Do Ventriloquist Dolls Give You The Creeps?

A bit of a strange one this week, I think you'll agree. I'll go into this week's cartoon's thinking and its history in a little while. In the meantime I'd like you to feast your little peepers on this lot (there's a montage near the bottom). I am always astounded by the huge diversity of styles and ideas this competition encourages week after week. Go on, it's astonshing isn't it?

Ennywhey, on to this week's scribble by yours truly. To be completely honest I didn't expect any points whatsoever. After all, it's hardly a thigh-slapper is it? The theme is Ventriloquist and Paul Mahoney (last week's winner) plumped for an optional caption. I struggled a little with the caption. My first attempt was "Helg helg! Nurder!". I thought this was hilarious - at first. This eventually evolved to "Helg, helg! Call the golice!" and then on to the final one you see above. I decided that the repetition of 'helg' was excessive, but the simple 'call the golice' was funnier because it was less fussy and more straight forward AND it only uses the ventriloquist's problem consonant once. That said, the caption was always thought about in conjunction with the drawing. The image came first. Where did the image come from? Once again we are about to delve into my childhood.

When I was nowt but a scrimbleshonker to a niddlewright (I don't know. I just made it up) I was allowed by my - I now understand to be thoroughly irresponsible - parents to watch a film titled Dead of Night. It was an anthology of four stories (if memory serves) the last one of which starred Michael Redgrave (pre-knighthood) as a ventriloquist with a strange, obsessional relationship with his vent doll that tips him over into the maelstrom of madness. Or does it? Does he project his desires from the Id through the doll or is the doll actually an autonomous thing of evil in its own right? As you can see, Dead of Night was the direct inspiration for my cartoon (in the film Redgrave 'murders' his doll) and I've continued with the ambiguous nature between vent and doll. It's a doll isn't it? We all know it is inanimate. So, are we witnessing a psychotic crisis, or is the doll really appealing for help?

Brrrrrrrrrr. Sleep well!

"Poor Robin Crusoe! Poor Robin Crusoe!"

And just how many points did yours truly garner this week? Go on, take a wild guess. That's right, not a sausage. Not even a chipolata. Zilchola. And small wonder when you consider what my scratchings were up against this week. A very deserved win, in my opinion, by Mr. Mahoney and a very nice bloke to boot.

I really am my own worst enemy at times. The brief for this week's competition was a cartoon with Desert Island as a theme with an optional caption. In other words I could have drawn and written anything I like. So, being me, I concentrated on a character from literature - Robinson Crusoe - and opted to do without a caption. An edgy maverick, that's me! Without any points.

My thinking went like this: which archetypal character do you associate with desert islands? Long John Silver. Well Treasure Island was uninhabited (except for Ben Gunn) until the Hispaniola hove into view. What if he met up with Robinson Crusoe? Mental image: Long John Silver and Robinson Crusoe looking non-plussed at each other. Either one of them could be saying, "well, one of us is in the wrong novel." Yes, hardly a side-splitter is it? Then I got to thinking about Robinson Crusoe. What is the most iconic image of this fictional character that springs to mind? Well, my mind anyway. Crusoe's discovery of a footprint, not his own, naturellement n'est pas? Would he be startled by a footprint? Possibly. Would he be startled by a Nike trainer? OH MOST UNDOUBTEDLY YES! And how hilarious would that be? OUTSTANDINGLY HILARIOUS! And how many points did it get? LLAREGYB!

God, The Devil and the Nature of Man.

Not really. Theology, philosophy, psychology pffft! I don't do deep. Shallow as a puddle on a summer's day, that's me. This is my entry for Caption Competition 76. Click here, scroll down a bit. A bit more. Just a little more. There you are, a montage of all this week's entries.

Good points: I like the devil's insouciant attitude. Bad points: God's hair. I didn't get it right. He wears a mullet, you know. And don't mention his monk's tonsor. He's very sensitive about that.

Happy New Year! Good Lord! Look at the time!

Piccyless post. Crawling out from under the festive season. Had a great time. Competition entry to follow very soon.