Look at all the robots!

I was a guest at Plant Comicon this last weekend. It was a great show. I wouldn't be surprised if it beat its own attendance records. It was nice to visit with fans of Halo and Sprocket and with friends I don't often see.

Oddly for me, a robot theme emerged.

First, we have the exclusive Sprocket T-shirt I was offering....

Next, shortly after I set up my space, R2D2 (?!?) approached my table. An actual size, working robot!

Then, my friend Chris Grine (creator of the awesome Chickenhare) drew the quick sketch seen below. It's a takeoff of his 165 Bots With Stuff, as seen on the always entertaining Shoebox blog.

I also sat by artist Rob Davis. If his last name was "Ot," my con experience would have been complete.

The United States of Lazy

(Not a political statement.)

Have you ever noticed that the states get bigger and bigger, basically in the order that they were created?

The original thirteen are rather small and the others gradually grow, generally speaking, as they progress down and over to the west.

It's a lot like if I were drawing a pattern of stars and got tired of creating all that detail. (I'm right-handed, so it goes left.)

Did the early settlers also think, "What a pain. We'll just make 'em bigger as we go..."

Art by George Perez (and Kerry Callen)

I was flipping through some of my childhood comics and was shocked to see a rectangle cut out of a page in Avengers #155!

I then realized I had used a coupon on the opposite side. I grew up in Rural Arkansas, so if I wanted any comics-related material, I had to mail off for it. Occasionally, cut my precious comics. I must have ordered Bring on the Bad Guys from this one.

I then noticed I had used a pen and colored pencils to draw on the page across from it.

I have absolutely no memory of doing this, but I know I always hated to lose any comic story to coupons. Voila.

Why Moore created the Watchmen. Hurm.

If I remember correctly, DC Comics obtained the rights to all the Charlton Comics characters. Alan Moore then proposed a mini-series which used all these characters; superheroes such as Blue Beetle and The Question.

After reviewing Moore's proposal, DC asked him to create new characters for his story. So, Blue Beetle became Night Owl, The Question became Rorschach, and so forth...

The reasoning behind it was to allow the Charlton characters to continue to be used, instead of destroyed. Let's take a quick look at how things turned out for Blue Beetle and The Question in the DC universe...

Hurm.

Planet Sitting

I posted pieces Thursday and Sunday night, which messed up my normal rhythm of posting every Monday morning. So, today, I'll merely mention that Ill be a guest at Kansas City's upcoming Planet Comicon, March 28 & 29!

It's always a great show! Stop by and say "hi."

Mugg!

I had thirty minutes to kill as I was waiting on someone, so I pulled a blank Mighty Mugg pic and Photoshopped a quick Sprocket, just for kicks.