Jessica Makes a Milkshake —

I had this for sale on NaughtyBids. Can you believe nobody bid on it???

Twitter —

I've been on Twitter for almost 2 weeks now, and I don't know that I'm getting anything out of it, but there are 3 tweeters I'm following that are making me laugh: Sarah Silverman, Olivia Munn and Angela Ryan, in that order. I had no idea Angela Ryan was funny!

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Hottest. Superheroine. EVER.

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Jessica does Jessica —

I completed a major new commission piece last night.The ever-popular theme of "Evil Jessica" doing it to Jessica Rabbit will never grow old! This time, Evil Jessica has abandoned all the torture and bondage devices in favor of satisfying herself.

You can see the whole thing HERE.
(WARNING! It's filthy!)

Hulk and She-Hulk?? —

Heheh. I found this on Frank Cho's blog!

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More Jessica Rabbit sketches! —

I'm particularly proud of this! It's one of my more beautiful Jessica sketches. I used this as the basis for one of my new auctions at NaughtyBids today.

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OGLAF!!! —

I discovered this HILARIOUS online comic last week! And it's sexy as hell, too! (He's getting a lot of traffic lately, so you might need to reload several times... Oglaf.com

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The Scratch! New Wallpapers! —

I've really needed to do more work on 'Scratch,' so I took the opportunity of the October wallpaper/calendar to work on her. She's SO different form my other characters! All bone and muscle! As an artist, I LOVE IT! She's a... DIFFERENT kind'a sexy!

Golden Girls Gone Wild! —

I got this link in a tweet from Angela Ryan:
http://laist.com/2007/08/12/golden_girls_go.php
It looks like it's more than 2 years old, but DAMN is it funny!

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Talk-Like-A-Pirate-Day! —

It's that time of year again! Here's my favorite pirate day image.

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Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs —

...was actually a pretty good movie! I smiled and laughed all the way through it. That's VERY unusual. The story was pretty thin, and there was too much emphasis on the hero trying to gain his father's approval, but it was entertaining and the jokes were funny. Most movies, especially animated movies, don't meet even those two simple criteria. (They couldn't resist throwing in ONE monkey-poop gag, though.)

The movie is in 3-D, and just like every other 3-D movie I've ever seen, there was no reason for it to be. It's just a gimmick. I mean, it didn't contribute to the story. It was probably the most effective 3-D I've ever seen, but again, no reason for it. The most creative and impressive uses of the 3-D design were during the closing credits, where all the animation was highly stylized into flat cut-outs floating past each other. Why couldn't the whole movie be like that??

Another couple of things about the closing credits: there was a song called Raining Sunshine which reminded me of the theme from Xanadu (which is a good thing), and there was a brief, meaningless tribute to Yellow Submarine, of all things. Why?? I mean, I liked it, but...??

Oh, and as all the characters paraded past the screen in amusing little vignettes, there was one brief appearance by a woman who appeared to be a floating ghost, and she had Lauren Graham's name beside her. "Who was THAT supposed to be?" I wondered. So I watched for Lauren Graham's name in the final scrolling credits, and she had played the hero's mother at the beginning of the film, who of course died when he was child. So they put her in the credits as a ghost?? Weird!!!!

UPDATE!
After reading a little about the original book, I can see why fans of the book are not happy with the movie. It doesn't appear to have anything at all to DO with the book... other than food falling from the sky.

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More Jessica sketches!

I though these drawings were particularly beautiful, but they didn't sell...

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Jessica sketches —
I've been cranking out pencil drawings for my NaughtyBids auctions, and as usual, I'm happier with the sketches than the finished art. Here are some samples! I'll post more tomorrow.

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New Night Mistress art!

I drew this for one of my subscribers. It was supposed to be just a quick little request drawing, but it became quite the spectacular piece! The first draft, which I drew live online last night, was rejected by me because it didn't look enough like Night Mistress. It looked too much like Psylocke, which I do NOT want! Here's the rejected version so you can see what I mean.

Portrait of Mistress Orabella —

Here's a commissioned portrait I did for Mistress Orabella [kinkyorabella.com] whom I met at the FetishCon last month.

I also did one for Lika Linei!

Ultrafem is on Twitter now...
... so help me...
http://twitter.com/Ultrafem

Lee Rumiko's art —

For weeks now I've been on NaughtyBids selling drawings of Power Girl and Jessica Rabbit. Then I did some browsing on eBay and saw THIS:

 
Why didn't I think of this??
Google Lee Rumiko. There's no shortage of his work!

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Upside Down Typing —

Mystify your friends!
http://www.typeupsidedown.com/

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Yenny!



I just this morning discovered this fantastic comic strip! It's been around for years, but I'd missed it somehow. David Álvarez, the creator, is a tremendous cartoonist! Give Yenny a look!

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Lisa's Review of PONYO —

Short version:
If you like Miyazaki, you'll LOVE Ponyo! (Think TOTORO!)

Long version:
Ponyo is a relief-and-a-half! I've been a fan of Miyazaki's films since the mid-80s, when I saw Nausicaa at a convention. It was in Japanese with no subtitles, so I didn't really know what was going on, but I absolutely LOVED IT!

Being an early Miyazaki convert, I was very happy to see his films become popular here in the states back in the late 90s, but at the same time, I was frustrated to see his LEAST INTERESTING films getting all the attention. I mean, come on... Mononoke?? Ick! It's a pale, PALE shadow of Nausicaa. Just weirdness and violence, with NONE of the charm Miyazaki is known for. Spirited Away was the same. Just a series of awful misfortunes for no reason, with NO charm.

But when you look at the so-called "art cinema scene" here in the west, all you see is "MONONKE! SPIRITED AWAY! MONONKE! SPIRITED AWAY!" As if they've discovered something important. If only they would LOOK at Miyazaki's library instead of paying lip service.

Howl's Moving Castle moved somewhat toward capturing that Miyazaki charm, but it fell short. And it's a shame! "Charm," as I keep harping, is what Miyazaki is all about, yet the only Miyazaki any westerners have gotten to see on the big screen has been lacking it.

Ponyo has changed that. It's not Miyazaki's best, for sure. In fact, I think MOST of his work is better. Nausicaa, Laputa, Porco Rosso and Kiki, in particluar. But Ponyo has the "Miyazaki charm!" I keep saying "charm" because I can't think of a better word to describe Miyazaki when he's hitting. If you've seen Totoro, you KNOW what I mean.

And Totoro is the best comparison here. Ponyo is quite thin on plot. In fact, I can't really tell you what the point of it was. Much like Totoro. And Ponyo is obviously intended for children, again like Totoro. But like all truly excellent children's entertainment, no adult will feel bored or left out. You'll be laughing and smiling right along with the pre-schoolers.

So many of today's "family-oriented" animated films try to make up for their lack of content and/or talent by packing every minute with bad slapstick, lots of screaming and poop jokes. Oh, GOD, I am so sick of poop humor! You won't find any of that in Ponyo. Miyazaki does something I've rarely (if ever) seen any filmmaker do: he understands children's minds so well, he can make them sit still in rapt attention even when the characters aren't doing much of anything.

SPOILER ALERT:
In one scene, Ponyo opens a pack of Ramen noodles and drops the dry brick into a bowl. From all over the theater, I heard little voices whispering, "Noodles! It's noodles!" Then Ponyo watched wide-eyed as Sasuke's mom poured boiling water into the bowl. Sasuke said, "It'll take 3 minutes," and Ponyo stared at the bowl in silence, eyes as big as dinner plates, as if it were the most important thing in the world. And the children in the theater stared, too. Then, as mom put more ingredients into the hot soup, she told Ponyo not to look. Ponyo covered her eyes, but she tried to peek. "Don't look Ponyo!" said mom, and the children laughed.

This movie is bursting with a kind of wonder that only a Miyazaki film can possess. Weirdness is everywhere, but it's a happy weirdness that taps into the way children think and dream. Remember when you were a child, and you used to dream about the whole world being underwater? A crystal-clear water that didn't stop you from breathing? How you could just poke your face into a lake and see bright colors and magic of all kinds going on down there?

That's Ponyo.

(Oh, and all you pervert adults will FLIP over Ponyo's mom!)

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Ponyo movie trailer —

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