Here’s the family portrait I created as a Christmas present for my mother-in-law. She seemed to like it, and nobody in the family offered any objections to their portrayal, so I guess I did okay.
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Brush pen on bristol board, digital color. There was a story on NPR’s Morning Edition today about the great Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson’s appearance in the current issue of Action Comics in which he helps Superman locate Krypton. Dr. Tyson, in addition to being funny and engaging as always, takes the opportunity to get in a couple of digs at the Whipping Boy of the Justice League, Aquaman. And thus was I inspired:
My wife suggested that as part of this series, I draw a piece of urban mythology. Immediately, I thought back to a conversation we’d had a few days before:
In spite of all the hysteria, all the puff pieces you see on the news about the local hospital X-raying Halloween candy for free and scare pieces about “safe” trick-or-treat events held at the mall…there has never been a single documented case of strangers poisoning trick-or-treat Halloween candy, and the few reported isolated instances of razor blades, pins or needles in Halloween treats over many decades have almost universally been shown to be hoaxes. There have been only a very few minor injuries and no fatalities from a documented case of strangers tampering with Halloween candy. Halloween is a fine time for scary stories, but there’s a pretty massive difference between ghost stories and media-driven hysteria. Ol’ Billy Shakespeare definitely had a way with openings – but none is more evocative or intriguing in my book than Macbeth, Act I, Scene 1: Three witches, being all mysterious and creepy and suchlike:
This is what you get when I’m making a Halloween-themed drawing whilst also watching the World Series: Why a Tigers zombie? I kind of imagine that how they’re feeling right now with the Giants on the verge of going up 2-0 in the series. Today’s Halloween-themed drawing comes from my very favorite episode of The Twilight Zone which is, naturally, the one that more than any other scared the bejeezus out of me when I saw it as an impressionable lad:
Young Anthony Freemont of “It’s a Good Life,” aka “The one where the kid from ‘Lost in Space’ likes sending people to the cornfield and turns that guy into a jack-in-the-box.” The grim stonefaced expression on the brief shot of the guy as a jack-in-the-box stuck in my head for days and days, even though the moment was mostly seen in shadow, as I’ve depicted it here. We’re only a week away from Halloween…so why not some Halloween-themed drawings?
 “We were nearly to the road when I felt Jem’s hand leave me, felt him jerk backwards to the ground. More scuffling, and there came a dull crunching sound and Jem screamed.” Amongst all the indelible images from To Kill a Mockingbird – both the novel and the film – for some reason, the image of Scout in her ham costume for the Maycomb County Halloween Pageant (“Maycomb County: Per astra ad aspera: A Pageant”) sticks with me very strongly. Going back and reading the scene again, I was struck by how beautifully Harper Lee creates a sense of confusion and dread as Bob Ewell pursues Jem and Scout, barefoot and not wearing much of anything else beneath her ridiculous ham costume, as they make their way home in the darkness. And the ham costume, ridiculous though it is, saves Scout’s life as surely as does Boo Radley moments later, as the chicken wire armature turns aside Ewell’s knife…and it’s just a fun visual, to boot.  Always look both ways when crossing the street, kids! If you were a kid growing up anywhere in the Denver Metro broadcast area anytime between 1966 and 1998, you already know who that is in the picture up above. Russell Scott, aka Blinky the Clown, was a weekday morning institution for generations of kids in Colorado. He retired from television in 1998 and spent most of his last years running an antique store on South Broadway in Denver. He died today at the age of 91, and I was inspired to do a quick Blinky drawing. The birthday cake in the drawing is in homage to the most memorable part of each edition of “Blinky’s Fun Club,” in which he serenaded the kids in the audience who were celebrating birthdays thusly: To this day, I can’t hear “Happy Birthday to You” without thinking of Blinky’s distinctive rendition. |
  
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