Where No Bunny Has Gone Before! YAY

Live Long and Hop Around More.

Last week, mere moments after I posted the Bun Toon, I headed out to my local theatre and took in the latest Trek Movie.  This week (with very very slight spoilers), I report back with…

Beyond turns out to be my favourite of the last three NuTrek movies.  Maybe because it wasn’t so ambitious, and maybe because they got Spock and McCoy bang-on-bullseye for all their scenes, but it “felt” right, and I was grinning the whole time.   I’ve warmed to the Earth-2 crew, even the new Kirk, though he’s the only one that still doesn’t “feel right” to me.  The rest of it was delightful.

It’s nice to see Trek back on track for the Fiftieth Anniversary coming up in less than a month.  With a new TV series, and other little things here and there, there’s much to celebrate for this old Trekkie, including a return to doing NEW Trek related projects that I can’t talk about in public quite yet…but I promise, I shall shout and howl and promote like crazy when I’m allowed to.  (I probably wasn’t even allowed to say as much as I just did.)

So forget I said anything.

I can’t wait for the next Trek Movie, already announced…with the GHOST OF KIRK’S FATHER!  BOO!

Ty the Guy OUT!

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A few days ago, another one of my heroes passed away at the age of 91:  Long time Mad Magazine legend, Jack Davis.

I first encountered Jack, like most of us did, in a Mad Magazine when I was about nine or ten.  He was one of the “gang of idiots”, the cartoonists’ cartoonist, whose casual excellence, and confident line work has been a primary inspiration in my career.

In my twenties, I consciously tried to draw like Wally Wood, Neal Adams and Jack Kirby, but some years ago, I realised that SUB-consciously, I always draw like Jack Davis.

At least I do when I’m at my best.

His aesthetic, his line, his easy precision, and his lack of pretension, worked together to create what I consider the perfect “cartoon” style of the 20th Century.  It was accessible, and impossibly skilled at the same time.  There was something about the way he seemed to splash colours or tone on his drawings as though he had only minutes until a deadline, and yet EVERYTHING looked like it was in the right place.  The effect was magnificent, and obviously in high demand as Jack did a heck of a lot more than Mad Magazine.

When I finally got good with a crow-quill, I went to Jack Davis art for instruction on how to create all those fabulous textures and tones. It’s a master class on how to make crosshatching and greys work in illustration.

Around the age of nine or ten, I noticed the same guy who was killing it in Mad Magazine, was the guy that did those fantastic TV Guide covers, and those wonderful movie posters, and those album jackets and those back cover adverts.  Jack Davis was everywhere a cartoonist was called for, and no one ever did it better.

Here’s a gallery of some of those MANY TV Guide covers, not as often seen as his Mad Magazine or Time Magazine covers.

Last week, the Bun Toon FEATURED artwork inspired by and swiped from Jack Davis.  I was still using him as inspiration as recently as seven days ago.

That’s never going to stop.

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For last week’s Jack Davis based Bun Toon, click here.

For the Bun Toon archives of years gone by, click here.

 

 

How to Use Philosophy Bun Toons! YAY!

Saving you the cost of a college degree.

Hey there, Bunny People.  Hope 2016 is treating you well…it’s treating some of my favorite performers rather poorly…

Nothing’s more fun than defeating one of them high-fallutin’ brain-thinkers at their own game.  Where’s my prize money?  Where?

Ty the Guy OUT!

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Of course David Bowie was more than a recording artist and actor….

Naturally he was a comic book star as well.  How could he NOT be?

I think Alan Rickman is in the DIE HARD comic book, but I didn’t read it…

I’m afraid that the closest I could come to a comic book image to tribute Dan “Grizzly Adams” Haggerty, who also passed away this week.

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PLUG PLUG PLUG PLUG PLUG PLUG PLUG

Since I haven’t talked to you for a couple of weeks, I thought I’d push the comics that came in since Christmas with my work on ’em or in ’em…run down to your local comic store and buy them out of this product…my children STILL need to eat, and philosophy books can only provide so much…

The MAD came out a couple of weeks ago, just before Christmas, but it’s likely STILL on sale.    The Bunny got to contribute to the annual list of dumbest by drawing an article…I wasn’t dumb, myself.

My Jughead alt-cover came out LAST week.  My first contribution to the world of New Archie, and I couldn’t be happier…I hope they let me do more (hint, hint!)

My Evil Dead 2: Cradle of the Damned cover came out THIS week, and they ARE letting me do more over there…I have a few more covers, and maybe a script or two from the fine folks at SGP.

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For those who can’t get enough of the Bun Toon, here’s the TOP FIVE entries from last year!  CLICK ABOVE

For the last Bun Toon of  2015 (a Force Awakens Bun Toon) click here

 

 

Free Comic Book Day Bun Toons! YAY!

It’s Comic Book Day! Like Easter and Christmas and Losing your Virginity all at once! Only with comics!

I have arisen this morning and left my home within minutes…no time for an original Bun Toon (the rules are very strict…I gots to do ’em the morning I get up, folks and folkesses!) But….since it is…

…there is a feast of FREE COMICS here on the Bun Toon, for you to enjoy.

We’ll start with the Rules:

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Okay, sure, that was a free cartoon on my website, but what about a free Ty Templeton Spider-Man comic book at my local store?

We have you covered there as well…

Apparently, if you pick up the new Rocket Racoon Free Comic Book from Marvel, it includes a back-up story by me and Joe Caramagna from the Ultimate Spider-Man Adventures series.   That’s the first page of a rollicking space adventure up there, and you can have the rest of the story FREE at any participating comic store!

Wait!  You want more free?  Here’s a complete Spider-Man story by Ty Templeton and Dan Slott!

Yeah, that’s from about three years ago, but if I posted anything more recent without permission, Marvel would vaporize my backside.

If you’re in the Toronto/Brampton area, come and watch me give out free comics in person at:

Stadium Comics at Shoppers World Brampton (Hwy 7 and Hwy 10, more or less)  

With all the traffic problems in Toronto, it’s probably an easier drive that anywhere downtown.  Come and see me…anyone under ten years old gets a free sketch!  Adults must pay through the nose and call me Lord Highmaster.

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THANK YOU, AL FELDSTEIN

When I was eleven years old, I saw the movie THE POSEIDON ADVENTURE with my mom, and felt very grown up to have seen a film with swearing in it.  A couple of days later, I saw this issue of Mad Magazine and had enough money on me to buy it.

At eleven, I was already waaay into comic books, and drawing, and I couldn’t get over the idea that a comic book had a painted cover that looked sort of like Norman Rockwell had painted it.  But…oh my…the interior artwork…

I copied every artist in this book over and over again.  Tried to paint that cover with acrylics and draw like George Woodbridge and Mort Drucker and Dave Berg and Paul Coker Jr. and Bob Clarke and Angelo Torres and Al Jaffee and everyone involved in this issue.  I couldn’t believe the level of artistic skill on display in a comic book that made me laugh like a monkey when I was eleven.

So I got the next issue and the next…and immediately I was a subscriber.  It was the first magazine I ever subscribed to.  The first issue that came in the mail had THIS cover:

In this age of the internet, it’s hard to understand the level of subversion involved in this cover.  I understand it was banned in a number of stores and even a few American states wouldn’t let it be displayed within their borders.   Take that, developing taste in pop culture!

Mad Magazine rather quickly became a cornerstone of my personality.  At the age of 20, when it first occurred to me I might actually have the skills to make a living in this biz, I sent samples of my work out to Playboy, the New Yorker and Mad Magazine (it never crossed my mind to work on Super-heroes at the time, I was a gag cartoonist…)

All three magazines rejected my work (as they should have, the work was terrible), but the rejection from Mad Magazine was a treasure to me, because it was signed by Al Feldstein, editor.  It was like an autograph, and the rejection hung over my desk for years, somewhat proudly.

Al Feldstein: Grinning mischievously after rejecting me, the callous bastard.

We lost Al Feldstein this week at the age of 88.  I never got a chance to meet him in person, but he absolutely changed my life when I was eleven, and kicked me in the pants when I was 20.  He retired when I was about 25, so I never worked for him…but…

This was the first issue of Mad Magazine to include my art.

I finally got to his magazine.  Thank you Al Feldstein, for ruining my life with your sense of humour and subversion, and forcing me to become one of the Gang of Idiots.  It’s all your fault!  I could have been a plumber!

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Not another one!

R.I.P. Efram Zimbalist Jr.

This silver haired devil had the coolest name in show biz.

A television staple throughout my childhood on FBI and a number of other shows, I always dug this guy’s off-beat name and too-handsome-for-the-room mustache.

But the world of Batman knew and loved him as the voice of ALFRED PENNYWORTH, butler to the cave.

“anything else you need cleaned up, Master Bruce…?”

Thanks for all the memories, Efram.

Ty the Guy OUT!

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For last week’s Bun Toon about Fanboys and their difficulties with Fangirls, click here…

For the Bun Toon archive, click here

 

 

 

Batman Stuff! Plug! Plug! Plug!

On sale now!

Mad Magazine goes after the big summer movie.  Check.

Ty Templeton featured on a couple of pages of amusing Batman spoofing and high spirited satire.  Check.

And just in case fanboy outrage is more your style.  Remember “Bill The Boy Wonder:  The Secret Co-Creator of Batman” is on sale everywhere.  The first book ever written (and drawn) about Batman’s REAL father, is being well reviewed and is FLYING off the shelves.

Who’s giving it good reviews?  Check it out…

Bill Finger for the win. And Mark Tyler Nobleman, too. And me!

And that’s not even mentioning my ongoing Spider-Man work (tying into LAST week’s big Super-hero movie.)

If it turns out I’m working on the Hobbit or the next instalment of The Bourne Identity, I’ll let you know.

Ty the Guy OUT!

Here now, your BONUS Batman Movie Moment:

I’ll help you sneak into your movie, if you help me sneak into mine.

Sketchbooks! We got Sketchbooks! Yay!

Last Friday, the school I teach at (Toronto Cartoonists Workshop) had an open house for students to come meet the instructors – which include the tremendously talented Leonard Kirk, Dave Ross, and Eric Kim amongst others.

A big part of what I teach at the school involves the rough work of comics, the layout, the thumbnail, the sketched figure on the page, and I wanted to have something to show to students that involved sketch work and ideas in progress, so they can see the more candid side of an artists life.

To that end I edited together some warm-up drawings, some rough work, some scribbles and doodles and bears (oh my!) from from a small sampling of my sketchbooks, and put them into a never-before-seen 48 page collection.

We printed up a small box of ’em to sell at the open house, and did a lovely brisk business, thank you very much…but we’ve got a handful left over.

It looks like this, with a wraparound cover.

A few of you asked me to make the book available on the blog here, and that’s what I’m doing today, but to be brutally honest, I’m not sure what the methods involved will be…Paypal?  Barter?  A pound of flesh?  I’m fairly sure we’re asking twenty dollars for the book, but my wife Keiren is by FAR, the better person to ask these vulgar details of.

I’m assuming Keiren will pop on the blog in a moment and supply some of these details below. **  If you’re reading this before she’s come on to finish this blog post, please come back in an hour or two, and it’ll all be solved.  I’m off to my bed.

**(send an email to tybunny@gmail.com, with your mailing address–books are $20/Cdn plus shipping. We’ll email you shipping costs, confirm purchase, send you a PayPal invoice).

Ty the Guy OUT!

Here now, your BONUS sketchbook moment.

I'm fairly sure his legs are broken.

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Don’t forget to pick up Mad Magazine this week:

Including a few pages featuring Spider-Man by Ty the Guy.

A Mad Mag Birthday Card and A Lovely Review. How nice.

It’s time for more happy stuff around here, to counter the lousy news of the world.  First off, a couple of days ago, I mentioned it was Al Jaffee’s 90th Birthday, and the gang at Mad was tasked to make Genius Jaffee some gifts and cards.  Here’s mine…

And now…folded in…

Okay, okay…it’s corny, I admit.  But until you’ve tried one, you have NO idea how difficult it is to create a fold-in.  I used to think Jaffee was merely a talented guy, but after trying to walk into his shoes, I cannot conceive of how his brain works —  to be able to come up with these fold-in images month in, month out, for fifty years and every one of them, much cleverer than anything I could do — AHH!

Again Happy Birthday Mr. Jaffee.  Clearly I believe you look like some blinged-out moron’s hairy ears.

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click the image to read a gushing review!

And now, one of the nicer reviews that Northern Guard #2 has gotten this week.  We’ve had a couple of good ones, and some “okay” reviews, (and nary a bad one…yet!).  This one from Ain’t It Cool News, however, went full out drooling happy, and that puts a little whistle in my tune and a spring in my step.

Go HERE to read it.  And when you’re done, stomp down to your retailer and DEMAND he order more copies of the first two issues…(and a TON of the third…) we need a little support for this book…who knew Golden Age Canadian Super-heroes didn’t set the American imagination on fire?  If you like snow, radioactive Russian scientists, fur bikinis, and explosions, we’re your one stop shopping experience.  All that and Johnny Canuck?  Grab your maple syrup and run!

Ty the Guy OUT!

Here now, your Al Jaffee Fold-In Moment:

Tom Toles, one of the best political cartoonists of our time, did this wonderful tribute to Mr. Jaffe, May 2008.

If you’re not following the great Tom Toles at the Washington Post, you’re missing out! Oh, and here’s what the ‘toon looks like folded in.

(kts–You can check out more of Tole’s work at the link–the archive links don’t seem to be working at the moment to link to the original cartoon posting).

HAPPY BELATED BIRTHDAY AL JAFFEE!

Mr. Jaffee demonstrating how a Reuben Award can be weaponized.

Yesterday was the official 90th birthday of one of the great, great cartoonists of the 20th (and 21st) century.  Mr. Fold-in, Mr. Snappy-Answers-to-Stupid-Questions, and Mr. Inventions-We-Need is still at work, still supplying art for Mad Magazine  every issue, after more than fifty years of doing so.  And like the genius he is, they’re still as beautiful as they’ve always been.

I always like Jaffee’s self portrait.  It’s as iconic as as Alfred E. himself.

Al Jaffee's SECOND fold-in ever shows the level of inventive clever required for each one of these...

The usual gang of idiots is celebrating the birthday of the master with a collection of amazing cards, gifts and b-day wishes for the Sensei today (at least it was today, the last I heard about it).  Though I can’t be there to see it happen,   I’ve contributed a card to this meshuga.  You guys will get to see it eventually, but I’m saving it to show off here until AFTER the party for the Master of Madness has finished off, and Mr. Jaffee has his fun.

In the meantime, here’s a Jaffee fact most of you don’t know:  He started his career at Marvel, editing and drawing MILLIE THE MODEL, PATSY WALKER and others in the “girl’s line” of Timely back in the 40s.

Al Jaffee edits and draws! Doesn't this character end up in the Avengers as a demon powered cat-lady?

Personally, I first encounter the genius of Jaffee with a Snappy Answer to a Stupid Question feature in a Mad from the late 60s.  The book pictured below is a treasure from my childhood that I have held onto since I was about ten years old…

I filled in every blank balloon in this book when I was young, marking the first time Al Jaffee and I worked together.

So happy 90th birthday, Al.  There’s no exaggeration in saying you are one of the bedrock DNA influences on my career, and I’ll never get over the idea that I sometimes get to contribute to the  magazine you helped make a household word and a national treasure.  I sincerely hope I’ll be seeing you in the pages of  Mad Magazine as long they still let us print it on trees.  It wouldn’t be the same without you.

With genuine love,

Ty the Guy OUT!

Here now, your Al Jaffee comic book moment:

I'm not sure what's going on here with those guys on the right, but if you fold in this cover, Patsy is kissing the guy in the orange blazer...is this where it all began...?

Bun Toons Countdown 2010 Part IV! Star Trek in Four Panels!

Today we offend the Trekkies.  When this first ran in November, thousands read it, and thousands objected.  Mostly Riker fans, but who really cares about them?

This got reblogged on Wil Wheaton’s site…I’m still getting a tons of hits from this one a month later.  FULL DISCLOSURE:  I’m a Trekkie…I’ve written a Star Trek Graphic Novel for IDW, and I’ve not only got discs for all 30 seasons of the shows, I’ve got all the Power Record Read Along comics…so no harm done, okay?

There’s so much you can do in just four panels.  First the world of Star Trek…and now…

Coming Soon:  Quantum Physics All in Four Panels…easy as pie.

See you tomorrow, on New Year’s Day for the most popular Bun Toon of the year…tens of thousands of hits, just because it’s all about SEX!

Ty the Guy OUT!

Here now, your New Year’s Eve Comic Book Moment of Zen:

Darn, this is the last day of 2010 that I can promote this issue of Mad Magazine:

Bun Toons Countdown Part III (Blasphemy Edition)! The Glories and Failures of 2010!

Take one part blasphemy  – one part corporate owned super-hero property -and mix well.  You end up with the most popular recurring gag I did this year in Bun Toons.  Super-Heroes vs. the Gods!   Don’t blame me, I was only filling a need.  Coming Soon:  The Mighty Xtapalatakettle vs. Herbie the Fat Fury!

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As of this writing, in the fight between Dr. Hawking and the Spectre, the score is Hawking 1,  Spectre 0.

Expect to see more of these preposterous team-ups as I think of religions I’m okay with making fun of.  Scientology, Wicca, Nascar, etc.   My mother won’t let me do the Wonder Woman vs. Mohammed strip I had planned, and the coward in me agrees.

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Here’s one of my favorites from 2010 toons…but it got overlooked in the ongoing media circus surrounding the Palin daughter on Dancing With the Stars.   For weeks, our blog numbers sagged as we steadfastly refused to weigh in on the Palin “voting”  issue, and the following Bun Toons went unnoticed by the interweb during those trying times.

Besides, it only offends blind people, and they never read my blog.

See you tomorrow with the Bun Toon that brought down the 2nd biggest Science Fiction franchise in history, and I’m NOT talking about Planet of the Apes (which is probably, like…sixth or something).

Ty the Guy OUT!

HERE NOW—your team-up of the gods comic book moment of zen:

Okay, sure we still gasp in awe at this.  Did you ever see the ALT cover that came out from Marvel?

I think they used clip art.  And that tag line is so defensive about the whole project, it’s like you caught Marvel drunkenly groping your sister.

By the way, did you notice that I went the entire blog entry without mentioning that the big Mad Magazine Top 20 Dumbest Things of 2010 issue is in stores NOW?  I never talked about it once.

And I never showed you this cover.

 

The Top Five Bun Toons of 2010- plus the awful ones – part 2

My end of the year round-up of the last eight month’s worth of bun toons continues.  I’m an unstoppable juggernaut, and you’re in my sights, web surfers, so get up on the motherboards and RIDE!

Everett Mann seemed to be a hit with you readers.  From the reaction they got, I shall certainly be returning to this character.  Perhaps something in a adult themed dance-drama, or a weird science fiction opera.  One never knows…Until then, here are the first two appearances of…

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The LAST ROUND-UP series of webcomics were my first attempt at recurring characters in the opening few months of the Bun Toons series.  I did six of these in total, and might force them on the public again in 2011, but as there were no swear words, blasphemies, or nudity in these comics, they never caught fire with the good-natured pervs that essentially run the internet.  No matter how much I loved Space Cows…  Here’s one of my favorite chapters, if not yours.

They escaped in Chapter 5, by the way, but were sent adrift into space in Chapter 6.

See you tomorrow for more of the countdown!

Ty the Guy OUT!

Here now, your end of the year countdown moment of comic book zen:

This ultra-rare misprint of Mad #507 was discovered recently in a comic shop in New York City.  Every page was printed up-side-down, and the staples were inserted into the wrong side of the magazine!   Astounding, but true…and I’ve heard there are other misprints exactly like this one out there in stores RIGHT NOW.   You MUST hurry to buy this special mis-printed version of the year-end issue of MAD…or you’ll be covered in fanboy shame.