Tag Archives: comics

Justice Stinks!

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In west-central New Mexico there is a humble city. Maybe not that humble. Anyway, this city was a magnet for evildoers, and wherever and whenever crime, mayhem, and naughtiness struck, its humble (or not) citizens would cry out for the fragrant justice of their hometown champions!

            When he was a child, young Barry fell into a radioactive sewer and gained the power and abilities of that sewer! From that day forth, he dedicated himself to the protection of Gallup, New Mexico as Sewerboy!

When he was a child, young Eugene sat down on a radioactive cactus and gained the power and abilities of that cactus! His idol, Sewerboy took him under his wing, and he fought by his side as the Kactus Kid!

Over the years, they developed quite the rogue’s gallery, including The Nitpicker (“You’re going to jail, Nitpicker!” “How can I be going to jail if I’m standing right here?”) …

The Passive-Aggressive Giant (“I guess I could go to jail. I feel bad about my mom, though, who has a bad back and can’t do any of the yardwork.”) …

And Irwin, God of Cannabis (“Perhaps we shouldn’t, uh, talk about Irwin.”)

But never was evil more powerful than with the caffeinated villainy of Major Jitters, who drank a radioactive cup of coffee and gained the power and ability of that coffee, and she chose to use it for nefarious ends. All it takes to unleash her awesome gifts is a wholesome mug full of Joe.

With her army of café-themed goons, she has cut a swath through the innocent (?) city of Gallup.

But when it comes to muscle, none can defeat the Percolator.

When evil is afoot, when all seems lost, you’ll hear the battle cry of Sewerboy and know you’re in safe hands.

“Justice Stinks!”

Does Whatever a Mortal Can

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I love drawing comics. The comic book I’m working on, the second chapter of Best Fiends Forever, is not my first comic book. The first chapter of Best Fiends Forever was not my first comic book. The one I worked on nineteen years ago for those smug dudes in New York who badmouthed me after I quit was not my first comic book. My first comic book was MortalMan, in 2003, and I dug up some of my sketches from back then.

You probably don’t know this if you’ve picked up comic reading in the past twenty-five-to-thirty years, but once upon a time, issues were self-contained, and the only thing you needed to know was in a one- or two-sentence summary near the logo. For example: “When Peter Parker was bitten by a radioactive spider, he developed abilities of a spider and learned that with great power comes great responsibility.” From there, you’d pretty quickly catch up on Spider-Man’s specific powers and enemies, usually through narration.

For MortalMan, the banner was: “When Joe Branford was bitten by a radioactive spider, he had a rash for three weeks and learned that with no power comes no responsibility.” Joe (first pic) was a good-natured teenager who watched TV and read comics perhaps a little too much. However, this prepared him for some of the weird shit to hit Gallup, New Mexico. For example, he was not fazed when he met a talking dog named Pete, figuring he was just bilingual. Pete is a goth. He sees the world as gray and bleak, he writes dark poetry, and he attempts suicide in the first issue (if I were going to write this again, I’d probably change that last bit). He and Joe hit it off, and they hang out at the mall.

This is Kgnydjll and Fphihln (pronounced “Nigel” and “Phil”) emissaries for the Galactic Empire who come to Earth in the first issue to welcome us to the fold. Unfortunately, they arrive in time for a Science Fiction Convention, and no one believes they’re aliens.

I had a lot of big plans for MortalMan, and I wrote a lot of scripts, but I never followed through with them. Joe and Pete were going to run afoul of a pair of John-Woo-inspired super spies and a mob of Tarantino-esque gangsters at a Mafia Convention being held in Gallup, and they were going to rediscover the long-retired superhero guardians of Gallup, Sewerboy and the Kactus Kid.

One of their rogues’ gallery was Irwin the God of Cannabis.

More on Sewerboy et al on a separate post.

At one point, Joe was going to get sucked into hell and would escape when a pair of little boys, attempting to tunnel to China, dig a hole in Perdition’s walls, leaving Joe stranded in Hastings, Nebraska. On his way home, he’d run into my most ambitious creation, M: the scourge of I-80, based on my dear friend, Emilie. With her sidekick, Pixie (based on our friend Abby), she leaps from car to car and liberates the change from drivers’ ashtrays. To pull her off, I’d have to learn how to draw a lot of cars and some very kinetic poses. Twenty years ago, I knew I had it in me. Now, I’m a little more humble.

I still have the original art for the comic, sans word balloons, but I don’t have the script, nor the scripts for future issues because Newcastle liked to sit on my laptop, and 18 years ago, he was much heavier and broke my hard drive.

And yet, I am starting to look for a projects after I’m finished with Best Fiends Forever…

Call It A Draw

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I’ve been prepping for a while now, and I have one more pre-production task to do, but this weekend, I’m going to start working on my third comic (technically my seventh, but the other four were done roughly two decades ago). I’m looking forward to this. I’ve got a script that’s been broken into pages and panels, and a lot of the obnoxious stuff has been edited out. All I need to do is finish layouts before I pull out the Bristol boards.

I learned some lessons from the last two comics I did, and I want to incorporate them into this one:

  1. Don’t rush. I’m not on a deadline, and no one is clamoring to see it. I need to take my time on each page.
  2. Don’t settle. I have an eraser, and I can use it as much as I need to. I’m never happy with the art I finish because I’m frustrated or I just want to get it over with.
  3. Watch the eraser. I’ve come to realize that the larger erasers I’ve been using are smearing the paper. I need one I can control.
  4. Backgrounds, backgrounds, backgrounds. I need to put as much work into those as into what I’d rather be drawing. A good background is invisible, and an over-simplified or missing background is glaring.
  5. Most importantly, practice. If I don’t know how to draw something, I shouldn’t learn on the page.

On the last point, the first page of my new comic focuses on children. When you’re used to drawing adults, it’s tough to remember that they’re not miniature adults. Take this panel from acclaimed comic artist, John Byrne. These are toddlers.

Mindful of this, I gave it a try for myself (while also practicing how to do a playground and mountains, both which also feature on page 1). I did way better than acclaimed comic artist, John Byrne.

On the left is Max Fuentes, Criminal Mastermind of the Third Grade. To the right is his enforcer, Lisa Green.

Another problem I have is likenesses. My former neighbor, the eccentric bombshell Cleo, guest stard, so I gave that a shot (while also working on backgrounds). I still need to do her roommate, Brandyn, who also puts in an appearance, but I have plenty of time to practice until I get there.

No more excuses. Time for layouts so I can get started. Wish me luck!

The Printed Menace Revisited

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I learned how to read from comic books. My dad had a huge stack of The Amazing and The Spectacular Spider-Man, The Avengers, and my personal favorite, the first fifty or so issues of The Defenders, all from the seventies and early eighties, and I read them obsessively. He had an original copy of Amazing Spiderman #129. In many ways, my dad was awesome.

I stuck with comics through the nineties, and I refused to take sides during great rivalry between adjectiveless Spider-Man and X-Men #1s. I remember my friend Tony telling me I was stupid for not picking up Superpro #1 because it was a NUMBER ONE, DUDE! I foresaw the collapse of the speculator boom when this guy I knew bragged about how he bought five copies of Spawn #1, and I thought, “If he has five copies, and his friends have five copies, who’s going to buy them? (And sure enough, twelve years later, when Chris Claremont did a surprising signing at Jim Hanley’s Comics in New York City, I bought a copy of the gatefold cover of X-Men #1 for a buck, or 20 percent of what I paid for it in 1990.)

When a guy named Robert opened a comic book store in my tiny hometown in 1993, I had found home, as well as Grendal, and I hung out there until 1994, when I went to college and became an intellectual, reading only Sandman. After that, I branched back out into the comics world and discovered lots of new stuff, a collection only confined by the size of the tiny apartments that my ex-wife (X-Wife?) and I lived in. When we moved to the DC metropolitan area, she surprised me with tickets to DC’s AwesomeCon, where I met my first muse, Peter David. But one day, I just stopped reading, even books by my favorite writers, such as Ed Brubaker.

However, my youngest sister, who prior to this point, read only Garth Ennis Punisher comics, suddenly became fascinated by Robin, and from there has become her own encyclopedia. When I told her who Snapper Carr was, she found out quickly that I had no idea what I was talking about. The student has surpassed the master.

Which brings me to the main event. Originally written to pit Brian Michael Bendis and Warren Ellis against each other. I love them both. They’re both very clever, very exciting, very cerebral writers, but they couldn’t be more different. To explain this to my friends (and later to my sister), I let them both write Star Wars. As I’ve revisited this, I’ve added more writers with distinctive voices.

Brian Michael Bendis:
LUKE: I got a bad feeling about this.
HAN: You got a bad feeling about this?
LUKE: I got a bad feeling about this.
HAN: About this?
LUKE: Yes.
HAN: A bad feeling?
LUKE: Yes.
HAN: You got a bad feeling about this?
LUKE: I got a bad feeling about this.
LEIA: This?
LUKE: This.
LEIA: This is what you got a bad feeling about?
LUKE: It is.
LEIA: You got a bad feeling about this?
LUKE: I got a bad feeling about this.
CHEWBACCA: WRAURGH!
LUKE: Chewie’s got a bad feeling about it, too.
LEIA: About this?
LUKE: He does.

Warren Ellis:
LUKE: I got a bad feeling about this.
HAN: Me, too. Let’s shoot it in the head.
LEIA: (Lights cigarette) Bloody right, then.
CHEWBACCA: WRAURGH!

Frank Miller:
LUKE: I got a bad feeling about this.
HAN (In captions): I had a bad feeling about this, too. A real bad feeling. A bad feeling burning ice cold in my gut. It tells me things are bad. Real bad. I watch the boy. Luke Skywalker. Age eighteen. He thinks he knows what he’s getting into, but he has no idea how bad it’s going to get. This feeling he’s got? It’s roses. Roses and picnics and apple pies to how it’s really going to get. Luke Skywalker. Age eighteen. He’s in for a world of hurt.
LEIA: Oh, Han! I can’t stand it anymore! I have to have you! You’re so manly! Take me, you wicked, manly space pirate! Smuggle yourself inside of me! Take me now!
CHEWBACCA: WRAURGH!
HAN (In captions): The Wookie screams a dark, primal scream into the cold, dead interstellar void. A void colder and deader than that bad feeling in my gut. The Wookie screams. I know how it feels.

Joss Whedon:
LUKE: I got a bad feeling about this.
HAN: Then maybe we should go all Buck Rogers on it and kick its evil ass! Set phasers to awesome!
LEIA: Totally!
CHEWBACCA: WRAURGH!

Garth Ennis:
LUKE: I got a bad feeling about this.
HAN: Fuck!
LEIA: Cocksucker!
CHEWBACCA: WRAURGH!

Kevin Smith:
LUKE: I got a bad feeling about this.
HAN: That’s because my cock is in your mouth!
LEIA: You guys are so gay!
CHEWBACCA: Han, I think your bluster hides the fact that you do, in fact, have sexual feelings for Luke, but are conflicted because there is also something there for Leia, as well.
LUKE: Snoochie-boochies!

Chris Claremont:
LUKE: I got a bad feeling about this.
HAN: Of course you got a bad feelin’ about this, old friend, because the evil we face is the Empire, which has caused us no end of difficulties. If you’ll recall, Darth Vader has revealed himself to be your father as part of his master plan to overthrow his lord and master, Emperor Palpatine [See The Empire Strikes Back—Ed.]. We’ll need to face this together …
LUKE (In a thought bubble): Han’s talking tough, but it was only recently that I was able to rescue him from the clutches of Jabba the Hutt, and he may still be suffering from the side-effects of carbonite hibernation [See The Return of the Jedi—Ed.]. He can’t keep pushing himself like this. Hey, is that an Imperial Storm Trooper about to shoot at us? It is! I’d better warn the others. (Out loud) Look out!
LEIA: (Thought bubble as she jumps over the blaster fire): Incredible! It was only months ago that I was a helpless princess in the clutches of Grand Moff Tarkin [See A New Hope—Ed.], but now that it has been revealed to me that I am the daughter of the once-noble-Jedi-turned-evil, Anakin Skywalker [See The Return of the Jedi—Ed.], and with the training I’ve received with the rebels, I can easily evade this blast! (Out loud, still mid-jump) Luke! Use your lightsaber and Jedi training to deflect the blast! Chewbacca! Use your crossbow gun to stop the Storm Trooper before he can get another shot off!
CHEWBACCA: WRAURGH! [See The Revenge of the Sith—Ed.]

Jimmy Palmiotti and Amanda Conner
LUKE: I got a bad feeling about this.
LEIA: What are you gonna do about it?
LUKE: Are you going to wear the metal bikini all the time now?
HAN: I have no objection to this.
CHEWBACCA: WRAURGH!

Ed Brubaker:
LUKE: I got a bad feeling about this.
HAN: It’s about to get a lot worse. (Shoots Luke in the back) Now we can be together, Your Highness, without him standing in our way.
LEIA: (Points her gun at Han) Oh, Han, don’t you see? It was never about you and me. You were the one standing in my way.
HAN: No!
LEIA: (Shoots him.) Now, Chewie, we can take the money and get away from it all! Just you and me.
CHEWBACCA: (Strangles Leia) WRAURGH! (Wipes a single tear from his cheek.)

Neil Gaiman:
LUKE: I got a bad feeling about this.
NARRATOR: The bad feeling drifts through the hearts and minds of the galaxy, like the smell of something foul, yet bittersweet, like kimchi. The words cross their lips as the feeling overcomes them. The Correllians know it …
HAN: I got a bad feeling about this.
NARRATOR: The Mon Calamari know it …
ACKBAR: I got a bad feeling about this.
NARRATOR: The Gungan know it …
JAR-JAR: Meesa got a bad feelin’!
NARRATOR: The Hutts know it …
JABBA: Botaka! Hoo hoo hoo …
NARRATOR: The Ewoks know it …
WICKET: Yub yub!
NARRATOR: The Wookies know it …
CHEWBACCA: WRAURGH!
NARRATOR: But never is it more real than in the dreams of the exiled royalty of a world that is no longer there …
LEIA: I got a bad feeling about this.

Peter David:
LUKE: I got a bad feeling about this.
HAN: Are you sure it’s not “More Than a Feelin’”?
LEIA: (punches Han in the shoulder) Han, this is serious.
HAN: Oh, dry up, Princess.
CHEWBACCA: WRAURGH!

Grant Morrison:
LUKE: I got a bad feeling about this.
HAN: The only way we can get through this is if break the parsec barrier and cause a chain reaction. This will require everything we got, all of us. And if we fail, we run the risk of turning every living creature in the galaxy into yarn.
LEIA: (turns to camera) That is if it’s okay with the writers.

Ben Edlund:
LUKE: As he stares out across The Galaxy, the galaxy far away, our intrepid hero stands there, asking himself the same tough questions. What is it far away from? If Darth Vader is indeed his father, why don’t they have the same last name? Do they have Chinese food in space? It’s these questions and more that make him think. They make him cry out to the stars! The warring stars! I! GOT! A! BAD! FEELING! ABOUT! THIS! AND I’M OKAY WITH THAT!
HAN: Who are you talking to?
LUKE: Hello there, old chum. I’m just setting the mood.
CHEWBACCA: WRAURGH!

My favorite writer is Matt Wagner, but he doesn’t have any consistent tropes to hang one of these on. I was also going to do Mark Millar, but thinking about it made me want to throw up a little.