The girl behind BMS
Hello, all, Leanne here!
Rod’s normally the one who takes care of writing our blogs each week (in addition to making sure the BMS strips are uploaded and go live every Monday/Friday), but he’s turned this one over to me…
I just wanted to thank all of you for the support you’ve shown us over the years. Either through commenting here, posting thoughts on Facebook, downloading our podcasts or simply by checking the site to read the new strips each week. Next month BMS will be celebrating its fourth anniversary (crazy!), and though it’s been tough going sometimes, it’s also been well worth it simply because of you fine folks. It’s easy to lose sight of just how many people around the world read this little strip of ours, and we’re very grateful for all of you. We wouldn’t have made it this far without your encouragement, and we have much more of this wacky Star Wars universe to explore (BMS style) and many more tales to tell!
I also wanted to thank everyone who purchased one of my artbooks and/or sketchbooks over these past few months. And to anyone who purchased a sketchcard– you rock! You guys were way creative and I had a blast drawing all of these characters. The biggest request, surprisingly, was BMS Leia hands down. I wasn’t expecting that for some reason, but I had loads of fun drawing so many versions of her. I’ve been posting these sketchcards (usually at least one per day) over on my Twitter account and still have many more to go, so check it out if you’re into that sort of thing.
Since I now have to turn back to some of my (non-BMS) comic book work and we’re just about out of our current artbook/sketchbook stock, we’ve taken my store offline for the time being. But it’ll be back in the near future– and to anyone who is still waiting on a sketchcard or artbook, they are in the mail and should be arriving soon!
Rod may have mentioned that we’ve seen The Hobbit a couple of times since its release… And we’re actually about to see it a third time this weekend with fellow Marylander and 501st Old Line Garrison member Eric. I was never a huge LOTR fan, but Tolkien’s world has definitely grown on me since Rod introduced me to it years ago, and I think the Hobbit film is a lot of fun. I drew this Gandriel piece (Gandalf + Galadriel = Gandriel) just the other night. Obviously you can… read into… certain things during the Gandalf/Galadriel scene in the film, and I dug it. (Thankfully no Tolkien purists have tried to murder me over this… YET.)
I thought I would end this blog by posting a drawing my sister Rachael emailed to me today. She’s playing my mom in Draw Something, and this was my mom’s drawing for the word “android.” (It was too precious not to share, Mom!)
Keep up the great work Leanne! Maybe one day you’ll be inspired to BMS Tolkiens work. If so Biggs should make random appearances 😀
Leanne, love the sketch. Wish you two could attend Comic Cons out here on the west coast.
LOVE the Gandalf/Galadriel sketch, Leanne – I too decided they shared a murky past 🙂
And thanks again for my awesome Greedo card!
Oh, and excellent strip today!
Any Tolkien purist should also recognize that that a medieval, courtly love is a common theme in LOTR. While Galadriel and Gimli’s love is the most notable example from the books, I don’t think that it is going too far to include Gandalf for the Hobbit. Just try not to frame it in more modern terms and most LOTR fans will probably curb their homicidal tendencies.
yep, like my post on the previous strip: it’s too easy for modern people to forget that love in these situations is more than just physical attraction, especially for beardy angels :3
Love the Gandriel drawing. Very nice art. 😀 (I’m no purist and I like fun stuff).
Hiya Leanne,
Lovely to see you blogging here. You deserve all of your thousands of worldwide followers.
The piece of Gandalf and Gandriel is wonderful. It has every element of great illustration. A very fine piece!
best of luck with all of your work,
John
I also read a few weels ago in a british magazine where they interviewed McKellen and Freeman, Sir Ian said that while they (he and dumbledore’s actor) considered themselves pretty good friends, he would mos tlikely not have taken the role, since he believes dumbledore isn’t a real wizard, because Tolkien “defined what a wizard is”. Since I dislike Potty, er, Potter, in almost every way, that made my Xmas x3
Who is colder and more calculating? Dumbledore or Gandalf? Both were willing to sacrifice innocents for a perceived greater good. Hey, I’m not picking on Gandalf. He’s my favorite character from the LOTR universe, but J.K. Rowling was definitely riffing off the back of Tolkien in a number of places that were in plain sight. Dementors…? Ring Wraiths clearly. At least visually. Voldemort… Sauron. Dumbledore was a bit of a douche. But was Gandalf as guilty of ruthlessness?
Gendalf said that in all if Middle Earth only Sauron was more terrible than he was. This was not a statement to be taken lightly. If he had taken Frodo’s ring when offered (or by force at any other time as he could easily have done so) he probably could have gathered power to overwhelm the Host of Mordor and taken the throne of Middle Earth for himself.
Being aware of his darkness is exactly why he did not fall for the rings lure.
Sorry I’m typing 1 handed, with a sleeping baby in my arms, should have read “Gendalf said that in all of Middle Earth” please excuse the typos.
There can be few better reasons to make a typo. 🙂 Look at John, he called Galadriel “Gandriel”, hopefully by mistake. 🙂
Rod, I haven’t a clue. I actually thought that I copied and pasted it from Leanne’s post! 🙂
Galadriel + Gandalf = Gandriel. It’s a “shipping” pairing.
By “riffing off” did you actually mean “ripping off”?
But then pretty much 80% of the fantasy genre as we know it these days comes from Tolkien. It’d be harder not to reference it at all.
No. I meant what I said: riffing. 😛 In the musical sense. Or riff trax.
The Gandriel drawing is really good, thanks for sharing it with us. Just don’t start writing crazy fan fictions about it and I think you’re good. :p
Thanks for (nearly) four years of free comics, as well!
I’m no writer, so no worries there! 😉
I have really been loving the sketch cards on Twitter. Nice bonus to the BMS strip. Thank you so much! 😀
I love my Sketch cards.
A have a set of Indiana Jones and Dr. Jones bookends that I made years ago.
The cards will decorate them nicely. 🙂
I absolutely love Blue Milk Special. Thank you so much for continuing to create it. 🙂
Gandriel = the new Bennifer? 😉
Thank you Leanne and Rod for BMS! It is precious to me.
BMS is what I live for. You guys are my heroes.
“There Is No Holiday Special” LMAO!!
I have to be honest. I LOVE the Story of the Faithful Wookiee.