The Night The Lights Went Out In Georgia

Designing Women is a formative part of my love of pop culture. After school most days I would turn on DW for a few episodes and be mesmerized by these powerful, hilarious, southern women. It had so much style, but the sense of humor of Linda Bloodworth-Thomason and her company is slightly in a league of its own. At least in this moment. Most people think of Delta Burke and her vapid beauty queen alter-ego, Suzanne Sugarbaker, but the true gem as any fan knows is Dixie Carter as her sister - razor sharp TNT - Julia Sugarbaker. No moment in DW has become as iconic as this moment. While at a beauty pageant event for Suzanne, Julia overhears a beauty queen trashing her sister in a backstage area. Julia confronts the woman and rips her a proverbial new one in one of the most quoted monologues found among people my age ("And that so you know, Marjorie, and your children will someday know, is the night the lights went out in Georgia!") It is a scathing defense of her beloved sister and a lesson in erasing the history of women - specifically Suzanne - because they have become too old to matter. Julia leaves nothing but ashes. It is setting up what will be a common theme in the series, Julia takes no prisoners and has a gun for a mouth and a bullet with your name on it. This drawing is much more expressionistic than some of the more recent ones. The hair is more of an impression and I've seemingly left a lightning bolt down Julia's left side. I intentionally dropped a tiny bit of red in her irises to give a literal fire in her eyes. I struggled with her face. She completely looked like Sigourney Weaver at one point, but I think I fixed it. I love this one.