Ever feel like you’ll never measure up to your parents’ standards? Ever get shipped off to a summer camp to “fix” you? Well, that’s the starting premise of Brain Camp by Susan Kim, Laurence Klavan and Faith Erin Hicks.
In the beginning of Brain Camp, we’re introduced to two 14-year-olds who don’t measure up to their parents’ expectations of them. That’s when a mysterious stranger shows up late at night to offer these two kids a chance to attend an invite-only summer camp guaranteed to make them smarter.
Now, while at first this seems like a fairly standard Stepford Wives-type of story, Kim, Klavan and Hicks manage to pull off something that’s different enough to draw you in to see what’s going on because some kids are suddenly vomiting up feathers… Is there a plague affecting the camp? What’s causing all of these kids to be magically smarter?
The story is fantastic, suspenseful and quite clever. It’s also very creepy and weird (which is a great draw for me). The art by Faith Erin Hicks was truly enough to keep me reading through the book even if the story wasn’t good (but it totally is). This book is the total package.
As a small caveat, I know that I have some readers out there that may be offended by language, emotional abuse or disturbing imagery. Well, then you may want to read this book before handing one to your kids, but this book is probably considered a PG-13, I would assume so that’s a good measure anyway.
If you’re looking for a story to creep you out even more about summer camps, or just a wild ride that gets creepier as it goes, then Brain Camp is a graphic novel for you.
For the month of July, we’ll be exploring the webcomic and forthcoming graphic novel (more about the Kickstarter in a minute),Jackie Rose by Josh Ulrich (Twitter, Behance Portfolio). To refresh you on the process, I’ll be posting one page of his graphic novel each Wednesday to give you a full sense of his storytelling abilities and art stylings, along with a portion of an interview to let you in on the artist behind the art, and also my thoughts on why I like his comic and why you should too! As there is a Kickstarter currently going for this particular graphic novel, each post for this will also include a call to action to back his project because it’s great and I want my copy of the book… Without further adieu…
Over the past year, I’ve gotten little snippets of this comic as Josh Ulrich has been retooling it. As far as I can tell, it was once a ten part epic which he still has available online, but he’s decided to reboot it with a new story and a slightly different take on the characters. The best part about Jackie Rose to me is that it’s like Indiana Jones meets Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow but instead of a handsome leading man, it’s a teenage girl. There’s airships, and air pirates. Kidnapping and tons of action adventure. Not only is the story exciting and great, but the artwork is quite impressive. Josh Ulrich is a professional colorist with tons of awesome comics under his belt (my favorites are the Adventure Time, Bravest Warriors and Simpsons comics he colored, but I digress), and it shows.
Last month, I was actually given a sneak peek at the unfinished Jackie Rosegraphic novel (Volume 1) and let me tell you, it was great. So when I heard that Josh was going to start posting the whole thing as a webcomic AND starting up a Kickstarter for it, I was super-excited. What he’s done is crafted an excellent two part story, and he’s posting it all online Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays and also holding a Kickstarter for people to get a print copy of the book ahead of when the webcomic will finish.
I chose a set of 4 pages in order to show you over the next few weeks that I feel have a nice scope for the story, characters and action. So, here’s the first page, and we’ll get to the Kickstarter details after the interview!
Jackie Rose Page 14
Interview: Part 1
Q. When did you know you wanted to make comics?
Really it was only about eight years ago. I had done some writing in highschool, and I would draw on occasion, but nothing serious. I was growing more and more fascinated by the idea of making comics, but I always understood the enormous amount of work it would take just to get good enough to make the stories I wanted to tell. You have to understand that up to this point in my life, my whole future trajectory was based on me becoming a fighter pilot. We’re talking since I was 5 years old and understood what an airplane was. I was even in the Navy ROTC in college at the time, on my way to becoming an officer, when the comics bug bit me. Coming up on my junior year, I was really praying about what I should do, and that summer everyone not on scholarship was cut from the ROTC program. There were two people; I was one of them. From that point on I was pretty much all in for comics.
Q. How did you get started with comics?
I picked up an Action Cartooning book by Ben Caldwell, copied everything in it, then changed my major to graphic design and started taking every art class in sight. Then it was just study and practice every day. I got really into the Flight series, right when book 2 was coming out. That was the first time I saw the kind of stories I wanted to tell on the shelf. I spent a lot of time on the old Flight forums, learning from other artists and exposing my terrible work to them for feedback. That’s where I met one of my closest friends, Michael Regina, and from there we kind of stumbled in the dark together.
Kickstarter
I’ll let him speak for himself for this bit. Link to the project after the video.
There are some awesome rewards for backing this project. If I was richer, one of the top-tier rewards is that he will color 24 pages of a comic for you! SOUNDS AWESOME! Ha!
[button color=red url=http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/865787103/jackie-rose?utm_source=Underfold&utm_medium=Featured+Series&utm_campaign=Underfold+Feature target=self]Back this Kickstarter Project![/button]
Written and Illustrated by Doug TenNapel
224 pages, black and white
Published by Image Comics
The first time I saw Men in Black, one of my favorite scenes is when Will Smith’s character first visits the headquarters. His wide-eyed, confused expression while everyone else is just doing their job. Nothing strange going on… it’s not like aliens are running around or anything… Ha! Creature Tech is like this as well, but instead of experiencing all of the weird things through Will Smith’s character, you, the reader, are the surprised party. Except instead of just aliens… what if I told you that Creature Tech was about space aliens, sorcery, ghosts and the Christian faith?
Doug TenNapel’s Creature Tech is quite the ambitious graphic novel. For starters, TenNapel’s artwork is some of my favorite out there, so that’s already a draw. I admire his ability to weave a good story that’s fast-paced without forsaking the depth.
Creature Tech is about a young-ish scientist who works in a small town branch of a Men In Black-type facility researching mysterious crates full of all sorts of weird stuff. Without ruining too much of the story, the main character accidentally gets a symbiote attached to his chest, and a malevolent sorcerer’s ghost is up to something devious!
The story is great. It’s got a ton of action and an overarching story of a man who’s lost his faith. However, I will say that the moments where the “losing my faith” conversations seem a bit forced. Granted, in real life, I’ve had conversations like that. Suddenly someone’s just saying something about how Jesus can’t possibly real, etc. Or even the other way around, “Hey, remember when you used to like Jesus?” and it just seems out of left field. So it’s hard to say if these are truly out of place, or not, but to me, they felt like they were.
To be fair though, the scenes are usually so short it only lasts a page or two before the action starts back up. There are some great subplots going on too. My favorite is one involving a giant mantis-man and a couple of rednecks. Yeah. It’s wonderful.
It’s a great book. In the version I read, you should skip the foreword. It has quite a few spoilers in there, but the graphic novel is terrific.
I have really enjoyed taking something that I really like, and breaking it down so that I can explain why I like it. I can’t wait to introduce you all to more artists and their comics. But I digress… here’s the final installment of the Sketch ComedyFeature Series!
So in the three installments, I’ve talked about Sketch Comedy‘s lack of a fourth wall, use of highly detailed panels, and hilarious expressions. For this last post, I wanted to draw your attention to the backgrounds. Unlike many webcomics where there’s usually only one punchline all the time, Jackson Ferrell (Twitter, Google Plus, Facebook) occasionally hides little mini-jokes within panels. It takes form in many ways. Sometimes it’s the movements of some background characters who bump into each other, sometimes it’s like the comic below and there’s a light reaction from another character, sometimes it’s a little note or graph that just emphasizes something. Either way, I really like it.
It’s like these small asides that keep you re-reading his comics. You just never know what’s going to happen the second time through. I’ve been reading his comic for a while now, and every now and then, I’ll still stumble upon something in the backgrounds that cracks me up. It’s the small moments like this that round-out the humor of Sketch Comedy for me. Overall, his comic makes me happy, and for that, I love it.
Phasing Out
Interview Part 4:
Q. Who is your hero, and why?
I have a lot of respect for David Willis as a cartoonist, and he’s particularly impressed me with his work on Dumbing of Age. The comic showcases his strength in characterization through dialogue, body language and facial expression. His backgrounds are solid too–it really looks like his characters are inhabiting physical college spaces. Granted, sometimes I read a strip and say to myself, “Another sex joke? Willis is using his talent for this?” but the fact is he knows how to bring his writing and art together to make quality comics, and he developed this talent by drawing comics relentlessly for over fifteen years. Sometimes I wonder if the only way to succeed as a cartoonist is to have a really terrible sleep schedule.
Q. As an artist, where do you draw value from your work?
Obviously, it’s great to share my work and see others enjoy it. Comics are communication! But the creative process–the mechanical routine of penciling, inking, laying out word bubbles and adding tone and shading–can be almost therapeutic for me, and as much as I love interacting with my readers via comics and comments, I’d probably keep cartooning even if I were the only one reading my stuff.
And of course, it’s great to see that people value the stuff I make when they buy a t-shirt or original artwork. I don’t know why it feels like money-grubbing to say that, but the fact is that ink, paper, brushes and pens, tablets, printers, scanners and software all cost money–cartooning isn’t free. When people donate, commission, or buy stuff from my store, it helps me make better comics more frequently, and I really appreciate their support.
In Conclusion…
I hope you’ve enjoyed learning more about Sketch Comedy and its creator, Jackson Ferrell! It updates on Mondays and Thursdays, so go read it!
Next month, we’ll take a look at another comic and artist! I’m excited about this series!
Written and Illustrated by Nate Powell
216 pages, black and white
Published by Top Shelf Productions
Have you ever watched a movie you can tell has been finely crafted but by the end you have no idea what it was about? That was my experience with Swallow Me Whole.
I think I enjoyed it. The art is great, the story is weird, there’re some really great storytelling tricks I’d like to implement into my own work, but in the end… I don’t think I get it.
Upon looking up the book for a link, I saw a few articles talking about the topic of mental illness in association with this story, but I didn’t read them. I’m okay with not understanding a story. I enjoyed the read, and honestly want to give it another read-through.
The story revolves around a brother and sister in high school. Their grandmother is in the hospital and comes to live with them. Then weird stuff starts to happen. The brother begins to see/hear a tiny wizard telling him he’s needed for something, and the sister can hear bugs. The bugs occasionally swarm her and fill the page, but she’s cool with it. Now, as far as plot goes… this is basically as much as I can figure out. Not much happens, but it’s always interesting to look at.
Powell has a way of adding this sense of depth throughout that draws you in. He uses estranged bits of dialogue from conversations in the backgrounds of scenes that give you a sense of noisiness in a page. There’s this sense that there’s more to the story the whole time, that you’re not getting the whole story… Similar to the way the movies like Cloverfield give you glimpses of the fuller story that’s just outside of the main characters’ grasp, we’re only getting the story from the siblings perspective, and I feel okay with that, even if I don’t totally understand.
The artwork fluctuates easily between detailed and abstract. I feel it really adds to the chaotic feelings of the teens and helps to further show how confused everything is for them. Disembodied word balloons, frameless panels, and complete darkness are just some examples of the use of abstract. It’s an excellent visual representation of their inner turmoil, all the while still quite beautiful to look at.
Like I said, I’m pretty sure I liked this story and I didn’t even understand what happened. Just think about how much more you’d like it if you do.
Written by Susan Kim and Laurence Klavan
