THE WOODS

Here is the story "THE WOODS", such as it is, that George Turner starred in. He had a BALL playing Uncle Fogey, got into the costume changes etc with great enthusiasm. He owned a "native shield" prop from his beloved KING KONG which you can see on the wall in one shot, although that is not the room he was actually in. This was my first experiment with "live action comics" which I actually thought I had invented, forgetting for a moment there was a whole tradition called "fumetti" where captions are added to photos! Of course the digital manipulation involved was not same as the fumettis I had seen (where one simply took pictures and added words to whatever was in them). I collaged my people into whatever backgrounds and situations I needed and added the monsters etc. Dark Horse published three volumes of these stories as trade paperbacks but this particular story is not in them. It was a perfunctory exercise- I needed a story to try out my technique so I just banged one out and went with it- and I know it's not much of a story which is why I didn't use it in the books. But it DOES feature the late, great George Turner and will always be special to me for that.

George Turner

George Turner was a great guy who co-wrote (although it was MOSTLY him) The Making of King Kong, the definitive chronicle of that monumental and immortal film. And I'm not talking about "the 70's one" junior! George was a great writer and artist and a dear friend. We worked together doing storyboards for Filmation, even carpooling and sharing laughs and stories all the while. (He once grumbled about their Tarzan cartoon show that "Tarzan has to KILL somebody once in a while!") George passed away a few years back but it was a true privilege to call him a friend. He was also the editor of American Cinematographer magazine for many years and authored many books on movies including The Cinema of Adventure, Romance, and Terror (which spelled ART to him!). I can by no means offer a real biography of George but he was a genial and mischievous gent from Texas with a southern drawl and a twinkle in his eye. He gave me this ink wash drawing (obviously inspired by the work of Willis O'Brien and Marcel Delgado) as a gift and I thought I would share it. I asked George why Kong and many old movies were so great and the Jurassic Parks and their kin seemed so lame by comarison. George puffed on his pipe, looked off wistfully and opined: Well those OLD boys like to go out in the world and DO things... these NEW boys like to sit around in offices...". Amen. One other quick expample of his wit. We were in a Mexican restaurant and I noticed they had tongue tacos and I said, "Hey, George! You ever had a tongue taco?" and he shot back "well, that would be a TALK-o, wouldn't it?" I miss George. He graciously volunteered himself as a star of the first "photo comic" I made, a lame story called THE WOODS, which I will share with you. Soon. Soonish. Soonishly...

Murder Ink

Told in the manner of a silent movie, the actual movie (if you can call it that!) can be viewed right cheer... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SjyMAYDrGqA

"THAT!"

"How does it feel to share your body with an ALIEN life form? "To be TRAPPED with a hideous, unwanted THING? I know... I can tell you. This is my story." So opens the horror tale called THAT from the pages of PETE VON SHOLLY'S MORBID volume 2 DEAD BUT NOT OUT (from Dark Horse- get it now!" It's a kind of 50's paranoid kid-or is he? /alien invasion/ thing. It's weird- Morbid (voume one) sold great and continues to sell but the second book (which is much better in some respects!) lays there like a lox! Here's a link in case I convince you that you need this book for your continued well being and literary wholeness: http://www.darkhorse.com/Books/10-397/Pete-Von-Shollys-MORBID-Volume-2-TPB-Dead-But-Not-Out The story features David Merritt, long time pal and boss of the model shop at Stan Winston's studio (Legacy) as the dad and comics great Mike Vosburg as the teacher.

Too Many Monsters???

I wanted to cram more monsters into my History of Monsters Mural than I could fit! The damn thing was already over 35 feet wide (at one foot tall). I was going to put a cryptozoology section in and even toyed with the idea of a section of my own monsters (seen here) from the pages of my Dark Horse MORBID books, which I wish some people would go and buy... ahem. Especially volume 2!

That's the Spirit

Burton for Certain

So I made a couple goofy Superman drawings while working on Tim Burton's version of the movie a while ago. What I did had NOTHING to do with the script and is in no way representative of what they were going to do. Then I made Ed Wood Super Hands for Comic Book Nerd (from TwoMorrows- an imperishable classic!) combining a bunch of names from Burton movies. I don't generally like his movies or go to see his movies. The last one I actually liked was Beetlejuice, and now that I think about it, that might be the only one. I workd on Mars Attacks but don't think that one ever quite figured out what it was...

Aaaaaaaaaand here also are the Haunted Mansioning lenticularization of Mr Burton himself for your viewing pleasure. Oh wait! I forgot- I also liked Ed Wood!

Big Schtick

NIGHTMARE BED

From a comic story of the same name. That I did.

Random Oddments and Peripherabilia

1) Andrea Von Sholly's unproduced Yithian. (But you can get the box at http://www.morbidmonster.com/)

2) How The Thing should have looked in those not so good movies.

3) Monster Models we used to want. I used to want them anyway!

4) An illustration from SPINECRAWLER, my forthcoming
graphic novel. More news to come.
5) Jennifer Tilly reads Pete Von Sholly's MORBID (get it from Dark Horse!) in Romania while
waiting to start shooting SEED OF CHUCKY.