Japandex!!!

Japandex has begun!!!
As issue two of Spandex is partly set in Japan, I had the idea to organise a series of artwork in hom-age to Japanese movies and culture with a cheeky Spandex twist! I've had about 15 entries so far and they are all a-ma-zing. I'm so excited about it!
So forgive me if I take over this blog over the next month with these pics, but I love each and every one of them to bits!
So here's the first one - It was supposed to debut on 1 June, but I couldn't wait, so I'm a few hours early!

COSMO WHITE'S 'LUST IN TRANSLATION'
This is the first Japandex art-piece I received, so Cosmo gets the honour of being the first to get shown!
...I met Cosmo at last year's Birmingham comic con - I was actually doing portfolio sessions for my day job. His artwork is beautiful and the colouring is breath-taking - especially for me, I love blues and purples, and he uses a lot of those (so I loved the idea of him drawing Indigo).
When I came up with the idea to do Japandex, Cosmo was one of the first people I approached, and apparently this took him just a day to create - blimey!
Most people who have seen it absolutely love this pic - myself included.
If you'd like to know more, check out http://www.comicspace.com/cosmo/ and you can contact the man himself at cosmowhite@googlemail.com if you would like him to draw for you.

A quick Japandex note: I have around 20 artists working on drawings, but it'd be really nice to fill up the entire month of June. If you'd like to get involved I still have about 10 places left - please drop me a line at martrpeden@yahoo.co.uk

Tomorrow/2 June:
L'IL SPANDEX...

A week of ups and downs!

Wow what a weird week!
Finally, after a lot of hard work, I finished Spandex 2. The plan was to get it ready for Bristol and it really was tight (bearing in mind I had to pretty much finish it over a week before the con, so I could get a proof copy of the issue, and then get the printed copies).
But hurrah, I did it! The issue looks good I think. I only printed up 200 copies in case there was a disaster, and I have spotted a few tiny slips – nothing major – but I will correct those for the second printing.
So I made my merry way to the Bristol con – and…what a damp squib!! I used to go to Bristol back in the O Men days and it was great fun! So busy! But over the years, I started to sell less and less copies as the number of my issues increased, which is fair enough I guess. I’d heard that things had changed a lot, but didn’t realize how much! It’s all split up now – pro’s, dealers and signings are in the hot and sweaty Ramada hotel and the small press guys are round the corner hidden away on the 5th floor or the Mercure Hotel…
Our table was down a dead-end avenue, right in the far-back corner of the very back room lol! So on Saturday, maybe 30 people passed by our stall in total?? I’m used to a steady stream of 100s!! I mentioned my disappointment to the organizers, and they moved us further up the room on the Sunday, and it was maybe a bit busier, but really, they could have fit 10 times more people in. Apparently the event was sold out. Really? How many tickets did they sell? Ten?
But Bristol isn’t just about selling comics, it’s about the people too, and I had a right laugh! Was sitting next to ‘Samuel L Jackson’ all day on Saturday- what a geezer. And the bar on Saturday night was a riot.
But I was gutted that I almost broke my back carrying all my comics there, and almost broke my back and two legs carrying everything back with me again (along with all the comics I’d bought).
Anyway, I’m no moaner – I’ve given the organizers my feedback.
So I felt very ‘down’ after Bristol – only to find out today that I’ve been nominated for an Eagle Award! I cannot believe it! I didn't’ even get all my friends and family to vote for me!! I really don’t know how it happened. I’m in ‘Best British Colour Comic Book’ up against 2000AD, the DFC and Beano!!! Jeeeeez! How exciting! I’m not expecting to win, but it’s cool all the same, and I will try to rally some troops to vote for me!!!
Voting link is here if you fancy casting a li’l vote for moi!!
http://www.eagleawards.co.uk/vote.aspx

A rant about Lost

I love Lost. Such an incredible show, dark, edgy, intriguing, unpredictable.
So why is the current, final season such a piece of crap?
I really haven’t enjoyed it (and I’m not going to stop watching it after investing so many years in it!)
It’s all the writers’ fault. They have completely Lost it.
We used to be on the same wavelength as the writers, we used to trust them... But no longer.
This season is a mess! People just running around like they’re in an action movie, ‘answers’ being revealed in a really casual ‘didn’t you already know that you stupid viewer?’ way, and everything just generally being very samey. Lost isn’t an action movie. It shouldn’t have submarines in it or huge gun battles or Pantomime villains (I’m looking at you, Jim Robinson).
Let’s look at last night’s episode as an example. This is the one that’s on Sky tonight (‘The Candidate’), so avoid it til you’ve seen it, cos there are some really big spoilers!!
- Sun and Jin – in this one, we say goodbye to Sun and Jin, but it’s so contrived! There’s an explosion on the submarine, and somehow, while everyone else is standing there, Sun manages to get trapped behind a wardrobe and several tons of piping – which means she has to die!!! No one else gets trapped like that! C’mon writers, don’t treat us like morons.
- Sayid: Sayid, the Iraqui character, kills himself in a suicide-bombing incident... D’oh, bad idea, writers... So what happened to this huge subplot about him being some kind of weird zombie? Nothing, that’s what happened...
- Submarine: The Losties escape on a submarine (stupid submarine) and decide they can’t wait just 2 minutes for Claire to get on board too. Well, fuck you, Losties!
- The Smoke Monster now disguises himself as John Locke, and everyone seems to know this – so why do the (new and crap) Ohers decide to have a gun-fight with him? And how come Smoke Locke never does anything apart from stand around looking annoyed? Let’s see him transform!!
- When the sub explodes, near the bottom of the ocean, Jack manages to escape with an unconscius Sawyer, supposedly being able to get thru the sub’s hole with water pouring in, and being able to get Sawyer to breathe with an oxygen tank, even though he’s unconscious. Big fat Hurley also gets thru the same hole and manages to athletically escape with Kate in his arms. Yeah, right. And after this, in pitch black, Hurley/Kate are able to locate Jack/Sawyer immediately on the beach, cuz they just happened to swim to the exact same point... Gah!!! Stop it, writers! Yes, I know you need to get the characters into place, but honesly, stop treating us like morons!!!
And let’s look at the episode as a whole. A really dynamic episode, but this is Lost – it’s not the Poseidon Adventure. And wait a minute, yeah it’s exciting, but if you stop and think for a minute, you realise...again, nothing gets answered.
How many ‘answers’ have we had this season? Three! The numbers was answered in a quick fashion – and it’s an okay answer, I’ll give them that. The whispers were explained in a really casual way, almost as if the writers are saying ‘duh, didn’t you figure that out?’ And Jack’s dead dad ghost sitch was again answered in a really casual, throwaway manner, relating directly to a specific event from six years ago!! I can’t remember it, and also, I figured you’d already answered that one anyway.
Some people are saying ‘Lost isn’t about the answers, it’s about the drama.’ Bollocks! You create questions, you need to answer them! If I ever watch this series again, I know there will be dozens of moments when a question comes up that won’t ever get answered. Who was Miss Klugh? What was going on with Walt? Was Mikhail immortal? And I really wanted to see all of Danielle’s back-story (no, we didn’t get it all, as much as people say we did).
Maybe I’m wrong, maybe we’ll get loads of answers in the 2 and a half hour long finale, but at this point, I severely doubt it. And any writer that talks about the audience (who want answers) in such a dismissive way as this (in a recent interview) should be ashamed of themselves!!!:
It’s like when you spend time with a 3-year-old, you quickly find out that one question just begets another — there’s a “why” in the wake of every “why” — and the only way to end the conversation is to say, “Oh look, a Chuck E. Cheese!” The show is doing its best to say, “Oh look, Chuck E. Cheese!” For example, we’ve now given the viewers as much as we’re willing to say about the numbers, and we’re moving on.

Lost, you have two and a half hours to restore my faith in you – but I’m not holding my breath :(

Heeellp!!!

Helloooo helllp. Lol, I'm going slightly loopy. I've been working on Spandex 2 since before November... I'm on the home stretch now... But still bits to do. I'm hoping to launch it at the Bristol Expo (22 May) which means I need to get it finished a week before, so I can get a proof copy and get it printed. I think it's do-able. Man, is this normal though?? Past few weeks, I work all day at Titan, then come home and work from 7 til 12 on Spandex (also work at lunchtimes on it when I can). It is driving me slightly insane. Put it this way, I spent a year working on issue 1 and spent a MONTH when I finished it, just looking over and sorting out corrections! I haven't got a month to sort out corrections lol...
And I took the day off work today to work on it, got up at 7am - computer dies! Every time I bump it, it's been crashing (no I'm not hitting it, i just mean knock it slightly - but this time it wouldn't come on again. Went to PC World straight away, where the guy i need to talk to isn't there til 1pm - but miraculously my computer comes on lol! Luckily it's worked all day yippeee!
I gotta say though, this issue should be a doozy. There's a lot more depth to the art, I think, it's all a lot more fun. I think the one good thing about working on an issue for so long, is that the whole thing just develops and develops. The final version is leagues ahead of the original script. Every page has a million things going on. Even the ending - it originally ended at a certain point, but over time, I've taken it further and further, and I think it's really effective.
Can't wait for everyone to read it.

Iron Man 2...

Caught Iron Man 2 on Saturday (sounds like a disease...?)
Well it's entertaining enough, but worryingly flawed...
There didn't seem to be a story. I think they went for a sprawling epic tone a la Dark Knight, but failed miserably, because Whiplash isn't interesting enough, and my god... Justin Hammer... Sam Rockwell you are so annoying!!! Shut up!!!!!
aaargh!
There didn't seem to be much of a script, just a bunch of chuntering and mumbling... Didn't really like Don Cheadle as War Machine - he's not handsome enough - I preferred the other guy.
One of the things I really enjoyed though, was Scarlet J as Black Widow. I'm a sucker for chicks who fight, especially if they've got red hair (and especially if they have cool curly red hair!). She didn't do much, but I liked what she did - although I'm surprised Scarlet went for sch a cheese-cake type of role. Oh well, she fit her leather suit nicely. I don't really get the flak that Scarlet seems to get - no one seems to like her! I like her style - she's laidback. Take a chill pill guys, hehe.
Another highlight were the Extras - man, they over-acted their hearts out! Check them out if you haven't seen the movie yet - especially in the Whiplash v car racing scene.