Speakeasy, RIP

So, just got off the phone with Adam Fortier, President etc. of Speakeasy Comics. Speakeasy is no more. Due to some payment problems and low sales, it seems, they've had to lock up shop. Elk's Run... well... We're working on it. The book is 90% done, and it's murder keeping it away from you guys, cause frankly, I've never been prouder than I am of the back half of the series. Everything clicks, and it's just amazing work from Keating and Noel... The type of stuff you, as a writer, only dream of having turned in.

The book will come out. You will get to read the rest of the series.

When and How are still our main questions.

More Punks

So... Got a huge rash of e-mails on Punks, and Kody and I wanted to share some more. Here's the first two pages. Just enough to torment you tll the whole thing comes 'round.

http://www.punksthecomic.com Get gettin'.

Updataroonies

So, there's more of World's End up at the blog, etc, including a script to page thing with the full first page. And then there's this...

Visit the production blog, and you get to see the full first page of the book.

That's here.

AND, my other new project...

Kody Chamberlain and I bring you: Punks

Go here to sign up for updates, etc.

World’s End

So, so, so. The other project I'm working on has it's own little page up over at www.worldsend-thecomic.com. There you'll find some concept stuff, info about the book, and, the World's End Working Blog. This is where Keating, J-Rod, and Myself are hoping to portray exactyl what it's like to make a comic, from conceptian to final publishing. So, go by, bookmark, and keep an eye out. We'll be putting up most everything we do, as we do it.

Added Some New Stuff on the Side There

There's a little RSS feed of my last.fm thing, so you can see what i'm listening to, and I added a del.ico.us blog roll. Thinking about mounting a redesign of the blog, but I've been swamped just trying to keep up with the three new projects, my freelancing work, and trying to figure out what happens with the rest of my life. So I need a nice distraction, I suppose, I just don't know that I can afford the time to do it.

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Also of note, I started getting art in on my other new project with an artist y'all should know and love. I'll announce it officially once we're more than a few pages in (hate to jinx things). It's been shown to the brain trust, and everyone's pretty ecstatic about it. It's a much more sophisticated action piece than Western Tales of Terror, while still being considerably more accessible than Elk's Run. It's even got a clearly descriptive title that's not quite so on the nose. I do listen to Warren Ellis' advice afterall.

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Elk's Run 6 is going into lettering as soon as Keating finishes colors (which should be any day now) and issue 7 is at least half penciled if not more at this point. It's my favorite of the bunch, and makes getting through the script for issue 8 (le grande finale') tremendously daunting. So much so that I've managed to start (and script) three other projects rather than work on it. This week is it though. I'm putting the son of a bitch to bed, and moving on whole heartedly, and with joy to the next projects.

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Is this format strange?

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Got quite a bit of feedback (although you wouldn't know with how none of you bastards post in the comments) on Punk (as seen below), even had a few publishers sniff around. That's good. It'll be nice to have something come out that a large cross section of people will actually be interested in that I also enjoy writing. Like I said before, doing it feels like it makes my brain stretch, and that's a good thing.

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Being that tonight is my night off (I have transcriptions, a job interview, and Elk's Run 8 to do this weekend), I watched The Jacket (beautifully shot, well acted, hell, even pretty well scripted, and yet... eh. The endng's just not there,) 12 Monkeys (after The Jacket I figured I'd watched the clone, might as well watch the masterpiece it liberally takes from as well), and the first half of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. I can't remember what I said about it when it originally came out (it's somewhere in the archives here), in watching it for what is my third time (twice in the theater, dammit), it's finally gotten to the 'Alright, this movie doesn't work anymore' phase for me. Which is a shame. I've listened to the radio show, read the books, watched the BBC show, and played the video game constantly throughout my life. And they never get old. The movie... eh... They softened it too much in the wit and fury departments, and inflated the zany and quirky to a point where it eclipses the other more important aspects of the film. Yes. The Lemon Juice helmet is a funny addition... but, we've got a main character who's reduced to being a babbling idiot for the sake of it. Just hurts the overall movie when all of your protaganists are bumbling idiots except for the one character who seems to get kidnapped constantly.

Anyways, go read the book. It's worth it.

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Now, to bed I go.

Livejournal Directing Comics Discussion

Over on my LJ there's a little piece I wrote about my background in directing, and how much I miss it. It's growing into a little conversation about film directing being a great bridge into comic writing. Chime in comic writers!

Screenplayin’

I've been working on this screenplay for about three months now. Got up around page 50 or so and then realized why it was taking so long. I made a choice on around page 16 that was wrong. The whole thing just unravelled because of it, and I kept trying to spin it into something that it wasn't. So, tonight I finally sucked it up and chucked it, starting over from right before the bad choice. So, after spending the better part of the day screenwriting, I'm reminded of one of the other reasons I stopped. It's tremendously hard for me to write without wanting to direct. I have it all in my head, down to minute details, and I just... burn to direct it. I directed a feature I wrote in college, and it was... well, an experience. The final product turned out okay (Chris Arundel once told me there's a great fifteen minute movie in that hour and a half, and he's right), but, I think it was at least partly due to scripting problems. I'm semi-confident that with a tight enough script I could pull off a pretty cool movie.

But, unfortunately, that's not the track I took. Directing is a road that I hope I get to walk down at some point again, it's rewarding in a very different way than writing, although it can be comprable to comics.

I mean, that's the thing, Comics is the closest thing to a true auteur medium we have any more. Even when working with an artist, you can have the same control as a director in terms of pacing, camera placement, and narrative flow, you just end up trusting in the artist as cinematographer.

Where that analogy falls apart is that a lot of times your artist brings a LOT more than just cinematography. I find myself looking at Noel's pages and being inspired to take the story in different directions, heading down different avenues of emotion, and truly collaborating.

Still, I miss wearing a head set and baseball cap and telling people what to do.

Elk’s Run — Update

To the left is a page of pencils from Elk's Run 6, No Spoilers, so click, and enjoy the brilliance of Noel.

So, Issue 7 is written. It came out of me in two days of intense scripting, and I think it's about the best thing I've ever written. It's a fucking whirlwind of action, so much so, that I'm actually suprised. I'd always envisioned issue 7 as a bridge between 6 and 8, but, instead it took on it's own life. This is me letting go. J-Rod's going to have a lot of cleaning up to do on it, but, it's easily the tightest (and one of the shortest, it's right at 22 pages) scripts I've ever written.

I'll be honest. Elk's Run is a schizophrenic book. It's partly due to my creative procss, and partly due to the construct of how the book's set up. The shifting POV's mean that I can't tell a linear story, no matter how much I want to. The device was picked as a way to present the story in an interesting way and set it apart from the rest of the art in it's medium. That thought process went all the way down into our artist choices in Noel and Keating, and into how Jaco letters the book. Every issue has a unique feel, and I think that's part of what people identify with in the book. This ISN'T just another indie book, and certainly not one of a sea of superhero lit.

That's what I'll be proudest of. I think the book has managed to tell a story that appeals to both sides of the fence (even if neither side has really adopted it as it's own.) I think, and maybe I'm crazy, that that's what you have to do in order to make something that lasts and has meaning in this industry. The unfortunate reality is that the most sophisticated and daring pieces of comic literature are generally ignored till after the fact.

This is much more pompous than I mean it to be. The fact is, I love this book. Dearly. At the end of each script I feel like I've given birth. I'm more than a little sad to know that in under a month, there's a distinct possibility that I'll never write these characters again... But, I think that at the end of it all, there'll be a pretty outstanding book made by a bunch of people who love it more than a sane person should.

Through all the financial problems, low orders, and general malaise the book's received with the comic reading public, we have a dedicated fanbase who 'get it.' So, whenever I read about things like, ahem, "Apocalypse vs. Dracula" coming from Marvel or a 300 part crossover epic that will 'Break the internet in half,' it heartends me to know that there's still an audience for comics like mine.

So, in short. Thanks for the love and for letting the book exist. I promise not to disappoint you.

And, if we do... it's totally j-Rod's fault.

Falling Behind

Fell a bit behind on the Novel this weekend, because I have to finish Elk's Run #7. I'm about 1/2 way through it and should wrap it up today, and then try to crank out another thousand or so words on the novel. The novel, while definitely draining a lot of my time, has been pretty isnpirational. It's made me come to terms with what can only be seen as my own laziness in other writing with not getting them done. Cause, if I can do these massive sprawling chunks of text, I have no excuse for not finishing a 22 page comic script containing less words than a single chapter of the novel.

Anyways, Chapter 5 of the novel went up today, hopefully, Chapter 6 by the end of the day.

Woof.

This whole novel writing thing is god damn exhausting. I'm about 1/9th done right now, which in theory is god, as I'll have an extra couple of days to finish off as needed. I have a general idea of how the story goes, but I like sort of free-wheeling it as I have been. Anyways, the third chapter will be up shortly. Keep an eye out.