…and SPEAKING of Spider-Man!

You might have noticed that there is a new ad to the right of the comic today letting you know that you can now BID for original Theater Hopper artwork on eBay!

To celebrate the release of Spider Man 2 in theaters, I have decided to draw the Theater Hopper cast as characters from the movie! Tom as Spider Man, Cami as Mary Jane Watson and Jared as “Mister Busyhands” himself, Dr. Octopus!

Bidding starts at .01 cent – one thin copper penny! The auction will last until next Friday, July 1st!

I’m selling the art partly to raise some more money for Wizard World Chicago. I don’t think I’ve mentioned it here, but I’ve reserved a hotel room and a booth. I’m sharing the booth with Mitch Clem from Nothing Nice to Say and Barrett’s Lament, Zach Miller from No Pants Tuesday and the omnipresent Neil G from Dayfree Press, Robot Stories, The End Chronicles and Limited Space. The convention runs from August 13th to the 15th – Come out and meet us!

Anyway, I’m raising money for that, but I’m also trying to improve our seller rating over at eBay. We’re trying to auction off some other stuff lying around the house and people aren’t buying yet because we don’t have a high seller rating.

If you’re interested in Betty Boop stuff, Cami is selling off a lot of her collection, so check that out. I’ll probably put up some of my junk there in the next couple of days.

/end whoring

Anyway, thanks!

Something I wanted to mention yesterday but was too busy fighting off a migraine to recall is that Zach Miller – yes THAT Zach Miller, the one from the erstwhile No Pants Tuesday – has thrown his hat back into the web comic ring with a new strip called Joe and Monkey.

What’s Joe and Monkey about? Simple, really. It’s the tale of a delivery boy named Joe and a monkey named Monkey. Oh, and be on the lookout for Kleptobot!

Anyone familiar with Zach’s work knows that Joe and Monkey has been in development for a long time. There’s a good reason for that. Y’see, Zach sometimes has a little problem with updating on time. Not a strike against him! Just stating a fact!

Well, Zach knows it just as much as we do, so he decided to do something about it. That’s why he produced A TON of comics in advance so he would never miss an update. You think I’m joking, but the amount of comics he produced weighs literally 2,000 pounds.

At any rate, I’m really excited to see Zach producing comics again and also experienced a warming of the heart when he mentioned Theater Hopper in his opening blog and had lots of nice things to say. Thank you, Zach! You cut to the core of me!

Incidentally, I will be sharing a booth with Zach at Wizard World Chicago August 13 through 15. Don’t forget Mitch Clem of Barrett’s Lament or Neil G from Robot Stories. They’ll be there, too.

I’m looking forward to the trip to Wizard World Chicago, but a little nervous, too. From Des Moines, it’s a 6 hour drive to Chicago. That’s the furthest I’ve ever driven somewhere by myself. Hopefully I won’t get desperately lost and end up dead in a crack house somewhere.

I’m also a little panicked that I didn’t bring enough stuff to sell. I only have maybe, 20 of my original posters left. Jared gave me his last 6 copies of the DVD to sell. I’m bringing, like 8 t-shirts – all mediums and larges that I’ve been waiting for someone to order and that I’ve been sitting on. I still have a lot of the Trainspotting parody poster. But the item I worked the hardest on – the 24 page sampler booklet with a new, never seen before comic – well, I only have about 150 of those. Still, if I sell out of merchandise, that’s not really a bad problem to have, is it?

I went totally D.I.Y. on this booklet. They’ve all been lovingly arranged by hand. I was going to take them to a professional printer, but they wanted $300. Sh’eah, right!

Once I get to Chicago, I expect things to be in full swing. I’m sharing a room with Zach Miller from Joe & Monkey. Let’s hope he doesn’t snore!

The two of us are sharing a booth with Nothing Nice to Say’s Mitch Clem. We were also supposed to be booth-buddies with Neil G from Robot Stories, but he had to drop out at the last minute because he’s buying a house and needed to get his stuff together. We’ll miss Neil, but I’m sure we’ll have a good time. It’s like a reunion of the Minneapolis FallCon!

…except without Carrington, who we will also miss.

Before I wrap things up, be sure to check out our latest advertiser Built For Comfort. These guys are just getting off the ground with their comic, but I think it looks pretty good. The site design is tight. BOOKMARK’D!

I prepared Friday’s comic in advance and it’s sitting in the display cue ready to go. Hopefully I didn’t screw things up with the code and you’ll have a nice comic about Aliens vs. Predator to kick off your weekend.

See you soon!

This isn’t the first time Tom has taken flight. It isn’t the first time he’s seen a movie with his web comic contemporaries, either. But as I place great importance on tradition, so goes today’s strip.

For the record, great thanks must be extended to the fabulous Joe “I’m So Fast I’m Already” Dunn who not only helped whip up the punch line of today’s comic, but also added some compositional suggestions to the last panel.

Anyone who dares to doubt that Joe is the most talented man in web comics needs only sit next to him for 15 minutes. The man works so fast and with such precision, the fact that he’s able to churn out work for four to five web comics a week starts to come into focus. Seriously. The man doesn’t even pencil out his work first. He reaches straight for an ink brush. He’s THAT good. I’m hoping that by hanging around him for those four days at the con that I can absorb a little of that talent. I don’t know how. By osmosis or sumthin’.

# THE REST OF THIS BLOG WAS LOST WHEN THEATER HOPPER MOVED TO WORDPRESS IN JANUARY 2009 #

One more thing before I forget.

I’m getting read to go to Wizard World Chicago in a couple of weeks and I need everyone’s help.

I’m putting together a small booklet with my best comics to give away to people who come to visit me on Artist’s Alley and I’m using the Top 10 of the Top 50 Comics as my sampling.

So if you guys have a little free time to go through the archive and rank your favorite strips (don’t be afraid to use that search bar to find them!), I would appreciate it. I want to give new readers the most accurate representation possible of what Theater Hopper is all about! Who better to let them know than the fans!

Thanks for your feedback. It’s always interesting to check in on the Top 50 from time to time to see what you guys are enjoying!

Later!

Before I forget, everyone needs to listen to The Triple Feature talkcast tonight at 9:00 PM CST at TalkShoe.com. Gordon, Joe and I were all at Wizard World Chicago this weekend, so we’ll likely be talking about that. So if you’re tired of us talking about movies all the time and maybe want us to give you a little behind-the-scenes web comics talk, tonight is the night to listen!

As a matter of fact (and I’m just thinking about this now), I’m going to see if I can get some of my web comic buddies to call in and provide a little extra commentary. Will they make an appearance? Listen in live to find out!