370: you shouldn't have spared my feelings
Hullo
Die Another Day (In July)
Dancing In the Dark
I’ll go
Books!
MoreMeta
Clap Your Hands If You Want Some More
Links
Bye
****
We’ve released some details about the second arc of DIE: Loaded, which kicks off in July.
Here’s the quote I gave…
"Die is a book driven by characters and their choices (mostly bad)," said Gillen. "Zero Sessions ended with one of them making perhaps the worst decision anyone's ever made in Die—and now we live (or don't) with the consequences. With this at the starting point, can any of them get good? Plus it's just a huge arc for all the fans of Die, with us revealing details of the world we've only vaguely hinted at before."
And admire the alt cover from Aleksi Briclot.
Want to know more about DIE: Loaded? Go nose here.
****
Caspar is well into the second issue of The Power Fantasy’s (don’t call it a) comeback, so he’s put up a panel from the first issue back. It’s such a lovely panel that we did think whether it was a shame to share this early. That said, we also realised we have lovely panels aplenty in this issue, so we can afford to show one. We’re not a book with a surfeit of pretty.
Also on the plate this week was a lettering draft of the first issue back, which was fun. It all is holding together. There is one sequence where I basically deleted 12 captions and replaced them with nothing. It was some lovely panels, and I didn’t want to get in the way.
There’s exceptions to this, of course, but a broad principle of writing comics is “If you can delete it, you probably should.”
****
The Hugos nominations are out, and – lawks – the Power Fantasy is in there, in beautiful company.
Absolute Wonder Woman Vol. 1: The Last Amazon, written by Kelly Thompson, art by Hayden Sherman and Mattia de Iulis, coloring by Jordie Bellaire, lettering by Becca Carey (DC Comics)
A Girl and Her Fed, written by KB Spangler, art by Ale Presser (www.agirlandherfed.com)
A Wizard of Earthsea: A Graphic Novel, written by Ursula K. Le Guin, adapted and art by Fred Fordham (Clarion Books; Walker UK)
The Invisible Parade by Leigh Bardugo and John Picacio (Little, Brown Books for Young Readers; Orion UK)
The Power Fantasy Volume 1: The Superpowers, written by Kieron Gillen, art by Caspar Wijngaard, lettering by Clayton Cowles (Image Comics)
The Space Cat, written by Nnedi Okorafor, art by Tana Ford (First Second)
The Hugos is an award I’m always really touched to end up on a short list of, and it’s a great list.
****
Comps! DIE: Loaded’s first trade arrived, and it’s beautiful. Hurrah!
Where’s my hair gone? Have I been balding and no-one’s told me? You shouldn’t have spared my feelings.
****
The triumphal (that’s the word I’m going for) Crowdfunder for DIE RPG: THE METADUNGEON continues. We have nine days left, and are still heading towards unlocking a bunch of Stephanie Hans chapter heading arts.
Want to know more about it? I published an interview with Gareth over at Old Men Running the World about the project. This is the raw material I cut into the interview which ran in the back of DIE: LOADED 6, so if you want the full thing, you can read more.
The basic structure of one level per decade – well, partly it’s probably the one division of the hobby we can all agree on and immediately understand. Doing it by company or by game design or setting would be a lot more confusing and contentious. (Plus, sticking with one-decade-per-level means I know which volume of Shannon Applecline’s Designers and Dragons to grab on any given day.) After that, the challenge is identifying the big games, the big companies, the key designers and the really important moments in each decade – and then sifting them again to find playable bits. It’s not a reference book, after all. It’s the Horrible Histories of Gaming.
Also, Naomi has been showing why she’s frankly worryingly at this Internet thing.
Here’s how I ended turned up...
Honestly, 1980s girlgeek with the Clarinet is laser-guided precise.
Back the crowdfunder here, etc.
****
The next Script Club (Details in link) is The Power Fantasy #1, which should go out at the last day of the month.
Upgrade now****
I won’t be able to make this as I’m already tied up, but Gareth Lipstick On Your Collar brought this to my attention.
It’s a daytime club to mark the 20th anniversary of Lipstick On Your Collar.
To be short: Lipstick On Your Collar is the club which directly inspired the setting for Phonogram: The Singles Club. Except Gareth is the absolute opposite of Seth.
If you’re a certain kind of Phonogram fan, and you’re free on Saturday afternoon and are around Bristol, this is a unique chance. I wish I could be there.
****
DIE: Compressed released two episode back to back, covering issues 5 and 6 of DIE: Loaded. Always a great dive into what we’re up to.
Joe Quesada writes about a lot of things here – but especially the cosmic horror that is tangents and assorted other things which make things feel wrong.
Mark Wallis has started blogging again, starting looking back at my original sin, the New Games Journalism “manifesto”, and putting it in context of today. “He goes on to say (the second point), "This makes us Travel Journalists to Imaginary places." Word. Good travel journalism is not about how to get the best hotel deal or what sights not to miss. It's about how the experience of travel changed you, some new understanding you came to as a result, even things like the dubious theorizing sparked in your mind by the catalyst of climate change on the eve of a petrochemically-inspired war.” Mark wrote about this in the New York Times circa it dropping, so it’s interesting to see him think of all this now.
Lore is a LoTR Adventure Game retroclone. I don’t know the LoTR adventure game – but this is really neat.
Slings and Arrows does a lovely review of Stephanie and my We Called Them Giants. “Almost a fairytale, certainly a coming of age story, We Called Them Giants eventually becomes a surprisingly human fable about aliens.”
****
I was starting on a new mini this week, before I realised I’ve become unstuck from time, and Stephanie will likely need a new DIE script early next week. This has led to the last couple of days being me wrestling with significant problems – we’re at the point where I basically need to nail down the three issues until 12. I’ve done that, or at least got a firm page count plan for issue 10, so I’m writing that, and hopefully should be able to wrap it before then. It should cascade nicely.
I’ve also kinda-sorta taken on another book, so need to write the proposal/synopsis for that. It’s not 100%, but unless I write it and think it’s terrible or they read it and think it’s terrible, it seems fairly likely. This is an expansion of something else I’ve been up to, needing a bunch of research into comics. I’m excited by it. A little nervous, but also excited.
It’s an interesting period right now, in that the amount of work I’m doing is all a bit off. One project may drop in September. The other three things I’ve been talking about are all next year, I believe. The Power Fantasy should return before the end of the year, but DIE will have a break after 12. I’m looking forward to folks seeing some of this – like, my Inbox is full of joys every day, and it’ll be good to share.
That the research I’ve been doing has been comics has eaten into my reading in ways – basically, if I’m reading a bunch of comics, it’s less likely I’ll read more comics afterwards. So I am way behind on the array of PDFs I’ve been sent by peers – and even the ones I’ve read I haven’t had a chance to write anything about.
However, I see Aditya Bidikar and Som’s In Your Skin is out today.
Which is a creepy and deeply atmospheric story about fame, obsession and horror. Significantly horror. It’s really nice work, heavy with awful sensuality and need, and is worth you time.
In terms of fun (but also work) I’ve been continuing the playtest of the Scions, where I’ve been set up a campaign journal for folks to write up.
There is something a revision war going on. You may be able to guess which Scions were the most recent author in this sequence…
I told a friend that the game was going well, and very funny. She wondered if that was a fail state, given the them. No, while one can go heavier, it’s very much one can be extremely campy, and still operate as intended. These arguing muppets are very much operating as intended.
Anyway, I’m gaving fun, at least inside these walls. I hope the same’s true for you.
Kieron Gillen
Bath
22.4.2026