Smithson
April 15, 2012 ~ 9 Comments
It’s too bad this is running right now, because the main Smithson site is down with technical problems I haven’t been able to work out. But the WebComicsNation archives still work fine. Man, Smithson was a blast to do. We ultimately had to put it on indefinite hiatus because it wasn’t making any money and Brian had this selfish need to eat. I’ve shipped it around to print publishers without any luck so far. But it was a blast.
Smithson was a story I started in college, and for a long time it was a kind of dumping ground for all the good ideas I didn’t have room for elsewhere. It ended up being a very strange story. The completed portion of the comic is just the very beginning; there’s so much more to it. I don’t know when I’ll ever get back to it. Lately I’ve been thinking that I should only return to Smithson if I can do it in the form I originally envisioned for it: a musical TV series. My elevator pitch is “Twin Peaks meets Glee.”
But it’s a story I still love very much. And Brian is awesome.
I miss Smithson. Will we ever find out what precisely was the deal with the first Roger Langridge sequence? This and many other mystery may well follow us into our graves.
(But, I only just noticed now that Smithson was the apocryphal “More Fun” comic mentioned in several previous updates. That’s one puzzle solved, at least.)
Smithson was totally captivating, and I loved the way each artist interpreted the characters. I’m still bummed that it stopped on a cliffhanger: I’m dying to know what happened. And I’m not the only reader who’d be willing to Kickstart a collection of the strips to date. (I know, you were experenting with infite-page style, but I think it could still be done, maybe as a cd-rom, if not a book.)
Brian is indisputably super talented, but I think I’d have liked Smithson a lot more if you’d drawn it. I didn’t feel like his art was a good fit for the story.
Brian’s art was pretty close to exactly what I wanted for Smithson. I also think it might have been good drawn in a really glamorous style, completely different from either of us. I sometimes picture the characters as drawn by Ai Yazawa.
As a Glee Club member and steam tunnel spelunker, I could not help but like Smithson.
I just looked up Ai Yazawa’s art. Shaenon, you should definitely go back in time and fire me and hire her. And also please pick up some goodies from Citizen Cupcake for this end of the timestream.Smithson was great fun. I learned a lot, and I had an awesome collaborator. Thanks Shaenon.(In case anyone here hasn’t seen it, a pitch for a print version of Smithson is here: http://www.brianmooredraws.com/sketchblog/2011/08/smithson-pitch-project/ )
That ties it.
I now know what I will do if I become obscenely rich, and can’t think of anything selfish to do with my (no-doubt) filthy lucre:
Fund Smithson, the TV Series.
It’s a bit too strange and wonderful for network TV, but I bet we could find it a home on cable. Maybe HBO? There’s *almost* enough implied nudity…
Would naked folks destroy your artisic vision?
Been going through the archives via the Wayback Machine. Some of the images appear to be dead, sigh.
Don’t suppose you could archive it here or on one of your other sites?
Is there anywhere that Smithson is currently being hosted? Someone mentioned the Wayback Machine which I’ll try if nothing else.