Sea Monkey Wallet

 

What is a Comic Wallet? Let's go to ComicWallet.com for the answer:

"Each Comic Wallet is made from a page of a real comic book that has been fused to a piece of rugged canvas. Wallets are professionally sewn together and comprised of canvas, cotton nylon and velcro. Each wallet has six separate card slots and a clear ID pocket.

Like the Cabbage Patch Kid, every Comic Wallet is 100% unique. Custom and bulk orders are enthusiastically accepted!"

Sea Monkey Evolution Hi-Jinx

A very funny discussion of Sea Monkey Evolution at www.fairyshrimps.com.

The Post "Why did Sea-Monkeys go from living jungles back to living in the sea?

Was this because the only other mammals in the oceans were whales and dolphins… Or was this an evolutionary step, and the result of the introduction of some new predator on land?

Simply fascinating creatures."

brought the comment:

"Ah, you’ve fallen for the common mis-conception about so-called "sea-monkeys", because of their silly name. This is extraordinarily irritating to those of us who have a bit of biology, because, of course, they’re not monkeys at all, but are actually New World Apes (not to be confused with the Old World Apes like Baboons and some Europeans) which have returned to the ocean. The history behind this is fascinating and little-known (at least until my forthcoming blockbuster book/movie comes out, co-authored by, and starring, Sarah Palin, next year) – it seems that when the Central American isthmus arose thousands of years ago, connecting North and South America and exposing the great, peaceful South American Empire of the Last Dinosaurs to the depradations of the vicious herds of giant carnivorous sloths and tapirs that roamed the great plains of North America, the defenders of the huge but placid Ceratosaurs, the great, intelligent New World Apes known as the Howling Spider Apes, which defended the Empire with their paleolithic axes and laser guns were driven into the sea while fighting their untimately doomed battle to preserve their way of life and their lovable masters, to whom they had pledged their lives and their sacred honor in a moving ceremony commemorated and memorialized in the fantastic stone carvings on the ziggurat of Micchu Moucchu found in the 17th century deep in the jungles of Patagonia and from which Thomas Jefferson drew much of his inspiration for the Declaration of Independence, and were forced to develop gills using their advanced biomolecular cloning techniques to survive, simultaneously growing smaller to escape the attentions of the terrible Antedeluvian Period predators such as the Great Killer Whale Shark, which roamed the waters of the southern North Atlantic in huge swarms, devouring anything bigger than a small tuna or caped cod which happened to carelessly get in their way, but which are now no more than a memory after the terrible Shark Flu epidemic of 731 BC which was caused when a flock of Passenger Pigeons (which were riding on the backs of a remnant, but overloaded, herd of Quetzalcoatlus for their semi-annual migration to their wintering grounds in what is now known as Upper Volta) fell into the sea and were messily devoured, infecting the sharks with their particularly virulent variety of Bird Flu that spread from shark to shark due to their rabies-like reaction to being infected until they were extincted to the last fish, but leaving the now-tiny Sea-Monkeys (as they became known to the first protohumans which timidly left their sea-side trees to watch the "Sea-Monkeys" frolicking in the Atlantic surf).
I hope that this answers your question sufficiently thoroughly. We aim to please."

Ha ha. Great stuff.

Adorable Knit Plush Sea Monkey

J. Bone, a Toronto based comic book artist, illustrator and crafter started with this great sketch and ended up with the adorable little sea monkey friend you see below, with three eyes...

Who but a true geek would know that in a period of their adolescence Sea Monkeys do indeed have three eyes?
Awesomeness indeed.

Please check out J. Bones website for more great stuff including a Wolverine plush.
www.bonesyarn.blogspot.com

Or click here to start on the Sea Monkey page!

X-Ray Specs

Amazing X-Ray Specs. Wow. So Much coolness for only ONE DOLLAR!
It's amazing and it came from the same mind that brought us Sea Monkeys.

Harold Von Braunhut, a wild character to be sure, marketed these little novelties through comic book ads just like his "Instant Life" and like instant life, once you got over the disappointment and embarrassment of being had you might discover how fun these items really were, even if they didn't let you see through the neighbor girl's clothes or lord over your own aquatic anthropomorphic simian civilization.

If you could believe in the possibility of x-ray vision enough to spend a dollar (and wait 6-8 weeks) then perhaps the girls at school would believe it enough to be a bit nervous or a-lot nervous around you. The more convincing your acting as you ooed and awed while leering at them and wearing the specs the better the response. And looking at the schoolyard bully's crotch while laughing hysterically was almost worth the beating you'd eventually receive.

Ah the bizarre mind of Harold Von Braunhut. I'm currently putting together funding for a documentary film on this amazing man to be completed in the Summer of 2009. Sea Monkeys (and Sea Monkey fans) will of course receive serious coverage in my documentary.

Click the image below for a full page of comic book ads including Sea Monkeys and X-Ray Specs.

Disney's "Fun"

Terry Zwigoff to have Fun
Disney is in pre-production on a film tentatively titled FUN which may feature some great Sea Monkey action. The premise is that two friends buy all manner of Comic book advertised goodies, X-Ray Specs, Sea-Monkeys etc. and thirty years later the products magically start living up to the advertising claims. The two friends then must deal with the ensuing chaos.
I'm thinking we may see some CGI Sea Monkey families.
The most exciting thing for me is that Terry Zwigoff (Crumb, Ghost World, Bad Santa) has already been attached as the director. Zwigoff has a deep love of comics and I think he'll bring an understanding to the film that just might make it work if Disney stays out of his way.

If this film happens, it could be the best thing to happen to Sea Monkeys in decades. Disney can at times live up to their evil-empire image but they also have the power to quite effectively plug in to the mass consciousness. You can't go to an aquarium now without hearing kids name off the characters from Finding Nemo as they pass the blue tangs and the clown fish, etc.
My hope is that we get anthropomorphic Sea Monkeys that are mischievous and prolific.

I'm crossing my fingers and making a wish that we see this project move from pre-production to production.

Red Meat

Click image to enlarge

Red Meat has long been one of my favorite comics. Of course I have no way of knowing if this fine Sea Monkey strip is a Max Cannon original or if one of his fans made it. You see, there is a beautiful thing known as the "Build Your Own Meat" construction set with which you can almost instantly create your own Red Meat comic. Check it out by clicking here.

Sea Monkeys and Futurama Comics

Click Images to enlarge

I was a big fan of Futurama and was sad to see it taken off the air. I'm now very excited to hear that it's coming back on Comedy Central.

The animated TV show spawned a monthly (now quarterly) comic book and the very 1st issue in November of 2000 featured our beloved Sea Monkeys.

In this premier issue "Monkey Sea, Monkey Doom!" an old lunch box from the 2oth century is discovered and in it are some old comics.

Coming across an ad for Sea Monkeys Fry is reminded of how much he wanted to order them when he was younger.

At "Shitfy's True Wonders of The 20th Century Emporium he finds some but sadly, they do not exactly spring to life, at least not until after he disposes of them by tossing them into a vat of Gamma Radiation.


Dr. Zoidberg finds the newly irradiated and now very much alive critters and all is happy as the monkeys grow...

and grow...


and grow...




Until...

...





And of course there is a funny surprise ending but I won't ruin it for you here. The issue is very hard to find, in fact my favorite comics supplier has been trying to get if for me for a couple of months now and so far, nada. There is a trade paperback that has issues 1 through 4. I haven't tried to find that yet, but may go after it next.

TMCM meets The Sea Monkeys

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It was in the pages of comic books that the earliest fans of Sea Monkeys were introduced to the hobby that for some became an obsession which often causes other adults to look at you funny (and with maybe a touch of sympathy.) So it seems appropriate that todays comics would want to feature Sea Monkeys.

For me its win, win. I love comic books, the indy ones like Too Much Coffee Man especially. I was thrilled when my friend Carl informed me that TMCM had himself a Sea Monkey adventure.

Our caffeinated hero decides to fill his bathtub up with Sea Monkeys. When he accidentally falls in, he discovers he has created a whole under water world. And he soon finds himself in hot water under water.

You can read the whole adventure and plenty more for free at www.TMCM.com. To start at the beginning of the Sea Monkey issue just click here.

And as long as we're on the subject, other comic book artists I enjoy are Daniel Clowes, Jeffrey Brown, Robert Crumb, Chester Brown, Los Bros Hernandez and many more. Of course not all their work is appropriate for all ages.