Friday 24 June 2016

Weekly Update #140: Is Cerebus In Hell?


IS CEREBUS IN HELL? the video. (2016)
Randy Bowen's one-of-a-kind MELMOTH CEREBUS sculpted figure (a commissioned gift from Diana Schutz in 1993) starring "in" a 1911 Italian silent film adaptation of DANTE'S INFERNO. The wiggling legs of Cassius Longinus in the mouth of Lucifer and their subsequent transition to Lucifer Chew Toy are worth the price of admission. Written and directed by Dave Sim. (2016, 8 mins.)

"An instant classic!" 

                  genericblurbsforsale.com 

39 comments:

Stephen R. Bissette said...

Oh, man, is this a gem! Dave, you'll not be amazed if I tell you I've had DANTE'S INFERNO in my DVD collection for years now...

Stephen R. Bissette said...

...and what am I to make of Dave Sim and Alan Moore making MOVIES in the 21st century, after both were often disparaging of my love of cinema (back in the late 20th century)?

Unknown said...

It's pretty funny. Sandeep came in with it one day MONTHS into the project. "Oh we HAVE to do something with this!" Had to shoot the whole thing in pitch darkness before the sun came up. 1 am to 6 am. The Manticore is terrible and they must have known it was terrible when they shot it. It's only in the movie for, like 3 seconds!

Unknown said...

So far, I'm able to keep it to 4 minutes. If I do something longer than that, report me to somebody.

Stephen R. Bissette said...


I envy the fun you clearly had with this; very cool, and lots of fun!

Unknown said...

Sandeep's at home coordinating all of this. Posting a strip every half hour and then Tweeting and Facebooking it -- as well as sending specialty strips we did for 35 comic stores. He's going to run a list at the end of the day -- 6 pm -- and we'll see how many stores have tweeted theirs.

If anyone has a question for Bissette or me -- or Sandeep -- jump in!

Unknown said...

Sandeep and I call it "Funny Friday" -- we work exclusively on CEREBUS IN HELL? (that's pronounced "Cerebus in Hell with a question mark" by the way) on Friday. He does his in photoshop and I mock mine up with little cut-out Cerebus figures and Joe Kubert Comiccraft lettering word balloons.

It's definitely fun. And at the end of the day making myself laugh, I get to read 3 or 4 or 5 of Sandeep's and laugh at those.

Unknown said...

I have to admit that a lot of the time I'm thinking, "This is for you, Bissette". Like Neil's 24-hour comic where he couldn't draw the Emperor's horse so "here's a dirty stinking zombie, for Steve Bissette!"

Stephen R. Bissette said...

I'll keep checking in ever half hour or so, so bringit on!

George Peter Gatsis said...

Very nice video...

But where is the call back to CerebusDownloads or anything else regarding Cerebus?

George Peter Gatsis

Stephen R. Bissette said...

Dave: I am honored. So, where's the f**kin' DINOSAURS, then?

[Note polite concession to language parameters]

Unknown said...

Steve's going to be filling in for me during my prayer times today -- approx. 1:30 and 5:30 -- True Dave Sim stories only Bissette knows about.

I'm hoping Sandeep can chime in if he gets a spare 10 seconds. That's a BIG IF, though!

Unknown said...

Hi George! It's JUST on A Moment of Cerebus today. "Dance with the one what brung ya!" The strips are going to link to CerebusDownloads. We're roughly seven minutes away from the first one. The first two are A Moment of Cerebus Exclusives!

Wait, that's not true. We're e-mailing the first one to the COMICS JOURNAL as well. You'll see why.

Stephen R. Bissette said...

As they say in the horror movie ballyhoo, "PRAY FOR DAY!" Apropos to CEREBUS IN HELL, revisionist use of ancient PD Italian horror cinema, etc....

Unknown said...

Dinosaurs. I knew the film was missing something. Also, notice that I described it as being 8 minutes long in the caption. I WORKED ALL !@#$ING NIGHT AND IT'S ONLY FOUR MINUTES LONG??!!

George Peter Gatsis said...

It always FELLS longer in hell, than it does here on Earth... ( not that I know ANYTHING about it )

GPG

Unknown said...

Is it just my computer? It's indicating "0 comments" and we're up to 15. Talk about a bad review of the Dave 'n" Steve 'n' George Show!!

George Peter Gatsis said...

Dave, simple... refresh your web browser...

Stephen R. Bissette said...

Dave, you just have to leave comments and then refresh your page; you'll get a proper comments count (though it doesn't matter; they're all here)...

Jeff Seiler said...

Very clever, Dave! Well worth a week (just a week!) off from the weekly update. These images of hell(?) remind me of what it was like trying to fight through the computer glitches and issues when I was 'reading Reads...Nice job, both of you.

George Peter Gatsis said...

Just saw the covers... VERY SEXY STUFF!

GPG

Unknown said...

Hi Jeff! Thanks, Jeff. It's been interesting "doing Hell" for six months how many times you go, "You know, this is a lot like [fill in irritating real world experience]

Stephen R. Bissette said...

I remember what it was like spending about three months+ "in Hell" back in the SWAMP THING days. It was, of course, "our" (Alan Moore/me/John Totleben/Rick Veitch) invented Hell variant via the DC universe, but Gustave Doré was my go-to reference imagery of choice as well.

crazyyears said...

Dave,

Just want to say thanks for the movie and the upcoming strips. I'll be pimping the hell out of 'em on my Facebook page and at every Comics Meetup Night at Third Coast Comics in Chicago. There was a lot of interest when I brought your Free Cerebus Download offer to the gang.

I'm really looking forward to CEREBUS IN HELL? and am pleased you've found a way to entertain your fans during the long wait for SDOAR. I know SDOAR is your main focus and I really do appreciate the time and effort you and Sandeep have put into it. Thanks again and good luck!

--- Michael Hunt

Menachem Luchins said...

Just an FYI, Dave- in "classic comic store" fashion I am going to be withholding Escape Pod Comics exclusive strip for a few days. I'll be all, "Oh I think we never got it or something..." and then when people are clamoring I can say, "Oh, I found some in the back" a charge 10 times the price!!
Oh wait, I don't do that... Darn... hmmm...
Oh, okay, I'll post mine- but probably after Shabbos, if that's cool.

Kousmichoff said...

This made my Friday-- hilarious! Thanks for doing this.

(And thank you, Mr. Bissette, for sharing your comments. Huge fan of your work!)

Stephen R. Bissette said...

Thanks, Kousmichoff; much appreciated. Dave invited me in for the afternoon, and how could I say no?

Unknown said...

Menachem - you might look into autographing a few copies of the ESCAPE POD strip and getting them CGC graded.

You aren't really reading all this infernal crap this close to sundown, are you? Better check Leviticus 15 (?) and see what you need to do. A long hot shower, I'd guess, at the very least!



Unknown said...

Michael Hunt - Appreciate the back-up! Say hi to everyone at Third Coast for us!

Troy Little said...

Can I pitch in an "LOL" or two? :D

I think this is a great idea, and a clever work around while the hand rests. Looking forward to it!!

(Side note for Dave - here's a link to that Cerebus #2 page I did a re-creation of ((with some liberties)). Hope you like it!)

http://meanwhilestudios.tumblr.com/post/144550348217/happy-60th-dave-sim-in-honour-of-daves-60th-i

Unknown said...

Hi Troy! WONDERFUL page! You're definitely the first one "into the pool" on ULTIMATE SWORDS OF CEREBUS Vol.1 planned as a benefit for Hero Alliance. I've also asked Jim McLauchlin at Hero to track down potential contributors. I don't think IDW will have a HUGE page rate to offer, but hopefully enough that a lot of the amazing talents they're helping will be willing to do a page (or two or three or four).

I've also asked Steve to pitch the idea to some of his students and alumni. It should be the CRAZIEST version of the first four issues of CEREBUS in existence.

The only rule is that the page has to begin and end the way the actual page does. Apart from that, everyone is free to improvise like crazy and, of course, everyone will own their page (i.e. full rights to reproduce and sell it in any form they see fit in perpetuity) (reciprocal rights: A-V can reproduce it as well).

Menachem Luchins said...

1. I am so glad you and Troy are connecting here, Dave- His piece was fantastic, and I am pretty sure he said somewhere he'd love to do more.
2. I can think of a few artist who might be down for this, actually, if you could have Ted or Chris (or whoever at IDW is in charge) send me some details, I may be able to approach some great artists that might not hear about it otherwise.
3. Praise the creator, in summer Shabbos can start as late as 830ish, so I am able to not only stay open a little, as I always do, but leisurely make my way into the day making sure everything is set, set aside and/or squeaky clean.

Unknown said...

By contrast, this is the Most Brutal Ramadan in 17 years: fasting from 4 am to 11 pm. It's interesting that I used to talk to Sandeep about that back in the glamourpuss days. "It's somewhere up ahead. 2014? Where the fasting day gets longer and longer over the summer solstice."

And here we are! Ramadan 19 with 11 days to go. There's also this weird thing where the first prayer time hits 3:52 -- AND STAYS THERE FOR LIKE A WEEK! WHO'S IDEA WAS THIS!?! And same with the last prayer time 10:56, 10:56, 10:56, 10:56. And then -- FINALLY! -- starts going back one minute at a time. By Christmas, it's a few minutes after 6 pm.

Definitely keeps you on your toes!

Shalom!

Menachem Luchins said...

The Ramadan thing is inexplicable to me- the only reason I can even begin to understand is because Judaism has a leap year system worked in specifically to avoid this happening!
But prayer times are the same- Thank G-d we believe there is an "optimum" time that is NOT the first possible moment of sun.

Unknown said...

It's actually pre-dawn when (theoretically) you can "distinguish a white thread from a black thread". I've always wanted to check that out, but I don't own any thread and it would seem odd to go and buy two spools of thread just to check.

Whoever it is -- presumably G-d -- I'll take their word for it.

Learning how to shave and perform the ritual ablutions between 3:33 am when the alarm goes off and 3:52 seems a more fruitful use of my time. Haven't nicked myself once in 17 years. Praise G-d!

Robbie Foggo said...

As a fan of Cerebus and also if classic horror silent films, the clip is fantastic.

Really looking forward to reading more installments and getting the issues when they arrive!

Unknown said...

Robbie Foggo! Thanks for posting that!
What we're doing is promoting and demoting strips based on how funny we think they are so all of July is blocked in by week and August is a pile of 31 finished "candidates" and then September is made up of what's left over.

Sandeep and I are both looking forward to just doing strips on Funny Friday instead of having to figure out "How do we LAUNCH this thing?"

See you at CerebusDownloads starting Saturday!

Stephen R. Bissette said...

FYI, Dave, there's also a 1935 Spencer Tracy film DANTE'S INFERNO which features a marvelous Inferno sequence, but that's not Public Domain. If you and the team choose to tackle another one of these, check out the silent Italian gem MACISTE ALL'INFERNO / MACISTE IN HELL (1926), which is on DVD and all over the internet and quite fit for more Cerebus-in-Hell appropriations!

al roney said...

So I don't check in for a week and the day I do (after finding CAN4 delivered!), I see this?!?!

Holy...I'm speechless.