Comics and Movies

In the next soon-to-be-released edition of KudeeCast, Jason makes a comment about how comic book movies are often frustrating because of the many ways they deviate from the original comics. I couldn't agree more.

Since its release in 2005, I have hesitated to watch the Fantastic Four film, partially because of this reason. The film's main villain is, of course, Victor von Doom, AKA: Dr. Doom - one of the most feared and powerful villains in the Marvel Universe. But rather than staying true to Doom's origin as a poor child from Latveria who grows in both knowledge, technology and mystical power to become the villain we all know today, the film depicts Doom essentially as an American billionaire (if it wasn't for the fact they say he's from Latveria, his accent and demeanor certainly wouldn't give it away) who comes to power in the same cosmic accident that creates the Fantastic Four.

Twists in the plot such as this always seem to anger the true comic fans. Whether it's something great like distorting Dr. Doom's origin, making Mary Jane Watson Peter Parker's High School crush or killing off Venom after 15 minutes of screen time, or whether it's something minor like making Tony Stark's butler Jarvis a computer or giving Wolverine a leather jumpsuit instead of his classic yellow spandex (okay, maybe those aren't minor).

While in some cases, I have to admit, the changes are not a big deal, and in fact, are (I hesitate to say) necessary for translating the story from the printed page to the silver screen, most of the time I'm still left asking, "WHY DID YOU DO THAT?" I mean, would it really be so bad to try and get the story right?

And I've barely even mentioned what is perhaps the biggest tragedy of them all - killing off the villain at the end of the film. This is fortunately one area where The Fantastic Four film didn't go wrong, but yet so many comic films do. One of the greatest joys of the comic book world is seeing the hero and the villain locked in a seemingly never ending battle. While at the end of the day we always want to see Peter Parker trump the Green Goblin, or Wolverine get the better of Sabertooth, or Batman send The Joker to Arkham Asylum for the umpteenth time - we DON'T want to see these bad guys put away forever. You have to admit, when Gobby comes back from the dead, you might be saying, "Oh no Peter, watch out," but there's at the very least a little piece inside that's excited because it means you get to see the conflict all over again.

In the movies, though, dead means dead, at least most of the time, so when we see the hero put the villain six feet under, we know they're not comming back, and we know that we're missing out on seeing another great battle between the two in a future film.

I write all this knowing it isn't going to change anything - and that as comic book movies that distort the comics continue to come out, I will still keep paying $8 a pop to see them on the big screen. But at the same time, I keep in the back of my mind the resolution that should Hatman & Indigo, or any other 3Twins story, ever make it big enough to get the green light for a film version, I will NOT let them turn Hatman's head into a Fedora, or change the animal parts of Indigo, and I will certainly not let them kill off Glomo, or The Evil Zap Man, or Super Cold Frozen Man, or any other villain that we didn't kill off in the comics!

Well, that's all, thanks for letting me rant.

-Steve

P.S. For more of Jason's take on this, be sure to watch the next installment of KudeeCast when it airs soon on 3Twins.net

Voice Actor Profile: Tom Cox

Tom Cox is likely our most seasoned actor at 3twins.net. So, naturally I thought I'd start my new blog series devoted to the Voice Actors, with our "granite voiced" Narrator.

Tom has been involved in the Theatrical Arts since the young age of 12 when he joined the Kalamazoo Civic Theatre, although he told them he was 13 because that was the youngest they would allow.

Tom "hammed" it up at the Civic for several years until he went off to College at Olivet, where he joined the theater there.

After School, Tom took a short hiatus from the Kalamazoo area and moved to Florida for about a year and a half to do Dinner Theater. Until the late 1980's when he joined his father's side at the microphone back in Kalamazoo doing voice work for radio spots.

In the early to mid 1990's Tom took a bit of a break from acting to focus his live more on his sons, that is until around the time our paths crossed for the first time while both attending Lake Center Bible Church, where he put back on his dinner theater "hat" and entertained and ministered in the various productions there.

Although Tom had been a great proponent of 3twins from its inception, he didn't begin working with us from the start. But when we needed a "Joker-esque" actor to play the part of "The Evil Narrator" in Hatman & Indigo #24: Omniscient, Tom stepped up to the challenge and has been a regular since, later taking on the role of the Hat-Mo-GPS Unit in Issue 27 and ultimately taking his place as the life and breath of the Hatman Universe itself, the Narrator in Origin Remastered.

Tom can also currently be heard in the Christain Webtoon, "The Wartleys".

Join me next time when I give you a little peek into the acting history of yours truly.

-Jason

Superheroes

Fans,

Now that Hatman & Indigo plan on attending the Superhero convention. What do you think will happen?

The story is left open for your interpretation (until the sequential issues are released).

Will Hatman join the Galactic Superhero Force?

Will this be a trap by The Terrible Trio?

Will we meet new heroes or maybe even villains?

Share your thoughts... I always love hearing where our viewers think we are going with a story.

Thanks for your input,

Andy

What's Your Favorite Back to the Beginning Art?

The Back to the Beginning series consists of over 270 panels of art and over eleven covers. I have decided with each completed series of Hatman and Indigo Issues I will pick one panel and one cover that is my absolute favorite art within the running series. From these issues I pick Super Cold Frozen Man and Glomo seen in Back to the Beginning Part 2 page two panel one for its conveying two of our favorite super villains menacing acts and mischievous demeanor, And The cover from part 3 Hatman & Indigo's Excellent Adventure because it 's just Awesome!

Issue 40 Preview

Last night the final installment of Hatman & Indigo issue #39, Shocking Science Fiction Stories, went online. This means that next week we're ready to begin a new saga in the world of Hatman & Indigo titled Superheroes, written by yours truly.

I wrote the first draft of this script a couple of years ago and it was one of the first three-part stories we ever wrote. I remember back then that seemed like quite a saga. Now there are six three-part stories and a four-part story on 3twins.net! But just as our story-telling over time has grown, so has this story and by the time it is completely unveiled it will be our first five-part issue. The first part of the story was drawn by guest artist Kendall Stump.

I don't want to give too much of the story away, but I can share a little for our valued blog readers. The story begins with Hatman, Indigo and the Damsel family planning a party for Blonde. But the plans are quickly interrupted when Hatman gets an invitation to a super hero convention and decides to take Indigo along for the ride. There's something odd about the convention and it's up to our heroes to figure out just what.

"So who's behind the mayhem?" you might ask. While I can't say exactly who, but I will tell you that it's a brand new villain. You'll just have to stay tuned to find out just who that new villain is and what his or her motives for provoking Hatman & Indigo just might be.

By the end of this saga we promise more mystery, more action, more characters and more battles than ever before. And we hope you'll get a lot of good laughs in there too. So don't miss next week's launch of our newest story!

-Steve

Fun with wii

Check out this video:



3Twins is considering utilizing this technology for an upcoming event.

Isn't technology amazing!!!

Andy

Twelve hours of creatvity

This last Saturday Andy, Steve, and I shut ourselves in my house completely isolated from the world and immersed ourselves in the world of Hatman & Indigo. Our goal was to work out a massive saga for 2010 and possibly 2011; and let me tell you this, it's going to be amazing!

Obviously I can't give away much at all. However, I can tell you a couple of things to hopefully entice you:

New Villains!

New Heroes!

Oh, how I want to "spill the beans" on the gritty details; but alas I must abstain. Suffice it to say, you do not want to miss one single issue of Hatman & Indigo

-Jason

Blank Label Comics

In ye olde tymes, artists would often gather together in guilds and collectives for mutial support and to encourage their edevors. On the belief that working together is better than going it alone a group of webcomics artists got together and formed 'Blank Label Comics'- a online publisher of their artists titles.

Take a trip over there and you'll find a very disparate group of comics. My three personal favorites are Real Life Comics by Greg Dean- a semi-autobiographical 'slice of geek life', Wapsi Square- a comic that's evolved into a paranormal quest to prevent the end of the world, and ShortPacked- a dysfunctional team of retail co-workers in a toy store. You'll also find Shclock Mercenary and Melonpool- two sci-fi comics, and Ugly Hill- a 'traditional' 3 panel funny-papers offering. These are all SFW, probably PG-12 at worst

Take a stroll over there and take a gander. Next time, we'll look at the 800-pound gorilla of webcomic publishers- Keenspot!

Excelsior!
Mutz

Writing: the heart and soul of 3Twins

Well Andy may have forgotten his turn at blogging, but I certainly did not forget mine!

I had a conversation last week with Jason about writing, specifically writing for Hatman & Indigo. One thing is for sure, Jason, Andy and I love to write, maybe more than anything else. And I think you'll notice if you watch some of our earlier comics and compare them to some of our recent comics that our writing really has improved.

I feel like quite often one of us will write a new Hatman & Indigo script that really raises the bar (like Jason's script for The Hatman Clause, or my script Superheroes, which you'll see come to life in a few weeks). Many times these "raise the bar" scripts end up sitting on the shelf for a while to the point that by the time they are actually released, the comic itself is just sort of average, even though the writing of the script inspired us to get better.

In other words, even our best stuff can be improved upon.

So with that in mind, this Saturday Jason, Andy and I are getting together for a 3Twins writing conference where we'll brainstorm ideas, rework some upcoming scripts, and even write some new material.

This is where you as a fan can help us out. If there are any particular Hatman & Indigo stories that stand out to you as funnier, more action packed, or just all around better than the rest, let us know. Or if there are certain stories that just didn't do anything for you, tell us. Or if you have any comments that you think could help us write even better stories, please, say something. We'll take all of your feedback into consideration when we come together Saturday, and maybe your input will have a big impact on our upcoming stories!

Now, in other news, last week I blogged about how it can be discouraging to create comics for 3Twins, believe they're really great, but struggle to get people to come to the site. Well, here's an opportunity for you to help us correct that. There are several websites dedicated to promoting webcomics. For example thewebcomiclist.com, topwebcomics.com, webcomicz.com and comicon.com. With some of these sites, just by searching for the Hatman & Indigo page, you can increase our popularity and potentially drive up our ranking on the site. And in the case of topwebcomics, you can even vote for Hatman & Indigo to move us up the list of top comics.

So we are shamelessly asking you to click here and vote for Hatman & Indigo. In fact, you can go back every 12 hours or so and vote again. And with your help, we can move Hatman & Indigo up the list and hopefully bring in more viewers! And while you're at it, check out some of the other great webcomics on the list and help them find new viewers as well!

-Steve

To blog or not to blog

So I was informed this morning, via an email I received yesterday (that I neglected to check) that Yesterday was my turn to blog.

"Oh NO!" I thought, "Not me!?" I cant forget my turn on the illustrious 3twinsRAW blog.

But now with out any preperation or forthought, I type these words.

Hope you like Monday's. Jason sure does. I think someone has a case of the "Monday's".

And that's my 40404

Andy

Your art could be on 3twins.net!

I blogged about this quite a while ago in a post entitled "Issue 50 cover contest". Since the deadline is approaching in little over 2 months I thought I'd shoot out a reminder to those of you who are interested in submitting cover art.

Again the rules are pretty simple:

1. The cover must have something to do with Hatman comics

2. No, profanity or vulgarities will be accepted (just remember that we try to keep our website acceptable for families, so aim for a G or PG rating, however, mild cartoon violence akin to what has already appeared in Hatman will be considered)

3. No parody covers will be accepted (we want these to be original)

4. Entries are due by 11:59pm eastern time October 31st 2009 (you may email entries to board@3twins.net or if you wish to use snail mail, please email us for mailing information. Snail mail entries must be postmarked by no later than October 31st 2009)

5. Providing rules 1-4 are followed, feel free to express yourself and be creative, we will not divulge the plot of issue 50 (which, if we did would blow your mind) so any and/or all of our characters are free game. (All Hatman & Indigo character's likenesses and logos are trademarks and copyrights of 3twins.net, LLC, and may only be used for the purpose of this contest.)

6. All submissions become the property of 3twins.net, LLC, however the artist will be credited.

Shortly after the issue is released we will provide a gallery page displaying the 50 different covers.

If you have any questions feel free to post them here or email board@3twins.net

Jason

Uncle Mutzie: Webomic Explorer

Who knew that being a slaughter and legendary quests could be so funny? What am I talking about? The comic "Looking for Group" (PG13+ for violence)

LFG is a fantasy genre comic, so anyone familiar with sword and sorcery novels or World of Warcraft will feel right at home. The tale follows the adventures of an Elven hero Cale and his companions in a world of right and wrong and all the grey in between. For fans of pure mayhem, the most memorable and homicidal character, Richard, is bound to become your new "hero".

I highly recommend you start at the archives and read your way through this one to get caught up the the present. Before you do that, stop by YouTube and check out this inspired musical number staring Richard and produced by Blind Ferret Entertainment*

LFG is related to the more adult-themed (PG13+) "Least I could Do Comic" which is also worth a look.

*more on them in a future post

Excelsior folks!
Mutzie

To the Writers & their Fans

Nothing like a good ParodyI've Seen the brilliance of the writer's behind the Hatman and Indigo issues, and their ingenious way of incorporating stories and ideas that stretch back beyond our own childhood to paying a tribute to some of our favorite moves like Back to the Future or Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure. From homages to parodies nothing seems beyond the writers of 3twins.net so I invite you to a chat session here to share your thought or ideas of your own. What do you think would make a great parody and why?

Sincerely, MJL

Just another face in the crowd?

A few years ago when Andy, Jason and I decided to start writing stories and making silly videos, our whole intention was to just have fun with it - and trust me, we did. At the time none of us realized that our having fun would eventually morph into what you now know as www.3twins.net. Today we're still just a group of friends having fun, but obviously things have changed now and with it there are different expectations.

In putting your work out there for the world to see, there suddenly becomes the expectation that you will actually get viewers - that people will want to see your finished product and actually like it. But in a sea of internet media, the question is, how do we actually get people to come and see what we're doing at 3Twins? Of course there are people out there who are interested in watching funny and entertaining comics or cartoons on-line, but with so many options to choose from, how do we get them to find, much less stop and watch, our site?

It's sort of like everybody in town just broke for lunch at the same time, and there's one street with 500 restaurants. 3Twins is one of those restaurants. Now how do we convince them to come eat here instead of one of the other 499?

Now, it's not EXACTLY like that, because you don't have to pick 3Twins over other sites like Homestar Runner, 8-bit Theater or Penny Arcade, you can enjoy them all. Nevertheless, how do we move beyond just being another face in the crowd?

The discouraging part is, I know we've got something great on our hands, and something that's quite a bit different than a lot of the other, often more popular, web comic or cartoon sites out there. But just as we've learned how to do everything else along the way, we're having to learn how to generate hits and attract viewers as we go.

The easiest method, of course, is word-of-mouth, but that can really only take you so far. Then there's getting out name out there on sites like Facebook or Twitter, but it seems if people haven't heard of us already, then again, this only takes us so far. There are also numerous webcomic listings, but as stated previously, that leaves us as yet another face in the crowd. And so that leaves us at something of a loss. Do we keep trudging along and hope for that big break? Or do we keep trying new methods? And if so, what?

At the end of the day, perhaps the best thing we can do is to keep working hard to make 3Twins the best website it can be and have faith that someday, hopefully soon, all of this hard work will pay off! And of course, as always, your feedback on all things 3Twins is accepted and encouraged.