Four out of Five Dentists Recommend the Helm Trade Paperback!

A pair of reviews just beat the Helm TPB to press! The Helm Volume 1 comes out tomorrow, but two reviews went up today.

The first was on Girls Entertainment Network by Stephanie Carmichael and gave the Helm a rating of 4 out of 5. I'm not sure 4 out of 5 what, but 4 out of 5 anything sounds pretty good to me! It could be 4 out of 5 dentists, which was good enough for Trident and is consequently good enough for the Helm. You can read the full review at http://www.girlsentertainmentnetwork.com/graphic-novel-review-the-helm/

The second review was on Around Comics and reviewer Brion Salazar said, "I really enjoyed this mini series in singles. The story was funny and should speak to the inner fanboy in all of us. Bart Sears art was some of his best." That seemed pretty positive to me, and I absolutely agree about the Bart Sears comment too. You can read the review at http://www.aroundcomics.com/index.php/Blog/ although I have quoted the entire review above. Yes, short, sweet and to the point. You have to love that Brion Salazar!

Now, all I have to do is hope that the book actually comes out tomorrow! Comics are unreliable!

Forteana and Jim From the Future

The Helm trade paper back is actually coming out on the 25th of this month, as opposed to the 8th of next month as was previously reported.

Anyway, I was putting a preview copy of The Helm TPB in the mail today to send off to the Fortean Times and I decided to ride the office Segway instead of walking.

For any of you who don't already subscribe, the Fortean Times is an awesome, monthly magazine about strange phenomena and experiences that continues the work of Charles Fort--the premier investigator of oddities and the man who coined the term teleportation. You can check them out at http://www.forteantimes.com/

I thought that the Fortean Times might be the most appropriate place to run a review of The Helm.

And now the Segway. First, you can't ride a Segway without feeling like some imperiously arrogant visitor from the future--perhapse a being named Orlon 5 or Commander GreeGnxx--just visiting this planet to mock the backward apes that still get around using their own legs.

As you hover along the streets, a foot or so taller than everyone else, drawing stares and shocked looks, you can't help but feel the odd mix of smug superiority and awkward stupidity that is the signature of the Segway experience. If you haven't ridden one, I'd suggest you try it.

We own a Segway because my business partner, David, won it as a door prize at the TED convention one year. Mostly it sits in the corner, quietly gathering dust, but about once each spring I get tempted to take it out for a spin. Since the post office is nearly a fifteen minute walk from the office, today provided a great opportunity to blow the dust off our chariot from the future.

Hair, the Helm and Helmet Hair

So, I was just reading a report that said that online content related to hair draws more traffic than any other topic.

Really? Hair? Now that's saying something...although I'm not sure exactly what.

I suppose, for starters, it suggests that I ought to be including a lot more references to hair in my various posts about the Helm trade paper back and that maybe I ought to have a page on the Helm Website dedicated to hair. Hmmm. Maybe something about helmet hair.

Helmet hair is closely related to the dreaded hat hair, but much worse. In movies, heroic folks are always taking off their helmets to reveal perfectly coiffed, sexy looking hair. In real life, however, the inside of a helmet gets pretty sweaty and makes your hair do some fairly strange and unattractive things. Take it from me, a guy who has probably worn far too many helmets with far too little provocation--you're way more likely to end up with pointy hair or Gumby hair or skanky hair than sexy hair after your head has seen the inside of a helmet. Oh, and a lot of the time, your hair smells too--like sweaty leather or sweaty foam padding or even just sweaty head.

So, I'll get to work on a feature about Helmet Hair and see if I can't attrack more of the vast swarms of internet users who are apparently so interested in the hair topic.

Matecumbe redux, the Helm Speaks and the TPB!!

Okay, so first thing is, thanks to everyone who wrote in with the lyrics to the theme song from The Treasure of Matecumbe! But please everyone stop sending them now! Even the Helm's massive servers have been swamped by the volume of responses!

With that out of the way, two bits of news.

First, there's a new page on the Helm Website--The Helm Speaks. Check it out for daily tidbits of wisdom straight from the mouth of the world's only talking helmet that pretty much no one can hear (except Mathew Blurdy).

Second, I have reason to believe that the Helm TPB may be arriving from the printer today! I'll keep you posted, but everyone is so excited here at Helm central that no one can sleep! And also because it's during the middle of the day and they have work to do.

BroMance and Pineapple Express

First, the Helm TPB is currently at the printer! Whoo Hoo!

Second, I saw Pineapple Express last night on DVD and it makes me think that the Helm is a BroMance.

Instead of watching the DVD, I really probably should have been doing something more obviously constructive with my time, like paying my bills or sleeping, but instead I chose to enjoy myself. Ah, enjoying myself, the bane of my existence.

So, anyway, pretty funny movie. It was not really what I was expecting. I had heard it was funny and that it had Seth Rogen in it and that it was in some way about drugs, but that was all I knew. All of those things were true, but they didn't really prepare me for the experience, probably because the movie was so odd.

Without giving anything away, I will say that I really enjoyed the collision between realism and absurdity and the way the film seemed completely okay with the conflict between them and didn't seem to have any need to reconcile it.

Beyond that, the movie got me thinking about BroMance as a sub genre of stories.

The key factors that seem to me to identify the BroMance story are that it's about a relationship between two guys (a relationship which can't exactly be described as a "buddy" relationship but is extremely close) and the bulk of the female characters primarily serve as speed bumps and obstacles to the central male relationship.

Now, to be clear, I'm not talking about a romantic or sexual relationship between guys. There's a different name for that kind of Broke-Back-Mountain sort of film and it's not BroMance. But I am talking about a level of relationship that is deeper and odder than your standard Lethal-Weapon kind of buddy film. BroMances tend to be comedies, probably because it is difficult in our society to deal with intense and interesting relationships between guys. The relationships in BroMances tend to be filled with as much tension as camaraderie and are even sometimes more negative or fractious than they are positive. There is frequently a lot of fighting and physical abuse of the main characters--as if they are manifesting their emotional lumps externally.

Anyhow, I'd say that Pineapple Express qualifies as a BroMance, and it got me thinking that the Helm is a weird sort of BroMance between Mathew and the Helm. They bicker and fight, Mathew gets the daylights beat out of him, there are comic overtones. I hadn't really intended that when I started writing, but I'm happy with it now that I'm done. And, at the end of the day, that's what's really important here--that I'm happy with it, because everything is always about me, how I feel about things and the strange sort of BroMance I have with myself.

Diamond 300, More Snow, The Final Cover

The Helm #4 made it onto the Diamond top 300 list for November, which pleased me all out of proportion with being number 268. I don't know when the list came out, but I just stumbled across it today. Well, stumbled very purposefully, as in I was actively checking for it.

Anyway, we've had more snow here--although we somehow avoided the apocalyptic ice storm the weathermen were predicting for us. Based on what they said, people stayed home from work in droves on Wednesday, but then nothing materialized. Turned out to be a really nice day even with some decent flurries of snow. Today was pretty much more of the same. The biggest trouble has been that the scaredy cat schools have cancelled out every day this week, leaving lots of parents struggling to work little people into their work schedules. Our two little people generously prevented almost anything productive from happening this week--all while remaining perfectly delightful.

And then, this afternoon, my editor at Dark Horse sent over a proof of the finished cover for the Trade Paper Back collection of the Helm. It's not much changed from the one I was gushing over yesterday--except that now it has the title and the logo and the tag line and all that good stuff. I expect they'll start posting it to the various websites advertising the book pretty soon so that they can replace the current posting which shows the cover of the first comic rather than the cover of the book. What that means is that, hopefully, you'll get to see the cover for yourselves soon and judge whether it looks good for yourselves.

Snow Days and the Helm TPB Cover

So, I'm at work today! Hooray!

Yesterday I couldn't make it in because of snow. Not a lot of snow, mind you, just a couple of inches--but here in Portland, Oregon, two inches is enough to shut down the town. So, school was out and buffoons were skidding into parked cars and smashing up real estate. It was chaos.

Anway, I had to put chains on the car to make it in today--the city was requiring them--but it was worth it because the cover art for the Helm trade paper back was waiting for me in my email! What with the Helm series being finished up for a while now, I haven't seen any new art from Bart in months and I've been going through withdrawal. So, this was a good fix. And it's really pretty. I can say that, with italics and everything, because I didn't draw it, so it's not bragging.

Also, thanks to everyone who's been writing in and saying they want more Helm! I'm all for more Helm too! If you are feeling really proactive about it, go ahead and send your emails directly to Dark Horse. You could cc me if you want.

Okay, I think that's it for now except that we're expecting more snow tomorrow. That should shut the town down for a month.

Chuck Action, The Helm Trade Paper Back and a Shout Out to Gloria!

Last night I had to catch up on a few episodes of Chuck that I've missed over the past few weeks. I was up until 2:00 am. I didn't feel that kind of devotion was out of line because I love the show Chuck (I think the character is nice too, but I don't feel any kind of romantic spark between us--nor with the wonderful actor, Zachary Levi--although I think he's great as Chuck). Anyway, I think the show is really funny and smart and charming and I am highly likely to keep watching it as long as they keep making it, even if I have to stay up really late to do it.

But (and there's always a but) they really need to do a better job of directing their action scenes. The clumsy action direction started pretty early on--remember episode #2, Chuck versus the Helicopter? And it's still going strong (or weak, to be more accurate) think episode #24, Chuck versus the Sensei.

Now this clumsiness is kinda weird. It's consistent enough that you'd figure there was maybe one really clever dialogue and relationship director in charge of the whole thing and he/she just wasn't that great at action--except that there are at least five different directors credited on the series and each of them has directed at least one episode with at least one really bad action sequence. And yet, based on their other credits, they seem to be pretty competent directors. Hmmm. Also, between the five credited directors, there are only fourteen shows listed--but, there are twenty four episodes produced and aired so far. Where are the other ten episodes/directors? If I was the intersect, I could figure that out just by looking at the line I just finshed typing. Unfortunately, I still have to use Google to find stuff out--just like everyone else on earth (Google Earth).

Okay. So after searching, I discovered that you can find them--guys like David Solomon who directed episode #5 of season one, Chuck versus the Sizzling Shrimp, but they aren't listed as Series Directors. Maybe that's because they've only directed single episodes? Like susbstitute teachers? Or is there some other, darker, more mysterious reason? Probably not. Or is there?

Regardless, there pretty much hasn't been any really stellar action directing on the show, whether it's a series director in charge or a substitute--and some of it has been really darn flat. Not that it derails the show for me. Like I said, I love that show.

In an attempt to be fair, I will now invite the creators of Chuck to read the Helm and criticize the things that I do poorly and/or defend what is going on with the direction of action on their show. I mean, who am I to criticize without knowing all of the issues? Well, I'll tell you who I am. I'm me, and even I can tell that the action is clumsy on Chuck.

Okay, enough Chuck.

I was just looking at a mockup of the front and back cover for the Helm Trade Paperback! The cover art's not in from Bart yet, but the mockup is looking pretty cool. I would buy it, if I was me. Which I am. It's cool to have all of the issues collected together--and it's also nice that the four "chapters" will have the titles of each of the issues in the series (which aren't printed on the actual issues because they were imaginatively titled Issue #1 and so on). I mean, I don't know if the titles being there will be nice for anyone else, but I appreciate it because of how I went to all the trouble of coming up with titles for each issue.

I also want to take this blog entry to say "hi" to Gloria.