The Three-Headed Rat of Doom

First things first - I believe the new Fin Fang Four stories begin their online serialisation on Marvel Digital tomorrow (I'll update that link when I have an actual page to direct you towards). Last I heard, they were going to kick off with the Fin Fang Foom solo story, The Bald Truth, which is one of Scott Gray's finest and funniest.

Monday was a deadline cluster - a triple whammy of Nick Mag, Muppets and Inside Soap spot illustration. Like three rats with their tails tied together (I'm just tired enough for that metaphor to make perfect sense - it'll probably be a complete mystery to me tomorrow). Finished the second variant cover for Muppet Show #1, just squeaking in on the deadline - there may be tweaks before publication, but this is what'll go in the Previews catalogue for now.


And I should clear something up: there's an online press release which seems to suggest that I'm some sort of "supervisor" on the Muppets comics, which is not the case, I'm afraid. I'm just a schlepper with a pencil, and that's kind of the way I like it. Any and all supervision is coming from Boom Studios, Disney and the lovely Jim Lewis at the Henson company, while I sit in an attic all day, scratching away. (I blame this new laundry powder.) So if there are Muppet fans who are worried about what I might do to the characters we all know and love, please rest assured that I don't have anything like the kind of power that could do any serious damage. Frankly, I'm lucky to be allowed to cross the road by myself.

Disney Dribblings

It's my daughter's sixth birthday today. Blimey. Where did that go.

Just about finished the second of the short Captain America stories I'm writing for Marvel Adventures. This officially puts me ahead of schedule. Yay! It looks like Scott Gray will be writing the first 16 pages of each book now, which makes me very happy indeed. (He'll be doing the 21st Century Cap, I'm doing the World War Two stuff.) Scott's plot outlines look fantastic. I'll have to actually work at this.

For no reason at all, except that the magazine's been gone for long enough now that I don't think posting the illustrations here will make any waves, here's a piece I did for the defunct Disney Adventures. For a few months there I was their official credit masthead illustrator... fun job while it lasted. I've got a few more of these I'll post over the next little while.


Currently working on: Muppets, Nick Mag, Captain America, more or less in rotation. Plus I'm illustrating a two-page strip for Cthulhu Tales (did I spell that right?) which imagines H. P. Lovecraft's early, failed career as a writer of descriptive paragraphs for chocolate boxes, which is such a lovely idea I wish I'd thought of it myself.

Hands Up

Disney's crack team of thumb-twiddlers have finally given my first Muppet script the go-ahead, so things are finally moving. Moving at a slightly faster speed than I was prepared for, in fact. Boom Studios have decided to go with variant covers on the first issue, they want them both drawn by me, and they want them yesterday. Eek! Here's the first one in pencil form...


Boom, like Disney Adventures before them, have asked me to do the characters in my own style, but even so, there are some that simply don't work unless you get them just so (Miss Piggy being the most glaring example). I've tried my best to do them justice. But my god, I hope it gets easier. The last thing I want is a crowd of glove puppets outside my window carrying burning torches, the smell of hot foam rubber and felt scorching the night air.

Young Boris!

As promised, here's my "Young Boris" strip wot I did for Time Out. For non-UK readers, I think all you need to know to get up to speed is that Boris Johnson is the mayor of London, famous for howlingly politically-incorrect clunkers and coming across like a public school buffoon (the British call private schools "public schools" for some obscure reason I've forgotten). "The evil Doctor Livingstone" is the previous mayor, and was Boris' opponent in the mayoral elections. Ta-dah.

Vigil of the Mad and other stories

I should like to draw your attention to the recently-released Giant-Sized X-Men: First Class #1, which features two pages written and drawn by me. The brief was to do something involving Charles Xavier as a kid in a Village of the Damned/Midwich Cuckoos type scenario, which I ended up doing in the style of Edward Gorey. Why? I don't know.

Something I keep forgetting to mention: I've got a piece in the upcoming Fantagraphics book, Beasts! Book 2. I draw Spring-Heeled Jack. The book promises to be a thing of beauty by all accounts, featuring a veritable Who's Who (or in my case Who's That) of alt-comix talent.

Last but not least, I've been working on the cover to next year's Fin Fang Four special this week. Continuing with the Silver Age theme established on the first one-shot, here's where it's at right now...


This one makes me stupidly happy for some reason.