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Underground > Comic Books >

Jenny Everywhere in "My Bloody Valentine"

14:17 / 06.11.02

...and coming in second place...

Ahem. In the manner of Flyboy and Nelson Evergreen, we're posting this here in the Conversation to get a bit of general interest stirred up, then it'll be moved to the Comics forum in a couple of days.

On the back of Fly and Nel's first Jenny Everywhere story, Name's Not Down, MC Lentil and myself have completed our take on this Barbelith-originated reality-hopping open source character. For those who haven't been taking notes in class, there's a big hairy thread about the whole situation down in the Creation, and Flyboy and Nelson's thread complete with links can be read in Comics.

I'm really pleased with Lentil's work on my script. It's the first time I've tried to write a comics script, and seeing the end product passed through someone else's creative filter really is quite interesting.

Tell us what you think.

Have a look at the six-page story My Bloody Valentine and tell us what you think.

15:10 / 06.11.02

cool.

15:51 / 06.11.02

I'm telling you, Jenny Everywhere is going to be The Next Big Thing. I have started a Shifter collection... may I have a copy of your script too Sax, pretty please? My collection will be worth millions!! The shamefaced giant squid is the best, I want him for my desktop... now how do you do that... no no don't tell me, I can figure it out...

17:13 / 06.11.02

Hey, that's great. I love the drooling monster. Poor drooling monster...

18:51 / 06.11.02

You make me jealous. Sigh.

Pretty.

Regrettable Juvenilia

19:04 / 06.11.02

"They sold out at the shop."

That's bloody brilliant, that is. Really good stuff. I hope you don't want constructive feedback, though, I'm missing 'Faking It' as it is...

The Return Of Rothkoid

21:31 / 06.11.02

Awww. That rocks, again. I too like the drooling monster. Identificatory purposes.

21:46 / 06.11.02

That's top stuff that is.

Like everyone else here, I'm a big fan of the monster. There aren't enough drooling squid things in the world these day. Or perhaps there are too many... I can't decide. Either way, that's a fun comic you've got there!

If you're up for it, I'd quite like to see your script for this...

23:15 / 06.11.02

hehe.. cute.
The punch line makes it... I was starting to have doubts about halfway through as the paturn was becoming a bit redundant... but the punchline makes it.

06:08 / 07.11.02

Cheers, folks. Mr Lentil is quite rightly proud of the drooling monster. Which might actually be a woman, if they have such gender divisions on drooling monster planet. That spread is his favourite bit of the comic, although I personally have a fond feeling for the framing sequence in Jenny's flat. I think Lentil's attention to detail is excellent.

I trust we're going to get this into some kind of hard-copy zine, Shifter-types?

09:11 / 07.11.02

Lovely.

Anyone else got one up their sleeve for us non-sequential art creator types?

11:58 / 07.11.02

Well, I PM'd Sax a link to the story so he could give it the once - over, and what do you know, next time I log on he's started a thread abbout it! Guess I can take that as an endorsement. Thanks for the props everyone, this was the first time I'd illustrated someone else's script, and one of the first "proper" comics I've ever tried to do (late starter i know - I blame art school), so I'm very pleased/ relieved that it seems to have gone down OK.

*shuffle, nervous cough*

Also, continuing in a spirit of shameless pluggery (I couldn't decide which was more spammy, tagging this onto this thread or starting a new one, as you can see I opted for the former)....

I have recently released my first mini-comic! Yes indeedy! It's vastly different to the Shifter story, and in fact anything else I've done, because the whole thing was completed on my work pc using the incredibly sophisticated Microsoft Word and Paint packages. A 28-page epic tale of drudgery and failed romance, it's currently available from Gosh Comics and Orbital Comics & Collectibles (Old Compton Street) for the paltry sum of £2. Here is a piccie of the cover so if anyone's interested they know what to look for.
Basically if anyone buys this they have my undying love and respect (yeah, you'll be stuck with it. It's a bit smelly but hey), but i'd love to get any feedback on it at all, so if anyone PM's me hir address ze will receive a copy, gratis. In return I expect to have my artistic visiopn mercilessly but constructively savaged.

OK, spam over.

(Sax, are you going to shove this over to comics?)

12:33 / 07.11.02

Ah, now I get it. That's a picture of Slab on the wall of Jenny's flat, isn't it?

14:08 / 07.11.02

Start work people.

Good things:
The wordless first page is brilliant. And its ordinariness fits in nicely with the black 'n' white. The playaround with the drooling alien is funny. Nice punchline.

Things to take away:
I felt the rest of the pages were just crying out for colour (but budgets n all). With 6 pages you've not got a lot of space to play with but the flitting from scene was a mite annoying. Something a bit more organic mighta been kewl.

Lots a potential, guys.

14:15 / 07.11.02

Thanks for the comments, Peps.

I too agree the thing would look a lot better in colour. We'll have to see what Lentil can do when the thing is published.

As regards the flitting... for those who baulk at wading through the Collaborative Comics Project thread in the Creation, the backstory of Jenny Everywhere, aka The Shifter, is briefly that she exists in an infinite number of realities at the same time, and each incarnation of her has different powers/situations/etc. The photo-negative effect at the end of each page is supposed to suggest Jenny shifting rapidly through different realities, or at least her consciousness or perhaps even just a tiny bit of her inner self being aware of such a shift. Hmm. Maybe it doesn't bear too much analysis. Sorry if it doesn't work or is a tad confusing, but it should hopefully look better in the context of other Jenny stories and an explanatory editorial.

14:45 / 07.11.02

Yeah, you know I was thinking about that whole colour thing, it'd be good fun to play around with it. I hope that in time my inking style will have developed to a point where it seems complete as it is. There's something so honest about b&w. The skills (or lack thereof) laid bare for all to see, etc.

I think we can say with reasonable certainty that printing a full colour comic ain't gonna happen, but if I do colour any of the pages I'll surely post em up for people to look at.

'nother comment on the flitting - way back when in the original thread i said that I wanted to have Jenny visiting a few worlds in the course of a story, which may have led to sax deliberately including that aspect in his script, which may perhaps explain why it doesn't seem "organic".

sax - you got it.

Nelson Evergreen

22:14 / 07.11.02

It's ace, gentlemen. Being aware of the fact that Jenny Everywhere is, well, everywhere, certainly made the shifts of scene (not to mention the smart little references to the trials of omnipresence on the final page) hang together beautifully for me. Encore! (in your own time, of course..)

22:42 / 07.11.02

Very very nice. Lovely art, some great ideas, it's all gravy and makes me want to put Jenny somewhere in my nanowrimono. Can she be used in non-comic form?

jUne, a sunshiny month

08:39 / 08.11.02

nice art, nice writing, nice stuff indeed. i suppose i do have to wait 6 months to get it translated in french version ? do you need a publisher here ?

21:53 / 08.11.02

That was fantastic! I loved the space-opera universe, but I have to say the mutant cat beat the squid monster in my book! It was just so cute. I'll start work on a shifter story immediately.

Less searchable M0rd4nt

08:08 / 09.11.02

Also "they'd sold out at the shop." That was fucking amazing! 'Specially the ending. I loved the artwork, BTW.

21:56 / 09.11.02

Thought it was good. Getting a real Jerry Cornelius feel from Ms. Everywhere, which is if I remember part of the point, yes?

m.

21:46 / 14.11.02

Great. Now I've gone insane. Thanks a lot, Lentil and Sax.

12:52 / 15.11.02

brrrrDING! wooop woop woop it's our FNARP pleasure, Qalyn.

*burf*

16:28 / 14.02.03

Bump.

Happy Valentine's Day.

01:45 / 15.02.03

Guys, it's absolutely bloody beautiful. I love it.

Zoom.