UPDATE: Joe threw some words down so I added them along with my own. Check them out:

The Adventures of Dr. McNinja is among the most popular web comics ever to be put on-line, and Chris Hastings has spearheaded the writing and the art of the project since 2004.  I stumbled across it in December of 2009, and ended up catching up on the entire 4 year run at that point in one afternoon.   At one point I handed a copy of the first McNinja book to frequent guest Brett Kelley to show him a joke probably a ninja joke involving Jose Cuervo and after he laughed, he flipped over another page, and then another, and then grabbed the second book.  Hastings has a talent for pulling humor out of every medium that he works in, from writing to drawing to skit comedy, and you all have the pleasure of experiencing the auditory version of that with this week’s episode.

  In addition to a great webcomic, Hastings has churned out several fantastic comic books including Gwenpool (which has recently popped out a trade) and Adventure Time (a five year running book that Chris joined in 2014).  He also churned out the Deadpool arc of Fear Itself, and Longshot Saves the Marvel Universe, both of which allow the hilarious Hastings to paint with a large comedy brush.  I’m obviously a hugely obsessed fan, but it comes from a place of immense talent and deep hilarity. 

 This week’s episode has Alex, Jayare, and myself interviewing Hastings a little about his career, talking about how he goes about creating comedy gold, the importance of creating compelling characters, his sketch comedy, and then like 15 minutes on how apparently Hearthstone is awesome.  It was nothing short of being one of the best hours of my life, and I sense you will all find hilarity and enjoyment from it as well.

Finally, if you are going to check out Dr. McNinja and haven’t before, start here with the first official storyline or here with the first color storyline.  The current arc is the last one, and nearing completion – avoid it at all costs, because in addition to being an awesome payoff for hundreds of pages of hilarity, it is crazy spoilerific.  Thank you to Chris Hastings for joining the episode, and Jayare and Alex for letting me join them in interviewing one of my personal heroes.

-Joe

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I apologize in advance if I've written this before but it bears repeating:

One of the greatest feelings in the world is when you talk to someone you really admire and you confirm that they're a genuinely good person. That they fit that image that you've formed in your head based off of a 2 minute conversation or a quick Twitter exchange. They live up to the absurd and probably unfair expectations that you've set for them simply because you enjoy the product they create. They're not obligated to humor you and sacrifice their spare time while you fanboy for the better part of an hour...but they do it anyway.

To put it bluntly: It's awesome.

Our guest this week is the one and only Christopher Hastings. (Longtime listeners will recognize the name mentioned in past episodes.)  He's the creator of the hit web comic "The Adventures of Dr. McNinja", he's written comics for Marvel such as "Deadpool: Fear Itself", "Longshot Saves the Marvel Universe", and "The Unbelievable Gwenpool". He also writes the Adventure Time comic and makes frequent appearances in the local New York sketch comedy scene (More on that in the episode). He's also one of those people I talked about in the beginning of this post. We've admired him for a while, we're all fans of his work, and after spending an hour and a half with him on Skype we can confirm that he's just as rad as the stuff he makes for us.

To reiterate: Awesome.

Enjoy.

-Jr.

As the title suggests: This episode is a little different from our normal weekly jam and I think you're gonna dig it. There's no guest. There's one topic. And it has nothing to do with anything we've ever covered on the show.

This week: Alex takes us on a journey both terrifying and inspiring.

Enjoy.

-Jr.

This might sound absurd but this week was Brett's first appearance since May. We went 6 months without having Brett on the show. Half of a year has passed since he last sat in front of our microphone. I wanted to make a list of all the things that have changed since then but it would just turn into me complaining about Donald Trump and I'm guessing you're not here to be reading about that hot garbage.

So anyways.

Brett came in this week in celebration of a few things: His Steampunk coloring book that he Kickstarted earlier this year has started finding its way into the hands of eager backers (including ours) and he's got an upcoming show at the local Easthampton comic shop "Comics N' More" for everyone to check out.

Those are two awesome things and this week you get to hear us talk about them. Now if you'll excuse me I have some super important podcast business to attend to that definitely isn't laying on the floor coloring in my new Brett Kelley coloring book.

Just super important podcast business.

-Jr.

In the words of the lovable robot Bender:

I'M BACK BABY.

Super chill episode this week while we prepare to get back into our regular schedule of recording our conversations with neat people. Join Alex and me as we chat about videogames and comic cons.

It doesn't get much better than that.

-Jr.

I'm not sure how to get this one started as this episode is a bit foreign to me.

Because I'm not in it. And I had no part in its creation.

See. I got a new job recently. And part of this new job means passing a really hard test with a short amount of time to study and learn the material. So every minute of my life for the past two weeks has been spent grinding for this test that I'm *hopefully* going to take next week.

Because I've been so busy...I took the week off from the show and Alex manned the Board with the help of dual guests Joe Sherry and Jon. I haven't even listened to it yet...I'm just uploading it on good faith...which could be a mistake. Probably not, though...probably.

Oh God.

Nah. I'm sure it's fine.

.....

-Jr.

I'm not gonna lie: I almost completely forgot to upload this...and the streak was almost ruined.

BUT I REMEMBERED. MAYBE AT THE LAST MINUTE, YEAH...BUT I REMEMBERED.

Anyways. This episode was kind of inevitable. It's tradition for Will to join us at least once during the month of October to talk spoopy things and this year was no different. And we're talking about Stranger Things.

So.

This one gets a bit spoiler heavy so if you're that one person that hasn't watched Stranger Things yet you should remedy that then have a listen to our weekly chat. Unless you dig spoilers. In which case this episode is perfect for you. 

Either way. Stranger Things is incredible (did you catch the contest we had on Facebook a while back? Exactly) and this week we're talking about it. 

-Jr.

I can't remember if it was Bob Ross who coined the term "happy accident" but for now I'm gonna go ahead and say it was.

This episode could be considered one of those happy accidents. In the best way...because a few times now we've seen this great Tony Stark cosplayer tearing through Boston Comic Con. His outfit consists of maybe some boots, maybe some gauntlets, some sunglasses, and that sweet case of armor from Iron Man 2. To put it bluntly, it's awesome. The handful of times we've been able to talk to him were great and it was evident he was a rad dude so obviously we were going to try to get him on the show.

Cut to Alex doing his thing and hunting the internet for contact info when he stumbles upon his Facebook page and what does he see? It turns out this guy is HUGE into the haunt life and has been working at various haunts for more years than I can count. So initially we sent out to have him on the show because of his spot-on Tony Stark...and found out that we could potentially have a new guest for our month of Spooky.

You see? Happy accidents.

-Jr.

UPDATE: Sad news folks:

"Due to unforeseen circumstance, The Only Scream CT has unfortunately closed for the 2016 haunt season. We plan to reopen next year, and trust us, we’ll be back with a vengeance!

Here at OMV the month of October has become synonymous with recording episodes with our friends who like spooky things. Seeing as Alex spends a good chunk of his month making monsters at our local haunt, it proves very difficult to not immediately get into that Halloween feel. So we embrace it. We cherish it. We nurture it until it is a fully grown and hideous demon spawn and then we record a podcast about it.

And our friends join us.

This week it's Kyle and Noah. You might remember Kyle as he's chilled with us a few times in the past to talk about his gig at Decimated Designs and while Noah may be new to OMV....he's definitely no stranger to the haunt life. Between the three of them Kyle, Noah, and Alex combine to over 20 years of spooky experience and being able to just sit back and watch them go was truly astonishing. And now you get to listen to it while I go prep for our New York Comic Con excursion tomorrow.

Neat!

-Jr.

When it comes to conventions I frequently rely on Alex for continuous hand holding. Unless we're at one of the enormous, in-your-face oh my god I'm so overwhelmed with amazing things shows like NYCC or PAX....I tend to get a bit lost and I overlook all of the awesome things I should be paying attention to.

Last summer when we went to MASSive Comic Con in Worcester I was starting to slip into that mode. It was a smaller show, it was a Sunday, there weren't a lot of people there and there wasn't a whole lot going on. Luckily I have Alex. You see, Alex is smart and does research on things and knows who is going to be at the shows he's attending......like artist/writer Keith Champagne. Alex had visited Keith at a prior show and was aware of his work and how chill of a guy he is. I, with no reason to argue, followed Alex to his table and did my usual hover routine while he struck up conversation.

A half hour and many dollars later we left his table with merchandise in hand (including 3 pages of original art and two hardcovers) and yet another fantastic interaction to brag about.

I guarantee you if I didn't have Alex with me I would have done one lap through the show and gone home. I would have never met Keith, I wouldn't have read The Mighty (which was so good), and we wouldn't have a guest on the show this week.

The thought of all of that is just tragic. Alex....what would I do without you?

-Jr.

While wandering around the aisles of the Boston Comic Con last month I saw my partner in podcasting crime engaged in what looked to be a hearty conversation full of wonder and laughs. As I made my approach Alex noticed me and eagerly invited me to join in. I believe his exact words were something like "HEY. LOOK WHO IT IS!"

It was our pal Israel from Skelton Crew Studios. After exchanging the usual pleasantries Israel started to hint that there were big things on the horizon for him and The Crew. This resulted in the exchanging of the usual obscenities (all from me) and desperate attempts to coax out whatever secrets he was hiding. But alas. His resolve proved to be unmatched.

But that was last month. Time has passed. Contracts have been signed. New collectibles are coming. And Israel joined us this week to give us the 4-1-1 on some of them.

My wallet is already aching in the best way.

-Jr.