TWO FISTED HOMEOPAPE July/04 - emergency ward for broken and wayward thoughts
Enough about me, how are you?
♫ I applied for a rescue dog,
But if I get you dog,
You're rescuing me ♫
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2022 -- bounce.
MonkeyBrain Comics, thank you.
Adam P. Knave wrote a post about it being the MonkeyBrain Comics 10 year anniversary this past week.
For those who don’t know, MonkeyBrain Comics was a small digital publisher established by Allison Baker and Chris Roberson. Their plans were to get creators a shoe in at ComiXology to publish their stories in whatever [digital] form they saw fit. This was before ComiXology Submit, so back then there was no way to get your work on the platform, and posting webcomics online was just a crapshoot of hoping people found your work.
I remember the exact weekend MonkeyBrain launched - their line up was cool, the creators were cool, it was a brand new idea/venture. I was all in and read most of the comics they published in that first year.
As someone who up until that stage was just tinkering with comic shorts and pitches, I desperately wished I could be cool enough to land in that crowd. But I had no in, and they rolled in different circles. So I supported their comics, enjoyed their creative stable, and kept working on my own hopes.
At this time, Eric Zawadzki and I were working on a pitch for HEADSPACE. We had a cover, 5 pages of sequential, and a full synopsis/pitch package. We’d been tinkering with this thing for months, Eric giving notes on the story, everything refining, and we finally had an 8 page document ready - so I printed it up and flew to Seattle for ECCC in early 2013 so I could share the pitch with editors, as well as the one-shot FATHERHOOD, which I’d just created with Daniel Schneider.
The trip was a huge gamble - a lot of money to fly across, my second kid had been born about 7 days prior, and I had no idea what I was really doing. But I had a pitch and a one-shot and was tabling with Paul Allor, Ryan Ferrier, and Jeremy Holt.
Tabling that weekend with good mates was spectacular. I also took some time to meet editors on the show floor, but can confirm most don’t want to be relentlessly pitched, so instead I introduced myself, had a chat, and gave them copies of my work they were welcome to look at or trash, but so long as I had their details I would follow up later with an email.
That weekend I met editors I’m still talking with today, which is pretty cool. But one very lucky conversation took place.
Allison and Chris had 9 months of success with MonkeyBrain at this point, they were on everyone’s radar, and they’re genuinely awesome people so you naturally want to be around them. I never got the chance to chat with them on the con floor, sadly. But then late one night, at the bar, Christopher Sebela called me over and said I should meet someone, it was Chris Roberson. I had a chat with Chris, and the group they were sitting with, and it was a good laugh. I can thankfully confirm, this was a common comics experience for me - good people helping out and wanting to be around more good people. I had so many industry pros vouch for me in conversations and introductions that weekend because they knew I was from a long way away, they knew my kid had just been born, and they knew I was hungry and hoping to make the most of that con.
Sebela is directly the reason I got to stay in contact with Chris, and then after the show got the opportunity to pitch him Headspace to which they said yes. We began publishing digital issues a few months later.
I still remember them saying yes - I was genuinely over the moon. A publisher I thought was cool, and out of my league, was willing to help me tell a story I was deeply passionate about. It was every writing dream I’d been seriously harbouring and chasing for the previous decade up to that point. I still try and remember that feeling whenever I wonder what I’m chasing, or whenever I hit a goal that I should celebrate. MonkeyBrain backed me and it was a thumbs up that i was on the right path.
That ECCC weekend, that introduction, this publisher, they’re all the reasons I broke into this industry. MonkeyBrain will always have a special place in my heart because of this. I loved making HEADSPACE there. I love that book. Eric is still one of my best mates in comics, and we would follow up with ETERNAL at Black Mask, and hopefully do something else again soon. Sebastian Piriz drew the B Story in that book, and we just wrapped up BLACK BEACON at Heavy Metal. Marissa Louise coloured Seb’s work and I still keep in touch with her, and am always looking for the next chance to work with her again. Dee Cunniffe also coloured some of our story and he also came along for the ride with ETERNAL, and has spun a solid career collaboration with Eric that warms my heart. Dan Hill edited this story and would go on to edit heaps of my future independent work, and also become a lifelong friend. [Not to mention my table mates, all would go on to have their own MonkeyBrain comics, as well as other huge successes in the industry].
We made HEADSPACE an 8 issue mini, with each issue 16 pages for just 99c, with some back matter from Dan Hill and myself, and we found critical success. Reviews were strong, even if sales only really added up to a few pizzas each over the course of the publication. We did manage to land a deal with IDW to publish the trade collection, which was a nice way to end the story, and we got to tell the story on our terms - both in story content, and delivery method, and as a baseline for passion in the industry.
I still think someone needs to do an Oral History of MonkeyBrain Comics, from start to finish, because the stable of creators they worked with are some of the best voices from the past 10 years and I’d love that insight to be shared and bound somewhere.
Anyway, that’s my nostalgic view of MonkeyBrain Comics - and I hope every generation gets their version that gives opportunities, draws community together, and stands for such quality.
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BACKSTORY on Crowdfundr.
My one-shot comic with Jen Vaughn & Teo Acosta is just on halfway funded and we need your help to bring this home and make it happen!
HAVE A SNOOP AROUND THIS INDIE COMIC AND FIND YOUR PREORDER LEVEL!
Have a scope of Jen’s cover:
I really love the script on ths one - four teens come into possession of a superhero’s power ring and their night goes sideways instantly, and ends up in some very dark places.
I also really dig one-shot comics - you get in, and you get out. We definitely do this for this story. I know many of you will dig this one, and Crowdfundr is a new platform that’s pretty cool, and we appreciate your support, your links, your questions, and you :]
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Lost things.
My office constantly gets messy. I try, I swear I do, but paperwork and comics and other ephemeral detritus just manage to slip in and lounge about and suddenly I look like some kind of emergency ward for broken and wayward thoughts.
Firstly, let me say, losing anything you’ve written hurts. Whether it’s a whole story, a character note, a planned scene - you know that thing will never come out of your head in the same way a second time and you know if it came out and made its way to paper or the screen, then it came out in the way it was supposed to, and it’s really hard to say goodbye to that stuff. It doesn’t happen often, but every now and then I can’t find something and it breaks my heart.
Secondly, let me say that finding that note or story or whatever is like manna from heaven. It’s such a blessing, and I always feel a surge of gratitude that the thing in question was ever placed in front of me a second time.
So, I was tidying a bunch of paperwork, and junk, in my office the other week and I stumbled across a stack of papers in which were:
A solo RPG I wrote and couldn’t find and just knew I’d never get the bandwidth to rewrite, and
A solo RPG I didn’t actually remember writing, but I remembered the storyline once I saw it and was instantly filled with joy to find it.
As such, I’m in the process of tinkering and formatting both and should have them up on my itch.io page soon-ish. I’ll link us up when I do, but feel free to follow me on there, too.
I’ve noticed a huge upswing of downloads over there in the past week, across all the titles, and I wonder if it’s because of the new followers I’ve been gaining steadily also [which is due to Substack allowing other newsletters to recommend ones they like, and some nice people have listed me in those recs].
I like the idea that the games I’ve made can just sit there and be discovered, and lead people to more of my other games, and slowly just spin their own readers/revenue. Very different from any kind of comics platform, honestly.
Anyway, keep an eye on my itch.io and I’ll let you know when THE MONSTER ISLAND GAME is live - it’s a bloody good one!
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The work.
Still chipping away at script pages. Art/page notes. Now the solo rpgs. Just making little incursions into progress, nothing major on the In or Out trays at this stage. I think I’m also just letting my brain cool a little after what was a very big semester of learning a new teaching location/style/level. The mental energy and focus needed was awesome, but I need to notice and respect the fatigue - not to mention any post-Covid delay in speed or energy levels.
I’m also tinkering with a 1000 word short story because I want to have a specific example I can show students as we ask them to write 1000 shorts, too. The plan is to have a first draft to show them, notes to show them, and then a finished/polished version.
The hope is I can write at least a B grade. Surely I can manage, that, right?
So this has become a brain unblocker as I tinker with it either to wake up, or as a procrastination tool. It’s been fun to write a little prose, too, because then that’s warming me up for a project I’m doing with my brothers.
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ASD&D.
Last week I wrapped up a 6 month DM storyline and it was very cathartic. I’d adapted the GHOSTS OF SALTMARSH into a slightly weirder storyline and ran my crew through it.
It culminated in them fighting a giant monster made up of the bodies and weapons of a whole suhaugin village that was lumbering towards the coastline to raze and colonise it. I thought this might be the moment I finally killed someone, but the crew had some amazing tricks up their sleeves - our Monk created a barrier cube around himself and let himself get punched so the monster’s fist first got completely shredded as no metal could pass through, and then so nothing could pass through as it stomped on him. Another person used a metal allergy item I’d created to give the creature a serious problem as metal was threaded through its entire being.
The whole idea of the creature was ripped from Clive Barker’s ‘In The Hills, The Cities’ from one of the volumes of his BOOKS OF BLOOD. It was fun to run with it, but insane to see how quickly this group just decimated the creature with smarts, and some high level spells.
Now, I’m no longer DM, and I shall enjoy goofing off as a character again for a while.
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PERHAPS YOU'D CARE TO SAMPLE
Donald Glover interviews Donald Glover - an interesting chat one of my favourite minds has with himself. It dances around many topics. It is absolutely 100% worth your time in reading and thinking about.
TALGARD on Zoop - I really love Talgard. An Aussie comic series that’s 5 page fantasy shorts about the main character, a sellsword [such a cool word]. These are so well produced, and Gary Proudley’s writing across all of them is entertaining *and* structurally brilliant. An absolute Must Read and Support!
A list of some interesting solo rpg games - stuff like this is always fun to slice into for some links.
THE SAGA OF THE SHIELDBREAKER on Kickstarter - I read the first issue of this at a con a while back and absolutely loved it - go in and grab the first two issues right now!
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GRIST FOR THE MILL
I’ve not been reading enough at all. My comics reading is falling well off, booooo. But I’m reading some novels:
THE ROAD by Cormac McCarthy - as bleak as I remember it, but still beautifully driven with emotion.
THE FISHERMAN by John Langan - an ominous start that just builds dread and intrigue and I’m waiting to see how that bubble pops. Sidelined this for a minute to finish THE ROAD, but will then jump straight back on.
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Be one of the good guys, because there's way too many of the bad.
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POST CREDITS SEQUENCE
Just discovered the music of VOIDHOOD
Cope their hit song/video DISSOCIATING here
Strangely enough, I taught this artist back in the way, way way back, and it’s phenomenal to see someone putting a little grey matter to use. This is some funky electronic music that kinda slips between enough genres to defy being pinned down.
Scope their music on SoundCloud and I hope it puts the same smile on your face as it did for me. Anyone calling a song ‘Scorsese’ gets a thumbs up from me :]
Love the MONKEY BRAIN story at the top. Great stuff. And I didn't know about that Donald Glover interview but what a spectacular read! Thanks for sharing!