Monday, March 19, 2007

Future Jones says "Again with the pleas from my crazy Uncle Brendan? I just wanna swing Daddy-O!"

As I try to get over my fear of Future falling out and cracking his head open, let's see what BJ's whining about now...










Hey gang,

After months of unsolicited plugs, I am very pleased and proud to announce the completion of The Last Good Morning – book one of my comic book series Breakfast of the Gods.

Finishing anything is reason for celebration but I'm sure I don't have to tell most of you that this project is an especially important benchmark for yours truly. From art school musing to complete work - in just nineteen years! (Truthfully, the actual creation only took 11 months, but sometimes it felt like I'd been working on it since '88.)

Thanks to all of you for humoring me and giving me feedback along the way. In the end, I think I've now got a very strong piece of work to present to the pros.

The positive reviews continue to spring up sporadically on the Net and, if you'll forgive the indulgence, here's one of my favorites so far.

“Brendan Douglas Jones is the Alan Moore of breakfast cereal! That's a strong (and infinitely weird) statement, but Breakfast of the Gods is a strong (and infinitely weird) webcomic.

Like the best art, reading this comic strip makes you uncomfortable, not least because it makes you aware just how deeply corporate icons like Tony the Tiger, Sugar Bear and Count Chocula have buried themselves in our collective psyche. No one in North America who grew up on Saturday morning cartoons will need any explanation or backstory to follow this comic (though presumably, someone from France or Botswana would find it utterly incomprehensible).

Jones' recasting the icons of Thiamine, Ribflavin and super-sweet sugar coatings as heroes in a Tolkienesque drama (with hints of the Crisis on Infinite Earths) is just brilliant. Or, dare I say it... it's GRRREEEAT!” --- Mark Shainblum, Webcomics Nation


For those of you who might be curious to know the future of BOTG, well, I do believe I'll try and finish the whole thing once I've settled up north in Portland. Barring sudden employment by an actual, real live comic book company, it's not like I'll be too busy to do so. I hope everybody'll be back for Book Two: O Cap'n, My Cap'n!


Your sugar-frosted flake,




Brendan


Hmmm, how come when I call him a flake he gets all defensive, but when he's got a well-reviewed web comic to push, all of a sudden it's "Your sugar-frosted flake"?

Well, didja evah?

Also...

reading/listening/watching...

1) "Remainder"written by Tom McCarthy. A man, recovering from a blow to the head, uses the settlement money he receives to create larger and larger "re-enactments" of reality. When I read the publisher's blurb on the Adavanced Reader's Copy I got, the book was compared to "Memento". Aside from the memory loss at the beginning, I disagree. It's a well-told tale about the nature of reality, but there are no gimmicks in the storytelling to convey this. And I think I prefer it this way.

2) "Back To Black" recorded by Amy Winehouse. Possibly the most surprised I've been at a new artist (to me anyway) since Nellie McKay. This album is like a combination of a young Etta James (without the scat) singing Ronettes material (lyrics by Eminem), produced bya pre-murder Phil Spector. Music to drink and smoke by while living in a black and white, early sixties jazz photo.

3) "Robin Hood" seen only on BBC America. Witty, swashbuckl-y fun with the guy who plays the Sheriff getting the "Vincent Price I Like Being A Villain" award '07. Watch it if only to hear the arrow thunking into a target sfx whenever the location graphic comes up.

Hope everything's fine with you and yours.

4 comments:

Mona Buonanotte said...

Ooh...I love bad Sheriffs!

your fiend, mr. jones said...

I think we all do, when it all boils down to brass tacks.


Not that anything ever really boils down to brass tacks... except maybe brass doorknobs.

Or brass knuckles.

But not "Brass In Pocket". Never that.

Anonymous said...

Hey Mr. Jones,

And I meant every word of it! What a great strip you've created!

Just wanted to mention that I've reprinted the review in ORION, a small fanzine I produce for inclusion in the Comicopia APA. It's online at www.efanzines.com/Orion.

Keep up the good work!

best,

Mark Shainblum
shainblum@gmail.com

your fiend, mr. jones said...

ummm... I'll tell my brother, the other Mr. Jones, you said that.

Sincerely,
Not The Mr. Jones Who Can Draw