Blommer, Fruit Striped Gum and the Goon

I've been eating a lot of Fruit Striped gum and reading a lot of The Goon over the past few days.

I bought The Goon #1 and #2 TPBs at the Stumptown Comic Fest and I read them that night and really like them. So then I got The Goon TPBs #3, #4, #5 and China Town (which is actually a hard back and, I understand, basically The Goon #6). And I read all of those the day after I got them. And now I'm waiting for The Goon #7 and #8 to come out. I'm digging The Goon.

And then there's the Fruit Striped gum. I love the smell of Fruit Striped gum! It smells better than virtually anything else, with the possible exception of freshly baked bread or the Blommer Chocolate Factory in Chicago. It's freaky, but I like to just hold a stick of Fruit Striped gum under my nose and huff the fake-fruit scent. That's actually better than chewing the gum--mostly because the super intense flavor of Fruit Striped gum burns bright but quick and is gone in a twinkling, while that delicious smell is there for as long as you can resist chewing the gum.

Anyway, this got me thinking that there's a connection between Fruit Striped gum and the Goon. I love them both, I consume them both way too quickly and they both have a strange, intoxicating appeal that would be difficult to explain on any kind of a rational level.

At the San Diego Comic Con last year, at which we unveiled issue #1 of the Helm, Dark Horse had a conceptual poster for a potential Goon movie. David Fincher is slated to direct, so I am likely to be there opening day, probably chewing Fruit Striped gum.