Jolly Fats Wehawkin

I love The Middleman. I love the comics, I loved the TV show, and I really wish either of them had caught on with the general public, because, like Usagi Yojimbo,  the Middleman kicks serious ass. If you were one of the 12 people who watched the show, you will no doubt remember that the Middleman's headquarters was disguised as a temp agency, the Jolly Fats Wehawkin Employment Agency. Here's my take on the logo.

The original logo was set in a fake typewriter font with a big drop-shadow. It was only seen on the wall in the front office and on a t -shirt that Wendy Watson wore once in a while. I thought it was perfunctory at best (which was no doubt the intent of the designer), so I decided to take a stab at it.

The typefaces are Bodoni Poster and Copperplate, both reliable old standbys. My thinking here was the logo probably hadn't changed much since about 1978, and it was probably whatever the kid at the sign shop came up with. I went for a gold look, something a little cheesy, but a step up (I think, anyway) from the rather flat original design.

KBBL-TV

KBBL is another blank slate; the only thing that's consistently been used for Kent Brockman's station is "a red 6 inside a yellow circle" and "red block letters," according to the Simpsons entry at Wikipedia. (yeah, yeah, I know.)

So we start with a red six and red block letters. In this case, I chose to warm up the red a little, pushing it a bit toward orange, and muted the yellow down a bit. A white keyline to brighten it up a little, and a blue holding shape to tie it all together.

The six is that same Chimes font I used for the Canyonero, but slightly edited to make it square proportions. The KBBL lettering is set in Simian Gorilla, a font from House Industries based on the lettering from the original 1968 version of "Planet of the Apes." I kerned it super-tight so the letters would overlap.