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fight.
a link from lying in the gutters:
Hey everyone, Darwyn Cooke here.
Last week I was out to lunch with friends Brian (Obi Wan Shinobi) and J. Bone (Gobukan). At this point, I was aware that they were producing a self-published comic for San Diego which was to include the guys at the Royal Academy studio. (Board regulars Cameron Stewart, Chip Zdarsky, as well as Kagan McCloud and Ben Shannon. I've known of this project for months, and I'll say right off the top that this was Brian and J.'s baby and the rest of the guys were invited to participate.
The story they told me over lunch was hard to believe.
Below is an account of the genisis of what Cameron is now hyping as Rumble Royale-a product of the Royal Academy studio. I didn't write it, the two gents who started the project wrote it. So before anybody thinks I might be skewing this one way or another, it's coming straight form the horse's (J. and Brian) mouths....
>
>The idea for what is now called "Rumble Royale" came from the unknown Obi 1 Shinobi who approached his friend J. Bone about the two of them publishing a book together.
The book was to be titled "Drive-in Comics" and each of the stories loosely revolved around that theme.
Another friend, Kagan McCloud (infinite kung fu) was invited to join in and eventually, the project grew when Kagan's other studio mates (Cameron, Ben and Chip) were invited to participate,
as was a visiting Sam Hiti. It's
>important to note that while in town, Sam (and the
>rest of the studio) saw a finished unpublished comic
>by Obi which had nude sex scenes and was told that was
>the kind of story Obi would do for the book. The group
>agreed to publish a book of b-movie themed comics
>(think MONKEYSUIT with a common theme including
>Infinite Kung Fu's violent bloodfest, Bone's ode to
>Flash Gordon and gladiator movies, and Obi's 70's
>Sexploitation flicks) No one would be allowed to edit
>each others work unless there was something highly
>offensive, such as racism or graphic sex. 2 months
>later Obi showed his pencils to the studio and all the
>Toronto artists approved of it except one minor change
>which he made. 3 months later Obi finishes his story
>before the deadline and shows it to everyone. Cameron
>was a bit uncomfortable with the nudity and non
>graphic sex in Obi's story but accepted it. Around
>this time a cover was in the works. It was agreed no
>one member would be the sole creator of the cover and
>the title was "DRIVE-IN COMICS" since our theme was
>drive-in movies. Again, Cameron seemed to have a
>problem with this, requesting a change in title at one
>of our lunch meetings. Bone and Obi both reiterated
>that a change in title altered the intent of the book,
>to re-visit drive-in movies.
>American Sam saw Obi's story and perhaps had
>forgotten the original comic he saw. He said he didn't
>want to be in a book with sex and nudity so he bowed
>out of the book. The studio mates Cameron, Chip and
>Kagan asked Obi to make a change to keep Sam in the
>book. It's also worth noting that Sam wasn't paying to
>be in the book because he couldn't afford it so
>everyone was equally sharing his costs. Obi made some
>changes but not enough to satisfy Sam. So Sam was
>still going to leave the book. Then Obi was pressured
>by Cameron to make the changes because Sam would
>guarantee sales. Obi wouldn't compromise any more than
>he had offered. He was told by Cameron that if they
>were to lose someone it wouldn't be Sam because the
>unknown Obi wouldn't bring them any money. So Obi's choice was to bend to the editorial will of Cameron Stewart or be removed from the book he started by
Cameron (and his passive
>studio mates) for not making changes to something they
>had all agreed was okay at the beginning of the
>project. At the same time Bone was struggling to
>finish and called Kagan to let him know there was no
>way he was going to be done by deadline. Cameron was
>also in on the call. No mention was made of the drama J.'s good friend Obi was being put through. Not an hour later Obi
>called Bone to tell him he'd been kicked out of the
>book. Bone was pissed but having only just quit the
>book had lost any say in the matter. During the
>process Cameron had been putting extreme pressure on
>his studio mate Ben Shannon to be done on time. Also,
>he had apparently wanted to feed J. Bone dummy
>deadline dates so he would have the book done on time.
>Somewhere along the way the whole fun purpose of this
>project was lost in the overbearing ego of one
>contributor. The announcements on this very board make
>it clear who's project this really is.
Well, there you have it. If anyone is wondering why I'm stirring up this pot of crap I'll tell you-
Brian is just breaking into comics, and is afraid to speak up, lest it hinder his opportunities. J. and I discussed this and decided that it would be wrong to let Cameron propigate his lies without any challenge.
Cameron is an unprincipled, deceitful boor who basically hi-jacked this project to further his own ends. Friends, associates, prior agreements, and common decency all went out the window to ensure that he would be seen as the star of the show.
Where does a guy who has worked on all ages comics that show torture and eyeball eating get off appointing himself censor/editor of what was supposed to be a self-published indy?
This doesn't surprise me at all. I've experienced Cameron's duplicity first hand. What does shock me is that Chip, Kagan and Ben went along with this railroading. I'd like to think they're ashamed of what happened, hence thier absence from the threads hyping this project. You guys ought to be ashamed of yourselves.
But hey, any regular poster here knows there's no love lost between Cameron and I. So make of this what you will. But take a good long look at how Cameron handled this and put yourself in Brian's shoes.
I have no doubt that Cameron will be posting spin on this thread before the paint is dry, but what would really be nice would be to hear from the other studio mates about what happened.
Tell me Chip, was Brian bullied and screwed over or not? Kagan? Speak up boys.
So, to one and all, at least you all know the back story.
Disgustedly,
Darwyn
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