Here we go again, Mr. 2022

An edition about piles of manga books, some SciFi movies and dirty crime cheap novels

WELCOME TO THE FIRST EDITION OF 2022!

I hope this new year bring better things and some sense of normality. I hope you enjoyed your holidays.

UNTIL MY KNUCLES BLEED #2 SOLICITATIONS

The issue 2 of my new superheroe/crime series, published by Behemot, is available for pre-order, so ask to your favourite retailer.
https://www.previewsworld.com/Catalog/DEC211427

I chatted with the people of Previewsworld about the series, its origins and the figure of the 90s superhero:
previewsworld.com/Article/256505

Let’s continue with those little things that make us happy…

MANGA PORN (NO TENTACLES EDITION)

I had a newsletter edition of 2020 showing photos of my studio, and I must say I love to take a look into the other artists’ den, how they distribute their workspace and obviously, snoop into their shelves and see what artbooks and comics and movies they own. Oh, how we love the shelves porn…
This time, I took some photos of my manga books shelves (you we’ll see non-manga books too, but you know, I don’t live in a store).

Manga has been a huge influence in my work. I was born in 1977, so the Anime and Manga blew my mind when I was a teen and has been a part of my development as a creator, and it’s something I share with artists from over the world. It’s exciting how I can chat hours and hours with a friend from Texas or Paris about Yoshiaki Kawajiri’s best action pieces or the new Dragonball Super movies.

WRITING FOR GROWN-UP CHILDREN (OR INFANTILIZED ADULTS)

In the previous “regular” newsletter I wrote about how I thought there was a part of the audience who wanted adult contents in their stories but later, these adult unpleasant contents, creating disturbing feelings and rejection in them. I want to connect this with other thoughts I have, this time blaming the creator: What happens when you write undervaluing your audience to the extreme?

These holidays I tried to watch movies from my “to-watch-pile” of blu-rays and streaming platforms I’m paying for.  I began to watch Infinite in Prime Video, a movie with an interesting concept (people able to remember their past lives and their acquired skills). The movie begins with a long exposition of a voice over explaining “This a world where people can do this and this and there are two factions…” Absolute-Red-Flag. And all the magic of discovering this new universe is ruined. But during the story, characters constantly stop to tell you about this premise over and over again.

I really think the original script was better until a bunch of suits expressed their concerns: “Audience is going to be texting and checking Instagram, we need to repeat it every ten minutes to be sure they understand what’s happening.” I don’t know, or maybe they considered the audience is directly stupid.

Honestly, I couldn't finish it. I’m not sure if the movie improves but reading some reviews, it doesn't look like it. But my body asked for SciFi, so I began another movie in the same streaming service, Prospect. And I loved it. The movie introduces you, step by step, in the story of a father and a daughter. They are freelance prospectors in a society where planets are basically sources of raw materials. For them, this is their routine, their everyday, they don’t need to verbalise their actions, and you put tighter every piece of the puzzle of their private universe. It’s a low budget movie but with a lot of good ideas, a kind of “Gold Rush Western” translated to a distant future.

I’m not saying that low budget movies are better than the blockbusters… I say that if you consider your potential readers/viewers a bunch of idiots, you will make worse stories.

SOME RECOMMENDATIONS

I’m trying to use my smartphone in different ways. Instead of checking the social network all day, I’ve become used to reading in the kindle app, mainly noir anthologies and novellas (with the additional problem that I skipped my subway stop more than once)
My phone right now:

I have discovered some interesting writers online, and I highly recommend you Tom Leins and Paul Heatley. Heatley’s novel Cutthroat is a British take of Parker novels, a heist-and-revenge tale with some unexpected (and well done) twists. And Tom Leins’ Paignton Noir Misteries is a series of novellas/novelettes/short novels/long tales (I don’t know how to define them) where the brutal P.I. Joe Rey investigates the best way he knows: smashing skulls. If you are a fan of Garth Ennis and Warren Ellis’ more over-the-top comics, Leins is your man.

And speaking about phones, my good friend and editor Jim Gibbons recommended in one of his wonderful newsletters using google docs and your phone because guys, the phone is an excellent word processor where you can write your dialogues, treatments and pitches online and fix them on your computer later. I began to use it during my travels to conventions as a tool to note ideas for pitches, story structures, characters bios…. But maybe this is a subject for another newsletter…

See you soon!
Victor

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