The Perfect Gift for the Holiday Season

Sustainability Unpacked: Food, Energy and Water for Resilient Environments and Societies has finally been released, and I'm holding a copy of it in my hands right now. I can't tell you how excited I am.

(I didn't do the cover though)

I was contacted by Maura Shelton in September of 2009. Kriistina A. Vogt, a professor at the University of Washington, and her team were looking for someone to do illustrations for her upcoming book on environmental sustainability. By chance, Maura saw my cartoons in The Daily, and contacted me. I met with Kriistina, Maura and the team, and was impressed by their enthusiasm and kindness.

The next few weeks were a blur of sketching, pitching ideas, re-drawing, pitching again, and finally creating the finished drawings. I won't lie, I felt like I was in over my head a couple of times at the sheer amount of work that went into this project, but I never forgot what a great opportunity it was.

Looking at the book now, it brings back all those memories, and over the next week or so I hope to share them with you guys. So I'll be posting sketches, alternate drawings, unused drawings, and other odds and ends.

I want to thank again Maura Shelton and Kriistina A. Vogt for letting in on this amazing opportunity. It's something I'll always be grateful for.

Jimception

July 21st, 2010.

What Are They Gonna Do, Fire Me?

July 14th, 2010.

The American

July 7th, 2010.

Goal

June 30th, 2010.

Oil's Well that Ends Well

June 23rd, 2010.

No Exit Nearby Says Goodbye

You've probably been wondering how "No Exit Nearby" wrapped up its epic and complicated story line. Well, here are the final four cartoons to bring you the closure you need.

May 24th, 2010. "No Exit Nearby" has never been a story-driven strip, but the characters of Jim and Jillian have a been constant for four years, and to end the strip without some sort ending felt wrong to me.

There were many, many options considered for the ending. I remember one involved them meeting the Grim Reaper, who was going to take them away to the Land of Dead Comic Strips.

May 27th, 2010. I do remember that the "We're Canceled" storyline came pretty late. Before any of those strips ran, I talked with the head of The Daily, Kristin Millis, to make sure I would really be out the door come summer quarter's end. Yep.

The inspiration for the storyline came from the large number of strips I've done where the characters break the fourth wall and acknowledge that, yes, they're in a cartoon. If they know they were in a college newspaper comic strip, then logically they should know when their strip's coming to an end.

June 2nd, 2010. I don't remember where the wrap party idea came from, but in retrospect it seems to be ripped off from "Bloom County's" ending where all the characters gather around for a final party before their strip's cancellation.

Yeah, but did it have a cameo from Rae Dawn Chong? I don't think so!

I wanted to do a wrap party finale because I wanted to bring back a bunch of characters who have appeared in the strip in the past. The original idea was to do a strip where every character that's ever appeared in "No Exit Nearby" is crammed together in one panel. That obviously didn't come to pass, but I managed bring back Larry (the guy in the hat who used to be in the strip a lot in the early days), Elisabeth, and the two editors, Mike and Al.


June 3rd, 2010. The last strip of my first year doing "No Exit Nearby" featured Jillian finding an Exit, that led into a weird "2001" parody. Of course, it was not the Exit.

There was a lot of thought over how to end the strip, but I realized I needed to basically thank people for letting in me hang out in their student newspaper for so long, and address the title in some way.

I brought back the title box for old time's sake. I had gotten rid of it a year or two back because it took up too much space, but it was nice to do one more strip with it.

I can't really intellectualize why the final panel works, but Jim and Jillian walking off into the void while discussing the significance of their strip's title (which is itself a play on Jean-Paul Satre's "No Exit") seemed very appropriate.

Don't worry, "No Exit Nearby" will return for summer quarter, and it will continue to exists somewhere on the internet, amid a sea of disgusting fetish comics.

I wouldn't have it any other way.

Coming Soon: A retrospective! See how the strip has evolved from something terrible to something less terrible!

This Post is a Mirage

Cartoons are fun. Here are some more:


May 17th, 2010. God only knows what people thought of this one. I was inspired to do this strip by the Werner Herzog film, "Fata Morgana," a weird, pseudo-documentary that depicted actual mirages. I really liked the name Fata Morgana, and tried to incorporate something of it into a cartoon.

The black-on-white artwork worked surprisingly well in this strip; it's a neat visual concept, and I'd like to try it again.

May 20th, 2010. I won't lie, this one was cranked out pretty fast, but I think it's a fairly amusing take on the Husky Stadium negotiation fiasco, which has taken far longer than even the most pessimistic among us thought it would.

Come back soon for the "No Exit Nearby" finale spectacular!

The Five Stages of Grief for a Recent Graduate

Sorry I haven't been posting much. A lot's been going on, and blogging has been pretty low on the list of things to do.

However, I've still been doing a lot of fun stuff. The good folks at the University of Washington's student newspaper, The Daily, asked me to do some illustrations for an article in the Opinion section. Doing illustrations was a nice break from my regular cartooning, and I think the drawings as a whole turned out well.

The article is located here: "The Five Stages of Grief for a Recent Graduate."

I'd liked to thank Kevin Wong for writing a funny article, and my editor Ashleen Aguilar for giving me the job.

What Are You Doing This Summer?

Oh lookee here, some more cartoons for you:


May 6th, 2010. This isn't one of my favorites. It sort of lacks a comedic punch, and I think it was a mistake to not have labels for each interviewee. But hey, you can't win 'em all.


May 10th, 2010. I like this one because it's true. No one cares about ASUW elections.


May 13th, 2010. There's something very amusing about opening a newspaper and seeing two comic strip characters talking about their strip ending. In some ways, you almost feel like you've walked in a conversation not meant for you.

Also, I got to remind people again that Scalia sucks. That's an important job.

FDR Has Some Words of Wisdom

'Nother bunch of strips coming your way.


April 27th, 2010. I drew this cartoon almost two years ago. My editor at the time asked for a bonus cartoon that wasn't topical so that it could run at any moment. That moment never came, so it's been sitting around for awhile. A cartoon I did just recently ran into some problems, so I submitted this as a replacement.

The FDR caricature in the strip is based on a real caricature I saw from the 1930s. My only real change was to make his head bigger. That made it funnier for some reason.

I've always liked this one, and whenever I pass my portfolio around I usually include this strip.


April 28th, 2010. I received an e-mail last Tuesday asking for a cartoon regarding Mark Emmert's sudden departure as president of the University of Washington. Upon reading this news, my first immediate thought was, "Well, I'm leaving this year, so there's obviously no reason why he should stick around." This joke became the basis for the cartoon.

By the way, this is the fastest I've ever put together a cartoon. From idea to drawing to submitting, the whole process took a little over an hour and a half.

May 3rd, 2010. Nobody ever complains about those damned Canadian immigrants. Stop taking our jobs!

This was a fun one to write, and I'm particularly fond of the "Alan Thicke level of blandness" line. Oh, and there's another "Degrassi" reference, for you "Degrassi" fans out there.

Cartoons-a-Poppin'

Sorry for not updating in awhile; life's been pretty busy. But here are some cartoons to make up for it.

April 12th, 2010. I'm pretty sure I'm the most self-deprecating cartoonist The Daily has ever employed. Even in a cartoon talking about the strip being canceled, I still manage to take a shot at the strip, implying that it's cancellation is for the better.

I also like that I got a chance to call the Greek system "tired and worn out," which it is. Surprisingly there were no complaints. I assume the frat guys and gals were all far too hammered from their ritual couch burnings to notice the strip.

April 15th, 2010. Oh yeah, here's a real charmer. I want to emphasize that I'm not anti-Catholic at all, and frankly I find it the most interesting Christian denomination. Catholicism seems to lend itself to discussion better than any other subdivision of Christianity (Mormonism is the funniest though).

I made Jillian a Catholic on a whim a few years ago, and it's been a nice character trait for her. I think she reflects a certain kind of religious young person today; she obeys almost none of her religion's tenets, but is still faithful. That's a an amusing concept.


April 19th, 2010. I actually did go the UW's career fair, and it actually was kinda fun. It was also really sweaty, and there were many uncomfortable looking people. There wasn't much in the way of booths for me (animator/cartoonist), and the focus seemed to be more on the business side of the equation. Which is fine, but us artists need attention too!

April 22nd, 2010. I love these kinds of strips. Nothing delights me more than creating strips that really play with the medium. You can't do it all the time, or you'll no longer have any fourth-wall to break, but whenever I get the opportunity, I always go for it.

The inspiration for this strip came from imagining a blank page in The Daily reading in bold typeface, "Bill Gates, Give Us More Money." As funny as that is, it could also be pretty effective. Would you say, "No," to The Daily?

Uh Oh

Let's go see what our friends are up to.

April 5th, 2010. I had done a cartoon similar to this during my first year of the strip, and I felt like it was time to revisit the concept.

The joke in the last panel originally read, "That Sarah Palin TV show airs. The producers contemplate suicide." With this, the bearded producer (Mike) would have had a gun to his head, while the skinny producer (Al) adjusts a noose. It was just too much death for one panel.

April 8th, 2010. Wait, what?

When I came into doing "No Exit Nearby" for the last year, I knew I wanted to end it in a fun way, and considering how long the strip has run, it really necessitated some kind of closure. The strip has broken the fourth wall numerous times, and there have been a couple strips where "No Exit Nearby" was sold or portrayed as in dire financial straights. A story where the strip ended seemed to be the right thing to do. (I am also aware that nobody cares about the "story" of the strip as much as I do, so most of the remaining strips this quarter are going to remain topical and current events based.)

The plan was always to have a strip like this run sometime during the middle of the quarter, but when the jobs report came out last week, I realized it fit perfectly with the strip, and had to do it then.

I like Jim and Jillian's expressions in the last panel; they don't look too happy.

New Quarter, New 'Toons

Spring quarter has begun at the University of Washington, and that means new cartoons just for you!
March 29th, 2010. I think this one speaks for itself pretty well. And yes, that is the 1958 version of "The Fly" in the last panel.


April 1st, 2010. This one has a pretty long story. Earlier this week my editor informed me that she had pushed up an upcoming deadline, leaving me no time to do an elaborate cartoon that I wanted to do. So I frantically tried to think of easy, "cheater" cartoons that I could do instead (no joke, I once did a cartoon with just Jim and Jillian's eyes). Then I realized I had done a bunch of cartoons over Spring Break for my own amusement, and the above cartoon seemed the most fitting to run.

Because of this fairly rushed process, I left in the name, Stephanie Kaye, which is a reference to the study body president character from "Degrassi Junior High." Normally such an obscure reference wouldn't make it into an official strip (I probably would have used Patty Murray instead), but it just sort of happened this way.

Cartoons Out of Nowhere!

Wasn't Martin Scorsese's "Shutter Island" great? What, you didn't see it? Get thee to a theater now!
This one ran on February 2nd, 2010. I really like doing conceptual cartoons like this one; strips that really play with the medium and have fun. Drawing the strip was pure joy, and I knew at the time I was doing something special.

By the way, for you "No Exit Nearby" fanatics out there, many of the characters in the background have appeared in the strip before in minor roles. There are some obscure ones in there, so you better keep the NEN Wikipedia article ready.
February 4th, 2010. I think you can tell on which days I just want to draw monsters. This was one of them. For those curious, the three monsters in panel two are: an ant from Them!, James Arness as the Thing from Another World, and the fly from the original 1958 version of The Fly.
February 10th, 2010. I think this is the third time I've drawn an Avatar related strip, which, considering how much fucking money this thing has made, is warranted. The idea of using Avatar to pimp incredibly dangerous Toyota cars rather than fixing them struck me as very amusing. I'm surprised it didn't happen.

Also, that second panel kinda sweet. Oh James Cameron, you've made me believe in blue cat people.

All Cartoons Attack!

Sorry I haven't been posting recently. School's been pretty busy, and I've been working on an animation demo reel.

But enough of that livejournal nonsense, let's post some cartoons!
This one ran on January 21st, 2010. I figured I should probably do a cartoon about Haiti Relief, but I wanted to make sure it wasn't sappy or condescending. Cartoon violence proved to be the best answer.
January 27th, 2010. I thought this one turned out to be a suitably bizarre tribute to the late Ted Kennedy. The fact that the caricature actually looks a little like Kennedy really made me happy.
January 28th, 2010. One of the things I try to avoid in my cartoons is really overt anger. I've found that anger and didactic-ism usually make for poor cartoons, and I was infuriated by the Supreme Court decision mentioned in the strip. By really going all out into goofiness I managed to make my point, without being on a soapbox and just yelling at the reader. Plus, I really like drawing giant monsters.

And yes, that turtle is Gamera.

More Cartoons For You

Hey, here are some more "No Exit Nearby" cartoons. Both of these ran last week.

The CNN guys are two characters that used to appear in the strip a lot. They usually fulfilled whatever pointlessly bureaucratic role that needed filling. They've been the editors of "Time" magazine, Newscorp execs, ABC execs, sitcom writers, and now CNN editors.

Originally, Jillian was going to name the celebrity in the final panel (i.e. "I bet it's Tom Berenger; there's something weird about him"), but I doubted that my editors would find the allegation that a celebrity was responsible for 9/11 all that amusing (at least not their legal department). So I changed it to "one of those "Little House on the Prairie Kids,"" making it less specific and a little funnier.

I like this one because it's so weirdly mean. I think I wanted to do a cartoon about Steven Soderbergh's "Che," and through the process it fell into this particular take on it. From there I decided to include as many ridiculous stereotypes as I could, so I could offend the UW campus socialists and conservatives at the same time.

Originally the cartoon began with an Editor's Note. My editor told me to make it "Cartoonist's note" instead, somehow fearing (I think) that people would believe The Daily endorsed this cartoon. I thought it was pretty silly, but the fact that my editor let this ridiculous cartoon run at all convinced me to play nice.

Both cartoons can be found at The Daily's website, in the Opinion Section.

No Exit Returns

Sorry for not blogging recently. Life got busy again, and blogs have a tendency to fall by the wayside.
"The Daily" started publishing again last week, so I've been drawing a new batch of cartoons. The above is a sequel to one a did a year or two ago, which also gave (hopefully) practical advice to freshmen. Assuming they still read newspapers.
This one was fun to do, because it involved: aliens, monsters, zombies, and Stephen Lang. How times will I get to do that in a student newspaper? (answer: not enough)

It's a minor detail, but I really get a kick out of the tiny Navi's exclamation of horror. It's so goofy.

Bruno ist Coming!

I watched "Bruno" again the other day, and it inspired me to dig up something I'd written about for "The Daily's" blog earlier this summer (I was the blog manager right before The Daily decided to "go in a different direction" with it).

Here it is. For some reason I can't find the article on The Daily's webiste, but the link to the blog is here.

Since we’re all about satire here at “No Exit Nearby” Enterprises, I’d be remiss if I didn’t talk a little bit about Sacha Baron Cohen’s newest film Brüno.

The film tells the story of Brüno (Sacha Baron Cohen), a gay Austrian fashionista bent on becoming “uber-famous,” and who will do anything in his power to achieve this glory. Along the way, Brüno comes to the United States, pitches his own celebrity talk show, travels to the Middle East to solve the Israeli/Palestinian crisis, adopts a black baby, and generally makes a fool of himself and anyone around him.

In this follow-up to his 2006 hit, "Borat," Cohen takes aim at a vast number of subjects, from the idea of instant celebrity to stage parents. But to me, the most fascinating target in the film is the concept of sexuality.

Some have complained that Brüno is an unfair caricature of homosexuality, and the first hour of the film almost bears that out as Brüno is depicted in a number of extremely graphic and bizarre sex scenes. Homosexual sex is portrayed as ridiculous and utterly alien to a heterosexual audience.

However — and we’re getting into spoiler territory here, so reader beware — in the film’s third act, Brüno decides the only way to become famous is to become straight, like his favorite movie stars, Tom Cruise, Kevin Spacey and John Travolta. What then follows in the film are Brüno’s numerous attempts to rid himself of his homosexuality, from visiting a pastor specializing in gay conversion, joining the National Guard and going hunting with three freaked-out hunters.

Late in the film Brüno attends a swingers party and while graphic, absolutely real sex occurs, Brüno stands horrified, unable to understand heterosexuality. The gay sex acts at the beginning of the film might have been ridiculous, but they’re no more ridiculous than the actions of these straight people. Heterosexual sex is just as bizarre as anything Brüno engages in. At least it looked like Brüno was having fun.

The film reaches a climax of sorts — sorry — with Straight Dave’s steel cage match. Straight Dave, Brüno’s alter ego while trying to shed the last of his homosexuality, greets the crowd and whips them into anti-gay, proudly heterosexual fury. He challenges anyone to question his masculinity and is admonished by his spurned lover, Lutz. As the two fight, the crowd delights in the pure spectacle of two men wrestling each other. Their excitements turns to horror, as Brüno and his lover stop fighting and begin to make love on the cage floor. The crowd is visibly shaken as they watch heterosexuality die right before their eyes. From there on out, they will never be able to watch a steel cage without seeing the homosexual overtones.

And that really is the genius of Sacha Baron Cohen, Director Larry Charles and the writers: They managed to take a gay stereotype and make a movie where the joke is the people reacting to him. Brüno is a ridiculous character, but his actions in the film with real people expose the absurdity of all sex. The movie states blatantly that if you’ve got a problem with gay people, take a look at your own sexual practices. You’re a lot sicker than you think you are.

I don’t know if Brüno will change any minds but it takes a gigantic stab in the right direction. Any movie released as a summer blockbuster that makes you feel uncomfortable with your own preconceptions is one worth seeing.

Watching "Bruno" again with a few people who'd never seen it reminded me just how shocking the movie is. There's something about the movie that makes people genuinely uncomfortable. The easy explanation is that they're all homophobes, but I think it goes beyond that. Bruno is such a ferocious sexual being, and the filmmakers have absolutely no inhibitions; the stuff that happens in film goes beyond the cheerfulness of "Borat" into dark, strange territory. It's a potent mix that assured the film's relative failure at the box-office (though 60 million is still a remarkable sum of money for a movie where we're treated to a close-up of a penis spinning around and yelling "Bruno!" at us).

I still think "Bruno" is hilarious, and the passing years will only further cement it as a truly weird, cult classic. See it with someone you love.

And yes it has occurred to me I'm writing about a movie like this on Christmas Eve; it's my gift to you.

Merry Christmas!

No Exit Nearby

Here are some "No Exit Nearby" strips I did this quarter.


I remember this being a fun strip to write. I'm not an expert on video games that don't involve Mario, so I was forced to actually to do some research on war games. There are a lot!

The ending to this strip was originally much longer. Jim, playing the Iraq War game, was supposed to say, "Damnit, I have to give a speech at the UN again. Jillian, can you pass me the Wii-Keyboard?" I thought it was pretty funny, but it took up too much space in the final panel. They're squished enough as it is!


I like the punchline in this strip; it's a nice little joke, and it ends the strip in a different place than where you thought it would.

For you copyright buffs out there: these strips belong to the University of Washington's student newspaper, "The Daily" (Their motto: Read it now before it goes away forever).