Linko! VIII

Hey gang,

It's been a long, lonely, frustrating week here at Linko! Central, so let's cleanse the pallet late on a Friday with some funny videos, huh?

* First up, courtesy of Dave Paggi, how not to interview Grant Morrison:



I had to watch that one in 12 second snippets because of the extreme awkwardness, and I still haven't made it through to the end. If you can, you must be some kind of sadist. In other Dave news, we've got a much nicer sight – some NYC school kids singing "Landslide" for their teacher. Super adorable:



Back to comics, a video from C.B. Cebulski (whose blog you should click through to for awesome word from the Barcelona con I wish I was at right now), there's a translated interview from French TV with Pluto and 20th Century Boys mangaka Naoki Urasawa right here although I can't figure out how to embed it.

Finally, via James Walker, Fuck the Kingons and their stupid new glasses:



* OK! As for the cool comics-related links I stumbled upon this week, let's start with something I that threw me as I didn't even realize this existed: The job of working as a comics coloring Flatter. No, not a Flatterer (although I'm sure colorists like that too). Joe Keatinge of Image put a link up on his Twitter about breaking in by doing basic color guidelines for colorists to build their computer magic on, a process also known as Flattening. Read all about it here. If you end up getting work by following this post, you have to buy me and Joe a Baby Ruth later.

* Complete fanboy link: I'm always a little astounded when I find sites like this one which spells out Wolverine's entire life in exact detail over many, many pages.

* Semi-related nerd link: after watching at least one scene from every "Star Wars" movie on MTV over Memorial Day weekend (MTV, by the way, is generally more repulsive than I even remembered), I fell down the Wikipedia Hole and came across this mind-blowing interview with George Lucas that ran in Rolling Stone shortly after "Star Wars" came out. I could probably write 12 blog posts covering everything I thought and felt while reading that thing, but just not today. Still, if there's one link you click through this week, that HAS to be it.

* Art Link #1!: Rafael Grampa draws Batman and Robin!! I'm not even posting a teaser. You owe it to yourself to click through and see the full image (via Dave and Robot 6).



* Art Link #2!: Some wicked Star Wars/Batman mash-ups found via Agent M. Above: Luke Nightwalker.

* Web Comics Link!: I giggled a lot reading Nedroid's Party Cat saga. (Via Hudson)

* Funny thing I almost forgot about Link!: I know I linked to Dave's Tumblr already, but he has been having a fucking field day making fun of old Batman covers. An example, you say?



"WTF, Batman & Robin? The Joker literally has enough bad luck to get himself killed 100 different kinds of ways, some serious “Final Destination” shit, and you can’t wipe those ridiculous smirks off your face and be serious for one second?"

* Tech Link!: I'm wary of Google releasing yet another "life changing" platform. I mean, I know I'm an old man when it comes to embracing technology, but do I really need a program that integrates E-Mail and IM and sharing videos and bunch of other bullshit? They seem to think so. (Via Jonah)

* New York Times Link #1: I read this essay about the math of romance like three times this week.

* New York Times Link #2: I found this story about how much teens have "embraced" hugging (har har) to be interesting as I did this follow up post of "experts" trying to explain where teen fads come from. I always thought that the point of teen fads was that as soon as adults figured out where they came from and what they meant, they stopped being cool. Sometimes you don't want to know where he pulls the rabbit from, you know?

* Finally, "America is fucked up" Link!: This is what's going on in Casey Sejas' home state right now.