Talent Pools

Do Not Siege Walled Cities - 318

PLAYED SOME SHOWS

We do big festivals from time-to-time, but these were the biggest shows we’ve opened. Bands are crew were really kind to us. My major takeaway is I need some gym time and hair transplant surgery if I’m gonna be on amphitheater jumbo monitors again.

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PAGES IN MY INBOX

So many good ones this week.

Above are some pencils from

EPHK

that demonstrate the instinct of a great cartoonist: every character needs to be recognizable at a glance. These are all women around a table, so faces, hair, and dress needs to be distinct. Notice how the types of tops vary? More important than you think!

And check this out:

A double-page splash from Ludo that just kills. While it will be colored, the blacks are really selling it already.

And have I shared how hard Al is bringing these RPD pages?

As a kid online would say “oh he CARTOONING cartooning!”

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THEY DID THE THING

So DC (WB directly, if we’re all reading it right) addressed Gretchen Felker-Martin’s Bluesky posts about Charlie Kirk. The RED HOOD series she was working on is cancelled.

And we’ve gotten the predictably dishonest response from all parties. Just like in the broader discourse, we’ve got a value reversal from the left and right.

The right, which whined incessantly about cancel culture for ten years is now in favor of it. “This is about decency/civility!” they say. Which reminds me of “this is about accountability/consequence” which we got from the left for a decade. Just gibberish phrases auto-generated to justify bad behavior.

The left, who for a decade felt it their moral responsibility to render strangers unemployed, are now very much against cancel culture. “Accountability” is, apparently, malleable.

I said my peace last newsletter, and it must’ve felt boring for longtime readers because you’ve read it before. I’ve had the same line on this for as long as I’ve had a platform to talk about it.

Which is why I am advising you to shut up.

Shut up.

For years I put myself in the difficult and annoying position of defending Ethan Van Sciver. A dude I find unpleasant. A dude whose style of art I don’t like at all. And a dude whose politics (insofar it can be said he has any) have decidedly little overlap with my own. And I did that because I believe his firing was based on his politics, a thing that should fall outside corporate purview. It’s my belief that in the social media age we have no private lives as we previously understood the term, and *as a matter of worker rights* we should be protected.

Or, as I said last newsletter, at the very least these ideas need to be enforced equally without even the suggestion of political bias. Workers need to know the rules. It CANNOT be a club.

For years, I was the only ‘progressive’ I could find who was willing to say this. And, really, for good reason, because it met with punishment. It’s purely a function of whatever O.D.D. I may suffer that I feel compelled to say shit like this. But you didn’t. So you don’t get to have an opinion now.

You, oddly-silent-for-a-decade comic book pro don’t get to say… anything.

There’s a chirping gaggle of do-nothings on Bluesky painting Felker-Martin’s firing as an injustice. But those people are larping. Unless you have a history of defending nutball creators REGARDLESS OF THEIR POLITICAL ORIENTATIONS OR SPOOKY CANCELLATION BULLSHIT, you have nothing to say. Everyone understands you’re a partisan, which is why nobody will listen now.

For years I had editors assuming things about me because I wasn’t willing to treat freedom of expression as a team sport. You don’t get to breeze in on your transparently dishonest new “anti-censorship” stance. You had an opportunity to defend workers for a long time and you opted out because “icky.”

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AN IMMODEST PROPOSAL

“Should DC have hired a lunatic to write some bullshit book?” is the question among the reader commentariat. But among creators, there’s a second conversation happening. It exists alongside whatever the scandal-of-the-week is, but said scandals can enflame it a bit. And longtime readers of this newsletter know where I’m going.

“Why in God’s name do these publishers hire non-comic talent to write comic books?”

Everybody who creates comic books knows it is a specialized skillset. When editors hire people without those skills to do skilled labor, you prove what creators suspect about you: You don’t have a fucking clue. You’re not comic book people. You’re PMC functionaries of multinationals with zero stake in the quality of a book.

Did you hire a crazy person? Maybe. I don’t give a shit. I’m crazy by someone’s definition. Who cares. But I can demonstrably, provably, write a good comic book. Did this woman come with any evidence she could say the same? No? THEN WHY HIRE HER?

The Coates thing shoulda been a wakeup call for sleeping editors. Writeups in the NYT isn’t a fungible asset. Those inches of fluff writing on paywalled newspaper sites and $2.90 can get you on the subway. It’s bullshit. It’s stupid people currency. Clout isn’t real. Get off social media. Go to THE COMIC BOOK STORE and buy comic books. There’s your talent pool. Stop hiring from NPR puff pieces. Hire real comic book people who care about craft.

Or don’t, and become more irrelevant by the day.

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PEOPLE I SPOKE TO

Guy running a taco truck. Large gay fella. We talked about tips, corporate gigs, and the area. The county we were in, adjacent to Indianapolis, has a lotta money.

I told my only story that confirms it, the fact my friend’s place had a closed showing which he was asked not to be around for. Later, on a security camera, he realized it’s because the house was being shown to prospective buyer Mike Pence.

The taco guy had his own Mike Pence story, which I’m gonna tell here because I’m only using the name of a public figure and not the private citizen. Taco guy was catering a private event for a wealthy family that had hired him on a couple other occasions. He noticed a guy who looked a lot like Mike Pence, but didn’t think it could possibly be him. After all, in the monied areas of Indiana don’t they all look like Mike Pence?

Later in the evening, his client introduces him to the Pence lookalike, who, in fact, was Mike Pence. They talk for ten minutes. Taco guy said Pence was engaged and affable. At the end of the night, Pence approaches taco guy. Taco guy goes for the Bill Clinton handshake and instead gets a full hug from Pence.

Taco guy: “I hate his politics, and I know this sounds weird- I needed a hug. It was a really hard day and this guy could tell I just needed a hug.”

We talked for a few minutes more about how politicians see humanity as masses to be moved around a board, but individual personhood is often weighed differently.

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MEDIA CONSUMPTION

This game really shit-tests you out the gate. No scumsaves, no checkpoints, just frustration. But midway through it drops the tough guy act, gives you enough lives to complete levels, and becomes really fun. The aesthetic is disgusting and does for the color red what Quake did for brown. I really liked it by the end. Recommended.

A true ripoff film, Female Convict 101: Suck, was obviously tryna ride the Female Prisoner Scorpion 701 wave.

It has 1/100 the style and flair of FPS, but there’s still something here. It’s as cynical and possibly more feminist in disposition, despite the sexploitation moorings. Women can barely trust each other here, but men can’t be trusted at all. The end is about as dark as anything you’ll watch. Recommended.

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FROM THE DESIGN FOLDER

I have a folder of faces. When trying to find the spirit of a character, “attractive” and “ugly” are not really doing it. Every artist has a vision of what a character is, and frankly I’m inclined to trust them. But creative partners also always want buy-in from each other. The better everyone feels about a project, the better that project will come out. So, character looks are often discussed. But few people have the words. Imagine how frustrating it would be to describe me, for example. I have tattoos, so you could say that. But do I wear any ethnic markers other than the broadest possible “white guy” designation? “Big nose” might work, but there’s multiple kinds of big noses.

This is all to say, a reference folder can help. Here’s an image which really struck me. A former political candidate whose eye was damaged by police action during a protest.

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FLYING HOME

That’s a two day mission. Wish me luck. Do for self.