So... "Gotham High"

With that headline and perhaps with what you can discern of my mood lately, I'm guessing it's pretty transparent that some stuff happened recently in real life that made it hard for me to keep on top of things in the wider pop culture world. I... might explain what's going on later or I might not; right now, it's too soon.

Anyway, here is something the rest of the animation blogosphere is already over:



Mad props if you can recognize all the characters. "Gotham High" was a show that was being developed by the comic book artist/author team Celeste Green and Jeffrey Thomas. The whole thing was prompted by a piece of art they had made and sent in to DC. You can see it and the other concept art for the series on their blog.

So as far as anyone knows, this was not the "make us a cartoon about Batman in high school to appeal to the young parsons!" series that, through clever interpretation, eventually became "Batman: Beyond". It's a more recent proposal that was lost in the great sea of Batman-related animation projects pitched in-between the two (thus far) Christopher Nolan (hold that thought) films. It was rejected and it isn't happening. I think the "this is a secret test" theory over at Topless Robot is intriguing, though a little unlikely. The whole thing was probably going to be in the vein of the dearly missed "Clone High".

This is, if it were actually happening, a fine example of the crazy and stupid stuff Warner Bros. likes to do with it's characters now (let's not bring THAT series up again). But with the "This is not actually going to happen" safety net securely beneath us, I have to say that, surprisingly enough... I don't hate this. Which is to say, I think the concept art and character designs look really, really good. Clayface leaves me a tad confused, but every other character design choice is pretty clever.

I am glad this isn't happening, don't get me wrong. Now, have you heard of that crazy Spider-Man musical?

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Been surprisingly disciplined in adding new reviews to the Realm of Mad-Ness. The latest is of a kid's movie that will scar children for life. Actually, that describes most of the kid's movies I review. Huh.
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Sketch of the Day!

Yeah... I still kinda feel like this.

"Jo-OY! An' Painting! / Are like-a SUN-SHI-INE! An' Rainting!!!"

What, you thought I was kidding?



So here's the first acrylic-on-canvas painting I've made in... I don't want to think how long. I won't feel sad if you all laugh at it. This is what happens when you follow along with "The Joy of Painting" using really old brushes, the wrong kinds of knives, and acrylics.
It's pretty obvious here that there are some serious differences between oils and acrylics. I wanted to go back into it again later on, maybe in a day or two, just so it wouldn't be so transparent.

Now a funny thing happened between me deciding this and this painting's ultimate fate: somebody closely related to me happened to see the painting.

This person (who wishes to remain anonymous) saw this painting and said she loved it and wanted it and could she give it away as a present please please please? I said, sure, but I need to work on it before I let anyone else see it. See, it didn't feel like anything I'd paint.

So, I went ahead and added in an Oviraptor.



Because why the heck not? By the way, the people who now own this painting love it!

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"Inception" is out this weekend, and we should all go see it. Because buying a ticket to this movie is an unspoken vote for creative, director-driven, non-sequel, non-spinoff, non-franchise movies in what has so far been a spectacular summer for astonishingly bad movies. My feelings are more eloquently expressed in this old Devin's Advocate article from CHUD.com (which, by a happy coincidence, involves another crazy-ass director-driven movie that just happened to be released by the Dubya-Bee; emphasis and visual bleeping mine):

"Know that you went out and voted with your ticket, that you sent a message to Warner Bros that you'd prefer them to keep taking chances, to keep trying new things, to not always be safe. Know that you sent a message to the studios that they don't have to make horrible movies... that you won't wait to see the interesting films at home. And if you don't go, I don't want to hear you complaining the next time there's a sh*tty remake or a sh*tty sequel or a sh*tty movie based on a sh*tty toyline or cartoon." - Devin Faraci

It should be said that "Inception" is one of only two, maybe three, movies I am 100% on board with this summer. I *just* got to see the first of these, so next week is Movie Week! Which will hopefully build to something very special for August...

Further "Teen Titans" thoughts, DCAU movies, and a strange clip from Disney

When we last left off, I was near the end of "Teen Titans" and it was just then starting to get good.
I can confirm: the last season of this series is excellent and the rest of it is essentially skippable. (It depends on how long you can tolerate some very stylized characters shouting "Dude" and "Boo-yah" at each other. Or, if you're me, seeing Beast Boy turn into the exact same damn bird but having him be identified / sound like at least three different species. Yeah.)
All snark aside, the fifth season is absolutely worth renting. They have a lot of fun with some of the stranger DC characters, like the Doom Patrol, who otherwise may never have seen the light of day in animated form. However, it's frustrating to see a series have it's greatest moments in the last episodes. Where could they have gone from there?
Must be noted: I related way too closely to Raven in the "Hide and Seek" episode. Entertain yourself with the implications, dear readers.
One things for sure: Ain't gonna miss that theme song.

Turns out that I missed a few crossover episodes back in "Batman"/"Superman" (available only as something called "The Batman / Superman Movie" and not in either series' season sets. Maybe I'll complain about Warner Brother's inane DVD policies later. For now: durable boxes. Or how about not having three different security stickers on your cardboard boxes, huh?) They were fun.
And I also forgot "Mask of the Phantasm". Many have argued that this is the best "Batman" film prior to when Christopher Nolan got to play in the Bat-sandbox. I'm not sure about that but I thought it was at least as good as the first Tim Burton film.

And now for a fun little early '90's Disney thing:



Remember when they were shamelessly promoting Roger Rabbit? ("Who Discovered Roger Rabbit" is my "Chinese Democracy".)