72423-Syndicated-Liveshow70

0:00 The following is brought to you in part by MFC Studios. The views of the show's host and guests do not necessarily reflect those of the management, owners or staff of this radio station. And now it came from the radio. Yeah, but turn and welcome once again to a champion of radio, the officially Big Apple Con. This is your host, Mark Torres, speaking with me in front of your Live to the Audience live show courtesy of the East Meadow Public Library.

0:54 I have None of them have special guests who you want to be talking to with and about, which is awesome because he's right here next to me. Listen to all of this. This is Tom Travers. Hello, everybody. Alright, thank you very much for coming back. So on this week's shows, I'm actually going to be talking to with and about Tom, which is awesome. And I know my cohost Elman Jenny Fellows. We usually strolling him in just a few minutes, but before we do any of that, we have to take it away with the news. It's more than time The news is brought to you in part by the fine folks of Scifi dot Radio. That's Scifi for your Wi-Fi. So the fine folks of The Beer of the Connor, which are the official radio show of celebrated 125 six years of conflictness and pop culture stuff.

1:36 More information goes to www.bigapplecc.com. The next convention is scheduled for December the 16th and is the Big Apple Princess Con. And I believe tickets are on sale right now. If not, they will be on sale soon. We also want to give our shouts for our Patreons, of which there are Danny Grillo, Awardwings director Jade Burrell, Kyle Horn, Millie Cortez Newsday, Famous Resin Media When she's going, Shadow Rabbit, Art Gas and Ray Rosa and the Hurricane and have your own little shout. Go to our website www.thecampfire.com. There's a little button on. Ted takes you right to our Patreon page and you get it to shout out on our show. As always, you show off with the sad news. We have two business sad news out this week. We have actor, Venturequist and television host Jimmy Weldon died recently. As of this recording, which is July the 12th, 2023, no cause has been announced While appearing in a handful of shows. Jimmy is perhaps best known as the voice of the Hanna Barbaric character Yacky Doodle, the Little Yellow and Green duck in various cartoons in the Sixties, 70s and 80s, as well as the voice of Solomon Grundy and his Super Friends cartoons in the 80s.

2:41 He was 99 years old. Tom, are you familiar with the Super Friends cartoon? Yeah. I mean, yeah. Definitely a little bit. Not not a huge fan or anything by. You're not a calendar. Super Friends. Nah. Yeah. I mean, man, I. Appreciate it. Kind of artist. You're not a fan of the Super? I love Solomon Drundy. That's why I was like, oh, yeah, all right. I do love that character. So he was 99. Wow. For the last of the sad news we have Actress Andrea Lynn Evans also died recently from breast cancer. In her over 40 year career, Andrea was perhaps best known for her work on daytime soaps starring as Rebecca Hotchicks and on Bold and the Beautiful from 1999 to 2000 and 2010, 2011, Patty Williams on The Young and the Restless from 1983 to 1984, and most famously the first and last Tina Lord on One Life to Live from 1978 to 1981, coming back for a second run in 1985 to 1990 and a third and fourth time in 2008 and 2011. 7 Respectfully, she was 66. Were you a big soap opera fan?

3:47 No, but my dad was a stagehand and they worked on a lot of soap operas really in the 80s and so, So he may be familiar with her, her work. I'm not sure about that. That's cool. That's my only personal connection to soap operas. Did you ever take it to the to the set? Not when I was a kid, no, we didn't. I actually worked as a stagehand at one point in my life because of my dad. He helped me get in there and we worked. I did some stagehand work so. Not the soap operas, but he did the soap operas stuff. That's cool early in his career, right? So that's it for the sadness. So we're going to move on. Let's see from the Carry on, my wayward son. There will be peace when you are done. Lay only we had to rest.

4:32 Don't you cry. No more department. None other than The CW has announced that the supernatural train has finally made its last stop with the cancellation of the prequel slash sequel series The Winchesters after just one season. For those of you who don't know or care, for that matter, Supernatural was The CW's longest running series. So long, in fact, it started on the WB and ran for 15 seasons from 2005 to 2020 and was about two brothers hunting monsters, amongst other things. The series, however, is still being shot around to other networks and Jackie to say we're taking, we're talking not only about a story of where we want to take out cats, we were talking about who we're going to bring back from the mothership.

5:16 We're going together a lot of tricks to keep up with our sleeves and keep it exciting. Not just the new fans, but also returning fans as well. Hopefully we'll get to execute that. I think that there's just a way to keep this alive and would be ashamed to let that go. And then we don't know what it will look like beyond that. But there's also a certainly a way of trying to to possible return a Supernatural down the line. It is something that Jared had like me and I have talked about what it might look like. Were you a fan of Supernatural? I was not. I'm not a fan of. Worst guest for this stuff, but so. I'm aware of it. I'm aware of the show, yeah. I know it's the show, yeah. Maybe I'll check it out now. Is it on streaming and stuff? It's on streaming everything I'm saying now, The show originally was intended to be a five year show and had it had ended at the end of five years, I would say it's probably one of the best scifi horror TV series out there. But then they went for another 10 years and never maintained the magic.

6:14 It was OK, but like that first five years, it's amazing. And then overdid it a little bit. Well, I mean the ratings were there, the money was coming in. So you know, that's I guess that's the most important thing. And then the show finished and then they decided to make a prequel sequel series for the Winchesters about the parents. And now only I can't stop the one season, so he's trying to keep it. Going I want to check it out. I got to check it out, so let's see. So moving on from the One Strike and you're out follow up department. As of this recording, which is once again July 12th, 2023, we are on day 77. Zero of the writers strike and if there is no new contract made by the end of the day today, the Screen Actors Guild will also go on strike, making it the first time that both the actors and the writers were on strike at the same time since 1980.

7:04 Because of which, and as mentioned in the previous episode of our show, San Diego Comic Con is going to be the mostly studios and celebrity free. Now it has been announced that if there is a strike, actors will be allowed to attend Comic Con, but only if they do not participate in any studio run panels or press events. Of course, while attendance is possible, the Union is strongly advising against any appearances whatsoever at the event. On top of that, none other than Sanyo Comic Con has announced that Fall H, their biggest stage, will not have any panels at all on Sunday and will be closed for the entire day. To be fair, the majority of panels are usually held on Friday and Saturday of the four day event.

7:49 Now I remember when I went to Santa Comic Con, I went there twice in 2008 and 2018 and I and I didn't know about Hall H when I went there and when I went there lost the TV show Lost was a big deal. And I had heard like the next day that the entire cast was lost, was on the panel and I completely missed it. And now people, you know, camp out. When I went back in 2018, people were camping out literally to get into this giant hall to see all the big celebrities. Like they announced The Avengers was announced on that stage, right? So the fact that the writers strike is going on and the active strike is going on, and it's severely affecting Sanyo Comic Con. Yeah, it's pretty crazy.

8:29 As an independent creator, what are your thoughts on this whole thing? I don't know. Maybe it'll bring the attention to the creators, like, you know, make Comic Con about the comics again. So maybe that's the pot of the silver lining. But you know send send people to artists alley and check out comics because that's what the conventions used to be about. So let's bring it back to that. But that is that is pretty insane because I know that that's that is a really big deal for the show is to have the the big Hollywood announcements and everything. So it's obviously going to have potentially huge impact on that. So that's pretty nuts, but. And what do you think, Elman, Jenny Kelvin, who usually walked in? Not the time to be part of the gang. Yeah, not the time to be. Part of. Again, I know we didn't want to start again, but you can see that if you join the gang of Sad and Hollywood, it's not working out so well for them.

9:22 And you know, work for whatever your game does. So I will definitely. Just a reminder to me to remain independent, not pick a partner. I would never again sort of use to chat with anyone else and I'm not doing the game of sad probably ever. So you don't think that it's a it's a bad thing or anything is a good thing? I think it's a bad thing for many people, but. I'm also commenting on a world that I have no interest in and I think it's very sad for people who have sacrificed and dedicated their lives to be part of the SAD union. I years ago we thought it was a dumb thing to do.

10:05 I know it works out very well for a lot of people, but my opinion comes from my viewpoint and it is not for me. Fair enough, fair enough. Now I remember in the 90s there was talk about having a comic book union, that there was going to be a thing. That way all the all the complex creators got together. But then it kept on falling apart because no one could figure out how exactly it got. Before Image Comics or after, this was like right after Image formed because it was talk about, it was talk about the complex stores be coming to together like a cohesive unit. And then because that was when the the boom of the industry was happening and it all just kind of fell apart as the years went on. So do you think having a conflict union as a conflict creator, would that be something that you would join into? Would be like now I'm good being an independent? I don't know.

10:55 I mean, if you're yeah, it can get complicated with unions, but. I'm sure if you're like a really working professional comic book creator who's doing this for a living, you have a family and stuff like that, a union would probably be pretty appealing to have that kind of protection. I'd be interested to see like how they would handle that. You know, how they would set it up and approach it when it comes to comic book creation. And you know, it would be interesting to see. So moving on from the that's a lot of nuts department. The new Insidious sequel has taken the number one spot in the domestic box office, pulling in $33 million in ticket sales in its first week of release, knocking off the new Indiana Jones sequel from the number one spot, which made an additional $27.4 million in its second week of release. For those of you keeping track, the Super Mario Brothers movie is still the highest grossing film of this year with $573.8 million and counting, followed by the new animated Spidey sequel with $358.9 million.

12:03 Insidious comes in at #28. Did you manage to see either of these movies? Nope. No. On the most uninteresting with the movies, Jenna hasn't seen the movies either. I managed to see Super Mario Brothers. I have yet to see the Indiana Jones. I'm concerned about it, but I'm I'm willing to go see it. As you know, I usually go out of my way not to get spoilers and not to see trailers, so I'm only hearing and Queens about that. They might have emasculated Indiana Jones. So yeah, so I'm so I'm curious, but I'm like, you know what? Let me just go in clean, go in not knowing and enjoy for what it is. And it allows me to enjoy better than I find if I come up with preconceived notions.

12:52 How has it has it been? I don't know. That's what I'm saying. I I have not, I have not done any digging because that would be me funny out about something about the movie, which I don't want to know anything about. I saw that's that's exactly what they say. So when I saw the spider verse, when I saw, I saw flash, I saw spider verse and there was things in the flash which everybody else knew about but I didn't know about. I was pleasantly surprised like, oh, that was cool. I didn't know I was in there. And then I see things in the movie and then I go, oh, that's what that meant. Like I see things on the Internet I try not pay attention to. I just kind of scroll past it. So there's certain things you see and I try not to make it registered, but it's like an image or something.

13:36 I was like, no, I don't get it. But then when I see the movie, it's like, oh, now I get it. And I think it may enhances my enjoying of of these movies in this way. I like not knowing anything about it, just going in straight. Because I figure if I'm going to watch a movie, I don't need to know anything else about it. I'm going to watch this movie either if I pay for it or not. That's a whole different story. But I'm going to watch this movie now if it's something that I don't haven't decided on what I want to see enough. I might watch the trailer, might be a little bit about about the movie, But if I already know I'm going to see this movie, I don't want spoilers because I've come to realize over the years, at least for myself personally, when I'm watching all the trailers and all that stuff, I put together a movie in my own head.

14:18 And now that movie that I made-up in my head has to match what I've seen on the screen. And that's why I think a lot of people get upset because they see things that are in the trailer, which we talked about that they make fake trailers now, so not to have spoilers. So you're going watching fake trailers to see a movie based on this fake trailer. You're going to theater. Hey, that's not in the movie. Hey, that's not there. Why am I going to see this movie that I paid to see? Because of the advertising. It's not what I'm going into, right? Well, maybe the fake trailers are going to give you one example. I'm filming a website right now and there is a trailer of films and now we're shooting the pilot. So how do they know that whatever we shoot in the pilot is going to match what they shot in the trailer? Wouldn't have been smarter to just shoot the pilot cool scenes from the pilot to make a trailer instead of making everyone go upstate just to shoot a trailer which might not even match what we shoot.

15:12 I might even drop out of the website, so the. Trailer might not match. Anything, because the pilot might not have me in it. You know, it's funny you mentioned that. I've actually seen a lot of smaller independent films or even what's called the teaser trailer, which is just trying to get the interest of you into the product, which not necessarily has anything to do with the actual movie. One of the things that I realized, he was Power Ranger fans, you know I am. There was a trailer for the movie called The Order and it had a lot of Power Ranger actors to be in it. They did a crowdfunding, it funded, it never got made. And what they did was they filmed a proof of concept. That's what she called it. Because we had around as a guest on the show that they they made a proof of concept to take the trailer and and shop it around to studios that gain interest.

16:01 So that might be what the idea was also, but that should not be what the trailer should be. I think it's very misleading. I think people should should. There should be so much oversaturation of the marketing. If you're going to go see a movie, what are you going to talk from that? Yeah, I think I like what you were saying before about avoiding all the, the heavy watching of trailers and all that stuff to just avoid disappointment. I think that that's a good, good policy. And yeah, sometimes they overdo it with the advertising and everything and they create unrealistic expectations and everything. So yeah, I would avoid it. So Speaking of unexpected expectations over expectations, also from the That's A Lot of Nuts department with The Flash being designated a box office bomb now the list of the top ten biggest box office Conflict movies has been updated and The Flash now stands above the pack at #1 with an estimated loss of $200 million. Wow.

17:05 Followed by Shazam Part 2 with a loss of $150 million. Wonder Woman Part 2 with a loss of $137,000,000 X-Men George Phoenix, which was the last one before the studio sold, has an estimated loss of $133 million. The these Suicide Squad, which I think that's the second one, these Suicide Squad. Suicide Squad, because the first one was Suicide Squad, the second one was the Suicide Squad. Well, one of the was the loss of $130,000,000 I. Didn't know all these movies were losing all this money. Black Adam with The Rock was a loss of $100 million. The latest Fantastic Four movie was another $100 million loss. RIPV with Jeff Bridges and Ryan Reynolds was a loss for $92 million. The New Mutants, which was filmed and sat on the shelf for years before it actually came out, and I saw it during the pandemic.

17:59 I saw it as a drive through. It was really cool. That lost $84 million. And the Ryan Reynolds Green Lantern film lost $75 million. And this is just the amount of money that he put to making the movie. This is not counting the marketing, which is what they say is 3 times the budget of the film. Right. So they've lost a big bag of money. Yeah, on these films. Do you? What's he? Happened for the loss. So based it, well, yeah. Mostly it's because they are not selling as much tickets as they had anticipated on selling. Because if you think about it, with all this marketing, they're trying to get people into seats, into theaters. They're just not going.

18:40 The pandemic didn't help. Streaming didn't help, but they they it's still the antiquated system of that. The only way to quote UN quote validate a a movie is that first weekend box office. So if you're not making over $100 million minimum that first week, you're considered a wow. And I remember in the old days, a movie can, you know, last a long amount of time. I mean, look at Titanic, which is I think the second highest listen film of all time, might be the third. That movie lasted, I think, 15 weeks at #1, and it slowly builds up the money, right? Avatar. We were actually doing the show and Avatar came out, and I distinctly remember because everybody said it was going to be a flop because that's the first, that's the very first Avatar.

19:27 Yep. It came out on a weekend where we had a snowstorm on the East Coast. And so nobody wants to see the movie and like, oh, it's it's James Cameron is, you know, he doesn't, He lost his touch. He's not going to make any money because that first weekend didn't make any money and then the following week and then it went up. And I think it, I think it's like 5 or six weeks at #1. And it went crazy. Yeah. There's room for more money to make or is this the final number? Well, they, they, they count, they count it as a theater. So once it's in the theater, and it's. Out of the theater, that counts as a loss. So even if it makes up its money on streaming, if it makes up the money on DVD sales, that doesn't count.

20:09 It counts what it made in the box office for some reason. Like I said, it's all about being first so you can have movies that are that have become cult classics or movies that have become fan favorites that weren't popular in the theaters. The 1:00 I could think of at the top of my head would be Scott Pilgrim. That's terrible in the theaters, but apparently said The Love Moon. It was pretty darn good. I saw it, took me years to see it, but it's extremely popular, has a huge fall, and people will see rereleases of it. Scott Pilgrim versus the World. Based on the comic book? Yeah. Based on the comic book with the guy from Arrested Development. The the kid. Superbad. What's? Yeah, Yeah.

20:49 Forgetting his name? The skinny guy Michael Sierra. Michael Sierra was in it. It had Captain America in it. It had Captain Marvel in it. It had the Punisher in it. It had a pretty All Star cast back in the day that they became stars later on. So now it's more of an impressive thing to say, I. Think it was a critically acclaimed movie. Generally people like critically acclaimed, but nobody wants to see it because they didn't get it. Like I think it was ahead of its time. Have you ever seen? Yeah, I saw. I did see Scott Builder, Yeah, so. Years ago. So what did you think? Was it like a comic? A. True comic book or I remember being like, yeah, this is really like they were going for things that were very direct, like from the comic books. But yeah, which I hadn't seen too often before in film.

21:32 I remember that That struck me about that movie. So do you guys think that maybe the cost of making movies should be lower? So that's one thing that you have to consider, that the movie studios are putting way too much money into making the film, expecting a higher return. If they reduce the budget somehow, then they would make more money. However, the problem is there's now an expectation when it comes to big budget movies. The CGI is a big bag of money in and of itself, and then getting these actors and actresses costs a lot of money. If you look at the the multiverse of movies, you're getting actors that have been around for a long time.

22:15 Originally when the Marvel movies came out, they signed people for six 7-8 movies. So therefore you're stuck in that contract and then it's trying to renegotiate. That's when the big money comes in. You may not remember this, but when Iron Man no. When Avengers Part 2 was coming out, they weren't sure if Robert Downey Junior was going to come back because he wanted a big fat paycheck and they were debating on whether just to have him in the suit and not having to show up at all. Like so. When he showed up in the Spiderman one, the second one, whatever Spiderman was one way home. Something home far from home. One of the Spiderman no way home. One of them, The second Spiderman. The 2nd, the third second Spiderman film.

22:58 Iron Man appears in that when Iron Man shows out, he got paid like a couple $100 million just for like 10. They did like a 10 minute. They did a time of how much he was on screen. It's like 10 minutes. So that's money that they just throw in there. So they have to figure out if we put more money into it, we should get a higher return. But because of the way the system is, it's not happening anymore. It's far and few between. The spider verse movie I just came out, which is the second highest closing film of the year. Nobody expected to do that. Well, the first movie was amazing. And even myself, I thought the movie wasn't going to be any good because it took so long to make to make the first movie. And that movie was made over the course of many years to do it.

23:39 Like if you listen to the behind the scenes and interviews, you're like, yeah, we recorded that thing, you know, years back and it did little by little by little by little. And then it came out and it was a huge hit. So much so that Sony is like, we're going to make another one now. So I was worried that the quality was going to go down, but apparently they hired A bazillion more animators to get it done on time. Yeah. People seem to love it, and it came out in this amazing film. So that is something that they had to put extra money in to get the animators to get The voice has to get it done right now. And now they're talking about the next one's going to be in 2024 and they're still working on it right now. Speaking of seagulls, sorry to change it, but how did Avatar 2 do? Avatar Two is it it it came out, it made its money and then it didn't make out as much as it did.

24:24 I think it's probably like the 4th or 5th from the highest of this year. It made its money, but it did more internationally than anything because they actually, we reported this on how that the movie had to make $2 billion to break even. That was the that was the amount that it had to make before it broke even. And once again, that's not including the marketing budget. That's just how much it costs to make the film. And it did overseas all the money together. It did break the 2,000,000 but it didn't make the money here, so the the. Why did that cost so much to make just all the special effects? So it's all the CG, Yeah, it's all CG. It's all, yeah. But there's not even big actors in the Avatar. Zoe, Sal, Zoe, Sal.

25:07 It's weird yet you would think you would think Zoe Saldana is not a big actor, but she's in like 5 of the highest grossing films. Like if you look at her track record, she's made so many movies that has made a bazillion dollars. She should clarify. That's true. That's true as a as a listen. Although she really isn't, which is weird because when you said I'm like, Oh yeah. Yeah, like, I don't. I don't think of anybody in Avatar. She's personally she's no Tom. Right. I'm thinking of like, you know, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Tom for his, you know, the big, the huge marquee names and like in Avatar 2, Avatar, what's the guy? Sam Worthington, Sam Worthington. He's not like, I don't know, is he a bigger box office drawing? So I don't know With we're almost had time for the new segment, but I do.

25:51 Well, I'll get into this really, really quickly, right. Right. What's interesting about Sam Worthington is that at the time when Avatar One was being filmed, he was built as being the next big action. * they were. They were. They wanted him to be the next Tom Cruise. I remember that distinctly. And they were pushing him to be in all these movies and all the movies were flopping. He was fresh from Titans. He was in Clash of Titans. He was in. He was in The Terminator. He was in one of the Terminators and and they were pushing him and pushing him. So it was one of those situations where it wasn't on an organic rise to fame, right? And for some reason the audience hates when you're being shoved.

26:33 Yeah, a star. To contrived like the guy who played Gambit in the X-Men film. He was also being pushed. He was in a John Carter of Mars. Oh, yes. Yeah, I know he's the Battleship movie, OK? And he would, they were pushing him to be the next, the next big thing and his movie swap. And then he just kind of pushed him aside. We don't want to hear about that guy anymore. So who's the biggest star now? Tom Cruise, right. It's so weird that he's managed to have this following and Tom Cruise can bring in on his own. Absolutely. Money. That kind of star power is not common anymore, so that's really it. In New Yorker.

27:19 Nice. That's cool. That's awesome. Yeah, you. Jump off the couch. So that is it for our news. We're going to take a really quick break and we'll be right back in front of our lines with the audience. Hi. You've heard my voice open and close the show. Now we want to hear your voice. If you have a business or product, you can record a commercial here. We offer 30 and 62nd spots. For more information, contact Mark at mfc_studios@hotmail.com. This is Michael Bell, the voice of Duke from GI Joe.

27:59 And I am here at Cradle. Come and I am with it came from the radio. Here we go. Sort of. Omens come to my hand. I, Lionel, command it. Hi, everybody. This is Larry Kenny, the voice of Lionel on Thundercats. And you're listening to It Came from the radio. This is Kerry Seller from In the Girls Corner. And you're listening to It Came from the Radio. Hi, this is Amy, Joe Johnson, writer, director from the film. The space between and you're listening to it came from the radio. Now back to our show and welcome back to the game. Really. Officially, the guy for calling this is your host Mark Torres, speaking in front of a live studio audience for our 70th 70 live show courtesy of the East Meadow Public Library where they have tons and tons of programming, most of which are free. One of which is our show, which we do the second Wednesday of every month.

28:56 For more information go to www.eastmeadow.info. I'm here for our hello man Danny Feldy. Good evening and we have our special guest we are going to be talking to with them about this is Legendary Artist Contractors. Hello. So, Tom, I've known you for quite some time. I've seen you at tons of conventions and you've always been a print guy, but you've always had the desire to do your own book. We we've talked about it many a time. So did you finally get a chance to make your book? Yes. Yeah. So tell us a little bit about your book. It's called Yep, got some copies right here. Take a look at it all right. It's called Horn Helm Studios Presents and it's an anthology style book.

29:42 It's got several short stories in it, each one featuring like different, you know, different creator owned property of mine. It's all my stuff, different ideas that I wanted to develop. So it's got my my main character battle scale who's like my flagship. Personal character that I'm trying to develop for years. It's got a couple of his stories in there and then some other fun eclectic mixture of different things. Just whatever I was inspired to put together. I just sat down and drew it and got it put together over a couple couple of years. Teamed up with some great colorists and. Letterers and they helped me get this really to a nice finished product. I'm pretty happy with it. You. Know this kind of reminds me of garbage. Shell kids, Yeah, from Trauma, definitely. You're inspired by Yeah, that story Trashed and Dwellers that is totally inspired by Trouma and Garbage Pail Kids. That kind of vibe.

30:35 Yeah, yeah. And they're listed on. I saw some list of like the top ten worst movies. Like, I think it's that time. Yeah, the the movie, the live action movie is out of control. I don't know if you've seen it. Have you seen it? Have you? Seen it? The live action, Garbage bell, kids. Is it different than the original garbage field kids? No, it's it's the the live action movie. There's a live. There's only one. Yeah. The only one. Yeah. Yeah. Separate right now. Of course. So I oh, that's my. Idea. I've watched it like on time and that's my bar of what type of work? Yeah. Nice. Nice. Nice. So, you know, I'll keep ending up on the worst of the worst list, and that's great. And I did a crazy stand up. Which one person loved and few people hated, I guess.

31:18 I don't know. Yeah. So anyway, back to you. Very creative. It has like a grungy type of feel, right? Yeah, I'd like to have like a lot of texture in my stuff. That's what you're noticing. Yeah, I had little, you know, a lot of. Surface textures and I like to get into the drawing and really try to give it weight and make it, make it feel crunchy. That's the the adjective, Oddly enough, I heard one of my favorite comment of artists say that about the type of comic work that he likes. Dan Fraga, I don't know if you know Dan Fraga. Yeah, he said crunchy, like you got to make the art crunchy. And I like that because I know what I know what he's talking about. It's hard to articulate, but I know what he's talking about. It's like.

32:00 You know, the art has a lot going on. It's like, you know, yeah, little busy, intentionally busy, just to give you a lot of things to look at and and keep it fun and interesting and yeah, inspired by like the 90s comic book art. Tom McFarlane, you know, the image guys. Stuff like that to an extent, Absolutely. So yeah, I get the textures in there. Grungy works. That definitely works as an adjective. For it, yeah. It's like the opposite of Chanel. Like Chanel? Yeah. Is that clean? This is the opposite. Totally, yeah. Totally. Yep. Absolutely. So I don't see a makeup well.

32:40 I'm sure there's some, like grungy makeup companies that would make you want this aesthetic like a grunge type of book. Trauma filming. Maybe Trauma came out with a makeup line that hires you to illustrate their makeup. Line might work OK Can you get my number to? What's his name? Lloyd. Yeah, he's the main man. Main man of trauma. Yeah, Lloyd, and. Michael Hearst, Yeah, checks. He's in a comma style. You're in trouble with. Yeah, I keep coming out. It's going to have a theatrically spring on the dams and tie on the Tiger base and high school friends who I actually asked to prom, but he was too cool to go to prom. So I guess technically I had two prom days, but he just did some artwork and I'm going to give it to Lloyd.

33:23 Nice. Nice. Yeah, Excellent. Very cool. So when you said you took years to pull this together, is it something that you have written years ago or were you writing it throughout the years and changing your writing style as the years kind of thought? Yeah, it was happening over the course of years. Like, you know, I would just be sketching in a sketchbook and then draw a character and and say I love this character design, I want to build a story around this. And so that would happen. Over the course of years, yeah. I didn't have it all planned out or anything like that. Some of the stuff was conceived of a long time ago and I didn't get a chance to, you know, flesh it out and actually turn it into comic book pages and make the story until I got. Further alone.

34:08 But yeah, it happened organically over time. So did you find that you had to constantly change the story ideas as the times have changed, because stuff that you have written back then might not be politically correct to be having helping out now? Yeah, I don't know. My work, for me, it's like completely apolitical. My stuff. It's really, I'm not making those kind of statements generally. So I wasn't too concerned about that. I just wanted, yeah, just do what I. I wanted to do a lot of. It's inspired by the stuff I grew up with as a kids. It's all it's kind of nostalgic work anyway, so it's kind of old. It's inspired by old stuff. So Mad Max, yeah, I mean, I'm a fan of Mad Max. Yeah.

34:49 Yep, Definitely a little bit of anesthetic there. So yeah, I mean, it was like nostalgia based anyway, so I didn't really feel like I had to mold things to any current styles or or sensibilities of, you know, the current leadership or whatever or. Current year politics or anything like that, It's pretty out there stuff. It's not really a lot of. It's not really like a real world. It has nothing to do with the real world. So I didn't have to be too conscious of that, honestly. So when you're making books and you said that it took a little while to do it, as as myself I it took me 30 years to make my own comic book that I've been mixing up loading. That was awesome. Your book, it looks great. So what do you find has been the difference between trying to make a book back then?

35:34 As to making a book now, like what? What was the deciding packet that allows you to make this book happen this year? Well, I guess maybe being able to coordinate all the different people who are involved was a little easier, maybe using the Internet and everything, like the colorists and the letterers and finding the right people. I think that's what really brought the book finally together was I just, I found the people I really wanted to work with. And then? That moved things along. I was able to, you know, budget things out more specifically and get things finished along the line. Yeah, I guess, I guess you're saying like the difference in technology or whatever difference it is. Like for me, I noticed that because of the crowdfunding and the pandemic, it really did change things in my perspective, but it could be different for you. Yeah, yeah, Like crowdfunding, Definitely. I didn't do that for this book, but I am thinking about it for the future because it it's awesome, you know, to see what people are able to achieve with the crowdfunding. But yeah, I've kind of taken the same approach I guess to creating my own stuff since I was like honestly, yeah, long, many years ago when I was in high school, like self-publishing stuff.

36:49 The same kind of just like I'm just going to do this the way I want to do it and put it out there and and just make things come together the way I want to do it. And you know, I I probably could. Branch out for and do crowdfunding and stuff like that. I want to push myself to try those types of methods moving forward for sure. Now you are an artist, a writer, a colorist already, so why would you go out and get other people to do work when you can do it all yourself? Right. Well the what was the logic behind that? I I wanted the book to have a certain quality to it, that I knew my personal style wasn't necessarily the right.

37:29 I couldn't, I couldn't do it all the way. I wanted to do it on my own like I wanted the I have my hand colored artwork that I can do. I don't do digital colors myself, so my coloring is hand colored generally when I do color a piece. So I wanted to get a cohesive look for the whole book. I wanted to look, you know, kind of cutting edge and you know up to the standards of current day full color comic books. So my hand coloring technique. I didn't think was appropriate for this particular book. I wanted to. So I teamed up with Digital Posts and you know, so that, you know, I was able to get the look I wanted. So I guess I was just recognizing my own limitations, I guess, or my own, you know, what I was personally capable of or what I personally want to do.

38:12 And I said, you know, I can enhance what I'm able to do by teaming up with other people. So and also with the lettering like I didn't want to letter the whole thing by hand like. I'm not a letterer, but not a professional letterer or anything like that. So I had to hire graphic designer to help me out with the lettering and the design stuff and get it just the way I wanted to do is wanted it to be so you know you got to team up with people. So that does pull back to the earlier question about what was the difference the technology for you to have computer coloring, because back then it wasn't computer color. That's true, yes. So it wasn't even a possibility to have this done that? Right. Or if you did do it back then, what would it look like? Do you think it would be anything close to what it represents now, or do you think it would be exactly what you had envisioned? No.

38:55 Yeah. If I had to do this years ago, like too many years ago, I don't know. No way. I mean without. Without the people who I was able to team up with, it wouldn't be the same at all. And that's that is definitely important to how the book came out was. I was able to find the Internet, you know, social media and everything. You can find incredibly talented people, you know, everywhere, like easily. I mean there's guys posting their portfolios every day, beautiful color, color work, colorists, letterers. I think I found my letter. I just tweeted. Out to the world and said is there any count of letters like out there like looking for work and this guy contacted me so it just you know it's it is amazing you know how you can reach people and team up with people and.

39:40 Did you meet? Him. No, not in person. You never met him in? Person Never met any of these people in person. Yeah, that's what's weird about it. Like, never met any of these people in person, anybody who works in the book. So many of remote teams now. A lot of your characters, there's a big emphasis on eyeballs, glowing eyeballs, eyeballs popping out. One of the characters has three eyeballs. Now a lot of times, at least what I find before going to for example, I'm going to be directing commercial for a surgical team on Sunday. So every time you do a new project it teaches you something in life. And some I find that I look at the world with new eyes after every new thing I do. So. Before the book, you probably have one perspective on the light, on the world and yourself and your capabilities.

40:26 And now, after completion, how do you look at yourself, the world, your capabilities, What's possible differently? I yeah, that's a good question. I'm pretty proud of the book to be honest. I thought it came out great. So I was like wow, yeah, this I can, I can self publish. I can do this. It did show me that I can do. Some pretty high quality work by my standards and make it looks pretty darn good, you know, like get team together, team up with the right people and you can really make incredible stuff happen. So it's encouraged me to do more and to consider things like crowdfunding. Because I I look at this stuff and I said, you know what? If I got this in front of the right people and I promoted it properly, I probably could raise money for this, You know, Like it gave me a boost of confidence, I would say with creative work, absolutely, you know?

41:15 Getting the book out there, holding it in your hands like this is my finished product and I can bring this to shows that that it's, it makes you feel good that you have something complete and that definitely changes your perspective. Like for years I was just doing fan art like, you know and you know prints at the shows and everything and that was fun and that was rewarding. But it doesn't compare to your own work, you know, when you're doing your own creation. So this gave me a whole new feeling about like when I do a convention now if I sell a copy of the comic it. It means a lot to me. It feels it's it's very satisfying, you know, more so I would say. Well, maybe not more so, but differently. It makes me feel differently than selling like a Godzilla print by selling a drawing of Godzilla.

41:56 I love Godzilla, but Godzilla is not my creation. So when I sell my book, that makes me feel Do you think you'll make any discount, just come to life and like stuffed animals or have people possibly cost flying some? Of these, that would be very flattering if people chose to do that or I could hire some. People, Yeah. Stuffed animals of these, of these things, Sure, yeah, if I was younger and had stuff. Done. If you were young. Yeah, like this pirate looking guy with the beard. It was like a dog. I mean, that's pretty interesting for like a magnet. A bookmark? No, absolutely merch. Are you thinking of merch? Yeah, I love. I love action. And collectibles and toys. And a lot of this stuff is inspired by the toys that I grew up with as a kid. So I would love to make toys and you know, action figures collectibles out of this kind of stuff. I actually did make a small I teamed up with an artist and we made a tiny battle skull figurine, which I sell. It shows I do have, but we made a little figurine or like carvel cakes and.

42:57 Burger Yeah, I like your product ideas. That would be fun. Super fun or you have a Marvel cake. I drove by an ice cream store that was called Marvel that was. It yeah. So Marvel or Carvel. Maybe put some cakes in the shape of these things. Yeah, that would be awesome. Yeah. I mean that that's being able to take your creations into other places is awesome. Yeah. Like, you know, jewelry, right? Yeah. Now as. You mentioned earlier about the technology changing. We are right now in a time of huge transitional technology with the AI. Yes. Do you think that that's going to be the next step in the evolution of self-publishing? Is the use of AI, is that something that you particularly would do or do you think that that's something that others would do?

43:45 Because as we mentioned, doing it ourselves was a was a challenge. Yeah. So if you can find instead of finding people, which is now extremely easy to do, right all the world, just, hey, I need somebody, you don't even have to just go poop and then you have this ability. What are your thoughts on that? I don't know a lot about how AI works, I haven't really been might. What I've gathered is that you can literally like type things in and get an incredible painting or something which. Pretty much. I personally, I don't know if I hate that. I think that's horrible. Personally, I think it's terrible for artists and I would be ashamed of myself. If I came to a convention with a I created artwork and sold it.

44:26 I would be like, it's just to me horrendous. But I'm extremely against that. I'm extremely against that. I think you could use it as a. A primer. Like if you want to design A character, maybe you can type in some stuff. Use a I to design A character if you're not an artist yourself, or if you are an artist, maybe create a reference using a I use it as a tool. I think that's that's cool I guess. But I don't know. I'm just very like pencil to paper. That's what I personally do myself. That's what I respect. That's what I love. I don't want to see. I don't know. AI freaks me out. It really does. Like, it's crazy. It's like, I can't believe some of the artwork I see and I love it. I'm like, that's awesome. I see like an AI piece on Instagram or whatever. I'm like, this is awesome. And then you find out it's AI and it's like, Oh my God, like that's like, that's creepy to me. Yeah, and freaky.

45:12 I think the creep factor is in there that it can be done so easily. It's insane and. The amount of effort that somebody who would do that would take. And this is just, like I said, a push of a button. Yeah, it's very disturbing. But the sad thing is, I believe because the end product is what the consumer. Is all about. Right. And if the consumer doesn't care, right, they're gonna, they're gonna get whatever, the cheapest, right? Exactly. And then on the other side, if you think about it, if it's so easy and cheap to make. And then everybody's going to do it and therefore it will devalue any other type of art, right? So do you think that it would be detrimental to the comic book industry if AI becomes a thing? And do you think it will become a thing? I think it would be detrimental, definitely to artists and their careers.

46:07 I think it's going to be a challenge. It's really. I mean, I don't know if AI today I create a comic book page. I guess they could they could do each panel and assemble. I guess they probably could the. Only thing I. That's crazy so far. With the the problem quote UN quote problem the guy is the hand. Right. The hands. So if you have someone who can draw, really. Which is a problem with real artists too, but. You can get a guy who's drawing hands, he'll just fix the hand and that's it with Google Photoshop and just fix whatever is the problem. Yeah. But once again, if if the. Consumer, right? Becomes if everybody does something, then nobody does something. Is that the way it works? So now everybody's in art. Nobody's in. Art, right?

46:48 Yeah. I don't know. It's yeah, I think it will have a negative impact on a lot of aspects. I hate to be a pessimist, but that I mean, I can't see how it's not going to negatively impact the careers of artists who've spent their life learning how to draw and, you know, do all the technical aspects of drawing. And then they can just be replaced by. I mean, it already wasn't. There was some Marvel show that used AI to do the whole introduction and like, so that just eliminated a bunch of storyboard artists, special effects artists. Like they all just lost that work and that and of course that. Like you said, it's all about the bottom line for the studios and for the publishers. So they're going to, they're going to use it. I mean, why not? Like, I'm a comic book geek, so I care if you know the cover is drawn by.

47:35 Frank Miller or whatever, you know, like I care about that. But a lot of people, I mean, I guess comic readers, a lot of people do care if it's Frank Miller, but a lot of consumers will probably just say that's. A move the majority. The majority of the consumers will just say that's an awesome Batman cover. I want to read that comic. They don't care who drew the cover. So artists can be they can get screwed. So as an independent artist, is it focused more on the conflict fan or is it on the general consumer? I don't know. There are people who just want the Super Bowl because it's the thing to do. I guess comic book readers, there's kind of crossover, right? Because they're consumers, but they're also, they're particularly interested in.

48:18 And then there are people who will go to the football games. Yeah. True. True. Well, I guess, yeah, with comics it's very it is pretty niche, right My. My personal passion is I'm like a comic book freak. I love comics and I love comic art artists and stuff. So that's my audience too. That's my my friends, my peers, the people who appreciate this stuff. So that is my target audience more than just like a massive appeal. I'm not trying to massively appeal to anybody. I guess you would say like I'm not trying to be. I don't know. The Super Bowl. Well. That's cool. That's the that's the concept. Yeah, I'd love for one of my concepts to become big, you know? Of course I would love my concept to reach a wider audience.

49:02 Then it's fine. Then a bunch of artists can work on it other than me. When you get to that point, you know, if you're making video games or or animation with your characters, then you got to let it. You got to let it grow, you got to let it fly. But when I'm doing the comics, that's me. That's my personal, that's it. Like I want to do that myself. And have control over that. Well, you could create controversy, You know, controversy frees cash. So one says other than pay runs with mess, which gets people famous, you could start rumors about yourself in the books and that could help you gain contractions. Like, I'll tell you this my. Boyfriend now claims to be best friends with George Santos. You can claim to be best friends with maybe Joe Biden and create a fake rivalry with Elon Mus.

49:47 And maybe perhaps that will help. And then we can. Gorillas. Gorilla market. All right. I like it, so get under advisement. So since this is an. Anthology and it's a beginning, middle, and end of the anthology series. Is there a through line throughout the entire book? Is there like a host or? Now there's no like mascot, unfortunately. But that's a good idea. Shouldn't have that. So, but it is a beginning, middle, end. It's a total mix. It is something that you would see that you don't get mixed up, that it's a through loss like you're beginning to.

50:31 It's about anthology of what is anthology a horror thing. It's anthology of sci-fi, it's anthology of whatever. It's just a mix of stories. Whatever. Yeah. It's like I don't. Limited to one genre or anything. I'd bounce around. Totally bounce around the different genres, yeah. Is that something that you had planned ahead of time that you just see whatever stories that have mine, I'm just going to stick in? Yeah, yeah, definitely. It was really just, you know, whatever I wanted to do. Like over the years I was gathering the stories of the characters. And so, you know, I wasn't like, oh, I want to do only scifi or only like horror stories. I just was like, you know, I mean I generally kind of tend toward.

51:13 Certain genres anyway, like, honestly, like, I'm going to probably draw a lot of stuff that involves monsters or you know, characters that are fun to draw. So I end up tend to tend to have similar stuff in my stories, but I do bounce across different genres depending on whatever I just go with, whatever I'm in the mood for. If I get inspired to do like a Goonies inspired story with kids or whatever, like Adventure with kids, you might do something like that. Or if you want to do a. Spooky Halloween themed stories. I don't go with that. So when you see the finished product, the nasty gravity towards a certain story, like oh this is now my favorite story, now I've seen it. Or do they all just all your babies and you can't pick a favorite? Now there are definitely some that I feel stronger about, like in this book. There's the reanimated beast, which is a kind of wild little story in the middle of the book, and that's like my favorite of the book.

52:06 And it's because the yeah, it was just the most fun to draw and I'm proud of the drawings and that story and the colors came out great on that story in my opinion. I and I I just had a great time finishing that particular story. So I was like this was the most fun to draw and it was the I was the happiest with it. As far as the finish piece, I was definitely like that's my personal favorite in the book. So I I can have favorites, and I usually I might. To see like the approach I took because of my style changes sometimes depending on the story. So I'll see a certain style stylistic approach that I took and say I really like that style. I like working in that particular style.

52:46 So I want to do that again or I want to stick with that I want or you know, I'll keep that in my head for the next story. I want to say that style will really work nice for that story. So I'll bring those two together. So yeah, look at those aspects of it. And since there is no flu line for the anthology. How do you decide what story goes with? I try. I guess it's like tone, trying to pay attention to the tone of the book, see how the stories butt up against one another. And thematically, stylistically, you know, you try to, I guess, balance it out. If you have like a dark darker tone story, maybe put a brighter story afterwards or before or whatever.

53:28 Things like that I consider. And sometimes it honestly comes down to laying out the book as far as like if you have a double page spread in one story, sometimes you have to put that story at a certain point in the book because the double page spread has to line up for the printing purposes. So sometimes it's practical issues like that that affect the way you order your pages and line up your stories. But but I do try to like, I guess it's all about like how how does it feel? I guess like writing a song or you have to. Put the different parts together and see how they work together. So it's it's it's an artistic choice I guess. Just. So is it a weird thing that if you would read the stories out of order is completely different experience?

54:12 Yeah, I guess it would be. It would be like a totally different experience if you. Well, I mean they're they're short stories, so they're they're kind of their own thing. But so you could read, you could pick up the book and just read one of them and you don't, you don't read the rest of the book, right. But. Yeah, I guess if you. Put orderically and you like a song if you put. It on the order it will. Give you a different? Yeah, it would. It would give you. So you have that. And it's going to change your mood, you know, Right. Because you're going to be in one mood from one story and then you're bouncing into a different zone for the next story. So yeah, it could definitely could impact. The the way you feel is that something that you put your spot into that you're making this one way. And the consumer who might take it a completely different way, is that something that you've gotten feedback on that has happened or have you anticipated that happened?

55:00 Yeah, I didn't really anticipate that. I didn't consciously think about that. I guess like how people are going to experience each story and everything, but like, but I've had people who have read the book come and tell me which parts of it they particularly really liked and everything. So that was probably my closest, closest experience to that. And that's great to hear. I love to hear. You know, what people actually really liked and or or didn't like? It could be critical as well, Of course. That's all good constructive stuff that I need to hear. As a creator, you want to hear what people are feeling about the stuff. But I did not anticipate like, you know, Yeah. How people would feel bouncing from story to story, really. I mean, I tried to make it appealing to me, I guess when I put it together. And I tried to make it like, you know, this is how I would want to read the book. And this is, you know, that's all I could really go on, was my own personal taste.

55:48 When I was putting the book together. So that's what I went with and hopefully, hopefully people don't find it too charming or hopefully, hopefully they enjoy it. All right, so we're at social media times, which we will find out more about your stuff. Buy your book. Hire you for work. Yeah. Can they find a lesson? All right, I'm at. I'm on Instagram at Tom Travers art. I also have a Facebook page for Battle Skull which is facebook.com back slash battle skull. Those are really my 2 main sites. Right now I'm working on an actual website which I need to get together. Don't have that yet though. Want to have a regular website with the store and all that stuff?

56:29 Eventually it's in the works, but yeah, right now it's really just Instagram and Facebook and I'm on Twitter at Horntown Studios. Horntown Studios. Alright, so we're almost out of time, so I'm glad to see. 4 minutes left. So do you have any final thoughts for our listeners out there? People who want to make them on anthology. People who are sitting right now debating on whether they can do it, whether they want to do it, what final thoughts they. Have just do it. Go for it. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, totally. Like, comics are just the most amazing medium that really, you know, you don't have to be a great artist if you're a writer. You have an idea. You don't have to be an artist. You don't have to be a writer if you're an artist. Or maybe you're both. Whatever you are, you can if you have an idea. Comics is, to me, one of the greatest ways to get that idea. Down on paper.

57:16 Get it published. Get it printed, you know, and you shouldn't be afraid to just try it. You can't learn anything unless you do it. So even if you fall and you stumble and it's tough and you run into crazy obstacles and everything, it's worth doing because you'll just, you'll just keep getting better, You got to do it. So absolutely just dive in and start making comics, yeah. So my final thought is this. Tom, thank you for being guest on the show. I've known you for many years and it's always cool that not only did you manage to get your anthology done, which we've talked about for many years, but your artwork style has continuously improved. From. When I first met you to. Now you're always working on new things. You always have such an amazing library of work. Thank you and I want to.

58:02 Echo that about not giving up because as I've mentioned myself, I'm hustling my own book for 30 years when I got it done. I know how it is to finally get it out there. Even if it didn't take you 30 years, even if it took five years, it's an amazing feeling to get finally out there. And I know once you get it done. It's easy to do the next one. Yes. Because now you know what to do. What not to do is that it's slightly, it's not super easy, right? But it's slightly. Easier, Yeah? You learn a little something every time. Yeah, every time you get something finished. So you actually nice enough to have a little raffle for a piece of our?

58:43 Yeah, we've got. I've got a Godzilla and our piece with an original sketch on the bottom. My time. So take it out. Take it out. No looking. We got. 544582 544582 I I I believe one of the studio audience members had. Still. Actually coming out very shortly to get it, but so I have five or two. Yeah, there you go. Take the print as. Well yeah, so you win. So as soon as the recording is over, we'll we'll give you your reply. So what about does this for this week on the camp in the radio at the East Medal Public Library, courtesy of WWEA and emedal.info, where they have tons and tons of programs. Our next live show will be the 71st live show, which will be on August the 9th, and we have mentalist Robin Channing as a guest and he will be rattling off a private one-on-one reading.

59:50 So you guys come down for that more information to www.info and we will see you next time you've been listening to It Came From the Radio with Mark Torres. The views of the show's hosts and guests did not necessarily reflect that of the management, owners or staff of the station. We now return you to your earthly scheduled broadcast.