More information and stills of the production of this video can be seen here.
Bort sold his soul, but it looks like he’s gotten more than he bargained for when his old friend Milhaus showed up to play. Who will survive?
This is a stop-motion LEGO puppet animation that I initially conceived in late 2019, as it was intended to be a mere quick throwaway video. In the original premise, I planned on just having the titular Bort character wandering around outside and getting high off inhaling gasoline fumes, and eventually hallucinating. That was it. I didn’t have any other jokes aside from the trippy sequence. After storyboarding the concept, I began piling on more ideas and eventually fleshing out a somewhat rigid plot involving Bort being interrupted by his friend Milhaus. Next I wrote the idea of the two of them fighting, and ultimately leading to their deaths.
After animating much of the footage, I felt as if the duration was a bit lackluster, so I shot new closeups of the fight sequence to make it more violent. Even the end sequence with Bort’s soul was something I came up with at the last minute after the initial storyboard phase. I have somewhat of a Jim Steinman approach to writing in which I keep piling on more stuff until the projects balloon up beyond my control. The editing for this video commenced throughout January 2020, and was released publicly on February 1st, 2020 much to lukewarm response on YouTube.
Despite the mixed response I’ve gotten from this video, I went on to make a semi-related spin-off sequel titled Morgue Sampson in 2021. I even conceptualized a potential true sequel in 2022-2023 that was to have Chuck & Sneed characters as well as a giant mutant Bort puppet, but as of the time of this update, I haven’t made any progress.
Credits:
Cast:
Julius von Brunk as Bort Sampson, Milhaus von Haussen, Comic Book Guy’s head, and Leeza Sampson’s chanting
Music:
“The Simpsons Theme” originally composed by Danny Elfman, remixed and arranged by Julius von Brunk in FL Studio
“Night on Bald Mountain” originally composed by Modest Mussorgsky, remixed and arranged by Julius von Brunk in FL Studio
“Death Fuck” by Skot Shaub with Testosteroso
“Dead-Wood” by Skot Shaub with Testosteroso
“Flowers & Kittens” by Skot Shaub
Video production, LEGO animation, editing, and audio editing: Julius von Brunk
Equipment/Software:
Stop-motion animation footage – Nikon D5200
Live action footage – Nikon D750
Video editing – Adobe Premiere, Adobe After Effects
Stop-motion recording – Dragonframe
Animation computer – Dell Inspirion 5759, Windows 10
Editing computer – Dell XPS 8930, Windows 10
Inspired by The Simpsons originally created by Matt Groening and developed by Sam Simon, and are properties of Fox.