SEA SHANTY FUNNIES™ - Episode 120

 

Just for fun. A little weekday surprise for you outside the main ongoing storyline. These will be quick and easy for me to draw up quickly and do like this. I hope you will get a chuckle.

PHILATELY: Continuing to work with the Machin Stamps

Sunday Afternoon Leisure Time - Working on my stamp collection. This time sorting through Great Britain Machin stamps of QE2. These are always a little tougher to sort through with the variations.

SEA SHANTY FUNNIES™ - Episode 119

 

Purchase SEA SHANTY FUNNIES #1 and receive bonus SKETCH CARD with an original ink drawing by me.

 

 

For those that are still wanting to buy just the comic book, it comes to $14 shipped (U.S. Customer). I will also throw in an extra SKETCH CARD with an original quick ink drawing of a character by me as a bonus.

 

Here is a link (U.S. Customers) to the secure store (PAYPAL Payment):

 

https://scottmccullar.com/store/SEA-SHANTY-FUNNIES--1-Comic-Book-Only---NO-Fan-Club-Membership-or-Perks----U-S--Shipping--p2963575

 

Here is a link for International customers, shipping is more expensive I'm afraid. $28 (International). I will also throw in an extra SKETCH CARD with an original quick ink drawing of a character by me as a bonus.

 

https://scottmccullar.com/store/SEA-SHANTY-FUNNIES--1-Comic-Book-Only---NO-Fan-Club-Membership-or-Perks----International--p2963551

SEA SHANTY FUNNIES™ - Episode 118

 

Your Friday Funny.

Last Night's Interview with Me is Now Available to Watch on YouTube

I'd like to thank Mathew D. Rhys and Michael Hutchison for inviting me to "Monitor Duty" podcast video chat for an interview about my work on my Public Domain-based POPEYE comic strip SEA SHANTY FUNNIES last night. The interview and chat is available to watch now over on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tMrEATcl5ok

I'd also like to thank the other guests in the chat and those that stopped by in the audience like Popeye expert Ryan M. Maxwell and all-around good guy, comic writer, and pal John Morgan 'Bat' Neal. Also, to those with the screen names "Cartoonicus" and "Twitless" who came into the conversation to ask me questions.

If I missed anyone last night, it is because I sometimes have difficulties with keeping track of online screen nicknames and who they are connected to with real people names. . . so sorry if I missed recognizing you if you were there. Plus, it was a flurry for me that I couldn't read all the chat on the side screen at the time.

Also thanks to my wife Jennifer McCullar who also makes a few on screen cameo appearances in the video chat with our puppy Lulu to talk about the original comic character Caldonia Kindheart that was introduced into the SEA SHANTY FUNNIES comic strip as Wimpy's new girlfriend in the current storyline.

The interview goes pretty in-depth about my creative processes and choices, public domain and legal hurdle issues, and other Popeye and comic stuff that goes into making SEA SHANTY FUNNIES. If you wanted to get a little "inside baseball" behind the scenes, there were a few other golden nugget tidbits there in the chat last night.

Fair warning, this chat runs about 2 HOURS. I re-watched it and enjoyed the replay from a third person perspective. It is kind of strange watching yourself be interviewed. I tend to ramble in my thoughts. I just realized that if I ever do another video chat for a video podcast like this again in the future, I need to lift my head up and look more into the camera next time while making eye contact. Arf! Arf!

I'm tend to fall into deep thought a lot trying to formulate my words as I wrestle with my stutter. And as my wife points out, I tend to ramble and be verbose at times. So apologies in advance.

However, I hope you'll enjoy watching the chat.

Thanks again for those that turned out last night

p.s. I also gave some brief shout outs during the chat to my pals Troy Vilayhong and Joshua Garrett in the course of discussion.

I also recognized Chuck Dixon for encouraging me to write more of these Popeye stories that led me to continuing on with SEA SHANTY FUNNIES where I've now written and illustrated over 100 episodic comic strips at this point. I had stopped at 4 "test" comic strips in February 2025 thinking this wasn't going to work and then started back up in November 2025 making more. Here I am still doing it.

SEA SHANTY FUNNIES™ A Key Moment - Mini-Episode #4

 

From the Archive Journals... Popeye Joins the U.S. Navy

After POPEYE creator E.C. Segar passed away in 1938, the THIMBLE THEATER newspaper comic strip would continue under writer Tom Sims and artists Doc Winner (for a short stint) and then for a long stretch with Bela Zaboly. During the Second World War, Popeye enlisted in the U.S. Navy to help the war effort in a storyline that ran in the newspaper comic strips from December 13, 1943 to April 15, 1944 entitled "Popeye in the Navy".

 

But before joining the military in those newspaper comic strips, Max Fleischer Studios already had Popeye join the U.S. Navy in a cartoon released on November 14, 1941 (just three weeks before the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor that officially entered the U.S. into World War Two) where for the first time he wore his classic all-white Navy "Crackerjacks" uniform with "Dixie Cup" sailor hat and knotted tie with the outfit that he would continue to wear in the Famous Studios cartoons for the next few decades as his legacy uniform.

 

Interestingly, the "enemy" in this cartoon was not portrayed with a national identity and the "enemy" sailors were not shown. Just their ships and airplanes. There is even a moment in the cartoon where a generic flag was shown with the words, "Enemy (Name Your Own)" was shown on screen. After the U.S. officially entered the war, the real world enemy was named. The Japanese were negatively portrayed in typical racial stereotypes of that era (i.e. "You're a Sap, Mr. Jap"). Later cartoons also took their swipe at the Germans, too... including one with Adolf himself (i.e. "Seein’ Red, White, ‘n’ Blue" from 1943).

 

In the THIMBLE THEATER newspaper comic strips circa June 1942 in the storyline "The Seagoosk", Popeye also entered the battlefield to fight "The blastid Yaps" with a "Y".

 

The scene in today's KEY MOMENT SPECIAL comic strip that I have illustrated is inspired by that first cartoon with him in the U.S. Navy and is taken from the animated short "The Mighty Navy". Popeye would continue serving in the Navy afterwards in follow up animated cartoon features during the Second World War. Popeye was used to help influence and inspire a positive portrayal of the navy to help the war effort and recruitment at that time.

 

(*Sidenote: Before the war, Popeye also served in the U.S. Coast Guard in the 1930s cartoons and was shown as a stationed Coast Guardsman (along with a sailor uniformed Wimpy) in the 1937 animated short "Popeye the Sailor Meets Ali Baba's Forty Thieves" where they were "out hunting bandits".)

For those that care about "Behind the Scenes" stuff for my independent self-published comic series that you are reading here:

 

For continuity's sake in my "Alternate Retro Universe" that is SEA SHANTY FUNNIES, both these newspaper and cartoon stories from the Second World War era - for the most part in some way that makes sense to my head canon - happened in this timeline inside my own stories in my unofficial alternate universe take. I am absorbing them into the continuity. They mesh together if you can be flexible open to the idea that timelines merge. We're trying to keep this a retro timeline timeless in feel without pinning down actual real dates and thus I'm just generically referring to this time period in Popeye's life as "The War" where he is a war veteran that served in the Pacific. I'm also inserting into my timeline that he served in the U.S. Coast Guard for a brief stint (with Wimpy!) before "The War". I've already portrayed Wimpy once in his classic blue coast guardsman outfit in one previous comic strip earlier this year and think of him perhaps as in the Coast Guard Reserves.

 

Don't overthink it all. Maybe I'm overthinking myself and overwriting here an explanation, but you get to witness my ramblin' mind work in how I am "world building" Popeye's past history into my unofficial take in what I call "Earth-24C".

 

In my timeline for this unofficial Popeye comic strip that I am writing, Popeye is now in the U.S. Navy Reserves holding the rank of Chief Petty Officer currently where he could be called up if needed in the future. Popeye is a Master Diver with legendary Deep Sea Diver experience (partially thanks to his Uncle Davy Jones). 

 

But this scene portrayed comes from a pivotal moment in one of by Max Fleischer Studios from 1941. Enjoy!

Tune in tonight for a LIVE INTERVIEW with me on YouTube about SEA SHANTY FUNNIES

REMINDER: Feel free to join in and watch and post questions or thoughts. I've been invited to participate in an interview on YouTube tonight on the "Monitor Duty" YouTube Chanel to discuss my public domain-based POPEYE comic strip SEA SHANTY FUNNIES and perhaps some other comic book related topics by video podcaster (and Popeye fan) Mathew D. Rhys on his weekly show.

The show should go live 6 pm Pacific / 7pm Mountain / 8pm Central / 9pm Eastern this Wednesday night on May 27th.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tMrEATcl5ok

SEA SHANTY FUNNIES™ - Episode 117½

 

Popeye would like a word...

I'd be interested in your thoughts, too.

 

Here on my blog, I can get up to 2,000 visits a day from people reading my SEA SHANTY FUNNIES webcomics. YET, NOBODY HAS EVER ONCE RESPONDED WITH A SINGLE REPLY TO ANY OF THESE POSTS WITH MY WEB COMICS ON MY BLOG.

 

Why? I'm glad you're there and hoping you're enjoying, but a brother here would love some feedback and perhaps some evidence of acknowledgment that you're reading and perhaps even enjoying? 

 

Will SOMEONE out there just hit reply and respond? Pretty please? 

 

Hello, is there anybody out there?

 

First person that responds on this blog... I'll mail you a personalized Popeye sketch. Offer valid through June 1st.