No rest for the wicked. That is something for sure to be said, with under a week to go and with every second counting, for the second time this month I got sick. It's mainly allergies to dust, which luckily my shared living space here has got plenty of dust to spare, dust for everyone. And when you are away most of the time, yeah things end up collecting a lot of dust. Part of me thinks that is some kind of strange metaphor for my current state of life, things collecting dust and why it makes me sick. I might be onto something here, maybe. Regardless Storm Clouds, I have got some good news, I finished up the cover, so that's going to be getting scanned up today! If you follow me on Instagram, and if you don't follow me at ChileanStorm, you would have seen that I posted up five images, each of the five "wardens" of the Glass Prison. I will be posting them here, so take a look and see what you think...
Greed
Indulgence
Desire
Pain
Guilt
The five demons or the five wardens are the main antagonist of the Glass Prison story, while they are here to drag Jason down into eternal damnation, each of them has their own agenda and story. While some mainly want to conquer and dominate the mind, others are looking for something even greater and much darker. I want to go into greater detail for each of these guys, but I can't give away too much, it ruins the story and the surprise of it all.
So get to know these five monsters, they will be here for awhile.
Well that's all I got for now, if you have any questions or comments, you can ask down below or you can give me a follow on all the different forms of social media, ChileanStorm for practically everything I do. I will be back tomorrow with a new blog, until then keep chasing the storm!
Something to be said about those Inhumans, they always leave their mark. And sometimes that takes form in new Inhumans on the Earth or sometimes it can be a banished Inhuman king, like the main villain in this story, The Unspoken. A character so bad, so crazy and so powerful, Black Bolt and the royal family took it upon themselves to erase his name and all his history from Attilan. Damn, that's harsh. So needless to say, he wakes up more then a little bit cranky and ready to take over the world with his banned Inhuman machinery. With an omega level threat on hand, you need only one team...and the help of as many other teams as possible, but mainly, the Mighty Avengers! From the creative team of Dan Slott (Amazing Spider-man), Christos Gage (Avengers:The Initiative), Khoi Pham (X-Factor) and Sean Chen (Nova) comes The Mighty Avengers: The Unspoken! This hard cover collects the five issue of this story from Mighty Avengers #27-#31 and also includes various different Avengers making an appearance as well, including one of my personal favourite teams, the Young Avengers! This book takes place during the Dark Reign in the Marvel universe, and this Mighty Avengers team is led by Hank Pym, with team members; Quicksilver, Stature, Vision, Amadeus Cho, US Agent, Hercules and Jocasta. And also infiltrated on this team is Scarlet Witch, who is actually Loki, up to no good as always. Every now and then, you want something different. That's what you get here on this Mighty Avengers team, a very diverse cast of characters who don't get enough panels or pages, it's a nice welcomed change from the usual Avengers cast. But more importantly, is it any good? Let's find out..
What I did enjoy about this book, was seeing all the characters I love in action and working together. I am a really big fan of characters like Quicksilver, Speed, Kate Bishop and pretty much the entire Young Avengers team. But even seeing characters from Avengers: The Initiative was really cool as well, and you even get to see a Chinese super hero team that includes Radioactive-man, though he doesn't look as cool as he did back in that Warren Ellis Thunderbolts team. It was a really refreshing read to see these characters in action, because it's a shame when they collect dust or get written badly. The book does have a classic Avengers feel to it, especially having Jarvis back and with a new Avengers Mansion headquarters as well and plenty of team up kind of attacks. This is a great fan for the classic and new teams, it has something for everyone. When I think on how I would approach an Avengers story, this feels like it should be, lots of characters teaming up together against a great threat to the planet. So I was pleasently surprised by Dan Slott's writing, especially since I know him mainly for solo character books, like both Superior and Amazing Spider-Man. The art in the book while not mind blowing or anything like that, it does a good job with all the battle scenes and collections of the various different characters on a page at a time. It reminds me of John Romita Jr's run on the Avengers title, and it plays well in the whole classic feel to it all. By no means does it damage the story or legacy of the Avengers. But I also need to say, the look on the covers is absolutely fantastic work, Especially issue 29 ans issue 31, the Scarlet Witch/Loki one looks gorgeous!
So a great Avengers adventure, that doesn't feel weighted down by gloom and darkness but with enough battles and clashes to remind us what we love about super hero team ups in the first place. And while the collection is cool, check it out if you get the chance. By no means however is it a must read, but it's a fun little collection. If you do find a copy of Mighty Avengers #29 though, pick that one up, the cover alone is totally worth the price.
Well that's all the time I have for now, I am still working away on Glass Prison, so be sure to follow me here and all social media for small and big updates and everything in between. It's not easy balancing work and trying to make a comic book, but I do my best. And I do have fun sharing these reviews with you guys, whenever I go to my local shop and pick up my titles, it's great to look through all the classic books and pick some of these up. I highly suggest everyone do that, because as great as the new stuff is (AXIS is pretty hype and holy crap did you read Batman #35), it's always cool to give older titles a shot. You never know what you might find. Well that's me for now, keep chasing the storm.
Big news everybody! (Always wanted to open a blog like that)
So just this past weekend I was able to put the last finishing touches on my first small comic book project, Part-Timer. The project was from the 12 hour comic book challenge back in the Spring, and was something I've been meaning to finish off for sometime now. My hats off to any comic book creators who can pull off the challenge, like Shane Heron and Ricky Lima, who created their sci-fi adventure from this challenge, Black Hole Hunters Club. Great stuff guys! And if you guys have yet to read these books, go here right now and give them a follow. But yeah, I finally finished my little 12 page book. And with that finished, it will be part of the zero issue which I am going to try and finish for Glass Prison, so fans and curious people can get a sneak peak of what to expect from this nightmarish journey.
So Part-Timer as the name goes is about a part time worker. We follow this nameless dude through out his day, and you get to see how he goes about it. In each page we see what small daily task he is doing at work, and the extreme measure he wants to take to escape them. I don't want to give away any more, but if you have worked a part time job before, then you could probably relate in some way or another. Although the character is also very drastic, you are most likely not as exaggerated.
So yeah, that's one for the books, onto the next 8 pages and one mighty cover. And all this to be done by next week. Draw, ink, letter and print. Time to make a f*cking comic. Come on Storm Clouds, time to kick some ass!
Reblog, post and all that other good stuff and of course, keep chasing the storm.
Remember back when, I said I wanted to make a comic book. Well welcome to today, I am doing it and it is going to happen, and while this may be the most personal and time given project I will be working on, I know still that it is going to be rough and flawed, I know this, but the one thing I need to do as an artist and a storyteller is do it, I need to do it and keep going. So with that I am proud to say, that on November 26 2014, I, ChileanStorm will be releasing at retails here in the GTA and page by page on the weekly web-comic site, The Sequentials, a trip into the broken mind of the Glass Prison! This was the first project I wanted to do since joining the comic book artist community here in Toronto, and I feel like the need to release this project instead of being just another fan artist is essential to my future, I want to do this for a living, I want to be known as a storyteller and an artist. And so, I wanted to do start writing up my daily progress of each day as I work away to the deadline, so you can follow my progress and share thoughts and opinions as well. This will be a long ride and it will take some long hours to finish what I've started here, but for me there are no other roads left, time to start running.
I will give you guys a little synopsis on what the Glass Prison is all about for today's entry...
For those of you who are progressive metal fans, you may have noticed that this book shares the same name as the title track of Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence from legendary band, Dream Theatre. Give yourself a bonus star point, you would be absolutely correct. The song itself, an incredible musical journey based off Mike Portnoy's rehabilitation from alcohol abuse, it's the first three of the twelve step program. As far as music goes, absolutely brilliant! By far my favourite track from this incredible band, the thought that goes on behind the words of the lyrics to every rift and note is mind blowing, absolutely perfect execution. As far as music goes, I can honestly say Dream Theatre is near untouchable as masters of their craft. So needless to say this was just one piece to my idea...
The other element is more out of tragedy. A few years back, a distant friend, Kyle Miller, passed away. For many years Kyle had an extreme problem with addiction, drugs and alcohol. By the time of his passing, I had lost touch and contact, a lot of us did. I was angry at him, upset, I never could understand why he couldn't save himself, I felt that since I was able to put those vices behind in my own life, that he would be able as well. But we had very different lives, while both poor financially the one thing I had was always a lot of love at home. I need to pay a tribute to him, I need to tell a story about him in some way shape or form, I need to forgive him and myself for our mistakes.
So taking the song, Kyle and the elements of my own mind, I created Glass Prison. The story that centres around a young recovering addict, Jason, who is trying to regain control of his life. Unfortunately for our hero, he is haunted by many of his inner demons that nightly take him down to the dark corners of his mind, down to the glass prison. And what happens when the dream is real, when you can't wake up from the nightmare, when you can't escape the prison. Jason will have to travel the dark hallways of his twisted psych and find an escape if he ever wants to see the light of day and the chance of hope ever again.
So that's the plot. What do you think? Is this something you would like to see and read? Interested at all? Well let me know on the comments below or on Twitter (@ChileanStorm) and we can go on about the progress of my project. But now that you know the plot, be sure to come back and check often on the progress of the Glass Prison. A lot to do in the next days and weeks and a lot of ground to cover, but will be on this journey together. Be sure to also follow the #GlassPrison on all social media forms, I will be doing my best to update as much as possible, until then, keep chasing the storm.
