What just happened?

What a strange, strange week it's been. First thing to say is thank you -- thank you to everybody who said kind things about Muppet Show #1 online or in person, thank you to everyone who bought it or read it or just gave it a chance. (I'm especially gratified by the thumbs-up from ToughPigs.com who, as the name implies, I was expecting to be a tough crowd.) And thank you to Mark Waid for getting to the heart of the matter in his inimitable style.


The page above is one of the ones I did for the late, lamented Disney Adventures magazine, which was never published. It seems to me I ought either to have some Muppet content on my website or a link to a place where you can find some, so this will have to do for now until I figure out what I'm doing.

I had the privilege of recording an interview for the wonderful podcast for freelance illustrators and cartoonists, Big Illustration Party Time, on Sunday night. It's a great show for those in the ink-wrangling field, and very entertaining for those who aren't -- highly recommended. (And check out the work of hosts Kevin Cross and Joshua Kemble while you're there!)

But the highlight of my week was the great UK Web and Mini-Comix Thing, my favourite UK show by some distance. No dealers, no costumes, just cartoonists promoting their own comics, like it should be. Mmm... comics. Smoke one today.

Gimme an "M"!

The first issue of The Muppet Show should be out on Wednesday - there's a preview at Comic Book Resources for those who can't wait. I saw a PDF version of the finished book last week and I'm very happy with how it's come out -- let's see if anyone else agrees... Below is a frame from the pencils to issue #3, the Gonzo issue. (Just to give you something to look forward to -- or to avoid, according to personal preference.)


If all goes smoothly, I should have a minicomic version of the first chapter of Mugwhump the Great available at The UK Web and Mini-Comix Thing this weekend. (I still need to do a bit of work on it, but it's getting there.) If you're in London (or willing to make the journey), please stop by and say hello -- I'll be there all day sketching, selling comics and artwork and generally making an appalling nuisance of myself as usual.

Brown Thing

Been a while since I've posted any Horrible Histories illustrations, so here's one from the vaults which I don't actually remember drawing. I rather like the penwork on this one, although in hindsight I don't think I quite captured the Martin Brown look as much as I probably thought I had at the time.


Counting down the days now until the Web and Mini-Comix Thing. And indeed until Muppet Show #1, which will be within a couple of days of one another. Currently drawing issue #3, writing issue #5 and wondering what the world outside looks like...

A Box of Frogs

I love the expression "mad as a box of frogs". No idea where I first heard it, but whoever came up with it - well done.


Here's the cover to Zoot #6 from years gone by, photoshopped to remove the text, for reasons which escape me now - I think I just wanted to see if I could do it. On reflection I thought it might make a good cover to the hypothetical Zoot collection I floated last week (thanks to both of you who thought that was a good idea, by the way). Especially since I don't have a spare day to do a new one. Not saying it's going to happen tomorrow or anything, but it's another piece of the jigsaw falling into place.

Oh, Yoko!

Turned in the script for my X-Men story this week. Well, I say X-Men story -- what it is is, for all intents and purposes, a roll call for the never-quite-actually-formed Legion of Substitute Mutants. All good clean fun, which is why I'm going to have to think of another character to replace Holland's mutant hero, Dykefinger.


Here's a strip written by my brother Andrew for our long-forgotten comic, Zoot!, based on a never-used idea for a film conceived by Yoko Ono, in which every character experiences time at a different speed simultaneously. This was in my "I Don't Know What I'm Doing" phase of painted colour, where I'd basically fix everything with coloured pencils after I'd botched them in watercolour. Circa 1992 I think.

I've been thinking lately that I should sort out some kind of Best of the Rest Zoot! collection, a companion volume to Zoot Suite (Zoot Brut? Zoot Cheroot?), maybe on a print-on-demand basis -- I can't see any real publisher taking a gamble on something so relentlessly anti-commercial in these troubled times. Tell you what, I'll keep you posted. Might be one for the Bristol show in May, if I can get my junk together.