I know I posted one of these already, but here’s—what appears to be—Buffalo Bill from Silence of the Lambs doing a Halloween Costume review. But is actually Jim Silver doing toy reviews. I wish I could explain to you why these make me laugh. Maybe it’s all the snow, and being stuck inside. Maybe it’s a man in a giant Big Bird costume. Who’s to say.

Featured: BIIIPPPITY  BOPPPPITY BOOOOOOO….

This guy, Jim Silver, used to work for Wizard Magazine, and now he runs something called Time to Play Magazine, which I believe is somewhat successful (?). I don’t really know much about him other than that. But if I were to wager a guess on why the magazine is successful, I would say it’s because of the videos on their site of this guy play-testing toys. They’re…odd. If you Chop & Screw the videos, though, they’re much better. It’s Wipey Dipey time, children.

Pictured: Not Steve Brule.

“Actually its pretty screwed up what they did. They gave everyone off on Friday (very strange) then last night at 6:30 PM (right before kickoff [of the Jets/Steelers playoff game]) they called me and told me the magazines were no longer in publication. I was asked to go get my personal belongings and they told me the office was closed and moved to a different location and they would let us know when it was okay to get them. When I asked about severance or  unemployment they shrugged me off and quickly dismissed me. So, I still have no idea what is happening in those regards.” — iFanboy’s anonymous interview with a Wizard staffer laid off today.

In the coming days there will be no shortage of anti-Wizard commentary, impotent rage from ex-employees (anonymous and otherwise), industry creators, and level-headed commentary about where the company is going (accompanied by complete shit-fits and mud slinging in the comment sections). If you haven’t heard, Wizard and Toyfare Magazine are no more. They are survived by InQuest and Anime Insider. There’s also plenty of well-crafted commentary, such as this post from friend and ex-Wizard Editor/Writer Sean T. Collins. Sean, as always, provides a level of discourse and insight that make posts like mine completely unnecessary. But, as you know, I’m not always capable of such level-headed output. I’ve said it before: I’ve long stopped caring about Gareb or Steven Shamus, but I still enjoy shaking their ant-farm. I know more than one of my posts has caused some frantic morning phone calls, particularly if they involved my desire to involve the Shami in a Human Centipede of my own design.

That’s because, if you have ever dealt with them personally or professionally, you will know that they are a couple of wonderful, wonderful dildos. The colorful, extra-ribbed kind. If they didn’t exist, Keith Giffen would have invented them. The movie trailer for The Ghost and Mr. Chicken champions Don Knotts as “The World’s Bravest Coward,” but The Shami are in the Top 5. I wouldn’t give them the ego-boost of calling them #1. I actually can’t figure out if they’re purposefully brazen and cocky in their cowardice—whether it’s the tactless firing of long-time employees without, screwing over retailers, stiffing creators, etc…—or if they spent so much time in their youth launching the magazine, that they didn’t get to develop the correct range of inter-personal skills and emotions necessary to make people not hate you.

If it wasn’t so sad that people like my first boss—Dan Reilly, a wonderful guy who was with the company until the bitter end, and rumored to be laid off with a spineless phone call—and diamond-in-the-rough editors like Andy Serwin were laid off today, you could slap some wacky organ on the Shamus’ dealings and call it an episode of Arrested Development. The stories I’ve heard over the years both in and out of the office…you can’t make shit like this up. And I won’t even start on Mike Cotton. Mike and I haven’t always had a pleasant relationship—our personalities are tailor made for a hero/arch-villain relationship—but he’s certainly capable of doing bigger things. Unlike the Shami, Mike really can be a good and talented guy when he wants and, if I ever did, I sort of regret lumping him in with them. He may be kind of a son of a bitch, but at least he’s got a inkling of talent and experience. I may not have always liked him, but I respected him. Maybe that’s a backhanded compliment, I don’t know. I just don’t want to hold that grudge anymore. We had some fun. I’ve gotta echo what this ex-staffer said today on iFanboy:

FWE: Honestly, I know it will fail. First off, there is no leadership. The people that are still on staff have no digital publishing experience or seem to want to be there. As more money goes into the conventions, the less the owners care about the magazine side.  They plan on publicly trading and launching this app for free with no real advertising. I think anyone who does a little research before purchasing stock will find just how screwed that place is.

I’d buy that for a dollar. Well, not the Wizard stock….the first part. The other day I realized I’ve been living in Illinois longer than my time spent in New York. The whole thing’s distant from me, and has been for a long time. To paraphrase Biggie, it was all a dream…I used to read Wizard Magazine. Gareb S. and Joey Q. up in the limousine. It’s where I got my start, and like many people I took what I needed from it and tried not to look back. I met some amazing people. Met the best group of friends in this lifetime. The infamous Wizard World message board censorship lead to a great comic community called Panels on Pages, and they are truly wonderful people. I burned some bridges, sure…somebody’s gotta shake the ant farm. Why so serious?

Many of my colleagues went on to much bigger and better things, and we still talk about the Golden Years at Wizard (there really were a few). Those who stayed behind continued some really, really great output. Rich Johnston? Eh, sorry man…you weren’t one of them. They put food on their family’s table, they made that shitty commute into New York when the offices moved, they put out entire magazines by themselves as the staff dwindled, they took all the sticks with no promise of carrots. They wake up every day, waiting for the other shoe to drop. And today…thud. Or “Thwack!” I should say, I guess.

You don’t have to look too far to know the online venture isn’t going to work. It hasn’t about three other times, most notably GeekChic.com. I’m not linking to it, but go there if you must. It needs the traffic. Overall, I feel kind of sad. I don’t feel like getting in a Human Centipede with Gareb today. I feel bad for my friends. I feel bad knowing that any one of them could launch their own venture on their own, and succeed in spades. Anything under the “Wizard Brand” just isn’t going to fly. Simply put: it’s a shit sandwich but, unlike before, taking a bite is kind of optional. Too many other sites do it better, including ex-Anime Insider editor Rob Bricken, who runs the immensely, immensely popular Topless Robot. In the online Geek World, Rob is one of the pacesetters now. So you can bet when he says…

Since the one thing Wizard has never figured out is how the internet works, I’m not holding my breath for a return to glory. But I would like to call out the gutless shitweasels in charge of the company who had the unmitigated hubris and bastardry to issue a press release today, heralding both the announcement of “Wizard World” and that Wizard is now being publicly traded without ever mentioning the cancellation of either magazine, or the god-knows-how-many people they laid off. Not only it is callous and classless, telling people they should invest money in their company ON THE SAME DAY THEY CANCELED THEIR TWO MOST VISIBLE PRODUCTS… well, that sums up Wizard Entertainment more than anything.

…that people are listening. So while it’s easy to go with the old “Wizard can’t copy edit” jokes or “Wizard has just been shitty boob graphics” jokes during this time, just remember to direct your ire straight to the top, instead of where good people are not being paid enough to copy edit AND come up with something other than boob jokes AND write Gareb’s masthead letter (he never wrote his own masthead. In other breaking news, Burt Reynolds wears a toupee). And, even then, you almost can’t get mad at the people straight at the top. Because it falls on deaf ears. Because it’s aiming for the slow kid in a dodge ball game. Because it’s like getting mad at yourself for touching the stove every time and finding out, “Shit! That’s HOT!” Because when the Wal-Mart of ComicCons doesn’t work out, you’re going to say “of course.” Because it’s like yelling at your retarded friend, who you know is retarded and absolutely incapable of anything, but you yell at him anyway because he keeps doing the same thing and you expect different results. Because you’re a Goon, Gareb Shamus. Goon, goon, goon, goon, goon, goon, goon, goon. And that’s what I’m going to call you for the rest of your life: Goon. Oh, you too Steven. Goon. You’ll always be Goon.

We all have fond memories of the magazine. I could have been writing the Farm Beat in Peoria, actually…I literally got a call the day I was leaving for my unpaid internship at Wizard, offering me a paid internship to write the Farm Beat for the Peoria Journal Star. I told him, “I’m sorry, but I gotta go for it. This is a big opportunity, I think. My stuff’s all packed…I gotta say no. I’m sorry. I gotta go.”

We all still talk about Wizard fondly for a reason, and those reasons don’t involve Gareb Shamus…even though he was the catalyst. It became bigger than he was capable of handling, I believe. Tell anyone outside our little online and Geek Niche clique that you “worked for Wizard,” and they will look at you very, verry strange. But this was my world. It was a dream, A DREAM, of mine to write Twisted ToyFare Theater. And I got to do that. I got to interview celebrities, and see comic creators I respected stick dollar bills in stripper’s butts, and talk at length with my heroes, and live with illegal aliens, and see the New Frontier guy throw a beer in someone’s face. I got to know Harvey Pekar. I got Christmas cards from Jim Lee. Keith Giffen laughed at my jokes, for Christ’s sake. I got prison mail. I put Brian Cunningham’s head on an action figure. I played Foosball with Jason Mewes. I sat on a toilet seat after Jessica Biel came out of the Green Room bathroom. It was still warm. I ate a sandwich with Ryan Reynolds, stole Adam Setzler’s water at a Planet Hollywood PR event, got tons of free games and action figures, flirted with Julie Benz, snuck Ultimate Fighter Nate “The Rock” Quarry into a ComicCon, talked Road House with Seth Green and my buddy Mel. It was all a dream. And so, now…here we are.

My thoughts go out to everyone affected by this announcement financially and personally today, including a few good, unnamed friends. Shown: The 2006 staff of Wizard, my friends, etc… Raise your hand if you still work there…

Note: This is a long entry. Just man up and take the ride. There’s a contest at the very end to win a book called “What’s My Pee Telling Me?” from Chronicle Books and South Park Season 13 on Blu-Ray from Comedy Central.

First things first: My headline is probably misleading, because there are two definitions of “tryst.”

1. An agreement, as between lovers, to meet at a certain time and place.

2. A meeting or meeting place that has been agreed on.

Clearly, I would never intend to meet Gareb Shamus as a lover (though I totally might, have you seen him lately? We’ll get to that) But definition “#2″ deals with our agreed meeting place. Which, in this case, would be something called FaceBook.

Pretty straightforward questions, I think you’ll agree. Important ones, too. I don’t want to toot my own hose but I’m a reporter, you know.

But then something goes horribly wrong between Gareb and I. CLICK THROUGH to find out how Gareb responds to my sexual advances which I just couldn’t contain anymore.

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Shown: Look at that sexy bitch! Also, look at that girl!

Time for a palate cleansing. Yesterday, I wove a tale of a shitty band connected to a recent (justified) anti-Wizard tirade, bookended by my own mud-slinging at the terrible shenanigans and cast of unfortunate characters with the Panels on Pages weekly podcast folks.

Fun as hell, but it made me exhausted from all the negativity I felt I was creating, and I remember a time when I wasn’t just some disgruntled ex-Wizard guy (which I am, to an extent…but I’m more interested in making jokes and hurling occasional poo-balloons than I am mounting any sort of real anger-campaign against Wizard. This is all fun for me, I have no real impact on anything Wizard Magazine does. Though I’d like to think, somewhere, a Shamus is bristling with anger, that’s probably not happening. Not once did the man remember who I was in all the times I met him.)

Yes…I remember a time when I was…a WIZARD FAN! Not yet a Wizard Employee—that would be years and years and years later—but a FAN! Yes, I remember a time when—after the now-defunct Wizard Universe Message Boards got particularly angry and riled up—editor and friend Brian Cunningham would step in an start a thread called “A return to our roots as comic fans” or something. Like, “I know the magazine is doing some dicky stuff, but let’s just talk comics and be civil, okay?” And he was genuine, and nice, and everybody got like Fonzie, real quick. And then they fired Brian, and everyone else, and that went right out the window. And it’s that little Brian Voice in the back of my head now, squatting beside my desk (he would squat like that) and saying “Be cool, man. Things were good once. Before the Dark Times. Before the Con Wars…”

It reminds me of my first Wizard Convention. The one I talked my parents into taking my brother and I to just prior to my Freshman year in high school, after reading about these storied conventions in the magazine year after year.

The one in Chicago, where I lost both my contacts in the pool the night before and MIRACULOUSLY FOUND ONE at the bottom. Chew on that for a bit. I found a clear contact lens at the bottom of a pool. With two bad eyes. It was fate. And I enjoyed the entire convention, half-blind, with a big stupid look on the Acne Plantation I called a face. And I didn’t have to work any booths, or clean up anything, or be there on business. And things were good.

…This was back when I was EXCITED to see LOU FERRIGNO in person! Look how excited my dad and I are to see THE HULK! Hell yeah I’ll pay $20 for that! Long before people were like, “Lou Ferrigno is an asswipe!” Long before I saw the Hulk drinking alone at the bar at some Wizard after-party in Texas, where he could only DREAM of being more deaf so he wouldn’t have to hear the incessant come-ons of a hanger-on sorority girl!

…back when my favorite artist in the entire world was Mike Wieringo, and I stood in line forever just to see him! Back when I kept his Wizard cover under plastic until I could finally meet the guy in person, and he was as cool as I imagined and answered all my dumb Spider-Man questions. Back before I grumbled about calling some creator for a Spider-Man quote I didn’t care about getting, for a magazine they didn’t care about being in, so we could all go back to getting blackout drunk with interns. Back before Ringo passed away, and Wizard named a room after him, which caused a shitstorm of controversy!

…back when the line for the guy who played Spawn was so big, I had to take a picture from the sidelines! Back when I approached him and his model girlfriend outside the convention hall and got his autograph, as he acted like a total asshole about it before getting in his limo! Yes…A LIMO! FOR SPAAWWWN, DUDE! It was awesome. And I had a cool story about the guy playing Spawn being an asshole to me to tell my friends.

…Back when the hottest girls in the world were Avatar booth babes! Back when I wore a Star Wars t-shirt—and not even a cool Star Wars t-shirt—to a convention and it felt RIGHT!

…Back when scorned Darth Vader actor David Prowse wasn’t a DICK! Ok, he was always a dick, even back then. Just look at him, sitting there, wishing he had voiced Darth Vader. What a rube.

Which brings me back to this picture. This was the hottest girl I’d ever met, and the closest I’d ever gotten to a hot girl. Really, any girl. When she moved, her suit bowed out and I could see her full breasts from the side, and down the front of her G-string thing. Her wrist made crumpled, creaking sounds when she twisted it, on account of all the tight rubber material and aching seams.

I snuck away from my parents and my brother, said I had to go to the bathroom or something, and jumped in with a big crowd of men with cameras surrounding her. I quickly got some guy to take a picture of us. My eyes darted back and forth. At boob. At inner-thigh. At boob. At thigh. I was freaking out. Someone was gonna catch me. Hurry up and take the goddamned picture. But I didn’t care about my sun-burnt hair. Or the big zit on my nose. Or my trap-jaw teeth. Or my turkey-neck. Or my goofy Star Wars/Calvin Klein parody shirt. At this moment, I was hellbent for pleather.

When these pictures were developed, I had to get ahold of them first to sneak this one out. I was afraid my parents would flip.

Moments after this picture, I saw a skinny, big-eared man hurriedly walking across the convention floor. I knew instantly, from the Masthead page of Wizard, it was Publisher Gareb Shamus. I ran over to introduce myself, completely starstruck, as he continued toward a door, with purpose. “Hi! The Big Cheese!” That’s all I could think of to say. I was so, so incredibly nervous. That was his nickname in the magazine. So that’s what I said. “Oh hi…hi, howareya…” he said, nervously, and disappeared into a stairwell that headed to the show announcers booth. Years later I would meet him again, for the first time, at a company picnic. “I’m an intern for you!” “Oh that’s great, great!” he would always say back. “Just great…great!”

And then later, for the first time, we’d meet at the premeire of Spider-Man 2 in New York City. “Gareb! How’s it going? We work for you! For a few years now, actually!” a friend and I said. He looked at us, awkwardly. “Oh hi guys! That’s great…great!” and he nervously disappeared in the theater. Later, by total chance, my friend overheard him telling a story of how “these two guys approached him at Spider-Man 2 and said they worked for him, but he thinks they were screwing around.”

That guy never did know who I was. And man…Those were the days.

A magical thing hit the internet yesterday. And it finally allows me to tell an amazing story that I’ve been waiting to tell for years. If you’re not “in the comic industry,” (and, lord knows, I barely am at this point) you may want to skip to the hilarious audio bits at the Jump.

Because, at its heart, this post is about a shitty band. The world’s shittiest band. The band that drove Scott Kurtz to the place of madness he is now. The band Court Jester.

But why not hear the whole amazing tale, hmm? Why not dip your toes into the daily cry-baby shenanigans that make up The Comics Industry, won’t you?

CLICK THROUGH TO EXPERIENCE SCOTT KURTZ’S WILDEST NIGHTMARE!
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