I am not entirely certain, but I think a great part of it might have to do with what I associated “science” and “engineering” with when I was a kid. Even when I was little the idea of scientists in white coats was a bit weird. I had seen them made fun of in cartoons enough to appreciate a caricature. My grandfather worked in a hospital lab and for me such lab coats were for doctors. I never could put my finger on it until recently but as I have went back through the franchises I enjoyed as a kid, I finally realized who I wanted to be:
Commissioned art from Eddie Nuñez digitally colored by author
I know that they are basically the same person, barring the mutation thing. But that was it. Referencing in books, figuring out solutions and answers, the person that people went to for obscure things, that is who I have always wanted to be. In fact, it turns out that when I was 8 I tried to teach myself Assyrian and Sumerian because Egon knew them.
Now, here is the problem: There isn’t a path of study that can lead to that outcome. That outcome is not quantifiable nor does it really bring prestige or money to your alma maters and paters. As I continue to work towards finishing what has become a huge portion of my life I take solace in the fact that all of the extemporaneous stuff I have done through these years have led me more towards being the person I really wanted to be. Whether or not a Ghostbuster and a Ninja Turtle were the reasons I decided to get a PhD, they remain the noblest aspect of this entire experience.
If you enjoy either franchise check these crossover out. If you like both, buy the recently released hardover collection
I have learned more about myself in the things I have done to stay sane during graduate school than I have about any topic I have studied. When it came time to pick a major for university I settled on Mechanical Engineering because I was good at math and mechanics. If you’ve taken courses in engineering you can see where this is going. I completed all my core courses my first year in college and realized that I didn’t want to be a career engineer in the sense that we were learning it. I wanted to design and build things, not manage button pushing operations. There is a perfect example of this in Egon’s life in an episode of The Real Ghostbusters: “Cry Uncle”
In “Cry Uncle” Egon’s uncle shows up and reminds Egon that he said he would come work for him at Spengler Laboratories. There Egon would get to do “real” science. Once at Spengler Labs, Egon has his white coat, and is tasked with feeding the research rats and mice. When he admitted it wasn’t what he expected, Uncle Cyrus explained there are no small jobs in research.
I really like this shot because it shows that it isn’t only the rats that are caged.
There isn’t inherently a problem with going into a field you are good at, especially if you are interested in it, but for me it was extremely limiting in the scope of my expectations for college. Such expectations continue to shape my opinions of higher education. I think the first thing I found odd was that the way our classes parsed out on the rubric I would be a senior taking freshman speech. Nothing built on anything else. Even the Engineering courses, which were only offered every other semester or so, wanted info in and were built on the premises that you passed or dropped out.
When I went back 5 years later I tried my hand at a broader field: Anthropology. I took every course my university offered and enjoyed them all. I did field work in Belize with another University and ran the gamut of geology towards that degree. Issues of being color blind and terrible mineralogy courses dropped me out of that certification (although I still practive the paleo and science outreach that I learned there) and ended up with a history degree. That itself is just as problematic because everything is formulaic and most of the people at the top hate everyone and have painted themselves into such tight “intellectual” corners that they wouldn’t dare step out of their offices to help someone even if they could.
I even completed an advanced degree in History. Then moved on to combining what I had done and what I thought I wanted to do. History of Science. I worked on another MA, which was worse than History because of the way our coursework is arranged. I still wanted to know more. Not more of one thing, but more in general. There were loose ends that needed to be tied up. So I reached out and ended up taking graduate level hours in Art History and Biology. As I have worked through all the stories I want to tell, and then figuring out how to appease the Academy and still get to write for the audience I want to engage with, I realized that I still want to know it all, and I want to be able to use that to help people answer questions and solve problems.
I still want a lab and a workshop. I doubt I will ever build a nuclear accelerator or a portal device, but with such a practical environment, who knows. I think that this is one of the reasons I have gravitated towards museum exhibits. Aside from presentation and engaging the public with collections (and collecting) there is the technical aspect of getting the displays built, arranged, and installed. Practical needs that people ask you do do.
I think the best thing about all of this is that it took years of advancing schooling to get back into comic books only to find what I study and write about was there all the time. That isn’t to say I write about mutations or ghosts, but a huge swath of my work is science and popular culture, and how the public engages with science. As for my dissertation, it will compare early American Naval and Army expeditions in their scope and treatment of the scientists (naturalists) and artists as were full expedition members. The first one, The United States Exploring Expedition (U.S. Ex.Ex), was in many ways undertaken due to John Symmes’ insistence and marketing that the Earth was hollow.
The Hollow Earth Theory
Even my PhD advisor admitted that my niche might be in being a generalist.
When I first constructed the schedule to get through all these readings there weren’t full days built into maintaining sanity. The plan was to have these large “scenic turnout” posts when I completed a full section. After trudging through the first few weeks I realized that in order to actually survive this road trip was to have at least one day each week that was devoted to specifically not reading anything.
To that end, most Sundays are spent doing something as far removed from comps lists as possible. Productively this usually means painting, like the one highlighted in Scenic Turnout 1. This last path cut through the American Cultural Studies had more days of rest but less art production than the days would have provided.
This weeks installment is a nice urban landscape, which is fitting since I am starting the Art of the American West section of my comps and the American landscape features prominently in the myth-building of the new nation.
These are, by default, just one day adventures. So I haven’t had any extended canvasses sitting around unfinished during the week. I might attempt a longer, more complex (probably not less cartoony) piece after Christmas as I near the end of comps prep completely and our special collections offices are closed for the holidays, but I haven’t decided yet. As with all the ridiculous, useless things I create I do it as much for the time-lapse opportunities as for the finished products, which, as meager as they have been I have grown to like more and more.
There were far more days off than paintings painted. A lot of these ended up being wasted away on other side projects as exciting as shampooing the carpet and waiting for the cable internet tech to come and fix all our internet woes. Otherwise it was spend in the most time consuming manner imaginable: video games.
I have never been huge into video games, especially the sandbox games that require 416 hours to complete without doing any side missions. I do have Red Dead Redemption which is a great game when I have two days to play through, although I think I have been asleep in the bunkhouse now for four and a half years and never did master playing horseshoes.
Although there is a new one coming out, but I don’t know if it will be enough to warrant cobbling the cash together for a PS4 since Drake 4 wasn’t and Uncharted was the only reason I ever got a PS3, which happens to turn 8 this Christmas.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sqCwa8CZ5rU
More recently, I have replayed Ghostbusters and the whole lack of backwards compatibility is one of the reasons I haven’t seriously looked into getting the 4. It is great because you can pick it up, play awhile, and quit like the old beat ’em up arcade styles. Some creative youtubers have clipped and edited the cut scenes with some gameplay and it is actually an excellent Ghostbusters 3. (I’ve watched the “movie” twice).
Most recently, I actually bought a new game when it was released. I have no idea how that happened. Maybe I was preparing for comps earlier than I thought. Some of the reviewers hated it because it was simple, a quick play through, and didn’t have a gazillion side missions. Those are the very reasons that I have loved the game. It is a blast to play, and I can pick it up and play for an hour or so and go back to something else without feeling like I need to complete just one more mission. The graphics are great, the mechanics aren’t bad and the AI isn’t overly problematic if you aren’t running on “Easy.”
Of course all this is offset by having my old, original NES system hooked up to our giant-for-us television to play Kung Fu and (what else) TMNT: The Arcade Game. For the record I have never, ever, in the history of having the first TMNT nintendo game, gotten past the disarming the bombs in the reservoir.
The final undertaking that I have been putting off has been to paint the miniatures that came with the The Ghostbusters and Ninja Turtles Boardgames from Kickstarter. I suppose now might be the best time to tackle it on the Sundays in the future since it should start to ice and snow soon and the yard won’t need mowing again– at least after I mulch the leaves.
Intro texts for the art section coming up and with the holiday weekend, I will be back on the road to comps in just a couple days.
Today is another of those scenic turnout days from comps work. Instead of painting (I did that last week, and will post it after the next section break) I spent the day organizing and figuring out my bazillion bytes of animation data that I have spread across several hard drives.
This post will be filled with cartoon intros and very little thinking substance. While organizing and checking for new DVD releases I was checking the dates of some of my favorite series and noticed that they all happened about the same time. This isn’t a complete or exhaustive or even objective list. These are the series I remember watching, playing, and remembering from the three channels that we had on television.
1983
He-Man and the Masters of the Universe My cousin had nearly all of the toys for this line. At least I thought he had nearly all until I saw the list of what all actually made up this toy line.
The 2002 series intro is much shorter and actually spoofs the original, which is a lot of fun.
G.I. Joe: The Real American Hero actually “debuted” in 1983 as well, but the first two seasons were mini-series, so I will add that intro in 85.
1984
Transformers More than meets the eye. I think it did something like the G.I. Joe mini-series intro, I was more familiar with Transformers than G.I. Joe so I am putting it in for its first year release.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uRQtMVJKBFc
These things have come back around in various (dis)guises forever, I think the last time I saw any at all they were in the computer animation style beast wars and Optimus was a gorilla and Megatron was a dinosaur.
Voltron-Defender of the Universe I never saw Voltron until I was much older. I was aware of it through toys, but I wanted to include it here in situ with Transformers.
Voltron-The Legendary Defender The new (2016) Netflix launched one (that has been picked up for a second season) that really shows you how to do a reboot of a popular 80s franchise. It is a great story, but most importantly it looks like it is supposed to.Since it is Netflix, there isn’t an intro per se, but here is the original trailer that we were all excited to see
and a really great fan-made intro where none were before
I don’t want to leave 1984 without adding one of the best kids’ shows that ran the last half of the 80s. If you haven’t seen it, or don’t remember it, just because it was muppets doesn’t mean it didn’t have action, adventure, and a healthy dose of satire.
Muppet Babies
1985
Thundercats
I had the light up sword of Omens from this series but always wanted Panthro’s nunchucks. I thought Tygra’s whip was cool, but never really liked him. I can’t remember why.
More recently Thundercats came back in 2011. I haven’t brought myself to make time to watch it yet. I have seen bits and clips online and I am torn on the character looks. From what I understand there isn’t a tradition intro as one would have, but there are several fan made ones on youtube, with clips from the show with the original audio.
G.I. Joe: Real American Heroes
I didn’t have many, if all, of these figures either, and I only remember seeing a handful of episodes, and I really only include it because it is iconic in lists of 80s cartoons. I remember liking the ones that weren’t in standard uniforms which, in the 80s, meant some kind of outback hat and vest or something.
1986
The Real Ghostbusters
Now we get into the realms of utterly obsessed I suppose. The Real ghostbusters were the first figures I remember asking for by name. I remember having the sword of omens but not asking for it. I remember asking for and getting a proton pack. I never got a trap because we had carpet inside and dirt outside and there was no place for it to roll. I always thought this was unfair reasoning. It is also the first series I remember wanting to be like someone and that was (is) Egon. I saw the cartoon before the movie and was a little disappointed that Harold Ramis didn’t look like Egon was supposed to.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M7VS-ZoeMqs
The show holds up extremely well. I didn’t care for the slimer shorts when I was a kid, but it didn’t bother me when he became more involved in later episodes. I didn’t like the Jr. Ghostbusters at all.
Bonus: Why are they the Real Ghostbusters? The earlier Filmation (who also did He-Man) series debuted in 1986 as well and it was based on the 1975 live-action version.
Filmation’s guys were the sons of the live action guys, episode 1 was even called something like “I’ll be a son of a ghostbuster or something.” I am a diehard Real Ghostbusters fan, but there are things to appreciate about filmation’s busters, if only for the level of bizarre the series took. There was crazy fallout conspiracies with the two on air at the same time. One even declared Filmation was racist as the ape was supposed to be the equivalent of Winston.
in 1997 a PKE surge saw the formation of a new gang of busters. I was an adamant hater of Extreme Ghostbusters then. I caught a couple reruns on cable after 2000 while working out of state but didn’t see the whole series again in order until the dropped it on HULU. Honestly the “extremeness” really sets itself firmly in my late junior high early high school days, but the writing on this still holds up and like the original some of the episodes are genuinely spooky. Egon (and Janine and Slimer) are the carry overs (if you aren’t familiar) with the extreme ghostbusters consisting of students in one of Egon’s courses. A more diverse group, without being preachy, the toyline on this one really blew up when they refused to market the wheelchair bound adrenaline junky Garrett.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PGsMr3pe5T4
1987
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
By all accounts this was a true phenomenon when it hit the airwaves. The comics has been around a couple years and an older generation (or those that lived anywhere near a comic shop) generally hate the cartoon versions, but they were my first exposure and I was hooked. The downside to getting turtles toys was I had to get rid of my ghostbuster ones. Seriously. It was a tough choice and I think when it stopped coming on television I was able to justify the cut somehow and went on to get the turtle van and sewer lair. I never had the blimp but wanted it. Plus this thing runs for 10 seasons, the intros change (not for the better) throughout the season with the final “Red Sky” seasons splicing bits of the movie into the intro.
I just finished re-watching the series and there were scores of episodes I hadn’t seen as they aired on cable channels later. I have more recently started watching the 2003 series having never seen a single episode. The character development seems solid and the writing is an over arching story reminiscent of the original series first seasons. We’ll see how it goes for another 7 seasons. This is an extremely annoying intro and I have skipped it every time since watching it the first time.
TMNT comes back again in 2012 (there was a feature length computer animated film called Turtles Forever but that isn’t what this is all about). This series is fully computer animated and is generally described as “more for kids” but there are some deep themes covered in this ongoing series (currently towards the end of season 4). This intro is ridiculous too, but watching it change through time is interesting. Given the changes the intros made within a series who knows where they will go now.
My original list ended there, but I started looking at other things I watched on Saturday morning so I could round out the decade. In fact I would say the 1980s were the zenith of animated series that didn’t subtitle themselves “The animated series.” But before moving on, we can’t skip one of the best that is about to get a reboot:
Ducktales (woohoo)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=koSl8JX5BeI
One of my favorite episodes still is the druids episode with the glowing hound.
Another that seems only a handful if us remember was the far out space sci-fi western (way before Firefly) Bravestarr, another Filmation production.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UaMo4k7iG7s
1988
Garfield and Friends
I am watching old episodes of this as I type. The craziest thing about this is that the intro I remember doesn’t jive with the episodes I remember. It is also one of those intros that changed for the better and one of the few that had something different in each one (similar to, but not to the extent of the Simpson’s couch gag, more like Bart’s chalkboard writing).
The intro I actually remembered:
A Pup Named Scooby Doo
I watched every episode of this. Scooby Doo is by far my favorite animated series and this was the newest incarnation of the franchise (13 Ghosts of Scooby Doo kicked off in 1985, but was something between a mini series and a series, but some great voice work).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uo1C1XL4p6c
The New Adventures of Winnie the Pooh
It seems like 1988 was trying to turn away from the gritty anime action stylings with these new releases. In fact this is about the same time The Real Ghostbusters started fading towards a harder focus on Slimer and their intro was reoriented to be Slimer and the Real Ghostbusters. Either way, the turn wasn’t terrible. Maybe the sword fighting sound effects guy retired.
1989
This was the year for me that everything went Nintendo. The two new shows that hit network television were Captain N: The Gamemaster (which so few people remember) and The Super Mario Brothers Super Show.
Captain N: The Gamemaster
This was a weird live action into animation that included a dog. I didn’t know many of the characters in the show because affording Nintendo games wasn’t something I was good at. Welcome to VideoLand
The Super Mario Brothers Super Show
This is one of those shows that I remembered fondly and when it hit Netflix a couple years ago I wasn’t disappointed. That isn’t to say that it holds up as well as Real Ghostbusters, but the live action segments were the best. It was an animation/live action mixed intro with music that was great, but catchy as hell. I always liked Luigi, but being an only child I never was able to play the character (that is why I liked Super Mario Brothers 2). It is a weird intro, and when it was on Netflix it didn’t have the Legend of Zelda shorts in the middle. You remember “Excuuuuse Me Princess”? Because Link was obviously a valley girl. Putting this together I realized this show was over 10% intros.
Full show intro:
The Mario Brother animated Intro:
and the Legend of Zelda intro:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7eKS8L6dB20
It wasn’t all Nintendo though, these were on Saturday morning, but after school (or at least by the time I got off the bus) there was an Indiana Jones and Magnum P.I. team of chipmunks.
Chip N’ Dale: Rescue Rangers
1990
The 90s. What’s to add except
Tiny Toon Adventures
TaleSpin
My grandmother loved this intro.
1991
I am going just into 1991 to include a few outliers.
Darkwing Duck Is an excellent parody of the super hero genre that really takes off with animated series of their very on from 1992 until the virtual end of television.
The Pirates of Dark Water
Peter Pan and the Pirates
This was an excellent series and I wish it would get a DVD release. Who wouldn’t love a Tim Curry Captain Hook?
That will wrap up the pre “animated series” series. This is a rough mix of what I watched on Saturday mornings and when I got home from school, after feeding all our animals. The later years most of the good stuff came on FoxKids which was channel 29 for us and we only picked up if it was cloudy-but-not-too-cloudy. From 1992 on you see Batman, X-men, Animaniacs, The Tick, and a huge shot in nostalgia’s arm with Cartoon Network’s Toonami (my aunt got satellite by this time so I could get some VHS recordings of the Herculoids, Thundarr, The Centurions, G-Force, etc. Then Cartoon-Cartoon took off and we got Dexter’s Laboratory, The Powerpuff Girls, Johnny Bravo, Cow and Chicken, and (maybe most importantly) Samurai Jack.
This all started while I was waiting for files to transfer and I was interested to see which of these were on the air at the same time.
As you look back through this batch of nonsense, it is the perfect time to point out that those of us that grew up with this are now reaping the benefits of others our age working in the comic industry. Of those listed IDW publishing currently runs a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles ongoing comic, Ghostbusters comes in series, and Transformers are a huge swath of their enterprise. The also have Pink Panther and Strawberry Shortcake and ,among others, the reprinting of the old Popeye comics. There is also a growing trend with major crossovers. To date:
TMNT/Ghostbusters (2014)
Ghostbusters/Real Ghostbusters (2015)
TMNT/Batman (Dec. 2015-May 2016)
and DC is currently running…
He-Man/Thundercats
Ending where I started with He-Man, if you like the art here (and in the Batman/TMNT series) you can check out more, buy prints or originals at the artist’s (Freddie Williams II) website.
I have finally finished the first section of the comps list. This marks the end of the first “question” in theory if not practice. Most of my work crosses the subdivision created to make the list make more sense. Before I start to work on the rest (I am almost finished with the background section on the American Studies portion at the moment) I wanted to share some of the things I have learned about this type of work and how I manage to stay sane throughout the attempts to synthesize everything in print.
Scheduling. This seems obvious and impossible. It isn’t so much of “I must read 173 pages every 2 hours in order to finish this” as much as it is setting aside chunks of time to work on the sources, but also (and sometimes more importantly) having chunks of time where you don’t. Through the first few weeks I would use the weekends to catchup on things I missed and would marathon through 2 or 3 books each day on Saturday and Sunday. While this allowed me to get our regular blog posts and keep ahead of where I thought I should be it became a doldrum of monotony after two weeks. After I finished the first section I revamped the schedule and took another look at the list.
First thing I did was stop marathoning the weekends. I started to treat Saturday and Sunday like the rest of the days of the week (in relation to prepping for comps anyway). This means I get up at the same time but instead of going to work I take care of things around the house until the time I would be off anyway. Then I fix something to eat, watch my dinner episode of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and set off to reading. This was less monotonous but wasn’t very different from the previous, and it wasn’t getting me any farther ahead on the readings.
Talking to a Troll on a Bridge
I once was a boilermaker. I worked shutdowns in industrial maintenance. This means 7/12s (seven days a week, 12 hours each day) until the shutdown or turnaround was over. These typically lasted several weeks and then we would have time off until the next one. Turns out several weeks of the same thing is about all you can handle, especially when it is reading a normal size book a day (I saw “normal” to mean abound 350 pages which is about what I can digest in a day’s reading). So I took another look at the list and pulled out the calendar.
By putting a book on the calendar and doubling for some of these anthology pieces (and the Walt Whitman biography beast) and by getting up an hour earlier, I manage to free a full day on the weekend to do nothing related to comps. That probably isn’t entirely true as almost everything I end up doing finds its way into my work. But, hey, a day off! It also serves as a buffer in case something comes up that would interfere with our regularly schedule program. In the most recent case it was attending the opening of our Picturing Indian Territory exhibit at the art museum.
Orko the magnificent
With the current schedule running, I am actually at the time of writing this, a day and book ahead, I will read the final book on my list a few days after Christmas. That is if I continue to treat the days of break as workdays. The days for blogging have been built in as well. This one was supposed to be tomorrow and the next a couple days later, but I think I can get two out this weekend (don’t look for that to become a common occurrence anytime soon).
What do I do on the days I am not reading? I spend it painting and pastelling random bits of pop culture from 80s cartoons. At least that is what the last one consisted of. It happened that the end of the first section and the second time I had a full day off hit together so I finished a prepared board and canvas in the morning and took a more ambitious project after lunch. In addition to arting it up, I have been utilizing my obsolete iPhone to try capture a time-lapse of the mess. Below are the time lapse creations of the fruits of a day off when I could have read at least two books:
The first was a prepared board for pastels for Egon talking to the King Troll from the episode Troll Bridge
As you can see the capturing system (and the art) is far from a professional affair. But I also had a small canvas for Orko, to celebrate the recent beginning of a 6 issue DC comics crossover of He-Man and the Thundercats.
The great thing about painting bits of cartoons from 30 years ago is they mainly use primary colors. This is extremely helpful for someone who is colorblind. In fact, since the pastels don’t have labels, I don’t do them unless my wife is here to double check skin tones or accessory colors. I suppose one day I will do something random as I see them or match them to what I see, but currently I would like them to be “right”
To that end, this one has been the most ambitious projects as far as size and content. I have done a couple ninja turtle acrylics before of Rocksteady and Bebop from the cartoons and then a panel from the new comics, but never have I situated them into actual art. It was actually a lot of fun, and I was surprised there there wasn’t a version of NightHawks with turtles somewhere on the internet. There isn’t one of the Ghostbusters (or the Real Ghostbusters) either so I might have to give that one a try some time.
This may seem like a waste of time, and I go back and forth on whether it is or not, but I do know that this small break in plowing through an enormous reading list has severed to make the workweek more tolerable. If you have made it this far and are wondering why you feel burned out over your work, you might try adjusting some things to give you a break. It doesn’t have to be painting, it could be bike riding, hiking, swimming, snow skiing, practicing the japanese noseflute, video games, something, anything, or even nothing. Comps (or generals) is one of those things that isn’t actually testing you for a “grade” in the sense that you have to remember a bunch of facts in an order in order to regurgitate them back for your professor. You are being “tested” in order to prove that you are suited and situated firmly enough into your discipline not to embarrass yourself in conversation with other people in your discipline. More than a few people will tell you that during preparations for comps “you will never know more about your field than you do now.” I know the sentiment and I am glad they share, but at the same time that isn’t really comforting to me.
A tribute to Edward Hopper’s Nighthawks
The next scenic turnout may be art, or something else entirely. It might be a conglomeration of the things done on the days off between now and when I finish the next section, or something in the middle that think is more clever than it probably is.
I still haven’t put together all my thoughts on an action figure post yet (nor have I finished enough of my comps readings to make a useful post) so in the interim you get this, which, admittedly, is just an excuse to put all the Bebop and Rocksteady images I have in one place.
June ended up casting me down the pop culture wormhole that I long forgotten. In much the same manner that a random tweet rekindle my love for the Real Ghostbusters and finding the comics the universe had conspired to help me remember other parts of myself. I still say it is because all the people creating things are the same age as I am so there is a bout of cultural memory taking over production but whatever the reason, it has been fun.
There is a Ghostbusters/Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle comic crossover from IDW publishing. This is old news to many, but if you got here through some weird google image search and don’t know about it, check it out. It is what led me over to the IDW TMNT series itself. I probably would have remained agnostic over it otherwise.
A brief word about the IDW TMNT comics as a whole: It is great. It nods to the originals (both comics and cartoon) but has a more real feel to it. I don’t mean real in the authentic sense, but I mean it develops the characters in ways that weren’t possible in an animated program used to sell toys.
Now, back to June. A TMNT movie and a special IDW TMNT comic arc were the specials of the month. I’ll start with the comics since I have less to say about it in general. Bebop and Rocksteady Destroy Everything is exactly what it sounds like. The two get their hands on a time traveling sceptre and generally Rocksteady and Bebop their way through time and space. If you know anything about those two (and let’s assume you do since you made it this far anyway) you have some idea of just how bad it gets.
Pretty much the default issues when these guys travel through time
Since Time is involved we see our heroes in a half shell meeting back up with Renet (it has ties with Turtles in Time which is interesting given how much that was hated, at least that is the sense I get from the boards around this place).
As a whole this thing must have been a logistical nightmare. There are 2863 different artists (slightly exaggerated for dramatic effect) on each issue. I usually hate when artists change mid run, much less mid issue, but this one really seemed to work as they popped up and around different times and places.
seriously look at all the artist involved in a single issue!
They also tie back into IDW’s kickstarted for a TMNT board game. Nothing super special, just two scenarios included in the last two issues. Well it was supposed to be two different scenarios but many of us ended up with repeats.
Board Game Ad in Bebop and Rocksteady Destroy Everything #5Bebop and Rocksteady Destroy Everything extra scenario ad Issue #5
The swath of cover art is fantastic and Nick Patarra‘s interlocking 5 actually interlock back with itself and I am currently trying to find a way to make it into a nice lampshade because that seems like the best way to display it. Thank goodness there us a digital version of it, because it really does loose something when shot together for lampshade purposes. The tangible interlocking is rough, but there is still something about it that is fun.
My copies linkedDigital links from Nick Pitarra’s twitter cover
The timing for this arc could not have been better. The breakout stars of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows film was Bebop and Rocksteady. This movie was much better than the first one, which, admittedly I never finished. But, Out of the Shadows was absolutely ridiculous and over the top and wonderful.
For one, and for me specifically, it (and the comics really) have allowed me to actually match the turtle that I always liked. Donatello has always been my favorite but I have always been more of a cartoon Ralph in practice. With the movie making Ralph a jock and Donatello a more skeptical practical person, and the comics giving him (and all of them really) more wit, sits well with me.
I have said similar things
Turtles aside, the single duo reason to see this movie is the rhino and the warthog. Ever since I was a kid, even before the turtles were a thing Rhinos were one of my favorite animals, along with armadillos and anteaters. So when Rocksteady arrived I was thrilled even if he was a bumbling villain idiot. Fast forward to getting back into the comics and seeing how the duo are treated there was what kept me hooked on the series. (Now Leatherhead is back, and while I am more than a little sad he isn’t the crocodile dundee swamp thing he is, I am sure they are going good places with it).
When they announced the TMNT sequel I was skeptical and shrugged it off as another summer 2016 movie to ignore. Then I saw the first Bebop wanted poster. I instantly hit social media and tagged a friend of mine, who happens to be a DJ with a substantial mohawk (although not purple) that he had the perfect halloween costume. The next day or so Rocksteady’s showed up. So I went back and added that one and admitted that I had to do it.
I saw their action figures first. I was in WalMart on the hunt for the classic Ghostbusters mini figures and since they were working on part of the store they had staged about a dozen pallets of TMNT toys in the main aisle and I had to wade through them to get to the tiny little Ghostbusters section in the back. I ended up getting Donatello first and outfitting him with a proton pack. The next time I went back I got the 11″ Rocksteady and Bebop to go with the 13″ classic Rocksteady and Bebop. For the record I don’t actively collect action figures.
2016~1990Here is another mutant for scale.Sitting on a TV tray for scale
I didn’t know anything about either one of the guys playing them (I have been working on PhD stuff for a while and not watching television and I have never been into wrestling) so I went in with no preconceived ideas of what we were getting and it turned out great. The entire setup and most of the movie are rife with plot holes, impossibilities, and utter nonsense but that makes it great. Someone sat down with the comics and the original cartoons and said “how do we translate this to the big screen” and however they did it and whoever made it work need awards.
I went to see it the Sunday after it opened at an IMAX matinee and there were only 20 people in there and 90% of them weren’t born when the Turtles first fell into our laps. The 3D was awesome, but not the crux of the movie which is always nice. Donnie’s holographic gadets looks great and the internal mutation stuff with the cell binding and DNA structure changing looked really good in 3D. After seeing it, I had to go back and get the regular sized figures. The Rocksteady comes with a sledgehammer which he uses in the comics, but not the movie.
A couple weekends ago I pulled out some of our paints and took a stab at the comic and cartoon duo. I had recently been working on pastels based on the Cryptozoic Ghostbusters trading cards that I liked so it wasn’t a huge shift. I usually do something like that over the weekend to decompress from exhibit work and reading for comps. That is really why I got back into comics, they are a nice palate cleanse from comp prep.
Rough sketch outline
Finished acrylics based on a comics page by Mateus Santolouco. Check out his stuff it is all greatFinished cartoon versions“You’re like the Bob Ross of Ninja Turtles” three people made that reference
I still haven’t gotten the $20 (each) sets of Bebop and Rocksteady on their bikes. But I am watching for a clearance. I have wanted to chop my own bike for a while but don’t have the money and means to, but I now at least know how I want to do it.
Incidentally the Paul Jr. from that old Orange County Choppers organization designed and produced the bikes. I would have watched that episode. Actually if someone cut out all the Days of Our Lives family drama and focused on bikes the series would have been great. Maybe it will come out in a behind the scenes book or DVD extras or something.
Designed and brought to life by Paul Jr. (pauljrdesigns.com)This and below from Designsbyjoyce.com
I have never been big into trikes either and the only ones I had really ever seen were huge and were powered by Volkswagen engines and not an actual bike/chain drive, so Bebop’s was interesting to me on that front.
Bebop Trike For more great photos see http://pulse.therpf.com/bebop-and-rocksteady-posters-new-spot-for-teenage-mutant-ninja-turtles-out-of-the-shadows-features-krangBebop Trike For more great photos see http://pulse.therpf.com/bebop-and-rocksteady-posters-new-spot-for-teenage-mutant-ninja-turtles-out-of-the-shadows-features-krang –If anyone has any Pulse quality shots of the Rhino Chopper please share!
I even tracked down the UK released poster that was just Rocksteady and Bebop so I could frame it. There standard posters are 30×40 so framing it whole was going to be a gazillion dollars but luckily(?) the one I got in had a crease in it (so I got my shipping refunded) and didn’t feel bad about cutting all the words off the bottom. After getting it into a poster frame I already had, I think it looks better without the words.
Original 30″x40″ sizedetailCut for a 27″x40″ poster frame. I really think it looks better without the adsFramed on the wall
To that end I am trying to track down all the pieces for a good human Rocksteady halloween costume, so far not a single custom shop will touch it. One custom leather place in Chicago can get a basic one I would have to stud myself for almost $300. So I think it will be old jacket and razor blade time. I will probably make a post on that process too just to see how it comes off. The patch on the movie vest is a Black Label Society patch by the way, in case you are trying to make an authentic custom. It doesn’t show up as such on the figures, which makes sense if you listen to metal. It helps that Sheamus is only a couple inches taller than me and serves as a nice avatar for what I could look like in shape.
The final thing I haven’t gotten and probably won’t ever be able to afford are the SideShow collectibles figures for the two. (Rocksteady, Bebop) Both together are hovering around $700 before shipping, and I mean you really can’t get one and not the other that is just wrong. But the prototypes look AMAZING. Already decided when I win the Mega-Millions and build my museum of art and natural history (Faux-Art Gardens, HA) I am going to have life sized statues of these in the entryway.
In the end, I clipped just a fraction of the trailer in to put on my youtube channel to share whenever someone asked why they should see this movie:
Someone on youtube has clipped most of their scenes from a bootlegged cam and put them together for about 7.5 minutes of madness, which is funny but I think it is even better when it is strung out throughout the movie.
***I literally just–like as I am typing this part of the post–received my stickers in the mail to put on my bike’s windscreen. I can’t afford to get the bike converted into the Rhino Chopper, but I can afford $3 skateboard vinyl stickers. These will go well on the bike since I have the No-Ghost Logo on my saddlebags and the bike *is* an 86.
Skateboard stickers for my bike’s windscreen
Whatever the back stories on the other in-universie mutants, (I think Rocksteady was a Russian Arms dealer in one, I haven’t kept up with them all, but I might be getting around to them later this year). For my money and universe these guys are Bebop and Rocksteady. Now it is just question of making sure my Halloween partner doesn’t flake.
I guess the whole take home point to all this is realizing that I had packed away a lot of what made me, me. These are the things that shaped my primary school years and are people (imaginary or not) that live in my pysche. These are things I put away when I went to high school and then to college to be replaced by things like books and journals. I read the books as a kid too. Red Badge of Courage and Moby Dick in Jr. High and 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea a half a dozen times before that.
But the books could stay, they were acceptable part of the trade of growing up. Why did Ghostbusters and TMNT shed? I have no idea really, but I am glad they are back on the scene, even if their influences never really went away. Welcome back guys, it has been too long.
via GIPHY
now I have to go put those decals on my bike.
****Update: The Decals are on****
They have a whole set and a few others (Ghostbusters, Deadpool) at their Ebay shop.
