This week, we’re sitting down with writer and animator Ken Pontac. His decades-long list of credits includes The New Adventures of Gumby, Bump in the Night, Clayfighter, Lazytown, the ultraviolent Happy Tree Friends and the even more ultraviolent MadWorld.
We asked him to pontificate on Hollywood, cartoons and inadvertently creating a YouTube meme, and he obliged.
Our interviewee is Gene Yang, author of a number of critically acclaimed comic books, including American Born Chinese. His next book, The Eternal Smile, is a collaboration with artist Derek Kirk Kim and is due out this spring from Macmillan. Commentary and notes on the interview are after the jump.
Shortly after Raheem “Random Beats” Jarbo made a name for himself in the concious hip-hop scene with 2006’s “The Call,” he found himself gaining popularity in the nerdcore scene after releasing “Mega Ran,” which featured him rapping over 8-bit beats.
Fan demand was enough to spur a sequel, “Mega Ran 9,” available as a free download. We got ahold of him and, as always, we begin by asking him to introduce himself.
You may know this week’s interviewee from one of his company’s physics-oriented browser games, including the seminal Off-Road Velociraptor Safari. As always, we begin by asking if he would introduce himself.
Wegner: Gladly! I’m Matthew Wegner, one of the Flashbang founders (there were four of us originally). I manage the company at the business level, act as lead programmer, and do most of our physics number balancing.
MC Frontalot, born as Damien Hess, raps about such things as webcomics and e-mail spam. He might not seem like the most likely candidate for fame, but he’s the subject of a documentary about his first national tour, entitled Nerdcore Rising. As always, we begin by asking him to introduce himself.
Frontalot: I am MC Frontalot! I am the progenitor of this thing we call nerdcore hip-hop.
This week we’ve landed an interview with the artist behind the unique look of such games as Psychonauts and the upcoming Brütal Legend. As always, we’ll let him introduce himself.
Scott: I’m Scott Campbell, art director at Double Fine Productions. I also make comics and paintings!
Back when “The Simpsons” was just a short on the Tracey Ullman show, nobody could have predicted that it would end up being such a long-running, critically acclaimed, and influential show. Now, decades later, when “The Simpsons” makes a statement, people sit up and take notice. And the recent episode “Mypods and Boomsticks” was no exception. Thanks to Hulu, you can just watch the whole thing right here:
Kwanzoo: We’re here with Felicia Day of The Guild. Could you tell our readers a little bit about yourself to begin with?
Felicia Day: Well, I’m an actor and a writer, I’ve worked on many television shows and movies as an actor, but lately I’ve become known for the work I’ve done on the web, including acting in Joss Whedon’s “Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog” and creating a web show called “The Guild”.
So it’s not every day that an actual PR folk comes at me over something I say around here.
You remember when I gave Lycos static for not being, you know, relevant? Just because it’s so far back in the search engine ratings that they’re not even listed on Nielsen Netratings and looking at a graph on Alexa comparing their traffic to Yahoo and Google’s is just downright embarrassing?