Here's a closer look at the Evil Inc emails...
“It’s good ta be da king…”
While watching Mel Brooks: The 99-Year-Old Man, three things jumped out at me and immediately elbowed their way into my creative psyche.
First: Fear. Or rather, the systematic, professional-grade obliteration of fear. Again and again, the documentary circles back to how much of Mel Brooks’ creative power came from refusing to be intimidated — by authority, by convention, by “good taste,” or by the quiet little voice that says don’t do that, people might judge you. That hit me right in the gut.
If fear is the tax we all pay for wanting to make things, Brooks just… stopped paying it.
Second: as the Zoomers would say, that man was horny on main.
I rewatched History of the World, Part I last night, and wow — no easing into it. From cavemen masturbating in the opening moments to wall-to-wall boob jokes, dick jokes, and lust as a driving historical force, the movie commits early and never lets up. It’s joyful. It’s shameless. It’s aggressively adolescent in the best possible way.
And as the World's Okayest Smut Dad, I found it deeply affirming. There’s something comforting about realizing that one of the most celebrated comedy legends of all time built his empire by saying, “Yes, but what if we made it dirtier?”
Third (and finally): whatever happened to Mary-Margaret Humes?
Va-va-va voom. That is all.
Taken together, it’s a reminder I didn’t know I needed: Fear is optional. Horniness is timeless. And comedy works best when it’s unembarrassed about what it loves.
Which is… honestly a pretty solid Evil Inc mission statement when you think about it.
Transcript
Panel 1
Caption (yellow box):
The next day…
Dr. Muskiday (entering the nearly empty office, which is empty, speaking):
Where is everybody?!
Didn’t they get my email??
Panel 2
Giant Tess (holding up a red book):
Here’s a guide to proper terminology in the workplace.
You’ll want to read it.
Panel 3
Giant Tess, continues in a narration box:
“Desi and ‘Dragon’ took one look at the subject line and got exactly the wrong idea.”
Inset image below narration:
An email inbox is shown with the subject line highlighted:
All-hands meeting — NOW!!
Other visible email subjects include:
- “Reminder: It’s Casual Fridays, Not ‘Casualty’”
- “Who Keeps Feeding the Lava Lamp?”
- “RE: Are Monologues Considered Testimony?”
- “Janitor’s Closet…?”
- “Re: Re: Re: Stop Replying All”
Panel 4
Giant Tess’ narration (yellow box):
“When I caught them, I told them to beat it.”
Giant Tess (pointing angrily):
(No dialogue)
Desdemona and Iron Dragon are caught mid-makeout on the floor.
Panel 5
Giant Tess:
I’ll… um… need that book after you’re finished with it.
DETAILED ALT TEXT
A five-panel comic set inside the Evil Inc corporate office.
Panel 1:
A yellow narration box reads “THE NEXT DAY…”. A wide shot of an empty open-plan office filled with gray cubicles, rolling office chairs, desktop computers, and filing cabinets. Dr. Muskiday — a short, fly creature in a lab jacket — walks into a nearly empty office. Giant Tess is standing there, looking annoyed. Dr. Musiday says, “WHERE IS EVERYBODY?!” followed by “DIDN’T THEY GET MY EMAIL??”
Panel 2:
A closer shot of Giant Tess holding up a red paperback book titled “Evil Inc. Style & Speech Guide.” Dr. Muskiday’s large compound eyes peer up from the bottom of the panel. Tess calmly explains, “HERE’S A GUIDE TO PROPER TERMINOLOGY IN THE WORKPLACE. YOU’LL WANT TO READ IT.”
Panel 3:
Giant Tess’ dialogue is continued in a yellow narration box: “DESI AND ‘DRAGON’ TOOK ONE LOOK AT THE SUBJECT LINE AND GOT EXACTLY THE WRONG IDEA.”
Below is a close-up of an email inbox. The highlighted message reads: “ALL-HANDS MEETING — NOW!!” Other humorous subject lines fill the inbox, including reminders about Casual Fridays, questions about lava lamps, legal monologues, janitor’s closets, and an email chain titled “Re: Re: Re: Stop Replying All.”
Panel 4:
Another yellow narration box continues Giant Tess’ dialogue: “WHEN I CAUGHT THEM, I TOLD THEM TO BEAT IT.”
The scene shows Giant Tess pointing angrily at two coworkers on the office floor between cubicles. Desdemona, a red-skinned devil woman with small horns and a curvy build, is sitting in Iron Dragon’s lap. Iron Dragon, a muscular man in dark clothing with dragon-themed elements, has his arms around her. They are clearly caught mid-makeout and look startled and embarrassed.
Panel 5:
Giant Tess stands with Dr. Muskiday beside her, who is now holding the red Evil Inc. Style & Speech Guide. Tess looks awkward and thoughtful, one finger raised to her chin, as she says, “I’LL… UM… NEED THAT BOOK AFTER YOU’RE FINISHED WITH IT.”
Last week, the hosting for two of my other comics went toes-up, and I had to do a quick down-n-dirty WordPress site for both of them. (
Don’t judge the sites too harshly if you go… it’s a work in progress!) And, as I was doing so, it occurred to me that new readers of Evil Inc may be completely unaware of some of the other things that I do (or that I’ve done) in comics. So, here’s a quick overview for anybody who is interested:
My Patreon supporters get to see bonus cartoons and other behind-the-scenes content that no one else has access to. Please consider signing up — even if it’s the $1 level. All of those dollar-pledges help me keep working on comics!
Phables ran from 2006-2008 in the
Philadelphia Daily News. Each week, they’d give me a full tabloid-sized page in the paper to tell a story about everyday life in Philadelphia through a comic. Some of these were my stories, and some of them were stories that readers wrote in with.
I’m still tweaking the site, but go check out the comics. They’re bigger and crisper than I was ever able to display them back in 2006. It’s work that I’m tremendously proud of.
In 2006, it was named the best newspaper column in Philadelphia by the Society of Professional Journalists. That was kind of huge. It wasn’t awarded best cartoon or best infographic. It was acknowledged as a newspaper
column — one of the posts with the highest prestige in the newsroom. In 2007, it was nominated for the Eisner Award.
Here’s one of my favorites, introduced below…
All of the Phables cartoons are collected into a swell book that you can
buy from me (or
on Amazon.com).
Here’s another project I rarely talk about here.
Webcomics.com is a site that I run that features daily posts offering advice, information, tutorials and support for cartoonists working on the Web.
It’s a subscription site — $30 for 12 months of access or a special one-month Trial Membership for $5. I post four times a week with something new of relevance to cartoonists, and I do a dive into the archive on Fridays to bring up something valuable that members may have missed. This is an archive of information that I’ve been building day-by-day since 2009. It’s got answers to virtually any question you might have on topics that vary from the craft of cartooning to expanding your business.
Plus you get access to a private forum of serious professional cartoonists where you can talk frankly about issues — and get intelligent, valuable feedback.
The How To Make Webcomics book launched the site, and my writing there formed the basis of The Webcomics Handbook.
Courting Disaster was another
Daily News project that found its own life on the Web. When the paper started a sex-advice column, I offered to do a weekly cartoon to accompany it. They would respond to two letters from readers every week, and I’d do a cartoon based on one of them. My goal was to a smart, sexy
Playboy-style cartoon — while maintaining the content restrictions of a daily newspaper.
Courting Disaster was a blast! You can still find
the books for sale on Lulu.com. And the eBook can
be downloaded here, at
DriveThru and at
Amazon.
This one is badly in need of a new Web site. Those strips hold up remarkably well, and if they were displayed bigger on that old site, I think people would tear through that archive.
Greystone Inn was my first comic strip — running from Feb. 2000 – June 2005 (when I launched Evil Inc). It was a comic strip about the fictional cast and crew of… a comic strip. But, like
Roger Rabbit, the cartoons were living, breathing creatures. Many Evil Inc characters, like Lightning Lady, got their start in Greystone. Heck, that’s where the Evil Inc concept was born! (And if you want to read that storyline,
it’s a special bonus in this month’s Evil Inc eComic!
You can get the entire four-and-a-half-year run of Greystone Inn in a
beautiful hardcover book. And you can also get your copy as a
downloadable PDF for your digital device.
Podcasts
Had enough? I didn’t think so. You can also catch me on the several different podcasts I host! (
and a few I don’t!)
• Webcomics Weekly: We’re not doing this regularly anymore, but in its day, this was THE webcomics podcast. Featuring Scott Kurtz, Kris Straub, Dave Kellett and me, this show was the best when we just fired up the microphones and started talking.
•
Surviving Creativity: Scott and I are joined by Scott’s business manager, Cory Casoni, as we talk about trying to make a living as a creative professional.
•
Hey Comics — Kids!: Perhaps the podcast that is closest to my heart, my sons and I started recording our drives to school. We talk video games, TV, movies, superheroes and more. If you follow the podcast, you get frequent updates — plus supplemental mini-casts from each individual kid. You can even
subscribe to the show on iTunes. And if you do, be sure to rate the show and leave a friendly comment!
