AND HERE ARE THE THREE PAGES LETTERED, THERE ARE A COUPLE OF MISTAKES BUT AS I’M TRAVELLING I ‘LL HAVE TO WAIT TO CORRECT THEM. HERE THEY ARE WARTS AND ALL.
Category Archives: Comic Writing
Angels & Dreadfuls Prologue: Colours
And here’s those pages coloured and detailed…cheers Paul:
Filed under Comic Writing
DREADFULS AND ANGELS
OKAY, THIS MAY NEVER SEE THE LIGHT OF DAY. IT’S SOMETHING THAT WAS CAST DOWN AS A CHALLENGE AND I’VE PLANNED IT AS A TRILOGY OF GRAPHIC NOVELS, IT’S PRETTY MUCH THE HISTORY OF COMIC BOOKS FROM THE PENNY DREADFUL TO THE FLIMSIES WE ALL KNOW AND LOVE TODAY. WHETHER IT WILL EXTEND TOWARDS DIGITAL PUBLISHING–I DON’T KNOW. IT’S A STORY ABOUT A STORY, BUT IT’S A DIABOLICAL STORY–MWUHAHAHAHAHAHAHA–*AHEM* . ANYWAY, HERE’S THE FOUR PAGE PROLOGUE:
PROLOGUE
PAGE 1
3 panel Page. Panel one taking up half the Page. Panels 2 and 3 dropped in at the bottom. Credits etc. at the top of page.
PANEL 1: A wintery British day we are looking upwards from the ground on a busy shopping street somewhere in the UK. London actually, Charing Cross Road to be exact we can see the shops and stuff behind and around him, bookshops a Subway. We are focused on a young man with wild cut hair of varying lengths. He has a longish face and he is hunched into his leather jacket his hands thrust under his armpits whilst around him the world is scurrying around doing their business wrapped in scarves and overcoats. He is just over 6” tall and about 25 years old. It’s afternoon and the light is beginning to fail.
CAPTION: I’LL ALWAYS REMEMBER THE DAY I WALKED INTO THE BOOKSHOP JUST OFF CHARING CROSS ROAD. IF I’D KNOWN THEN THAT IT WOULD BE THE SINGLE MOST SIGNIFICANT OCCURRENCE OF MY LIFE, MAYBE I WOULD’VE TURNED AROUND AND GONE FOR A PINT.
PANEL 2: Backshot of the young man(ADAM) standing in a dusty shop doorway, one of those alcove doors, set back in shadow, a dim light can be seen through the dirty window of the shop door. Inscribed in faded gold leaf “A. HARMSWORTH & SON rare books & stamps”., his arm and hand outstretched to the brass handle that would open the door of the shop.
CAPTION: I REALISE HINDSIGHT IS 20/20 AS THEY SAY AND I WAS JUST EAGER TO GET MY HANDS ON SOMETHING I’D HEARD OH-SO MUCH ABOUT BUT NEVER SEEN..
PANEL 3: The door opens onto a musty interior. This is POV from the Punk’s perspective, we can see his hand and arm on the door knob. We are looking into the interior of one of those old bookshops (do they still exist?) piled high with dusty books on “Swan-tupping in the Upper Silesian everglades” or “Fly Fishing by J.R. Hartley”. They’re piled everywhere. The counter is small and class with rows of stamps on display trays with a few choice books open at significant pages under the glass. Columns of bookshelves rise up to the high ceiling behind the counter, stuffed with books. There is a wee old man behind the counter, he is hunched wearing a cardy has a bald head with a ring of longish hair around the baldness. He has a pair of pince-nez perched on the tip of his long, hawkish nose. He looks up as Adam (the Punk) walks in.
SFX: TING!
HARMSWORTH: AHH ADAM. A NICE SURPRISE–I PRESUME YOU RECEIVED MY TELEPHONE CALL?
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PAGE 2
A 5 Panel Page. 1 to 4 in the top half and panel 5 along the bottom of the page. This is all the interior of the bookshop.
PANEL 1: A side view, Adam is now at the counter one hand resting on the countertop and the other still thrust into the pocket of his leather jacket, Mr. H is obviously on the other side.
ADAM: HI MR. H. YEAH I FLEW INTO LONDON YESTERDAY BUT I’VE ONLY MANAGED TO GET AWAY THIS AFTERNOON. DO YOU HAVE IT?
MR. H: MY, MY. WE ARE THE ANXIOUS ONE, AREN’T WE?
PANEL 2: This is slightly from behind Mr. H has turned away from Adam and is going to pick something up from the shelf behind him. We can see Adam’s face in profile.
ADAM: YEAH, WELL I’VE SPENT A LOT OF TIME LOOKING FOR THIS AND I’M A BIT ANTSY ABOUT GETTING MY HANDS ON IT. YOU’RE SURE IT’S GENUINE?
MR H: OH YES. I HAVE PROVENANCE.
PANEL 3: Mr H has turned back to Adam. There is a malevolent smile on his lips, but Adam doesn’t seem to notice as his eyes are on the book that is in Harmsworth’s hands. For Mr H is holding a book that is busting it’s binder, little bits of paper hanging out in a few places, it is very old.
MR. H: HERE WE ARE THEN. THE LAST JOURNAL OF FREDERICK ANSTEY, THOUGHT LOST BUT NOW FOUND AGAIN.
ADAM: AT LAST! YOU REALLY DON’T KNOW HOW MUCH THIS MEANS TO ME MR. H.
MR H: OH BUT I THINK I DO—OH YES I REALLY THINK I DO.
PANEL 4: Adam is walking out of the shop, the journal under his arm.
ADAM: THE USUAL ARANGEMENT MR. H.?
MR. H: ALREADY PUT ON THE ACCOUNT ADAM. HAVE FUN.
MR. H: OH YES, THERE’S SOME SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL I DUG UP WHEN LOOKING FOR THE JOURNAL, IT’S AT THE BACK OF THE BOOK.
PANEL 5: This is a shot of St. Giles High Street from Tottenham court road as you come under the centrepoint or whatever it’s called nowadays. You have that wee road that comes round and the church on your right, then runs down towards Shaftsbury avenue. Adam is walking towards the pub with his book under his arm, we are looking from behind.
CAPTION: I DO MY BEST THINKING IN PUBS, WHETHER IT O’REILLEYS DOWN ON 4TH AND 23RD IN NEW YORK OR HERE IN THE ANGEL, ST GILES I GET SOME SERIOUS READING DONE. MOSTLY BECAUSE NEITHER PUBS HAVE MUSIC.
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PAGE 3
A 4 PANEL PAGE:
PANEL 1: ADAM is walking into the pub. Mike the landlord is behind the bar, there are a couple of customers scattered about the wee tables. Mike recognizes Adam and begins pouring a pint of bitter.
CAPTION: I’D BEEN COMING HERE FOR ABOUT TEN YEARS. MIKE’S BEEN THE LANDLORD HERE AS LONG AS I’VE BEEN COMING IN, HE’S FROM MANCHESTER—BUT HE SAYS HE PREFERS LONDON. I DO TOO I THINK.
MIKE: EH UP ADAM! HOW’S IT GOIN’ DIDN’T EXPECT TO SEE YOU SO SOON.
ADAM: HIYA MIKE. WELL I HAD SOME BUSINESS OVER HERE, YOU KNOW ME.
PANEL 2: Adam is taking his pint over to a corner table, we see him waist up from the front, Mike and the bar behind him. Mike is smiling his big landlord smile. Adam already has the journal open and is carrying his pint in one hand.
CAPTION: MR. H SAID ABOUT “SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL”. IT’S HERE AT THE BACK OF THE BOOK. IT LOOKS A LOT NEWER THAN THE REST OF THE JOURNAL, KINDA SLOTTED INTO THE BACK OF THE BOOK.
CAPTION: PROBABLY MR. H HIMSELF THAT TUCKED IT IN THERE. THAT WAS THOUGHTFUL OF HIM.
PANEL 3: Adam is now sitting in the corner his back wedged into the curved part of the seat, his leather jacket lying along the right hand wing of the seat. It’s a mid-week day so there probably won’t be many customers in, but it’s a way of distancing others from himself.
CAPTION: SO HERE WE ARE AT LAST THEN. THE JOURNAL OF FREDERICK ANSTEY– NOTED PUBLISHER OF PENNY BLOODS AND ERSTWHILE MEMBER OF THE “TEMPLE OF MITHRA”. GRANDAD WOULD’VE BEEN PROUD OF ME—THAT I DO KNOW.
PANEL 4: we are looking at Adam from a distance now, his attention drawn by the journal, we are going back in time. The lettering should be handwriting as this is the journal:
CAPTION: REDBOURNE HOUSE, HARPENDEN, OCT. 31ST 1888. I, FREDERICK ANSTEY MUST NOW RELATE TO YOU THE TERRIBLE DEEDS THAT I AND OTHERS HAVE PERPETRATED THESE LAST FEW WEEKS.
CAPTION: I MUST LEAVE BEHIND THIS RECORD AS A WARNING TO OTHERS WHO MAY ALSO SEEK TO WALK THE PATHS THAT WE HAVE WALKED IN OUR FOLLY. THE STORM GROWS OUTSIDE AND I FEAR THAT MY SOUL WILL BE FOR DAMNATION THIS NIGHT.
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Filed under Comic Writing
SHADRACH AND JONES: NINJA CHERUBS
HERE’S ANOTHER PITCH THAT I FINISHED UP TODAY. I HAD THE IDEA FOR THIS ABOUT 20 YEARS AGO (THOUGH THEY WEREN’T NINJA CHERUBS AT THE TIME) AND SORT OF LIKED THE IDEA. I DECIDED TO WORK UP A PITCH AND DO A SIX PAGE STORY. HERE’S A VERY ROUGH FIRST DRAFT.
SHADRACH AND JONES: NINJA CHERUBS
PAGE 1
A THREE PANEL PAGE: All the panels running the width of the page. It’s night and in the city, this is a kind of Frank Miller cityscape. SHADRACH AND JONES are two cherubim who have been thrown out of heaven for being naughty, but because they are cherubim they are not exiled into Hell but down to Earth. here they must save a soul a day for 100 years and then they might…might I say…be let back in though the Pearly Gates. A little character description of our two heroes. SHADRACH is the really tough one, he looks a little like BABY HERMAN from Roger Rabbit, even down to the stogie(can we have characters smoking?), but he’s a Baby Herman that has been reimagined by some Manga artist and then filtered through the spirit of Kirby. 5 O’clock shadow and derby perched on his head, he has a real attitude. JONES is the more timid of the duo, but don’t take his timidity for cowardice, towards the end of the story his dander is raised and it’s he who saves the day. JONES: Is the “sweet” one, he got mixed up in this because of his loyalty to his friend Shadrach. BOTH will be dressed in trunks(not nappies please) and be sporting dinky little wings, just like in Raphael’s paintings. These are not the kruvim of the Old Testament but the Putti of the Rennaisance and beyond! The feel should be a mix of cartoony and hyper-reality, backgrounds influenced by Adams and Miller.
P1:We are looking across a flat rooftop at a city skyline at night.
CAPTION:NIGHT’S VELVET BLACKNESS ENFOLDS THE CITY IN IT’S PICEOUS SHADOWS.
P2:THE SAME, but now we see two pairs of dinky little feet are dropping down into the panel, one pair on our left could be a little dirty.
CAPTION: BUT THE NIGHT ALWAYS BRINGS STRANGE VISITORS, AND TONIGHT TWO ASTOUNDING DEFENDERS ARE ABOUT THEIR BUSINESS.
P2: OK we are looking up across the parapet and it is lit from beneath causing highlights and shadows on the two figures from below. A classic BATMAN and ROBIN pose, but this is SHADRACH and JONES. Shadrach is slightly crouched with his left foot on the head of a gargoyle his hands in a “karate killer” type pose. JONES is dropping down to his left and slightly behind, just like ROBIN dropping in behind BATMAN. (There’s a Mike Zeck picture of Batman and Robin kinda in this pose but I can’t find it).
CAPTION:THE NIGHT DECANTS…
CAPTION: …SHADRACH AND JONES:NINJA CHERUBS!!
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PAGE 2
4 PANEL PAGE: This is mainly on the rooftop but I’ll give individual panel descriptions.
P1: We are looking slightly above and behind the duo. Shadrach is chomping on his stogie as he looks across the gulf between the building they are on and the building across the way. We can see the cars in the streets below, he has his hands on his hips as he is looking across at the window of an apartment in the opposite building, the lights are on and the curtains are open.
CAPTION: HERE WE FIND OUR DIMINUTIVE HEROES CONTEMPLATING A NEW CHALLENGE.
JONES: SHADRACH? IS THIS THE PLACE SHADRACH?
SHADRACH.: YEAH. NOW SHUT YER YAP!
P2: We are looking back up at the pair, Shadrach tilts his battered derby a little more and blows a cloud of smoke from the side of his mouth.
CAPTION: THE TWO EXPULSED FROM HEAVEN AND CHARGED WITH SAVING A SOUL A DAY FOR ONE HUNDRED YEARS…
SHADRACH: MICKY THE FINK KNEW WHAT THIS WAS, HE PASSED ON THE DOPE TO ME.
JONES: MICHAEL? I HAVEN’T SEEN HIM IN AN AGE.
CAPTION: …THAT WAS LAST THURSDAY!
P3: We are looking across at the opposite window, through it we can see a woman putting a young child down on the floor, she’s obviously his mother, the child is about 18 months to 2 years old. He has dark hair and is wearing kiddie clothes. We can see that his room is filled with kids toys and posters and a cot-like thing against one wall to the side of the door and a chest of drawers on the other side of the door. Perhaps we could see this scene framed by Shadrach’s and Jones’ heads one on each side in silhouette.
CAPTION: A SOUL TO BE SAVED.
JONES: SO SHE’S THE ONE!
SHADRACH: NOPE, NOT HER, THE KID… LOOK THERE’S THE DEMONIC LITTLE BEGGER.
P4: A zoom into the part of the room where the chest of draws is and we can see three scaly fingers wrapping round the edge of the chest of draws and a head about halfway up the height and it is reddish and scaley wand has a couple of wee horns and we can also see a bit of its toothy mouth spread in a grin, maybe a bit of slobber. The baby has stopped playing with whatever toy it had been playing with to look up smiling at his new friends arrival.
CAPTION: KOBAL! LESSER-DEMON OF THE SIXTH RING HAS BEGUN TO STRIKE A BARGAIN.!
SHADRACH(OP): DAMN! WE’RE ALMOST TOO LATE. C’MON JONESY!
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PAGE 3
5 PANEL PAGE. This is the beginning of the fight scene.
P1: A MID-RANGE VIEW: we can see the demon KOBAL walking across the bedroom towards the toddler, the toddler is holding out his arms to embrace this new and strange toy. KOBAL is short and dumpy with a pot belly. He is covered in scales (as he’s a demon…duh!) and he has clawed feet and hannds. A bulbous little head with tiny ears and little horns. his mouth as we have seen previously is in a permanant grin and there are sharp teeth, lots of sharp teeth.
KOBAL: COME TO POPPA YA WEE DARLIN’!
KID: POOPAAA! GOO..HEE HEE HEE!
P2: Here we are looking slightly above and down on KOBAL as he looks up in shock at the window beside them, his arms still outstretched. He’s in a half-shadow as SHADRACH AND JONES are swinging into action.
KOBAL: UH-OH!
P3: This is an upshot as we see SHADRACH and JONES coming in through the window, in yet again another pose reminiscent of B&R, the window’s open so there’s no noise to alert the mother.
SFX: SCHWIIIP!! SCHWIIING!!
P4: We are looking from floor level we can see S&J’s feet and legs and KOBAL and the KID in the back looking towards them.
CAPTION: OUR INTREPID HEROES ARE HERE TO SAVE THE DAY.
KOBAL: DAMN YOU SHADRACH AND JONES!
KID: GOO GOO, GAA GAA!
P5: We are looking from an elevated level. KOBAL is now running towards S&J to engage them in combat, the two are in a fighting stance and KOBAL has his arms and claws extended. The KID is sat on his tush watching the action unfold.
KOBAL: RRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAHHHHRRRRRR!!!
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PAGE 4
Okay, this is the fight scene, all you need to remember is that these are two ninja cherubs so they will have an assortment of ninja weapons, nun chucks, stars, katanas etc. keep the action flowing in a zigzag format down the page from left to right, right to left, left to right. There should be a well delineated last panel which is of KOBAL holding the KID up by one leg, ready to dump him out of the window. He looks with a smirk at the two cherubim as the kid is dangled out the window.
KOBAL: C’MON THEN YOU MOOKS…I DARE YAH!
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PAGE 5
6 PANEL PAGE
P1: A head and shoulders shot of S&J, shocked looks on their faces, particularly JONES’
CAPTION: THE DIDACTIC DUO ARE IN A FIX. KOBAL CHUCKED IN DANGER TO THE MIX.
JONES: NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!
P2: We see JONES leaping towards the KID as he is falling out the window. KOBAL has dropped him. He stands with his hand open and we see the KID’S legs as they fall past the sill.
KOBAL: WHOOPS!
P3: We are looking from inside the room towards SHADRACH and KOBAL as SHADRACH leaps towards the demon intent on wringing his neck.
SHADRACH: WHY YOU…!
P4: A close up on SHADRACH and KOBAL. SHADRACH has the demon by the neck and is drawing his fist back to punch out his lights.
SFX (OP): FLUTTER-FLUTTER-FLUTTER
P5: We see JONES framed by the window with the KID cradled in his left arm and a katana in his right hand pointing downwards. SHADRACH and KOBAL are looking up at him, he seems to be in a righteous light and he has an extremely grim look on his face.
KOBAL: UH-OH!
P6: We are looking from behind JONES and a little to the side so that we can see his face as he hands the KID to SHADRACH.
JONES: EXCUSE ME-COULD YOU HOLD HIM PLEASE SHADRACH?
SHADRACH: UH- SURE!
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PAGE 6
OK I NEED YOU (WHOEVER THE ARTIST MAY BE) TO LOOK AT THIS FROM THE DESIGN SIDE. THIS IS A SEVEN PANEL PAGE WITH PANELS 1 TO 6 ARRAYED IN THE TOP HALF OF THE PAGE, WITH PANEL 7 BEING A LARGE PANEL AT THE BOTTOM. Panels 1 to 4 is basically the same panels in design, but with the expressions of the two characters ( SHADRACH and the KID) changing in accordance with the pasting that JONES is giving KOBAL.
P1: SHADRACH has the KID in his arms as he’s wating the fight which is going on in silhoutte at the foreground of the panel. These panels can be head and shoulders shots of SHADRACH and the KID. The shadows of the two combatants are going from one side of the panel to the next. Try to makle the expressions as cartoony and funny as you can.
JONES: TAKE THAT YOU SWINE!
KOBAL: OOF!
P2: DITTO
KOBAL:AARGH!!
JONES: HAVE AT THEE HELLSPAWN!
P3: DITTO
KOBAL: NO! NO! NO! NOOOO!
JONES: COME ON YOU SISSY!
P4: DITTO
KOBAL: AAAAAAAARRRRGGGLLLEEEE!!!!
JONES: HA!
P5: This is a shot of JONES kneeling above KOBAL his katana held in both hands as he readies for the killing blow.
CAPTION: MILD MANNERED JONES NOW BRINGS AN END TO THE DEMON SPAWN KOBAL AND SENDS HIM BACK TO HIS OWN QUITE CORNER OF DAMNATION.
P6: This is a shot as JONES brings the katana down with both hands an almost diabolical look on his face. KOBAL’S hands come up into the frame jerked up by the killing blow.
JONES: CHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII!!!
KOBAL: AAAAARRGGHHHH!
P7: THIS TAKES UP THE BOTTOM OF THE PAGE BLEEDING UPWARDS BEHIND THE OTHER PANELS. We see the two cherubs flying up and out of the window, in perspective, the brightly lit window behind them, the KID looking up at them in adoration, the two flying upwards beside each other the cityscape behind them and the bulk of the apartment building too. in the middle of the floor there stands the katana piercing a cloud of smoke that is rising around it and dissipating.
CAPTION: ONCE AGAIN OUR INTREPID HEROES HAVE SAVED ANOTHER SOUL FROM THE CLUTCHES OF THE DEMON HOARDES – ANOTHER SOUL THAT WILL GO ON TO INSPIRE.
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Filed under Comic Writing
WAR OF THE THARIAN
OK, SO HERE’S ANOTHER STORY, FIRST DRAFT THEREOF. I’VE TRIED TO GO FOR A CELTIC FEEL HERE AND AN UPDATE OF THE “KID SUCKED INTO THE FANTASY WORLD” THEME. I HAVE BEEN A FAN OF WRITERS LIKE ALAN GARNER, SUSAN COOPER(BUT NOT THAT HORRIFIC FILM BASED ON “THE DARK IS RISING”), C.S.LEWIS AND THE LIKE, AND IN MY DAY SHOWS LIKE DOCTOR WHO, THE TOMORROW PEOPLE AND THE WONDERFUL BBC ADAPTION OF “TOM’S MIDNIGHT GARDEN” WAY BACK IN THE 70s. THIS IS A KIND OF HOMAGE TO THEM…WHO KNOWS WHAT YOU WILL ENCOUNTER, THROUGH THE ALWAYS LOCKED DOOR, THE OLD BOMB SITE OR THE BACK OF A WARDROBE.
WAR OF THE THARIAN
PAGE 1
6 PANELS: here we have the set up, for this to be a 6 page self-contained story I’m going to have to get in a lot of crap on captions. The set up is a suburban bedroom in a quiet suburban estate somewhere in the home counties. It’s a boys bedroom. The boy is sat playing on a Y-BOX ( copyright and all that you know) some kind of RPG, let’s make it a medieval one. The boy’s about 14, he’s dressed in jeans and a t-shirt(how do 14-year old boys dress in the UK today?), his bedroom is typically tidy as boy’s bedrooms generally are (that’s irony you know…ain’t I clever? He’s sat in his swivel type executive chair, lounging back his leg flopped over the chair arm. The door to his room is slightly ajar and to his right, our left. Bed, bookshelves and posters.
P1: SEE ABOVE
CAPTION: TODAY’S THE DAY THAT MICHAEL BARRETT’S LIFE CHANGES FOR EVER!
MUM(OP): MICHAEL, I’M OFF TO WORK. THERE’S SANDWICHES BY THE BREAD BIN AND POP IN THE FRIDGE.
MICHAEL: OK MUM, MIND HOW YOU GO AND I’LL SEE YOU IN THE MORNING’.
P2:The same but we are looking from behind MICHAEL so we can see the screen of the monitor and what he’s playing. It is a fantasy RPG, based around celtic legends. His character is in a castle hall and we can see it fighting with a load of other “knights” on the dais is a Princess (RHONWEN)
SFX: clash! swish! bloop! bleep!
P3: A front on close up of MICHAEL, his face illuminated by the lights from the monitor, we can see that his eyelids are getting heavier.
RHONWEN(FROM THE MONITOR SCREEN): WAKE UP SIR MICHAEL! WE HAVE NEED OF THEE!
P4: A SIDE SHOT so that we can see MICHAEL´S reaction and RHONWEN on the screen.
MICHAEL: WHAT? EH? WHASSAT?
RHONWEN: LOOK SHARP SIR MICHAEL. PRESS X,O,Y
P5: MICHAEL looks down at his game console and presses the three buttons, we see his body begin to dissipate and a long line of sparkly, swirly stars starts pouring into the games console. He is being transported to the world of the THARIAN.
MICHAEL: WOOOOOAAAHHHHH!!!!!!!
P6: MICHAEL has landed with a bump on the floor of the castle hall that he recently was playing outside in the real world.
MICHAEL: OOF!
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PAGE 2
5 PANELS: We’ve dropped into the action so it has to reAlly flow, I’ve said 5 panels but whatever makes it easier for the artist to get that fluidity the better. But we’re in the throne room. Michael has been thrust in mid-fight. He’s in his own clothes but there are some slight differences. The “Knights” that had appeared as yer basic medieval knights on the game screen are now a little rougher around the edges; their armour almost appearing to be made up of found material. RHONWEN is standing on the throne with her sword upraised in the air. She is wearing a jerkin and leggings and her long red hair is tied back in a braid that hangs down her back. she also has a shield on her arm. The whole seen is lighted by torches in sconces on the wall and the big roaring fire in a fireplace off to the side. There are many tapestries and wall coverings and their are rushes on the floor.
P1: This is a wide shot of RHONWEN on the throne slicing and dicing the foolish knoghts who have come to abduct her. MICHAEL is kneeling on the floor picking up a fallen sword and shield and he is rising.
RHONWEN: C’MON SIR MICHAEL. HAVE AT THE SIR KNIGHT AND LET’S PUT THESE BEGGARS TO THE ROUT!
MICHAEL: IF I KNEW WHAT I HAD TO DO THEN I WOULD BE DOING IT…ER…YOUR HIGHNESS.
P2: A close up on RHONWEN her teeth are gritted but she seems to be having a good time of it as she is swinging the bloody sword to and fro. We can see that she is a handsome lass, very milky skin with a dusting of freckles over her nose and cheeks, she can’t be more than 16-years old (I’m thinking of a younfer JUDY TROTT who played Marian in the good Robin of Sherwood series), that lithe celtic princess type young woman.
CAPTION: “AND SO PRINCESS RHONWEN BATTLED TO PUSH BACK THE COWARDLY KNIGHTS OF THE WIZARD ACCALON. HER KNIGHT – BRAVE SIR MICHAEL – AT HER SIDE CLEAVING THE CRAVEN DOGS ASSUNDER”
RHONWEN: HA! TAKE THAT YOU SWINE. YOU COME INTO MY FATHER’S HALL AND TRY TO ABDUCT ME, PRINCESS RHONWEN-DAUGHTER OF PRINCE CADFAL?!
P3: Michael has now joined her at the throne, she is swinging her sword to and fro and he has put his shield up to deflect a blow whilst plunging his sword into the leg of his attacker, RHONWEN”s attackers are flung back in sprays of blood by her sword.No shrinking violet this one.Michael seems stunned that he knows how to use a sword and a shield. Michael is nicked by a foes blade
CAPTION: “Bravely this young pair fought ever onward, keeping back their foes with a flurry of steel.”
RHONWEN: THERE IS A DOOR BEHIND THE THRONE THAT WILL LEAD US TO SAFETY. I FEAR THAT ACCALON HAS WON THIS ROUND–THE SWINE!
MICHAEL: BUT WHAT AM I DOING HERE? THIS HAS GOT TO BE A DREAM! ow!!
P4: Rhonwen is already leaping down from the throne and heading for the hidden door, Michael is keeping her back, there are three bad guys beating on him and he is aquitting himself quite well.
RHONWEN: LET US BE AWAY SIR KNIGHT BEFORE THEY SKEWER OUR HIDES TO THE CASTLE GATE.
MICHAEL: THEM’S THE MAGIC WORDS PRINCESS. I’M OUTTA HERE!
P6: Sees them racing through a dark doorway, a black hole that engulfs them both within its stygian depths.
NO DIALOGUE
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PAGE 3:
6 panel page:This is running through the tunnels that will eventually lead to the outside. There is initially very little light, occasional torches in sconces, but few and far between. This could be very Bernie Wrightson/Alfredo Alcala type stuff. the suggestion of gargoyles and the old gods in relief on the walls of the tunnels intespersed with very celtic symbology as well. The walls are either rough granite or carved into these tortured shapes.
P1: We see RHONWEN and MICHAEL as they are coming through the door from the throne room into the tunnel. Rhonwen is slightly in front, she now has the shield slung on her back. Michael’s hair is blowing untidily behind him.
MICHAEL: WHERE ARE WE GOING?
RHONWEN: WE ARE HEADING TO THE SACRED GROVE THAT IS AT THE NED OF THIS TUNNEL. THERE WE AND THE THARIAN WILL BE SAFE FRON ACCALON AND HIS MISTRESS.
P2: SIDE ON LONGSHOT: Rhonwen and Michael are running down the tunnel, we can see the designs, symbols and stuff on the walls, this should have a lot of shadow.
MICHAEL: BUT WHAT EXACTLY IS THE THARIAN? I MEAN–I KNOW I SHOULD KNOW–JUST HUMOUR ME.
RHONWEN: THE THARIAN IS THIS THING ON MY BACK, THE SHIELD. ACCALON AND HIS WHORE MISTRESS-MORGANA LA FAY- WOULD DO ANYTHING TO GET IT.
P3: This is from the front: There is a massive explosion in front of the running pair they skid to a halt bringing their arms up to shield their eyes.
SFX: FSHOOOM!
RHONWEN & MICHAEL: AIEEE! AAARGH!
P4: This is a pull body shot of a mysterious figure wrapped in long dark robes, we can see his dark nos peeking from out of his hood, his eyes are two red stars within the darkness of the hood. This is ACCALON the wizard.
CAPTION: ACCALON–LOVER OF MODRON AND TRAFFICKER IN THE NIGHTMARES OF DEMONS.
ACCALON: GIVE ME THE THARIAN BRYTHoNIC WITCH!
RHONWEN: NEVER! YOU WHORESON AND LOVER OF WHORES!
P5: Front on shot mid torso upwards. Rhonwen now turns to MICHAEL and he is at her side looking in stunned disbelief; his mind pretty much hasn’t caught up with him yet.
RHONWEN: THE TORC MICHAEL–USE THE TORC.
MICHAEL: EH? WHA?
RHONWEN: THE TORC YOU FOOL. IT NEGATES HIS MAGIC…AROUND YOUR NECK! GODS!
P6: SIDE ON SHOT as Michael brings the torc (which we haven’t seen but has mysteriously appeared around his neck) and throws it as ACCALON. Accalon shrinks back and tries to escape using his magic.
CAPTION: THE MAGIC TORC OF CERNUNNUS. THAT NEGATES WHATEVER VILE MAGIC IS IN ITS WAY WHEN THROWN.
ACCALON: AIEEE! NO! NO!
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PAGE 4
3 panel page: Here we can use the page to open out from the darkness of the previous pages into a light, woodland scene, after the stench of battle this should be a sunlit glade in the middle of a forest, very rustic and “greenwoodsy”.
P1: MICHAEL and RHONWEN are running through a cloud of smoke ( has Accalon been vaporized or has he merely vanished?) through the opening of the cavern onto a greensward, before them is an open glade the castle at their back is not visible because it is hidden by the forest and the mountain of granite upon which it is built.
NO DIALOGUE
P2: This is a long shot of them both standing in the glade, Michael is looking up and around him in wonder, (this is kind of a Disney momnet) it would be late afternoon in summer(to give you an idea of the quality of light) there could be a deer or a stag here, maybe other woodland animals that don’t seem to be upset by the vilent intrusion of the two people into their midst.
NO DIALOGUE
P3: Here is a mid body shot, RHONWEN has turned to MICHAEL we can see the the light streaming down through the canopy of trees(think Arthur Ransome) illuminating MICHAEL as if in a spotlight, RHONWEN is looking towards MICHAEL she has an amused look on her face.
RHONWEN: THIS IS THE HERNE’S CUP. WE COME HERE OFT TIMES DURING THE YEAR TO CELEBRATE OUR PROTECTOR AND THE MAKER OF THE THARIAN AND THE TORC.
MICHAEL: IT’S BEAUTIFUL!
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PAGE 5:
5 PANEL PAGE: Taking place in the greenwood glade. I hope it’s not too talking heads. I’m trying to move it forward to page 6 and get this sucker done!
P1: FULL BODY SHOT. RHONWEN is now standing in front of MICHAEL and she is speaking to him, we can see that she is but an inch shorter than he.
CAPTION: AND SO SIR MICHAEL AND THE FAIR RHONWEN RESTED. THEIR FLIGHT PAUSED THERE IN HERNE’S CUP.
RHONWEN: YOU SEEM TO HAVE SOME SkILL WITH THE SWORD AND AT THE TOSS SIR MICHAEL.
MICHAEL: YEAH BUT I DON’T KNOW HOW. I COULDN’T THROW A WOBBLER BACK HOME–WHEREVER THAT IS.
P2: RHONWEN is now moving away from MICHAEL towards a stream theat runs through the edge of the glade.
RHONWEN: COME LET US REFRESH OURSELVES AND THEN WE MUST MOVE ON. FOR WHEREVER ACCALON APPEARS HIS WIFE–MODRON–CAN NOT BE FAR BEHIND.WE MUST AWAY AND FIND MY FATHER BEFORE IT’S TOO LATE.
MICHAEL: TOO LATE? TOO LATE FOR WHAT? WHAT THE HELL’S HAPPENING HERE?
P3: RHONWEN is now kneeling by the stream and she has a drinking horn in her hand which she is filling with water.
RHONWEN: DRINK–THIS IS THE WATER OF “THE MEADHON“–HERE YOU SHALL GATHER YOUR STRENGTH.
MICHAEL: WHO AM I RHONWEN? I MEAN TO YOU–HOW DO YOU KNOW ME?
P4: Now they have refreshed themselves, RHONWEN is scabbarding her sword on her back and MICHAEL is left standing without an answer.
CAPTION: THERE IS A FEELING ON THE WIND AND FAIR RHONWEN AVOIDS THE QUESTION.
MICHAEL: THIS HAS HAPPENED BEFORE, BUT I CAN’T PLACE MY FINGER ON IT. I’VE SEEN THIS PLACE BEFORE.
RHONWEN: WE MUST BE AWAY MODRON WILL BE LOOKING FOR US AND WE CANNOT SKULK IN THIS PLACE FOR EVER.
P5: A close up on MICHAEL,
MICHAEL: I CAN.
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PAGE 6:
6 panel page. I’m going to have to cram a bit in here, but basically it’s going to segue from the greenwood back to Michael’s bedroom.
P1: RHONWEN has stopped at the edge of the glade. A look of shock on her face as she looks upwards, we can see Michael over her shoulder, he’s not really paying attention to her. A bit of a wind has whipped up and it’s making the loose hair that has escaped the braid, whip about a bit. A few stray leaves are being blown around.
CAPTION: THERE IS EVIL IN THE AIR, RHONWEN CAN SMELL THE SULPHUR.
RHONWEN: OH GODS. MICHAEL!
P2: This is from Michael’s POV. He sees RHONWEN lifted into the air by some big black swirly cloud thing(think Night of the Demon cloud thing here).
MICHAEL(SHOUTING): RHONWEN!!!!!
P3: MICHAEL throws himself and catches hold of her legs as she is drawn into the maelstrom.
SFX: HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!
P4: THIS PANEL IS A SWIRLING PSYCHADELIC MAELSTROM WITH THE FIGURE OF MICHAEL AND RHONWEN BEING OUTLINED IN SILHOUETTE, REACHING OUT TO EACH OTHER.
MODRON(DISEMBODIED??): I HAVE THEE AT LAST BRYTHONIAN WHELP–HAHAHAHAHA!!!
RHONWEN: MICHAEEELLLL!!!
MICHAEL: RHONWENNNNNN!!!
P5: We see MICHAEL landing back in his chair back in his bedroom, the clock opn the wall shows that only a few minutes have passed, his feet slightly up in the air as he bounces into his seat.
MICHAEL: OOF!
P6: He is now flying to the monitor, tears in his eyes he is gripping the monitor.
MICHAEL: RHONWENNNN!!!!!
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Filed under Comic Writing
LONG HOT FRENCH KISS PP14-15
OKAY, WELL I’VE MANAGED TO GET TWO PAGES THAT I’M MORE OR LESS SATISFIED WITH THESE. IT’S AN INTERLUDE, IF YOU REMEMBER FRANK HAD BEEN KNOCKED UNCONSCIOUS. I REALLY WANT TO ESTABLISH EARLY ON THE RELATIONSHIP OF FRANK AND BOBBIE JOE AND–EVEN THOUGH I’M TRYING NOT TO BE TOO SPECIFIC ON THE TIME PERIOD–IT GAVE ME A NICE CHANCE TO HAVE A LITTLE 2 PAGE INTERLUDE AND WRITE A WAR STORY (OR VIGNETTE IN THIS CASE). I’VE TRIED TO BE AUTHENTIC TO COMICS OF THAT TIME, THE ONES I REALLY REMEMBER IN MY COMIC READING OVER THE YEARS HAVE BEEN THE EC ONES “TWO-FISTED TALES” AND “FRONTLINE COMBAT“, THOUGH “SGT. ROCK” WAS ALSO A BOOK I READ WHEN I WAS A KID I PREFERRED THE LOOKS OF DAVIS, FELDSTEIN, HEATH AND WOOD THAN THE OPEN LINEWORK OF JOE KUBERT (THOUGH I LOVE KUBERT’S STUFF).
ENJOY.
PAGE 14:
OK the next two pages are a flashback sequence, it kind of explains why FRANK seems beholden to BOBBIE JOE to follow up on his murder and how they became “friends” THIS page (14) is nine panels, regular, the first panel is all black and the second is an explosion. The should have a Jack elder/Russ Heath “Frontline Combat” kinda vibe rather than Joe Kubert “Sgt. Rock” vibe to try and keep in with the noir tone of the story
PANEL 1,2 and 3 Across the three panels from left to right it starts off completely black.
CAP:10 YEARS AGO
P2: Here it’s kind of greyish, maybe a zippertone effect.
OP:(MOMMY!JESUS I CAIN’T FEEL MY LEGS!)
P3:An explosion breaking the whiteness.
SFX: KAAAABOOOOOOMMMM!
P4:We are in a prone position POV of someone who is lying on the floor, we can see cobbled streets with debris scattered around, in the background we can see the bottom half of some shopfronts, we can see shop names such as BOULANGERIE/CHACUTERIE/ GLACÉ etc. Maybe just the bottom half as the windows would be smashed or broken and we are looking from a low viewpoint. Also we would see soldiers legs as the are running.
OP:((men shouting) MOVE OUT TO THE RIGHT!)
(MEDIC!)
P5: We now have a helmeted face in our vision, someone has stooped down to help us, it is obviously BOBBIE JOE at a younger age, there is a look of concern on his face.
BOBBIE JOE: (HEY BUDDY, YOU OK?)
P6: We are now looking from behind, and we can see FRANK in full battle dress, he’s sprawled on the ground and BOBBIE JOE is hunkered down beside him. We are looking mid-distance and there is a crater just to FRANK’s right where a morter or bomb has gone off, there’s smoke and the genral mayhem of war going on around them.
P7: We are closer in now and FRANK is on one knee using his rifle as a prop with his right hand and BOBBIE JOE is holding his left elbow to help him up.
FRANK:(UHHN!)
BOBBIE JOE:(UP YOU COME BUDDY. HEY! DON’T I KNOW YOU? FRANK EAST AIN’T IT?)
P8: We are now looking from the front, both men are now standing, BOBBIE JOE a little to the front and turned slightly towards FRANK, this is a shot from mid torso up at middle distance. BOBBIE JOE is speaking to FRANK.
FRANK: (WEST…MY NAME IS FRANK WEST.)
BOBBIE JOE: (YEAH THAT’S RIGHT, I’M BOBBIE JOE LONG, ME! YOU USED TO HANG AROUND MACAULEY’S GYM BACK HOME.)
FRANK:(MACK. THIS AIN’T NO PLACE RO TALK A WALK DOWN MEMORY LANE.)
P9: A mid range shot from a side angle we are looking at BOBBIE JOE’s back and FRANK is now turned slightly towards him so we can see what happens next.
FRANK: (SNIPER!!)
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PAGE 15
6 PANEL PAGE. One panoramic panel along the top of the page. TWO PANELS on the middle tier and THREE PANELS along the bottom tier of the page.
P1: Here is a long shot of FRANK bundling BOBBIE JOE out of the way of the sniper shot. Almost like a rugby tackle midrift. we can see the bomed and burned outbuildings around them, the smoke is ever-present and we can see the dirt that is kicked up by the bullet as it misses its target andploughs into the ground about a metre from where FRANK and BOBBIE were standing.
CAP: DODGING BULLETS WAS A FAVORITE GAME WE PLAYED IN THOSE DAYS — I KNEW THAT WE WERE PLAYING RUSSIAN ROULETTE WITH THESE GUYS, BUT IT SEEMED LIKE THE ONLY THING WE EVER DID.
BOBBIE JOE:(OOF!)
P2: We are now looking at FRANK as he’s come up out of his roll with BOBBIE JOE and he is on one knee, pulling his service revolver out of it’s holster, there’s a snarl on his face, his helmet is slightly askew and he’s bringing the gun up.
CAP: I’D ALWAYS BEEN A DEADSHOT–THE GUYS IN THE PLATOON JOSHED ME ABOUT THAT. THE LOO BROUGHT ME UP WHENEVR THERE WAS DIRTY WORK TO BE DONE.
FRANK: (GET YOUR FUCKIN’ HEAD DOWN BOBBIE JOE!)
P3: We are now in a head and shoulders shot, FRANK has let of his shot it’s slightly elevated and he’s still snarling, we can see the back of BOBBIE JOE’s head and shoulders as he is leaning out of FRANK’s way.
CAP: I’D SPOTTED THE HUN UP ON THE BURNT OUT SECOND FLOOR. IT WAS A CLOSE ONE BUT HIS HEAD WAS OUT FAR ENOUGH TO GIVE ME A TARGET.
FRANK: (AAAAAAAHH!!)
P4: A LONG ELEVATED SHOT. In the distance we can see FRANK and BOBBIE JOE on the ground, FRANK kneeling and BOBBIE JOE sitting down in front of him, back to us and FRANK shooting over his shoulder. We see a man in German uniform,
P4: he’s behind a pile of bricks on the second floor of a bombed building that he has been using as a vantage point to shoot the Allied soldiers below. There is the proverbial corner made up of the remnants of two walls and he has been using this whole set up as cover. He is falling backwards, his hands up to his face, blood and brains flying out the back of his head and blood gushing from between his fingers, his rifle is falling down by his right side.
GERMAN SNIPER:(YEEEAAARRRGH!!!!)
P5: CUT BACK TO FRANK AND BOBBIE JOE BACK ON THE GROUND. Mid-range head and shoulders shot from the right side as we look on. FRANK no longer has a snarl on his face, in fact it has a look of calmness. BOBBIE JOE is looking up at him with something that approaches awe.
CAP: THAT WAS THE THING THAT HAPPENED–THAT’S WHY BOBBIE JOE BECAME MY BURDEN
BOBBIE JOE:(YOU SAVED MY LIFE FRANK.)
FRANK:(NO I DIN’T. YOU SAVED MINE REMEMBER?)
P6: CLOSE UP ON BOBBIE JOE, HS FACE ALMOST FILLING THE PANEL. WE CAN SEE THE FRECKLES THAT DUST HIS NOSE. WE CAN SEE THE SMEARS OF DIRT ON HIS FACE AND HIS CHIPPED FRONT TOOTH. EYES WIDE IN ADOLATION OF FRANK.
BOBBIE JOE:(NAAH. I JUST PICKED YOU UP. YOU’DA BEEN OK. ME? I WAS A GONER–YOU TOOK OUT THAT SHARPSHOOTER. NOW I OWE YOU BIG TIME. )
CAP: THAT’S WHAT I WAS AFRAID OF.
Filed under Comic Writing
The Long Hot French Kiss; pp7.8&9
SO I’VE ACTUALLY BEEN CONCENTRATING ON OTHER STUFF THE LAST FEW DAYS, BUT WHAT STARTED OUT AS A LARK HAS CONSUMED A GOODLY NUMBER OF HOURS SO FAR. I’VE HAD TO PLOT THIS FUCKER! IF I DON’T THEN I RUN INTO THE DANGER OF DISAPPEARING UP MY OWN WAZOO. LUCKILY THE CELTX PROGRAMME HAS A HANDY NOTECARD FEATURE SO I’VE BEEN ABLE TO KEEP THINGS IN SOME KIND OF ORDER. AS I THINK I’VE SAID BEFORE, “I KNOW THE DESTINATION, IT’S THE ROUTE I HAVE TO TAKE WHICH IS UNCERTAIN”. I HAVE A NEW RESPECT FOR MYSTERY AND THRILLER WRITERS NOW I CAN TELL YOU. WELL HERE ARE THE THREE PAGES THAT I’VE MANAGED TO GET DOWN ON PAPER(?):
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PAGE 7
This is a 6 panel page with the panels running the full width of the page horizontally(duh!). This is FRANK driving in his car from BOBBIE’s place to ‘EL GATO PRETO’ a bar out at the end of the STRIP. So there should be lots of movement when we see outside the car. The car itself is a 1956 black Eldorado Seville (the two-door hardtop coupe model, not the convertible), if references are needed I already have the photos of the outside and various interiors. When the panels are of interior moments their borders could be drawn as the car window frames.
P1:Exterior of car: The night lights are reflected off the brilliant exterior of the car like a mobile piece of the night sky dotted with stars. We can see neon blurs as the car drives along, reflected in the puddles on the road as well as the white walled tyres splash through the piddles causing little candy coloured fountains(OK if this is in B&W then that won’t matter, but I liked the phrase…sue me!)
CAP:
I HAD TO GO OUT TO THE END OF THE STRIP. THE PLACE I WAS LOOKING FOR WAS PRETTY ISOLATED AWAY FROM ALL THE OTHER BARS, CLIP JOINTS AND CAT HOUSES THAT MADE UP THE CITY’S ENTERTAINMENTS COMPLEX.
P2:Interior of car: Here is a back shot of FRANK, we are looking from the back of the car, his face and upper body is slightly illuminated by the lights from the dash-radio, he is smoking a cigarette(obviously) it is hanging out the side of his mouth, and his hat is pushed back slightly on his head. The driver’s side window is slightly open, the steering wheel is white and chrome, and the dash is also highly polished chrome so you would get some reflection off that as well. FRANK is steering the car with his left hand and he has a match-book in his right hand, which he is looking at. We can see that there is a black cat sitting and the words “EL GATO NOIR” written on the match-book. We can see out the windshield at the front, but still ill-defined smears of neon.
CAP:
BOBBIE DIDN’T SMOKE.WANETA WAS USING A LITTLE GOLD LIGHTER WHEN SHE WAS IN HIS OFFICE, SO THIS MATCHBOOK HAD TO BE TO DO WITH SOMETHING THAT BOBBIE’D BEEN WORKING ON RECENTLY.
CAP:
‘EL GATO PRETO’ WAS A DRUM THAT YOU ONLY WENT TO IF YOU HAD BUSINESS TO ATTEND TO. THE JASPERS KEPT AWAY AS DID THE JOHNS.
P3:Ex. from behind a slightly above: We can see the back end of the car and the road ahead. We can see the bars, nightclubs and all night liquor stores on the left hand side of the panel, people on the sidewalk, going in and coming out of the various establishments. Neon is the preferred decoration for these places (go a bit wild here, you, the artist, should know what is needed).
CAP:
IT WAS A GREASER JOINT, THE MEXICANS HAD BEEN MAKING INROADS INTO THE SCENE THE LAST FEW YEARS. ‘EL GATO’ WAS THEIR PLACE OF BUSINESS.
CAP:
A LITTLE OASIS OF NEUTRALITY WHERE THEY COULD GET BUSINESS DONE AND NO ONE FELT THREATENED.
P4: Int. from the right side window looking in. FRANK now has both hands on the wheel and he’s looking straight ahead. We can see some of the bars and shit through the other window, but this is more of a close up, we see him from mid-torso up.
IF BOBBIE WAS MIXED UP WITH THEM HE WAS IN SOME DEEP DOO-DOO. THERE WERE ALL KINDS OF HIGH PILLOWS THE HUNG OUT AT ‘EL GATO’, AND NOT ANYONE I’D WANT TO TANGLE WITH.
I LISTENED TO THE COLTRANE THAT WAS COMING OUT OF THE RADIO, TRYING TO LET IT SOOTHE ME SO I WOULDN’T BE SO JITTERY ONCE I STEPPED INTO THE LION’S DEN.
P5: Ex. once again from the back but no longer elevated, we are at eye-level and looking at an angle from the right to the left, we can see the end of THE STRIP, then there’s a void and then standing on its own, in its own pool of neon light ‘EL GATO PRETO’.
NO DANIEL ME! BUT I COULDN’T SHOW FEAR, EVEN THOUGH I SWORE I COULD SMELL IT COMING OFF ME.
P6: Ex. We are looking at the windshield of the car as its parked at the front of the club, we can vaguely see FRANK behind the wheel, but the windshield is reflecting the façade of the club, the ‘EL GATO PRETO’ sign in reverse on the windshield.
OK! COMING– READY OR NOT!
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PAGES 8& 9
A DOUBLE PAGE SPREAD of the interior of the bar. The two pages show the whole of the bar a long chrome and red vinyl thing with a massive mirror running the whole length of the back bar. The back bar is a plethora of liquor bottles and stacks of glasses. On the bar itself we can see little bowls of un-shelled peanuts set at regular interval along the bar, interspersed with ashtrays. there are a couple of people sitting at the bar, there are several bar-stools that match the scheme of the bar itself. We are looking from the right hand side of the page up and a little in front of the bar, we can see the entrance (which is a single door, there’re no windows in this club and the door is a plush jobbie) and FRANK coming in. The barman is at this end of the bar, serving a customer ( there are no beer taps, this is a place that sells only liquor, cocktails and probably imported beers in bottles), there’s a plush carpet on the floor of the bar proper, we can see tables scattered around the part of the club we can see.This is a classy joint, not some criminal dive, but classy. It should have a whole 50s vibe like something out of the Dick van Dyke Show or a Sinatra film of the time. Reflected in the bar mirror is the shadowy outline of a quartet on the stage in front of a small dance area of which we can see a little strip as we are looking into the bar. At the far side, after the entrance along that side wall are a mess of booths, we can see that at least two of them are occupied. There are 5 PANELS dropped in at the bottom of the two-page spread.
CAP:
THE WETBACKS HAD BEEN MAKING IN-ROADS INTO WHAT HAD ONCE BEEN EYETIE AND MICK TERRITORY OVER THE LAST 10 YEARS.
CAP:
THEY WERE RUNNING MOST OF THE NUMBERS GAMES AND HEAVILY INVESTED IN THE GEE-GEES.THEY PROVIDED NEARLY ALL THE PRO-SKIRT IN TOWN AND WERE THOUGHT TO BE IMPORTING ALL KINDS OF YUMMY NOSE CANDY TO KEEP THE HIGH ROLLERS KICKING OVER AT WEEKENDS.
CAP:
THE HEAD MUCK-A-MUCK WAS ADOLFO COSTANZA. THEY SAY HE HAD COME HERE WITH NOTHING 30 YEARS AGO AND HAD PUNCHED AND GARROTED HIS WAY TO THE TOP OF THE SHIT-HEAP. AND THERE HE WAS SITTING OVER IN ONE’A THE BOOTHS.
P1: Here we see a stocky man in his mid to late 40s, he has slicked back black hair and a little pencil moustache settling on his upper lip like a shadow. his eyes are small, but intelligent, there is a scar runnIng through his lips on the left hand side, turning his mouth into a permanent scowl. He is dressed in a double-breasted suit, probably a gray color. We can see the arm, side and hand of another man in a dark suit who is standing beside COSTANZA.
CAP:
COSTANZA WAS THE ‘GO-TO GUY’ FOR MOST OF THE CHICANOS IN THE BARRIO, IF HE’D BEEN ITALIAN, THEN HE WOULD’A BEEN THE GODFATHER. BUT THE SPICS WERE MOVING OUT OF THE TOWN AND HEADING FURTHER EAST.
COSTANZA:(¿QUÉ PASIONES?)
P2: Here we have moved up to the guy standing next to COSTANZA. He is obviously his bodyguard or enforcer, he is also hispanic but with long dark hair he’s in his 30s and has no facial hair, he is very skinny with sallow skin and a pock-marked face(the ravages of acne), he has a somber look with a feral gleam in his eye. His suit is funeral director dark and he has a white shirt and a thin dark tie.
CAP:
THAT THERE’S RAÚL MARROQUÍN. HE’S COSTANZA’S ENFORCER, A MEAN PIECE OF SHIT WHO HAS NEVER BEEN KNOWN TO SMILE–OR IF HE HAS NO ONE’S EVER LIVED TO TELL!
P3: We are looking at the band now. This panel can be on the page separation. I don’t know how that would work. There are three musicians, guitar, double-bass and piano (the three musicians are mulatto-Hispanic) and the singer is a girl in her early 20s, definitely Hispanic but with platinum blonde hair. |She has the thin waist and big bum that is ubiquitous on Latin women, and a pair of breasts to die for, she’s wearing a light colored cocktail dress and high heels, she’s holding the microphone stand as delicately as if it’s made of crystal (yes the phallic connotations are very much implied…now get your mind out of the gutter).
CAP:
THE BAND PLAYED SOMETHING SLICK AND COOL, SOUNDING A LITTLE LIKE COLTRANE OR BAKER. THE CANARY WAS ENRIQUETA MARTÍ, SHE WAS FAVORITE OF COSTANZA’S, SOME SAY HIS MISTRESS, OTHERS…NOTHING! NOT IF THEY WANTED TO LIVE PEACEFULLY THEY DIDN’T.
CAP:
SHE HAD A DECENT PAIR OF PIPES, BUT I DON’T THINK IT WAS HER VOCAL CHORDS THAT COSTANZA WAS INTERESTED IN.
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PAGE 9:
So this is the second page of the two page spread. Once again the smaller panels are dropped into the bottom of the page.
P1: This is a closer view of the barman that we can see in the main picture. He looks up we are looking from the front looking left, he is placing a martini glass in front of the customer seated at the far end of the bar. The barman is looking towards FRANK as he enters. the barman is about 6″ tall, he is heavy-set and mostly bald except for a ring of dark hair around his pate. He’s about 50-years old and has one of those Mexican droopy moustaches. He is wearing his barkeep uniform of a white shirt, dark waistcoat (vest?) and a little black bow tie. He is looking round at FRANK a little surprised, as well he should be– this is not a place that strangers visit much. The customer is looking round at FRANK too, more from a reaction to the barman than to FRANK himself. He’s thinnish, olive-skinned, he’s wearing a dark double-breasted suit and tie he’s in his late 20s, early 30s with slick-backed dark hair.
CAP:
I COULD FEEL THE TENSION AS I WALKED IN. THE BAND MISSED A BEAT BUT DIDN’T STOP PLAYING. MY INSIDES LOOSENED A LITTLE, BUT THERE WAS NO BACKING OUT NOW.
P2: This is of the customer sitting at the bar, we are closer in and focused on him, we can see the barman’s hand and arm, moving away from the martini glass that he has just set down, we can see an ashtray at the man’s elbow, there’s a cigar burning away in the ashtray and the man has his face turned toward us, his right cheek resting on his fist that is propping his head up. He looks half-cut, the only person so far that looks like he’s actually been drinking.
CAP:
I WISHED I’D TAKEN MY GUN OUT THE CAR. BUT–THERE’S NO USE CRYING OVER WATER UNDER THE BRIDGE–AS THEY SAY.
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Filed under Comic Writing
The Long Hot French Kiss
HERE’S SOMETHING THAT STARTED AS AN EXPERIMENT AND HAS NOW BECOME SOMETHING A BIT MORE SERIOUS. IT’S MY HOMAGE TO HARDBOILED/NOIR WITH A TRIBUTE TO JOHN D. MACDONALD ESPECIALLY IN THE TITLE.
I DON’T KNOW HOW LONG IT WILL BE, BUT I’LL KEEP ON WRITING TIL THE END 😀
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- (c) 2010 Alistair J. Robb
PAGE 1
THREE PANEL PAGE: The scene is a run down block of offices at night, the windows are grimy and some are smashed. The block is three storeys high and a city block in length. There are some lights on in random offices and the front door to the building is ajar, where once a security-guard/receptionist sat is now piled high with papers and fliers. The streets are shiny with a recent rainfall and the water and puddles reflect the orange glow of the sodium streetlights. The street is deserted and there is trash being blown around. The three panels are the space on the left-hand side of the page is taken up with one long panel and there are two smaller panels dropped in on the right-hand side of the page.
P1: Here we have the long panel NO PANEL BORDERS ON THIS ONE. It is outside the building which we can see stretching into the distance, we are in a long shot and slightly elevated, we can see the door and a street lamp directly outside the entrance to the building. There is no step up to the building, the door opens straight out onto the sidewalk. We see a man in silhouette standing with in the halo of the streetlight, he is a lone figure in this circle of light he is with his back to us and appears to be wearing a long coat, think of that classic image from “The Exorcist”, but he isn’t carrying a briefcase, though we can see that he is smoking a cigarette because the smoke is curling up around his head.
CAP:
IT WAS A STINKING NIGHT WHEN I GOT THE CALL, IT WAS A DAME CRYING HYSTERICALLY. SHE SAID THAT SHE’D GOT MY NUMBER FROM THE JACKET POCKET OF A DEAD MAN.
P2: Here we see into the entrance-way of the building, the front desk is on our left as we walk in, the doors are made of aluminium and glass and open inwards. Only one is open as the other seems to be stuck. The front desk is piled high with old newspapers and fliers, they cover the waist high desk, an air of abandonment exudes from this entrance-way, semi-derelict and dirty, which extends into (out of?) the whole building. We can see a set of stairs in front of us leading up and a single elevator is on our left which is standing open. There is a board on the wall above and behind the desk. It was once used to say which offices were on which floor, now it just spells out “ABANDON HOPE ALL YE WHO ENTER HERE”. This might be ironic, it might not.
CAP:
SHE SAID THAT SHE WANTED ME TO GET RIGHT ON OVER TO THE TAFT BUILDING ON 8TH AND KENNEDY. I KNEW THE BUILDING–I’D ONCE THOUGH OF RENTING OFFICE SPACE THERE.
P3: We are looking in on the hall again, but this time we are looking at FRANK HOWARD(our protagonist)we can see him clearer now, he is indeed wearing a trench-coat and he has short-cropped dark hair. He is about 6 feet tall and his face looks like it’s seen a few sights in its life. He has a cigarette dangling from his mouth and his hands are thrust into his coat pockets, he is looking into the open elevator as if contemplating whether to use it or not, we can see that it will be not because the control panel inside is broken and hanging out on its wires.
CAP:
I WANTED AN OFFICE ON THE SECOND FLOOR, LEFT BACK. I WAS GOING TO HAVE TO USE THE STAIRS.
FRANK: (SHIT!)
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PAGE 2
A SIX PANEL PAGE 2,2 AND 2: POV FRANK in each of these panels we see FRANK’s shoes as he’s walking up the stairs. The stairs are of scuffed and cracked linoleum with those aluminum strips on the front part of each riser. FRANK’S shoes are brogues made of some darkish leather, they are pretty clean for someone who spends his time on the streets.
P1: He begins to ascend.
CAP:
I NEVER SHOULDA COME RUNNIN’– IT’S GONNA BE THE WORST FOR ME, BUT I’VE ALWAYS BEEN A SUCKER FOR A DAMSEL IN DISTRESS.
P2: We can see a bit of the wall on FRANK’s right.
CAP:
SHE SAID THAT BOBBIE HAD BEEN MURDERED, HE’D CALLED HER TO MEET HIM AT HIS OFFICE AND WHEN SHE ARRIVED HE WAS LYING ON THE FLOOR WITH A .38 SIZED HOLE IN HIS CHEST.
P3: Now we can see a bit of wall on FRANK’s left to show that he has turned the corner.
CAP:
BOBBIE WAS BOBBIE JOE LONG MY OLD PARTNER FROM BACK ON THE FORCE. HE TOOK THE GRAFT AND I DIDN’T–BUT WE WAS TARRED WITH THE SAME BRUSH SO WE BOTH TOOK THE FALL. FUCKIN’ I.A. BITCHES!
P4: We are now looking straight ahead as we exit the stairs. There’s a long dark corridor before us and a collection of 8 doors on either side of the corridor, those old kind with the solid bottoms and glass tops, they are distinguished by the weak light coming from the street. But about halfway down the corridor on the left hand side we can see an office door ajar with light spilling out into the corridor.
CAP:
I GOT MY PRIVATE DICK LICENSE ABOUT A YEAR AFTER WE’D BEEN RAIL-ROADED OFF THE FORCE. BOBBIE’D GOTTEN HIS ABOUT 6 MONTHS AFTER THAT. I DON’T KNOW IF HE WAS TRYIN’ TO IMPRESS ME OR NOT–I JUST SHRUGGED MY SHOULDERS AND SCOUTED AROUND FOR WORK
P5: We are now closer to the open door which has ROBERT J. LONG -PRIVATE INQUIRY AGENT- embossed on the glass of the door, we can see through the opening a bookcase filled with books an a coffee machine on top of the case, there’s a hint of a coat hung on a peg beside the door.
CAP:
I KEPT MY BEEZER CLEAN AND OUT OF THE COPS’ WAY. MOSTLY TAILING GINKS ON THE AWAY DAY FROM THEIR FRAUS, OR THE OCCASIONAL BIT OF INSIDER DEALING.
P6: FRANK has now pushed the door open with his left hand, we see his hand and his forearm as he pushes it open, we can see that he has on the coat, there’s a jacket sleeve and shirt sleeve. He has a watch on his left wrist and it shows the time as 10 to 11. We see the room, it’s crowded with stuff, the bookcase on the right and a filing cabinet, there’s an overturned chair in front of the desk which has an office chair behind it, the blinds over the windows are venetian and half pulled, on the sills of the window ( there are 2) are piled papers and files, there’s a statue of Mickey Mouse incongruously on the end of the sill of the left hand window. In front of the desk, is BOBBIE sprawled out on his back with a look of suprise on his face, he is wearing a suit and tie(which is skewwhiff)and a big bloody mass where his chest should be. On the left hand wall is a map of the city, under this is a coffee table hard up against the wall and on the coffee table is a collection of liquor bottles and glasses, also an ice-bucket. The Desk takes up almost half the room, its a big oak monster there’s a telephone on the bottom left hand corner, an old type dial model. there are papers scattered over the desk, sitting in the chair behind the desk and drinking something, whiskey, there’s a bottle of Cutty Sark on the table before her(half gone)and smoking a cigarette is BOBBIE’s girl, she’s sitting so we don’t really know how tall she is, but she probably be 5’8″ in her heels. She is a stunner, a passing resemblence to BARBARA STANWYCK, with full lips, she is wearing a 50s style suit for women and a little pill-box hat sits atop her curled blond hair. there is a small veil over her eyes, her mascara has run and there’s a look of fright on her face, but the shock that she had phoned FRANK with has now all but disappeared. There’s an old style table lamp on the front right hand corner of the desk , this gives the only light in the room.
CAP:
MEET WANETA HOYT, ALL ROUND GOOD GIRL, NICE PAIR OF GAMS BUT THE MORALS OF A CAT IN HEAT. SHE USED TO BE A SONGBIRD OVER AT JOE JOHNSTONES PLACE–BUT I’D HEARD THAT SHE AND BOBBIE’D BEEN RUNNING IN HIGHER CIRCLES.
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PAGE 3
4 PANEL PAGE: PANEL 1 TAKES UP HALF THE PAGE, PANELS 2 & 3 ARE DROPPED IN THE MIDDLE TIER PERHAPS COVERING A LITTLE OF PANEL 1 AND PANEL 4 IS ACROSS THE BOTTOM OF THE PAGE.
P1: This is from inside the office, we are looking from a low perspective at FRANK who is in the doorway his hand still holding the door. We can see that he is indeed wearing a suit and tie, there’s a look of mild shock on his face, we see all the detail on the wall with the bookcase, the corridor behind FRANK is a black hole, on our right we see that there is another bookcase this one has some houseplants on top and there are more files rather than books stuffed into the bookcase.. BOBBIE’s body is stretched out to our left, we can’t see his head but his bloody chest is evident (GORE!GORE!GORE!), the overturned chair at his feet. the dark bulk of the desk is also on our left now. The light source is still the lamp and it lights mostly FRANK from front on.
FRANK: (JESUS WEPT WANETA! WHAT THE FUCK WENT DOWN HERE?)
P2: Now we cut to WANETA, upper body and head, seated behind the desk it’s straight on and her head is partly in shadow from the lamp, she is holding the tumbler of whiskey in her left hand and bringing up the cigarette to her mouth with her right, her eyes are squinting a little from the smoke.
WANETA: (IF I KNEW THAT YOU BOOB, I WOULDN’A CALLED YOU NOW, WOULD I?)
P3: A side on perspective from the waist up for FRANK and the shoulders up for WANETA. FRANK has come a little more into the office though he hasn’t come all the way to the desk because of the body…obviously. He points angrily at WANETA
FRANK: (WHO YOU CALLIN’ A BOOB YA DIP-HEADED FRAIL? YOU WERE QUICK ENOUGH TO CALL MY NUMBER WHEN THE KETCHUP WAS SMEARED OVER THIS JOINT!)
WANETA: (‘COS BOBBIE ALWAYS SAID YOU WAS A PEEPER WHO WEREN’T NO SKID ROGUE. COULD GET THE SUGAR ON WHATEVER DIRTY DEAL OR BADGER GAME WAS GOIN’ DOWN!)
P4: This is a long shot from the side, wide angle. We can see them both and the body, we see WANETA seated behind the desk and FRANK has now dropped his hand and is looking down at his old partner. It would be nice to have the body in a stronger light, echoing that of the halo of light back on PAGE 1:PANEL1, With WANETA and FRANK only dully illuminated from the desk lamp. We can see that WANETA certainly does have a nice set of ‘gams’ and she is wearing dark stockings and dark high-heeled shoes. she is a little raised from the chair and leaning a bit forward.
WANETA: (I NEED A BODY TO TRUST RIGHT NOW FRANK, YOU HAVE NO IDEA HOW DEEP AND HOW HIGH THIS GOES. AND I’M SCARED THAT I’M THE NEXT ON THE BUTTON MAN’S LIST. THAT’S WHY I DIN’T CALL THE COPS. THEY’RE IN THIS RIGHT UP TO THEIR SCHNOZZLES!)
FRANK: (YEAH, I’M SORRY, BUT WHY CALL ME? I WASN’T BESTEST OF FRIENDS WITH YOUR CAT.)
CAPS:
I KNEW I SHOULDA GONE TO TOLEDO THAT DAY, LIKE I WAS GONNA.
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PAGE 4
A 5 PANEL PAGE SET IN THE OFFICE SO THE SET UP SHOULD BE THE SAME. THE FIRST 4 PANELS IN THE TRADITIONAL SET UP BUT PANEL 5 WILL TAKE UP THE BOTTOM TIER OF THE PAGE. IF THIS COULD BE A BORDER-LESS PANEL AND THE REST OF THE PANEL COULD BLEED UP AND BE BACKGROUND FOR THE OTHER 4 PANELS.
P1: FRANK is moving around the office putting things into some kind of order.
CAPS:
I TOLD HER THAT I’D TAKE CARE OF IT, TO GET BACK TO HER PLACE AND WAIT FOR MY PHONE CALL, I ALSO ASKED HER WHAT SHE HAD TOUCHED, “JUST THE SCOTCH AND THE DESK. I SUPPOSE ON THE DOOR WHEN I CAME IN, ,BUT THAT’S ALL I REMEMBER.”
P2: FRANK is cleaning the whiskey tumbler with his handkerchief, he is standing at the right-hand side of the desk as we are looking from the door in.
CAPS:
“DON’T FORGET FRANK, THERE’S HIGHBINDERS AND DIRTY LAW MIXED UP IN THIS,” SHE THREW OVER HER SHOULDER AS SHE SWUNG OUT THE DOOR.
P3: FRANK is behind the desk slinging the cigarette butts and ash that WANETA had left in the ashtray out the window.
CAPS:
I CALLED IN THE INCIDENT TO THE 6TH PRECINCT, WHOSE MANOR BOBBIE’S OFFICE WAS IN. DETECTIVE HARVEY CARIGNAN AT THE 6TH WAS AN OLD THORN IN MY SIDE, BUT AS FAR AS I KNEW HE WASN’T A GRIFTER AND I COULD TRUST HIM TO PLAY IT STRAIGHT.
P4: FRANK is now sat behind the desk, his tie is askew and he is putting the telephone back in its cradle.
CAPS:
BOBBIE HAD ALWAYS BEEN ONE FOR THE BANGTAILS, THAT’S WHAT GOT HIM IN TROUBLE IN THE FIRST PLACE, TAKING GRAFT TO PAY OF HIS DEBTS ON THE PONIES.
CAPS:
BUT I HAD A FEELING THAT THIS WAS MORE THAN A FEW BAD DEBTS, THOUGH I KNEW OF A FEW GUNSELS THAT WOULD HAVE A BODY ZOTZED FOR LITTLE OR NO REASON.
P5: FRANK is sat at the desk his arms folded before him as he’s looking into the “camera” with a very threatening look on his face. Lips pursed into a thin white line, deep Vs between his brows as his thick eyebrows are drawn down into the centre and a cigarette clasped angrily in the corner of his mouth, its smoke creating a miasma around his head.
CAPS:
AGAINST MY BETTER JUDGEMENT I HAD NOW BEEN DRAWN INTO A MESS THAT WAS NONE OF MY MAKING, IN THE WRONG PLACE AT THE WRONG TIME–SOUNDS LIKE THE STORY OF MY LIFE.
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PAGE 5
A 4 PANEL PAGE: Once again in BOBBIE’s office but now the office is full of uniformed police officers(3 in all) and a short round, balding fat man chomping on an unlit cigar, this is DETECTIVE HARVEY CARIGNAN. He sports a thin moustache over his lip and his suit is cheap and rumpled ( think of Jon Polito in The Big Lebowski, but set in the 40s)he has a sour look on his face, there is also a man from the M.E.’s office, he is a small, thin man wearing big horn-rimmed spectacles, a check sport coat and a bow tie, he has a straw trilby with a dark band around iton his head and he has a massive old time camera around his neck.There seems to be more light in the room.
P1: We are looking from the side on at a slightly elevated angle. DETECTIVE CARIGNAN and FRANK are in the bottom right hand corner of the room a window at FRANK’s back, CARIGNAN is in front of him scowling up on him, the cigar angrily chomped in his mouth, his arms on his hips his hands in pudgy little fists, hiking up his suit jacket which has been thrust back because of his hands on his hips.
CAPS:
CARIGNAN AND I WENT WAY BACK. HE WAS A “BY-THE-BOOK” KINDA GUY AND I’D ALWAYS BEEN MORE RELAXED IN MY ATTITUDE TO PAPERWORK. I THINK THE WORD ‘SLOPPY‘ WAS BANDIED ABOUT THE SQUAD ROOM.
HARVEY: (OK FRANK, WHY’D YOU DO IT?)
FRANK: (C’MON HARVE, YOU AND ME BOTH KNOW THAT I WOULDN’A CALLED YOU IF I’D DONE THIS.)
P2: We’ve swung round now the angle is over FRANK’s shoulder (maybe we can see his right ear and a bit of his right shoulder)looking down on CARIGNAN. In the background we can see the M.E. leaning down towards the body ready to take another picture from another angle, the uniforms have spread out a bit and are searching the office for clues. The door to the office is ajar and we can see two ambulance men in whites, having a cigarette and they have a stretcher between them leaning against the opposite wall of the corridor, which is no longer dark as the lights have been switched on. CARIGNAN is furious, his face is screwed up with anger and he’s taken the cigar out of his mouth and is waving his hands around with the cigar in his left hand between the first and second fingers There could be a little spit and sweat flying here to denote that he’s a fat little fucker and they always sweat and that he’s spitting mad.
CAPS:
HE HATED IT WHEN I CALLED HIM HARVE, I THINK HE WOULD’VE PREFERRED ‘DETECTIVE CARIGNAN’ OR EVEN BETTER ‘SIR’. BUT I LIKED TO WIND THE LITTLE FUCKER UP–WHICH WAS PROBABLY NOT A GOOD IDEA AT THE TIME.
CARIGNAN: (LISTEN WISE ASS! I GOT A DIRTY EX-COP SITTIN’ IN THE OFFICE OF ANOTHER DIRTY EX-COP WHO HAPPENS TO HAVE A NEW .38-SIZED HOLE WHERE HIS LUNGS USED TA BE!)
CAPS:
SEE–I TOLDCHYA. BUT I COULDN’T HELP MYSELF. THERE WAS SOMETHING ABOUT THIS EGG THAT’D ALWAYS RUBBED ME UP THE WRONG WAY.
P3: This is roughly from the same angle, the uniforms have changed position, because they are still searching the office, one of them is bending down to look at the books in the bookcase, the M.E. has now straightened up and is fiddling with the camera. CARIGNAN’s face has now turned towards the body a little to indicate who he is speaking about.
CAPS:
I THOUGHT THAT LITTLE DIPLOMACY WAS NOW IN ORDER, THESE FLAPPING LIPS O’ MINE HAD GOT ME IN ENOUGH TROUBLE TODAY AS IT WAS.
FRANK: (LOOK DETECTIVE. YOU’RE TOOTING THE WRONG RINGER HERE. I CAME BY ON A SOCIAL VISIT AND WHEN I WALKED IN THERE WAS BOBBIE STRETCHED ON THE FLOOR– I WAS AS SHOCKED AS YOU.)
CARIGNAN: (WHO SEZ I’M SHOCKED? IN FACT I THINK THIS IS ABOUT A YEAR AND A HALF TOO LATE!)
CAPS:
HE WAS A “BY-THE-BOOK KINDA GUY” ALRIGHT–AND HE HATED DIRTY COPS. I COULD SEE THAT HE WASN’T GOING TO WASTE MUCH TIME ON THIS CASE.
P4: The same angle again, but CARIGNAN is now looking back at FRANK and the uniforms have moved again, the one by the bookcase is now crouched down pulling something from between the bookcase and the filing cabinet. The other two uniforms are spread out around the office. The M.E. is now looking across at FRANK and CARIGNAN, his mouth open and speaking.
M.E.: (CAN I ASK MY MEN TO COME IN AND TAKE THE BODY,NOW DETECTIVE? I HAVE EVERYTHING I NEED.)
CARIGNAN: (YEAH, YEAH DOC. WHATEVER. YOU’RE GONNA HAVE TO DUST FOR PRINTS WHEN WE’VE CLEARED OUT.)
CROUCHING COPPER: (DETECTIVE. I THINK I’VE FOUND SOMETHING HERE.)
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PAGE 6
A FOUR PANEL PAGE: This is still in the office.
P1: A full body shot of the young Uniform crouching by the filing cabinet, “we” are at floor level looking up from inside the office looking toward the door. He is reaching into the gap between the filing cabinet and the bookcase and he’s pulling out a manila file.We can see a name on the file-tab HERB BAUMEISTER. Behind him we can see the 2 ambulance men coming into the office carrying the stretcher to take away the body.
CAPS:
SHIT! WHY HADN’T I SEEN THAT?
CAPS:
MURPHY’S LAW I SUPPOSE. I JUST HOPE IT’S NOTHING IMPORTANT. BUT IT PROBABLY IS.
P2: We are now back up and the policeman is handing the file to CARIGNAN. We can see behind them the ambulancemen bending down to put the body onto the stretcher.
CARIGNAN: (WHO THE FUCK IS HERB BAUMEISTER?!)
POLICEMAN: (BEATS ME BOSS, BUT THERE’S NOTHING IN THE FILE. COULD BE IT JUST FELL DOWN THERE.)
CAPS:
BAUMEISTER.BAUMEISTER. WHERE HAD I HEARD THAT NAME BEFORE?
COP(OP): (LOO! THE SLUG’S GONE RIGHT THROUGH THE WALL AND INTO THE OFFICE NEXT DOOR. JEEZ, THESE OFFICES AIN’T BUILT OF NOTHIN’)
P3: We have swung round a bit now so we have the M.E. the 2 ambulance men and the other two uniforms in the picture. We are looking from FRANK’s POV. The cop who had spoken off panel is at the blood spatter on the wall, the M.E. Is standing mid-way between FRANK and the COP at the spatter and the 2 ambulancemen are now up and carry the body out on the stretcher, they are between FRANK and the M.E.
CARIGNAN(OP): (IF I WANTED YOUR OPINIONS ON THE ARCHITECTURE I’D ASK FOR ‘EM. NOW GET THE FUCK DOWNSTAIRS WITH THE BODY.)
CAPS:
I LOOKED AT BOBBIE’S BLOOD SPATTERED UP THE WALL LIKE A LITTLE RED SUN. POOR BASTARD!
P4: Now we’ve swung back to FRANK and CARIGNAN and pulled back so we get to see both men talking to each other,we are looking from the perspective of about where the head of BOBBIE’S body was. We can just see the back of the second ambulanceman walking out thedoor carrying his end of the stretcher. The cop who found the file is standing behind CARIGNAN.
CARIGNAN: (DON’T GET NO IDEAS ABOUT LEAVIN’ TOWN ANYTIME SOON HOWARD. I WANT YOU WHERE I CAN GET MY HANDS ON YOU.)
FRANK: (NO PROBLEM, LOO. I GOT NO TRAVEL PLANS.)
CAPS:
ANYWAY, I NEEDED TO FIND OUT WHO THIS BAUMEISTER CAT WAS. I WAS GETTIN’ AN ITCH AT THE BACK OF MY MEMORY AND I’D HAVE TO SCRATCH THAT SUCKER.
CAPS:
BESIDES — I HAD SOMETHING OF AN ADVANTAGE OVER THE COPS. I HAD A PLACE WHERE BOBBIE HAD BEEN HANGING OUT LATELY.
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Filed under Comic Writing
I’m Back Again
YUP, I WENT OFF FOR A WEEK TO RECHARGE MY BATTERIES AND SEE IF I COULD GET ANY SERIOUS WRITING DONE. WHICH I DID. I POLISHED OF AN EC/WARREN MAGAZINE TYPE STORY, SET HERE IN THE NORTHEAST OF BRAZIL. I KINDA LIKE IT, IT FLOWED PRETTY WELL WHEN I SAT DOWN AND PECKED IT OUT ON THE CANTANKEROUS KEYBOARD OF MY ANCIENT LAP TOP. I ACTUALLY DID SOME RESEARCH FOR THIS AND WENT OFF TO READ A FEW ECs AND CREEPIES, I FOUND THEM QUITE REFRESHING AND THERE WERE A HOST OF YOUNG CREATORS(SPECIFICALLY IN THE CREEPY MAGAZINES) THAT ARE AROUND TODAY AND I NEVER REALISED THAT THEY WERE ABOUT WAY BACK WHEN, THERE WAS SOME REALLY AMAZING EXPERIMENTAL STUFF MIXED IN WITH THE REPETITIVE MOTIFS OF VAMPIRES, WEREWOLVES AND GHOULS. SO HERE’S A GRATUITOUS PHOTO OF UNCLE CREEPY AND THE SCRIPT BELOW:
TM & (c) whoever owns the rights to Warren characters now
PAGE 1:
A 3 PANEL PAGE. The page layout is as follows. One large panel that takes up the whole page and two smaller panels dropped in at the bottom. If we want this as an homage to EC and Warren comics then perhaps we should have a ‘host’ like “The Crypt Keeper” or “Uncle Creepy”. I suggest “The Mausoleum Manager”. He would be in the upper right hand corner of the page, just his upper body and his head, I´ll leave it up to you to design that. His dialogue would then be across the top part of the page, with the title of the story immediately below that.
MM:
Hee hee heee kiddywinks, welcome to another bloodcurdling tale of terror from me, your host with the most, the Mausoleum Manager, step on into my humble abode and pull up a tomb. This is a little story of unrequited lust that I like to call…
TITLE:
…A SIREN’S SONG
PANEL 1: I say panel 1 but in fact this is the whole page. We are looking from a slightly elevated angle on a nighttime tropical beach. We can see the line of breakers marking the divide between sand and sea. Though there are also several large flat rocks taking up a large portion of the beach too. The full moon is peaking above the horizon and causing a silver path along the surface of the ocean from the horizon to the beach. At the divide between the beach and the foreground there are a line of coconut palms silhouetted against the background.
CAP:
The palm fronds click together like old dry bones marking a rhythm to the counterpoint of the soft susurration of the surf gently breaking on the sand.
PANEL 2: Here we are looking from the beach at an isolated beach house, we can see more palm trees and we can see that the house is on a slight rise above the beach, a dark line of ground hugging vegetation, a demarcation line between the pale sands of the beach and the true land. We can see that the house is two storeys with a wide verandah on both the ground and the first floor. It is flat rooved with wide windows on both upper and lower storeys. It is an oasis of light on this dark night. We can see a figure standing on the upper verandah silhouetted against the light coming from the inside of the house, he is so obviously alone. He is leaning against a waist high railing that runs the length of the verandah, looking out towards the sea.
CAP:
I KNOW she’ll be here tonight. The ‘Pai do Santo’ told me so. This is HER special night. My whole body is vibrating and I feel the night breezes thrumming through my veins making me feel more alive than I have ever felt in my short span on this earth.
PANEL 3: Here we have come in closer to the man on the verandah, this is a full body view of him. We can see that he is about 6’ tall and around 40 years old, with short greying hair and aquiline features and a short cut beard and moustache. He is solidly built without being fat. He is wearing a loose white cotton shirt with the top three buttons undone which is slightly billowing in the breeze and loose white linen trousers and a pair of light shoes. He has a glass of some kind of drink in his left hand and is bringing up a cigarette to his mouth.
We can see the house behind him, it’s obviously a bedroom/sitting room. There’s a large bed with several round pillows scattered on it on the left hand side of the room and some cane furniture with upholstered cushions, a mosquito net is above the bed, a large glass coffee table between the armchairs on the right hand side of the room and a large ceiling fan above the whole room. On the back wall there is some shelving with books and other knick-knacks on them, we can see a small drinks tray on a sideboard on the back wall as well with a number of glass tumblers and an ice-bucket. The door to the entrance to the upper room is on the right hand side of the room in the wall opposite the bed.
On the verandah itself we can see a smaller coffee table made of wicker and two more upholstered wicker chairs on either side of the table.
CAP:
Twenty years, three failed businesses and a failed marriage behind me in this country. A country that intoxicates but nothing has intoxicated so much and so totally as she has.
CAP:
The clean smell of ozone fills my nose, inflates my lungs. Rejuvenates me, clearing away the tobacco taste of my cigarette. I close my eyes and memories come tumbling in and the sound of the surf breaking on the sand I hear the street vendor in a busy open market…
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PAGE 2:
A SIX PANEL PAGE. 2,2 and 2. This is a market scene. The market is like many here in the northeast of Brazil. Crowded and dirty and they sell everything from screws and nails to furniture. Food, fruits and household goods are mostly in evidence. The market stalls are rickety affairs, close together and built of wood, with the rooves generally made of those heavy duty plastic tarpaulin affairs. There’s possibly enough room for two people to walk abreast down the alleys formed by the stalls.
The people are simple people most of the men should be dressed in Bermudas (torn and dirty would be good for some, well worn for others), a variety of hats ranging from the ubiquitous baseball caps to round straw brimmed hats and battered felt trilby type hats. Shirts are generally t-shirts and ordinary shirts generally open at the front. Footwear should range from battered sneakers to flip-flops and open-toed sandals.
Women will be wearing (younger): Short shorts generally leaving very little to the imagination, tank-tops, bikini tops and t-shirts. Some may be wearing mini-dresses mostly with floral patterns. All will be wearing sandals of various descriptions.
Older women: will be wearing dresses and sandals, some would probably be in platform shoes but those with tops like women’s sandals. The stalls themselves would be selling everything from fruit to furniture. We can see stalls that are selling tropical fruits and vegetables, others which are selling things like clothes, underwear and electrical goods such as mp3 players, cd cases and a bunch of other stuff.
We see our “hero” mooching around the stalls, which are hung with herbs of unsavory origin, fruits like mango, oranges, etc. He is dressed in Bermudas and sandals, a big flowery shirt, a panama hat and dark glasses. He is dickering with a vendor over the price of some spices.
What would be nice would be to have instead of normal panel borders have us see OUR HERO as seen through the stalls. Their silhouettes making the panel borders, as if we are standing in adjacent stalls watching the action.
VENDOR:
…will be six reis doutor.
OUR HERO;
Minha senhora, I think that if I pay you in cash you will accept the 5 reis I am offering.
VENDOR:
Doutor you are taking food from the mouths of my children. But as a favor to you I will sell to you my mangoes at this price.
OUR HERO:
I thank you for your KINDNESS and here is your money.
PANEL 2: this is another scene of the market. Our hero is turning away from the market stall and walking into the rough and tumble of the market populace.
PANEL 3: a side full body shot of OUR HERO as he walks past the fruit and veg. stalls. We are looking at him as he strides past the stalls with his bag of mangoes.
PANEL4: OUR HERO meets an old friend we can see them side on whole body and from the side. The little man, dressed in a white tropical suit, white cotton shirt, white linen trousers, white shoes and a white panama hat, he also has on dark glasses. He is mulatto and probably around 50 years of age. He has a young girl with him she is around 20 years old, almost as tall as OUR HERO, with long dark hair, smooth, with a sheen to it. She is lithe and beautiful. Her skin is the color of coffee, with a hint of milk, healthily dark but not black, her face has fine features and she has a natural grace. She is wearing a simple wrap-around dress that comes to just above her knees, with a bright floral pattern and low open-toed sandals.
OLD MAN:
Doutor Mark! How wonderful to see you!
MARK:
Seu Itamar! This meeting is indeed well met. I haven’t seen you in a long time.
SEU ITAMAR:
Indeed. Indeed. How is that lovely wife of yours? And those wonderful children? They are keeping well I hope.
PANEL 5: Here is a close up of MARK we can see from his shoulders up, he looks a little sad and a little sheepish.
MARK:
Ahh. Hmmm. Well she has left me and gone back to ENGLAND Seu Itamar. She found that she couldn’t take the heat and the corruption anymore. Me, I actually prefer it here. No grey skies and cold winter evenings for me.
PANEL 6: This is a close up on SEU ITAMAR and the girl. He has a look of concern on his face and we can now see that he has a very thin moustache over his generous lips, his dark eyes hold a twinkle of mischief as well as concern. As this is a head and upper body shot of the old man and the girl we can see that the dress has a bit of a plunge to the neckline, her full breasts are barely contained by the simple material of the dress, we can see that she has slightly alien cast to her eyes, as they have a slight upturn to them as if there was some Japanese in her ancestry and that they are really dark, almost like two midnight pools, the stars reflected in their depth.
SEU ITAMAR;
That is such a shame doutor. Your wife was a singular woman–
–well this is my niece, Inez, she is staying with me as her parents recently passed away and I am her only living relative.
Say hello to the good doutor Inez.
INEZ:
Good day doutor Mark. My…uncle has told me much of you.
MARK (OP):
Really?
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PAGE 3:
A FOUR PANEL PAGE once again this should have a full page illustration with the other panels dropped in. The full page illustration is actually PANEL TWO, with the other panels dropped in. I’ll describe it when I come to it.
PANEL 1: This is a normal sized panel in the top left hand corner of the page. We are once again on the verandah. MARK is leaning on the railing smoking a cigarette and looking out to sea. We are looking at him slightly from behind and we can see that the moon has risen a little higher. The silvery path is still there.
CAP:
That was six months ago. Six heady months. There was nothing that Inez and I didn’t do…
PANEL 2: This is the whole page illustration of INEZ and MARK dancing close together, passion in their eyes. Around them there is a party going on, coloured banners and streamers, almost carnival but not, it’s obviously a street scene and they are close to a building. She is wearing the same dress and he is in his white trousers and shirt. The street is full of revelers laughing and dancing.
CAP:
…all but that one little thing. Always we stopped short of that one little thing.
CAP:
I yearned to feel her around me, engulfing me with her femaleness. But always she held me off. Which doesn’t mean to say that there was no pleasure–far from it. There was always pleasure.
Panel 3: Two are silhouetted in a bed, the sheets are crumpled and a full moon is shining through the window, the window is open and the thin curtains are fluttered by a night breeze. She’s obviously giving him a blow job.
MARK:
Aaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhh!!
PANEL 4: A head and shoulder shot of INEZ and MARK in bed, we are looking down on them, she is curled into his embracing arm on his right. He is lazily smoking a post-coital cigarette, a happy smile on his face, like the cat that got the cream and the mouse. The thin sheets are crumpled covering their bottom halves, but we can see INEZ’s breasts quite clearly. She has her right arm across his chest and she is nuzzling his ear.
INEZ:
Querida, I LOVE you so much. I love you more than you could know. I am happy the day my uncle and I met you in Santa Luzía that day.
MARK:
Oh DARLING, so am I.
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PAGE 4:
This is A SIX PANEL PAGE. 2,2 and 2 again. Maybe this could be done without panel divides, one panel bleeding into the panels around it, here there will be quite a lot of exposition as we need to do this in 6 pages, this is when MARK discovers some of INEZ’s true nature. Enough room needs to be left for the caption boxes (will you be lettering this as well?) maybe we could do something interesting with the caption boxes and lettering. The lighting should be pretty specific here. In the scenes in the ‘terreiro’ the light source is flickering torches, thrust into the ground around the outside of the action. Remember that this is outside, an enclosed outside space, organic and tropical. The other scenes are in normal daylight, a hot dusty tropical (there’s that word again) daylight. Except the first panel which is night time.
PANEL1: Here we see MARK speaking to ITAMAR earnestly. They are standing outside a little street bar, its interior is brightly lit, there’s no door as such, just the big entrance, there are rickety metal tables and uncomfortable fold-away wooden chairs inside and outside on the pavement. The tiling on the inside walls is blue and white chess pattern, there’s a nudie calendar pinned on the wall. A sign for ‘Guaraná Antartica’ (a soft drink, I have reference for this if need be, though it wouldn’t be hard to find it from the internet, the older the better though), skol beer and ruffles potato crisps adverts abound on the wall. There should be a ‘Flamengo’ flag on the wall (every fucker supports Flamengo here). Generally in the bars here you’ll see beer and soft drink crates piled up in the back or against one of the walls in bars here. NOTE: If you do search online for references, be sure that it’s for the northeast of Brazil as the bars are different in the south, generally closed in.
CAP:
This is when ITAMAR told me who Inez was and how important she was. My old friend was a “Pai do Santo” a leader of CANDOMBLÉ, a mixture of African religious beliefs and primitive Catholic ones.
PANEL 2: Here we see INEZ dancing in the middle of a group of people, she is dressed in only a simple white skirt that comes down to her bare feet. She is naked from the waist up. Her hair is swirling round her head like a dark curtain. This is the “terreiro” or worshipping place of those that practice candomblé. The people around her are all dressed in white, the men in loose fitting white trousers, almost like pyjama pants, tied at the waist with coloured rope-like belts. They are naked from the waist up and very sweaty, they are playing fuck off big drums called ‘zabumbas’ and chanting. The women are dressed as ‘Bahianas’, these are the matriarchs and females of the community. The ‘Bahiana” dress is wide-skirted dresses, with lace and white turbans on their heads. They also wear lots of beaded necklaces around their necks, generally beads and seashell necklaces and lots of bangles around their wrists. Everyone is barefooted and singing and chanting, the light source for this panel is torches set up around the ‘terreiro’ they are all in state of religious ecstasy, no one, though so much as Inez who is dancing sinuously in the centre of the group. They are calling down the ‘orixás’ to inhabit her body and they can make their requests the embodiment of the goddess. The ‘terreiro’ is generally outdoors.
CAP:
Little did I know of this, but such was my intoxication with this girl that soon I was inducted into the cult. Not unheard of for a ‘gringo’, though it seems this particular group was considered…’hardcore’!
PANEL 3:Here we see MARK being inducted into the sect, he is kneeling before ITAMAR, we are looking from behind, ITAMAR he is wearing white trousers, and a white suit jacket but no shirt covers his scrawny chest, he also has one simple necklace of beads and is also wearing a slightly more ornate turban. He is standing over MARK his hands in the air clasping an obviously dead rooster, its blood dripping onto MARK’s head, the rest of the group is arraigned behind ITAMAR looking on (this includes INEZ) ITAMAR is crying something out, exalting the gods to bless the newest member of the cult. Once again the light source for this panel is torches behind the assembled group.
CAP:
I would do anything for my Inez, my darling —’minha neginha’ she had become the centre of my life and I could not imagine another day on this planet without her.
PANEL 4: MARK is prostrate in the background, face down on the floor, his arms outspread and the rest of the group is assembled around him, pouring ‘cachaça’ and water on him. In the foreground on the right hand side of the panel, INEZ and ITAMAR are huddled in conference, INEZ’s eyes have an evil gleam to them and ITAMAR is holding her left arm above the elbow as if he is attempting to calm her down, they are facing towards us in shadows, their faces in darkness.
CAP:
A fool! This is my fate, always to be the fool, but in this case a willing one. So ensnared was I by her charms. But what did I care? May God strike me down now, if I lie.
PANEL5: A street scene full body we are looking from the front. There are shops, bars and restaurants lining the street, our couple are strolling arm in arm and laughing together at some shared private joke, heads thrown back in laughter. The street is crowded with shoppers and people just passing the time, a couple of them have stopped and are looking at the happy couple, smiles on their faces, happy at the couple s happiness.
CAP:
We spent nearly every waking moment together. I certainly was caught up in the experience that was Inez.
PANEL 6: The two lovers are now kissing at the ‘terreiro’. They are in a passionate embrace, MARK covered in blood and liquid, INEZ naked from the waist up, just a simple shift, we are looking at them from the knees up he has her in his manly arms and she is crushed against him, sweat, blood and other liquids glistening, forming a sheen on the parts of their bodies that are naked. This is the foreground, in the background the ‘Candombistas’ are ranged around the couple, giving them some space and looking on with extreme happiness, echoing in some twisted way the people in the street crowds from the previous panel. Once again the light source for this panel is flickering torches; there should be lots of shadows and mystery.
CAP:
May Heaven help me, though I fear that I am far from Divine aid now- -now I must face my fate—for tonight is my wedding night.
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PAGE 5:
A FIVE PANEL PAGE: Panel 1 should be along the full width of the top of the page, as should panel 2. Panel 3 should be half of the bottom tier of the page, with panels 4 &5 taking up the bottom two spaces at the bottom left hand side of the page.
PANEL 1: This should be a repeat from panel 2 on page 1, but obviously with less space, maybe the perspective could be from further out. The difference her also is that the figure that was on the verandah is no longer there. Whereas in pge 1, pnl 2 it was a dark silhouette against a bright background, now we have a white silhouette against the dark background of the dark vegetation, the house is still a bright oasis in the background, slightly elevated.
CAP:
The crickets have now grown silent. All the night creatures have been unvoiced. They know what is coming. Even the soft sound of the surf has become muted. I stand here at the high tide mark. I can feel the springy seaweed beneath my feet. It feels like an old and mouldy mattress that I once stepped on as a child.
PANEL 2: we are now looking from MARK’s perspective down the beach to the sea. The moon is fully risen and casts its silvery sheen over everything (this should be one of those big fuck off Bruce Jones moons, where you can see all the craters and shit). The sea is calm and dappled by the moon’s light. Standing knee deep in the water, a dark silhouette and completely naked is INEZ, her hair fanned out around her head like some dark halo.
INEZ:
Come to me my DARLING. Come drink deep from the well of your sweet. I am here like a flower waiting for your embrace.
CAP:
God help me! But I cannot RESIST, all that I have dreamed of these past months stands before me.
PANEL 3: INEZ and MARK are standing face to face at the surf line. We are looking from the right hand side, MARK is now naked. His clothes in a crumpled heap behind him on the sand, INEZ’s arms are outstretched coaxing him into the waves.
CAP:
“With this silver cup of mystery from beyond the veil of night. Come I to take the rainbow in my shrine of hidden light.”
PANEL 4: Once again it is a side on shot of MARK and INEZ, this time close up from the shoulders up, they are close coming in for a kiss. INEZ’s hands are now cupping MARK’s head as she opens her mouth (perhaps a hint of reptile tongue can be seen here, but it needs to be subtle). Their heads bent at angles the easier to kiss.
CAP:
“You’ve left my heart shaken with a hopeless desolation, I’d have you to know it’s the wonders of admiration your quiet face has taken and your beauty will haunt me wherever I go.”
PANEL 6: this is from behind MARK. We can only see the back of his head and INEZ’s face as she is kissing him, the moon is behind her, her hands are at the sides his face, her hair is now wild and we can see a slight mottling to the shade of her skin, her elbows are up, the eye we can see is slitted and reptilian.
CAP:
“In Stygian doom I see you bloom, whilst my heart is wracked on midnight’s bench. I lie soul down on tellurian ground.”
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PAGE 6:
A THREE PANEL PAGE. In actual fact one large panel with two “panels” dropped in at the top, and leaving a space at the bottom of the page for our ‘host with the most’ to sign off.
PANEL 1: this is a close up of MARK he has broken away from “INEZ”, there is a look of stark raving horror on his face.
CAP:
NO NO NO NO NO!!!!
PANEL 2: This is from the same perspective but pulled out a little. We can see MARK’s chest and shoulders as well as his head. His chest and upper arms are encircled by what look like tentacles. The look of insanity in his face is enough to show us the horror that he is wrapped in. but still, there is a hint of the love that he felt for the INEZ creature.
THE REST OF THE PAGE: this is a full illustration of the monster that has MARK in its grip. It’s something out of Lovecraft, a mess of tentacles, really giant, taking up most of the space on the page, we are looking from the beach so it is silhouetted by the moon. Hundreds of tentacles writhing, a beak of a mouth, though it would be described as a maw, something like Cthulu. MARK is held up in the air in some of its tentacles, he is screaming (You can go nuts with this one).
MARK:
INEEEEEEEEEEEEEEZZZZZZZZZ!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!
AT THE BOTTOM OF THE PAGE: we have the mausoleum manager wiping a tear of happiness from his eye.
MM:
I love a happy ending. What? Not HAPPY! Well it was their wedding night. At least mark got INSIDE Inez.
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I ALSO WORKED A LOT MORE ON “THE GLORY DAYS” OVER THE WEEK AND STARTED ON A (I THINK) SHORT STORY INSPIRED BY A NICK DRAKE SONG AND VOLTAIRE’S ‘CANDIDE‘ WHICH I HAVE RECENTLY RE-READ.
SEE YA
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