Author: artofthecartoon

The Notorious B.I.G. Inspiration…

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On March 9, 1997, Christopher Wallace aka Notorious B.I.G. aka Biggie Smalls, was gunned down in LA. Arguably the greatest lyricist of all time, he has inspired not only myself, but countless other visual artists, especially in the street art form that is graffiti. Looking at the images below, I don’t think it’s a stretch to state that cartoons and animation had a little bit of influence as well.

 

daily-dos-life-after-death1biggiegraf1biggiegraf3biggiegraf4biggiegraf2

I know there are differing thoughts on the role of graffiti in society, so I’ll leave that heavy issue for another post, but I will say this: Your tagger name and/or initials scribbled on a wall does NOT mean it is art! Have some inspiration or meaning behind anything you put up for goodness sakes. Plus, everybody’s scribbled their name on a wall at some point, be original please.

RIP Biggie Smalls

Review: Watchmen (Film)

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Watchmen/ dir. Zack Snyder/ 2009

watchmenposterfinalWell it was a fun week of blogging. Watchmen week comes to its conclusion with this review of the live-action Watchmen film. 

Many thanks to those who came to dinner at Sea Garden to celebrate the birthday of a certain Art of the Cartoon blogger. Many more thanks to the 10 folks who also came out, waited in line in the freezing cold for about 3 hours, just to indulge my geek ego and watch the midnight showing of Watchmen. 

Now for the main event.

The Review

Ever since the end movie credits started to roll I have been trying to think of what to put in this review. At the very end, I just sat there trying to process what just happened on the big screen and in my head doing a quick comparison to the legendary comic book. Here are some of the questions that raced through my mind when Watchmen was over:

“Was it complete? Were the characters okay? Did this capture the essence of the graphic novel? Were the changes significant or were they easily overlooked? Did the film feel right? Was the original messages from the comic book also on the big screen? Should I take into account those who have not read the book? Do I compare this to the book? etc….”

For those who want the bottom line, here it is:

Go see this movie.

Be forewarned. You should read on though, because the reasons why you should see this movie is different from what you would expect. (I will try to keep the spoilers to a minimum, but there may be some minor spoilers ahead… hit the jump!) Continue reading →

Set the VCR: Alan Moore Speaks! (The Simpsons “Husbands & Knives” 2007)

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Alan Moore, writer of Watchmen, genius. He is one of the first writers to establish a literary and structural tone to comic books that rivals traditional novels. It’s no secret that Alan Moore is not a fan of the care-free licensing that major comic book companies (Like DC) take with writers’ characters. He has always decided to take his name off writing credits when a movie is made based on one of his many genius comic stories. With the disaster that was The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen movie, Alan Moore became more frustrated with the whole licensing process. 

Because of this, I don’t think he gets out in public that much. Actually, for many years I just knew him as that dude with the beard…
alan_moore

Yup, thas him! That’s all I knew of him. He never really seemed human, like if I ever met the dude I would cower in his presence. I never really heard him speak or got a sense of his personality until this fateful Set the VCR Moment: (there’s the jump!) Continue reading →

Watchmen: The End is Nigh (Video Game)

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Below is the opening cinematic and some gameplay footage of Watchmen: The End is Nigh video game. It’s a prequel of sorts, taking place before masked vigilantism was outlawed in the graphic novels. It follows the adventures of Rorschach and Nite Owl as they fight crime.

I hate to say this, but this game looks like it’s going to SUCK! Don’t get me wrong, the animation looks cool (moreso on the actual gameplay than the opening flash animation), but they always screw up these movie tie-in games.

And I hate that they’re doing this shit to Watchmen…

I hope I’m wrong…

UPDATE: The reviews are in, its official, this game SUCKS!

(shakes head in disappointment)…

Bootleg Classics: Justice League Unlimited “Question Authority”

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Watchmen week continues here at Art of the Cartoon…

The original “superheroes” that were supposed to be used for Watchmen were taken right from the pages of Charlton Comics. Charlton Comics was bought out, however, by a major comic studio named DC Comics in 1985. Since DC planned to incorporate the heroes from Charlton Comics into the DC Universe, Alan Moore, writer of Watchmen, along with Dave Gibbons, Artist/ Penciler of Watchmen, decided to create original characters for their soon to be classic book. Even though the new characters were original, they were still influenced by the Charlton Comics superheroes that were supposed to be in Watchmen.

Case and point, Rorschach was loosely based on The Question:

 

Question on the left, Rorschach on the right
Question on the left, Rorschach on the right

 

 

And Doctor Manhattan was loosely based on Captain Atom:

 

Capt. Atom on left, Dr. Manhattan on right
Capt. Atom on left, Dr. Manhattan on right

What would have happened had Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons been able to use the Charlton Comics superheroes for Watchmen? This intriguing question is somewhat answered in this Bootleg Classic.

Continue reading →

1000 HITS!

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It’s Watchmen Week! and guess what?…..

The Art of the Cartoon blog just passed the 1000 hit mark!

Many thanks to those who read this blog.  This inspires me to keep writing in this thing.  It only took a lil over 2 months, I never thought I would hit 1000 this fast, I figured people would get tired of my writing about cartoons and animation and stuff…

Anyway Watchmen Week…so enjoy this video…

WTF is Watchmen

Thanks Adam for the link!

IGN: The Ten Most Memorable Moments of Watchmen

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watchmen_smiley

It’s Watchmen week at Art of the Cartoon. Most posts this week will be about the comic book series and will end with a review of the new Watchmen live-action film which comes out on my birthday March 6. 

First off I would like to link to this IGN article which details the ten most memorable moments of Watchemen (IGN’s opinion, not mine!)

Hit the jump for the short list if you’re plain lazy (WARNING SPOILERS AHEAD, but honestly you should have already read this book):

Continue reading →

Sultan the Warrior…

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Check out this trailer for the upcoming Indian Animation (as in the Country India) Sultan the Warrior…

WHAT ….THE FU@K…WAS THAT!?

I can’t hate on the animation though (I sooo want to though…..). These are folks I might be working with in the future, I don’t want them saying, “why  you hating on our animation?”

You have to admit, it’s hilarious that the main dude’s facial expression never changes (I can watch this trailer over and over for the unintentional comedy that is the dude’s face). 

Oh and one last note, A.R. Rahman, the same dude who did the music to Slumdog Millionaire, did the music to this piece of…wonderful animation (grits teeth). Interesting….

This could all be just me though. Have a good laugh!

Review: La Maison en Petits Cubes

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La Maison en Petits Cubes (House of Small Cubes)/ created by Kunio Kato/ 2008 (Japan)

La Maison en Petits Cubes (House of Small Cubes) won the Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film this Year. Fresh off the heels of the best acceptance speech ever (sorry Geo, the Man on Wire disappearing coin was good, so was Sean Penn’s sentiments on Prop 8, and the Heath Ledger win was moving, but this dude thanked his pencil, and the domo arigato mr.roboto made more sense after I watched the short film, all acceptance speeches from now on should handled by Japanese men):

I decided I had to take some precious time off of work and school to give this short film a look and review.

Synopsis

La Maison en Petits Cubes tells the story of a man living in house surrounded by water. As the water rises he must build another level to his house to stay dry. One day, he loses his favorite pipe in the water. As he descends into the waters through different stories, he relives the scenes of his life.

The Review

Subtle and simplistic, yet oh so very powerful. I was riveted more by the 11 minutes of this short film than I have by some full length animated features…

(hit the jump to read the rest of my review, and the video of La Maison en Petit Cubes) Continue reading →