It's time for Summerween!

That's right. In last week's newsletter I teased some new fashioned summertime fun and this week I'm happy to officially kick off the Summerween season! So, what's this really all about? Here's a bit I wrote over on Patreon:

"Hear me out. I dig summertime, I do! There was a time, not so long ago, where it was my favorite season by far. I have very good memories of late nights spent on rooftop bars, having drinks with friends, glistening from the heat and never wanting to go home. I was also in my mid 30’s-so let’s keep that in mind shall we?

Since then, summers in Texas have gotten a bit hotter, drinks give me headaches and heartburn, I sweat far more, and now I’m in my mid 40’s. An argument can be made that maybe it’s just my mid-40’s and everything else has stayed the same, but the point I’m trying to make is I want to take back summer. Like, for myself. I want to make summer great again.

That’s when the concept of summerween crossed my path."

So, what exactly is summerween? Well, I first heard about it from a Gravity Falls episode where the locals love Halloween so much they celebrate it twice a year. That idea of celebrating all things spooky but with a summer spin unlocked a barrage of inspiration and I ran with it. Am still running with it. It's inspired a ton of illustrations, sticker designs, and gave birth to a summerween book club. Want to know more? Well, let's read some new comics first and then we can continue our conversation below.

Notes: Okay so it's hard to balance out my excitement about Summerween with the revelation of what Spencer looks like AS A HUMAN! But we're going to try. I wrote more about the process of discovering what Spencer was going to look like in the flesh over on Patreon. If you guys want you can join us over there and get all sorts of more gritty comic making stuff. But, designing a character can be challenging. You don't want them to be generic or forgettable, they need to stand out. But they don't all necessarily need be iconic. I feel like Madam Weary is iconic. She's definitely a person not to be reckoned with, but Spencer, he's our everyman, our regular dude. He's our window into The After Death. He needs to be likable and someone who we could see ourselves maybe hanging out with. And I'm pretty sure we nailed it. I say "we" because my editor-also known as my wife-who's pretty brutal in her art criticism cried when she saw me draw this version of Spencer for the first time. Even now, when I showed her this comic page, her response was that of seeing a baby kitten or puppy dog. That's someone who you can let your guard down around. And that is very much Spencer.

Celebrate Summerween!

Okay so, one of the major ways I'm celebrating Summerween is by reading a series of graphic novels that give me all of those Summerween vibes, which include a surprising amount of stories with kids, summer camp, and mysteries. Hey, if the formula works right? I mean, its got its hooks in me. The inspiration behind this year's Summerween logo of course comes from summer slasher films of the 80's and when I looked up "summer camp graphic novels" the lists were endless. There were many books to choose from! But, I managed to find a handful that piqued my interest. Maybe you've already guessed where I'm going with this: one of the best ways you can participate in Summerween with me is with a good, old fashioned book club. If you were looking for a reason to justify buying more books, feel free blame me, I can take the heat. I'll be reading one graphic novel a week for the month of June (and maybe July too if I'm still feeling it). At the end of each week I'm going to write up a little review of what I thought of the book on my Patreon page (if you do want to read with me, I'm sharing the book list for each week below). Then, at the end of the week, hop over to my Patreon page and let me know what you thought of the book in the comments of the review. It'll all be free and open to the public. No paywalls, no subscription tiers, none of that.

I will be offering some extra goodies to those who are patrons such as a Summerween themed sticker sheet which goes out to all Patreon members, no matter what tier you pledge to. But I'm also thinking of some freebies I can offer anyone who wants to participate no matter their budget, even if that budget is zero.

So, whaddaya think? Want to celebrate Summerween with me?

Here's the book list below:

WEEK ONE: Brain Camp.by Susan Kim and Laurence Klavan. Artwork by Faith Erin Hicks and colors by Hilary Sycamore.

WEEK TWO: Lumberjanes Vol. 1 by ND Stevenson and Grace Ellis. Artwork by Brooke Allen, colors by Maarta Laiho, letters by Aubrey Aiese.

WEEK THREE: Home Sick Pilots Vol. 1, by Dan Watters with art by Casper Winjngaard and letterer Aditya Bidikar.

WEEK FOUR: TBD (I'm still trying to decide on this week's book.)

Things kick off tomorrow, June 3rd and we have a week to read Brain Camp.

Jumping Ship

Apparently a lot of creators have gotten their feathers ruffled on Instagram about Meta scraping their accounts to feed to the A.I. machine. It's not just an issue over copyright or artwork, but also a pretty blatant privacy violation for all Instagram and Facebook users. Even though I'm definitely not happy about it, when I did some digging, it seems Meta made this announcement way back in October of last year. Maybe even earlier if I dug a little deeper, who knows. Why only now, nearly June, is everyone making a fuss? Because panic is contagious. At some point a spark was made and now it's a wildfire... Everyone, it seems, is setting up yet another tent pole up on another app named Cara.

I've seen this before, and even done this before. And you know what? The truth of the entire matter is...it doesn't matter. Corporations have already taken all the things they want from us. They have our data. They have our preferences. They know what music we like most. They know how often we buy paper towels. And now they use our photos and artwork to make fake photos and artwork. I almost got caught up in the fervor of it all myself if not for a few lone voices that wasn't giving into the mob. Look, corporations suck. The bigger they are the more they suck. But I can't sit around worried AI is going to make a ghost with shoes on that looks just like Spencer. I can't. The key to sharing good art and good comics isn't hiding it in fear of AI. AI is here. AI is going to do what AI is going to do. What AI can't do is write my next comic page. Only I can do that. And unless a vast majority of people decide they prefer comics made by AI rather than actual humans, I'm gonna' just keep going. I mean, I hate Instagram as much as the next person and for all the same reasons; but I can't switch my focus on taking down The Man. I'm a comic artist, not a copyrights litigator. In the mean time, I'll keep telling people about this newsletter and trying to get them to hop over to Patreon or Substack where I can own and control things a little better. As well as tamp down my own existential crises that crop up here and there without the help of a lynch mob or AI--thank you very much.

What's Making Me Happy This Week

Okay, that's all the doom and gloom I can stand for one newsletter, lets get into what made me happy this week:

• The Forged issue #8. The Forged is an Image comic about women warriors in mech suits, set in space, with alien space worms and mystical witches that can see into the future. It's got all of the space opera hallmarks but after I finished the first 3 issues-essentially the first story arc-I wasn't impressed. I even wrote a review about it where I said it came off meh. BUT, out of curiosity I did pick up the 4th issue when it came out and that 4th installment introduced a bit of the politics going on behind these female fighters and now I'm hooked! It's one of the best comics on the shelves. They release the issues in three issue spurts, and then disappear for a while, only to return again with three new issues. I assume this publishing schedule is to help ease the rate of production (making comics is hard), but I really dig it because I like the anticipation of waiting for the next installment to drop. The first two volumes are available now if you don't want to go searching for each individual issue. But if intergalactic space battles are your thing, as well as conniving space witches, conspiracy coverups, with a good chunk of action thrown in, consider giving The Forged a try.

Alright crew you are dismissed! Thanks for reading and generally being awesome in every way! I hope you guys have a good week ahead. Next week I'll have some really fun Summerween illustrations to share and I'll have a review of this week's book: Brain Camp! I hope you're able to grab a copy and read with me. Happy Summerween and I'll see you back here again next weekend.

~b

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