Wednesday, October 14, 2009

Big Apple Comic Con 01 _ FROZEN DARK

On October 16 and 17 I will be sharing a table with Juan Doe at this year's Big Apple Comic Con in NYC. For the occasion, I will be handing out limited copies of Frozen Dark a horror short that I produced with Swifty Lang and Chris Mangun of Blacklight Comics. We created it as part of an anthology but Chris is printing an edition right now as a mini-comic for the show.

The story originated from an anecdote Chris told about his trip to China. He spun it like a campfire tale with an effective, familiar, hook: when you're a kid, it's really scary to have to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night. In this case, the bathroom is an outhouse, and the kid is an orphan residing in a Buddhist monastery.

From there, the three of us brought our abilities forward to make every line and panel matter. Swift added an underlying poetry and worldview to reflect the teachings and myths our hero was immersed in as he traveled his arc. At the same time, Chris pressed for the cruel social dynamics of boys of that age.

My goal was to make sure that, as a short story, there was a rhythm to the way the information unfolded and an interplay between word an image that was more evocative than literal.

All said, we hoped to elicit the chill of a good ghost story while delivering on a subtext worthy of The Twilight Zone.

Swing by my table for a copy if you are at the con. Otherwise, we'll look to post it as a PDF in the coming weeks.

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