jacksonpublick

Super-busy crunch time of the season, which always happens around this time...so not much to say other than "we're working really hard."

Doc and I are presently collaborating on episode 37, which we intend to sandwich in as third or fourth in the airing order, since it introduces a plot line/character arc we've been playing with all season but somehow never got around to writing the genesis of earlier on. We'll only have two left to finish out the season after that--which instills me with a paradoxical combination of emotions: "my, where has the time gone?" and "crap...we're not out of the woods yet...what are we gonna do for a big finale this time?"

Recorded Patrick Warburton for episodes 33, 35 and 36 over the phone today--he in Burbank and me in Brooklyn. I was supposed to go to L.A. this weekend to record him, Urbaniak, Dana Snyder and a couple of other guys, but Urbaniak and the Snyde magically appeared in New York this week so I cancelled the trip and recorded them here. Which worked out nicely because Doc and I are a bit behind in our writing and he's going to DragonCon next weekend (which I'm not). Every day I don't have to waste six hours on a plane, stare at the walls of a Hollywood motel, or walk around like a zombie because I'm exhausted from doing either of those things, counts. Of course, this means I'll have to go out there in September...but I'm trying to book a couple of guest voice actors to make it more fun and keep things interesting. They probably won't mean much to anyone but me, but I'm excited about it. Why can't you just let me enjoy this?!

Speaking of me enjoying myself, I paid my first visit of the season to J.G. Thirlwell's place last night to chat about the score for the first few episodes. I was treated to several earsful of some of the themes he's been working on in anticipation of the hours of music he'll have to create this year, and, needless to say, everything I heard was super-cool.

Other than that, we just finished the animatic for episode 30, the design department is working on episode 36, the storyboard guys are plugging away at episode 35 (check out Stephen De Stefano's blog for a window into that world), and we've just shipped episode 29 to the studio in Korea to be animated.

One more brick in the almost non-existent wall of Venture Bros. merchandising is about to be mortared into place--I just got my 3 free copies of a 2008 Venture Bros. calendar in the mail. So look for those in stores...um...some time...soon-ish?

In non-Venture news, Adult Swim's SuperJail has just gone into production on their first season (wish them luck) and it looks like I'll be doing some voices for that.

As will become habit for the next few months, I bid you a fond farewell-for-now with some images of this season's background paintings...

The Revised Venture Living Room...


The Revised Venture Kitchen...


The Revised Venture Compound Overhead (on an importantly gloomy day)...


We Love You,
JP

P.S. If you're a fan of The Venture Bros.--especially the sad and lonely parts about loss and failure--I highly recommend Joe Meno's The Boy Detective Fails, which I recently re-read, and which is available at finer bookstores everywhere.

...then shake off those blues with an eyewalk through Brandon Bird's portfolio.