Happy birthday Craig Ferguson!

Happy 50th Birthday to Late Late Show host and Doctor Who fan Craig Ferguson!

Intellect and Romance

Back from Gallifrey

At Gallifrey One 2012

I traveled to the convention with the ever-lovely and photogenic Hal (she who is awesome and built this blog), who was making her first visit to Los Angeles. After checking into the convention hotel we made our way to Hollywood Boulevard to meet my friend Josh Elder for dinner. We arrived a little before Josh, so Hal and I spent some time exploring the Hollywood Boulevard tourist attractions, primarily Grauman’s Chinese Theater.

Hal at Grauman's Chinese Theater

The forecourt in front of Grauman’s is of course home to its famous collection of celebrity signatures, handprints and footprints in the pavement. Hal is generally not big on seeing famous landmarks or other touristy stuff, but she was still pretty delighted to find the signature and handprints of William “The Thin Man” Powell and the ENTIRE CAST OF STAR TREK! The cast members all left hand prints in addition to their signatures. It should be noted that James Doohan used his right hand with the missing finger (good for him), and Leonard Nimoy placed his hand in the position of the Vulcan salute.

Star Trek Cast in Cement

Next to Grauman’s is the Hollywood location of Madam Tussaud’s Wax Museum. We didn’t buy tickets to go in, but coincidentally I noticed Morgan Freeman standing near the entrance. I went over to say hello and compliment his work on the Electric Company, but apparently he wasn’t interested in discussing that era of his career and wouldn’t even make eye contact with me. Maybe if I’d asked him to narrate a documentary of some kind…

Morgan and Me

After dinner with Josh, Hal and I headed back to our hotel where we eventually met up with Mike and Alicia with whom we were sharing a room for the weekend. The next morning the convention began, and the first tasks at hand were to pick up our badges and get my art entered into the Gallifrey One Art show.

Chris at the Gallifrey One Art Show

I feel obligated to mention that the various Doctor Who-related prints I had in the art show are available in my Etsy Store. If you don’t want to pay the shipping fees, look for me at my next convention appearance.

The rest of the weekend was largely a blur of panels, celebrity spotting and enjoying amazing cosplay (see below). I had a chance to reconnect with a few folks I don’t often see, and got to meet some great new people. One highlight was getting to witness what was unquestionably the highlight of Hal’s weekend: Meeting John DeLancie. John was at the convention because of his role in Torchwood: Miracle Day, but ever the Trekkie, Hal was excited to meet him because he was Q in Star Trek: The Next Generation. Note the difference between Hal’s usual, easy smile for the camera and the extra-wide grin that threatens to rip her face in twain in the picture below.

Hal with John DeLancie

We met a Cyberman, but he seemed to take to Hal more than he did to me.

Hal & Cyberman

Chris & Cyberman

Chris & K-9

Chris and TARDIS Console

Wheelchair Tron

Idris and Suitors

Tiki Dalek

Tiki Davros

Hal vs Dalek

Dalek vs Angel w Hal

Hal as Novice Hame

Hal & Chris meet Inspector Spacetime

So long Gallifrey One 2012

Tangerine Hotel

1) The Late Late Show studio is even smaller than you’d think from watching the show on TV. Imagine how big you think it might be. It’s half that size.

2) All the pre-show coaching and the warm-up comedian made the experience feel like a job interview to Hal.

3) When you hear that a studio is kept cold, make sure Hal brings a winter coat. Seriously.

That said, it was fun seeing Craig Ferguson in person, especially when I’d just done a print riffing on Craig’s Doctor Who fandom. No, I didn’t get to give Craig a copy. You can’t bring ANYTHING like that into the studio and there’s a policy against trying to do that sort of thing.

Tuesday was a very full day. We started out by visiting the DC Entertainment offices in Burbank, and I got to finally meet Jim Chadwick, who has been my editor on Young Justice since I started work on the title a year ago. That’s part of the fun of the comics industry – you do so much long-distance collaboration and often never meet the folks you communicate with by email and phone.

Sarah Gaydos, Jim Chadwick, Batman and Me

After leaving DC, Hal and I met Greg Weisman and Kevin Hopps for lunch at Warner Brothers Animation. Greg is a producer and the head writer for the Young Justice animated series and Kevin is a writer for the show, and together they write the Young Justice tie-in comic that I draw. I’ve met Greg before on a few occasions but I hadn’t met Kevin before. I got to see the offices where the Young Justice staff work, and Greg and Kevin and I got to talk about plans for the comic as well as the peculiarities of the comics and animation businesses. All in all it was a grand time.

Me with Greg Weisman and Kevin Hopps

THAT’S what it’s like visiting these places. It’s fantastic.

Wally, Adam and I

With Rob and Bob. Bob's looking at me.

After that it was back to the hotel for some sleep, since we had a redonkulously early flight back to Minneapolis the next day.

It was a grand adventure, and I can’t wait to visit LA again next year!

Prints for Sale

Most Heinous

Intellect and Romance

Sonic Envy

It’s not ALL Doctor Who stuff. I’ve got my Green Hornet and Re-Animator prints available as well. In the coming weeks I’ll be offering original comic art as well. You can see my shop at the Buy Stuff link above, or go directly to my Etsy Store.

Coming to Gallifrey

This weekend I’ll be attending the Gallifrey One convention in Los Angeles, California, where much Doctor Who geekery will be had. I’m not there as an official Guest and I won’t have a table, but if you’re there and spot me please say hello!

My newest print is below, and I’ll be making it  available at the Gallifrey One Art Show. I’ll soon be relaunching my Etsy store, where you’ll be able to find all my prints, as well as original art from my comic book work.

Intellect and Romance

This makes a lot more sense if you’re a regular viewer of The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson. The Web Site URL does not appear on the actual print.

Doctor Who: The Movie?

So the recent flap over a possible Doctor Who feature film seems to be a disconnect between the BBC’s Film Division and it’s Cardiff-based Television Division, and is being fought in public by wanna-be Who director David Yates (Harry Potter) and current Doctor Who showrunner Steven Moffat (Doctor Who, Sherlock). In short, David Yates wants to “revamp” Doctor Who, making it a big film franchise with big-name actors and a recast Doctor. Steven Moffatt says any Doctor Who feature film would be made in cooperation with the production team of the TV show and the current television Doctor. This got me thinking about whether *any* Doctor Who film would get me that excited.

Peter Cushing as "Doctor Who"

We’ve heard talk about a Doctor Who feature film for years. There have been two of them, made in the 1960’s starring Peter Cushing as the Doctor and the films were made at the height of Dalekmania and are direct adaptations of the first two Dalek stories from the TV show. Peter Cushing is marvelous as the Doctor, but the movies make odd changes to the relatively simple premise of the show that hadn’t yet grown into the massively complex mythology it is today. The Doctor is actually named “Doctor Who”, and is an earth-born scientist who built a time machine in his back yard that looks like a police box for no particular reason. These films could serve as a lesson in the pitfalls of a Doctor Who a feature film out of continuity with the TV series.

This film was never made (and wouldn't have looked this cool)

Tom Baker and Ian Marter tried to get a Doctor Who feature film made in the 1970s but it never happened. And there have been countless rumors and genuine attempts at a feature film since then. (You can read about many of these attempts in the book The Nth Doctor.) Most of these were in the time before the 2005 relaunch of the show, when Doctor Who was either a television series of very (ahem) *modest* production values, or was off the air entirely. The thought of seeing Doctor Who return and on a big budget seemed very exciting, but I was always worried that such a production would lose the quirky, whimsical tone of the show. Well in 2005, thanks to Russell T. Davies and company, Doctor Who did return on a big budget, but it was on television. We got 13 new adventures of The Doctor per year (plus a Christmas special), with production values surprisingly lavish for television, shockingly lavish for British television! And the sometimes-dramatic, somtimes-silly, always-clever tone of the show had evolved into something faster and snappier for the 21st century, but it was most certainly intact!

Doctor Who in 2011

So what do we need a feature film for? Sure the scale could be made grander still, with even more action and bigger stars. But does Doctor Who need that? This is a show that has always been more about great characters, clever stories and witty dialog than epic action. Why do a featrue film given what we’re getting on television?

Well I figured it out. I know what I want in a Doctor Who feature film that would deliver an adventure the TV show could never give us, and with all due respect to Mr. Yates he’s not the one who can deliver it.

Let Pixar make it. Can you imagine a Doctor Who feature film with the strength of story and character, the sense of design and the action of The Incredibles? Or Monsters, Inc.? I realize that a partnership between the BBC and Disney/Pixar for such a film is unlikely to the point of absurdity, but most of these rumored Doctor Who films weren’t ever going to happen. Let me at least fantasize about the one I’d want to see!

Oh, and letting Steven Moffat help with the script probably wouldn’t be a bad idea.