Comic Series

Drawing a Crowd

Posted on 5th January 2023 by pj

Some people have imagination to burn, NOT ME! so, when required to draw a crowd, I’ll stick something on tv and liberally steal from every extra that walks past. Right now I’m catching up on Servant which means M Night Shymalan makes an appearance (well, not really, I’m not going for likenesses just INPUT for my imagination engines to latch on to.)

Obsidian Black

Posted on 3rd January 2023 by pj

During the summer I played with some writing, and just spilling stuff out and drawing it in my notepad, this is one such experiment. If reaction is good I might finish it, but I expect it’ll forever remain unfinished…

I did finish the script (written as chunks of dialogue and split into pages in my notebook) but I only pencilled the first three pages and inked page 1.

White Rabbit

Posted on 2nd January 2023 by pj

I wrote the story for this shortly after doing M for Dynamite with Declan Shalvey (2018), I was convinced it was a good story with some fun plot twists and a start sequence that would be great for James Bond (but later a quick rewrite and John Regent was born) and including stuff that felt like it was on the cusp of breaking into mainstream attention (white power groups, russian spies, hackers, betrayal, incels and more)

Anyway. I took the treatment and ran it through Chat GPT to see if it could write an exciting synopsis and crikey, it’s very good at that…

Here’s the blurb:

Get ready for a thrilling, 64-page graphic novella about REGENT, a skilled assassin tasked with taking out a notorious hacker known as the “White Rabbit.” But as REGENT soon discovers, the “White Rabbit” is actually a young, nonverbal autistic girl named ALICE. Betrayed and on the run with ALICE and her mother GABRIELA, REGENT must unravel a web of deceit and danger that stretches from London to Athens. As they’re pursued by ruthless terrorists and uncover the truth about ALICE’s computer, REGENT forms a deep bond with the young girl and fights to protect her at all costs. Meanwhile, a shocking revelation about REGENT’s own employer threatens to turn his world upside down. Can REGENT bring down the mastermind behind it all and emerge victorious, or will he be dragged down the rabbit hole for good?

Twitter/Mastodon Test!

Posted on 1st January 2023 by pj

In an ideal world, microblogging on wordpress (using “aside” format) would change what gets posted to twitter or mastodon so you could see the entire post contents. As though I’m actually tweeting/tooting from my wordpress blog. Let’s try, shall we?

Microblog

Posted on 1st January 2023 by pj

Honestly, one of the things twitter has ruined for me is the ability to think of blogging as anything other than long form posts. Twitter took the place of short form thoughts and then my attention withered to the point that I could no longer make long form thoughts. So… I’m gonna start microblogging here.

That’s it. That’s the post…

Christmas and Birthday Book Haul

Posted on 29th December 2022 by pj

Hey you! Been a while! I’ve loads to tell you about, bought a new/old house, family got covid over xmas, and I’m another year older, but let’s cut to the sweet meats – what was the book haul this year?

Two (count ’em) Artisan Editions (these are the paperback equivalent of the artists editions and I think they’re a little smaller – no matter, the good stuff is what’s inside and they’re priced at a reasonable price too)

The first was the Gil Kane The Amazing Spider-Man artisan edition (via forbidden planet here). Gorgeous stuff, I love Gil Kane though not checkign the cover initially I thought it was a John Romita spider-man aritisan edition, as Romita’s deft line work is all over this, but I think he was inking or finishing a lot of Kane’s work on this (or at least for some of it)

Second, Steranko’s Nick Fury Agent of Shield artisan edition (here’s an amazon link as I couldn’t find a Forbidden Planet link) I’ll be honest, I think Steranko as a creator passed me by totally (of course I knew of him, but I never really looked at any of it) so it’s interesting to see just how kirby it all is.

Outside of the artisan editions, there’s also:

Superman’s Pal Jimmy Olsen- Who Killed Jimmy Olsen – quite looking forward to reading this hefty volume of what I presume are wacky adventures.

Radiant Black, I love the logo and have absolutely no idea what it’s about.

We Only Find them When They’re Dead – scfi goodness from my ol’ Pal Al Ewing.

and finally…

Outer Darkness. I realise this got cancelled after one series (I think?) but I kind of love the art and the premise of scifi/religion stuff.

And that’s the book haul! I’ll be honest, every year I build a big old wish list and thank god for cheap image books. Any book I really like I’ll invariably buy again in a nice hardback edition.

Come back in a few days when I might have finally gotten around to doing an all new comic book version of review of the year…