'The Goode Family' is the latest Mike Judge animated series to debut on television. I loved the first episode and will continue watching the rest of the season. I'm concerned what the general reaction will be for the show. Since the show focuses on a vegan family, it may be topically too ahead of it's time to attain a television viewership necessary to financially justify it as an ongoing TV series. But, I sure hope I'm proven wrong!

'The Good Family' is to Obama what 'King of the Hill' is to W. Bush. 'King of the Hill' played with and expanded upon the stereotypes of Conservative Texas America and Redneck culture by grounding it all with a loving, functional family (the Hills). 'The Goode Family'  does the very same with Green politically-correct Liberals. The Goode family are vegans who have an organic garden in their frontyard, solar powered panels on their roof, shop at Whole Foods, and drive a Toyota Prius. It's a fresh concept that is ripe with ideas.

If the first episode is any indicator, there will be a lot of new ground covered in this animated series. In the span of 22 minutes I saw more original ideas than most shows have for an entire season. It starts off with the Goode Family asking their Black neighbor what's the current PC way to refer to Black people ("It can't be People of Color, that's just Colored People backwards!"). We also find out that the Goodes accidentally adopted a white child from South Africa named Ubuntu instead of a "real" dark-skinned African baby . There are many more funny ideas, but I will not spoil them for you.

I appreciate Mike Judge's recent animated series more so when I consider his cruder origins with MTV's 'Beavis & Butthead' and the 'Office Space' shorts. In hindsight, I can now see that Mike Judge gave way more love and depth to memorable characters like Beavis, Butthead, and Milton Waddams than he was given credit for. Back then, I thought Mike Judge's animation was just poorly drawn people who happened to be vulgar, and hilarious. Now I think Mike Judge is one of the greatest satirist of our time.

Below are some of the finer moments in Mike Judge's many animations:

GOODE FAMILY: What are black people called?

KING OF THE HILL: Bobby Hill-That's My Purse!

KING OF THE HILL: Early Animation Test

BEAVIS & BUTTHEAD: The Great Cornholio

FFFILLMMMM: Mike Judge animation test

Jerry and I just had the pleasure of having lunch with the uber-talented Sean 'Cheeks' Galloway. Cheeks has been making quite a splash professionally with his concept and character design work on animated projects like the 'Hellboy Animated' Films and the 'Spectacular Spider-man' animated series. He's also done some design work in the videogame industry and occasionally contributes a published comic or two amidst his busy work schedule.

I love the way Cheeks explores shape and form in his illustration. He uses a very economic line that conveys massive amounts of energy and volume. I highly recommend that you check out his wonderful Blog and Deviant Art sites. It's a wonderful showcase of a talented artist's growth and evolution. I've included some of my favorite Cheeks illustrations below.

CLICK HERE to go to Cheeks Blog.

CLICK HERE to go to Cheeks Deviant Art Page.

LOS CAMPEONES DE LA LUCHA LIBRE, FWAK! Animation and From Parts Unknown's Keith J. Rainville's animated feature film, is having its first English language public screening TOMORROW, February 5th, at 7:30 at the beautiful Egyptian Theatre.

We've had the great pleasure to meet FWAK!'s Lili Chin many years ago. Her enthusiasm and talent is infectious. Keith J. Rainville is one of the genuine US pioneers of Lucha Libre Pop Culture. His magazine and website, From Parts Unknown, are one of the richest resources for all things Lucha Libre.

I'm super bummed that I will not be able to attend the LOS CAMPEONES screening. But if you can attend you should! You are guaranteed a helluva evening!

Videogame logic. It seems so perfect when you're playing the game... but if you take a step back and think about it from a practical standpoint, it all falls apart. Seth MacFarlane (creator of Family Guy and American Dad) did this nice animated short which makes you think about the logic behind the classic Super Mario Bros. game.

It reminds me of a conversation I had in college...

More Seth MacFarlane animated shorts can be found HERE.

To celebrate the near release of our Oban Star Racer Molly figurine, Muttpop is collaborating with VinylPulse.com for an Molly Original Giveaway contest. CLICK HERE to enter.

Aaaah. Now we're getting somewhere! At this stage, you can feel life being brought back to the sculpt. The arms and neck are lengthened to emphasize her mixture of femininity and youth. The pose has been softened. Her butt and hips are given more shape and volume. Molly's finally beginning to look like a beautiful living and breathing young woman! Now we have to really work on that hair...