Action Satisfaction

By Steven G Saunders

Whew! Two conventions back-to-back, more moving, all sorts of other things, and here I am again pounding out another grand offering of All The Rage. I’m pretty damned beat and honestly I’d rather be sleeping than typing at this moment… But I don’t want to delay this any longer. It’s just not fair to you fine folks out there taking the time to read my weekly natterings.

By the way, Sakura-Con was an exhausting blast. I’ll be tossing up a write-up on that very soon over at Manga Life (which is up for an Eagle Award; go vote) for my Manga Hunter S column.



Art Flight

To get this party started right I have some fantastic Omega Flight #2 art that my kobold minions managed to procure from Scott Kolins.




Wow, eh? Looking good, Scott. Judging from how well Oeming and Kolins handled #1, I’m counting on #2 being very satisfying.

This Has A “Kicking Ass For Canada” Factor Of Nine Out Of Ten.

Shellshocked

With the new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie in theatres, I thought it might be nice to profile one of the upcoming Tales of the TMNT comics. It stands out to me because it aims to get back to the gritty roots that Eastman & Laird established in the days of Turtles yore.
Newcomer Tristan Huw Jones executes the writing and Paul Harmon (Sea of Red) handles the art (as you can see).




After much stal—er, diligence, I was able to get Tristan to talk a bit about this comic.

    Basically, I wanted to tell a Tale of the TMNT from a new perspective, and from one a little more grounded in that grim, gritty hyper-reality that permeated the original Eastman and Laird run, and after re-reading the epic City at War arc - where the police are dragged into a huge firefight/slaughter amidst the rival factions of the Foot Clan - I got to wondering ‘What would the police reaction to all this be? Surely, with all the chaos, ninjas, mutants and the like running around NYC, someone must have seen or said something.’ I've tried to answer the why's and why not's with this story, showing what state the police force is in this post-City at War TMNT universe. I don't want to reveal too much with the pages, so consider them a bit of a teaser; needless to say, fans will probably be able to see that we will be revisiting City at War in this comic. Entitled ‘Serve and Protect’, the whole thing is presented from the shoulders of Lt. Gordon Miller, an NY cop assigned to bring down those responsible for the mass carnage of City at War, but when a group of Foot Ninja's turn up dead in an alleyway, what looks to be another night of routine paperwork and more unanswered questions turns out to be anything but. From the get go, I wanted to bring the Turtles into that gritty, urban world they started in, and maybe even push it a little further, something akin to where Daredevil and Batman are at the moment. I'm hugely influenced by books like Year One and Sin City (and I think the Year One influences will probably be obvious), and I loved The Pulse and Gotham Central, so there are all these elements from these titles that influenced the way I went with the story. Obviously Eastman and Laird's work is a profound influence too! There's also a touch of Assault on Precinct 13 in there… Bat-fans and the like will hopefully get a kick out of this book too, and I'm pretty sure we've covered ourselves enough in this one for anybody to come in fresh and not have to worry too much about the TMNT comic history to enjoy it. The best part was that Paul and I were on exactly the same page in the story we wanted to tell and how it should be told, so when I was seeing his roughs and finals coming through, there was not a single thing I wanted to change, because EVERYTHING was nailed. Paul managed to make everything I saw in my head while writing it come out perfectly on paper, so what you see in this book is exactly the way it should be! If things go well and the book is well received, there'll be a follow on story (I've just submitted a pitch for a three part sequel/follow-up with some great concept art by Paul, which will - if things go well - be harder hitting than this one, expands on some things brought up in "Serve and Protect" and introduce a couple of new villains)!

    Also, we've got the Titan Book on its way (how I landed that job, I'm still not sure)! Regardless, it's a hell of a lot of fun to work on and from what I understand will involve stories based in the TMNT 2k3 universe (the new animated series and Fast Forward, I think). I've already written four Fast Forward stories and just submitted some more, so I'm waiting to hear how they all went, but I should have one of the four appearing in the first issue (which I believe is due out sometime soon) and another in the second issue, with the other two still up in the air. The Fast Forward stories are aimed largely at a younger teen audience (as the show is I suppose) and are just fun, self contained stories in the same vein as the show. The first ("Extreme Measures") involves Raph and Mike getting inadvertently involved in a futuristic extreme sports competition while trying to foil a kidnapping attempt on Cody Jones (April and Casey's great grandson). The second ("Ghost in the Shell") sees Mike paying the price for mucking around with a new stealth device created by Donatello, based on the technology used by the Street Phantoms gang. Other stories are being contributed by Jake Black (another Tales alumni and writer for two of the movie prequel comics) and very special writing guest Simon Furman will have a story in the second issue! The book looks like it's going to be a UK exclusive at the moment, and is being edited by Ned Hartley, who also put together the Wallace and Gromit books.


It sounds like Tristan has a bright future ahead of him! I’m looking forward to reading his work with Harmon’s art, which I’ll straight up admit took a bit for me to get used to with Sea of Red (an excellent series with Rick Remender, might I add), but it looks just right with what I’m seeing in the illustrations.

Expect “Serve and Protect” to hit the racks in July.

For more info check out the official website, Tristan’s MySpace page, and Paul’s website.

This Has A “Turtle Power” Factor Of Nine Out Of Ten.

All Hail Lords Abnett and Lanning

I would never forgive myself if I didn't mention the Dan Abnett & Andy Lanning interview which you can find HERE. As a long-time Imperial Abnett fething fanbot, I whole heartedly approve of the interview Tim O'Shea and Doug Smith conducted which coincides with the release of Nova #1.

After you pick up the great Nova issue they did, get your grubby chainsword wielding self a copy of Abnett and Lanning's Warhammer 40,000: Damnation Crusade out on Boom! Studios, as well as checking out Dan's Sinister Dexter comics from 2000 AD.

Really, Dan and Andy are probably the greatest writing team alive and I'll purge with flame anyone who says otherwise.

After I mention the interview: The only thing wrong with it is that I didn't get to conduct it. I hope I can find it in my Khorne shaped heart to forgive Tim and Doug one day.

To show you how much love I have for all things Abnett, here's a couple of preview images Tim and Doug managed to get for Nova #1 (due in stores tomorrow!), as well as images of Warhammer 40k: Damnation Crusade and Sinister Dexter on the cover of 2000AD Prog 1154.



This Has A "Sinister Human Rocket For The Emperor" Rating Of 10 Out Of 10.

Indie front: A Xombiriffic Hollow New World

And now for a little bit of indie action…

Devil’s Due has Xombie: Reanimated coming out tomorrow. It’s highly entertaining and I feel the pages below speak for themselves.




(I also think this is a good place to mention that I picked up a great Zombie Xing this last weekend at Sakura-Con.)

If you haven’t heard of Ape Entertainment’s Bizarre New World, now is a good time to see what it’s all about over at http://www.bizarrenewworld.com . I’ve read some of it and I can say that it promises to be a terrific comic as well as fresh and interesting. Here’s the blurb on it:

“Paul Krutcher is learning to deal with being planet earth's first flying man, but his physique is anything but heroic. Welcome to a Bizarre New World, the new comic by Skipper Martin, Christopher Provencher, and Wes Dzioba. Coming in May 2007 from Ape Entertainment.”

Bizarre New World has appeared in ATR before, and it will again. In the meantime, go to the website to see previews and read-up on what’s up with the comic. Oh and here’s some images for ya:




Speaking of things that have appeared in All The Rage before, Larime Taylor dispatched rabid flying monkeys to deliver to me the following pages from the forthcoming Hollow:



Duncan Eagleson does some fine pencil work, doesn’t he? For more information on this upcoming book about a boy without a soul, please visit the Hollow website.


This Has A “Flying Monkeys Love It!” Factor Of Nine Out Of Ten.

Comic Web: Creator Versus Creator

Not wishing to violate a long tradition of muckraking on here for too long, I thought I would mention this little “fight” I saw recently involving two webcomics creators I have immense respect for. It all started with Drastic Comics’ Adam Murray ranting about Scott Kurtz (of PvP fame) and his current video tutorial on digital inking. One thing led to another and Kurtz commented over in Adam’s Livejournal. There were some fine comments, but my fave is from Gail Simone (It’s just quite classy and nice, is all). Anyhow, yeah, I hear that Scott and Adam are to engage in a duel to the death involving Honey Nut Cheerios and paint-stripper, as well as interpretive dance.

The horror of what humans are capable of is hard to comprehend, I know.

Seriously speaking, I hope that everything is sorted and everyone involved goes home happy. Make sure to read PvP (which is also available in print format from Image) and Drastic Comics, for they are great comics and represent the rich diversity and fun webcomics are bringing readers around the world every day.

No, I wasn’t paid to say that. But I do take tacos. Hold the cilantro, please.

This has A “We Are The World… Of Interpretive Combat Dance” Factor Of Eight Out Of Ten.

That’s about it for this week. Now to rest for a little bit before getting down to writing up my Manga Hunter S column on Sakura-Con. Man, it was a lot of fun and I think it pushed me over the edge to becoming a full-blown anime & asian comics fan. Here’s a couple of pictures you may enjoy…



The above is for all of you that feel I should be eaten alive by a hungry cephalopod. You are so welcome.

And here’s the fine, merry bunch from Dark Horse who worked the show:



Yeah, yeah, I couldn’t resist jumping in. Besides, they bribed me with ending the threats of taking away my bacon.

There’s plenty of more pictures to see in a few days.

Now that I think about it, you should make sure to pick up Half Dead, directly from the wonderfully warped imaginations of Barb and Park Cooper. It’s in stores now and begs for your reading love. Another comic that caught my attention is the Irredeemable Ant-Man from Marvel. I dunno… I just really like it. Of course, that probably doesn’t come as a big surprise to those who know me and know the title.

If you feel like reading more crap that’s cool outside of Silver Bullet Comic Books (it IS kinda possible… maybe), click on over to http://www.mediagauntlet.com. It’s full of reviews and content that isn’t always about comics. As a matter of fact, most of it isn’t about comics… One notable exception is Girl Geek Gamer columnist Mickey Schulz’s last two rants. Just scroll down on the main page to get started.

Other places to stalk me on Zee Intardnets:

Email
Livejournal
ComicSpace
MySpace

Until next time (which should be on time), dear readers…