#145: RAVEN takes flight

ALIEN Descends and stingrays ...swim?

Apr 09, 2024

ALL THE LATEST

For those of you cursing me out over my Caribbean break, I can let you know that I was riddles in mosquito bites by the end, as well as a couple of nasty spider bites. Still worth it..? Yes, but that last bit wasn’t so pleasant

I wrapped up that trip with a lovely boat trip out to a bay where I swam with some stingrays[pictured below, behind yours truly]. It was suggested I kiss one for good luck, so I better get some good luck after that salty session.

The next day I make my trek home [via NYC] and am now hugging a radiator to stay warm like the rest of you plebs. How you sicken me.

I also forgot to post a couple of photos from my trip to the Dynamite offices in New Jersey. Above, me just in the front door and below, me in publisher Nick Barrucci’s offece afrer having signed A LOT of copies of THUNDERCATS.

-After some back and forth with editorial, the script for PROJECT RAVEN is nailed down and I have started drawing. Just finished up my layouts for the issue and am working on lightboxing and reference for this week. Been a good bit of setup to get this rolling, but very glad to get moving. Below is a [redacted] WIP of the first issue.

-I have a few covers to take care of soon. Had to get a STAR TREK cover in the second I got back, have another do do for the end of the month. Have a couple of mage covers as well as a couple of Marvel covers to do before the end of the month too.

-Need to start on the next scripts for THUNDERCATS and PROJECT RAVEN in the next month and one more OLD DOG [OPERATIONS]. Lots to do!

-As it happens, I sometimes miss the odd variant cover. Looks like my variant cover for PREDATOR: LAST STAND came out a couple of weeks ago. Sorry I didn’t give ye all a heads up beforehand, some variants just slip me by.

-I was recently offered a writing gig that didn’t work out, something that required way too much research, time I don’t have to pare at the moment. I then got offered another writing gig on a a title I was way more familiar with. It’s not yet locked in yet, some specifics to work out, but has lots of fun possibilities. No point in giving it a codename until I know for sure if I’m taking it, but watch this space.

-IDW released preview pages for the upcoming Issue One of TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES: BLACK WHITE & GREEN! This debut issue features stories by myself,Paulina Ganucheau [Wonder Woman: The Adventures of Young Diana] and Dave Baker [Mary Tyler Moorhawk] with Jesse Longergan [Hedra]. The issue is out May 8th, my preview pages are below but you can see preview pages from the other creators over on Popverse.

Lettered pages from TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES #1

-Not sure if I shared this here, but Image Comics released out trailer for TIME BEFORE TIME Vol 1-5!

-I recently got accruals for all my Image books [thanks for ordering my books everyone!] and while I can say I’m happy with the Direct Market orders, I find myself frustrated with the book market sales on the TBT and OLD DOG trades. I’ve spent time reaching out to retailers over the years and I feel that’s paid off but the book market is an area I just haven’t been able to crack in the same way and I wish I could figure out a way to push my books in that market. If any of you Decolytes are so inclined, I think some Amazon reviews might help that book out. Would be interested to see if that moved the needle at all. If ye’ve read the book and liked it, would appreciate if ye left a review as I think it would help.

-I just ordered some brass pens made by my friend Dan Berry. He makes them himself, I get a batch years ago that were really fun to play with, but lost track of with my big more Wesht. Looking forward to playing around with them again. Ye should check them out over at his Shopify.

THUNDERCATS

Issue Three is out this week! Here’s the preview pages from the issue.

I just spotted this new ‘Action figure’ variant by Drew Moss. My god, how cute is this, I wish this was a genuine action figure…

There’s also a 3rd printing of Issue One with this class David Nakayama cover.

Here’s a lovely little peek from Issue Four, looks like Drew is channeling a little Bill Watterson here, while I can say he’s also channeling a little Art Adams elsewhere in the issue. Just pumping out amazing stuff.

Not to forget that you can still get preorders in for Issue Fivee, featuring guest writer/artist Stephen Mooney. Ask your local retailer to order before April 18th in order to secure a copy. Despite Issue One selling like gangbusters, I still hear from people saying that they couldn’t find a copy at their local store. The only way to really avoid that is to ask them ahead of time, so do let them know.

And as an added treat, here’s an advance peek at my cover for Issue Six. Please don’t share this online.

In general I would like people to share this newsletter, but I shoot myself in the foot by sharing these advance peeks. Oh well, share it next time maybe.

Issue Six is written by the way, I’m currently breaking down Issue Seven as well as working out the cover for that issue. When I in the Dynamite offices, they were saying they saw THUNDERCATS as a 24-ish series but I can say there are definitely plans for the franchise going forward. Exciting stuff!

ALIEN

ALIEN DESCENDANT is out now!

It came out last week in fact, another release that slipped me by, until I saw this excellent review on AIPT. I’m really proud of my ALIEN run with Andrea Broccardo along with Danny Earls, Triona Farrell, Ruth Redmond and Clayton Cowles. Telling a larger ten part story in this universe across two volumes was an ambitious professional goal for me and thanks to all my excellent collaborators, I think we nailed it. Getting to take a beloved franchise and deliver my own take on it as a writer and haing some artistic unput on the project was a wonderful opportunity for me. I’m very grateful to editor Sarah Brunstad to take a chance on me and give me the creative latitude to have an authorial influence on the project. I think I said this beforehand, but I wasn’t famiiar with Andrea’s work before working on the book, but he has been a revelation. His enthusiasm for the franchise was infectious, I know his was a book he’d been campaigning on for years and in finally getting it, gave it everything he had. The amount of visual world-building he was able to add made me look like way more of an expert than I am.

I’m not sure how much more I should get into it, if any of ye want to hear more, see some behind the scenes art, ask in the comments [it is Alien Day soon, no?] and maybe I can dig into my time on the book, my approach, etc in a future post.

PROCESS

I was asked to do a series of variant covers for Marvel’s upcoming BLOOD HUNTERS anthology series. The concept was to provide ‘book’ style cover, in the vein of classic horror novels. Below was my idea for the look of the overall covers, but also specific to the characters featured in Issue One. My idea was to change the art box for each issue as well as the colour scheme of the ‘book’ element.

Ultimately, Marvel didn’t want to go with the old style numbering, or MARVEL COMICS treatment, but otherwise, liked the idea. In some ways, these covers would be easier as there is a small art area that changes each month, but it was also complicated up front in that I needed to work out the ‘frame’ and book elements.

Above are the pencils for the ‘frame’ and hand-drawn logo. It took a while to work it all out, and involved doing a level of maths my atrophied brain isn’t used to processing anymore. I drew the ‘box’ art on a separate piece of paper and coloured it, shifting the flats for that mis-registered print look. Next month, did the same once I know what characters were to be features and creators credited.

Here’s the first two, I’m quite happy with them. I ended up keeping the gold frame element in each cover as a way to tie them all together, but changed the sheen for each one.

A very different challenge for this series, but was good to think outside of the usual headspace.

OLD DOG

The Black Circle pins have arrived! They came out reeeaaaalllllly nice, I’m very happy with them. Once these are sent out with the DOSSIER, I’ll see about putting some extra I made on the ART DECO Store.

As for the DOSSIER itself, it is set up at the printers! Have just waiting on the print proof. I’ll be sending off the Kickstarter-edition ashcan too. It’s all starting to come together..

The OPERATIONS project continues with reports from Black Circle agents, including this evidence…