kid volume.

* Secret Identity: The Fetish Art of Superman's Co-creator Joe Shuster jumped up another five slots this week, no doubt buoyed by author Craig Yoe's appearance on yesterday's Fresh Air broadcast on NPR.

* A Drifting Life remains the only manga title on the list this week. The next volumes of Naruto & Fruits Basket aren't due until early July, so it could be a long dry spell for manga on the charts.

* Marvel Zombies 3 pops up in the bottom quarter of the charts, giving Marvel something other than Dark Tower to show for.

* Anybody know why The Perry Bible Fellowship Almanack might have popped back in way up at #11? I'm at a loss.

Hugos

For the first time this year, the Hugo Awards have a category for "Best Graphic Story." The nominees were announced last month; and in the Graphic Story category, the nominees are:

• The Dresden Files: Welcome to the Jungle Written by Jim Butcher, art by Ardian Syaf (Del Rey/Dabel Brothers Publishing)
• Girl Genius, Volume 8: Agatha Heterodyne and the Chapel of Bones Written by Kaja & Phil Foglio, art by Phil Foglio, colors by Cheyenne Wright (Airship Entertainment)
• Fables: War and Pieces Written by Bill Willingham, pencilled by Mark Buckingham, art by Steve Leialoha and Andrew Pepoy, color by Lee Loughridge, letters by Todd Klein (DC/Vertigo Comics)
• Schlock Mercenary: The Body Politic Story and art by Howard Tayler (The Tayler Corporation)
• Serenity: Better Days Written by Joss Whedon & Brett Matthews, art by Will Conrad, color by Michelle Madsen, cover by Jo Chen (Dark Horse Comics)
• Y: The Last Man, Volume 10: Whys and Wherefores Written/created by Brian K. Vaughan, penciled/created by Pia Guerra, inked by Jose Marzan, Jr. (DC/Vertigo Comics)

My pick out of these would be the final volume of Y, the Last Man. The winners for all of the Hugo Awards will be announced August 6 at WorldCon in Montreal.

Family Ties

Today's cartoon is made possible by Teenage Hormones.

I'll be the first to admit that I don't know Jack Crap about the Jonas Brothers. I assume they are musicians because they are holding guitars in the pictures I've seen, but I've never heard a single song. I don't know if their specialty is gangsta rap or Latvian folk dirges. But I do have three brothers-in-law, so this pun appealed to me.

For the record, none of the characters in this drawing resemble any of my real life brothers-in-law. All three are all forthright citizens with nothing but the world's best interests at heart and do not fit this narrow-minded stereotype in any way. The majority of them do not have criminal records of any sort and one of them even holds the honorable distinction of having eradicated all nude pictures of himself from the Internet.

Contrary to my own strong suspicions about my sisters' taste in men, all three of them actually did pretty well, to which the virtual non-existence of restraining orders among them is a public testament.

I'm hoping they forget all about this cartoon before our family reunion in Oklahoma this summer.