comic merch!

[sharkbytes.livejournal.com]

We've all been laughing/shuddering at some of the art in the comic version of Guilty Pleasures.  Like the thunder thighs and the throw-proportions-to-the-wind attitude.  Now we have something far more disturbing to laugh at:  They're selling merchandise with the comic book art imprinted on it.  I had to look, and I swear, anyone in this community could make better items for sale using one hand and a pack of sharpies.  The most offensive offering, in my humble opinion, were these *extremely sexy* men's boxer shorts with Comic!Jean-Claude emblazoned on the thigh.  

So many questions spring to mind: Who would wear these? Who would make these?  Was it deliberate?  Why are the boxers the cheap white kind that are given away at theme parties, usually bearing the legend "i danced my pants off at _______'s sweet 16"?  

But anyway, i thought i'd share the lolz, because nothing says funny like Anita Blake postage pals.  Not an actual stamp, mind.  But a sticker of some sort with a space for the stamp.  Sorry, LKH.  Elvis can be a stamp.  Not Anita.  


EDIT:  One of the things that has always bothered me is that on almost every piece of merchandise, there is a huge font that reads"Laurell K Hamilton Anita Blake Series" or some incarnation of the statement.  In my humble opinion, merchandise that is successful is subtle, without much fanfare and credit, that allows fans to squee when they see it, and non-fans to wonder what the deal is.  Case in point: I have a black tshirt with a huge yellow pepper on the front with a big bite taken out of it.  That's it.  People will stop me in the street to ask where i got it, what it's about, etc.  Fans of Iron Chef, who get the reference, literally go berserk and ask where they can get one.  That is successful merchandise, it doesn't need a huge font at the bottom proclaiming Iron Chef, and whoever the hell created it. 

Comments

[pandaemonaeum.livejournal.com]

My friend wants the t-shirt with the vampire penguin on it, because she loves anything to do with penguins. Apart from that, I don't know of anyone who wants any of it :/

[dan-lian.livejournal.com]

I looked for about 30 seconds on that site looking at it in sheer shock.. I WANT MY TIME BACK!

[rinkori.livejournal.com]

Oh my god, you'd think with her piles of porn-money she'd be able to hire someone who actually knows how to design merchandise to do her merchandising for her.

[sharkbytes.livejournal.com]

i know, it's almost offensive that this is what they're offering up for sale.

[sharkbytes.livejournal.com]

i'm gonna go with the boxers. Can you imagine an intimate setting, a good-looking man removes his pants, and behold! Jean-Claude's face and LKH's name staring right at you. I'd run as fast as my legs would carry me.

[lovedstrangely.livejournal.com]

she's got million dollar book deals and she uses cafepress for her merch. w.t.f.

[wickedmommy.livejournal.com]

It's a cafe press shop? She has a freaking cafe press shop??? *shakes head*

[kethryvis.livejournal.com]

Even when I was still a fan of LKH, I shuddered at her merchandise. I always found it incredibly cheezy and poorly designed. Like someone spent five minutes creating drawings in MS Paint and declared it a MASTERPIECE. Those boxers are just the latest exhibit. I mean, okay boxers are fine... but you don't put a picture like that on there. I mean. Fugly doesn't even come close to the tragedy of those things. If you had had had to have JC on boxers, take out the black background, draw him in black ink (same picture), and toss the logo at the bottom. It would look a hell of a lot nicer, which is damning with false praise.

To me it's just another example of LKH's whoring of her "intellectual" (and BOY do I use that term loosely) property. I'm waiting for her to hire Anita and JC lookalikes to flank her at signings and convention appearances.

Oh wait, she doesn't need an Anita lookalike does she?

[sharkbytes.livejournal.com]

i know! the big black square background surrounding him just screams "i learned how to do a solid-color fill in photoshop"

[terratheelf.livejournal.com]

I thought it was going to be a lineart of him, no background with a little logo on it not "OMG BLOCK OF BLACK DOOM".

[tylergrrls.livejournal.com]

Okay, I think this is the most telling thing I've ever seen:

http://www.cafepress.com/lkhprem.17937360 - LKH Print
http://www.cafepress.com/lkhprem.32481943 - Merry Print

[ladyblue99.livejournal.com]

Gee thanks for showing more WTFery from LKH, this stuff is horrendous. And the JC pic, Dear
Brett thanks for ruining a perfectly good mental pic I had of JC, with that metrosexual greasy looking pic. Its awful.
I must spork my eyes.

[sharkbytes.livejournal.com]

wow, i am usually up-to-date on my wank, and i had NO IDEA she handed out Anita business cards!!!! that's...really sad. I could see, as a gag, someone giving her them as a gift. That could be quirky and cute. But making them yourself and handing them out is a clear sign that you've stepped over the line of mental sanity.

Oh, and word--that website is the height of tacky. That's what happens when you trust untalented friends/family with your web design. It turns out shitty, and then you're stuck not being able to bitch about it (or not knowing any better, i don't know which is worse)

Second note...

[dan-lian.livejournal.com]

WTF is this? "Gru's Harem
The folks of The Playground know Gru! He is our Pasha. Show your Gru support!"

... Last I knew, a grue was something in an old text-based game... "It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue." I am totally not sure I would want to be in a grue's harem... (and the image on the shirt is the same of a stylized depiction of a grue, so I know I'm not off base).

This makes me cry. Some of it might have been nice (like a grey's detective agency mug for work), but... *shudder*

Re: Second note...

[sharkbytes.livejournal.com]

oh dear me...On the Grey's Detective Agency mug, in big letters it says "graphic by darla cook"..i should've known Renfield was responsible for this cheesiness.

[deire.livejournal.com]

Shouldn't "Anita Blake" was here have a slime trail on it left by the Crotch of Doom? One or two of these were okay, notably the Grey's agency ads and the Barinthus drawing. But most of it? Yes, I could do better with pack of Sharpies. And the self-congratulatory tone? Puh-lease. Heh. "I don't date vampires. I just screw them mightily, three times a night if they're not too sore and don't run too fast." My land, doesn't anyone associated with LKH know how to spell and use grammar? Is it some sort of writer's version of Ebola? You get too close to her, and all the punctuation just hemmorrhages out of you?

[thaliablooming.livejournal.com]

Oh, lord, I could see that: "my eyes! the semicolons are leaking out of my EYES!"
...
it being LKH, I somehow cannot find this totally implausible...

[karmyn75.livejournal.com]

I swear I've read that Merry quote about a throne for the wrong side in a Harry Potter fanfic. Or at least in a bad summary of a Harry Potter fic.
I forgot my brother-in-law's birthday last week. Maybe I'll get him the boxers.
No, I need him to fix my computer so I better not.
What self respecting man would wear those, anyway?

[melaniedavidson.livejournal.com]

Wow.

Classy.

[frabjously.livejournal.com]

I'm ignorant. What are postage pals?

I have a black tshirt with a huge yellow pepper on the front with a big bite taken out of it.

OMFG WHERE DID YOU BUY IT??

[sharkbytes.livejournal.com]

postage pals are a sticker, about two inches wide, that has a picture on one side, and a space for you to put your stamp on the other. i guess they're for people who think that the picture on the stamp just isn't enough pizzazz, lol.

the yellow pepper shirt came from an online iron chef merchandise store...i *think* it was buyironchef dot com.

[dwg.livejournal.com]

Oh god, those boxers are so bad. So very bad!

Srsly, this is right up there with the bad taste of silver charms for lycanthropes. AII!!! *headpiano*

I suddenly have hope that a range of cheap Frank-themed merch would blitz because of the simplicity and obscurity of it all. XD

[sharkbytes.livejournal.com]

those charms are teh funny, though...i want to meet the fantard who has all the book charms dangling off their wrist to signal to passersby that they have the worst taste EVARRR!! Frank-merch would be fab-u-lous!

[dinsedaledarby.livejournal.com]

I saw those t-shirts with LKH sitting on the stairs. Who would buy those? I don't know why she put her face on so much crap. There was a bumper sticker, I think it was the way to a man's heart one and I think it would have been a lot better if it didn't have the "anita on the true way to get to a man's heart" part at the bottom. you shouldn't site the quote on a bumper sticker/t-shirt/tote bag. there is no need to do that.

http://www.cafepress.com/lkhprem.23503479

So I totally agree with your point about stamping her name on everything. subtle is best.
and yeah, why is Anita a stamp?

[sharkbytes.livejournal.com]

oh i forgot about that hideous bumper sticker!!!!

[sharkbytes.livejournal.com]

Heavy Metal reference, ftw! That picture is hilarious...they both look so freaking hairy for some reason, and neither has a discernable neck. The more i think about it, it is EXACTLY like a shitty outtake from Heavy Metal.