Alpha-9
The Terrible Thing of Alpha-9 is a really stellar animated short brimming with pure, gorgeous cartoon visuals. If you haven't seen it yet, I heartily encourage you to do so! Just try not to think too hard about why this micro-budget independent film, made almost entirely by one man, looks so much better than about 99 percent of the multi-million-dollar animated productions being produced for mainstream television and film. It will only make you feel crazy inside.
Did you know that I have a Twitter account? If not... a world of exciting discovery awaits you! Before the creation of my twitter feed, it was completely impossible for anyone to learn about how asinine my twitter feed is. But good news, friends. Those dark ages are over.
-Sam Logan
Swag-o-rama
Admire this beautiful, painstakingly crafted hub site that I made to help direct folks to the two different places Sam and Fuzzy swag is now sold! As you can see, while all our t-shirts and posters have been moved into the shiny new Topatoco Store, our more personalized items -- books and original art commissions -- are still being sold directly on the site, so I can keep signing, drawing, and generally manhandling them in person up here in Canada. Hooray!
-Sam Logan
Sam and Fuzzy Q & A: Exploding Edition
Got a question you want answered? Just drop me an email with "Q & A" in the subject line!
"How can Fuzzy have a cousin, as shown in the 2002 Christmas special, if he does not know where he comes from?" -Loïc
As you can probably tell from the unusual art style, the 2002 Christmas special is very old... much older than any of the other comics on this site. It's actually from a much earlier version of Sam and Fuzzy... one that really isn't in continuity with any of the work on this site.
Sam and Fuzzy went through a good four or five different iterations before I settled on the premise that started the webcomic. Each one had it's own unique plot, and completely different backstories for the main characters. In one early version, Sam was 12-years-old and Fuzzy was -- no joke -- a magical teddy bear that came to life whenever someone uttered the phrase "ursus mutatus". It was every bit as horrible as it sounds.
Actually, it was probably worse than it sounds.
Anyhow, the 2002 Christmas special was from the very last version I made before the one that lauched this site. In those comics, Fuzzy had a wide variety of relatives, all of whom looked like slightly tweaked versions of the basic Fuzzy design... kind of like all of Snoopy's extended family in Peanuts. But when I rebooted things for the last time, I decided to chuck that idea... I felt like having so many nearly-identical characters running around made the original one seem less special.
And with that simple, cruel act, I wiped poor Trevor from existence. But many of his personality traits eventually found their way into another character. I'm sure you can all figure out who that is!
"I seem to recall you saying that you do the comic with pen and
ink, and then scan it in. If my memory is correct, and you are using ink,
how much ink do you go through a week? Month?" -Eddie
I do draw the comic on paper! But I use Staedtler brush pens, which are your standard one-use, disposable, non-refillable suckers. So while I don't go through any actual bottles of ink per se... I do go through boxes and boxes of pens. Each one generally lasts me about three to four weeks.
I should clarify, though, that I never ink in any of the really big black spaces that Sam and Fuzzy is often littered with. I just outline them, then fill them in afterwards on the computer with the bucket tool. That helps keep my ink consumption down. I'm pretty sure inking in all the black spaces in even one comic as black-heavy as Wednesday's would be enough to murder an entire pen.
"How could Sam and Fuzzy only known each other for nine years? Wouldn't that mean that everything from the beginning of the comic up to the ten year skip here happened in only one year?" -Jordan
No! But this kind of confusion is totally my fault, for constantly using vague terms like "ten years later" instead of actual dates.
Here's the deal: the new stories with Devahi and N-M-S take place ten years after the flashbacks with Hazel. But they don't take place ten years after all the previous Sam and Fuzzy storylines. Those storylines took place between the Hazel flashbacks and the new N-M-S stories.
If you are curious, you can find a much more ridiculously detailed timeline in the newspost here!
"Ok I know that I've asked this before but I didn't really get a proper
answer last time. What is with your obsession with Robert Boyle?! I know who he is now thanks to the last time I asked but my question was supposed to be interpreted as WHY do YOU reference him so often?" -Patrick
What's your obsession with Robert Boyle, Patrick? He died hundreds of years ago! You really need to let go.
That's all for this week. See you on Monday!
-Sam Logan
