MARMOT

How to Approach Strange Artists

2012-01-23T21:04:00.004-05:00

A friend of mine is looking for an artist, but doesn't know how to talk to random strangers that draw better than him.

So I've whipped up the following to coach him.

You never want to send an artist a form letter, because you're looking for a partner, not a hired monkey. That said, I consider the things in brackets to be good guidelines for talking points and basic politeness.

"What I'd do is this:

1. Have a bit of script done and your plot in your head.
2. Figure out what kind of baseline deal you have to offer, and where you're willing to flex on it.
3. Find an artist.
4. Email them saying something like:

Heya,

My name's [your name]. I'm not sure what's on your plate at the moment, but I'm looking to bring on a collaborator for this comic I'm writing. It's about [short version], and I think you'd be a good fit because [things about their art style that you think suit your story; why them, basically].

[Lay out your baseline deal]

[Layout your pitch plans A, B, and C] [Mention a little bit of what else you've done, and whether or not you'll be handling the legwork on the pitch].

If you're interested, I have [pages of script, an outline, a poem, a dream, a sigh, whatever]. If not, [no worries/it's all good/we cool, son/I'll still love you forever] and thanks for your time.

[how you end emails],
[first name]

Friends Don't Let Friends Kill Them With Kung Fu

2012-01-08T09:25:00.005-05:00

Hokuto no Ken vol. 2; image from pirates

Is Fist of the North Star my favorite comic? No. Is it the one I think gets the worst rap? Definitely.

I coined the term "fist opera" for it, years ago. Emotions are big in that series, and expressed through hugely violent kickpunching. Sometimes crying. Mostly kickpunching. The plots are not intricate; mysterious identities and "you're alive!?" are the biggest twists.

And yet...there's more to it than just that.

An example:

Kenshiro is our hero. The last practitioner of a deadly martial art, he and his fiancé (Yuria) and his best friend (Shin, a martial artist of a different stripe; pointillism to Kenshiro's expressionism, haha) survived the kind of nuclear war the 80s warned us about.

This friend, Shin, had a thing for Yuria. In the pre-apocalyptic martial artist scene, she was the It Girl, so that's understandable. But Ken's hard to dislike too; he's a Nice Guy, despite his martial art being an assassin's art.

He tells himself she'll be happy with him. Like you do.

But then the world blows up, and between the world now being a blasted, Darwinist plain and a little bit of poison in his ear from Ken's shitheel brother...Shin snaps. Cuts Ken's tendons on all four limbs, then has goons prop our lad up so that Shin can stab his finger up to the third knuckle into Ken's torso. Seven times for the seven stars of the big dipper. Pointillism.

And he takes Yuria. Because if Ken can't stop his crazy best friend from doing so, who can he stop?

She can learn to be happy about it. Shin lives in hope.

Ken also lives, which was not part of the plan. His mind is for revenge. Ken was schooled, quite literally; having your friend exsanguinate you a bit and steal the last good thing in the world teaches you important lessons about what trust and hardness mean in the new world.

Fast forward a bit. Ken meets some kids, and we see that Ken has stopped being a Nice Guy and started being a Good Man. Fools get their heads kicked off. Walks are walked. And Ken gets his revenge.

He almost falters when he sees Yuria on Shin's throne. And he snaps when Shin puts a hand through her chest. But that's a Real Doll. Yuria leapt off a balcony rather than have Shin bloodily carve out any more world for her.

They both failed her.

So, when Ken punches Shin's torso to mush, I suspect Shin feels he has it coming.

That's not what he says, of course. He dresses it up in bluster..."I won't die by your hand!" he says, already dead, knowing it, blood and whatever else is in him dribbling out of his sneering smile.

And then Shin takes a staggering swan dive off the balcony. He's dead after he hits the ground. Not a second before.

Because here's the thing: if teaching Ken that being a cruel man to protect what matters turned out to be an erroneous lesson, then Shin can't let Ken kill him. Pride and craziness won't let him concede the issue out loud, of course, and justice demands Ken gets to take his shot. But Shin needs a way to say "I was wrong, and it cost us the best girl in the world and it made you kill me."

He puts his blood on the cobblestones instead of his best friend's hands.

Ken buries him. Someone asks why.

"Because we loved the same woman."

Because this never should've been this way.

Looking for Artists

2011-11-06T10:37:00.005-05:00

My offered deal with all of these is basically the same: back-end, 60-40 favoring the artist, draw enough for a pitch, and if we don't get picked up, we can do it digitally somewhere. Or go straight to digital, because the Future is Now and so on.

A Duel Between Men
Length: 96 pages
Script: Finished
Plot:
England's greatest swordsman runs afoul of an ex-Confederate gunslinger in a series of duels. An anachronistic farce of snappy dialogue and short fight scenes.
Big Picture: Essentially me doing with Oscar Wilde
and swordplay what I did with Westerns in The Grave Doug Freshley. Older script that I discovered hadn't been lost; Bevis Musson was attached at one point but we just kind of unmaliciously vanished on each other (only some character sketches were done).

Excelsher
Length: Short comics
Script: Not yet.
Plot:
Sort of a Wonder Woman riff, taking the bondage themes built into the character and blowing a raspberry at them by making the character an escapologist par excellence. Also a bit of a wink at things like Mr. A, which are clearly just a creator espousing a philosophy by way of superheroes (see big picture below for philosophy in question). We'd start each story with her in a deathtrap and some villain ranting at her, show the escape, have her knock out the villain. Repeat ad nauseum.
Big Picture: It's therapy comics; the REAL death trap is like, depression, man, so like, if we draw this, like, superheroine (because women are better than dudes, like, obv.) breaking out of traps, there's like, some, like, comics-is-magic shit going on where we're like, rejecting depression?

Also, fo-reals, I feel like the elaborate deathtrap is a lost art in comics.

The Raconteur
Length: 96-120 pages or so; it should be a mini series, but I made a very solemn vow to only write GNs (and variable-length digital stuff)
Script: 20 something pages in, story plotted out pretty extensively
Plot:
When a superheroine is killed in a cosmic whatever, her secret supervillain lover is left to take care of the child he didn't know they'd had.
Big Picture: I'm a busy man, and I need to multi-task scratching the itches of writing indie dramedies and trying to build some super-comics chops so I'm god-I-hope employable for WFH someday. Also all my friends are getting married and having kids and I need to parse that through comics a little bit.

Contact me at Jamheck at gmail dot com.

D-Man

2011-10-16T23:01:00.004-04:00

click for bigger

There's been a meme of sorts, people doing little six panel strips nailing down/celebrating a certain character. All the ones I've seen have been DC (for the obvious reason of the reboot), but never let it be said that I won't intentionally miss the point, I guess?

What can I say? I've liked the dude since the first Avengers comic I ever read (the Busiek/Perez Heroes Return issue 1). Some people have a Batman or Spider-Man pitch floating somewhere on their computer just in case; I've got a a little word doc marked D-Man.

Anyway, I pulled in fellow (possibly only other) D-Man aficionado PJ Perez for the art, and he did an excellent job.

...God, I hope we don't get sued.

NYCC

2011-10-15T20:17:00.005-04:00

Just bullet points, I'm knackered:

- Sold, like, two or three books? Talked with anyone who'd talk to me, said hi to most passerby. I feel like the concept sorta overloads people, but I have no idea how to express the concept that it just works. Read reviews, they all say it.

Anyway, I'd do it again.

- Jeez, there's a ton of attractive looking women in NY. I mean, shit, man. Not even the cosplayers, I'm just talking girls I saw on the street, or in the train station. And cool looking. Like...like just fucking cool ways of dressing and shit.

- That said: too many fucking people on that con floor, man. Place was choked. Also, little Asian dude on your cell, why were you wielding me like Cap's shield to get through that crowd? You're lucky my response to physical contact is to ignore it until it goes away, or we'd have had problems. Whatever, I ain't mad.

- "You don't look happy!" "I never do!" Real talk, A. Dave, that pic's gonna turn out shit. I can't smile for photos, man.

- My NY traditions remain intact: get meat on a stick from a food cart, hit Tick Tock. Beef kebabs are better than chicken, FYI. No sauce; I was wearing a more-than-$100-suit.

- Speaking of: totally going to wear a suit to every con I work. Keep that in mind if you share a table with me down the line.

- Lady who stopped by just long enough to look at the rest of the signing section, back at me, and say that it's a shame I'm not a woman: you're still right. Also, that was out of the blue enough to be really funny.

- This girl Joan (god I hope I'm remembering that right, we talked for a while) who stopped by had a lovely idea for writers: get them to write a little short story instead of a sketch. Took me a bit to get started, but she seemed to dig it.

- Haul: Giffen/Clark Doom Patrol vols 1 and 2, The Many Adventures of Miranda Mercury, The Strange Talent of Luther Strode #1, Dr. Doom and the Masters of Evil, Volcanic Revolver, a new Mighty Skullboy Army comic, Matt Roscetti's Growing Up Comic, that issue of Herbie where he fights Dracula in a pizza parlor, and (still quietly flipping my lid over this) issues 1, then 4-12 of American Flagg, the original First Comics issues, for what they cost in 198X.

Ran me just a hair over $40, which I consider amazing.

- Acknowledgements: Archaia for the lovely booth set up and hard work; A. Dave Lewis for the best iPhone case ever, Matt Roscetti for the comic and the chat, Andrew Rostan for recommending an amazing book on spaghetti westerns, Justin Jordan for not throwing Batarangs at me and being generally fun to talk to as always, Tradd Moore for being just an immensely likeable guy, Joan for rocking a Spider Jerusalem costume and letting me talk her ear off about a million book recommendations, everyone who came out, anyone I'm forgetting, and any of the above whose names I've fucked up because I am horrible with names.

A Duel Between Men

2011-09-29T09:57:00.004-04:00

I'm looking for an artist for my anachronistic Victorian fop farce fight comic, A Duel Between Men.

96 page OGN, script's finished but for the usual "'what if we tried this?' 'sure, artist I'm happy to work with, that's an elegent solution to this flaw in the story'" rewrites, back end deal, co-ownership, we'll distribute digitally if we don't land a publisher. Looking for elegance and cartoonishness, style wise.

Contact at Jamheck at gmail dot com to show interest and/or for more info.

The Grave Doug Freshley in Stores

2011-09-29T09:53:00.002-04:00

I'm told by reliable sources that The Grave Doug Freshley is in stores as of yesterday. Between this and the digital version, it's now, finally, as purchasable as possible.

Also:

The Daily Blam reviewed the book, giving it 3 1/2 stars out of 5 and more importantly, digging it without bringing a love of Westerns to the reading of it.

and

I yammered a bit about the book on the Archaia website.

Doug in Print

2011-09-17T13:06:00.002-04:00

Yesterday, I got my largest single check for writing and a notice from the postal service that they'd failed to deliver "Box (HEAVY)".

So this morning, I hit the post office.

Eight copies of The Grave Doug Freshley in hardcover. My first graphic novel, that I wrote when I was 19. My first graphic novel in print. Hell, only my second print credit ever, actually.

So, that's a thing that exists now.

30 Day Song Challenge: Day 8 - A Song That You Know All The Words To

2011-07-27T23:40:00.003-04:00

Charlie Daniels Band - The Devil Went Down to Georgia

Good music and the devil have been rubbing shoulders ever since a bunch of hicks saw a black kid who could play guitar better than them and said “only way that makes sense is he must’ve sold his soul to Satan to get that good”. I guess the logic is that music you can feel on a primal level, in your gut and crotch, has to have a tinge of the demonic, because that’s the only way anything is any fun, ever. Wrong, sure, we’re all God fearing people here…but still. Fun.

Equally crucial to the rock narrative is the kid-from-nowhere-who-can-rock-your-fucking-guts-out. Lo, around the next corner of the bootlegger’s road, where men are men and sisters are wives, will come the next rock god; the Johnny B. Good story, so to speak.

Charlie Daniels’ finest moment combines both of these narratives into a parable of the time Satan picked a good ol’ boy with a fiddle for an easy mark and got his ass handed to him. It’s catchy.

“I DONE TOLD YOU ONCE, YOU SON OF A BITCH, I’M THE BEST THERE’S EVER BEEN”.

Right on.

Runner up: Herbert Kretzmer - Stars. From Les Miserables. My mom would play it in the car, y'know, on tape (to give you an idea as to how long ago this was). And I picked up the words, because...well, it's fucking Stars, innit? Best song in a musical full of songs that are not terrible, to say the least.

30 Day Song Challenge: Day 7 - A Song That Reminds You of a Certain Event

2011-06-02T21:14:00.003-04:00

Chet Atkins - Show Me the Way to Go Home

So me, a fisherman, and the sheriff of a sleepy beach town were hunting this shark...

No, but seriously: I forget the occasion, I don't remember the kid's name, but damned if some drunk kid at one of Kane's parties didn't lead us in a drunken rendition of this song that seemed to pick up more and more people in the house on each sequential verse (before everyone bailed and the kid sang a verse or two by himself at top volume, which was a bit much).

It wasn't the best party ever, but it was a good one, and one of those "this sounds like cliche bullshit, but I swear we did this" moments that pops up once in a blue moon.

Runner Up: David Bowie - Five Years. R. Stevens over at Diesel Sweeties ran some event where we all piled onto Twitter or a chatroom or something and listened to Ziggy Stardust. It was the first time I heard it. Cool little event.

30 Day Song Challenge: Day 6 - A Song That Reminds You of Somewhere

2011-05-30T19:42:00.003-04:00

Blur - Look Inside America

At Shippensburg, I'd usually catch breakfasts at the cafeteria just as it opened. On a foggy morning, the whole world would look like the back cover of Blur's self-titled. I'd have it on over earbuds while I grabbed breakfast in an empty cafeteria and had a dozen more cups of coffee.

This, Country Sad Ballad Man, and You're So Great in particular, never fail to take me back to those mornings. Albarn always sounded just as clever as I assumed I was and as burned out as I actually was.

Still, it was a good time.

I mean, I wrote 500 pages of comic script, slept every other day, and didn't graduate from there because of that, but those were good mornings.

Runner Up: Pixies - The Holiday Song. I know the actual song's about whatever, but the whole "this ain't no holiday/but it always turns out this way" always haunts me on family vacations I don't want to be on.

30 Day Song Challenge: Day 5 - A Song That Reminds You of Someone

2011-05-29T23:06:00.003-04:00

The Highwaymen - Michael, Row The Boat Ashore

I’m not getting into this.

Runner Up: Vince Gauraldi Trio – Christmastime is Here. This someone’s still alive, I’m just not naming names. He’d be miffed that I chose the quintessential Schultzian bummer song as his theme, but I don’t think he’d argue it.

30 Day Song Challenge: Day 4 - A Song That Makes You Sad

2011-05-28T14:24:00.004-04:00

Los Campesinos - The Sea is a Good Place to Think of the Future

“At fourteen/her mother died/in a routine operation” always guts me, for reasons I’m sure I’ll blurt drunkenly to someone someday.

Besides that: the quiet urgency of the guitar, the slow slice of the violin, the way the band crashes into the chorus...look, I’ve hung out on the beach, and I’ve gotten The Fear and escaped from parties without a word*, and this sounds like what would happen if the two coincided, with nowhere to go but into the sea.

And then the chorus comes in, and it sounds like realizing too late that this wasn’t what you really wanted. Blub blub blub....bloop.

*Editorial Note: I wrote this two days ago, but actually ended up doing this exact thing last night. Prophetic! - Josh

Runner Up: Sigur Ros – Staralfur. “I wonder if it remembers me.” It’s obvious, and probably more than a little hipstery, but this song always takes me back to that scene, and that scene always just goes right through me.

30 Day Song Challenge: Day 3 - A Song That Makes You Happy

2011-05-27T18:03:00.002-04:00

Kenickie – Montrose Gimps It Up For Charity

Now, admittedly, British bands are my green Kryptonite and female singers are my gold K (God help us both if you get that reference), but still. I’m sure Kieron Gillen’s written a million more and better words about why Kenickie are great, but the best I can put it is that Kenickie perfectly capture the weird mix of sassy glee and deflating self-loathing that come with being a half-clever depression case who still likes getting out of the house and hanging out.

But that’s the big picture, and your mileage may vary anyways.

Sometimes, it’s just a delight to listen to a bunch of British girls (and one dude) get infectiously goofy in the studio, like on this hidden track off At the Club. When that happens, for 2:09, Kenickie are the most chaarrrrming and luvverly band in the wooooooorld, dahling, thank YOU very much, ahahahah.

Runner Up: Bon Jovi – You Give Love A Bad Name. Straight cornbread with a side of Doritos, but I always rock out if it comes on.

30 Day Song Challenge: Day 2 - Your Least Favorite Song

2011-05-26T17:57:00.000-04:00

My Darkest Days - Porn Star Dancing

UGH.

What makes this song grate on my nerves isn’t the throwback sexism; I have no dog in that fight, being the sort of guy who digs songs like “Under My Thumb” and “Stutter” in true equality. And the lyrics are asinine and piggish, but if we’re going after rock music for being asinine and piggish, we’ll never stop and our record collections will all fucking suck.

What bugs me about Porn Star Dancing is just how horribly unsexy it is. It’s all rock-hard fake boobs and off-center nipple piercings and Chinese character tats that probably don’t actually mean “peace” or “water” and that fucking dude with the guyliner and the fucking Mohawk. Looking at the singer's fresh-from-Zoolander cheekbones, I think "maybe it’s supposed to be ironic?". Even that’s done artlessly, and I know from conceptually good jokes that go over like lead balloons in the execution.

The whole endeavor just comes off like the bummer trying-too-hard corner of a Maxim party.

It's not the subject matter, either. "Boy, slutty dancing is awesome, I wish more girls did it" is a perfectly valid subject for a rock song. It's skeevy, sure, but here's the thing:

When Mick Jagger sings about how it’s down to him that the lady in question does just what she’s told, the big picture is creepy, but Mick radiates enough pure sex that you can maybe see why she’d go along with it. For that matter, when Justine Frischmann somehow manages to vocalize a perfectly arched eyebrow when asking if there’s something (anything) she can do for your ED, she’s already done it, thanks.

Good music about unhealthy or skeevy situations is still good music, and the best of it excels at seducing you just enough to go with the song, is my point (much belabored).

The problem here is that this song is not good music. The tune is a chugging, unadventurous piece of shit, the singer’s growly wail is the fakest kind of rock put-on, the lyrics make the word "broseph" seem clever, and I believe I mentioned that fucker with the Mohawk already. There’s just nothing in this song that makes anything in it seem remotely appealing.

Porn Star Dancing revels in being willfully fake shit that doesn’t have the self-respect to pretend otherwise,and it doesn't respect the listener enough to even try and have some charisma. It's a wannabe stripper anthem that would be embarrassing for strippers to dance to.

Moreover, it breaks the cardinal rule of rock music in being no fucking fun at all.

UGH. UGH, I SAY.

Second Runner up: Radiohead - Creep. Here, I'll sing a bit: "wank wank wank whiiiiii~ne~!" Second verse, same as the first, etc.

30 Day Song Challenge: Day 1 - Your Favorite Song

2011-05-25T20:39:00.005-04:00

This is a thing that's been making the rounds. Old news, but I'm using it to get some more content on this here blog. Thirty days, thirty songs, each day with a different song theme. Here we go.

day 01 - your favorite song

Foo Fighters - Breakout

I find Foo Fighters super likeable. They're the kind of band where no song, no matter how often I hear it, pisses me off. There's never an "ugh, this fucking song/those fucking guys" reaction; I may change the dial, but there's always going be another time where I leave that same song on and dig it.

That feels like I'm damning with faint praise, but I'm sincere: I always at least like, if not love, any given Foo Fighters song. That's kind of amazing for a band with as much material as they have.

As for why this song:

Breakout is everything I want out of a rock song. It has fast bits and chiller bits, heavy bits and soft bits, clever bits ("little frayed around the ends" may as well be my quintessential character description) and shoutable bits, and it’s romantic in a “look, I’m basically a crazy person, but on an unrelated note, I love you” way that I can relate to more than cock rock's "I'm going to fuck the dogshit out of that bitch" or indie rock's "girls who won't talk to me are the most beautiful girls of all".

And all that aside, I just never get sick of the song. That's enough for me to call it a favorite.

Second Runner Up: Art Brut - Emily Kane. "I hope this song/finds you fame/I want schoolkids on buses singing your name" remains the most romantic lyric I've ever heard.

R+M: I Was A Teenage Android Timebomb Concludes

2011-05-25T20:35:00.003-04:00

Over at R+M, we've finished our first little story, "I Was A Teenage Android Timebomb".

Next story, we meet our second lead, Ryan, and Jorge drops some atomic bombs of coloring.

Bear Beater Bunyan on Graphicly

2011-05-08T13:14:00.001-04:00

With all the R+M stuff, I sort of lost track of this:

Bear Beater Bunyan is now available on Graphicly.

It joins The Grave Doug Freshley on the platform, and I'm super pumped to have another comic out with Graphicly.

R+M Goes Live

2011-05-04T20:08:00.000-04:00

Today! Right here!

There Is A Difference Between A Kill And An Execution

2011-05-02T17:35:00.005-04:00

You know what's surreal? Sitting at a baseball game watching a man maybe five years older than myself awkwardly fist bump an old woman because our country killed a criminal mastermind on the far side of the world.

I had originally typed "murdered" in that sentence, but that's not right. And it's important to be right about this. This was an official operation and he was an official enemy of the country. He's killed. Not murdered. That difference matters.

But I'd have preferred executed.

I don't, as a rule, believe in killing anyone. And I get very uncomfortable with any group (and especially a country) singling out an individual as needing to die for any reason. But speaking as that guy, with those beliefs, I have little to no problem with us not sharing a planet with a homicidal madman from now on. I have problems with how it's done, but I can't argue the final result needed to happen.

It's just that I'd have liked a trial and a body, in that order.

I can see how he'd have become a symbol while on trial. I can see how it's just more practical to put a bullet in someone who's been keeping one cave ahead of our entire armed forces for roughly ten years. I can see how if you're an American soldier with that man in your sights, you don't go for the knee.

But I don't know what it says about us as a country that our response to a big enough crime is to just track you down, shoot you, and bury the body at sea.

And I don't like not having a body for proof, even if I can understand not even wanting to leave something to venerate after the job is done. And I don't like the sneaking, cynical suspicion that even more than the birth certificate, this is the President proving he's a real American by killing America's archenemy.

I don't know. There's justice here, but it's justice for America alone. For everything that came after, I feel like his crime was of a scale that we needed to put him on trial in front of the world. The world needed to say "you don't get to kill that many people and remain a part of the global community". And then the noose, cremation, spread the ashes into international waters with little ceremony and no celebration.

I was there when they were chanting "USA, USA" at Citizens Bank Park. And while I like the USA just fine, celebrating a killing isn't something I can get behind. You don't high-five your bros for putting down a mad dog.

He was always going to die for what he did, and even I'll say it was rightly so and too-long delayed. I'd have just preferred it to be an execution, not a killing.

R+M Coming in May

2011-04-30T18:57:00.002-04:00

R+M has a website now, roplusmo.com

Some more details:
- Weekly pages, updated on Wednesdays
- We've got the first two stories in the can, Jorge's mostly done drawing the third, I've written the fourth.
- R+M originally started off as "Batman/Superman with Astro Boy/Devilman"; the shorthand I've been using for it nowadays is "Pete&Pete if Pete and Pete were Astro Boy and The Hulk", but I'm increasingly wary of drawing comparisons to that particular sacred cow among my age group. That said, the series really is just bizarre little vignettes about being a robot/monster/teenager.

The Future:

2011-04-17T12:52:00.003-04:00

Black Flies
R+M
Defiance of the Surprising
Rock Raleigh and the Hole Way Down

And probably a few of my older titles showing up in a new form.

Nomad To-Two

2011-04-06T21:00:00.002-04:00

That was horrible.

Serious business: I've known Harry Myland since Noah was a boy and the Ninja Turtles were culturally relevant. His webcomic, Nomad Tofu, is two years old today, and the best thing the Jim Henson Studios never did.

Uh, Yeah. WoWwwwww...

2011-03-13T12:09:00.003-04:00

So, I had thirty free days of World of Warcraft, bequeathed to me by Blizzard for supporting StarCraft II in early days (which...I got it for Christmas? So...I'm not actually sure that applies, but thank you, guys).

I have a few friends that play, and at least one co-worker, and I occasionally miss City of Heroes, so...sure. Why not. I decided to try it.

...

Thirty days later, I think I logged in maybe three, four times? Ran into my friends once, couldn't really do anything with them because of my low level. I got to ride Jeff, who'd turned into a giant stony dragon or some shit, which is not a sentence I thought I'd be typing ever.

I had a Human Warrior, Polnar (from Brawler Land, more or less), and a Dwarven Hunter, Gingenutter. Of the two...while I liked dashing up and smacking dudes with a bo staff as Polnar, being a ginger dwarf with a rifle and a pet bear was nice as well.

Still. I dunno. I couldn't get into it. And I'm wondering why.

It's not lack of free time; I've burned a whole bunch of hours on Nier recently, and games before that. I'm the sort that starts a game and marathons it until it's dead or my interest is.

So why didn't the addiction take? Well, me being me, there's a few factors at play here:

1. In terms of MMOs, nothing's ever going to really top City of Heroes for me. The build up, and that rush of an entirely new experience (it was my first MMO), and in a superhero context to boot, isn't going to be topped. Especially not by fantasy, which isn't my favorite genre by any stretch.

Moreover...man, the starting customization in WoW either sucks, or I didn't get it. Not being able to design an initial outfit is just so bizarre and a turn-off to me.

2. The lack of community was also a factor. I had friends that played, but I rarely saw them. And while I was an RPer in CoH (Dueling Dervish on Virtue, who was sort of a Daredevil-by-way-of-Booster-Gold street level fighter. No travel powers, and a dozen or so macro'd taunts), I didn't want to start making a character and new friends just to bounce in 30 days.

(On the other hand, I'm looking forward to Diablo III for the main reason that most of my friends are also going to be playing. Also, my disinterest in fantasy is mitigated by being able to kick things in the face with kung fu.)

3. I really don't like MMO fighting systems. I don't like "I'm going to stand here and press the number keys on my keyboard until the fight's over" fighting; to me, it's only one step up from turn-based RPGs, which I've also lost the patience for.

I suspect Mass Effect and Batman: Arkham Asylum have basically ruined me for third person action games. I like having more agency in my actions, even if my buttons are boiled down to one or two selections.

I like being able to block, dodge, and especially parry, and it being me doing it, not automatic/arbitrary.

And I like when cover and the space a combat is taking place in play factors in a fight; not in an exploding barrels sense, per se, but AA in particular was good at making a room full of enemies feel like a something to control and manage. With punches.

4. Not that any of these reasons are hard science, but this is the least scientific of them all:

I realize that Warcraft is a Thing now, a whole mythology and franchise and yeah yeah yeah. But to be honest? To me, Warcraft's always going to be Warcraft II for hours and hours, on Dad's dusty and yellowed computer next to the shelf of tobacco stained Tom Clancy and Stephen King hardcovers, on his coffee ringed desk. Warcraft is cheat codes and Yoohoo and making huge scrums and sieges in the map editor and that weird splatty "Baa~!" the sheep made when you blew them up with a ballista.

It feels weird to over-analyze a free game, but I was curious as to why I'm immune to a legit phenomenon. I guess in the final analysis, I should just say thanks for the time, and hope Diablo III is the roaring online bullshit-and-wreck-things jaunt with my friends I'm hoping it'll be.

A Cynical Evening

2011-02-24T21:42:00.003-05:00

Tonight, across Twitter and Facebook, and for reasons of my own, I curated/inflicted a four song (well, video) set of songs. The theme of which was cynicism. I present that set to you, loyal reader.

The Teenagers - Homecoming

Misty's Big Adventure - Fashion Parade

Los Campesinos - Romance is Boring/There Are Listed Buildings

Pulp - Common People

The Grave Doug Freshley OGN on Graphicly

2011-01-25T22:19:00.002-05:00

The digital version of the hardcover collection, with pin-ups by Anthony Peruzzo, Jorge F. Munoz (w/ Harry Myland IV), Scott Newman, Lea Hernandez, and John Bivens.

Also a foreword by the man who gave me my break in comics, Mr. Rantz Hoseley.

Also also, only $4.99. For a 170 page book on your computer.

Doug at Robot 6

2011-01-20T22:30:00.001-05:00

Robot 6 talks Doug Freshley. Caught me wholly by surprise, which is the best kind of positive press.

The Official Grave Doug Freshley Press Release Released Officially

2011-01-19T22:33:00.003-05:00

Archaia's put out an official press release for the digital release of The Grave Doug Freshley.

Hugely flattering comments from Russell Lissau, A. Dave Lewis, and Graphicly's Micah Baldwin.

iFanboy's also picked up the story, and has preview art.

A quick Google reveals that Kitty's Pryde, Omnicomic, and Nerds in Babeland all ran with the story as well. More as I see them, because I am utterly tickled that this is out and about.

All Doug

2011-01-07T10:48:00.002-05:00

All of The Grave Doug Freshley is out on Graphic.ly in singles. I think (emphasis on think) that a digital version of the hardcover is still coming as well, with pin-ups and forewords and all kinds of loveliness.

Still, as it stands, you can get 150 pages of color comics for $8ish, about the price of a manga volume. Only in color. And written by me. Two big pluses right there.

Top Myself

2010-12-31T15:30:00.001-05:00

Weird year. I saw two Joy Division movies back to back, not long before I turned 23, ended up spending the rest of the year quietly obsessed (and you can tell, because I didn't Tweet much about it) with Ian Curtis killing himself at that age.

"Top yourself" has two meanings; #1 being one-up yourself and #2 being kill yourself. The joke, and it's not a very funny one, is that my New Year's resolution as a writer is always to Top Myself #1, and my resolution as a person is always to not Top Myself #2.

I'm always surprised that I manage to pull both off.

I also graduated this year. Not with a very impressive degree, but whatever. Got a real job. Got back on Facebook, got back on Brawler Land, as a prose lark. Drank too much, swore off it, got back on it with a little more caution. Saw my first hockey game, saw my first rock show in Philly, went to a Phills game with very nice seats. Met some girls, talked to some editors. Didn't get anything going with some new collaborators, got some great stuff going with old ones. Dropped the ball with one collaborator in particular, to the point where I'm amazed the guy still talks to me. Got a new computer. Got a new bass, or at least one that's not owned by my friend.

It occurred to me that 2008 (Christ, really?) saw the release of my CBT story; 2009 matched that with Yon Kuma and topped it with The House Always Wins. Somehow, I've been managing to Top Myself #1 in comics.

This year:

Bear Beater Bunyan

The mobile adaptation of Yon Kuma, remixed and repackaged. The remixing and re-lettering process was mostly on me, and was a lot of fun. If YK was garage rock, this was the re-recording in a proper studio; Surfer Rosa/Come On Pilgrim to YK's Purple Tape.

That said...it's kiiiiinda a big ol' failure in terms of marketing. The new name didn't help, and the audience retention rate between free issue one and cheap issues two and up is abysmal. It's a cause of constant puzzlement to all involved, since A) it's no longer up for free anywhere and B) when we tell people "bear-wrestling comic", the response is almost invariably "right on!".

Still a comic I'm very fond of.

Okita and the Cat

I still can't quite wrap my head around this existing. The Shinsengumi, a kind of samurai anti-terrorism squad, have long been a weird little interest of mine. That Marv and I managed to get out a little 48 page graphic novella on the subject astounds me.

Also, my first foray into "serious" writing. I don't think anyone's really read it, which is probably a good thing, as I suspect I put faaaaarrrr too many of my own hangups just under the surface, if buried at all.

Also also, possibly my biggest dork-out-at-getting-art-back moment of the year, seeing Marv Mann draw an absolutely perfect Hajime Saito, the Lee Van Cleef of historical samurai. Like a bit of dream casting in comic form.

The Grave Doug Freshley

This is out! Holy shit!

Watching this book come together this year, with Scott Newman's book designs, and the insanely good pin-ups and foreword we got for the print collection, warmed my bitter heart. And then it came out digitally just in time to be a kind of Christmas present to me.

That I got a hair up my ass every time people asked me when the print version was coming out instead hasn't spoiled my joy too much. A little, but not much, and I'm aware enough to know it's me pissing in my own cereal.

That said: it's out, it's readable, and I'm looking forward to going full tilt boogie on the press blitz next year.

Next year, or rather, tomorrow.

It never fails to bite me in the ass when I predict things, but 2011 is starting to take the shape of an interesting year.

The goal, as ever: top myself top myself top myself. First meaning all the way.

The Grave Doug Freshley on Graphic.ly

2010-12-23T15:39:00.006-05:00

The first three chapters of The Grave Doug Freshley, the first OGN I ever wrote, are finally (FINALLY) available for public consumption.

Here's step by step instructions on how to purchase this fine product:

Step 1: Download Adobe AIR from Adobe.com (you might only need to do this on Macs, but better safe than sorry)

Step 2: Go to Graphic.ly

Step 3: Create an account (this is free) and download the desktop app for your opp orating system of choice (also free).

There's also a Google Chrome app and an iPhone/iPod Touch app.

Step 4: Once you're set up, click the icon on your desktop and sign in.

Step 5: Click the Comic Store tab up top.

Step 6: Click the Archaia Comics link in the sidebar.

Step 7: Click through the pages, and click The Grave Doug Freshley (should be page 2 or 3 as of writing)

Step 8: Buy each issue. They'll appear in your basket in the upper right.

Step 9: Pay however.

Step 10: The comics will automatically download. You can see them under the My Collection tab.

Chapter/Issue 01 is free, the other two are $1.99 a pop. All of them are 30 pages, not counting ads and such.

Experiments in Undiscerning Alkie Crap

2010-12-22T22:15:00.003-05:00

So: read about this in Spin (the LCD Soundsystem guy is not allowed to have it before gigs), decided to try it as a first-night-of-vacation experiment. The original recipe was 2/3rds champagne to 1/3rd bourbon. I, however, am a cheapskate, so it's 2/3rds Asti to call-it-1/6th Black Velvet (profoundly mediocre and exceedingly cheap whiskey favored by myself after either Steven or Tyler introduced me to it) with a little lemonade to ease the passage.

Conclusion:
It's not that great, but not hideous. Inoffensive, I'd call it, though your mileage may vary, and that might be down to the Black Velvet. I suspect if I drank it a little colder, it'd be like a really butch mimosa.

Speaking As Retroactive Poplife Superfan Numero Uno:

2010-12-21T21:57:00.002-05:00

Matt Fraction talking about comics he digs, in whatever context, for whatever reason, is invariably something I enjoy.

Also: I've known OF the Ballad of Dr. Richardson for years now. First time I've ever actually seen what the doctor looks like. Which is down to the continual industrial tragedy of Paul Pope's early stuff being out of print, but never mind.

Interview with Arrow Publications

2010-12-20T19:21:00.003-05:00

Arrow Publications, of course, are Okita's publishers. This interview was a lot of fun to do, and just appeared in the monthly email newsletter Arrow sends out. They also did one with my Okita collaborator Marv Mann, in the same newsletter.

Josh Hechinger
Author of Okita and the Cat
tells all!

Writer Josh Hechinger says he lives a cheap train ride from Philadelphia. He made his comics debut in Image Comics’ Comic Book Tattoo anthology, which went on to win both a Harvey and an Eisner Award. He followed this with the garage rock bear-wrestling comic Bear Beater Bunyan, taking full advantage of the new possibilities for comics available on mobile devices. He awaits the release of his first graphic novel, The Grave Doug Freshley with mpMann.

ARROW: Hi Josh. We’ve spoken to your Okita partner, so now we’d like to learn a little about the writer of Okita and the Cat.
JH: I’m 23, I’m a Cancer, I drink too much coffee. I play a little bass and a little harmonica, but you couldn’t call me anything like an actual musician. I was that kid who was always sneaking novels in to read in class instead of paying attention.

ARROW: LOL! So what motivated you to start writing and, in particular, comics?
JH: I was writing stories about my GI Joes and stuff when I was five or six; it’s just always been a thing with me. As for comics, it was realizing from James Robinson’s Starman series that comics could have actual stories and characters like other mediums. That writing comics was more than just filling in Superman’s word balloons. Also, that it was like writing novels but faster.

ARROW: Very true! Can you tell us how you begin to create your stories and characters?
JH: Tough one. I guess the main starting point with me is, “What do I want to see out there? What kind of story would I want to read?”

ARROW: Interesting approach. Are any of your characters based on real life?
JH: I actually just got caught using a bit from real life in Okita and the Cat. And, of course, Okita was a real guy, and the stuff in the comic did more or less happen to him.

ARROW: Uh oh! Is there a particular writer who influenced or mentored you?
JH: Influence wise: James Robinson. Terry Pratchett was also a big influence. For mentors, I’ll always be grateful for Rantz Hoseley giving me a big first chance in Comic Book Tattoo, and artist Marv Mann, who was my first collaborator, and has been invaluable over the years.

ARROW: And Marv is the illustrator for Okita and the Cat. Any genres or subgenres you haven't tried that you'd like to?
JH: I’d actually like to do a romantic comedy. Okita has a little bit of romance, more like affection really, but I’d like to do a straight-up rom-com at some point.

ARROW: Arrow’s readers love a good rom-com! Did you have any challenges in finding a publisher? Any advice for new writers looking to get published?
JH: I write…I dunno, unorthodox stuff? Bear-wrestling comics, historical character pieces, supernatural buddy-comedy Westerns. So yeah, there’s some trouble finding publishers at times, especially in print. My advice would be to not worry about that, just do the work you want to do. But always have that work on hand to show a publisher, as finished as possible; don’t try to just bluff your way into a gig.

ARROW: Good advice! What are your latest releases, and do you have a favorite?
JH: I think this year I had three comics come out? The House Always Wins for Zuda, Bear Beater Bunyan for iPhones and the like, and Okita and the Cat for the same. Okita, a story about the Shinsengumi, is kind of a dream project of mine.

ARROW: What can your readers expect from you in the coming year?
JH: Hopefully, knock wood, the release of my first print OGN in October. It’s called The Grave Doug Freshley, mpMann also did the art for it. It’s the supernatural Western buddy-comedy mentioned above.

ARROW: We will look forward to that. What do you do to promote your books, your brand and yourself?
JH: I Twitter. Tweet. Whatever. (I’m joshhechinger on there. Fair warning, I occasionally have a bit of a potty mouth on there.) I also email news publications and sites saying “Hey, I have a comic, any interest in covering that?” I try not to embarrass myself in interviews like these.

The nice thing about the web is that it makes contacting people, be it reviewers, readers, publishers, whoever, about a million times easier than it was in the days of looking up information in magazines and books and chasing down an address from that info.

ARROW: I think you’ve mastered social media. What do you think about the current changes in the publishing industry? Do you plan to release more titles in eBook or other formats?
JH: I’m pretty opinionated about digital comics being a big deal, and I’m trying to back that up by releasing as many projects in that format as I can.

ARROW: That is very proactive! What advice do you have for new writers? And for publishing eBooks?
JH: Write every day. It’s going to be terrible at first, but writing every day should work that out of your system. As for eBooks: don’t feel confined by the tiny screen. You can do a full-page comic and always slice it up into manageable bits, and it’ll still look decent.

ARROW: Anything else you'd like to tell us about yourself or your books?
JH: Okita and the Cat was a bit of a change-up for me, going from jokey fight comics to something serious. It was an experiment, and I’m hesitantly proud of it, but mostly just really humbled that people are checking it out. Thanks to all the readers out there.

Okita and the Cat by Josh Hechinger and illustrated by mpMann

Souji Okita lives in a little private estate on the outskirts of Tokyo. Once, he held the respect of his peers and the fear of his enemies as the finest swordsman of the Shogun’s own anti-terrorism unit. And while that wasn’t so long ago, now all he has is a wicked case of tuberculosis, a nurse with the patience of a saint, and a cat. Enjoy Okita and the Cat today!

Okita and the Cat is available as an Apple App! Search the title or author and keywords arrow publications to find Okita and the Cat in Arrow’s Comic Collection in the iTunes App store.

Bad Chemicals

2010-12-19T17:56:00.005-05:00

I've been reading Vonnegut again. By which I mean the two books of his I own, the two books I got the week I heard he'd died, and read the day I got them.

They were Breakfast of Champions and Slaughterhouse Five. I started Five waiting for the bus back to Shippensburg, ended up reading it, and then Breakfast, in one uninterrupted go from then on. Outside of the mall, on the bus, and finally in the student lounge. It took me from afternoon into that night to read both books.

That's my nice Vonnegut story. The shitty one is that I smoke Pall Malls because he did and why not. I can't smell and my sense of taste is probably retarded because of it, so why not pick a cigarette brand on the arbitrary account of another writer who's dead.

And anyway, it's not like the cigarettes killed him.

That's my bad Vonnegut story. That I have a nice one that's a kind of too-late appreciation of the man and a shitty one that's a pretentious and callous mess says more about me than him.

Anyway. I've been reading those.

Also a book of miscellaneous writing of his that I read on the Berlins' toilet while ladydrunk at their house. This was Friday. I was probably on the toilet too long to be polite, despite (or especially, depending how you look at it) because I'd finished whatever business I was doing and was just getting sucked into the book for a bit.

I don't remember what story I read. Something about a car, and something else about writing in general. I remember there was something in the writing one I agreed with quite a bit, but damned if I remember what. That's not down to the beer, that's just down to being absent minded. I think, I hope.

I'm reading all the Vonnegut I own and some I don't, is the point. I like Vonnegut because I too am a writer, and I too have bad chemicals in my brain, and I enjoy both his writing and the way he seems to deal with his own bad chemicals. As well as all kinds of other shit.

Remember that I myself am distrustful of my own writing, my own ability to deal with bad chemicals and all kinds of other shit. But it gives me hope to see someone else did well with those things, even if they weren't anywhere exactly the same.

I am capable of reading a Vonnegut book in a day, maybe two books in a day. I am incapable of not thinking about those books for days and days and days afterward.

A Fifth of Freshley Round Two

2010-12-13T19:54:00.003-05:00

Second question in the trivia contest. Same rules apply: first three respondents to each posting get a PDF of the first issue. It's also on Twitter.

If you respond here, and you don't have a publicly listed email, or don't want to give it out in the comments, drop me a line at Jamheck (at) gmail (dot) com with "Fifth of Freshley" as the subject header, and I'll hook you up.

(Stephen from Round 1, it's not too late to still claim your prize, guy).

The cover still looks like this:

And the second question is:

Doug Freshley is the best cowboy name since The Man With No Name...who HAD names, in each movie. List those names.

R+M Old School

2010-12-11T13:05:00.020-05:00

In the process of transferring shit to my new super typewriter (I got an Alienware Mx11 to replace my rage-inducing obsolete MacBook), I found all the old R+M screens We (myself on writing/lettering, Jorge on sequentials, and Nomad Tofu's Harry Myland IV on colors) had done this as a for-the-iPhone comic, the first one where I planned to put it on the phone from the start, and sized the panels accordingly.

Also, and this is embarrassing: Bakuman had just come out, Jorge and I were really digging it, and I suggested that I draw "names" or roughs for each chapter ala Japan's style of putting a comic together.

So below, you can see all the screens, and some of the roughs:

Rough Number 1:
Which through Jorge and Harry's magic, translated into:

This was after BBB, so I think this was actually my first time seeing Jorge draw, like, normal people in a normal context. That dude with the headphones looks like the coolest guy in the school.

Also, Harry's little highlights on that girl's hair are great.

I love the shit out of Harry's backgrounds. Makes me wish he did more color work.

Rough Number 2:

And the screens it translated into:

It's only now I wonder if Harry colored the nerdy guy's jacket that shade of brown because of the that-shade-of-brown jacket I've owned since Noah was a lad...

Carey'ss top was, when I sketched it, a riff on the singer's in the Company of Thieves video "Oscar Wilde", which I was all about at the time. Came off a little differently in the art, but that's good. I hate getting sued.

Rough Number 3:

In my roughs, Ryan's always constantly surly. Jorge draws him a little more normal.

And the screens:

I don't seem to have the next screen anywhere. Welp. This finishes off the story:

Hugely embarrassing: I can't tell if there's missing screens here (the file numbers skip ahead) or if I botched the gag here. The gag being that Ryan's at the principal for punching out a bus driver, whereas El only overslept and got in trouble for being late.

It's a mystery.

Anyway, that was our first take on R+M. Nowadays, I just write scripts and letter, Jorge draws full page, and Harry's off making the best Muppet story Henson never thought of.

R+M is one of the projects I'm most excited about doing, and here's hoping I have news for you on that front sooner rather than later.

A Fifth of Freshley: The Doug Freshley Trivia Contest

2010-12-03T18:14:00.008-05:00

I'm giving away free PDF copies of the first digital issue of Doug Freshley on Twitter and Facebook. And heck, here too. First three responders to the trivia question get a copy. So nine copies per question are going out.

The cover looks like this:

It's the first 30 or so pages of the OGN's 150, so...a Fifth of Freshley.

First question: How many horses are too many horses if you're meeting Charles Bronson at the train station?

(Hint: Western flick, famous scene)

The Friends I Have and the Enemies I Don't

2010-11-25T11:39:00.005-05:00

As Kimya Dawson sang, "I'm a pretty impossible lady to be with". I've always related.

(Minus, obviously, the lady bit. Or lady bits, hahahaw)

(...When I talk about being a hard man to like, I'm referring to shit like that.)

As a shitty person, I'm thankful for the friends I have, and the enemies I don't (save for in those few beats after I make a terrible joke).

As a writer, I'm thankful that I know a pretty amazing assemblage of people. I count among my friends and acquaintances enough writers and artists to beat the world, but also actors, soldiers, classical musicians, cancer curers, healers, gamblers, teachers, drunks, mothers, fathers, husbands, wives, lovers, johns, scientists, butchers, bakers, and bartenders. And other things uncategorable besides.

Most importantly: all good people.

And I'm thankful for them.

Teriyaki Pork Chops over Rotini and Mushrooms

2010-11-18T18:42:00.009-05:00

You'll need two thin-cut pork chops, a box of rotini, a box of cornflake crumbs, black pepper, seasoned salt, and some teriyaki sauce.

Not shown: oven pan, non-stick foil, pot of water, freezer bag.

Pour a liberal amount of cornflake crumbs and a bit too much pepper into the freezer bag. Cover the pork in teriyaki sauce, put it in the freezer bag, and shake. That's right, we're making shake n' bake, just "from scratch".

So breaded, put the chops on the pan while you pre-heat the oven to 400 degrees and start the water heating up.

When the oven's ready, pop the chops in, set the timer for 15 minutes. Your water should be starting a slight boil at this point. I like my pasta a little on the al dente side, so I wait five minutes on the timer for the pork, then put in the rotini and seasoned salt with ten minutes to go.

Now, at this point, other than giving the rotini an occasional stir, you're good. Except maybe you, like me, decide that the mushrooms in the fridge are about to go a bit manky, and would do better to be sauteed with a little garlic salt and put into the rotini.

Quick-sautee the mushrooms. Butter! High heat! Gogogo, you only have four minutes!

At the timer's beep, get the rotini off the burner drained immediately if you're of an al dente persuasion like myself. Then take the pork chops out, which should look like so:

If the mushrooms are sauteed properly on short notice, dump them and another butter lump into the pot, and stir it together with the dry pasta.

Dump the pasta and mushrooms on the plate, put the pork chops on top, and enjoy.

(I hadn't intended both of these to be pork meals, but whatever.)

Pork Palm Combination

2010-11-04T20:23:00.008-04:00

Take two thin-cut pork chops and cut them in half, so you have four pieces. They look a bit like palms, hence the name.

This is going to be the combination part: some mixed nuts, mushrooms, frozen peas/carrots, and an apple. For spices, we have crushed rosemary and chili powder. Our cooking liquid is a cooking sherry.

Dump some chili powder on the pork halves. Most of this is going to wash off with the sherry and the cooking, so don't be afraid to go a little crazy.

Flip the pork, and cover the back with crushed rosemary:

Flip it back to the chili powder side, and fairly drown the pork in a quarter-inch of sherry:

Cover it, and let it simmer on a low heat for fifteen minutes:

After fifteen minutes on a low heat, your pork should look like so:

Peel, core, and chop the apple. Bonus points if you take the peel off all in one spirally go like a master chef. Take half the bag of frozen peas/carrots, your mushrooms, and a handful of nuts (cashews are king here, and you want to avoid walnuts and skins, which will just get soggy and gross in the pan).

Dump your sides onto the meat:

Lid it, and give it another ten to fifteen minutes or so on medium heat, covered. Which is to say: give it ten minutes, then start eyeballing it and making sure the carrots and such are cooked, going up to fifteen or whenever it looks done.

It should look like this on the stove top when it's ready:

Drain the sherry, and plate the pile. If you're feeling fancy, you can try to dig out the four chop halves and arrange the sides around and through them.

I, clearly, was not feeling fancy.

The Grave Doug Freshley Dustjacket Cover

2010-10-25T19:31:00.004-04:00

Marv did the art, Scott Newman did the design, I wrote all the doofy-text that makes it a pulp cover.

My first thought, of course, is that this is almost picture perfect the design concept I came up with years ago, and Scott Newman came to it without me saying anything about it beforehand. I think literally his first email was "I love the book. What if we did the cover like a dime novel?" and I just grinned at my monitor.

My second thought is also an "of course", and that's...man, it sucks, this book not being out.

I Still Think "You Will Be The One Escaping!" When I Fight Bosses

2010-10-21T21:42:00.005-04:00

Okay. The Avengers.

When I was a kid, I played Captain America and The Avengers, religiously. Which combined two of my favorite things: beat 'em ups and superheroes I'd never heard of.

The concept grabbed me. But...and this is key...I could not, for the LIFE of me, find a single Avengers comic. Nowhere. Not the Farmers' Market comic shop the size of my dining room, not the Bumfuck-on-Bumfuck, PA mall comic store, not out in Levittown. Nowhere.

And that just made them more interesting, y'know?

I'd read things on the internet; Avengers fansites, huge text files about the various rosters of the Masters of Evil and famous story arcs. I'd occasionally see a trading card (or an Overpower card) that gave me some hint of what the team was about. I knew they were sort of the varsity team of Marvel, and unlike the X-Men, they weren't everywhere.

I kept looking for a jumping on point. There was obviously a mountain of history to the characters, but I wanted a clean start on these guys. I tried the Heroes Reborn comics, but I only ever found the one where Naked Hulk jacks up the team. I avoided the United We Stand cartoon like the plague.

And then, the Busiek/Perez Heroes Return run started up. A straight-up issue 1 jumping on point and return to classic form for this team I'd been obsessed with reading about as a kid.

(Also, the first issue of the Heroes Return run? Where I caught the D-Mania. "Why's Hacksaw Jim Duggan running around in that awesome yellow and brown outfit? Who IS this guy?")

To this day, that volume of Avengers is the only comic series where I've bought every single issue when it came out, from Return to Disassembled. Also, the only long-ass series besides One Piece where that kind of completion matters at all to me (though if pressed, I'd get rid of everything after Busiek leaves).

All of which is to say: at my core, I am a pretty huge mark for the Avengers. Haven't bought the series(es, any of them) since Disassembled, but...yeah. The Avengers are a thing for me.

Which is why I watched Earth's Mightiest Heroes last night. And, y'know, Gavok over at 4thLetter basically nails everything I could write about the cartoon in an objective sense.

But I'll add this: it is exactly, exactly, the cartoon I've been waiting for since I was like nine. I'm pretty pumped about it.

Jorge!

2010-10-13T19:17:00.003-04:00

Because ~~I'm an anal control freak~~ I wanted to help Jorge out a bit, I offered to letter our new collaboration R+M. Jorge, because he's a genius mind reader, sent me these great little balloon placement charts to go with the finished art.

Not only does it make my job infinitely easier, but...look at those. I love behind the scenes/undercooked production stuff like that. I might print these out.

Arrow Ad

2010-09-30T23:47:00.003-04:00

Blogger doesn't support gifs, but the unanimated Arrow ad to the side there will take you to a variety of comics that are not currently cycling through on this site.

Arrow publish Okita and the Cat, and while they do crackerjack romance comics, they're branching out into all kinds of genres.

Hell, they gave my Shinsengumi comic a fair shake, go check out what else they're giving to the world.

EDIT: Arrow sent me an Okita banner, so that's over there now.

The Return of Bad Decisions -or- My Actual Chinese Democracy

2010-09-22T16:00:00.001-04:00

http://brawler-land.blogspot.com/

The idea is "serialized light novel". We'll see how that works out.

1:4

2010-09-21T14:46:00.005-04:00

Instead of doing any actual writing today, I'm blogging, apparently.

Something bugging me today: I consider myself to be 1:4 on "scripts I'm proud of" vs "comics that are available to read".

These are not the comics you're thinking of. Quickly:

I'm not proud of the Bouncing Off Clouds script; it did what I wanted it to do perfectly (give Matthew cool shit to draw), but I should've set my sights a little higher with the script's goal. Earned my place at the table a little more.

The House Always Wins was a fine script, but it didn't do its job: winning that month's Zuda. I don't recall a single negative comment on John's art (and rightly so, he's fantastic), but I failed to grab most of the people reading the comic.

I'm not proud of BBB's script; it has its moments of genuinely funny dialogue, but the story is a rushed mess, and Jorge's art does too much of the work in making it a good comic.

Now, out of the scripts I'm proud of, most of which you can't read at the moment:

The Grave Doug Freshley is...let's call it jinxed. But it's my first OGN, and as such, it has a genuine quality to it that my later work doesn't hit. It's just a straight-up download of where my head was at, what I was watching and digging at the time. It doesn't read like I was worried about a career in comics, y'know?

Next, The Moon Is Mine, where I feel like I nailed whatever weird hybrid of Looney Toons and shonen comics I've been chasing all these years. I wouldn't go so far as to call it a career making book, but it's exactly the kind of comic I set out to do when I first started writing comics.

The third script is actually something of a "lost" book. Under the Gun was a hitman rom-com I pitched unsuccessfully to Tokyopop, so I brought in smarter-than-me Xander Bennett as a co-writer and we grabbed the extremely versatile Anthony Peruzzo as an artist. The first issue, with Xander's help, was as clean and well-polished contained script as I've ever done, and I loved (loved LOVED) writing the characters. Alas, we totally failed to interest anyone in it. I occasionally consider trying to reunite the band for another go, but Xander and Anthony both seem like they have better things to do, so I never quite get around to asking.

The one script that's gotten out there that I'm unequivocally proud of is Okita and the Cat. As a GNette, as a "serious business" comic, I'm hugely proud of it, and getting to do a Shinsengumi comic has been a dream of mine for a while.

Still...

One for four is not good odds, and makes me wonder what I've been doing wrong so far.

"Included Editor's Commentary"

2010-09-21T12:21:00.006-04:00

Los Campesinos! is my favorite band. As such, I've been hesitant to share them with my friends; it's not that I'd think less of them for disliking Los Camp!, but why raise the issue?

Anyway, shooting the shit with Zach about music on the way back from Lancaster, he tells me to give him a sampler pack. You're not getting the sampler pack, you're getting the included editor's commentary I sent in the zip file.

Of all the things I'm frustrated at, being a frustrated music journalist is the most fun.

Los Campesinos! (the ! is a part of it, I swear) are a half-dozen or so kids our age who met at the University of Cardiff and formed a noisy indie kid attack squad with violins and yelping and boy-girl harmonies.

1) Sweet Dreams, Sweet Cheeks (off Hold On Now, Youngster...)

I'd describe Los Camp, especially on this first album, as "shouty" and "stompy", but with a caveat: they're too-smart indie kids, so the shouting has a healthy amount of yelp to it, and the stomping is the frustrated single-foot stomp of Daffy Duck.

2) Ways to Make It Through The Wall (off We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed)

Second album opener; both the album's title and the "A ROOMFUL OF VACCUM AND A ROOMFUL OF AIR LOOK THE SAME!" refrain are derived from things Kieron Gillen wrote about them for a British indie music mag that I think I have the entire run of in PDF form, somehow.

3) Romance is Boring (off Romance is Boring)

Third album opener. My pet theory: first album's about never getting laid, second album's about starting to get laid, third album's about never getting laid because you're in a relationship.

4) The Sea Is A Good Place To Think Of The Future (off Romance is Boring)

Summer bummer, total tonal shift, campfires on the beach at night, with hot girls who were way broken before you met them. Like Pixies' "The Holiday Song", sort of an anti-vacation song that I somehow always end up listening to obsessively on vacation. Possibly why I'm no fun on vacations.

5) Straight In at 101 (off Romance is Boring)

Self-deprecation and bad behavior, with a rich gravy of sarcasm. What the fuck am I even talking about? Anyway. Now that The Long Blondes are kaput, here's Los Camp lifting their second-coming-of-Pulp crown and running with it.

The Leaves Have Not Even Changed Much

2010-09-21T12:08:00.003-04:00

I woke up cold today.

Or rather, I woke up warm and snug and unwilling to get out of bed because I could tell it was cold on the other side of my blankets.

I mean, it's mid-September, it's only sensible that fall's here. But that doesn't mean I have to like it.

If my car CD player still worked, I'd be putting away the summer music and breaking out the winter discs. Away with The Offspring, Highway 61 Revisited, Plumtree, the Pipettes. Out would come the first Bloc Party album, Blur's self-titled, Fortress 'Round My Heart (whatever happened to Ida Maria?). The Walkmen's A Hundred Miles Off straddles the fence; winter album by day, summer album by night. Ziggy Stardust is an all year album, but works in the winter where Hunky Dory does not.

I hate the cold, despite my ape-like natural fur coat (I'm a hairy bastard, essentially). People always tell me they prefer the cold because it's easier to put clothes on and get warm then remove them and get cool.

I just prefer being warm when I get out of bed. I like sun in my face, and not that white-wine weak shit you get in winter.

I've been getting away with a spring jacket, but I'm thinking of getting a hoodie. For under the jacket. Just because I don't like the layer reasoning, doesn't mean I don't subscribe to the science.

All New, All Different, Bland As Dry Toast

2010-09-14T18:01:00.007-04:00

Pics via Comic Book Resources, from Atlas Comics old and new The Grim Ghost property:

The New Version:

"Hi, I'm going to pout at you in my muscular MC Hammer Pants while absolutely nothing happens in the background."

That's not a glower. That's not a grimace. Look at his lip and the tilt of his head. Dude is POUTING.

The Old Version:

"I'M ON A HORSE SHOOTING PIRATE GUNS AT THE DEVIL IN HELLLLLL!"

Never mind that he can't aim for shit, I've never even heard of this guy, and I want to find out what the hell is going on in that comic.

The Other Words-and-Pictures Medium

2010-09-14T16:22:00.004-04:00

So, Adi Tantimedh has this column over at Bleeding Cool, called "Look! It Moves!"; basically, he covers the video game/movie/book/other beat.

(I like Adi; he's one of those guys who are excellent at exploring both the guts and entertainment value of all kinds of things.)

Adi's recently done a series on visual novels (go here, it's articles 61 through 64, and the back half of 65).

Visual novels are one of those primarily Japanese media that fascinate the hell out of me. If you've played Phoenix Wright, you've played a visual novel; if you've played horrible dating sims, you've also played a visual novel, but I don't really want to talk to you about it.

I want to call visual novels comics-as-games, but that's not exactly right. There's the reader-controlled-consumption, and using a combination of words and pictures to present a narrative, but it's way more linear (even with branching choices) and you don't get the visual construction of a comic.

Two things fascinate me about visual novels.

First, that they tend to be amateur projects. An art guy/writer, or an artist and a writer, maybe a couple programmers. I don't have the chops to make a beat-em-up or an action-shooter, especially by myself. But I could probably swing a visual novel with Flash and Photoshop.

Secondly, that visual novels, when they're not about creeping on schoolgirls, absolutely live and die based on their writing. Something like Phoenix Wright stands out because it's a manic lawyer dramedy instead of a Betty-chan and Veronica-chan simulator. Even the examples Adi uses, which all have a romance/porn element to them, stand above the pack because of what else they bring to the table: the Lynchian madness of When They Cry, the Buffy-esque asskicking of Fate/Stay Night, etc.

I've already dismissed comics-as-games, but maybe plays-as-games is closer; limited sets, lacking the pizazz of their bigger budget brothers, but with an intimacy that only comes from having as little as possible dressing up the story.

(Or maybe it's like, they're, y'know. Novels. But with visuals!)

(Fancy that.)

The Grave Doug Freshley Situation

2010-09-08T15:08:00.005-04:00

Short version: not coming out in October as solicited.

Long version: basically, pre-orders were too low to justify doing a print run. Same thing that happened the other time the trade was solicited, except this time, I know what's up in advance.

It's worth noting that outside of Twitter, I did no press at all for this release, which was a mistake. My reasoning was that I didn't want a repeat of the last two times the book was coming out, where I talked it up and the release date came and went with nothing happening.

A bad call, and more down to sour grapes than I'd care to admit, but this is my first OGN, and it's not Archaia who looks like an asshole when it's continually delayed. At this point, Doug's coming off as my Chinese Democracy.

Still, keeping mum was a mistake.

For the record: the book's finished. As in completed, not dead. The full 150 pages have been in the can for years now, and this time around we added pin-ups, a foreword, and the level of book design Archaia's making a name with. Scott Newman is the book design guy, and he's a stone cold genius who managed to intuit exactly what I pictured the book design being five years ago, when I wrote it. And this without me saying a word about it to him beforehand.

It's really just a lack of pre-order sales keeping Doug buried.

In any case, PJ Bickett at Archaia gave Marv and I three options on how to proceed, which we're talking over. And I have to say that PJ's been a real straight-shooter with the options and what went down this time, and (for me, at least), it's made this shitty situation that much more manageable.

More as it develops.

Spaceships, Robots

2010-09-07T14:57:00.003-04:00

Concept art for Black Flies with mpMann:

Unlettered page of R+M art by Jorge F. Munoz:

Ugh. Vicious.

2010-09-06T14:44:00.005-04:00

Bebop seems to be a thing again. Er, Cowboy Bebop, the cartoon, not bebop the musical style. Or Bebop the warthog thug from TMNT.

I just saw that Tor.com is doing a re-watch of it (as well as Firefly, funnily enough. Because let's be honest, Firefly is Bebop with John Ford instead of John Woo as a touchstone). Over at AnimeVice, Tom Pinchuk is watching the series for the first time and writing about it as he goes.

(An aside about Tom Pinchuk. He's the writer of Hybrid Bastards! from Archaia, and the kind of guy comics needs more of: a little crazy, very personable, and making comics that don't read like goddamn movie pitches. My kind of guy.)

Anyway. Tom got to episode 5, Tweeted a link to his write-up, and I responded with something like, "I'm of the opinion that the series would be 95% better if that was Vicious' first and last appearance".

To which Tom replied something like, "Oh, he shows up again?".

I, ah, forgot this was his first time watching the show. Oops.

Anyway. All of this is a lead-up to me talking about the Vicious thing. Because if Bebop's a thing again, that means I have an excuse to whinge about my problem with a show I otherwise dig quite a bit.

My problem is this: I hate Vicious. And I hate the whole Spike plotline that forms the spine of the series. I feel like it undermines the show's recurring theme in favor of wanking away to John Woo films.

The show's recurring theme being that the main characters are both running from and looking for their pasts...but in a refreshing twist, their pasts don't actually give a shit about them.

Spoilers, obviously, but...look, Ed's dad is an absent-minded parent at best. Nobody cares about the Ein after his debut, despite him being cutting edge biotech. Faye used amnesia to reinvent herself, but her past is literally ancient history, dead and gone. Jet's old flame moved on, and he deals with the rest of his metal arm past in a single ep.

Only Spike has a past that makes an effort to catch up with him; the main character (or the most visible...Bebop's really Jet and Faye's story, I think) doesn't fit the mold of the show.

Which I could accept as being the point...if it was handled differently.

As in "Spike's past catches up with him, he blows it up, and IT'S NEVER MENTIONED AGAIN".

To me, that'd have been the ballsy, subversive thing to do. Everyone else in the show runs from their past, but Spike, as the main character, deals with it. Pays for itphysically, but deals with it.

Shoots the swordsman, so to speak. Does it fix him? No. But Spike's more interesting when his problem is existential doubt, not his generic HK action movie past.

Try this: watch Bebop, preferably with someone who's not seen it, with episode 5 being the only time Vicious shows up. Replace Jupiter Jazz with the movie; Spike encountering a there-but-for-blowing-up-Vicious-goes-I mirror in Vincent. Use Hard Luck Woman as the last episode.

Like this, Bebop emerges as an art-house actioner about people running from pasts that don't care about them instead of a genre stir-fry that goes off the rails trying to be too cool.

Times I Have Almost Died At Sea

2010-08-31T19:01:00.001-04:00

I was in Ocean City over the weekend for a friend's birthday, hit the beaches with what we'd call a solid crew. The sea was, I'd say, fierce. If a wave broke, it was over your head, and jumping just meant you'd get tossed back and go ass over teakettle underwater. At least twice, I had my t-shirt pulled up over the back of my head like I'd gotten into a hockey fight. One particularly nasty wave dribbled me like a basketball, bouncing me on my shoulder and then the space between my shoulder blades in a two-second span.

It was, frankly, a blast.

I came back to news reports of something like 250 people needing rescue, and at least one dude lost to the sea. Because in addition to the waves being massive, you had the riptide. Here's how that worked:

Take your foot off the ground a second.

Congratulations, you're a mile out to sea now.

This happened to me. One minute, I'm bobbing along on my back like an otter in a space behind where the waves were breaking in our faces, the next I realize "oh, are my friends heading in? They seem pretty far away. I'll just...fuck, there's no sea bottom. I need to start swimming now."

Now, apparently, you're not supposed to swim directly into shore. I didn't know this, and so I was panting like a dog by the time I got back into a place where my feet could touch bottom and I didn't feel suction.

As I swam in an inch at a time, I remember thinking "man, I hope the lifeguards don't notice. That'd be mortally embarrassing."

That was the second time I've been over my head in the ocean. Or, I suppose, out of my depth.

(Hahaha.)

The first time was on a family vacation in Avalon; storm coming in, nobody on the beach, I go for a walk, decide on a whim to see how far I can climb out to sea on a large, rusty pipe jutting out of the shore.

I got a third of the way out before problems set in. What I hadn't realized was that the sea washing over the pipe made it incredibly slick. I went from shaky footed to stuck on all fours to trying to figure out how to get off in choppy water that had a storm starting to kick fuss behind it.

Eventually, I said "screw it", and jumped off the pipe into the water. Only then realizing that the ground directly under the pipe was more like a valley. I pulled myself along the pipe's supports until my feet touched ground, while getting banged repeatedly into the rusty pipe from the chop. I came up on shore with dozens of tiny cuts that I'm amazed I didn't get diseases from.

There were pointed questions when I returned to the hotel room.

Okita and The Cat on iTunes

2010-08-25T21:44:00.000-04:00

So, this came out today, from Arrow Publications. Here's the summary from iTunes:

Souji Okita lives in a little private estate on the outskirts of Tokyo. Once, he held the respect of his peers and the fear of his enemies as the finest swordsman of the Shogun’s own anti-terrorism unit. And while that wasn’t so long ago, now all he has is a wicked case of tuberculosis, a nurse with the patience of a saint, and a cat.

It's a 48 page comic cut into 170-odd screens, for $1.99.

It's also the first time I've done a comic that isn't my usual jokey fighty thing; there's some humor in this, but for the most part, it's a serious character piece. I'm proud of it, and I'm especially proud of Marv Mann's art, which is just absolutely spot on for this piece.

Oh! It's a Mystery Comic!

2010-08-21T01:49:00.000-04:00

I have no idea where I found this link. Was it The Engine? I think maybe so. Anyway, I've had it for ages.

Anthem: A Comic For Tish is just one of those things that's been floating around my bookmarks, the link emailed from computer to computer as I go. I keep it around, and I don't know why.

(I know why, partially: when I read it, it blew my mind. It was like stumbling across a local band in a bar that, y'know, isn't the next Who, but for that moment, you're nailed to the floor.)

The weird thing is, I don't know who made this comic. I don't know who Tish is. It's hosted on an .edu site, but not from any school I ever attended.

It's a Mystery Comic, not in genre, but in origin.

It reminds me a bit of How I Met Your Mother if it'd been given over to the FLCL animators. It's scratchy and raw and improvised, but there's also moments of elegance and pure chops that kinda blew my mind the first time around, and continue to stick in there today.

So yeah. Anthem: A Comic For Tish.

On Her Majesty's Secret Service

2010-08-20T01:13:00.001-04:00

So I get back from seeing Scott Pilgrim again, make an experimental dinner that turns out to be a failure. As I'm eating, I'm leafing through the second Icon issue of Casanova, where M. Fraction and M. Chabon talk spy films. On Her Majesty's Secret Service comes up.

I start watching TV. Moonraker is on, followed by...On Her Majesty's Secret Service. Which I watch, because it's my floating second favorite Bond movie (From Russia With Love is first, Casino Royale 2nd/3rd).

Emma Peel goes to the bullfight, I go upstairs to take care of toilet business and, as it happens, read The Cream of Tank Girl. On the second or so page is a spread of buttons.

Lower right hand corner? On Her Majesty's Secret Service, black text on a white button.

There's no profundity to this, or if there is, I don't know about it. But it's some weird shit in the span of a few hours.

Scott Pilgrim cartoon

2010-08-13T01:21:00.000-04:00

20* pages of comics = like three minutes of pretty scrupulously faithful cartoon.

Not a diss (dude, I'm all about Lisa Miller), just kind of interesting to me.

*I'm famously bad at math, so take 20 as an estimate.

Looking For Artist

2010-08-12T16:39:00.000-04:00

So hey, looking for an artist for a thing.

- B/W sci-fi series involving derelict space ships for Kindle-to-print
- First volume is three 32 page Kindle issues, 96 pages total. Two more volumes of the same if the sales dictate, no worries if not.
- No upfront money for either of us, co-ownership, back-end payment.
- I've talked to a publisher about the pitch, they're mildly interested.

Email Jamheck at Gmail.com for more info.

Heya

2010-08-12T02:56:00.000-04:00

Six out of seven of you reading this already know me, but let's optimistically assume there's people coming fresh to the Josh Hechinger Experience.

(We'll also optimistically assume that sentence didn't send them screaming for the hills.)

I'm Josh Hechinger. I write comics. Including:

- "Bouncing Off Clouds" in Image's Comic Book Tattoo anthology. Which has won an Eisner and a Harvey. The anthology, not my particular story. Matthew Humphreys drew the hell out of it, which was sort of a complicated personal geek out moment, and it was a tremendous honor to be a part of.

- Bear Beater Bunyan. Bear Beater Bunyan used to be Yon Kuma (a pun on four-panel comics and the phrase "four bears"), but we changed it so I wouldn't have to explain that every time I mentioned it. BBB was my stab at three-chord-garage-punk comics, fast and furious in the way that only a comic about a kid who wrestles bears (and WINS) could be. It's now an iWhatever/Google Android/soon-to-be-PSP comic. Jorge F. Muñoz did the art, and to this day is one of my all time favorite people to work with.

- The House Always Wins. This took 4th in one of Zuda's contests. It's a CSI/J-Horror mash-up, but really, it was mostly an excuse to work with the insanely talented rising star John Bivens.

In terms of upcoming work:

- The Grave Doug Freshley. Oddly enough, this is the first comic I wrote, but fate's been dead set against it being released twice now. The third try at releasing it, this year, will hopefully be the charm. It's a supernatural Western buddy comedy; Marvin Perry Mann (or mpMann) drew it, and I maintain to this day that I could not have asked for a better first collaborator. Ignore the bit in the link about it being a mini. It's an OGN.

- Okita and the Cat. A gallows humor character study of Souji Okita of the Shinsengumi. The Shinsengumi were real historical figures, a kind of samurai anti-terrorist squad; Okita, their best swordsman, was also a real dude. He died of tuberculosis, back when you could, and spent his last days trying and failing to kill a cat. Gallows humor, like I said. This too, is drawn by Marv Mann, who elevated and probably outright saved what would've otherwise been an experimental historical fiction comic from a dude who usually writes fight comics. It'll come out for the iWhatevers hopefully later this year.