Dissect My Brain (Union Weekly Serial) Season 3, Episode 8: "Dissect My Brain with Zombies."

QUICK! If you haven't read the original Dissect My Brain with Zombies, read it here! It actually has absolutely nothing to do with this new one, but I just want to put over my bud Calvin since he is a phenomenal artist. He does his own comics with the most prominent series being Hooker Fighter: Reloaded. Off the premise alone, the comic is an acquired taste that is much akin to exploitation films, but I personally think he does great work. The comic has a hilarious gag each page, and is an absolute fun read.

Anywhoo, this isn't the "talk up Calvin" blog, but the Dissect My Brain blog! What can I say about this one? It's honestly one of my favorite one's of the third season thus far, if solely that I liked how much jokes I could cram into four panels. I felt I had a great amount of momentum in my work with each one hitting it out of the park, and then I put out the clips show one. However, I think it's safe to say I recovered as last week's comic was great, and this week's was just as good.

The title of the comic itself is self explanatory. They've done Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, so why not Dissect My Brain with Zombies? The comic hasn't changed one bit. It's still the fictionalized Kevin character being mopey about life, and there just happens to be a zombie in it.

I honestly don't get the zombie craze. . . at all. This isn't to say I don't like various zombie media. I like the George Romero films, Zombieland, Shaun of the Dead, The Walking Dead comic, etc. etc. I just don't understand why it's a thing, and why people are so in love with the idea of a zombie apocalypse. I guess we're just that bored with ourselves as a society, that a crisis just seems romantic. Who knows? If anyone can explain why there's just so much love for the concept, I would love to have lunch sometime.

So my mom (who is very religious) strangely got me this Ouija board shirt. I don't particularly believe in them, but then again, I've never tried. My mom apparently did, and swears that it spelled out the name of my dad when she asked it who she would marry. Of course, my assumption is that she had spent her whole life looking for an "Arthur." Either way, it's a weird story, these things are supposedly "demonic," and I've a shirt of one.

Original Publication: October 22, 2012.
Union Weekly Vol. 71: Issue #9

Dissect My Brain (Union Weekly Serial) Season 3, Episode 7: "Michael Cera is Just an Actor."

Another week, another Dissect My Brain. I feel that recently I've been putting out a lot of negative strips. This was a conscious decision to do something a bit more lighthearted. Lo and behold, I kind of felt this one was a bit challenging to do.

This was one of those strips that I did based of a real conversation with a friend and fellow local musician, Ann Louise. (You can check out her official facebook fan page for her music here.) We had celebrated a birthday the week before, which led to this conversation. In retrospect, she probably wasn't drunk, but it was fun to tease her. I thought I was going to be smooth by putting all these words into her mouth that didn't exist.

Anyone that's ever met her knows she's has a very expressive face. I hope I successfully captured that while drawing her.

Here's an awkwardly shot video by my awesome friend Michael Yip. It's Ann Louise and I performing one of my songs. If you really can't figure out who is who, then I guess I fail miserably as an artist. . . or it means you have poor eyesight, and you should really get your eyes checked:

Original Publication: October 15, 2012.
Union Weekly Vol. 71: Issue #8

Dissect My Brain (Union Weekly Serial) Season 3, Episode 6: "Lazy Brain Clips Show."

It was my birthday week going in. I was overwhelmed with everything and just threw this together. That's pretty much it. Shortest commentary ever?

I feel sorry for anyone who was seriously expecting tits and explosions the next week. Perhaps one day I'll do a comic that has just that. . . someday.

Oh, and did anyone catch the Shakabacca cameo? For those of you who don't know, Shakabacca was this lazy Union Weekly comic that starred a surfing Chewbacca. It was the same art every time, and the punchline was typically "FUUUUUUUUU~!" I never thought it was ever good, but it's a pretty well beloved strip amongst the other Union Weekly staffers.

Here's some links to some Shakabacca:
The "dubstep" one.
This entire issue of Union Weekly had nothing but Shakabacca strips.

I remember the one time I went to a Union Weekly meeting, I badmouthed Shakabacca and one of the guys at the offices got super defensive about it.

No shirt of the week this week.

Original Publication: October 8, 2012.
Union Weekly Vol. 71: Issue #7

Dissect My Brain in HUBY Zine #1: "Lo-Fidelity."

Dissect My Brain in a new home? Crazy talk! Nobody wants to publish this shit.

On the real, a big thanks to Patches and Kento for putting this in their DIY zine, HUBY. (I could tell you their real names, but I'm not sure if they'd want me to.) I know this sounds weird coming from a guy who pretty much puts all of his strips on the internet, but I am still a firm supporter of the printed word. I like this ethic: "You don't want to read a physical magazine. Well, it's your loss." There's just so much love and dedication that goes to such a project, and I feel it appeals to the hardcore of the hardcore. It's really hard for me not to applaud it.

But anywhoo, on to the strip. The title is a reference to lo-fidelity music, but directly to High Fidelity. It's a great Nick Hornsby novel, but I think it's better known as that John Cusack/Jack Black movie about girls and music compatibility. A scene similar to this sorta happens in the movie.

This features one of my best friends: Chris "Kasatka" Nguyen. He is an easy character to write, and it seems that any time I do, people receive it very well. (SEE "I Heard You're Doing a Comic" and "The Ballad of Christopher John Nguyen.") He has a very distinct personality in real life, and I feel I'm able to bring this to life in this comic. I'll admit that it's a bit more controlled in the realm of fiction, but this is more or less how he acts in real life.

I wasn't sure what to put in this coffee house, so I decided to just whip together two odd paintings. One is of a cat with freaky eyes, with words floating over it saying "Always watching." The other is a knock off of the Dos Equis guy. I made the tip jar to be lovingly adorn with a smiley face, and filled with a lot of cash.

As for the girl in this strip? She's an amalgamation of various singer-songwriters I've met in my life. A lot of my friends commented on her ridiculous tiny hat, to which I'm pretty sure I saw Zooey Deschanel wore once in some movie. I've met so many songwriters (not just females, mind you) where I was super jazzed to meet them after hearing a set, and they just thought I was some weird freaky dude trying to rob them or something. I guess sometimes the connection just isn't there. I've also seen many of guys fall head over heels for "folk girls" because of lyrics or what-have-you, only to find out that she's either taken or has some other dude in mind. Nobody likes a fanboy, I guess?

. . . Folk girls are still hot though.

Shirt of the Week:

It's the "Empty Hearts" shirt from the game, Catherine. I'm a big fan of Atlus games!
If you were a nerd like me and bought the deluxe edition of the game, you got this shirt.

Sadly, it doesn't go for cheap anymore.

Original Publication: October 3, 2012
HUBY Zine: Issue #1

Dissect My Brain (Union Weekly Serial) Season 3, Episode 5: "Birthday Pizza."

For those of you that don't know, I actually launched Dissect My Brain two years ago on my 23rd birthday. As such, I felt it was only fitting that the two year anniversary strip have to do with birthdays.

I don't remember exactly which year it was, but one time, my best friend Pat came over to my house to celebrate his birthday. I live near CSUDH (Cal State University of Dominguez Hills), and he wanted to shoot a music video for his band at the time. While waiting, my dad comes by. Once he found out that it was Pat's birthday, he was insistant that I buy him pizza . . . but was pretty specific that it be Little Caesar's. I don't know if it was his intent or not, but ever since, we always joke that "birthday pizza" means buying someone the shittiest and most cheap pizza for someone.

I actually don't think Little Caesar's is that bad considering it's $5 (you get what you pay for!), but definitely it's better when it's fresh. You can tell when one's been sitting around too long.

Last point, I want to make is that facebook really has made people super lazy when it comes to things, and birthdays is one of those notable things. I'll never forget remembering my friend being so upset one year that nobody remembered his birthday. I tell him that it's because he didn't have a facebook. The next year, he makes one and he was upset that so many people remembered his birthday. It just came off as fake to him.

I was always intrigued by this, and decided it was worth making a strip out of. . . except this time, I'd be the guy bummed about it.

Shirt of the week: It's Death as drawn by Chris Bachalo from Neil Gaiman's Sandman series. Just look at the Season One shirts feature to get back up to speed. It's sadly out of print, so it's pretty hard to come by. I wasn't quite satisfied how I drew it in this strip, as I've drawn it better in a previous strip. It's a just a bit wonky looking here.

Original Publication: October 1, 2012.
Union Weekly Vol. 71: Issue #6