305: mathematic protagonists drop out of reality
Hullo
PF2-2PF3-1week
NYCC
Links
Bye
One week until The Power Fantasy #3 drops. In which case, how about a preview?
Here's the first two pages.
This was the second sequence that jumped to mind when doing my initial plans, and Caspar really nailed it.
Also the second printing of issue 2 is in the shops this week (which has already sold out and is being reprinted, as we talked about last week). Go buy it!
Jump aboard! 3 is a good one. I'd say it's my fave issue so far but I'm even fonder if issue 4, which is interesting, as they're about as far apart in approach as you can be while still serving the same concept. That’s one reason why I’m so excited about this book - it's a space where you can really do a lot of different things, and it demands you do a lot of different things.
As said last time, It's NYCC week, and as said last time, I'm there. I'm at A-30 Artist Alley basically all the weekend, sharing a table with Caspar and being hosted by Kinetic Collectibles, who made these handy bits of art saying what we're doing there.
Coo!
I'm looking forward to being here a whole bunch. I haven't been in New York since before Covid, and it feels deeply strange that I didn't visit the home of the Marvel Universe for the whole period I was shaping it. Hell, I even flattened a whole bunch of NY. How rude.
Anyway – come say Hi.
Tragically, Zoe Thorogood's brother James committed suicide in the last month. She's donating all the profits from her Graphic Novels for the rest of the year to to mental health charity, and various of her Italian, French and Spanish publishers have joined in. If you've yet to buy It's Lonely At The Center Of The Earth, you should – it's one of the best books of the last five years. If you have bought it, consider buying it for someone else. Love to Zoe, her family and everyone who knew James.
This article is both depressing and a useful way to think about voting. It breaks down politicians into either enemies or cowards. Enemies are those who actively wish harm. Cowards are those whose convictions are shaped by what the public demand. As such, vote for Cowards, and then fight to change the context so Cowards make the right decision. Worth reading and not just my paraphrase. Weirdly comforting.
Paul Cornell and Lizbeth Myles have just announced the sequel to the Hammer Horror Podcast, Telefantasy Time Jump about the history of UK SFF TV. They're starting with 1953's The Quatermass Experiment which sounds great, and as Paul and Liz are great, makes this especially great sounding.
Ideas Don't Bleed is one of my favourite comic centric podcasts right now – it's not as hilariously anal as Decompressed was, but if you want to hear a bunch of writers just laying the truth down, it's the best game in town. The recent second part of the Tim Seeley and Tony Fleecs one is must listening for anyone who cares about the economics of creator owned work, and speaks to the reason why we're pushing The Power Fantasy so hard to begin with, as the readership size at the start is the thing which determines so much about doing a Direct market Book.
Did I link to this last time and not delete it from my links scratchlist? Perhaps, but how Green Day are remastering Dookie deserves another link. Inspired.
I'm writing this on the flight over to NYC, figuring I should do this now, as you can never quite tell how Jetlag is going to work out. I'm also going to write it short, just so I can (er) nap? Actually do what folks tend to do on planes? I dunno.
When I used to fly as a games journo (and earlier in my comic writer career), it's basically 6-10 hours in a confined, boring place, without internet or easy distractions. I could get a lot done with that space. I should go through my history and work out which of my scripts I've done a big chunk of mid-air. If I didn't have anything that required writing, it's the best concentrated reading time I have. I rarely (say) watch a film. It happens occasionally, but rarely.
And as I handed Stephanie the script yesterday (which needs a section reworked, but it's 75% of the pages complete and structurally is sound – and the reason why it needs a bit reworked is just a bit more research). I've cleared the deck of the game things. Yes, the next Power Fantasy script is relatively close, but not close enough to demand it. So I don't have much work screaming at me.
Except perhaps going through the latest PDF of the WicDiv Covers collection and the proofing notes on How Do Aliens Do “It”? I could try and do some design of it, but learning to use a program cramped in a plane seat feels a little like a torture method.
And there's this newsletter, which part of me feels I should write a whole load of essay content for (I just finished When We Cease To Understand The World by Benjamin Labatut, which certainly calls out to be written about – a non-fiction book collapsing into fiction like its mathematic protagonists drop out of reality). But how about... I just read a little, maybe play on the switch, maybe snooze and not beat myself too much?
This may be influenced by having To The End playing before writing this. It’s the documentary about Blur recording together again leading up to their Wembley gigs, which does paint Damon (among other things) as this driven workaholic. And I look at him and felt a little sad.
So, I'm going to do the barre minimum and then just… not.
Looking forward to seeing folks, and hope you get a chance to just not soon.
(Wait – I've gone online to post this, so now I'm clearly going to get dragged into work and won't be stoically looking after myself. Oh no! What a fool I am.)
Speak soon.
Kieron Gillen
London
16.10.2024