Agh! Uk! Ut! Ow! Bun Toons!

Smile, though your guts are breaking, smile, even though you’re aching…

I wasn’t around Bun Tooning last week because of the chronic, you know what I’m saying?  And by chronic, I mean chronic and ongoing kidney stone problems.  No details, I don’t want to bore you with the icky stuff, but it’s why I wasn’t here last week.

All real quotes.  My wife overheard the comment in the bed next to mine in emergency last week.  Apparently I was getting a little too detailed about my belief system while the universe took shots at my innards, and it put someone off that I wasn’t just saying “Ow!”.

I ended up in a semi-private room with a nice Catholic man named Rick who didn’t deserve the tsuris, so I learned to stay quiet about the Bible as the meds wore off.   I can be good.

Fingers crossed, my doctors think I can be free of these things for the rest of my life in a couple of months.   Then I’ll be reduced to only cursing bad movies and bad drivers, but I’ll keep those blasphemies to myself.

Ty the Guy OUT!

I know it’s because of SELMA BLOTTE (the Kidney Lady from Howard the Duck) that all this happened to me.   I wrote her into ONE Howard story in a Civil War special, just a single panel cameo, for god’s sake, and she took it wrong.

I have the power of life and death over you!

I’m glad I never wrote a scene with Appendix Bursting Man or Lung Disease Boy (two of the lesser members of the Legion of Substitute Heroes), or I’d never be free of the hospital.

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for the archive of years bun past, click here

 

for folks in the Toronto Area that are interested in learning to write and draw comic books, click here!

Kidney Bun Toons. OW OW OW!

Apparently it’s as painful as childbirth…but I can’t believe childbirth is THAT painful.

So, as I head for bed last night, I realize I’m a couple of days late with a Spider-Man job, and it’s actually immoral for me to work on a Bun Toon the next morning until I finish the job on my drawing table.  But…about ten minutes after I head for bed, I get a little pain in my side…which changes some of my plans for the weekend, all on its own.

This Bun Toon was drawn in the Emergency Room with paper a nurse found for me.  Sorry if it’s difficult to read.

Pain.

 

As of this morning at about 6:00 am, I passed the stone.

Ow.

They’re right.  It’s WAY more painful than giving birth to a child.  At least the child gets you birthday presents once they reach the age of ten.

Ty the Guy OUT!

Of course, this being comics and kidneys, there’s only ONE possible Bonus Moment:

Comics’ greatest Kidney Hero, from Howard the Duck.

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For last week’s Election Themed Bun Toon, drawn by someone in no pain whatsoever, click above.

For the Bun Toon Archive, stretching back a couple of years, click the rabbit in pain above.

 

 

Comics of Yesterday and Comics of Tomorrow. Literally.

Here’s one that has to be told today, right now, cause it won’t be yesterday and tomorrow lined up like this any other day.

I picked this Kirby Book up in Montreal THREE DAYS ago.  Love Kirby Collector.  Loved the price.

TWO DAYS AGO:

After getting into my Kirby Zone, I’m strolling along the convention floor and spot this little gem, leaning forward in a dealer’s box, for two bucks.

You're kidding.

It’s the only issue of any 80s Jack Kirby I don’t own.  Wanted to read it for fifteen or twenty years.  Conventions are fun.

YESTERDAY:  I read the book.  It’s GREAT.  I’m reminded how much I love Steve Gerber, the creator of these mad Mallards Of Comics, which included the magnificent Howard the Duck, Stewart the Rat (almost a duck), Destroyer Duck, and others ducks who teamed up with the Savage Dragon that I won’t mention.

Fig 1: why childhood was funny.

Well TODAY is Steve Gerber’s Birthday.

Steve Gerber at a convention. It's all lining up, like the stars.

I find this out because my friend Phil Winslade put up a magnificent drawing of Howard and the gang on his facebook page today in celebration.

http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100000779359593

Sorry, I don’t know how to link to facebook pages better than that clunky code-paste up there.  I hope it works.

So Happy Birthday Steve Gerber, the great creator of GREAT comics of Yesterday.

Look! I've summed up a human being's life and career with a wacky photo.

Here’s the thing.  When I first went online TODAY  it was supposed to be so I could  promote a comic book that’s coming out

TOMORROW

  I got to draw my old pals the Great Lakes Avengers for a chapter of the FEAR ITSELF epic.

So Today is the birthday of an industry giant, who wrote something I read Yesterday, and I’m shamelessly using that celebration to tell a story that promotes a comic I worked on coming out Tomorrow?

What a genuine right bastard I am.  My god.

Go buy the FEAR ITSELF: THE HOMEFRONT comic.  It’s fun, it won’t make you fat, and it can’t harm your family, pets, and furniture.

Ty the Guy OUT!

And now, for your Bonus Comic Book Gerber Templeton Shameless Association Moment:

We lost a couple of good ones today. Gene Colan and Peter Falk

Gene Colan and Peter Falk.

Gene Colan needs no introduction to any comic fan my age, he was responsible for SO many iconic runs on SO many characters it’s impossible to keep track.  Daredevil, Iron Man, Batman, Tomb of Dracula, Wonder Woman,  Dr. Strange, Captain America, and so many others…but my favorite of course was HOWARD THE DUCK.  The idea that someone could be the definitive artist on Dracula AND Howard is a testament to the versatility of Gene’s skill as a story teller.  He could give you chills and laughs effortlessly.

We only worked together on ONE thing over the years, Gene did a lovely painted cover for one of the Howard the Duck stories I wrote during CIVIL WAR, just before the miniseries I did with Juan Bobillo.  Colan’s magnificent alt cover piece looks like this:

We’d known that Gene had been ill these last few years and it had been a struggle for him to face financially.  The HERO INITIATIVE helped out with his expenses as best they could these last few years, and whenever I participated in a HERO project, in the back of my mind, I was pleased to be contributing my efforts specifically because I knew HERO was there for Gene when he needed it.  Considering the sheer volume of comics in my collection drawn by this man, and how much of my childhood, youth, and career was spent marveling at his craft and use of shadows and light, I figured it was the least I owed him to auction off a cover or two.

You were a tower of inspiration, Gene, and a delight to share the planet with.  Off you go…

Now, PETER FALK:

To the world, Peter Falk was Lt. Columbo.

Few actors get so long a run with the same character as Falk had with his famously rumpled detective from American TV.    I’m sure that there will be thousands of articles written about Falk’s genius performances involved in creating him, and these articles would be right, Columbo was one of the GREAT characters of mystery fiction.  But for me, Falk was at his best playing a series of completely insane men who manically destroy the world around them by force of will.  Check out Falk in such masterpieces as MURDER BY DEATH, THE CHEAP DETECTIVE, ROBIN AND THE SEVEN HOODS, THE IN-LAWS and my favorite of his more obscure parts, as the loopy soap opera writer in TUNE IN TOMORROW.

The film is sufficiently obscure that it has more than one title (sometimes it’s called “Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter“) but Peter’s performance in it is one of sheer lunatic brilliance.   Perhaps it’s the best thing he did; I know I’ll be putting in my copy of the film tonight and toasting Falk’s performance.  If you can stream it on Netflix, you should.

I expect to lose the creators of my youth as I get on in years, but TWO towering and skilled talents departing in one day?  That’s annoying.

Ty the Guy OUT!

Here now, your BONUS Peter Falk comic book moment:

I'm not quite sure what this is, but it SEEMS to be Lt. Columbo ("One more thing..." was his trademark line) and it SEEMS to have Batman in it, and it SEEMS to be drawn in an almost Gene Colan-ish style by someone who SEEMS to be credited as "Kyle-Latino".

The image comes from HERE, and you may figure out what it is at your leisure.

This is The End

…of the five part interview of Ty, by Michel Fiffe. Ty discusses Howard the Duck, Mr. Comics and Hoverboy. Check it out over at The Comics Journal.

Ad for Revolution on the Planet of the Apes, from Mr. Comics

Keiren