When I set out to write the Bearmageddon story, I did not set out to write a big sci-fi story about bears. I wanted the bears to be like zombies in the sense that they require little explanation, they are just there to make the story awesome and provide a backdrop for the characters involved to go through hell. The thing is, with zombies, our culture already had an idea about them, so when you do a zombie story you can often get away with no explanation… and if you do choose to explain, you can usually get by with about two seconds of some exposition about radiation or some government experiment gone awry. This story introduces a new monster, so I can’t get away with such simplicity in this story, but that doesn’t mean it has to be e=mc².
I just saw Planet of the Apes this weekend and I did really enjoy it, though my main gripe with it is that it took itself so seriously. This is my main gripe with a lot of recent comic movies. They take a premise that is silly-fun absurd and then try to be as dead serious realistic and believable as possible. Think of the premises of certain recent movies that try to be ultra real: Transformers: alien robots from space turn into awesome cars and trucks. Planet of the Apes: Apes take over the human race. Spider Man: A teenager gets radioactive spider powers and becomes a super hero that can shoot webs out of his hands (in this case I am speaking of the upcoming Spider Man reboot. I loved the Raimi version). These stories are not awesome because they are believable, they are awesome because they are unbelievable.
Axe Cop really taught me that this genre, and by this genre I mean anything in the realm of fantasy, sci-fi and comic books, is about fun. That’s why I am setting out to tell a story that is more fun than believable, more outlandish than it is water-tight in its logic, and rather than going for ultra-reality, I am aiming for the ultra unreal.
So that’s my approach to the bear explanation, which today’s page begins to tell. The premise of the bears is fun, ridiculous, and it’s as dumb as the premise: bears take over the world. It’s got lots of similarities to other campy animal apocalypse movies like Planet of the Apes and Man’s Best Friend (a hilarious film). I am not going to make the explanation any less insane than the premise itself.
I want to thank everyone who has shared links to Bearmageddon with their friends. We had a good first week and the comments section has been incredibly uplifting. Another page will go up Friday morning. See you then!
Ethan
Discussion (60) ¬
HA! Medved. Nice.
I was looking up names that mean bear and Medved means “the honey eater” (referring to bears) so I picked it.
I realize that “Medved” has probably got more of a Russian origin (or sound, at the very least – think “Medvedev”) but the funny thing is, in Hungarian “medve” (no final “d”) actually literally means bear… :))
I thnk literally translated medved is “honey eater” but it is used as the word for bear.
Well, Hungarian is my native tongue – I don’t know about other languages, but in Hungarian “medve” is definitely the literal, immediate meaning for bear – there’s no other word for it… 🙂 Oh, and I love the comic so far – I’d take fun over coherent any day.
Medved (or a similar form) is a name for a bear in many slavic languages. Big + for doing your research 🙂
thanks! More info… like it is really important:
“The common Russian surname Medved is an apotropaic circumlocution for ‘bear’ meaning literally ‘honey-eater.’ This is an old Slavonic periphrasis for bear. Med is Russian for honey, and the ed root means ‘eat.’ The ed and yed roots are related to eсть [yest’] (Russian ‘to eat’) and are cognate with other Indo-European verbs like Latin edere to eat’ (which gives English the adjective edible) and even with the English verb to eat. Although the Russian word for honey is med, the combining form is medv- which becomes medu, a partitive genitive of med, so the literal meaning is “eater of honey.” source: http://www.billcasselman.com/letters/about_medved_june_2008untitled.htm
I wonder if there will be more octobears? Oh will beartato be appearing during this? that would be pretty funny.
A beartato? Like one with a slow clap? Oh, boy.
nope… my bears are not cross bred with any produce, only other animals.
Project Ruxpin, haha. I’m lovin it!
Excellent reminder. I had thoughts along those lines when I watched Super8 (though it did a good job of just barely making sense of the alien). Great comic so far.
Yeah I liked Super 8. It was about kids not aliens.
Best UnReality show I’ve seen in ever. 🙂
PROJECT RUXPIN?? Sorry, that just took me out of it lol!
It’s the perfect name for a bear communication project, come on admit it.
Just one question- if any of the characters get mutant bear blood on them will they turn into a mutant bear? ;O)
definitely not, they will just turn into the same person they always were, except covered in bear blood.
Oh, really? I thought it was literally “bear” in Russian, or something. I didn’t know it meant “honey eater.” Very cool.
I’m reading your excellent comic when I realize I’m reading the newsreader’s voice in Ted Koppel’s voice. “That’s our report for tonight…”
good, that’s what I was going for. The only two voices you should hear on this page are Ted Koppel and Stephen Hawking.
Wow, I really enjoyed the blog going along with this page today. I’m working on my own comic right now actually, and today’s writing going along with the page is actually very helpful and interesting. Thanks, The page today was also pretty epic too. I love the brainy bear that speaks English.
I would like to express a personal experience of mine in the form of a comment… A few months ago, I actually had a dream about bears taking on a lot of zombie apocalypse aspects. They invaded and started viciously eating people. (It was actually quite silly though. The bears were dressed in Victorian Era British clothing, and I’m pretty sure there was at least one in a cheerleader costume.) Not only were they ferocious, but they had super-speed. All of these strange features made it one of my most memorable dreams. Now Ethan, I don’t know if you Inceptioned my brain or something, but I’m really liking this series. Two paws up!
Oh man now I have to take my Victorian suit wearing bears out of the story!
Love the Teddy Ruxpin reference. I hate that this is only coming out one page a week. Keep up the awesome work on this!!!
Hey now, it’s two pages a week! You get another page on Friday. That’s twice as many a week as you thought!
The bears in the tubes won’t be important later at all, right? xD
I…really want to work on Project Ruxpin now.
I would have a lot of questions to ask that ear if itnwere for real. Though I am pretty sure every answer would be “I do not understand. Please provide me with more honey or fresh salmon”.
Which begs the questions: is the voice a robotic one, Stephen-Hawking-esque, a soothing British voice (I’m currently reading the bear as played by Stephen Fry), or none of the above?
Definitely Stephen Hawking.
I know the bear who can express his thoughts in English is suppose to have a Stephen Hawking voice but for some reason I picture him sounding British–because the bear sounds sophisticated. He doesn’t just want or need honey–he desires it. Now if the bear was simply saying “honey” then I could picture the Hawking voice.
Either way “I desire honey” is rather amusing.
that’s why I chose that language, because the contrast between a brainless robot and the intelligent choice of words makes it funnier. You can tell the programmer tried to make the bear sound smarter than it is.
Or perhaps the bear is smarter than he is letting on.
Bears are ALWAYS smarter than they are letting on.
I really miss the absurdity you’re talking about. It used to be there were great silly tv shows (See Dr. Who, A-Team, StarTrek.), but more recently, many shows have taken a serious turn (See StarGate, StarTrek.). Thanks for keeping it light.
I know right? Could you imagine if Hollywood did a remake of Howard the Duck? They would have to explain how Duck DNA traveled to a distant planet and ducks somehow evolved into sentient humanoids. They would need to explain how American earth culture made it’s way up to to their planet and they would probably put some spin on it like it was the downfall of their planet. They would have to make Howard a classical musician who got his heart broken and the duck would have to look as real as possible, but be totally CG. He would be voiced by a depressed Robert Pattinson and probably be an environmentalist who cries when he sees a dirty pond.
Don’t forget sexually confused
Yes!! Campy is where it’s at! And the key is not taking yourself seriously. Snakes On A Plane *could* have been an incredible movie, had they not tried to make a serious movie about snakes on a plane. The best moment was in the deleted scenes when one of the actors goes crazy mourning the death of a stewardess… it was brilliant, and they cut it. But if you treat Bearmageddon like Mel Brooks treated Spaceballs, you will achieve “campy” without seeming “forced.”
The art and coloring so far is fantastic, by the way. “I Desire Honey” is already a great t-shirt moment!
Space balls is spoof, I’m not intending to go that far with it. I’m aiming for something in the realm of Shaun of the Dead or Pineapple Express. Funny but it still feels like the action genre. We will see if I can pull it off. Thanks for the comment.
Quite frankly, I think you just ended up with the “awesome” genre.
I don’t understand anything at all in these comments. Where is “Medved” referenced in this page? The same goes for “Project Ruxpin”.
All I have are two janitors discussing if a bear or a tiger would win in a cage fight.
I’m quite confused.
Same with MartinE, there’s a discussion that’s not matching the content?
sorry guys, my site for some reason replaced today’s page with Friday’s page. You weren’t supposed to see this yet! It will be fixed soon.
alright fixed. Refresh and the correct page should load. Sorry about that.
I thought this was referrence to “Preved Medved” meme.
When you get a movie deal, please make sure it doesn’t get ruined by Hollywood.
one reason I love doing comics is, if a movie is made, and if it does suck, you can always look back at the comic and see the film as it was intended, in storyboard format. That being said, I’ll do my best…
I almost did a spit-take with my morning tea when I saw “Project Ruxbin”. This is the most original web-comic in a long time. Keep up the good work.
Thanks I hope you continue to feel that way 40 or so pages in.
‘Project Ruxpin’?
I guess ‘Project Pooh’ didn’t sound as great.
I just saw Alien:Resurrection last week, and I’m betting it was an influence on that last panel…
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Preach it my brother.
So, was it intentional that the doctor’s name is “Medved”? Because “medvěd” is “bear” in Czech.
Enjoying the comic. Thanks 🙂
Project Ruxpin??? Teddy Ruxpin creeped me out when I was a kid. I am sure he was evil. After so many years I never thought I’d ever hear that name again. O the horror, the horror…
This is the first time that I noticed that the bears in the capsules are baby’s and then I notice that they were all bears at the top of the page.
Heehee this is really awesome and cool