A gay western centaur romance isn't the kind of story I encounter enough, even in furry fandom. Hotblood! A Centaur In the Old West is a webcomic by Toril Orlesky that ran from 2013-2016. The color artwork is as stark as the landscape, but the story is a bit more complicated than the black-and-white world that the western genre is known for.

The art is lovely enough that I was mostly able to put aside the sometimes uneven pacing. As the story circles around the action, it digs deeper into its characters' pasts - and their hearts. The two main characters are not morally whole men, and therefore they caught my interest.

Rook is a centaur. In the story universe, centaurs are an integrated part of American society. There's some social stigma, but not as much as you might think for someone who looks half-animal. There's at least one centaur in the U.S. Senate, for example. Rook is employed by Asa, a human steel tycoon. We don't get to see much of the world outside of their relationship, and it's only by the second half of the story that we really start seeing the two of them bond, sexually and romantically.

Mandi Tremblay (also known as the artist Mitti, creator of Peachy Keen) has a new on-line graphic story in full color, Lucky August Carson. It goes like this: “On his first day as a small town sheriff, August Carson’s got caught in the snare of Freddie, the legendary Bandit Queen, who kidnaps him for her own mission. Can August survive the Mojave Desert, or is there more to Freddie than she’s letting on?” Find out at the official Lucky August Carson web site.

image c. 2014 by Mandi Tremblay

The Cartoon Brew presents a 5:41 minute Western featuring anthro pies, muffins, cupcakes, quiches, and other baked goods. A CGI student film by Adam Campbell, Elizabeth McMahill, and Uri Lotan of Sarasota, Florida’s Ringling College of Art and Design.

When first shown the trailer to Nickelodeon Movies' Rango, I was unimpressed. Though the inclusion of Johnny Depp would normally be interesting, I assumed he was just another slumming celebrity voice. And the character designs were a bit offputting. To put it mildly. But the revelation that the director for the movie was Gore Verbinski did pique my interest.

Rango is Verbinski's eighth film; previous work includes such oddities as Mousehunt (which furry fans may be somewhat familiar with), the American remake of The Ring (one of Bravo's "100 Scariest Movie Moments" selections), and the three released Pirates of the Caribbean movies — the third of which made him one of only four directors to gross over a billion dollars at the box office (putting him in the company of Peter Jackson, Christopher Nolan and Ursa Major Award-winning James Cameron). In other words, Verbinski is a director to watch.

But does Rango live up to some of his previous works?