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Friday, January 23, 2009

Overlords #148 - Snake Eyes


Stand by, following some new commercial jibber-jabber for a time-out from your Minion Master!

Your visit is important


NEW! SUPPORT "MINIONS AT WORK" BY BUYING STUFF YOU WERE GOING TO BUY ANYWAY!

We're now Amazon.com affiliates, which means that if you click on the Amazon link in our sidebar and make purchases from Amazon, a tiny little sliver of what you spend goes to support these fine (maybe even near-mint!) cartoons!

Later, we'll be adding a selection of Minion-recommended merchandise, but until then, use your imagination. Books, videos, electronics, games, maybe even ACTION FIGURES!
Minions at work is inadequately supported during this financial crisis by your purchases from our web stores and our advertisers. Feed the economy and help us bleed green just a little more slowly by purchasing tee-shirts, buttons, calendars, hats, undies (we kid not!), and other fine Minions at Work items at one of the following stores.

While waiting for your impending doom, pick up a Minions at Work tee-shirt or other great souvenir of your visit to the Lair:
THE MINION'S LAIR OF MERCHANDISE
"Satisfaction guaranteed or we'll make make you buy something else!"

and

NUMBER TWO'S HOUSE OF NAUGHTY
(Naughty is as naughty does!)

Join the Minions Reminder Email List. It's free, it's easy, and you'll never miss a Minions at Work cartoon (or if you do, it won't be our fault!)

Greetings, Stay-at-homes!

We're in sunny Florida this week for the Space Coast Writers Conference, so while we're getting carjacked and shot at, Minions at Work is on autopilot. Also, if you missed it, we posted a BONUS Minions cartoon mid-week. Go back and have a look. See you when we get back.

- Braced for a Water Landing Steve

Wednesday, January 21, 2009

Bonus Minions #147 - Alternator Problem


As promised, a mid-week BONUS Minions at Work. Why bonus? Well, because this is so geeky and obscure, I'm not sure how many people will get it! But what the heck. If you get it, let me know. If not, ask, and I'll try to explain it all when I get back!

-Steve

Sunday, January 18, 2009

Minions #146 - Supply Problem


Click on image for full-sized version!

Stand by, following some new commercial jibber-jabber for a time-out from your Minion Master!

Your visit is important


NEW! SUPPORT "MINIONS AT WORK" BY BUYING STUFF YOU WERE GOING TO BUY ANYWAY!

We're now Amazon.com affiliates, which means that if you click on the Amazon link in our sidebar and make purchases from Amazon, a tiny little sliver of what you spend goes to support these fine (maybe even near-mint!) cartoons!

Later, we'll be adding a selection of Minion-recommended merchandise, but until then, use your imagination. Books, videos, electronics, games, maybe even ACTION FIGURES!
Minions at work is inadequately supported during this financial crisis by your purchases from our web stores and our advertisers. Feed the economy and help us bleed green just a little more slowly by purchasing tee-shirts, buttons, calendars, hats, undies (we kid not!), and other fine Minions at Work items at one of the following stores.

While waiting for your impending doom, pick up a Minions at Work tee-shirt or other great souvenir of your visit to the Lair:
THE MINION'S LAIR OF MERCHANDISE
"Satisfaction guaranteed or we'll make make you buy something else!"

and

NUMBER TWO'S HOUSE OF NAUGHTY
(Naughty is as naughty does!)

Join the Minions Reminder Email List. It's free, it's easy, and you'll never miss a Minions at Work cartoon (or if you do, it won't be our fault!)

Greetings, Stay-at-homes!

We're in sunny Florida this week for the Space Coast Writers Conference, so while we're getting carjacked and shot at, Minions at Work is on autopilot. Don't worry though. Next week's cartoon will post even if we aren't around to do it. And since the reminders maybe won't be going out like clockwork, just to keep you checking back, there will be a BONUS Minions cartoon going up mid-week! Who says we're slacking off, just because we aren't here? (I think Minion Number Two has this on a tee-shirt.)

- Braced for a Water Landing Steve

Monday, January 12, 2009

Overlords #145 - Special Needs



Click on image for full-sized version!

Stand by, following some new commercial jibber-jabber for a body-shot from your Minion Master!

Your visit is important to us. Please give all your Christmas presents to the nearest Minion and we'll throw you down the chimney tonight.


NEW! SUPPORT "MINIONS AT WORK" BY BUYING STUFF YOU WERE GOING TO BUY ANYWAY!

We're now Amazon.com affiliates, which means that if you click on the Amazon link in our sidebar and make purchases from Amazon, a tiny little sliver of what you spend goes to support these fine (maybe even near-mint!) cartoons!

Later, we'll be adding a selection of Minion-recommended merchandise, but until then, use your imagination. Books, videos, electronics, games, maybe even ACTION FIGURES!
Minions at work is inadequately supported during this financial crisis by your purchases from our web stores and our advertisers. Feed the economy and help us bleed green just a little more slowly by purchasing tee-shirts, buttons, calendars, hats, undies (we kid not!), and other fine Minions at Work items at one of the following stores.

While waiting for your impending doom, pick up a Minions at Work tee-shirt or other great souvenir of your visit to the Lair:
THE MINION'S LAIR OF MERCHANDISE
"Satisfaction guaranteed or we'll make make you buy something else!"

and

NUMBER TWO'S HOUSE OF NAUGHTY
(Naughty is as naughty does!)

Join the Minions Reminder Email List. It's free, it's easy, and you'll never miss a Minions at Work cartoon (or if you do, it won't be our fault!)

Greetings, Overboards!

We're getting ready for our Florida trip next week, but don't worry, I'll program our loyal robot minions to deliver your regular Minions at Work entertainment while we're gone. Just about the time the next installment is posting, I should theoretically be boarding a plane for our scenic Chicago layover. Joy!

Hey, I was surprised tonight to discover that one of our readers has extensively cross-referenced "Minions at Work" into the "TV Tropes" site. TV Tropes is a wiki that documents the various tropes, idioms and cliches common to popular fiction, starting with television (thus the name) but moving on into movies, books, comics, web comics and other media. Kind of cool being recognized (in no matter how small a way) as a cultural touchstone.

Thanks, whoever you are.

Well, tons to do, and no time to do it.
-

- Minions On Autopilot Steve

Monday, January 05, 2009

Lair Report: James Bond in "Doctor No"



As promised, this is the first in a series of "Lair Reports" highlighting various lairs, minions, and overlords from popular culture.

This time was start with the granddaddy of them all, the 1962 James Bond film, "Doctor No."

This certainly isn't the best James Bond lair (though it's good), or villain, or movie, but it is the one that sets the standards by which all others are measured. It's the movie that launched a thousand cliches!

In the film, Bond travels to the Caribbean to investigate what may be causing U.S. missile and rocket launches to malfunction. He uncovers rumors about the mysterious Doctor No, and strange goings on at his private island, Crab Key.

Eventually Bond arrives on Crab Key, loses his guide to a flame-shooting tank, picks up a half-dressed Ursula Andress, is captured, escapes, in infiltrates the lair just as Doctor No's evil plan is coming to fruition.

You figure out the rest.

LAIR REPORT

Of course, what we're interested in here is the lair and its occupants. I'm going to try and develop a standardized system by which lairs can be compared. Individual features will be ranked from zero (not present) to ten (most excellent).

Forgive me, as the system will probably be refined as we go along, though Doctor No should provide a decent template.

The Overlord:







Appearance: Anglo actor in Asian makeup.
Rank 3

Dress: Chairman Mao suits, plastic radiation hoods. Rank 5

Special Abilities, features, or disfigurements: Mechanical hands under black rubber gloves. Rank 8

Minions:

Minion Type: Basic human, including Chinese guards and soldiers, female Chinese housekeepers, and assorted generic technical types. Rank 4

Minion Uniforms: Chinese looking military uniforms, color coded and transparent radiation suits, nurse-like dresses for the housekeepers. Rank 6 (Add points for color coding, subtract points for those dresses.)

Special Minion Equipment: Assorted guns and machine guns. Radiation detectors. Rank 3


Minionmobiles:
Patrol boats equipped with machine guns. Fire breathing dragon tank. Rank 8







The Lair:

Location:
Scenic Crab Key. Blue waters, white sandy beaches, swaying palm trees, waterfalls, and Ursula Andress in a bikini. It doesn't get better than this! Rank 10

Exterior: It's disguised as a mine. Or it's under-water. Or something. We really don't see much of it from the outside. Rank 2

Lair Nerve Center: Check. Massive control room with nuclear reactor and satellite control station. Rank 8

Easily Accessible Man-sized Ventilator Ducts: Check! It all starts here! Rank 10

Overlord Bachelor Pad: Check! Includes "mod" fireplace, antiques, and a gigantic aquarium that magnifies its fish to look even bigger. Rank 8

Guest Accommodations: Check! Includes both Spartan holding cells (with easy access to the ventilator system via a poorly protected vent), and luxury "gilded cage" apartments, complete with room service and pointlessly-drugged coffee. Rank 9

Easy to Identify Self-destruct Feature: Check! Just turn the dial up to "Really Dangerous!" Rank 10

Special Lair Features: Dragon tank garage, nuclear reactor, "hot room" with robot waldo-arms to handle radioactive materials, underground corridors with vault-like doors, radiation decontamination room with conveyor-belt showers, fluffy towels, and anti-radiation gas-pumps, retractable anti-satellite antenna, interrogation room with cool, shadow-casting, circular skylight. Rank 7

More Illogical than Usual Design Flaws: The easily accessible air ducts in Doctor No's lair periodically flood with water for no apparent reason (reactor coolant?). Parts of them also heat up (from the nuclear reactor?). Maybe it's just me, but I prefer not to have hot reactor cooling water spewing out of my air-conditioning ducts!

Also, Doctor No has foolishly located his entire control room inside the nuclear reactor chamber, so that the operators actually had to wear radiation suits, even when operating the missile control equipment that had nothing to do with the reactor. I just can't see how this is a good idea.

Rank: -8


LAIR-O-MATIC SCORE: 6.2

This is the definitive lair, but not the best. Most all the essential features are here (and many of them originate here), but many lack the scope and refinement that will follow.

Still, this movie is a must-see for any lairophile. We give it a gloved thumbs-up

Sunday, January 04, 2009

Minions #144 - Escape Clause



Click on image for full-sized version!

Stand by, following some new commercial jibber-jabber for a body-shot from your Minion Master!

Your visit is important to us. Please give all your Christmas presents to the nearest Minion and we'll throw you down the chimney tonight.


NEW! SUPPORT "MINIONS AT WORK" BY BUYING STUFF YOU WERE GOING TO BUY ANYWAY!

We're now Amazon.com affiliates, which means that if you click on the Amazon link in our sidebar and make purchases from Amazon, a tiny little sliver of what you spend goes to support these fine (maybe even near-mint!) cartoons!

Later, we'll be adding a selection of Minion-recommended merchandise, but until then, use your imagination. Books, videos, electronics, games, maybe even ACTION FIGURES!
Minions at work is inadequately supported during this financial crisis by your purchases from our web stores and our advertisers. Feed the economy and help us bleed green just a little more slowly by purchasing tee-shirts, buttons, calendars, hats, undies (we kid not!), and other fine Minions at Work items at one of the following stores.

While waiting for your impending doom, pick up a Minions at Work tee-shirt or other great souvenir of your visit to the Lair:
THE MINION'S LAIR OF MERCHANDISE
"Satisfaction guaranteed or we'll make make you buy something else!"

and

NUMBER TWO'S HOUSE OF NAUGHTY
(Naughty is as naughty does!)

Join the Minions Reminder Email List. It's free, it's easy, and you'll never miss a Minions at Work cartoon (or if you do, it won't be our fault!)

Greetings, Hang Overs!

Welcome to 2009! Cheer up! It can't suck as bad as last year!

Can it?

Anyway, this week's toon offers some more Minion employment advice that you can put to work in your own little life. We're all minions on this bus.

As I said last week, we've been on a real James Bond kick over here at the Lair, and I made one last purchase this week that really puts a cap on things. Ask yourself this, was there ever a bad Bond song? Sure, some are better than others, but they're all great, starting with the Bond theme music in "Doctor No," and on "Goldfinger," "Diamonds are Forever," "You Only Live Twice," "Live and Let Die," "A View to a Kill," and many others.

Until recently, if you wanted to get them all, you'd need a stack of CDs (or at least pay $20+ for downloads that are useless when your Zune hits a leap-year or your iPod's battery bursts into flame!). But now they're all on one, affordable CD. Trust me, this is money well spent.

How much would you pay? Operators are standing by!

Nah, not actually. But buy it from Amazon through this link, and send a little scratch our way.



Your iPod will self-destruct in ten seconds. Gotta go!

See you next week.

-

- Minions are Forever Steve