Angry Zen Master

Apparently, my girlfriend Audrey and I appear many years younger than our actual age. For me, this makes sense since Asians appear to be age resistant. But for Audrey, I think it is her hotness rather than her Frenchness that hides her years.

This happened to us on the way to see Kung Fu Hustle. Why are you still reading this? You should be in the theater already! So we get up to the ticket taking pixie and he says, "Well, you guys are probably old enough but just in case, but I gotta see your IDs.” How annoying. How dare he stand between me and my woman and ultimate kung fu bliss! HOW DARE HE! He handed back my ID and waved us in declaring that he didn’t need to see Audrey’s ID. I posited that since I’m over 25, I could qualify as her legal guardian. It was then that I breathed a sigh of relief in the knowledge that Audrey did not know Buddha Palm. I would surely be smashed flat had she knowledge of kung fu.

You must see Kung Fu Hustle. If the Brothers Shaw had access to modern CG technology, Five Deadly Venoms may have been something like this, except less funny. Nothing about Stephen Chow’s films is what you would call typical, but as one can expect from his style of film making, Kung Fu Hustle is a sort of subversive kung fu movie. It’s dark humor sets it apart from traditional and modern kung fu movies within the first minutes of the film. And he pushes it further still.

One of the great things that I appreciate about all of Stephen Chow’s films, whether it be Shaolin Soccer or God of Cookery or Kung Fu Hustle, is that his heroes are very human. Movies like Crouching Tiger and House of Flying Daggers present very stately and beautiful heroes with elegant movements (i.e. HOT ASS ZHANG ZIYI). Stephen Chow’s characters are homely and rough and many times very crude.

The fight sequences will evoke a certain Matrix-esque quality. But true fans of the kung fu film genre will recognize the nods to the old Shaw Brothers classics. The nod to Bruce Lee is truly precious, a moment I was unable to do justice in comic form so I chose a different subject for this update.

So go on! Get! Go catch this flick right the fuck now!

Nope, your eyes do not decieve you, the title header is correct. I’ve decided on a Tuesday/Friday update schedule. How long that lasts is anyone’s guess, but it’ll work for now.

I might post up some WIPs of some stuff I’m working up for the comic sometime later in the week. Don’t know if it’ll work out the way I hope, but it’s always fun to try.

The real Great Teacher Charlie caught a mistake in the dialog for the comic. I left out a key word in the last panel. Good thing he caught it. I read the thing over like five times before I posted. That’s what I get for posting at 4am. Thanks Charlie!

I started a WIP thread over at CGTalk. I’ve started modeling a base mesh for the characters of the webcomic. I’ve run into some slight problems with the hands and feet, but I’m not too worried about it. If it turns out I can’t fix it in ZBrush, I can fix it in Maya.

Oh, and if you’re a digital artist, you have to check out CGTalk. It’s one of the greatest digital art forums out there. It’s moderated by a number of professionals in the digital art world. I know I’ve learned a lot just checking out the highlighted pieces everyday. If you work with pixels, get your ass over there!