The Most Important Thing Right Now!

Add It Up

This is such an amazing time to be me, in terms of creative work, and I'm very, very excited to share ... some of it with you. Let's begin.

PROJECT WILDFIRE: STREET JUSTICE

In developing the new web comic with Quinn McGowan, it's important to know that unlike the latter-day Cylons, we really do have a plan. Project Wildfire is a limited story. It had a beginning and it absolutely has an end, one that Quinn and I know very well.

What's hard as a creative person is doing all the intermediary steps to get to that ending. Garrett has a very specific story, a narrative arc to follow, from long before the Wildfire Contagion existed. He has to follow that through. Raven, wow, Raven ... he has so much on the road ahead of him, so many secrets to uncover and to truly accept that Shelby City is his, now and forever. Then there's Cheryl ... even she would say the less said, the better.

Are these spoilers? From a certain point of view ... all I know is that I have a lot of panel descriptions between now and a wonderful, quiet one page panel with Wildfire that ends this ride. Well, ends-ish. Ends adjacent. You'll see. Just you wait.

That's not even what I'm supposed to be talking about: what I wanted to discuss was how the process leads to unexpected pleasures, and there are no greater ones for me in Street Justice than Riverside Drive. I needed to challenge the protagonist where he lives, and that's at the core of being a hero. He has dived wholeheartedly into the role of saving Shelby City from giant monsters, but many monsters are much more human sized. Riverside Drive is an example of that, borrowing the concept of a “smart gang" from the Kasper Cole run on Marvel's “Black Panther." An organization “too big to fail," with fingers in every pie, able to elude prosecution and skirt the law with impunity.

That didn't mean anything to me unless I could connect with the characters. A perverted version of Jon Snow, desperate for the approval of a father interested only in power. The estranged wife too valuable to exclude and too bitter to make it easy. Her brother, the self aggrandizing city councilman with dirt on everybody. They're a whole family crime drama to themselves, and they're a subplot in Street Justice, fascinating me completely.

The people who comprise Riverside Drive

Quinn and I dreamed up The Kaiju Queen shortly after we invented the The Corroded King. Yes, the symmetry there is not accidental. We always envisioned a wildly different kind of giant monster. Smarter. Craftier. The Kaiju Queen is an antagonist that will allow us to make repeat conflicts logical and not a factor of the incompetence and/or lunacy of the hero (sorry, Wally and Bruce). Putting her together with the challenge of Riverside Drive makes what we hope is a hell of a compelling story.

This isn't even the big news, I'm just excited to talk about it. Moving on ...

CHURCHILL

When actor Damion Poitier first approached me about collaborating, it was for a completely different project, a significantly bigger project, one we both hope to bring to light later on. This was a little amuse bouche, a story that could be told in sequential art and done with the resources at hand. Science fiction. High concept. My dude Quinn McGowan on the artwork.

So we started on Churchill — that's not the real name, we registered the real domain and I'm working on the site for it — and started working on stuff. It's not a mistake that Poitier himself is the lead character David Chance. A charismatic man lost to time, he will have an interesting paternal styled relationship with The Pearl Princess, a weapon of mass distraction. They stand at the center of a story that spans worlds and generations.

The Pearl Princess is a weapon of mass distraction.

There are big spoilers afoot that I'm trying to avoid, but this winter we hope to bring you along for the ride. In the immortal words of the RZA, “plug in, get connected."

IRRATIONAL NUMBERS

This right here? This is the big ticket item.

I'm three scripts in to a very big historical speculative fiction work with Wunderman Comics that we have not officially announced, but that I've been leaking information about it here and there.

An act of mercy leads a legendary educator down a path no one could have predicted, leading to centuries of bloodshed and horror. In the end, it just didn't add up. Set in ancient Greece and 20th century eastern Europe, Irrational Numbers is a sweeping, historical, deeply researched, meticulous work with art by Giancarlo Caracuzzo, colors by Flavia Caracuzzo and Josephine Roberts on lettering and digital pre-press.

More? Okay. I have three more scripts to finish but ... hang on ... okay, here, have a little sneak peek, but TELL NO ONE ...

Coming this year from Wunderman Comics.

TH-TH-TH-TH-THAT'S ALL, FOLKS!

I am enjoying the freedom of a refurbished 128 GB iPhone 6. Two generations back? Of course — I still need health care! *sad trombone*

For now, I hope that's enough. Hasta.