Joelanta - The End

Well, we've pretty much run through the Joelanta material, so that's the end of the bonus stuff for now. Tom sent me the attached imaged as-is, and I thought it was a fitting end-cap to the series.

Thanks again to Tom for coming up with the idea, kitbashing the Minions, and taking the shots. Also thanks out to Buddy Finethy and the fine folks at Joelanta for allowing Tom to do his thing, and to Mike Gardner whose wonderful zombie diorama was the backdrop for many of these cartoons. Also additional thanks to Tom, who sent me the two Minions he created to add to my regular Minions crew. Thanks, Tom!

Bonus Joelanta Minions #9 - Security Leak

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Bonus Joelanta Minions #8 - Secret sauce

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(Note from Steve 10/14/06: I just spotted the typo in this. Siigh. I'll fix it at some point. Just not right now.)

Bonus Joelanta Minions #7

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As promised, I hope to squeeze a few more out of the photos Tom sent, but life has been busy this week.

Not my most tasteful joke ever. Not to pick on Koreans or Korean food. In some respects, it could have been almost any kind of ethnic or regional food, but I'm especially suspicious of a cuisine that includes rotten cabbage. Okay, I also wonder about people who soak perfectly good fish or corn in lye, or eat snails, or boil peanuts. (Okay, maybe you should be suspicious of people who boil peanuts, but I'm from Alabama and I love the darned things.) Of all the possible choices, Korean just sounded funny. Plus, it's newsworthy.

Bonus Joelanta Minions #6

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Bonus Joelanta Minions #5

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Bonus Joelanta Minions #4

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Bonus Joelanta Minions #3

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This is the first of a series of panels shot in an amazing multi-room zombie diorama constructed by Mike Gardner. Mike was nice enough to allow Tom to actually place his Minions inside the diorama and shoot them there.

Mike and friends are apparently working to turn all this stuff into an epic photo-story called "The Final Outcome." You can find more information here (and see how Mike actually got one of his zombies signed by George Romero himself!).

Watch for more of Mike's amazing diorama through the rest of the week. You ain't seen nothing yet!

And a reminder, join the legions (well, several) folks who have already signed up for the Minions reminder and secret-handshake mailing list. Sign up here.

Bonus Joelanta Minions #2

Our Joelanta specials continue. Scroll down for this week's regular Minions at Work cartoon.

According to Tom, this tank appeared at the table of Toy Chest and Collectables. No information on who made it, or if this is a one-off custom or something that had for sale. Perhaps someone out there has additional information.

Tomorrow: those zombies I've been promising! Really!

As a reminder, we've just created our new Minions reminder and newsletter mailing list. Sign up and get email reminders when new cartoons appear. Members will also get access to exclusive Minions features you won't find anywhere else, and I'm planning some drawings down the line with the chance to win prizes. So sign up today. Join here!

Bonus Joelanta Minions #1

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If you're looking for our regular Monday Minons cartoon, scroll on down. It's there. But as promised, this is the first of our bonus Minions toons created by me using photos from Minons uberfan, Tom Brooks, taken at the Joelanta GI Joe show in Atlanta, Georgia last weekend. We'll be posting a new bonus panel every day this week, and maybe beyond, depending on how long the pictures, jokes, and my time hold out.

According to Tom, the happy fellow in the picture (no, NOT Minon No. 1A!), is Buddy Finethy, Joelanta's organizer, who was kind enough to allow Tom to shoot around the show.

Stay tuned, as Tom found us some fantastic stuff. Okay, one word to tease you with: Zombies!
Be there!

Minions Fan Art (and bonus Minions for you!)

From the beginning my philosophy has been that "Minions at Work" is a cartoon site that happens to use action figures, not an action-figure site that happens to have cartoons. In other words, my goal is to make this entertaining for anyone with a bit of pop-culture awareness, not just people who (like me) collect action figures. But given the unusual nature of our format, it's hard not to have things blur sometimes. For example:

Tom Brooks, who I know from my action figure discussion lists, sent me the attached cartoon and a suggestion. As you can see, Tom had followed my basic "recipe" and kitbashed (that's hobby-talk for combining existing parts to create something new) his own set of Minions characters. Let's just call them No. 1A and Number 13A. Tom was headed to "Joelanta" this weekend. Joelanta is one of the country's premiere shows for GI Joe and 1/6th action figure collectors, held in Atlanta, Georgia, and he wondered how I'd feel if he shot some photos of his Minions at Joelanta, in essence, providing some "on location" reports.

After some discussion about how we'd go about it and his getting an okay from the Joelanta organizers, I gave Tom the okay. We decided that he'd shoot some interesting shots, then send them to me for editing and captions. I wasn't sure what to expect, and I figured if the geek content was too high for the general audience here at Minions at Work,, I could post them on my hobby blog (pure action-figure geek content, visit at your own risk) One Sixth.

But as it happens, what I've gotten from Tom so far is really good stuff, and I think we can do some jokes suitable for general audiences. So come back here all this week for a series of special "Guest Minion" panels from Joelanta.

And as a preview, as a thanks to the Joelanta folks for their cooperation, I did a special Joelanta tribute Minions cartoon for them. You can find it on the Joelanta blog here.

So buck-up, Minions fans. In addition to your regularly scheduled Minions, you're going to get a whole bunch of bonus content this week! Thanks to Tom, Joelanta, and all the nice folks there who helped Tom get his shots (to be named later).