Tone Tank is at it again with another sweet resin bootleg figure.  This time, it’s a, yep you guessed it, Non-Racist Skinhead Black Panthro!

From Tone Tank:

Hello People,

Before you start asking yourself, “Yo, is Tone on some racist shit!?”, check this out, it’ll save both of us a lot of breath.

I always knew Panthro was a black man, but recently I was watching the Thundercats as a grown up and it hit me that he was a Skinhead. He has the shaved head. He has the suspenders. He is a black Skinhead.

I decided a ‘Skinhead Panthro’ needed to exist, and I wanted one for myself, so I made 24 of them out of resin and re-purposed vacuum plastic.
Get your own ‘Non-Racist, Black Skinhead Panthro’ at www.scumlife.com or go directly to the Scumlife store.
Get em’ while they last.

Oh yeah, my man Scott Thorough made some theme music for a Skinhead Panthro commercial that never got made, that song is awesome and available for free download @ www.scumlife.com…

If you want your very own, you had better move fast!  Head over here right now!

‘Tis an exciting day in comics, indeed.  ‘Tis.  Because, today is the first issue of WildCats (#19) by the creative team of Adam Beechen (writer) and Tim Seeley (artist)! You know Adam Beechen for his work on Robin and Teen Titans, and you know Tim Seeley for his work on the world famous, critically acclaimed webcomic, Colt Noble and the Megalords.  Tim has worked on such titles as Hack/Slash and GI Joe!

From WildStorm:

Written by Adam Beechen; Art by Tim Seeley and Ryan Wynn; Cover by George Pérez

The Carrier has left UnLondon, taking some of Earth’s most powerful defenders with it. Can the heroes who remain help the planet survive not one, but two alien invasions? In the world’s darkest hour since NUMBER OF THE BEAST, Super Heroes from every corner of the WildStorm Universe must put aside past rivalries and disagreements to work together as one massive team of incalculable power – and it still may not be enough!

Expect wall-to-wall action from the new creative team of writer Adam Beechen (ROBIN, TEEN TITANS) and artist Tim Seeley (Hack/Slash, G.I. Joe)!

As someone who grew up on Image Comics/WildCats and is a huge fan of Tim’s work, this is a book that I’ve been looking forward to for quite some time.  Pick WildCats #19 up at Chicago Comics or your local comic shop today.

Max and Ben welcome indy comic creator Jeffrey Brown as they discuss Jeffrey’s career, his creations, his origins and his future projects.  From stories about cats to Transformers spoofs to everything in between, Episode 65 of Nerd City has everything that you’ve ever wanted in your entire life.

Pics and links after the jump…

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After recently discovering the art of Skinner, he has quickly become one of my favorite artists.  His work is a psychedelic pop art vision of a heavy metal rendition of all of the great fantasy properties.  From his successful Blood Wizard skateboard company to his gallery showings worldwide, to his forthcoming art book, skinner is really making a name for himself with his uniquely stylish and kickass art.  Skinner was kind enough to answer a few questions from Nerd City.

Full interview after the jump! (more…)

At some point, the tri-wolf tee shirt (original seen HERE) became a nostalgic, hilarious staple for hipster apparel.  Since then, several witty, hipper homage tees have popped up all over the internet (my personal fave being the “Three Keyboard Cat”).  However, this newest release is pretty kickass.  So, if anyone at founditemclothing.com is reading this, the Nerd City crew will take a couple mediums, a couple large, and a small for me.  

The exciting news is that Royal-T (Royalt1us) and Gatchagrey are announcing a poll in which you can choose which one of the creations from Gatchagrey’s fan-created Bug-Shido world, Royal-T will make into a mini-statue.

From Gatchagrey:

To my delight, fellow fan, Royal-T has agreed to make my dream come true
and create a mini-statue of ONE of my Bug-Shido Characters. But with over
55 characters to choose from, we thought we would hold a little character
contest and let all of you help decide which character that will be.

The contest information, rules, and polls will be posted soon. We want to
invite all of you to join in the voting, and post ideas, and even designs.
Because, just like Royal-T’s own contests, when all is said a done, the
winning character will be sculpted, cast, and made available to everyone
who wants one.

Stay tuned for more info and get ready for an Royal Battle of Insect
Proportions. I hope you all have fun with this as much as I plan to.

To keep things simple, this is a contest to decide which Bug-Shido character is worthy of being sculpted into a mini-statue. To do this we are going to organize the 50+ characters Gatchagrey has dreamed up into four groups. Each group will be made of similar characters; for example Big Guys, Females, Winged, and Non-Winged characters.

In Round 1, you will be allowed to select your favorite 4 characters from each group.
In Round 2, you will select one of 4 Round 1 favorites (one from each group).
In Round 3, the Final 4 characters will go head to head to decide the 2009 Bug-Shido Champion.

For each poll, we will post the artwork Gatchagrey currently has for each character. For some this will only include his original design. For others this will include commissioned, and non-commissioned, works done by other artists. We hope each design will be given equal consideration, regardless of the artwork presented. Vote for the concept of the character over any of the art that may or may not be available.

We also invite anyone at anytime to post their own art of any of the characters in order to bolster support for their favorites. The Final Four will be drawn up by Royal-T to demonstrate his initial take on the design for the sculpture.

Links to the polls will be posted as soon as they are up and each poll will last 10-14 days. So stay tuned for updates and look for the battle to begin sooner than later.

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Recently, at Chicago ComicCon, I had the chance to pick the collected trade paperback of Moos Miht: The Adventures of Mighty Moose from Josh Warner and Hanging Chad Entertainment.

Moos Miht is a fascinating balance between gritty and cartoony.  From the character designs to the overall art style to the overall storyline, the books walks a fine balance between street-level crime drama and cartoon animal superhero story.  It is in this dichotomy and the way that both sides are balanced that the book’s charm lies.

Due to the fact that the chatacters are anthropomorphic, and that the book is done in black and white, an easy comparison would be early TMNT comics.  Although this wouldn’t be completely off base, due to the books grittier elements and indie-style appeal, Moos Miht certainly blazes a slightly different path.  There are certain elements of Manga polish to the book’s visual style that shine through to interesting effect throughout the book.  Along with this, the narrative focuses upon a character who is gradually coming to terms with his super heroic heritage, as the comic both celebrates and deconstructs the medium’s own history with costumed heroes.

Did I mention that it’s a bunch of fun, too?  A duck and a moose super heroes fight ninja freaking cats!  The boss of the mob is a bunny rabbit!  You’ve seriously got to check it out.

For more info on Moos Miht: The Adventures of Mighty Moose, check out the official page on Hanging Chad Entertainment’s site here.

Happy Monday Nerd City. I am going to tell you guys a travel secret that the fat cats that run the hotels don’t want you to know about its called late check out if you politely ask the concierge they will most likely do it for you so you don’t wake up at noon and run around the room shoveling your belongings into your bag trying to figure out who ordered all this room service. After I got back from the Great Taste I decided to go to the hotel bar to check out the local talent and ended up drinking the better half of a bottle of Jameson while watching the Brewers game. Sunday my friend and I decided to go check out O’so Brewing Company in Plover Wisconsin. He does their graphic design work and I thought it would be cool to check out the brewery. Marc Buttera and Bart Peterson opened O’so with an idea of creating unique beers that don’t fit into one given style. Four years ago Marc and his wife Katina opened Point Brew Supply, a home brew supply store. A lot of successful breweries started as home brew supply shops Bell’s and local Chicago favorites Two Brothers. I had a chance to talk to Marc and his enthusiasm for beer is contagious, he reminded me of other brewery owners that I have met. O’so has been having a great year with better distribution around Wisconsin they have gone from producing 350 barrels last year to 1200 already this year. With the current economic hardships around the country supporting local brands is as important now then it has been in years. O’so has some solid year round beers but the beer I think is going to put them on the map is Night Train Porter. A big dark beer with a deep chocolate/coffee noise. I am not a fan of porters but I really like this beer because it drinks more like a really creamy ale and I find that some porters have a real bitter finish but Night Train doesn’t. Night Train is very drinkable and flavorful. Nerd City looks forward to O’so Brewing Company’s contribution to the craft beer scene and if your Wisconsin keep an eye for them you can’t miss their tap handles. Till next time, Cheers!