It’s only in the last few weeks that I’ve been able to pin down — tentatively — a dominating characteristic of my writing over the past couple of decades.
Much of it originated in depression.
And the stuff that did is, generally speaking, the less interesting stuff. Or the stuff that doesn’t seem quite… “there.”
The best of my work, I think, has always had its roots in righteous outrage, compulsive curiosity, or reckless abandon.
I won’t even bother to dissemble. This is likely to be among the most self-serving blog posts I’ll ever write and you’ll ever read.
The June issue of *Wizard* (#164) contains a very flattering article about me and my alleged career.
I’d like to thank Chris Lawrence for writing the piece, for all the nice things he had to say in it, and especially for the kind words about *Hard Time*.
Thanks also to the editorial staff of *Wizard*, naturally, for putting it into print.
Here’s the cover:
You should still be able to find the issue at your local comics shop.
Okay, *this* pisses me off.
From the *Washington Post*, 6/10/05:
Panel Seeks to End CPB’s Funding Within 2 Years
A House subcommittee voted yesterday to sharply reduce the federal government’s financial support for public broadcasting, including eliminating taxpayer funds that help underwrite such popular children’s educational programs as “Sesame Street,” “Reading Rainbow,” “Arthur” and “Postcards From Buster.”
In addition, the subcommittee acted to eliminate within two years all federal money for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting — which passes federal funds to public broadcasters — starting with a 25 percent reduction in CPB’s budget for next year, from $400 million to $300 million.
I don’t like all of Public Television. I could do without the endlessly repeated Wayne Dyer specials and the Lawrence Welk reruns. Watching Charlie Rose devolve into a corporate lapdog and Hollywood sycophant is disheartening. And while *Boobah* can be bizarrely fascinating, it’s also deeply disturbing on some primordial, lizard-brain level.
However, *The Newshour*, *Washington Week*, *Now*, and *Frontline* are among the last sources of honest news reportage in America.
Republicans want to kill them. Fast. Before another election cycle.
Gosh, what a surprise.
You may have heard the Downing Street memo mentioned once or twice, in passing, if you watch the news in America. Its significance, however, is rarely discussed by our so-called “liberal media.”
The “memo” actually consists of meeting minutes transcribed during the British Prime Minister’s meeting on July 23, 2002.
It leaves very little doubt that our Prosthedent lied to take this country to war.
Not a dream, not a hoax, not an imaginary tale.
This is the first *truly* intriguing piece of computer news I’ve read in years:
From John Dvorak’s PC Magazine
column:
Today’s announcement that Apple will be phasing itself to the Intel architecture comes as no surprise to this writer since it’s simply a smart move. …
I’ve never understood why the Mac nuts are in such denial over this platform shift. This change to Intel will not only save the platform but potentially drive it into a position of dominance. What will be lost, of course, is the niche and mystique aspect of the Mac which many of its users seem to relish as part of some misguided superiority complex.
A more interesting scenario to me is examining the possibility that Windows users can switch to the Mac OS on their Intel machines. Is this going to be possible?
Previously, we learned that…
Now, finally, we have a publication date. *Hard Time: Season 2* #1 will hit the stores in December, which means the solicitation should appear in *Previews* around September. DC decided, wisely I think, to wait until we had three issues completed before soliciting the book.
There’s still no word on whether *Hard Time* #7-12 will be collected as a trade paperback before then, but Joan, Mary, and I are all pushing for it. If you’d like to see this second TPB collection, let DC know. Post a message on the forums at DC’s website . I can’t promise it’ll help, but it certainly couldn’t hurt.
So — what are we planning for the new series?
We’ve spent the first year of *Hard Time* establishing the prison setting, Ethan’s place in it, and the characters in his orbit, both inside and outside the walls. We’ve seen him gain awareness of and begin (barely) to achieve some mastery over his psychic force manifestation, or khe-chara. Up to now, Ethan has been the only character whose crime we’ve portrayed, and even in his case, we know almost nothing about his life before the day of the Caulfield High School massacre.
In *Season 2*, we broaden and deepen our scope.
We’ll be looking at formative moments in the major characters’ pasts, especially those instants in time that changed each of their lives forever. For most of the inmates, of course, that moment relates to the crime that landed them in State Penitentiary. But even those on the outside — Ethan’s mother, his attorney, the girl named Red — conceal secrets that have altered the direction of their lives.
*Hard Time: Season 2* #1 retells the story of the Caulfield High School massacre in much greater depth. You’ll get new insights into Ethan’s character, a clearer picture of his friend Brandon (the other gunman), and you’ll see the events that led up to the cafeteria shooting. I’ll go out on a long, long limb and opine that this may be the most gut-wrenching single issue of a comic book I’ve ever written (or co-written, in this case). You have to go back thirty years, to “The Kid’s Night Out” in *Giant-Size Man-Thing* #4, to find a story that’s even comparable.
*Season 2* #2 reacquaints us with many of the characters from the first season, gives us a tour of State Penitentiary and a primer on its inmate economic system, and introduces a new antagonist for Ethan. His name is Cutter, and he’s hands-down the most *disturbing* character whose mind I’ve ever had to crawl into.
The third issue takes us out of the prison for an excursion into Red’s world, then brings us crashing back to the reality of Ethan’s captivity and the highly unsettling role Cutter will play in it.
Issue #4 explores the background of the series’ most controversial character, the irrepressible Cindy.
I did a lot of raving last year about Brian Hurtt’s art on *Hard Time*. I thought the work he did on Season 1 showed considerable storytelling skill and a perfect understanding of the mood and atmosphere of the series. I still think so.
Evidently, though, our hiatus proved reinvigorating for Brian, because he’s made a major leap forward in his development as an artist. The style of the art on *Season 2* is still very recognizably Brian’s, but he’s bringing a new ease and grace to the line work, a more confident hand. Mary and I have been ecstatic each time we’ve received a new batch of pages.
All of us — Mary, Brian, Steve, Joan, Rachel, and myself — are immensely proud of the work we’ve done so far on *Hard Time: Season 2*. If you enjoyed the first twelve issues, we think you’ll like this new series even more. If you missed the first twelve and, for some reason, don’t intend to pick up the trade paperback, that’s okay; we’ve made it very easy for you to come aboard with the first issue of *Season 2*. Consider this an invitation.
For any artist or writer, there’s always the temptation to oversell — or, in the interest of managing expectations, undersell — a new project.
I’ll stop here, in the hope I can’t yet be accused of either.
(But it’s good stuff, folks. Really, *really* good stuff.)
You have to love a site that calls itself “We Ain’t Cool.”
I have to love a site called “We Ain’t Cool” that runs a review of the Foolkiller maxi-series that’s as dead-on as this one is, even in its less-than-flattering moments.
You can probably find Foolkiller in the quarter bins at your local comics stores, on eBay, or as an illegal download on some BitTorrent site. However you go about locating it, I hope you like it as much as this reviewer did.
I’ve just been working on a couple of longish posts about the *Omega* flap and *Hard Time – Season 2*. I’ll be posting both in the next day or two.
