Once again, I become a preposterously minor character in a vague spin-off of a legendary franchise!

Third in a series.

Last night, we had a meeting for the Toronto Cartoonist Workshop group — the talented bunch of creators who are writing and drawing the Sensational Holmes Incorporated second issue that I’m editing.  (I’ll start to show off some of the fantastic images from the new stories soon!) and after the meeting, one of our crafty and skilled writers (Mighty Mike Marano) got to chatting with me, and I mentioned that I’d appeared as an actor in some old Canadian TV shows about twenty years ago, and I foolishly told him the name of one of them:  Katts and Dog.

Dog and Katts. Note: I am neither of these actors

And so Mike promptly got to looking for it on Youtube, and found a clip or two online, because Youtube is a level of hell where all your past mistakes are in streaming form.

Before we go to the clip,  talk show rules require I set it up….  I play an annoying rookie cop – an academy classmate of the main character, Katts.  The role required sighing, snorting, barking and behaving like a dick whenever the camera was on.  My dialog included the memorable line, “Woof Woof, punk, I’m a dick.”.  It’s where the Emmy I keep in my “sun room”  comes from.

Seconds before a sigh. Soon, I'll be barking. Note: I'm the one on the right.

After you watch this clip, I’ll explain why this is even remotely interesting…

Okay…so I’m looking for a link to where you can buy the DVD set, or the IMDB page for this show or something, as is nettiquette correctness dictates, and found out that the only DVD sets of this old show available or in French.  And in French, the series has a different name:

Rin Tin Tin Junior!?!?   Being in Katts and Dog, I could care less about, but I was in a Rin Tin Tin TV show!  That’s cool, even accidentally!  I remember meeting the dog, but we didn’t do anything on screen together.  I think his name was RUDY.   But ignore that I’m terrible in the part, and that I never worked on screen with the dog, or that his name wasn’t originally Rin Tin Tin….I worked with a Hollywood legend’s fifteenth generation, French-Canadian heir…. Rin Tin Tin JUNIOR!!

It seems the series was set in San Fransisco or Paris. Or both. Perhaps it involved a magic transporting genie-dog who flew between cities. I've never seen the show.

Apparently, in either the French of the English version of the series, I had a two second moment in the starting montage of one of the seasons.  Which means, when it was on the air, I would have friends tell me they saw me on TV all the time, even though I wasn’t actually on the show, but I got whopping residual checks for like, fifty bucks every year or so for a while.  The instant fame caused me to seek drugs and whores, but Dr. Drew cleaned me up.

By season three, the dog adopted an orphan, and a drunken Katts was arresting street car tracks. I had long ago left the series, by this disappointing season, unaware for years that I'd even been on it.

First I was made a subway station  in Gotham City, then a minor character in Planet of the Apes, and now, again… in the deepest corners of the most obscure records of Hollywood history, I am an astoundingly unimportant footnote in the legend of Rin Tin Tin!

Oh the life I lead.

Ty the Guy OUT!

Here now, your BONUS Rin Tin Tin Comic Book Moment:

What kind of a heartless monster would trick a dog and a child?

Toronto Cartoonists Workshop. Holmes Inc. Issue #2

Hey.

As some of you might recall, last year, the school I teach at (Toronto Cartoonists Workshop) put out their first issue of an all new adventure comic series “Holmes Inc.”  It was a wonderful experience for all concerned. lovely to read, well reviewed, and enjoyed by all who got a copy.  (I think there are still a few available…we’ll get to how to order one in a minute…)  Impossible as it was to believe, most of the work in the issue was from heretofore unpublished,  first time comic book artists and writers, ready to burst onto the scene and kick Joe Quesada and Jim Lee around the block a few times with their upstart-y enthusiasm and skills.

Anything with exploding aircraft and wheelchairs on the cover can’t be all bad, right?  And I THINK it had something to do with Sherlock Holmes and his descendants fighting world crime in the 21st Century.

Well, it’s starting up again…for issue #2.  In just a few short weeks, the gears start gearing and the submissions start submitting.  If you have graduated from any of the TCW classes (especially comic book bootcamp, storytelling or writing) and want to join in the fun for round #2 then head on over to the TCW homepage and let the king of TCW, Sean Menard, know that you want to play too.

TCW’s phone number is 647-328-1656 and the email is: info@cartoonistsworkshop.com

I hope to see some of the newer students head out this year, as well as welcoming back some of the creative studs and studdettes that helped make our first issue so good.

Oh, and if you can’t live another moment without your personal copy of issue #1, called “The Best Sherlock Holmes Comic Book Ever” (by my mother and some of my neighbours), then let Sean know your troubles when you contact him, and he’ll get one out to you.  A measly six bucks for 52 solid pages of tomorrow’s superstars is a pittance to pay.

Ty the Guy OUT

Here now, your Sherlock Holmes Comic Book Moment:

It’s…it’s…NOT Melvin!

Fan Expo Canada 2010–Friday August 27

Ty is in post-con mode–tired, exhausted, fatigued…but with lots of work that he couldn’t do over the last three days. So, as he catches up with deadlines on oh-so-many exciting projects, he’s asked me to quickly “throw something on the blog”.

So, to be frank, I posted something to my own blog…but I’ll try my best here. Nothing fancy–a few pics, and maybe a comment or two!

Friday–

Ty at TCW booth (photo Rachael Wells)

I was home with the younger kids while Ty and the teenager were free and easy, men about town, wandering the Convention Centre, checking it out. Okay, in reality, the boy hung out at Dad’s place in Artists’ Alley, or he wandered around looking for loot (I think his favourite moment was the three? six minutes? of Halo Reach demo after the hour wait in line). Dad was off at the Toronto Cartoonists Workshop booth chatting with students past, present, and potentially future.

Members of the Fit-to-Print course were on a schedule, for the weekend, to do signings at the booth; talk to people about the Holmes Inc. comic and course, and about TCW itself. For some of them, it was their first time at a comic convention on the other side of the table.

Kathleen Gallagher/writer and Eden Bachelder/artist for "Night Clubbing" from Holmes Inc. (Photo Rachael Wells)

Some members of Holmes Inc. actually had tables as well. I spotted Christopher Yao there with a table for his own work (with maybe one of the best names for a company going, Yaoza Graphics). And I spoke briefly with Adam Gorham who was hanging out with Big Sexy Comics, for which he draws Teuton.

Christopher Yao at his booth

Gibson Quarter sketching

In Artists Alley, Ty was seated beside Gibson Quarter who drew Flight Plan for

Gibson Quarter sketching in Artists’ Alley

Holmes Inc.  On Gibson’s other side was the one and only Leonard Kirk, who is teaching a course with TCW this fall.  To the right of Ty was seated David J. Cutler who is the penciller for Northern Guard, the Johnny Canuck mini-series Ty wrote for Moonstone Books (due out beginning in Novermber). By luck (or intentionally?) on David’s other side was Jason Edmiston, who is the incredible artist behind the cover for Hoverboy #1, and the same upcoming Northern Guard mini-series (as well as many, many other projects…check out his gallery of work).

Leoanrd Kirk wondering why the heck I was taking a picture of him.

So, Ty came back pretty happy to have been able to spend time with his students, to show off the finished Holmes Inc. comic, and to see everyone in Artists’ Alley.

And I totally forgot (’cause, you know that whole “I wasn’t there” thing)–Ty did a mini version of a Comic Book Bootcamp lecture. Was thrilled with it–said it was one of the biggest groupws he’d had for one, and thought everyone was very receptive to it.

Keiren

What am I up to?!?

I get asked this a lot.    I usually have about nine projects in the air at any one time, and as a result, I’m always behind on about three of them…but I’m STARTING to get caught up on some of it, so I thought I’d share (almost) everything I’m working on this week.

Back row: Suzie and Edgar. Front row: Sweet-pie, Dave and Lois.

Just finishing up a script for an issue of the Simpsons Comic, it should be done by the weekend.  Great fun, the family visits Canada again, and as a Canuck, I get to poke fun at some of my fellow country-men.

It’s been announced here and there that Marvel is publishing ONE LAST Harvey Pekar story for their upcoming Strange Tales series, but I’m not sure it’s been announced that I’m the one drawing it.  So I announce it here.

You can't see Harvey on this cover, he's hiding behind Hulk.

I’ve read Harvey’s script for this issue, and it’s one of the funnier things he ever wrote, and I’m bleeding with excitement to start laying this out on the weekend.   Drat him for dying like he did, but I’m honored and delighted that he made a point of asking me to do this before he died.  Yer a mensch, Harve.

For the next couple of hours I’m doing final production on a CANADIAN SHIELD cover for the fine folks at HEROES OF THE NORTH. I did a pin-up of their character PACIFICA a couple of weeks ago, and dove in for a second blast of illustration fun.  That’s today’s playtime.

Later today, I’m inking some pages over GIBSON QUARTER pencils for a new comic book (that I created and am editing for the Toronto Cartoonist Workshop) about the great grandchildren of the Master Detective, and their 21st Century adventures.  I’ll try to get some of the pages and cover for this mag up asap, it’s being published in about four weeks.  AHH AHH AHH AHH !  Deadlines!!  Whether you’ve never read a Holmes-style story, or  you’ve been an addicted Baker Street Irregular for years, you guys are going to LOVE this comic, trust me.  The premiere issue will  launch at FAN EXPO at the end of the month.  Much more on this as the day approaches.

Promo image from THE GAY CAVALCADE. Hoverboy, Uncle Orval, and "The Chief" seem to be upset about something...the Chief is likely drunk, as the character was often played for racist laughs.

And I’ve be looking over some old Hoverboy footage with the Hoverboy production staff… NEWLY DISCOVERED  “GAY CAVALCADE” episodes…the Hoverboy puppet show from the early sixties.  They need some editing and some cleaning up, but it should be ready for the Hoverboy Museum in the next couple of weeks.  FOUR entire episodes were found UNCUT!  Can’t wait to show ’em to you.

And though it shot LAST week, I think the TV program I co-hosted for Space:  the Imagination Station about graphic novels should be airing in the next week or two.  Check your local listings (in Canada) as they say.

And that’s not counting my teaching, raising my children, or my work with blind orphan girls.  ENOUGH TALKING TO YOU GUYS, I’m back to work…but before I go….

If you haven’t seen the DC UNIVERSE ONLINE game promo for the new game “WHO DO YOU TRUST?”, then go HERE immediately!  I mean NOW!  This is the BEST I’ve ever seen in super-hero CGI.  Not kidding, it makes Arkham Asylum look like Pong.  I thought everyone had seen this trailer by now, but it turns out a bunch of folks haven’t seen the glory.  Go, enjoy.  Bring popcorn.

TY THE GUY OUT!

Here now, your COMIC BOOK moment of ZEN