The Drink Tank 080 (2006).pdf

Judith Morel’s Page of The Drink Tank

Numbered 80

OK, I’m fairly certain that we can

all agree that Chris isn’t in the best of

moods right now. He’s been through

a lot, and when I briely saw him this

weekend, he was in a mood that I call

edgy Chris. We heard Cher’s Half-

Breed and he obviously started think-

ing about the song and how it relates

to him. Believe it or not, even though

letting Cher get to you in that way only

happens to guys who have other is-

sues, Half-Breed pretty much applies

to Chris...in the weirdest way.

Chris wrote a thing about the

last few days of his father’s life that he

has me working on turning into a real

piece and he’s doing the same for me

with a piece about my Dad’s death. In

the thing that’ll show up in The Drink

Tank issue about families, he talks

about seeing that part of his family for

the irst time in years and noticing that

he was a Mexican...but only to a point.

I’m not sure how best to put

this, and it only half-way comes across

in the article, but Chris’ cousins are

all Half-Mexican in the same way as

Chris, but all of them are the children

of full-blooded Mexicans who lived life

the way you hear about on the news.

Except for Chris’ Dad and David, the

second oldest, all the brothers and sis-

ters have done some time, have done

their drugs, have made mistakes that

would make a person suspect that they

were sabotaging themselves. They all

have the same racial make-up, they’re

all half-breeds, but Chris is the only

who broke out.

Chris graduated High School.

Chris graduated college.

Chris has had a steady job for

nearly a decade.

Chris has even won these

strange little awards that mean noth-

ing.

Chris has managed to get into

trouble with little things ( saving for

one FBI issue-CG ) and has always

managed to get out of it. He’s separated

from his family by something that is

really insurmountable: he’s not a fuck-

up.

That’s why Half-Breed made

Chris misty: instead of having to face

the fact that people had dozens of neg-

ative preconceptions of what it meant

to be Cherokee/Armenian,Chris’s got

all of the positive stereotypes of being a

white guy and none of the negatives of

what it means to be a Mexican.

And takes him further away from

the rest of his family than anything.

M Lloyd’s Page of The Drink Tank Issue 80

I’ve discovered that sex is what

The Drink Tank is all about. Even in

the issue where it’s all about us cov-

ering for Chris when he needs a little

time to do nothing but layout, I need to

bring a little sex to the proceedings.

I was talking with a bunch of Ex-

Pats about things we missed about the

US. Most folks mentioned things like

American TV, good BBQ or Mexican

food. I had my answer: slutty college

girls.

Now, everyone pointed out that

there were plenty of slutty European

chicks who dressed even more provoc-

atively than the Jersey girls who show

garters and high milky inner-thighs.

While I gave them that point, I had to

make mention that there was a signii-

cant difference between those Europe-

an skanks and the ones that populate

most of the major college towns.

You see, the European girls are

just trying to get laid, just planning

on having a good night’s fun while

fucking a semi-stranger. The Ameri-

can college slut, she’s a different bird,

she’s trying to kill something with her

ishnets and same-sex face sucking.

She’s trying to revenge her father, she’s

trying to make up for all that time in

high school when she could have been

sleeping with multiple partners. She’s

trying to do all of it by taking her life

into that hole that everyone in the US

says is the ilthiest. She gives in to the

sex, to the dirty, to the fucking. It’s

violence. In Europe, she’s just plan-

ning on entertaining her moist places,

in America, she’s trying to bring about

something much different.

When we talked about this more,

everyone wanted to tell their story of

that girl who was obviously trying to

make it all happen. I told them how I

would search those girls out and take

advantage of their rebellion. I was good

at it, still am if I give it a shot, but the

others had some fun stories too.

Larry had discovered a good way

to gather womanfruit. He would go

to a bar and say that he was a psych

student and he would do a brief in-bar

analysis. She’d tell him things and he’d

give back answers meant to drive her

into bed.

Larry was an Art History major.

He’s a genius.

The Continuing Adventures of Frank Wu and Guidolon

This Week’s Installment: MANAGING TO LEAD

ive shows now on Adult Swim” to “The

characters need to be re-designed and

re-animated” and “The voices just

don’t work.”

Curiously, almost all the positive

feedback was at World Horror. And all

the negative feedback was at the party.

At World Horror, the folks who

saw it were mostly writers (but also

a few artists), and perhaps they were

just being encouraging, or perhaps

they understood (as I explained before

5/15/06

I’ve learned a lot about

leadership in the last few months.

Encouraging people to be creative,

yet keeping them more or less on the

path of the overall vision of the ilm.

But now, as time grows short, now I

must Direct. Which means sometimes

making decisions people don’t like.

Yesterday we had our irst group

meeting, and the irst showing of a

rough cut of the ilm. BenniiD, who’s

animated probably three-fourths of

it, just about killed himself to put

things together in time. I had a BBQ

at my place, and about half of the 25

or so people who’ve worked on this

showed. One of voice actors,

our music guy (Dave Fleminger, whose

work makes this piece ly), and most

of the army of artist/animators. The

night before I had brought the piece -

about 6 or 7 minutes - and a portable

personal DVD player for people to see

at the World Horror Convention up in

the city. I had one set of headphones,

so people sat in a corner and watched

it. And from across the room, I

watched them, to see if they laughed,

if they squinted and leaned into the

screen. Over the weekend, I heard a

wide range of opinions from “Great”

and “Better animation than four or

I showed it), that it was perhaps 75%

done. It was at the party that I heard

all the speciic things that were wrong,

which was of course disconcerting and

disappointing. We have essentially two

weeks to inish production before we

have to make copies of this before I get

on a plane to New York and try to sell

this at the trade show June 20-22.

But, oh the comments!

I stopped taking notes after 4

pages.

The general consensus was that

the Production Assistant - a teddy-

bear-like male ingenue who arrives

on the movie set cheerful, but leaves

embittered by Guidolon’s monomania

- has to go. The transitions between

scenes - just about all of them -

don’t work. Many of the shots are

too complicated. For example, Todd

Tennant’s image of Guidolon’s trailer

- which appeared on the cover of Drink

Tank #76 - is great as a fanzine cover,

but too complex to just lash on the

screen for four seconds. (The solution

- start in tight on one spot, like

Guidolon’s name, and then zoom out).

There are too many talking scenes.

The zooms are discontinuous. Cap’n

Takao’s lips are too red.

A small but vocal contingent really

wanted Guidolon to be cutesiied

(“neotenous” in Rachel Forbes’ apt

words). When I enlisted Rodney

Artiles and Eugene Sheshenin to do

sculptures of Guidolon, I gave them

free reign to modify Guido - to show

that the

character had lexibility. To show that

he would still be recognizable despite

minor changes. But some of the artists

said that their friends irst thought

Guidolon

was “ugly” or “scary,” whereas others

kept saying, “He’s perfect - he’s cute.”

I am Captain Kirk, with Spock

and McCoy on either side, arguing for

their viewpoint.

But I alone must decide.

I will direct and I decide that

And those were but some of the

minor, easily-ixed problems.

Some of the other suggestions

- which would involve huge amounts

of work - were simply untenable. A

lot of discussion centered around the

visualization of Guidolon himself.

Todd Tennant’s original Guidolon

design is Guidolon. He will look like

what he looks like now. (Partly this is

a practical decision - there is simply

not enough time to re-design and re-

animate all his scenes.) But more

importantly, I like the way he looks.

What he lacks in beauty he makes up

for in personality. He is suspended

in that no-man’s land between cute

and ugly, between friendly and scary,

between enthusiastic and crazy.

I will never create a character

(or do a painting) which 90-100% of

the people like. I am not out to do

“Friends.” I want Guidolon to be a little

scary (he is a giant monster, after all).

And I want him to be a little cute.

Chris Garcia’s voice.

with piles of sketches and rejected

character designs and pencil scribbles

and inished backgrounds - a slew of

images to show the huge amount of

effort behind this creation. To prove

that we are the Hardest Working

Artists in Show Business. And in

the binder will appear the cutesiied

versions of Guidolon.

The question is prioritizing what

desperately needs to be done over the

next few weeks. So many voices. So

many suggestions. Only a few of these

can be implemented.

No. I am the director and I say

that Chris Garcia is Guidolon. His

crazed personality, his inlection - he is

Guidolon, and if he fails to appear so,

the fault is in my directing.

No, I am director, and Guidolon

will appear as he appears, and Chris

Garcia will be his voice.

Guidolon’s appearance must

be marked by as speciic locus on the

visual landscape. If that locus were too

close to Cutesy-land, then there would

be no room for pushing the design one

way or the other. If he were too

anthropomorphized, then his animal

nature would be out of reach. As it

is, precariously balanced between

cute and ugly, his cutesiied or

anthropomorphized versions can

appear in future

dream sequences

or similar. Or toys.

Rodney

Artiles did have

an excellent idea

(one of many).

He suggested

that I assemble

“scrapbook

binders” (he used

a different term).

These would

be to show the

Cartoon Network

execs the complete

script, along

Yes, as was said at the party,

perhaps the wings lap too much.

Yes, perhaps the deelie boppers cycle

through the same set of motions too

many times.

But the priority must be ixing the

transitions and the huge gaps of

undone animation.

I think about the lurry of

opinions expressed. I am glad they

were all said, because they bring up

issues that will need to be dealt with.

And, yes, I should have done the

complete soundtrack before doing a

single frame of animation. And I should

have had this meeting a month ago.

Oh well.

I also know that artists are most

critical of their own work. And that

many of the people in the room are

desperately hoping that this project

will sell. They want full-time jobs.

They are rightfully worried about their

Guidolon is both sweet and sour.

Some folks said they didn’t like

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