Tuesday, September 16, 2014

"The CARTOGRAPHER'S DILEMA"





There's still stuff that needs fixin' in this--and maybe the jokes misfire. Maybe they're offensive. No offense intended. But it is 1966 we're talkin' about.

As always, any comments/criticisms are more than welcome--they're requested.

Remember our Fr'Goom page of last week or so? He goes searching for specimens to mind scan and finds the traveling cartoon historians Mit and Mal? That's the lead-in to this....

Not sure on the Gorham character's name yet...it's "Chick Griesman" here, but something about the gruffness of "Chick Grist" appeals to me....

Of course the Chick Griesman/Grist character is not meant to represent Jim in the least. Any resemblance other than physical is coincidental. Obviously.

8 comments:

MrGoodson2 said...

Cartoon historians , homos, same difference. Half a fag here, half a fag there.

That last page is just beautiful.

The environment, settings, throughout are just candy.

You should be doing this all the time.

But is the X there? The writing. I think it is but only the public will tell you where you fit. Solidly niched as a cult item, or huge, must have it, fan favorite.

I can't tell you. It will take the market test. I'm way too biased that it's all genius.

I "listened to a movie" the website, took in Mike Judge's Idiocracy again. The whole country has become over populated with Fritos. It's reflected in the culture top to bottom. That may be a population that does not embrace an ironic and wordy, no matter how beautifully drawn, comic book.

MrGoodson2 said...

But as far as wordy goes, big thumbs up on the font work. Reads great.

Tom Moon said...

Well, there's too many incredible, funny details in the art to even attempt a comprehensive list - the faces of the teacher and all the students in class each with their own individual character, the motorcycle cop hassling the black newspaper delivery people, the Indians sitting on the closed store porch.

You have a masterful way of portraying character through dialogue as well as art, especially the new character Chick, and he's just a perfect contrast to Teen Ellis's sensitive, intelligent nature.

The best thing of all is that you have built this entire world around Teen Ellis and his struggles fitting in. Everyone can identify with that. It's so universal and yet you don't fall back on cliché. Instead, it's this astonishingly, detailed and true-to-life portrait of a life of a teenager, in humorously exaggerated form.

Even if you weren't one of the people whose biggest childhood influences were T.V., movies and comics, you can still feel deeply for Teen Ellis and his attempts to cope.

There are two "m's" in dilemma and you spelt "global" as "gloabal" on the first page.

Not sure about the use of the words, "born'd" and "stol'd". For some reason they don't sound quite right to my ear as word forms Teen Ellis would use. Maybe just "born" and "stole" are better.

MrGoodson2 said...

The name search for the Jim character. Just call him Jerk. Good auto bio title. JUST CALL HIM JERK

Rickart said...

I will see you in a few days Marty, so I'll gush more in person. Suffice to say that I will be pouring over this again and again for pleasure and inspiration!

Davis Chino said...

Dudes! So glad you guys like the new pages. Your kind words really give me a lift!

And Tom, my apologies for yet another set of lazy misspellings!

The text for that intro "Map of Fume" page took me forever--and it's still not quite what I was going for. Funny--I give half the page over to straight text, and I thought therefore I'd have lots of room to get down what I wanted--instead I ran out of room before I was even halfway thru the spiel I'd planned! Ah, the universal constraint of space....

I've done a new printing of this year's Brushpen Breakfast sketchbook, and I've added the Fr'Goom flying saucer page and the "COMICS DAY" story here...it looks real good in a tw-panel-per-page, horizontal format. It will be my main offering for the Rose City Comic Con this weekend. (and yeah, printed at Staples again--it keeps the cost down!)

Now I'm off to pack--we hit the highway for Portland early tomorrow morning!

Davis Chino said...

And Tom, so funny you mention "stol'd" and "born'd"--they rang wrong to my ear, too, but I thought I'd try 'em out--they're common usage among my Okie family. Dialogue for The T.E. is tricky--just like with our real life Ellis, he's a unique blend of the erudite and the vernacular! (fer instance, I don't mind "injun" thrown in when he's given a disquistion that's basically sympathetic to the native peoples...I'm trying to keep a hold on the fact this is s'posed to be 1966 (hence the Elvis flick), but I've got a lot of anachronisms sneaking into the last few pages...oy!)

And seriously, I love yr analysis of the T.E.'s appeal. That really, really feels good to hear. I am trying hard to make it all work!

BDMontag said...

This is terrific stuff. In the seventies where I come from, comic book day for the "stationary stores" were Fridays. They were Friday until Heroes World got them a day early. In 1987, in Philadelphia, I was going to comic book store on Fridays for the new shipment. It took a decades to move to Wednesday--where I come from.
Chick was created just a few weeks ago, you did these fast!