Jeff Bernat is an entrepreneur originally from East Moline, Illinois. He has many ideas under his belt, and the latest endeavor is a comic strip of his trademark saying “I’m NOT Complaining, Just Explaining!” “I got the idea for this from my dad, who is one who likes to complain. His response one day was ‘I’m not complaining, just explaining!’” With some persistence and assistance from a few of his friends, Jeff is creating a variety of life’s everyday scenarios in comics form in the hopes of bringing a smile to your face. Hope you enjoy it!  Read More

The Academy Awards will begin at 7:30 p.m. Sunday, airing on ABC, and finally all of the speculation will be over in regard to who will walk away with the coveted statues. So who will win? Here are this critic’s humble picks. And the Oscar goes to… BEST PICTURE Arrival Fences Hacksaw Ridge Hell or High Water Hidden Figures La La Land Lion Manchester by the Sea Moonlight WINNER: La La Land did tie Titanic’s record and has all the spot on buzz around it. It will be hard to beat this beautiful and energetic film. POSSIBLE UPSET: I wouldn’t be too surprised if Hidden Figures came... Read More

La La Oscarland By now, we all know La La Land is my favorite film of the year and one of my favorite films of all time. I think it’s a masterpiece and deserves each and every award it garners. Is my opinion biased? Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. But I think we can all agree that is not an “alternative fact” that La La Land rocks. Like or not, it’s hard to call foul on something that looks and sounds this good. The Academy Award nominations were announced Tuesday and La La Land is up for a whopping 14 Academy Awards. To beat the record held by Titanic, Lord of the Rings and... Read More

A theatrical event can’t happen without an important component: the audience. And Paul DeWilde has spent years in the audience cheering on local shows and local talent. A regular at nearly every theater in town, he’s become a friend to many and supporter to far more. For Mr. DeWilde, his journey began at the now defunct Harrison Hilltop Theatre in Davenport when he went see a production of Oedipus that had been adapted by Hilltop company member Steve Quartell. DeWilde said, “What I came away with was the intimacy of the room and the feeling that I was really missing something important... Read More

On Tuesdays when the shop gets their new comics in to process so that they’re ready for the shelf on Wednesday, we divvy up things up in several stacks. This usually leaves us with a stack for all the big five publishers, Marvel, DC, Dark Horse, IDW and Image, as well as a stack for Dynamite to keep the small publisher stack from getting too tall. A few weeks ago a friend of mine and I noticed that Dark Horse had a vastly smaller stack compared to all of the others. This got me thinking about how Dark Horse stays in business when we seem to get only a few titles a week. Looking at comichron.com,... Read More

I normally like to balance out my criticisms with things I love about comics, but it’s still early in the year. So, there isn’t a lot for me to praise this year while the comic industry keeps doing things that frustrate me to no end. That being said, with the recent announcement of a new Defenders comic I decided it was an opportune time for me to talk about the thing that’s at the top of my list of ‘Things Guaranteed to Angry Up My Blood’, namely when comic companies change the contents of their comics to fit movies and TV shows. Ten years ago I read Doctor Strange: The Oath from Brian... Read More

The Quad Cities has seen a lot of change in the past five years in the local comedy scene. Many shows have risen and many have fallen to the wayside. Now the newest addition to the scene arrives and is preparing to make a name for themselves. Open Source Improv is a collection of comedians that have come together from virtually every comedy property in the Quad Cities and beyond to make something new and exciting. Hoping to bring their passion for improv to the forefront, Open Source Improv is looking to reinforce a community of comedy. Every aspect of their shows, from the themes to the venue,... Read More

Oscar nominations will be announced January 24th and this day has always been (and still is) a little like Christmas morning for me. I love the hype, the excitement, the politics… I hate that I love it, but man oh man do I love show business. It’s totally cool to get stoked about this kind of thing! I’ve been so inspired by this year’s offerings and it safe to say this has been one of my favorite movie years since 2005-2006. Here are my Academy Award nomination predictions for the Picture, Director, Actor and Actress categories: Best Picture: Moonlight La La Land Manchester by the Sea Lion Hell... Read More

P.T. Barnum once said, “Nothing draws a crowd quite like a crowd.” Sadly, the circus can no longer draw a crowd. On Saturday night, Feld Entertainment announced that the famed Ringling Brothers-Barnum & Bailey Circus would shutter forever in May. And while this is a merely drop in the bucket of things truly affecting our nation, it still broke me a little in a very unexpected way. This company provided employment for hundreds of specialty acts, technicians, musicians, clowns,  stunt performers and designers (and more) and this was their passion. They’ve lost more than their... Read More

By Tristan Tapscott The Golden Globes are well known for being, to quote Ricky Gervais, “a bit louder, a bit trashier, a bit drunker” and it typically lives up to the hype. This year? Not so much. The tone still had that air of who-the-fuck-cares but was low key, somber and all over the place. Here are some thoughts on the evening! FA FA FALLON Opening and Host The night started off with a bang featuring one of the best cold opens I’ve seen in years. Appropriately, Fallon led a star studded spoof of La La Land which included hysterical cameos from Tin Fey, Barb and the kids from Stranger... Read More