Kibbles ‘n’ bits, 9/23

We want the series to last a while. It would’ve been jumping way too far ahead in the larger story, and I’m not the type of person (and neither is Scott) to hold on to ideas – one of the best pieces of advice Grant Morrison have me was to not hold on to ideas, to just use them all, paint yourself into a corner, and come up with new ideas – and I’ve definitely held on to that way of thinking, but the original story that we were thinking of telling in this second series will now be series four, which is more or less the midpoint of the entire story as a whole. So it needed to wait.

In saying that, there are a lot of things that changed from working on series one – a lot of things happened – we ended up caring about these characters a great deal, readers ended up caring about them a great deal…weirdness started happening – not arbitrarily, but if I was inspired to write a scene, I’d write it, and now those scenes are now growing in the larger parts of the story.

Breaking into comics as an artist is relatively easy. You make up some samples, you show them around, you take the advice you’re given, and you persist until you get work or find something more responsible to do. It’s hard work, but it’s a simple plan to follow.

But breaking in as a writer… that’s difficult. There are a lot more wannabes than ever will find work in the field, everyone thinks writing is easy, and most people have ideas for their favorite characters just waiting. Plus, you can’t easily show your work. So how do you start getting paid to write comics? There are four and a half ways I know of.

But if you are one of those unfortunate souls who bought all the New Avengers and Mighty Avengers tie-ins and then realized you’d wasted over twenty bucks, don’t worry! Just do what I and my good friend Lisa McMullan did. With a little creativity, you can take those pages and make yourself a very smart looking jacket! Now you’re not a sucker, you are actually quite fashionable!

I was amazed when that first issue of Rock ‘N’ Roll Comics, on Guns N’ Roses, sold almost 10,000 copies in just a few short weeks. Those were big numbers, even in those days of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Todd would call me every time a big order came in, and then he’d call to tell me every time the comic was mentioned in some major mag or newspaper, which was happening almost every day. “Someday, we’ll be selling millions of comics,” he’d say. I was doubtful, but I allowed room for the possibility.