Rotoscopers Roundup 7

It's time for another Rotoscoper's Roundup! As I said in my last one of these, I was going to start putting these out every six months. So here is everything I did between January and June of 2018!

World of Tomorrow Episode Two: The Burden of Other People’s Thoughts: Short Film Review

The BFG: Blu-ray Review

Star Wars Rebels: Trailer & Return Date Announcement

Steven Universe: Season One: DVD Review

Rugrats: Seasons 3 & 4: DVD Review

Star Wars Rebels: Roundtable Review: Jedi Night & DUME

The Little Prince: Indie-Mation Club: Intro & Review

Star Wars Rebels: Roundtable Review: Wolves and a Door & A World Between Worlds

Infinity Train: Series Pickup Announcement

Star Wars Rebels: Roundtable Review: Series Finale

Marvel Cinematic Universe Countdown: Guardians of the Galaxy

Black Panther: Blu-ray Review

B.C. - Back to Civilization: Production Announcement

Early Man: Blu-ray Review

Marvel Cinematic Universe Countdown: Ant-Man

Alice (Neco z Alenky): Indie-Mation Club: Intro & Review

Avatar: The Last Airbender: Blu-ray Review

Looney Tunes Cartoons: New Series Announcement

A Comic Review

I never thought I'd review a comic strip. I've done Movie reviews, TV reviews, Book reviews, but doing a comic review never even crossed my mind. Until today.

A blogger that I  enjoy following is Jen Yates, who runs Cakewrecks and Epbot. Today on Epbot she shared this strip.

I thought it was mildly amusing, and I was really drawn to the artwork, so I clicked the link to the site it came from, a webcomic called "The Abominable Charles Christopher."

I didn't quite "Get" the title at first, until I went back and started at the beginning.

The main character seems to be a Bigfoot. An "Abominable" Snowman.

At first it didn't seem to be about much. There didn't seem to be much of a plot line, it was just this Bigfoot, Charles Christopher, and he was not having a very good day. during the first few strips, getting caught in the rain, stung by a bee. Not hilarious, but great artwork. As I read it became pretty obvious that Charles Christopher himself was completely mute, and he seemed very childlike, he even has a pacifier. Without the other animals, it would have almost be a pantomime strip.

The plot seemed a bit slow, but I did find the dialogue of the background animals to be funny. The best thing was the artwork. If the artwork hadn't been so good, I may not have read very far and moved on to something else. As I read, I noticed a background plot about a party devloping. The animals around the forest were talking about it, but Charles was oblivious. The party storyline culminated here.

The next strip took a different turn and showed that this was not going to be your ordinary "Funny" comic strip.

It was followed by this strip,

This made me think that maybe this was just a one time thing, meant as a set up for the cute scene of Charles holding the bunny. I was wrong. The more I read, the more I realized that this strip was developing a very rich mythology.

Here's a strip from a little later on.

I got sucked in completely after this strip. It went in a direction that I definitely did NOT see coming. The plot of this comic is so much more detailed than your average newspaper comic strip.

If you choose to read this for yourself, prepare to fall in love with that fox.

I spent about 4 to 5 hours tonight reading the entire archive of strips. That's about 5 years worth. Though it's not quite as much as you would think, since the author, Karl Kerschl, only releases one strip a week. He works at a comic book company, so he has another job to keep him busy. This is just his own project.

I loved it so much that I am seriously considering buying the books he has so far released. The only problem is, the first one is only available in paperback. Not that there's anything wrong with paperback, I just really love hardcovers. I doubt it will ever be available in hardcover though. The hardcover edition is sold out and he said it is way too expensive to get more made, so he chose to get paperbacks for the second printing.

The story has gone so far from these first strips. There have been so many new characters introduced, so many new plot lines started, and it has become one of my absolute favorite comics ever. It can be downright hilarious at times, but also extremely moving. I was shocked at how emotionally involved I got with this story! There has been more than one moment that was just "Punch-In-The-Gut" heartbreaking that if I had dwelt on it for too long, I'm sure the tears would have started flowing. I won't spoil anything for those of you who want to read it, but I will warn you, if you cry easily at sad movies, be prepared to cry at a COMIC STRIP.

If you have a few hours to kill, or you just want to read a few at a time, I can not recommend this strip highly enough. It is one of the best things I have read in a long time.

The website can be found HERE, but I highly recommend starting at the beginning, which you can find by clicking HERE.

Dark Humor

I’ve always had a thing for dark humor. A small thing, but a thing nonetheless. I never knew why. Until recently. I figured it out. Why do I think that death can be so funny sometimes? What was it in my past that causes me to find humor in things that other people might find gruesome?
3 words.
Calvin and Hobbes.
I am a member on the Go Comics web site, so I get a comics page e-mailed to me every day. One of the comics I get sent is repeats of Calvin and Hobbes strips. This was the one they sent me a few days ago. I definitely remember this one from when I was little. I would imagine that reading this back when I was about 6 or so would most likely affect what kinds of humor I would find funny later in life.

I miss Calvin. :) I loved reading his adventures over and over when I was a little kid. Of course that wasn’t the only thing I read, I also read a ton of Garfield, Peanuts, Luann, FoxTrot, and The Family Circus, The old ones, not the saccharinely sweet ones of today. I still remember one in particular that always made me laugh.

“Raisins are so dead grapes! Aren’t they Mommy!?”

And of course, probably the reason for my love of all things random, (See Blog Title :) ) was the library’s collection of “The Far Side” books. I had a very balanced humor diet as a child. Not too dark, not too sweet. :) But the dark side of my funny bone definitely had to have come from Calvin and Hobbes. :)
Now if you’ll excuse me. I need to go figure out where all my old Calvin and Hobbes Treasury books went to. :)

Awareness

As you are probably AWARE, I am really tired of all the AWAREness campaigns that currently plague our nation. I’ve written about it before, most recently HERE. Most of them, breast cancer awareness in particular, have gotten to the point where they are no longer creating awareness, they have just become a fashion trend, what with all the fancy AWARE jewelry, the AWARE purses, the AWARE t-shirts, and countless other AWARE items that everyone knows perfectly well what they represent, and thus can no longer be said to be creating awareness. That’s why I found today’s F-Minus strip to be so hilarious. It's funny because it’s true! :D

“Anti” Humor

I really love good bagpipe music. I love great accordion music. I love Opera where the soprano hits the really high notes. I like broccoli, cauliflower, lima beans, and fruit cake. Why am I telling you this? Because according to “Funny” people. All these things are universally detested by humanity. This is simply not true. But I don’t get mad about people making fun of these things. (Though I do admit I think the anti-fruitcake jokes are getting pretty old. The jokes are staler than the cake at this point. :p) Quite the opposite. I think these jokes are very funny.

Today there were two comics that had examples of such “Anti” Humor, and I found both of them to be downright hilarious, so I decided to come here and share them with you. :)

 

Agnes is always hilarious. :D

The Most Unwanted Music

Time for another incredibly random post. You are about to listen to one of the most ear-splittingly awful things you have ever heard in your entire life. But also one of the most gut-bustingly hilarious.

This morning I read this comic:

I thought the idea of Opera and rap was one of the worst, yet funniest ideas in music history, and I really wanted to know what it might sound like, but my brain just couldn’t put the two together. After I read the strip I went down the page and started reading the comments that people had left. One person replied that Opera-Rap had already been done, and posted this link.

~http://www.wired.com/listening_post/2008/04/a-scientific-at/~

This is so much more than just Opera Rap though. It is a terrifying fusion of Opera, Rap, Cowboy music, and children's holiday choruses. It is played on bagpipes, tubas, electric keyboards with the preset beats, harps, pipe organs, banjos, acordians and many other instruments that have no buisness being in the same song. This is 20 minutes of musical horror that is like watching a train-wreck with your ears. It is so awful, but so incredibly funny!

The opera singer can barely make herself understood, even when she is not rapping. I couldn’t understand most anything she said. The most hilarious thing I could pick out was when she was wailing mournfully, lyrics to a cowboy song, singing about "Miss Kitty" and going "Yaaaaahoooooooo..." very very sadly.

The children's chorus sings many songs, all to the same tune, joyfully exclaiming about shopping for Christmas, Yom Kippor, Labor Day, and Halloween. "AT WAL-MART!"

In short, you have to hear this! You will laugh your head off as you plug your ears. :D

All Hail the Mighty Expiration Date!

Yesterday I read the following comic and it got me to thinking about how ridiculous some people can be when it comes to expiration dates.

There really are people who are like this. I know, I’ve seen them at the grocery store. They don’t care when a product was made, they just want to know when it expires.

What they don’t realize is that those dates are almost meaningless. The companies pick a random date at a specified point in the future because the government says they have to. I mean, seriously. Do they really think that on 05/06/11 that box of cereal is perfectly fine, but at precisely midnight on 05//07/11, *POOF!* it suddenly becomes a box of toxic death flakes to anyone who eats it?

Expiration dates are a handy guideline, but to throw something away the day after the date on the package expires is just foolish and wasteful. Some things are still good months after the expiration date, and some things, such as pasta, are good years after. Just as long as the package is sealed, and bugs haven’t gotten in it.

I did an internet search on how long some items really last and I found out that even these five most feared items are good for quite a few days past the date. (Original article HERE.)

Milk: If it's properly refrigerated, it will be safe, nutritious, and taste good for about a week after the "sell-by" date.

Cottage cheese: It should last 10-14 days after the date on the carton (or 10-14 days after you open it, if this period ends before the printed date).

Mayonnaise: If it’s unopened and refrigerated, it can be kept for 30 days after its expiration date or three to four months after opening.

Yogurt: It will be good 7 to 10 days after its "sell-by" date.

Eggs: If they’re properly refrigerated, they should last at least three to five weeks after the "sell-by" date.

Just use your own good judgment, and don’t follow the religious sect of the Expiration of the Holy Date.

It drives me crazy how wasteful our country is. The store where I work throws tons of perfectly good food away because of that date on the package. And they don’t even wait till it passes, if the date even starts approaching, it gets chucked in the dumpster. Why not mark it down or donate it to a food pantry? Oh, right, because Nanna Government says not to. And we mustn’t disobey Nanna now, must we?

Ok, that’s enough ranting for now. I’d better move on to some homework before I start off on another tangent on how wasteful the government is. :)