Can someone out there make sure that the Silver Surfer movie is not horrible? Sprinkle some Kirby magic on it or something? Please?

It is beautiful, but it's not the moon. It's the Geostationary Banana Over Texas.

Sloane Tanen's work is so adorable and kitschy that it makes a person want to move right into Pee Wee's Playhouse again. Or go bowling with Fred Schneider.

My year-old daughter got a Sloane Tanen book from Auntie Jill for Christmas, but I am too busy re-reading it to myself (alongside the new Pynchon novel) to share with her. Sorry Mili.

Here are 275 Saul Steinberg cartoons!

What a bunch of nice guys they are, over at the New Yorker!

Oh my... hundreds of drum machines are in my house. I am so styley!!

Thanks metafilter!

The heartwarmingly pointy-headed films of Charles and Ray Eames!

If you use your imagination you will hear the clatter of the classroom film projector, the teacher snoring, and bored 13-year-old girls passing notes. This should not distract you from how nerdily awesome these are.

If you have never palpitated at the sight of a vintage recording studio, you will not want to spend six hours checking out this obsessive microphone site. Like I did.

Makes a person want to record something, don't it?

You may feel, as do I, that there are arguments to be made for the 1960s George Barris Batmobile and the 1940s Bob Kane Batmobile. Barris' car is probably cooler, but the postwar, domed, glowering coal-black monster always intrigued me, since getting a hold of a reprint of some 1940s Batman comics (in the 70s, mind you).







This is a prototype, smothered in its little toy cradle by its uncaring parents at Hasbro. Imagine this thing, in shiny black diecast metal and chrome, under the tree.

Wake up, Hasbro people!















(and PS Hasbro: also, bring back the Weebles Haunted House)

Very sharp animation from Zagreb Studio over at Cartoon Brew... my only complaint is this blatant ripoff of The Cheat from 1961, when The Cheat was very young, and impressionable... perhaps he didn't realize he was under contract with the Brothers Chaps.


Off the subject a little, here is my Top Ten Most Entertaining Double-Bass Players of All Time List:

10) Frank Denunzio
9) Frank Denunzio
8) Frank Denunzio
7) Frank Denunzio
6) Frank Denunzio
5) Frank Denunzio
4) Frank Denunzio
3) Frank Denunzio
2) Frank Denunzio
1) Frank Denunzio

Pascal Campion does pretty jazzy stuff with his digital drawing gizmo.

Actually, so does Les McClaine, but in a technical way. Very nice of him to share his technique, you think?

Also... take a few minutes to study the Wan Brothers. 1930s Chinese cartoons, anyone? More please... and how about some sort of non-PAL format disc to look at???

Don't forget about this crazy Russian site either. KOMS! Image at left is by the amazing Andrey "Amontillado" Bakhurin.

Finally, gaze upon the manifold wonders at Bechamel, including the lovely Les J'Me Bouffe by Guillaume Joire (at right).

(Nice job WUB!)

My apologies to the 1,837,729 people (as of this evening) who have already seen this, but it is pretty staggering... Lasse Gjertsen says he can't play these instruments, he's just good at editing his footage together. Heh!

Get home from work and say to yourself "I am finally all set. I have enough music and I don't need anything else."

And then find out that you can get Roosevelt Franklin mp3s for $0.

Now who has enough music, huh??

Huh, tough guy??

(It's from FMU, natch.)

Have you voted for this earth-shatteringly terrific video lately?
You have to sign in, and click on the little heart.
Then you have voted for it.
Tell all your friends. Again and again!!

Looking for great gift ideas?
Well I don't have any. Sorry.

But I think this touring film festival of Russian/Soviet sci-fi flicks looks like a whole mess of fun and visual overstimulation!

To the Stars by Hard Ways, in particular, makes me want to go into space. Plus Ptushko, Starewicz, Tarkovsky... yow!

Too bad I missed the stop in Boston, but you folks elsewhere should look this up.

Here are some silly movies for your enjoyment, courtesy of the Drawn blog.

I forgot to tell both of you beloved readers how great Oskar Fischinger is. Although you already read about this at all the other websites and so forth.

Let me reiterate: after you watch all the 1950s French commercials (above, from Cartoon Brew), watch some Oskar Fischinger, which is even more fun.

Then buy the DVD and support the ever-lovin' arts already.

Is there still Russian spying activity going on in Britain, even though the Cold War has ended?

Security sources in Whitehall have told the BBC Russian intelligence officers spying in Britain are every bit as active today as they were during the Cold War.

They say there are more than 30 known Russian spies operating in Britain, for both their overseas intelligence service, the SVR, and Russia's military intelligence arm, the GRU.

They are believed to report directly to two controllers in London, known as "the Residents".

- from the BBC online

What a relief, huh?!!

And this guy Litvinenko probably just died from listening to too much Negativland!

Is your problem: where to get those The Three Suns mp3s?

Problem solved!



Is your problem: how to learn about the wide world without sinking into depressive bloated anxiety?

Problem solved!













Sad about the 1966 Batman TV show being held up forever in DVD-release purgatory?

Problem solved!

You try making a cheeky cartoon in Nazi Germany. Not for the faint of heart!

Subtle reminder.. if you love anything beautiful and meaningful, then make sure you vote for the CrapMill Doritos commercial to air during the Superbowl.

The superbowl is a popular football game, by the way, and Doritos are a brand of corn chips.

Sorry about that last post... hadn't yet realized that Chinese Jet Pilot also featured a fully-animated sourcebook of ALL HARRYHAUSEN MONSTERS.

This is a huge score for all the cheapskates who balk at the price for the Harryhausen DVD collections, but still wants to be scared about skeletons attacking. Whoa!!!!

Why is this picture hypnotically interesting?


Hmmm...

Stumped? Find out here.

It's also worth mentioning that this site, Chinese Jet Pilot, features Kitten or Spider? ... which could be the best name for a game show that I've ever heard.

Thanks to the metafilter for waking me up to this little-understood gateway to multidimensional perception.

It would suffice to have one vintage Darryl Blood animation to explore.

In fact, there has been one Darryl Blood animation to explore, which I keep mentioning because I love it.

But now there are four.

So... so... well, you know. Go look! Not later. Now!

I am completely unbiased, really.

I just get worked up about Doritos commercials... and this is the best potential Doritos commercial I have ever seen!

Behold!!! your chance to make Doritos history!

Joel Trussell has a blog, for frequent applications of his kaleidoscopic frying pan to your funny bone.





I just got some Thomas Herpich comix in the mail and now I can definitely start flogging his stuff too... he is nutso, like early Julie Doucet, yet completely artistically sound at the same time. Like early Julie Doucet. Inotherwords, check him out before he stops drawring, like Julie Doucet!

Wot's more, there's new materials at Chris Harding's lovely site. And plus it's mysterious!!! Go hence!

Thanks to cartoonbrew for noticing this development!












PS There are still believers in Afanasy Nikitin!
If you are waiting for your Das Brick comic book, do not despair!

It's getting too cold to ride a bicycle.

It might be best if you dismantled it and played the nutcracker suite on the carcass.

It's from the metafilter.

WFMU has bought YouTube!

No, not actually... but as of today they're heaps better than YouTube, since their UBUWEB warehouse of avant-garde film and video is now available for streaming ... in other words, it's youtubular!

No more waiting in long lines with intimidating Hungarian intellectuals to see the midnight showing of obscure art films, or waiting all night for some humongous file to torrent into your brainpan. Another public service from your friends at 'FMU!

I had a blast at the Harvard Book Store tonight, playing Santa. Herewith is my report (from their newly-burgeoning not-for-grownups graphic arts section, naturally).

When you find yourself peeking into your stocking, I hope your friends and loved ones have remembered to get you these cluster-bombs of merriment:

The Collected Moomin Comic Strips! Believe me, this has all the Tove Jansson you'll need to get through the long, wintery winter.

If 1930s Popeye strips had been drawn by Tony Millionaire, in Finland in the 1950s, Tove would not have needed to draw Moomin.

You can be glad she did.














For any of you tots who accidentally spent the 80s reading Goosebumps (or worse, watching TV), here's your chance to get caught up with the funniest writing that came out of that chrome-finish decade.

No, not Dave Barry... this! The collected piercing wit and fame-bashing wisdom of SPY magazine, in one easy-to-purchase tome!








Lastly, but far from leastly, this treasure of a coffee-table book made my lungs collapse, my larynx dilate, and my uvula ovulate: Art Out of Time, edited by Dan Nadel, is a compendium of zillions of forgotten illustration gems from the 1900s through the 1960s. Wild, fearless, and unrelentingly wonderful introductions to little-heard-from comic geniuses.



I leafed through it and felt like giving up: it's a veritable bottomless pit of inspiration.



Buy it for someone you love, or do like I did and get somebody you love to buy it for you!

You either love Mary Blair's stylized 1950s artwork, or you don't. It's A Small World is not everybody's cup of meat.

I think MB is a barrel of monkeys, and when somebody digs up a nice scan of her graphic design, I feel obliged to point folks' attention to it. Is nice!

It needs to be seen. Can not say more.

The newest bestest internet meme: the post-it note comes to life; some nostalgia for everybody who misses being in the office.

Puzzled how to make your life more like Ren & Stimpy? Get the soundtrack... lovingly assembled, and available over at the Secret Fun Spot.

Every so often I remind everyone in the world that you can't not read Bibliodyssey.

Whatever it is you're looking for, it is there.

Joel Trussell has a new ad
and it looks nifty.

Novo Drziac's Velky Keychac (The Great Sneezer)... just one of the treasures from the aforementioned darkstrider collection.

Starewich is here! Ptushko is here! Trnka and Zeman are here! Crazy nonsense I never even laid eyes on before! I am deed and gone to animation heaven.

Do not miss Kim Blanchette's Cup-O-Noodle Cinema either!

Ho ho! I am kilt! I am deed!

There's this orc or wizard or something... THE DARKSTRIDER... and he has put together a most scintillating confectionarium of stopmotion treats! Really! It's not a passage to Middle Earth. It's very awesome.

Don't recall where I got this... Bruno Corte has a great blogful of illustration and inspiration. Easy on the eyes.

Dekotora!

from

the metafilter.

Been a banner month for bug pics, this.

This bunch is from boing boing .

How I love the films of Alexander Ptushko. Here is pretty fine transfer from Sadko, with a pretty spooky, serene Phoenix of Happiness.

Na mean?