OMG, I suddenly understand Wolverine’s hair

And The Beast’s hair, too. Here’s a picture of Hank McCoy, aka, The Beast:

BEAST

Those are trunks, not underwear. You know, like wrestlers wear.

Here’s a picture of Hugh Jackman done up as Logan/Wolverine:

Wolverine hair!

(I gotta get me one of those man-watches.)

Both of those guys have pointed hair on the sides of their heads, and as I’m developing a sort of “ape/monster” for the book I’m writing, I suddenly had to ask myself something unexpected: what sort of ears do these creatures have?

If they’re more primate-like, they’ll have round ears on the sides of their heads. If they stand up from the top of their heads, they’ll be more like a bear’s or a wolf’s. More human/less human.

And maybe this makes me an idiot for not realizing this before, but Wolverine’s and Beast’s hair are designed to let them have human ears while suggesting a non-human head shape.

Anyway, it’s something to think about (when I ought to be writing).

Randomness for 10/13

1) What it’s like to work on a show in trouble.

2) Saveur magazine invites comix artists to write and draw their favorite recipes. Wonderful.

3) Cameos carved in Oreo cookies.

4) Cat vs. Hairdryer. Video.

5) Six big economic myths, debunked.

6) Super-rich superheroes (and villains) are the 1%!

7) TV/movie starships, to scale.

Randomness for 10/6

1) This is the guy who should be redesigning DC’s rebooted heroes.

2) Artwork created in rice fields.

3) The 20 Biggest Idiots on Facebook. via Marisol

4) Spooky Victorian Mansions made of Legos.

5) Who Killed Videogames, A Ghost Story

6) Microphotography contest winners.

7) “We are the 1%.”

Randomness for 9/26

1) A die to cure writer’s block. It jingles when you roll it, so that has to be worth $45.

2) How many continents are there? Video.

3) Joe Lansdale beats the hell out of his son-in-law (in a martial arts exhibition). Video. As always, I’m a little dubious about this stuff, but it’s still cool to watch.

4) This is odd. via @mizkit on Twitter

5) Beautiful, anonymous paper sculptures being left at Scottish Museums.

6) Soon-to-be Father of the Year photoshops Ewoks into family photos to convince kids they are real.

7) A fantastic new webcomic.

Randomness for 9/4

1) A visual compendium of notable haircuts in popular music.

2) The origins of Superman’s villains, done in the style of Little Nemo In Slumberland>.

3) Amazing manhole covers in Japan.

4) Lord of the Rings in Lego (via Rose Fox)

5) The Silmarillion, bound and illustrated by hand.

6) The many difficult decisions around crossing a street in Los Angeles.

7) “There is widespread belief in a warm and comforting story which states the horse is a gentle herbivore.” From the description of Deadly Equines: The Shocking True Story of Meat-Eating and Murderous Horses by CuChullaine O’Reilly (seen via Ray Radlein)

Quick Friday post

1. I have promised a thread for spoilery discussions of the Twenty Palaces books. I have not forgotten this promise.

2. Today is the day I travel around Seattle (by bus!) signing book stock in stores. Fun! Okay, not. Actually, it’ll be a good time to do some reading and thinking about item 3.

3. My agent got back to me with some notes about A Key, An Egg, An Unfortunate Remark. They seem very straightforward but will require a bit of fixing to address. Must turn on brain.

4. My agent has also shamed me into replacing my phone. Let us not speak of this further.

5. The Livestrong calorie counter is making me rethink my devotion to kielbasa and peanut butter.

6. Booster Gold is a terrific character.

7. My email inbox has been exploding for weeks. I’m not sure what to do about it, but I have to do something.

8. Last night was date night for my wife and me. Unfortunately, our sitter never showed (don’t know why) so we ended up cooking some quick, sorta-crappy food and then rushing out to Elliott Bay Marina to see “Cirque du Sail” a couple who travel around the world on their sailboat, with their kids, and pay their way by doing acrobatic shows in the rigging for donations. Last night was the final Seattle show but they’ll be in San Francisco in a few days. They’re very good. Check it out if you can.

9. One the way to the Marina last night, my wife turned to me and said “Thanks for coming to see this thing with me.” I said: “Hey, it’s Date Night! We just had bad food and now we’re going to see some unlikely entertainment. The only difference is that we’re dragging the boy behind us in a little red wagon.” Date night, everybody.

10. Time to get out of here and start signing. Have a great holiday weekend, Holiday Weekend People.

Can’t be a hero without cubes

I read comics in the trade collections. Sure, that puts me months behind the main stories, but the truth is I don’t have the money to spend on them, and I’m only casually interested in the storylines. There are very few comics I genuinely care about, far fewer than I read.

Anyway, one of the comics I’ve been half-following is SECRET WARRIORS, which is a sort of spy/superhero mashup, with a pack of unknown superpowered non-heroes as the operatives and Nick Fury running it all.

It’s fun, it’s shaggy in a pleasing way, and unlike some comics the story isn’t an incomprehensible mess. It also has a hero named Druid, who I liked because he has pseudo-magical powers and because he’s a fat guy.

It’s pretty rare to see a fat hero in comics. I’m not going into the history of it, but when Blue Beetle fell into a depression and put on a bunch of weight, all he needed to do was beat up an obnoxious guy and snap out of it. Easy, right?

Well, Druid was a powerful character who didn’t have full control of his powers (magic!) and who was a little insecure because he made mistakes. See, I like him even more. Then, at the end of the previous trade, Nick Fury kicked him off the team.

In the trade I read over the weekend, we pick up his story: he’s gotten the boot, goes home, sits in a chair and is all “Now what?” Then he goes home and finds one of Fury’s agents waiting for him (a guy who’s a human head on a robot body, but never mind). Fury’s buddy is one of those grizzled old commanders who doesn’t take any nonsense, and he quickly informs Druid that with spies and Nick Fury, there is no “out.” The agent sits Druid down with a stack of papers and tells him to fill out the test, it’s the same one he’s been giving to his raw recruits for decades. Then this happens: (I’ll put in a cut for the scan) Continue reading