Millar Gough Ink

AVID SansAVID Sans

Background
Millar Gough Ink is founded by the Smallville producers Miles Millar and Alfred Gough as a production company.

1st Logo (October 12, 1999-November 10, 2011)


Nicknames: "Orange-Red Ink", "Ink Bottle Gets The Sledge-Hammer"

Logo: In an office setting, we see a bottle filled with orange-red gel in it. A black label covers the bottom half, containing the words reading "MILLAR GOUGH INK" in Impact,, a stacked format and all in uppercase. "INK" has the bottom half in white. A split-second before the logo ends, a sledgehammer (which can be seen coming down in the bottle's reflection if the viewer looks very closely) swings down on top of it and hits the bottle, causing the gel to spread everywhere, including covering up the whole screen along with the black label getting ripped. The bottle then gets smashed.

Variants:


 * The logo appears in both fullscreen and widescreen formats.
 * Starting with Smallville, the animation is noticeably slow.
 * Starting with some prints of Smallville, the logo is shown in widescreen.
 * On The Strip, originally, the animation is noticeably a little faster.

Technique: Live-action, designed and edited by Miles Millar and Alfred Gough.

Cheesy Factor: Full gel in the bottle itself makes the bottle look smashable, and the transition to the next logo is really poorly done.

Music/Sounds: Depending on the variant:

Music composed and sound designed by Miles Millar and Alfred Gough.
 * 1999-2000: The closing theme of the show before the splattering sound.
 * 2001-2002: Just the sound of a shattering glass.
 * Early 2002: An odd three-note piano tune.
 * Late 2002-2011: A reverberating cartoon ditty.

Music/Sounds Variants:
 * On the Smallville season 1 episodes "X-Ray" and "Hug", it's silent.
 * The CW airings of Smallville use a generic theme and a voice over.

Availability: Common. First seen on The Strip and was later seen on Smallville, the 2006 television pilot of Aquaman and the 2011 revival of Charlie's Angels. Don't expect this to appear on the company's films, though.

Legacy/Editor's Note: While the sound of a shattering glass can be startling for some people (especially the version without music where it breaks with no warning, which can be jarring to many people), some people may find this logo funny, and it may be favored for fans of Smallville.

Scare Factor: Depending on the variant:


 * 1999-2000: High, but the splattering sound can be startling to many people.
 * 2001-2002: Medium to high. The sound of the shattering glass without music can be silly to some people.
 * Early 2002: Medium. The piano tune can have eerie noise, which is creepy and startling to some people.
 * Late 2002-2011: Low to medium. It is slightly less scary with the music playing, but people can relate to you.

2nd Logo (November 15, 2015-)
Nickname: None.

Logo: On a black background, we see the stacked words "MILLAR GOUGH". To the right is a beaker with a big black water-drop in it. Inside the water-drop is "INK".

Technique: Still.

Music/Sounds: None, or the ending theme of the show.

Availability: Seen on Into the Badlands, The Shannara Chronicles (based on the book trilogy by Terry Brooks) and Wednesday (a spin off to Tim Burton's Addams Family).

Scare Factor: Low.