Legacy

1. I'm sure you've heard February 3rd, 1959, referred to as "The Day the Music Died." That was the date of a famous plane crash outside of Clear Lake, Iowa. The crash killed early rock'n'rollers Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and J. P. "The Big Bopper" Richardson, as well as the airplane's pilot, Roger Peterson. The phrase originated in the Don McLean song, "American Pie."

2. You're no doubt familiar with the expression "life in the fast lane," which comes from the 1976 song of the same name by the Eagles. I'm sure the expression is used by some people who have never heard the song.

3. I'm also assuming that you've occasionally heard something described with words similar to "this one goes up to eleven," usually meaning that it's over-the-top in some form or another. That term was first used in the following routine from the 1984 mockumentary film This Is Spinal Tap.

4. I am sometimes asked what, if any, goal or goals I have as a writer. Some writers would settle for having any or all of their work published. Well, I've already had some of my writings published.

Others would say that they want to be able to support themselves by their writing, and only their writing. I did that briefly for a few months, but I'm not ambitious enough to make that a long-term reality.

Some would say that they'd love to see at least one of their works adapted for television or motion pictures. So would I, but I'm not holding my breath.

But as for my own goal? I only hope that someday, I may write a phrase which will enter the English language as the three examples listed above have. Even if people don't know where they first read or heard my phrase. Even if they don't know that I'm actually the one who wrote it.

That, to me, is immortality. And it's  the only form of immortality I have any desire for at all.

Thanks for your time.

Insect Asides, Part Twelve ~~ A "Comical Wednesday" Post

Hey, gang, guess what? Do you remember "Insect Asides" Part Ten? That's the one where I told you, at great length, about my plans for a far-reaching, epic storyline very loosely inspired by DC Comics' Crisis on Infinite Earths. I ended that post by saying "As for what happened to all these magnificent plans... well... See you next Wednesday!"

Well, that "next Wednesday" came and went, but I skipped my "Comical Wednesday" post that week. And last week, in Part Eleven, I jumped right into my post without ever telling the reason why I was forced to drastically reduce the number of chapters in what became known as "The Funnel Effect."

Oops.

Actually, it's fairly simple. As I've mentioned a few times before, Insect Man and Insect Man's Weird Tales were amateur comic books, eight-page (well, usually), photocopied, 5" x 8" comic books printed in black & white. No one made any money from them. They were written and drawn just for the fun of it. Even their publisher, Paul Howley, owner of the That's Entertainment comics and collectibles stores in Massachusetts, didn't make any profit from the sale of the comic. Sales of the books just covered its printing costs, if they even did that!

Well, fellow babies, there is absolutely no way to impose a deadline on work that's done on a volunteer basis. I mean, you can say "I need this by the end of the month" or whatever, but in the end, you can't really enforce that. What are you going to do, threaten not to pay the creator who's already not being paid?

Add to that the little fact that writing a comic takes a lot less time than penciling it or inking it. That's why the professional companies pay their writers much less per page than they pay their artists.

I remember when my former collaborator Skip Simpson and I were working on The Bird #1 (shown above). One day Skip approached me rather hesitantly and said that he'd been talking to his then-wife -- something he often did, oddly enough -- and they were discussing the expected revenue he and I would receive for The Bird's publication. He and Linda assumed that Skip and I would each receive 50% of whatever the publisher would pay the Simpson/Lynch team... and considering that his job as penciler, inker, and letterer was a lot more time-consuming than my job as a scripter, the 50-50 split didn't seem fair. I quickly pointed out that although we hadn't discussed our pay rates until that very day, it was never my intention to get half of the proceeds. That's just not the way professional comic book companies did things!

So, back to Insect Man.

It didn't really matter how quickly I could plot and script all the Insect Man stories (and spin-off series) that were floating around in my head. There was absolutely no way to make Ken Carson (or whoever else we could have found) churn out artwork at the same rapid pace. It's one thing to have an artist do an entire comic book of twenty pages or more every month, when you're paying him or her to do nothing else but that during an eight-hour day.

But the Insect Man stories were just a hobby, and not an occupation, for all of us.

So that's the reason my original, lengthy, convoluted plotline for "The Funnel Effect", as described in "Insect Asides" Part Ten, had to be condensed so very much before ever seeing print.

I had also had to make many other adjustments along the way. I had envisioned various sub-plots, and most of them would have taken place over a span of several issues, but I just didn't have the luxury of doing that.

To list only one example, I decided at the very start of my run on Insect Man's Weird Tales (Number 95, remember?) that I wanted to introduce a son for Rex "Insect Man" Mason.

I laid the groundwork slowly and not-so-surely. In issue #97, Greg "Mr. Secret" Nile supposedly learns for the first time that Rex had been very briefly married around the time of his high school graduation over twenty years earlier, but the marriage had been annulled due to their lying about the wife's age, and Rex hadn't seen her since then. Greg, citing TV soap operas and other similar forms of entertainment, suggests that Rex could have a hitherto-unknown offspring somewhere on the planet.

At the very end of Insect Man #101, a young man is shown, about to take a bus from Worcester, Massachusetts, to  Cirrus City (the fictional town in which Rex and Greg grew up). The man signs a traveler's check with the name "Alexander Mason."

In Insect Man #102, an unofficial "meeting" was arranged at the home of Rex's parents. Both Rex and Greg were invited... but due to the unplanned arrival of Scythe and the "Baby-Faced Ninjas," the purpose for said meeting was never revealed, either to Rex, or to Insect Man's readers!

In my mind, and unfortunately, my mind alone, here's what happened behind the scenes. ALLLLL of it:

• Soon after their marriage was annulled, his former wife discovered she was pregnant. At about the same time, she somehow learned that her former husband had a new hobby, that of dressing up in a weird costume, changing into bugs and fighting crime.
• Alexander Mason, Rex's son, had been told by his mother that his father had died in Vietnam during the 1960s. She figured that was preferable to revealing Rex's costume/bugs/crimefighting hobby mentioned previously!
• Sometime after Alex had reached adulthood in the mid-1980s, his mom told him the truth, that his dad was actually still alive.
• Not knowing how to get in touch with Rex, Alex instead contacted his grandparents, Richard and Betty Mason, who still lived in Cirrus City, where Rex had been raised.
• Rex's parents didn't want to spring Alex's existence on Rex, especially while Rex (as Insect Man) was so busy trying to defeat SKULL once and for all.
• Mr. and Mrs. Mason ended up contacting Greg Nile (sometime before the events told in Insect Man's Weird Tales #97), who was in the process of re-joining Counter-SKULL, and got him to begin warming up Rex to the idea of Alex or some other child being around somewhere.
• Meanwhile, Alex himself arrived in Cirrus City, and presumably stayed indefinitely at some hotel.
• Rex's parents and Greg finally decided to confront Rex directly. That was the unofficial meeting mentioned above, the one which went awry.

The sad part is, I was only able to show about 10% of all that! As a writer, I always try to tell the readers everything they need to know! But here, I just couldn't manage it. I finally threw my hands in the air (well, figuratively) and decided to deal with it in issue #105.

That meant that issue #105 was going to be a long, dialogue-filled issue. So I wrote it, Holly Basiner  (Scythe's co-creator, along with Frank Hunt) penciled it, and Ken Carson inked it (under the pseudonym of "Ethan K. Conners"). The cover, which was actually page one of the story, was penciled by Ken (again, as Ethan K. Conners) and inked by Holly.

As the conversation begins, Rex offers Scythe a drink. Non-alcoholic, of course. That leaves ginger ale (Rex's usual choice) or milk. Scythe teases him, asking if he also has any apple pie.

The conversation resumes. Scythe explains that she's been trying to actually sit down and talk with Rex for a while. (And finally, I get to deal with both the "son" thing and the "Rex/Michael Mason" thing! Well, part of that second one, anyway.)

Did you see that? "Next Issue -- It Finally Begins! "The Funnel Effect!"

Ohhh, if only my life went that smoothly!

To Be Continued.

Thanks for your time.

Insect Man, Insect Man's Weird Tales, and all related characters and titles are copyright © Paul B. Howley.
Scythe is copyright © Holly Basiner and Frank Hunt.

Determination ~~ A Fable (Reprinted from 8/10/2012)

The little girl came from a large family, mostly brothers. There were so many things she wanted to do alongside them, so many games she wanted to play that they could... and so many voices in her head saying "You can't do that. You're just a girl." So many doors locked, so many gates barred... "Boys are stronger." "Boys are smarter."

She laughed at the silly voices every time. "Let me pass!" she insisted. And she passed. And that was that.

When she wanted to leave her childhood home and marry, the voices said, "You can't, not yet! You still have responsibilities here." But she knew it was time to start living for herself. The voices sought to block her departure.

She set the wedding date and packed her bags. "Let me pass!" she insisted. And she passed. And that was that.

All through the middle decades of the 20th Century, when it was the woman's so-called "place" to raise the children, cook, and clean, she did all that and much, much more. The voices implored her to remain in her station, and not do volunteer work, not manage her husband's income, and not do minor refurbishings of their home. "You're doing far too much!" reprimanded those ever-present voices. "Stick to your assigned position as a wife and mother!"

She shook her head and laughed as they stood in front of all she hoped to accomplish. "Let me pass!" she insisted. And she passed. And that was that.

When her husband died, the young widow was perfectly suited to continue raising her children as a single mother, having coordinated so much of their lives to this point anyway. And her guidance continued long into their adulthood. She would always be their mother, she reasoned. They would never "catch up" to her; she would always "outrank" them. The voices said "At their age, you shouldn't help them anymore! They're adults!"

 She countered with "But they're adults I'm responsible for bringing into this world... and you're in my way. Let me pass!" she insisted. And she passed. And that was that.

In time, her eyes grew weak, as did the legs, the ears, and even the mind which was once so sharp. When advanced age threatened to rob her of the independence she'd lived by for so many years, she knew that her work was done. And the voices, though not as strong as they used to be, still droned on. "You have to keep trying! Your loved ones will miss you! You can't just give up!"

The old woman smiled one last time. "They'll get by. So shut up. This, like everything else, will be done on my terms. Let me pass!" she insisted.

And she passed.

And that was that.

*  *  *  *  *

Kinda proud of... No. Very proud of this one...

Thanks for your time.

Insect Asides, Part Eleven ~~ A "Comical Wednesday" Post

• Somewhere along the way in this multi-parter, I mentioned that there were two Insect Man stories in That's Entertainment's "inventory" which I didn't write. The first appeared in Insect Man #103. It was written, penciled, inked, and lettered by Chris Coleman. The story played off of the plot point where Greg Nile had lost his arm. Insect Man encountered a one-armed Vietnam vet.

A guy on the far right of the above panel lowers the window shade, giving us one of

the greatest sound effects ever, thanks to Chris Coleman. "Pull." Pull! Gotta love it.

Of course, by this time, I had come up with a much simpler version of that convoluted epic I'd originally envisioned for my follow-up to the "Fractured SKULL" storyline. And I must add that the development of this new story was greatly aided by Ken Carson. He and I would end up being co-plotters for the entirety of what became known as "The Funnel Effect."

And although the main stories in Insect Man #103 and #104 weren't scripted by me, Ken and I managed to insert a couple of "Funnel Effect" teasers at the end of each issue. Here's the first:

That upcoming "If God hangs up, do you get your dime back?" title was
only a joke, by the way. It was just a line that I liked, and decided to use.

Insect Man #104 contained a stand-alone story by W.W. Bird, a story in which Insect Man receives a letter from a woman named Aliethia. I read the name "Aliethia" and said to myself, That's got to be a made-up name! (But then  again, aren't they all?) So, I looked it up, just a couple of weeks ago. It is a real name! My apologies to Bill Bird.

W.W. Bird penciled the cover to IM #104. It was inked by Ken Carson.

Except for the framing sequence, Bill's story took place in the 1970s. Insect Man meets a woman named Aliethia, who is being stalked by a mercenary named Silver Fox (No relation to Yours Truly!).
 

By the way, I have absolutely no idea why W.W. Bird wrote SKULL as "S.K.U.L.L."

Bill decided to stick in the above subtle indication that Insect Man and Aliethia had slept together, but it was the following scene, where Silver Fox shows up, that presented a problem. Rex was originally naked while fighting Silver Fox. Even though Bill had drawn the scene more-or-less discreetly, it seemed silly and unnecessary. Paul had Bill retouch the artwork to add a uniform.

Insect Man was wounded by Silver Fox and ended up on the floor, at the mercy of the villain. Luckily for Rex, however, the Silver Fox who was after Aliethia was actually a pretender to the throne, so to speak. Aliethia was the original, "real" Silver Fox.

And once again, Ken and I contributed a teaser for the upcoming "Funnel Effect."

I  took "Jack Keller" from the name of an old comic book artist, and then expanded it to "Jacob Kellerman."

Did you notice this stained glass window, fellow babies?

Yep, it's Insect Man's good ole alien buddy, Hur-Bi.

Hm. A phone book listing for Michael Mason, not  Rex Mason? Well, y'see, it was planned by Ken Carson and myself to establish that "Rex" was only a nickname. Why change the name after over twenty years? Well, ever since DC Comics' The Brave and the Bold #57 (Dec 1964-Jan 1965), there had been a superhero called Metamorpho, the Element Man. And Metamorpho's real name was Rex Mason. 

Metamorpho had his own series for a while in the 1960s, and had made several guest appearances here and there over the years, but he was never incredibly popular. However, in mid-1983, DC introduced a new team title called Batman and the Outsiders, and as it happened, Metamorpho was prominently featured in that group.

By the time 1985-1986 rolled around, Paul Howley had been talking about the idea of publishing a "real" Insect Man comic book, so Ken and I thought we should steer away from using "Rex Mason."

I even had a really cool story in the back of my mind as to why, after a lifetime of being called "Rex," the newly-rechristened Mike Mason stopped using his childhood nickname. But this was yet another story which never even got scripted.

You see, unfortunately, Ken and I did not run our little decision to change IM's name past Paul Howley himself, who 1. owned the character and 2. published the book!

Oops.

Now, I can honestly say that, as an editor, Paul was incredibly easy to work with. (And I'd say that even if he wasn't going to read this. Which he is.) With Paul in charge, every one of us who submitted stuff for Insect Man or Insect Man's Weird Tales could do anything we wanted to do...

...except when we couldn't, like in the naked fight scene example above.

Paul said he wanted Insect Man to keep the name of Rex, as Paul was a fan in his childhood of a Boston-area TV cowboy named Rex Trailer. I was too, for that matter.

So, how did Ken and I handle that...?

To Be Continued.

Thanks for your time. Heh.

Insect Man, Insect Man's Weird Tales, and all related characters and titles are copyright © Paul B. Howley.

1912 Library

I borrow a lot of DVDs from the two libraries I frequent. A couple of weeks ago, I was watching -- and enjoying -- The Internship, a 2013 release starring Vince Vaughn  and Owen Wilson.

One of the scenes showed an establishing shot of the following library:

This photo is a screen shot from my TV, taken with my old-fashioned flip phone.

Another film I watched -- and didn't much care for -- was Night Moves, starring Jesse Eisenberg and Dakota Fanning. It was  also released in 2013, and included an establishing shot of this library:

Another screen shot from my television.

To my eyes, it looked like the two totally different films included the same shot of the very same library! Both buildings say nothing but the year they were built, 1912, and the word "library."

So I went online and found that The Internship was filmed primarily in Atlanta, Georgia. Night Moves was filmed in Medford, Oregon.

So, I thought, this couldn't be the same library, right?

Well, not having two photos to compare like you do, I had to find the appropriate scenes in both movies, and take a photo of each.

Notice that the basic construction of the front part of both libraries is very similar. A door, flanked by two windows, and all of them have a funky design at the top. Under the word "library" are four concrete whatever-you-call-thems, and each entrance has an electric lamp near the top of the doorway, on either side.

I guess 1912 was just a good year for building libraries.

Thanks for your time.

Nothing to Sneeze At (Originally Posted on April 14, 2010)

Sorry, NO "Comical Wednesday" entry this week, for various reasons. Instead, I'm recycling an old post from 2010.

*  *  *  *  *

My Blogger-blogger friend Betsy -- the one who "immortalized" me in the acrostic printed below my blog posts -- writes a blog called My Five Men. (And if you're unfamiliar with it, don't be thrown off by the blog's title. It's not what you're thinking! She's a lady!) In a recent post, she included the following quote from the Guinness Book of World Records, on the subject of sneezing:

"The longest recorded sneezing fit is that of Donna Griffiths (UK). She began sneezing on January 13, 1981 and sneezed an estimated one million times in the first 365 days. Her first sneeze-free day came 978 days later on September 16, 1983."

Hm. I wonder. That entry -- Guinness's, not Betsy's quoting of same -- is a bit suspect. I've always heard that the Guinness people do everything possible to authenticate their entries. How the hell did they manage this one?

"Hi, is this the 'Guinness' bunch? Well, this is The Silver Fox."

"Not The Silver Fox?!? Oh, my! What an honor! All of us here at Guinness love your blog!"

"Thanks, I get that a lot. Anyway, I've been sneezing for 982 days in a row, and haven't stopped yet! I think my name should replace Donna Griffiths' name in your book."

"Oh, dear. We're so sorry, Mr. Fox, but we can't just take anyone's word on that... Even yours, I'm afraid. We have to verify everything!"

"Crap. Okay, good-bye."

So, how did Ms. Griffiths do it?

"Hi, Guinness? This is Donna Griffiths."

"Never heard of you."

"Of course not, silly! This is 1981, and blogging hasn't even been invented yet."

"What hasn't been invented yet? Plogging? Blarging? Speak up, will you?"

"Never mind! Anyway, I've been sneezing all blasted morning, and something tells me this could last for years! I think I could qualify as a candidate for sneezing champion -- or whatever you'd list me as -- in your book, whenever this spell finally ends."

"You may be right, Ms. Griffin!"

"Griffiths."

"Whatever. Well, look, we can't count your sneezes up until now, of course, but we're going to send a man... or a woman, if you prefer, depending on your home situation, whether you're married, single, and all that..."

"Of course."

"He or she will stay with you and document the number of your sneezes and the duration of this bout of sneezing, until you have a completely sneeze-free day."

"Wonderful! So, I should set an extra place for dinner, then?"

"Yes, of course. And... Do you have a spare room?"

"No, but I have a very comfortable couch."

"Well, that's a start. And do you allow smoking in your home, in case our representative is a smoker?"

"Sure. This is 1981. Who doesn't smoke?"

"Excellent. Would you mind holding while I get a secretary to iron out the finer details, and get your address, and so on?"

"Of course not. And thank you so much."

Update: It has been rumored that Donna Griffiths married the Guinness representative in 1986 (or maybe 1987), but since I wasn't able to authenticate that last bit, let's just pretend I didn't write it.

Thanks for your time. And thanks for the inspiration, Betsy!

Silents, Please!

Except for some masterful, isolated instances of sound (the background music, some sound effects in one particular scene, and then some dialog and other assorted sounds at the very end), 2011's The Artist is what we refer to as a "silent" film.

I didn't see this film until I recently bought a used copy of the DVD. I had no idea that the movie had won five Academy Awards, but after viewing it, I understood why.

The other day, after having watched it for the second time, I noticed on the DVD "menu" that there was a listing for "captions & subtitles." I immediately wondered, "What the hell for?" Most of the dialog in the film appeared on what they call "intertitles" or "title cards."

Here are just some examples of what the closed captioning said:

• [orchestra playing tender, yearnful melody]
• [weary melody ends]
• [foreboding music playing]
• [lively jazz playing]
• [music stops]
• [frenzied, discordant music plays]

And then, of course, there's my absolute favorite:

• [silence]

No, really. I swear.

WTF?!?

Thanks for your time.