Minions at Work: A Photocomic

Be sure to read our “What’s Coming in 2017” post over on Patreon. (Yes, it’s free to everyone to read, as are our regular comics, now, and hopefully forever!) Now, on to our bonus panel!

 

The REAL story of Gondor McKome

This concludes our “in story” origin of Gondor McKome, Universal Suit, but he’s been around in Minions at Work for quite a while, and here’s his REAL story!

The fifth Minions at Work comic (then just known as “Minions”) had Minion No. 1 going to an unemployment office. I built a little office set that, while not perfect, I was kind of pleased with. I went so far as to make one of those little name placards to sit on his desk, and of course, I needed a name. I decided it would be a play on my old high-school and college friend, (and “father of hobby robotics”) Gordon McComb, which is how the character came to be called “Gondor McKome.” No, the “Gondor” is not a Lord of the Rings reference, it’s just a mangled version of “Gordon.”

Men’s suits in action figure scale were hard to come by in those days, but I had one and I put it on a random male action figure (chosen for his generic looks) and had him be the unemployment case officer. Mind you, this figure looks not even SLIGHTLY like the real Gordon, another reason I messed with the name.

Gordon and I have a long history of sticking each other in our published works, often in embarrassing fashion. There’s a picture of me, in silly robot cosplay, in early editions of Gordon’s famous “Robot Builder’s Bonanza,” and an example document in his popular “Word for Macintosh” book, is a news story about me reporting a UFO, with the clear implication that I’m in insane loon. (For the record, I’m JUST a loon.) In turn, I’ve used Gordon’s name on a number of unflattering fictional characters in stories and books over the years, and I think killed him off a time or two.

Anyway, I had this generic guy in a suit, and I just kept using him, every time I needed a bureaucrat, official, salesman, or anything else that required a “guy in a suit.” So he showed up again in “The Origin of Doctor Santa” as an antagonistic, racist, mall manager, and apparently was killed off. In a flashback that probably predates all his other appearances!

So, purely as an afterthought to the Doctor Santa story, I decided to settle his fate, and also explain how he keeps showing up in different roles, different jobs, working for different companies and agencies. Mainly I did it because it’s silly and fun, but maybe it will mean he’ll take a more active role in some future stories, develop some kind of character, and become more than just “that guy in the suit.” Certainly, it’s going to be interesting the first time he runs into Doctor Santa, something that hasn’t happened. Yet!

By the way, there are now actually TWO Gondor McKomes! At one point I needed to use him in a comic, and couldn’t find him. But I DID by then have an identical back-up suit, so I found a similar but not identical looking figure, dressed him in the suit, and used him instead. Later the original figure showed up, so now I have two not-quite-identical Gondors. Is there in in-story explanation for that as well? Time will tell.

Happy New Year, everybody. Keep laughing, no matter what!

-Minion Master Steve