John DeNardo's post on Budd Clampett's animated pitch for John Carter of Mars reminded me of another potential animated classic that almost was: Nexus. In 2004, artist-illustrator Steve Rude adapted his comic book (which he created with writer Mike Baron way back in 1981) into a two-minute promo. Circulated at conventions, and sold by Rude on his website, the briskly animated promo brings to mind classic Alex Toth creations such as Space Ghost and The Herculoids.

Created during the '80s indie comics boom that gave us TMNT and American Flagg!, the Nexus comics also owe a deep debt to Toth's clean linework and energetic storytelling. (Steve "The Dude" Rude is the closest thing we have to Toth these days.) Rude has so far been unable to sell Nexus as an animated series, which is a real shame. Outside of The Venture Bros, there is very little quality action animation on TV these days. And memo to Hollywood: The spacefaring adventures of Horatio Hellpop (is there a better name in comics?) could be your next hit sci-fi film franchise.