The Yellow Skull has a dastardly plot to destroy Rose City.
The Yellow Skull has a dastardly plot to destroy Rose City.

Totally Naked Commentary

I need to point out that I’m a big Masters of the Universe Fan. The Yellow Skull’s look is based on Skeletor. The coloring of the Blue Totally Naked Man is the color schematics for Fakor, the evil duplicate robot of He-Man.

The Real-Life Supervillains (RLSV) were a notorious online group notorious for mocking the Real Life Superheroes (RLSH) community. These individuals, often seen as nerds, found it easy to target and ridicule members of the RLSH, exploiting their vulnerabilities. I personally faced a lot of unanticipated ridicule from them. The RLSH community tolerated these individuals because some of their criticisms seemed valid, reflecting thoughts that many heroes secretly harbored.

Over time, I realized that criticism for its own sake is merely one person insulting another. There was never going to be a fusion of ideas because these individuals were more interested in trolling the geek culture online. They wanted to be part of the spectacle without being labeled as part of it. This experience led me to assume, and continue to assume, that anyone calling themselves a Real-Life Supervillain is likely a jerk in real life. An example of my assumptions being validated is the actions of The White Skull.

The White Skull would troll ineffective RLSH while supporting the competent ones. Despite his trolling, The White Skull offered some valid criticisms and constructive feedback, which earned him a place in my social circle.

There were several sites that younger kids were joining, such as the Heroes Network. Eventually, it was revealed that these forums had pedophiles and abusers as administrators. Another site, The Earth Agents, was run by an older man, sometimes talked about killing a person of color in Indiana as his brand of vigilante justice. As the Real-Life Superhero concept gained mainstream attention, I felt it was time to clean house. I indirectly asked The White Skull for help, which upset him. Skull believed I was acting like a fascist, suppressing free speech. This led him to create a video accusing me of being a Nazi. In retaliation, I flagged the video for copyright infringement, as I own the rights to Zetaman and the RLSH logo. This action sparked another online conflict, making me appear as the bad guy.

There were indeed some very bad people with influence. From an outsider’s perspective, it might have looked like I was being a dictator. Perhaps both perspectives are true, but I will always choose to protect young people over those who exploit them.

Eventually, I retired. Later, I heard that The White Skull had passed away. Despite my feelings towards him, I didn’t want him to die and felt genuinely sad. His wife even created a Kickstarter for funeral expenses, which was heartbreaking.

However, it was discovered that Skull had faked his death online. He claimed it was to test people’s gullibility, but I don’t believe this story. What kind of person fakes their death for internet attention?

Creating comics has always been my way of making sense of the world. There are many things that confuse me, and others that frustrate and anger me. My comics serve as my coping mechanism. I was often bothered by people within my social circle, and one way I dealt with these unpleasant individuals was by diminishing their importance. I learned this tactic from a villain named Lord Malignance. By turning these people into colorful and absurd cartoon characters, I was able to put them into perspective. They are just like cartoon characters.

Characters like The Yellow Skull and other villains such as The Roach serve as filler villains in my stories. When I need a quick joke or an easy win for the heroes, I insert these “villain jobbers.” In real life, most of these people were never a real threat to me beyond their childish armchair insults and ridiculous conspiracy theories. They were just placeholders, filling time until something more interesting happens.

The Yellow Skull's weapon is revealed.
The Yellow Skull’s weapon is revealed.

Totally Naked Commentary

Working on some sketches for a new Totally Naked Man series.

I drew a Totally Naked Man Red and Blue story years ago. The villain was a nerd named Geoff the nerd. For years I sketched out different versions of my cartoons.

I was working with a local director/film maker named Allan Luebke to make a Zetaman reality show. One of the components of the show was a real-life comic book of Zetaman. I dusted off the Geoff character and redesigned it. Geoff created armor based on the Gundum series. I am not an anime fan. I was addicted to those snap build kits of Gundum robots kits found in Target and Walmart at the time.  Geoff was a techno hack who didn’t have an original idea so the character built armor based on popular cartoons.

The idea of a Zetaman comic series was dropped because I didn’t make the time to draw.

I published Naked Man Comics #1 in May 2012. I was figuring out how to draw people to my comic. Someone in my online social group recommended putting up some free comics. Around this time was when The White Skull was garbage posting his drama online. This gave me the inspiration to tweak the red and blue story to fit within my new Totally Naked Man universe.

Introducing Totally Naked Man, hero of Rose City.

Totally Naked Commentary

Technically, the online webcomic came out BEFORE Naked Man Comics #1. This would be the “first” appearance of Totally Naked Man.

The team of Totally Naked Man Red and Blue stopped The Yellow Skull.

Totally Naked Commentary

I am not the master at humor. I loved this little story. It was very cathartic to put together. I didn’t think I’d like The Yellow Skull character when I crated it. But the villain grew on me.

Page one of Bridge City Pizza Bandits.
Totally Naked Man sings to Rose City!

Hi,

I have decided to add commentary to my comics. I have been drawing Naked Man Comics for over 10 years. I have blogged about things from time to time. But I never added commentary before. I am migrating my old stories into the Totally Naked Man domain. I figured adding commentary will help old fans look at my pages different. Or, at least, I feel it safe now to post what were digs at people in real life and what was complete fiction.

Back in my Zetaman days, I ran around with other costumed people. When I retired as Zetaman a lot of them were very vocal on how they felt about me. A bit of the criticism might be right. Most of the comments were not. It was my fault, to be honest. I tried to screen people the best I could. But people can mask very well.

This story’s premise is that there are a bunch of creeps I met online teaming up and calling themselves the Rose City Rebellion. My ex-wife was going around seeking intimate attention from other Real-Life Superheroes. When we broke up, I made the whole thing public. At the time I did not see a problem with it. My ex used a forum I built to share naked pictures of herself. Because I did cause a stir online, my ex needed to do some damage control. She found some other people I did not have a good relationship with and create a new team. From what I gathered; they spend a lot of their time at buffets. My ex-wife decided to find someone who called himself a Real-Life Supervillain (Mavalo or something like that) to draft a very personal blog detailing information about me, who I was dating, and my parents. When I read that blog and saw how much it hurt other people, I retired as Zetaman.

But I felt like I had to say something back. I did, using a character I created as a teenager, Totally Naked Man. I figured I can at least vent. I was not going to go into many details. But I was going to just make a jab and move on. Little did I know I would be going on a decade later.

Totally Naked Man is singing in this because I loved Mighty Mouse cartoons as a kid. Mighty Mouse always sang. The orange in Totally Naked Man’s hair is yellow and red mixed together.

I did poke fun of the blog creator by creating The Blazing Bag of Poo. Basically, calling the person who wrote his meth fueled blogs a $#!#-head.

-Illya

Page 02 of Book 1 of Naked Man Comics.
The pizza bandits strike!

Totally Naked Commentary

This is a complicated page. The two people I was digging into were a couple named Cat and Sean. They were not nice people at all. But just because they were not nice people, and they wrote terrible things about me did not give me the excuse to joke about Cat’s weight issue. This is where I failed and wrote some unkind stuff in comic form.

Cat has Colitis. She was often in the hospital for this. It was terrible.

One time I took Sean out while Cat was in the hospital. All he did was complain about the medical issues. I did my best to empathize. My own wife, at the time, was also in and out of the hospital. It is tough. There is a little bitterness because it seems like the medical issues will never end. There is a feeling of hopelessness. Still, Sean was really mad.

When I retired, Sean and Cat were spending time together with my ex. Because of the garbage my ex put me through (like having people pretend to me my friend or ripping me a new on podcasts) I was distrustful of anyone close to her. Sean and Cat took it as an insult and that I had to answer to me about my activities.

So, I did what anyone would do, I told them where to go and how fast to get there.

I tried to do street work again as a civilian. Sean took every opportunity to belittle me with his blogs. He ripped apart my site because of spelling errors I made. Sean even photoshop my face on Osama Bin Laden’s body.

The last straw was a news article featuring Cat and Sean, A.K.A. Lunar Veil and Dark Wolf. I read the article. A reporter followed Dark Wolf on a patrol. Everything DW did was an imitation of a colleague of mine, Antiman. Down to getting the mug shot newspaper, the routes to patrol, the homeless den under McLoughlin Blvd in Portland. In the article, LV talked about taking down a puppy mill in Beaverton (which was impossible for her being bed ridden all the time). It was a total piece of fiction.

I was frustrated. Here are some fake people talking garbage about me as well as lying to the media of who they were and what they did. I decided to vent about them via my comic.

 I decided to write Sean as Shawn the Pizza Bandit. In the article they were in, there was this picture of Lunar Veil cleaning a gun while Dark Wolf ate a pizza. I thought that was hilarious. What was not funny and still not funny was dragging Cat’s colitis into my story. I knew Dark Wolf cheated on Lunar Veil few times. He bought some Real Life Supervillain woman a penguin. Another time Cat emailed me about hacking into Sean’s computer and downloading porn to it.

Sean treated Cat horribly. That is what I wanted to say. The joke was that Shawn the Pizza Bandit purposely starving Catherine the Walf because he only likes skinny women. Shawn treats his partner like garbage and gaslights her.

Had I been a better writer at the time I would have gotten the point across. I hurt Cat and that was wrong. Granted, at the time I was still pretty heated about the harassment these two were throwing at me. But harassment is not an excuse to behave like them. I would have liked to be better, but I was not.

I will not be revising some of the dialogue because it is an opportunity to finally this off my chest. To normal people outside of the Real Life Superhero community, the character dynamic is innocuous. But to Cat, this joke hurt her. I was wrong to do it and  I am sorry. I reacted as a child to people acting like children.

-Illya

Totally Naked Man faces the Pizza Bandits.

Totally Naked Commentary

Pretty straightforward page to move the story along. I did walk around Old Town Portland to make sure that the background would be accurate.

Catherine the Waif strikes back at Totally Naked Man.
Catherine the Waif strikes back at Totally Naked Man.

Totally Naked Commentary

This was a fun concept. I’d imagine anything that harms the skin would be Totally Naked Man’s weakness.

Catherine the Waif and Shawn the Pizza Bandit ruminate over the defeat.

Totally Naked Commentary

The wide shot of Cat and Shawn is based on a photo of them in real-life. Dark Wolf and Lunar Veil did an article for some magazine. There was this picture of Lunar Veil on one side of the table and Dark Wolf on the other side. Lunar Veil was polishing a gun and Dark Wolf was eating a pizza. This is WHY I thought the “Shawn starving Cat” was going to be funny. It was not, as I alluded to a few pages ago.

Why the article frustrated me enough to make a parody?

I read the article. Lunar Veil claimed to shut down a puppy mill in either Beaverton or Hillsboro. She physically investigated the location, gathered evidence, and presented it to the police for the arrest. This never happened. The poor woman could barely move much less accomplished what she claimed. Dark Wolf had the reporters follow him around his patrol. Dark Wolf explained his operation method when “crime fighting.” What he did was copy our mutual colleague, Antiman. Everything Dark Wolf did was what Antiman did, down to the spots where Antiman liked to patrol. All the while Dark Wolf was writing blogs about how much I sucked.

I may have been lame in what I did, but at least I did what I said I did. I did not have to imitate anyone else. If I found an idea that worked from another RLSH, I would incorporate but I would cite where the idea came from.

The Pizza Bandits hatch a plot against Totally Naked Man.
The Pizza Bandits hatch a plot against Totally Naked Man.

Totally Naked Commentary

This is based on a real event. Cat sent me an angry email about what “I” was doing to her and Sean. Apparently, I was hacking into Sean’s computer and uploading porn. I was supposed to be doing this to ruin their relationship. One, I have no idea how to do that. Two, why would I waste porn on people I don’t like?

God, these two were total nutters.

Totally Naked Man gets some weird e-mails.

Totally Naked Commentary

Cat would send me these messages asking me to meet her and Sean to settle things. She would also insult me in the same emails. When I didn’t respond, Sean would type another nasty blog about how I’m an unhinged terrorist.

Totally Naked Man faces the full-figured force of the Bridge City Pizza Bandits.

Totally Naked Commentary

The Full-Figured Force of the Pizza Bandits are made up of people who followed my ex-wife, Allison.

Pie-Man was based on an RLSH named Skyman, who was sort of racist and inebriated.

Sweat-dude was based on a kid my ex left me for, whose RLSH name was Iconoclast.

The Victim based on RLSH named Victim. That guy was writing exotic emails and stories to my ex-wife. I even came across an email where Victim was instructing my ex on how to make things more romantic. So weird.

Dan the Sleaze was based on a guy named Irishman. My ex made out with him and caught herpes.

The Bridge City Pizza Bandits are tired.

Totally Naked Commentary

I just thought it was funny that villains gave up. Why do most villains in comics hard workers? You’d think they succumb to all vices.

Totally Naked Man goes undercover at McBuggies.
Totally Naked Man goes undercover at McBuggies.

Totally Naked Commentary

This story was based on my experience working at Burger King. It was my first job. Afterwards I swore it’ll be a cold day in Hell before I work food service again. Then again, this was in Connecticut. A lot of New Yorkers lived in the area and were entitled jerks.

Totally Naked Man returns in another awesome story.
Totally Naked Man returns in another awesome story.

Totally Naked Commentary

I recycled an old story I drew. I didn’t realize how much work one comic took. I had a full time job, Krav Maga, and Junior College classes. I had a lot on my plate. I took some tracing paper and inked over my old penciled in pages.

-Illya

Totally Naked Man totally lies to get out of work.
Totally Naked Man totally lies to get out of work.

Totally Naked Commentary

For some of these stories, I did random Google searches for buildings and bridges in Portland. I was not satisfied with the results afterwards. I felt it lacked… imagination. I thought it would be better to place the characters in actual locations in Portland, Oregon. Since then I’ve made sure my backgrounds would match where the characters would be in Real Life. It also gave me a chance to explore Portland more.

-Illya

Extremely Conservative Woman has doubts about Totally Naked Man's plan.
Believe in the Horseless Horse.

Totally Naked Commentary

This page sucks. There is no excuse. When I drew this story, I was in my early twenties. Re-inking it 10 years later was a nightmare. Coloring it 20 years later was worse. But, you live and you learn. Never skip out on doing backgrounds.

Totally Naked Man and Extremely Conservative Woman meets a mysterious stranger.
Totally Naked Man and Extremely Conservative Woman meets a mysterious stranger.

Totally Naked Commentary

This is another awkward page. When I first drew this story I was really big into The Unforgiving. I was also into Kingdom Come at this time too. I love last hurrah stories.

I never did anything with the mysterious cowboy character. But there are a lot of characters I drew that I have not done much with. Perhaps leaving these characters out there gives me potential stories in the future. I don’t know.

Enter Cronus... a Greek god bent on vengeance against his children.
Enter Cronus… a Greek god bent on vengeance against his children.

Totally Naked Commentary

Honestly, I would love to do an entire series on Greek Gods. I love the idea of the pantheon’s drama extending to the modern world.

In other issues of Naked Man Comics and Totally Naked Man, everyone has that painting in Panel 3. I wanted to expand upon this in a future issue. Only we, the reader, sees the painting. It is Cronus’ curse upon the readers for patronizing Naked Man Comics. He broadcast’s his greatest victory via paintings to the reader.

Illya King steals a page from Frank Miller's The Dark Knight Returns.
Illya King steals a page from Frank Miller’s The Dark Knight Returns.

Totally Naked Commentary

This was fun to color. I wish I didn’t to a straight copy of Dark Knight Returns. Horses are fun to draw. The art would of matched the rest of the comic. Ah well. It’s a messy process to find your voice.

Totally Naked Man believes in an unseen power to stop Cronus.
Totally Naked Man believes in an unseen power to stop Cronus.

Totally Naked Commentary

I cut A LOT of dialogue when I colored this page. I fall into a trap of over explaining a joke. I’ve been learning to get to the point than wax poetic about a silly comic.

The Horseless Horse strikes back!
The Horseless Horse strikes back!

Totally Naked Commentary

From what I remembered, this panel was fun to draw. I know I wanted to put doubt that the Horseless Horse is real. But I could not figure out how to write this.

Totally Naked Man ruminates on the events of the day.
Totally Naked Man ruminates on the events of the day.

Totally Naked Commentary

The final dialogue on this page sucked. It really did. I cleaned up what I could for this re-color of the pages. I was really flirting with meta humor back then. Sometimes I really hate my writing.