Time to take you back to the fall of 2013, when Edward Snowden leaked Paula Deen’s racist comments and Kanye West finally got engaged to the Star Trek alien he was dating (a Cardassian, for you non-Trekkies). You may recall from a previous post how my brother Alejandro and I had already come up with Stalin Island and the nefarious Stalin A.I. But we still needed a villain, someone who was calling the shots and could be revealed as the true bad guy.

We batted around some weird ideas: a resurrected cybernetic Che Guevara (Robo-Che!), a communist ape that had become super-smart after being launched off into space. Eventually, we settled on a generic sounding villain as a placeholder: Colonel Bolshevik. Could only be more stereotypical if he was called Captain Russia or General Communist, really.

Now we had to figure out: what the hell was he up to? Well, we still had lost Cosmonauts in the story… so we thought, maybe Bolshevik is trying to launch them back to space? Slowly, we realized the true timeline-altering answer: Bolshevik was gonna beat America to the moon! How? By launching the entirety of Mount Redmore into space. Naturally.

As the script took shape around this very silly idea, suddenly Colonel Bolshevik started feeling less like a typical villain and took on a personality of his own. A boisterous, gloating Russian dickhead with a crazy plan. The more we wrote him, the more we liked him. He was just a perfect foil to Time Cheetah and makes their inevitable showdown that much more satisfying.

For now, enjoy Colonel Bolshevik’s crazy plan and seeing Time Cheetah get smacked around a little. The tables will soon turn!

First off, today's Time Cheetah contains one of the dumbest jokes we've written. It's great, you'll love it, go read it!

Second off, I want to take the time today to spread the love. You've read our stuff (probably), laughed at our jokes (hopefully), and overall just been generous with your attention and compliments. In return, I wanna take a moment and mention some comics stuff that's made me laugh and inspired me to step up my own funny game. If you like them as much as I do, throw some monies (or clicks) their way:

Megg, Mogg & Owl stories by Simon Hanselmann–I picked up Hanselmann's book Megahex on a whim two years ago (to be honest, I find stoned-looking cats really funny, because I am a simple man). I read the whole thing that night and I don't remember the last time I've laughed that hard while reading something. It's stoner absurdism with the occasional Marx Bros. anarchy, and paced panel to panel like few other comics out there. I mean, just check out this strip. If you enjoyed that, there's plenty more in the two hardcovers released so far (Megahex and Amsterdam). A word of warning: the stories can get VERY R-rated and gross. So, you know, not for the faint of heart.

Sexcastle by Kyle Starks—I'm very glad I didn't read Sexcastle before starting to write Time Cheetah, because as much time as I spent with a big grin on my face reading it, I also spent a lot of time shaking my head and thinking “welp, can't do that now.” Superbly realized homage/parody of 80's action movie tropes, with some deft storytelling and just solid laughs all around. It was up for an Eisner this year, and though it lost against some small time cartoon humorist you may have heard of, consider it the Mad Max: Fury Road of the nominees: award or not, if you're into action movies and sheer fun, there's none better.

Captain Macbastard by Twistwood—It's easy enough to recommend some funny stuff with plenty of accolades. Well, how about some of that underground, “I knew about it before it was big” good stuff? For that, you gotta get on Captain Macbastard! It starts with a big burly man trying to kill baby Hitler, and then goes in a completely different direction. It's got an awesome style, fast pacing, and a fabulous sense of humor. Also? You can read it all in like 20 minutes. So, go read it already!

OK, so if you're not all laughed out after that (I hope you're not, are you? Wait, come back! WHAT HAVE I DONE?! NO!), check out the new Time Cheetah page!