Gail Simone's Blog, page 849

Are you still working with Ethan Van Sciver on that mystery project?

We are. And when you guys see it, your heads will asplode.

Seriously. The art is…RIDICULOUSLY AMAZING.

One more, then I promise I’m done for the night.This was...

One more, then I promise I’m done for the night.

This was at a rocking con near Memphis called the Mid-South Con, that I absolutely loved. It was an old-school con, I gather, run by people for the sheer love of what they do. Everything was designed to make people feel welcome and to have fun.

And good lord, were they wonderful hosts. They took us to see Graceland (interesting) and the Sun Records studio (REALLY interesting) and best of all, to Gus’s Fried Chicken, the best fried chicken I’ve EVER HAD bar none.

There was an awards dinner of some kind, for the life of me I can’t remember what it was about. But my husband and I had the good fortune to be seated at a table with these two folks. I will remember them forever. Invited guests were free, I think the attendees paid an extra fee to sit with the invited guests.

It’s a woman and her nephew. They were both incredibly quiet and polite. I kept trying to draw them out, as they both spoke very quietly and seemed very shy. My husband is amazing at getting strangers to feel welcome and join in but even he couldn’t really get them to talk. Salad came and went, they barely talked. Main dish, similar.

Finally, I asked why they wanted to come to the convention, what was it that they were interested in?

And, I love this, they BOTH wanted to make their own comics. No fooling around, no pipe dreams, they each wanted to write, print and sell their own comics.

Well.

That opened the floodgates. The reason she had been so shy is that she had a million questions and didn’t know where to start asking me. The reason he was so shy is that he’s just a super polite kid, I think he was waiting for his aunt to start talking.

So we sat for maybe two hours, if I remember right, me trying to answer every possible question about craft, every question about character, plot, dialogue, how to work with artists, how to distribute, everything. The aunt asked EVERYTHING and I could see she was taking it down in her head, she wanted to learn it and use it. Which I LOVE. Many times, someone will ask a huge question, “How do I make comics?” and then their eyes glaze over, not here. She was listening.

Then, I asked the young man what his comic was about and I swear, he just BLOOMED. He went through the entire plot, telling me all the characters and all the story and how it would look, I thought it was the most fun, thrilling thing I’d ever heard.

I looked over at the aunt at one point and my eyes must have had a little bit of skepticism or something, it seemed pretty ambitious for such a young guy.

She said, “Nope, he’s not kidding. He’s drawing it himself and he works on it every day.”

Dude, I MYSELF don’t make comics every day.

The best dinner ever. I loved it.  I had their email, we kept in contact for a while, but I haven’t heard from them for a bit. I hope they have made their comics. I hope they are telling stories. I hope, the next such dinner I’m at, they are sitting with attendees telling THEM how to make comics.

All I know is that they inspired me, I ran right to my room after and wrote half a completed script.

Again, coolest job EVER.

Are you in Singapore right now?

No! I wish.

The truth is, I only just learned how to post photos, so I am embarrassing myself by posting favorite memories.

I’ll cool it for a while. ;)

What would you say to people who accuse you of writing Barb as a weak female character because she cried about the Joker returning an torturing her family? I don't say that, but I want to know what your take is.

I would say people who think tears make you weak would probably never have a definition of ‘strong’ that makes any sense whatsoever.

Non-Update Update

Guys, I know I owe a million responses.

I’m not kidding…my email makes a little bong sound and for the last few days, it’s sounded like this bongbongbongbongbongbongbongbongbong. Just endlessly. Everyone has called, executives and editors from every company. My DM box on twitter was filling up so fast that I could read them before they went off the screen.  And the response on Tumblr might have been the biggest of all.

I’m sorry, I could not keep up. But even more than that, if I sat and read the kind words for too long, I would get very choked up every time. People said such kind things that it was almost harder to read in some cases than hate mail because I just had no idea, I have NO idea, how much support I had out there. I just didn’t. My hubby keeps saying I should have known because people have been so kind all along, but…well, this is another level.

I need to respond better. I’ll try to answer as many comments as I can, maybe in a big block so it’s not making people want to jump out the window when they read their dash. But if I don’t get back to you personally PLEASE understand that I read your kind thoughts and I got your message and it meant the world to me.

Truthfully, I keep saying this, but I was very bummed after the news. But I feel like anyone who could put on a mopey face in the face of this kind of support must be a very ungrateful person indeed.

I am happy. I didn’t know the opportunities that there are. I didn’t know that my work was valued by so many people in this industry.  Can’t say anything yet, but I will say that I’ve been offered to write some dream, dream books I never even thought I might be able to work on. I’ve been asked to do animation and games and RPGS and more. Friends I haven’t spoken with for years got in contact. People from every aspect of the industry, including pros I have admired but never even met, wrote just to check in and make sure I was okay.

I’m better than okay. I’m happy, ridiculously happy.

Because I have colleagues like that and readers like you.

So, it’ll take a while to respond to some of these posts, but I’ll try my best. DON’T THINK IT’S NOT APPRECIATED. It’s made ALL the difference, it’s the reason I’ve been smiling and laughing, instead of feeling terrible and beating up furniture. THANK YOU.

I have a lot of decisions to make. But SOME very, very, very cool announcements will be coming VERY soon, hopefully before the weekend. I’m talking with a LOT of great companies…soon I can talk about who, and for what reason. :)

LIFE is freaking WONDERFUL.

pizza-party:iheartchaos:Cosplay of the day: Lady...

pizza-party:

iheartchaos:

Cosplay of the day: Lady Carnage

Model is Lucy Challenger

Via

Whoa.

Somewhen, strangely symbiote-obsessed sixth grade Jim Gibbons has the weirdest boner.

Wow…I swear, I’m gonna punch the next person who uses the term, “fake nerd.”

You might THINK you have a cool job.My job, I get to meet kids...

You might THINK you have a cool job.

My job, I get to meet kids like this, who told me that not only was she Supergirl, but that she was “A Princess of the Sun.”

Some memories never wear out, the joy level never fades.

Having chilli crab, the national dish of Singapore, with some...

Having chilli crab, the national dish of Singapore, with some Marvel friends.

If they look a little tired, it’s because this was a publicity tour right hear sponsored by the Singaporean government, a food tour where they took us all over the city to try different foods. It was heaven…but it was also FOUR HOURS LONG.

So by this point…even miracle foods started to look a little intimidating!

Oh, hello, ridiculously adorable Nightwing who I met at a con...

Oh, hello, ridiculously adorable Nightwing who I met at a con and almost called “Dick” like twelve times because I KEPT MISTAKING YOU FOR THE REAL NIGHTWING.

This is my lunchbox.It has a cape.I win.

This is my lunchbox.

It has a cape.

I win.