Patrick Shand

It’s the eleventh hour. Four days left until Zenescope’s Grimm Fairy Tales: The Animated Series Kickstarter is either funded or not funded. The goal is $175,000 and they’re currently at $148,573. That’s a giant number, but it needs to be a bit beefier before this project gets greenlit. Take a second to click on the link and read up on it.

All caught up? Good.

Okay, so I know what you’re thinking. Of course I’m saying support the Zenescope Kickstarter. Zenescope pays me to write comic books that I’d be reading even if I were involved in the process at all. I will say this, though - I am not even slightly involved in the Grimm Fairy Tales Animated Series project. I found out about it when you did. I donated my money and I have been promoting it because I want it to happen. It’s a show I want to see. It’s good for Grimm Fairy Tales as a series. It’s good for Zenescope.

It’s good for independent comics.

If people watch and like the series, they’ll seek out the comics. They’ll go into the comic shop specifically for non-Big Two titles - and that’s what initially brought me into the shop. Looking for Angel comics from IDW. Now, my pull list has grown and I make it a point to support indie comics over and above all else. I believe this series will get more people into the comic shop the same way The Walking Dead has, and I like that. I like that as a comic book writer and I love that as a comic book fan.

So if you have a few extra dollars, consider throwing it toward this Kickstarter.

If you have $100 and choose to send it toward the Kickstarter, I will send you a signed copy of every Zenescope comic I do this year, starting in June. I’ve already got a bunch on deck. I’ll offer this to five people who support the Kickstarter with new donations of $100 or more. You can message me on Tumblr, Twitter, Facebook, or Blogger. Send me a screenshot of your Kickstarter confirmation, and we’ll start talking!*

*This is in addition to the rewards that Zenescope itself offers.

A few hours or so ago, I finished reading the first issue of Brian K. Vaughan’s new series, Saga. He co-created it with Fiona Staples, who always does great work… but if I’m being honest here, I showed up to the party primarily for BKV. I often go back and forth about who my absolutely favorite comic book writer is, and I almost always settle on either Brian K. Vaughan or Alan Moore. Nick Spencer, Scott Snyder, Brian Lynch, Joss Whedon - they’re all up there, for sure, but BKV’s work on Y: The Last Man, Ex Machina, and Runaways has completely changed the way I look at comics as a medium and perhaps even the way I look at storytelling. BKV is a master, and this is the first time that I’ve had the privilege of following one of his comics from the first issue on the day of its release.

Saga gets off to a great start. Perhaps the best start of all of BKV’s series. While his other series often take a few issues to fully live up to their premise, I’m already invested in the strange characters that populate the world(s) that BKV and Staples have created. The seeds of many interesting ideas have been planted, and a lot of it hits home in really weird ways because I’m working on a book called Roadkill with Ian McGinty (my Blood Pong co-creator) that has a few similar themes. Romance in the midst of an intergalactic war is nothing new, I suppose, but I’m ecstatic and absolutely relieved that BKV’s version is nothing like my own. There’s nothing scarier than when the best writer in comics announces that he’s doing a new series with a concept similar to something you’re working on.

Anyway, that aside, the writing here is as excellent as I’d hoped and (frankly) expected. Especially the stuff with Prince Robot IV. That character (an alien whose head looks like a TV screen - he may or may not suffer from erectile dysfunction) proves that those worried about BKV’s normally pop-culture infused writing suffering in this aliens-only story can breathe easy. Vaughan’s strength is that all these characters, no matter how alien they get (and man, they get alien as all fuckout), have insecurities that we can relate to… but through the screens of fully fleshed out alien cultures.

It’s too early to say “Saga is great and will revolutionize comics,” but I think this first issue has come at a great time. Image Comics seems to be attempting to prove that the comics industry has talent, that creator owned books are the future, and that the line should remain drawn at $2.99.

And hell - I’m with it.

-Patrick Shand