I was going to email this to Mike, but then I realized that I might as well release it for general kibitzing. I'm going to forego the thumbnails for the single big panel that is p. 7, and jump right into the pencils, for reasons that will become clear. The text in the page is all in captions that sort of slide down the page, sometimes askew, Joe Sacco-style.
Here's the script. Each paragraph is a new caption.
QUICKLY—ALMOST BEFORE I
CAN THINK—EVERYTHING
BECOMES A CHAOTIC BLUR.
WE'RE OUTNUMBERED, BUT I
CAN'T SEE HOW MANY OF THE
SHADOWS ARE OUT THERE.
THE JUNKMEN HANDLE THEMSELVES WELL—
TOSSING SWORD-BLOWS AND KICKS OF ALL KINDS.
BUT THE SHADOWS
KEEP CLOSING IN.
I'M TRYING TO
CAST A SPELL—
BUT I DON'T HAVE
MANY THINGS AT HAND.
QUICK—
WHAT IS THE ESSENTIAL
NATURE OF A SALTCELLAR?
—OF A WHEEL?
—OF A GREEN BOX?
—OF REINS?
EUREKA!
I GRAB THE REINS AND USE
THEM TO BIND ONE OF THE
SHADOWS TO MY WILL.
BUT I'M TOO LATE.
DESPITE OUR EFFORTS, TWO
SHADOWS GRAB ARNTHAM
AND HIS MAP—
—AND ABDUCT HIM INTO
THEIR INVISIBLE WORLD.
Now, at least, Mike knows what happens on p. 7, so he can start planning p. 8. And I'm packing in a lot more than three Duchamp references for Tom: the phrase "kicks of all kinds" is from a Duchamp title, as is "Green Box"; also, Duchamp apparently sometimes referred to himself as "the Salt-Seller" (Marcel Duchamp = Marchand du sel), so there's a pun in another one of my random objects...
... and there will be more references, at the visual level, for which you'll have to wait.
Off to a good start here, Kaiser! Some suggestions for tweaking:
ReplyDelete1) I'm not sure about "Eureka!" It sounds a bit too precious to me; when Stepan's being attacked by shadowy killers, is that the likeliest thing he'd say when he has a breakthrough? Something like "I've got it!" or "That's it!", while more bland, might be more convincing here.
2) Though the word count overall isn't huge, you've got a lot of little captions here--sixteen; and while I think a large number of captions can indeed be used to pace a single-panel page well (I've been teaching Sacco this week!), I also think that you shouldn't clutter the page with more captions than are really necessary. I'm not sure that each individual object Stepan considers needs its own box, for example.
3) You've done a good job throughout of making this sound like on-the-spot thinking, within the admittedly artificial conventions of captions narrating events as a character perceives them. (Goodness knows I've struggled with this in my pages, where Stepan sounds like a narrator more than a young person thinking and reacting to what he sees.) I think the one phrase that smacks of the study to me, though, is "Despite our efforts." It seems too well-considered, almost after the fact, not urgent enough for the present-moment alarm it must create for him.
I'm really eager to see the pencils. And I appreciate your going ahead and giving me something to think about for page 8!