Notes From The Cupboard Of Doom

I'm on the final slog to finish Stickleback - ten pages to complete by 2nd February, so I'm going to be spending most of my time locked in my little cubbyhole aka The Cupboard Of Doom. As a result, my blog postings may become even more irregular than usual for the next couple of weeks.

Part nine is another double episode (ten pages), with some real unexpected twists and a couple of absolute laugh-out-loud moments. Though Ian and I have been developing Stickleback for three years now, it's only when you get to the scripting stage that you really find out what the characters are going to be like. I just love what Ian has done with Stickleback himself; there's a strangely engaging willfully cheerful immorality to the character, as if Wilfred Bramble were playing the Antichrist.

False colour and finished-state versions of Stickleback Part 5 Page 5 Panel 2.
Stickleback is copyright © 2007 Rebellion/2000AD
Created by Ian Edginton & me.

In case I don't have the time next week, I thought I'd post advance warning that the groovy twisted-roots panel I blogged as a false-coloured image will be turning up in next week's 2000AD (Prog 1521, Stickleback Part 5).

I was also cheered to note that a few pages of Stickleback Part 3 printed a bit dark, and some of Part 4 printed a bit too light. This may seem like a really odd thing for an artist to say; the reason is that my hero Alberto Breccia had just the same problems with certain episodes of his classic strip Perramus, and sharing those problems makes me feel oddly reassured that I'm getting the technique right :-)