An interview I did in November for a podcast called The Marvelists finally popped up online last week and a big part of the discussion I had with Peter and Eddie in that episode centered around “continuity” – acknowledgement of past events and character consistency based on their history.

The moment you start working with established characters and worlds (instead of your own original creations) you’ll encounter the opportunities and challenges presented by existing material. Contributing to a property may gain you some legitimacy, but that comes with other limitations. Even if you try to break away from past stories and do something ‘new’, the choices you make are in response to what’s come before.

I grew up collecting Marvel Comics and obsessed over the interconnected nature of the stories – the way things that happened in one series could ripple out and effect others.

Early on, a two page sequence in Kitty Pryde and Wolverine #5 really stuck with me – Wolverine is in Japan and receives a call from Professor X to let him know that James MacDonald has died. James and Logan’s friendship and rivalry appeared in multiple issues of Uncanny X-Men over the years, so seeing the events of Alpha Flight #12 referenced here and Logan’s reaction made that character death feel even more intense.

On the very next page, Logan and Kitty are training and an impossible winter storm blows in because, over in The Mighty Thor #349, a villain named Malekith unleashed the power of an artifact called the ‘Casket of Ancient Winters’ and its magic was disrupting weather across Midgard (aka. Earth).

Two little moments played out over two pages, neither of them important to the plot of the issue, but what they represented to me as a reader and collector was cause and effect – A subtle promise that the people working on the Marvel Universe gave a damn about what was happening across all their stories and how it could weave together in unexpected and exciting ways.

When I write stories using established characters I do as much research as possible so I feel confident about what I’m building on. I also do everything I can to acknowledge the hard work of my peers so past contributors know that what they built matters even as we keep adding more over the years.

And building really is what’s required, not trapping characters in amber, untouched and unmoved. The best stories push characters into new spaces, challenging them (and us) to imagine what might come next.

Endless reboots or repeats of classic plotlines don’t do it anymore, if it ever did. The best chance you’ve got as a creator taking the wheel is to understand and acknowledge what’s come before, think carefully about the intrinsic qualities that matter most to the character and their world, and then steer into uncharted waters to see what new material you can discover.

Since I started writing stories at Marvel in 2014, I’ve gained a reputation for acknowledging continuity in the Marvel Universe, but I also put a lot of research into projects for other companies as well. The Baldur’s Gate video games inform key characters and elements of my Dungeons & Dragons comics. Obscure bits of Disney Imagineering lore found their way into the Disney Kingdoms: Figment comics. The Samurai Jack animated series provided endless inspiration while developing the comic series.

In some cases I’ve used continuity as a springboard for making major changes to characters (like returning Betsy Braddock to her British body in Mystery In Madripoor) or been asked to rejig and tighten up timelines on characters (like the Life Of Wolverine digital comic series). It can be a lot of work keeping it all organized, but a lot of fun too.

If we do our job right we should be able to keep the promise of these amazing ongoing creative sandboxes without losing current readers who may not have read the specific stories we reference. That sense of history and consequence should keep readers coming back and encourage them to read past stories, not scare them away.

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Speaking of Character Continuity…

The THUNDERBOLTS: BACK ON TARGET collected trade paperback arrives in stores this week.

This was my second chance to write the Bolts (lightning strikes twice!) but my first with Hawkeye at the helm, delving into his mid-life crisis around personal failure and burdens of leadership. Lots of deep cuts to past stories, but always presented clearly so new readers understand exactly what’s at stake.

I took a very Ted Lasso approach to this mini-series, mixing comedy and character drama together with classic Marvel super heroics and artists Sean Izaakse and Netho Diaz and colorist Java Tartaglia brought their best to every issue.

Thunderbolts has gone through quite a few iterations over the past 25 years and the through line that spoke most to me no matter which version I read was “redemption” – Can you change the arc of your future even when you’ve screwed up in the past? Whether individual characters succeed or fail, the journey should keep readers guessing right up until the end.

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Speaking of Character Continuity…

UNBREAKABLE RED SONJA #5, our final issue, arrives this week. The mystery of two Sonjas pays off in spectacular fashion thanks to the hard work of line artist Adrián Manuel García Montoya, colorist Francesco Segala, and letterer Taylor Esposito.

For Red Sonja’s 50th anniversary I wanted to create a story that walked the continuity tightrope – acknowledging what’s come before while also pushing forward into unexpected places with a new villain who threatens the Hyborian Age.

Sonja’s origin has been retold at least three different ways over the years, changing to generate different continuities. At the same time, a lot of people who haven’t read Red Sonja assume she’s just a female knock-off of Conan the Barbarian, which she’s definitely not. In our final issue I take those three origin stories along with the assumptions/misinterpretations and forge them together so they can coexist and then move forward.

Here’s a sneak peek at a page of Adrián’s amazing ink work referencing a classic part of Sonja’s origin story-

Although I wrote some Red Sonja previously (the Red Sonja and Cub one-shot story in 2014 and a Conan-Red Sonja mini-series with Gail Simone in 2015) this was my chance to bust out a big solo story for fantasy’s ‘She-Devil With a Sword’. Getting to do that as part of such an important anniversary made it even more special.

At the end of Unbreakable Red Sonja #5 there’s an epilogue that teases an even deeper continuity cut, acknowledging the character’s literary origin as “Red Sonya of Rogatino” from Robert E. Howard’s ‘The Shadow of the Vulture’ in 1934 (making this a bit of an 89th anniversary celebration as well), but I’m not sure if I’ll get the chance to follow that teaser up with anything else or not. In any case, it’s been a fun ride. Big thanks to editor Matt Idelson at Dynamite for helping make it all happen.

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Links and Other Things

• The #VisibleWomen hashtag on Twitter started by Kelly Sue DeConnick is always a fantastic way to discover new talent for fun or possible future work. March 27th was the latest showcase and, as always, the quality and quantity of creative skill on display is stellar.
• Dead Romans, my friend Fred Kennedy‘s new creator-owned comic about war, love, and bloody battlefields, launched last week. It’s off to a great start and the first issue has already sold out at the distributor level, so snag the first printing if you see it on the stands or make sure you pre-order the second printing.
• Wayne Reynolds, one of the best designers and illustrators in TTRPGs, is putting together a Sketchbook of RPG Saints and it looks so good. Make sure you check it out before the Kickstarter campaign ends.
• Sinix Design’s digital painting tutorials are wonderful, summarizing a lot of complex theory around design, rendering, readability, and appeal in easy to understand ways.When I have more time I want to practice a bunch of the techniques he covers, but in the meantime if you have any interest in making your own digital art I think you’ll really enjoy these: Beginner and Intermediate.

Thanks for reading!
Jim

Now We’re Playing With Portals

Revealed on Friday, the next Dungeons & Dragons Young Adventurer’s Guide is called PLACES & PORTALS and it arrives in bookstores on September 19th.

It’s a bit mind blowing that this is the seventh book in the series I originally proposed as just two books to Wizards of the Coast and Ten Speed Press. The response from gamers, old and new, has been incredible and we have even more in development.

Since the start, Stacy King and Andrew Wheeler have been an important part of development on the guides and Stacy, in particular, has taken on more of the workload as I juggle other writing projects and teaching. I’m incredibly proud of what we’ve put built and it wouldn’t be possible without their hard work.

If you haven’t seen the D&D Young Adventurer’s Guides before, they’re the perfect entry point to the hobby. They’re built for readers age 8-12 but we’ve also heard from a bunch of Dungeon Masters that they also work incredibly well for introducing adult players to the game as well. More info on the series here in the FAQ I put together a while back.

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A Blast from the Past: My First Comic Script

While digging through a bunch of old digital files I stumbled across CARGO, the first original comic script I ever wrote.

Back in 2002 I put this 12-page story together for a friend of mine working at the animation studio we were both at when he mentioned that he wanted to practice drawing comic pages in his spare time but didn’t have any story ideas. I asked what kind of thing he wanted to draw and he said “something Sci-Fi”, so this is what I came up with for him.

Obviously I’ve learned a lot since writing that first script, but I think the story still works well.

I thought it would be fun to post the full script up on my Patreon (with no paywall) so all of you can check it out and also so that if any artists or art students want to draw it as practice or a portfolio piece it’s easy to access. If you do illustrate it, just make sure you credit me for the story.

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Another Blast From the Past: Skullkickers Stew

Thanks for the nice response to Grandma’s pierogi recipe I posted last time.

If you never saw the recipe for Skullkickers Stew and Dungeon Dumplings originally included as back matter in SKULLKICKERS #3 (way back in 2010), click on through HERE and snag the recipe.

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A Blast From the Here and Now: R+M VS Cthulhu

And now, something new – This week sees the arrival of RICK AND MORTY VS CTHULHU #4 (of 4), the meta-mad chaotic conclusion of the mini-series Troy Little and I put together to tear a strip off ol’ H.P. Lovecraft, the Cthulhu Mythos, and the popularity of Rick and Morty all at the same time. Troy’s artwork (with Leonardo Ito and Nick Filardi on colors and Crank handling the lettering) elevated every scene, turning neat ideas I had for this tale into mind bending storytelling on a level I never could have imagined.

Even if you haven’t read any Lovecraft lore, there’s a lot to love here and I wrote a series of essays for each issue called Eldritch Endpapers that explains which stories and tropes we riff on and how it all links together.

The rocky ride Oni Press has had over the past year coupled with the PR bomb Adult Swim had to diffuse on Rick and Morty made the launch and release of this mini-series more difficult than any of us could have foreseen but, in the end, I am so damn thrilled with how well it all finally came together. We wove a lot of complex ideas and surreal visuals together while still delivering a story filled with humor and heart.

Big thanks to editors Sarah Gaydos, Chris Cerasi, Robert Meyers, and Bess Pallares for their support through thick and thin.

Check out preview pages for the final issue HERE.

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Links and Other Things

• The Etherington Brothers tutorial series How To Think When You Draw is a constant source of information and inspiration for my students and I. Their ability to summarize key concepts around perspective, structure, composition, design, and appeal in bite-size ways is really impressive and the subjects they cover run the gamut from the foundational to the fantastic. Their Twitter account also links to a bunch of other drawing and painting resources, so it’s well worth a follow.
• My buddy Charles Soule has a new novel coming out called The Endless Vessel, but even cooler than that is the fact that he’s already written a second book expanding on the lore in it and is offering that expansion and a slew of other goodies (including an incredible map by cartographer Marco Bernardini) via Kickstarter right HERE.

That should cover it for this one.
Jim

Thank you to everyone who subscribed (zubscribed, I know, I know…) or shared the link to this newsletter with others. I deeply appreciate it.

Dream about being out for dinner at a truck stop diner.

Our smiling server tells us every meal comes with a free side dish, but there's only one choice and it's called "despairagus"…

…I'm going to have to work that into a story at some point.

— Jim Zub 🎲 (@JimZub) March 15, 2023

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Legacy Numbering?

For my own ridiculous bookkeeping, I counted up the old newsletter emails before I switched over to a blog format and it looks like there were 130 ‘Zubby Newsletter’ releases before this new version I’m calling Zubstack. So, welcome to #132.

When I collected comics as a kid I loved the idea of big numbers on the cover. Titles like Fantastic Four, Avengers, or Detective Comics had 3-digits worth of issues and that just seemed incredible to me. Jumping into the midst of those universes felt more real because the timeline kept moving forward as their history stretched out behind them in a way that was easy to measure – month after month with the issue number on those long-running titles.

The first issue of Amazing Spider-Man I remember buying is #231. It wasn’t a ‘special’ issue or jumping on point, yet it hooked me so damn much.

I knew Spider-Man from the old Bakshi cartoon on Saturday mornings and seeing him in a kids magazine and TV show called the Electric Company. The cover of #231, with a villain called the Cobra trying to kill our hero as he’s perched precariously on a wall, was dark and exciting in ways I’d never seen in the cartoon. I couldn’t wait to dive in.

I collected Amazing Spider-Man from #231 through to #365 and bought a bunch of back issues and Marvel Tales reprint issues to try and fill-in as many gaps as I could afford. My brother and I collected every other Marvel super hero book we could get our hands on, especially Uncanny X-Men, Doctor Strange, Avengers, Fantastic Four, Alpha Flight, and Conan the Barbarian.

By 1992 my tastes had changed and I shifted over to black & white indie comics, Vertigo books, and manga (with only a handful of translated Japanese comics available in North America at that time). I eventually found my way back to collecting super hero comics in 2000 with Ultimate Spider-Man and The Authority.

I’ve still never had the pleasure of writing an issue of Amazing Spider-Man, but contributing to legacy issues of The Avengers (#675-690, 708-717), Invincible Iron Man (#609-611,614-616), and Conan the Barbarian (#288-300) is a huge honor.

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Conan the Barbarian #0 – Free Comic Book Day

Speaking of Conan, I’m still deeply connected to the Hyborian Age and will be relaunching Conan the Barbarian this summer with Titan Comics and Heroic Signatures. This week I received advance copies of our Free Comic Book Day zero issue (which you’ll be able to pick up at your favorite local comic shop on Saturday, May 6th) and, honestly, I can’t believe how incredible it turned out.

Rob De La Torre delivers powerful pulpy line work reminiscent of the best who have ever portrayed the Cimmerian, José Villarrubia’s stirring colors add atmosphere to match, Richard Starkings brings brilliant lettering to make each page flow flawlessly, and editor Matt Murray somehow managed to keep us all on schedule! It’s genuinely a dream team on a dream book and I am so damn proud of what we’ve put together.

I’m not allowed to show interior pages yet, but once you see them I think you’ll agree that this book’s an absolute stunner. We’re pulling out all the stops. Do not miss it, my friends.

Conan the Barbarian #0 in May.

Conan the Barbarian #1 in July, and monthly onward from there.

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Chez Zub’s

Quite a few people asked if I’d be including any recipes here in this newsletter. For those who don’t know, on Twitter I’ll post up the occasional photo of meals I put together for Stacy and I and people there seem to really enjoy it.

During the pandemic I made a concerted effort to learn how to cook new things and it became a surprisingly fun hobby. Without trying to sound too dramatic, when I’m cooking I push away a lot of the stresses of the outside world and just focus on the immediacy of what I’m doing in the kitchen – trying to make something taste great.

Learning to cook dishes we missed because we couldn’t travel or meals I’ve always wanted to wrap my head around has been both a stress reliever and confidence builder.

So, with that in mind, I hope you don’t mind if I include a recipe every so often. More value for your zubscription.

We’ll start with a classic from my Ukrainian grandmother – homemade cheese and potato pierogis. My grandma’s dough recipe is a bit different than other ones I’ve seen online and the way it tastes is a deep well of nostalgia for me.

Click through to this tweet thread I put together back in 2020 for a step-by-step breakdown of the process with photos. If you’ve only eaten factory-made pierogis you bought at the grocery store, you have no idea what you’ve been missing. These are comfort food on another level. Pure bliss.

Today @stacyking and I are making pierogies.

Step 1 was last night. We peeled a batch of yellow potatoes, boiled them until very soft, then mashed them with grated old cheddar and parsley.

Important: Save that potato water! The starchy water will be used later in the dough. pic.twitter.com/x0asERDd1u

— Jim Zub 🎲 (@JimZub) April 11, 2020

If you get a chance to make a batch, send me photos!

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Here’s a text-only version of grandma’s recipe:

Classic Pierogis (Cheese + Potato)

• 3-4 large yellow potatoes
• 2-3 eggs
• 4 cups of all purpose flour
• block of old cheddar cheese
• sprig of chopped parsley
• reserved potato water
• salt
• serve with sour cream, salt and pepper

Step 1: Peel a batch of yellow potatoes, chop them up, and boil them until very soft, then strain and mash the potatoes together with grated old cheddar and some chopped parsley.

Important – Save that potato water! Strain out any lumps and set it aside. The starchy water will be used later in the dough.

Step 2: Once the potato-cheese mixture has cooled, roll them into little balls and store them in the fridge. Each of these little cheese balls will be the filling for one pierogi.

You can do this whole process in one day, but getting the filling done the night before saves a bit of hassle juggling both parts (dough and filling) at once in the kitchen.

Step 3: The dough ingredients are simple-

• All-purpose white flour (Grandma swears by Five Roses brand, but any all-purpose non-cake flour should work)
• 2-3 eggs
• Strained potato water
• Pinch of salt

Beat the eggs. Add a bit of potato water.

Step 4: Put 4 cups of flour on your work surface. Make a well. Pour liquid in.

Step 5: Incorporate together and knead the dough. Too sticky? Add flour. Too dry? Add a bit of potato water.

Step 6: Knead the dough for 5-10 minutes. Throw the dough ball down on the counter a couple times to get out any air bubbles. If you cut the dough in half, you shouldn’t see any air bubbles.

Cover with plastic wrap and let the dough rest for 40-60 min.

Step 7: Separate the dough into manageable sections and roll out thin with a bit of extra flour so it doesn’t stick.

Step 8: Use a wide glass, mug, or circle template to cut circles.

Step 9: Flatten a filling ball a bit in the middle, then fold dough over it and pinch the dough closed.

If the dough doesn’t seal, use a bit of water along the edge and press together.

Step 10: Set the pierogis in rows on parchment paper and put those trays in the freezer. If you need to stack them, put a sheet of parchment paper between each set to keep them separated. Once the pierogis are frozen, you can put them in freezer bags all together or portioned out.

To prepare- Boil in salted water for 6-7 minutes. Strain and toss with butter. Serve with sour cream, salt, pepper and a bit of chopped dill (if you want to be extra fancy).

If you have any left over after boiling them (I don’t know how that could happen, but let’s pretend you didn’t scarf them all down in one go) the best way to reheat them is to fry them with some butter or bacon. The crispy outside and warm potato inside is unstoppable.

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Links and Other Things

My students at Seneca are in the midst of a project where they’re drawing a street scene with buildings. Being able to quickly and accurately split surfaces into equal perspective sections is an absolute must when you’re building buildings (for plotting floors, doors, windows, or other repeated architectural features) and, when I looked on YouTube I couldn’t find a straight forward tutorial on the process I could refer them to after the lecture, so I made my own:

Also, one of my TAs pointed me toward the website of layout artist Steve Lowtwait. Steve has an exhaustive portfolio of professional background line art and some wonderful tutorials and step-by-step examples of how he translates storyboard panels into full backgrounds for production.

How to draw dynamic perspective with a simple Photoshop trick.

Plus tips on drawing buildings.

An environment design step-by-step thread: pic.twitter.com/tRviD8GoYS

— Steve ✦ Lowtwait (@Lowtwait) September 15, 2020

It’s a goldmine of reference for students or any other artists who want to improve their environmental art.

That should cover it for this time.

If you have any questions or comments, please let me know!
Jim

Before social media or personal websites were a regular thing, I had a “Zubby Newsletter” I’d send to 20-30 of my friends/colleagues (those few who actually had email addresses back then) as a way to stay in touch when I moved to Calgary. The first one I sent was on March 27, 1999.

In February 2004 I migrated that newsletter over to Livejournal.

In May 2012, I moved all the newsletter and LJ posts to my personal website at www.jimzub.com

Starting up a newsletter again 24 years later feels both familiar and strange.

Zubstack will be promotional (but not spammy, I promise) and also a spot for me to talk about process – writing and drawing – links to articles and tutorials that have grabbed my attention and games, books, or other media on my mind…

…Which, funny enough, is almost exactly what the original newsletter did 24 years ago. The only difference now is that it’s open to anyone instead of just a handful of people I knew in ’99.

It’s all cycles. Wheels within wheels. 😉

Let’s get to it-

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Introduction

I assume if you’re on board this newsletter thing, you know what you’re getting into. It seems weird to do an introduction when people are actively choosing to sign up but, just to be on the safe side –

I’m Jim Zub (a pen name shortened from “Zubkavich”), a Canadian writer and artist probably best known for comics and TTRPG material I’ve been producing in various capacities since 2001.

Maybe you found my first webcomic during nascent internet days.

Maybe we met at a comic, anime, or gaming convention in the early 2000’s.

Maybe I popped up on your radar when I launched Skullkickers (2010) or Wayward (2014) during the Image Comics 2nd/3rd creator-owned wave.

Maybe you read one of my Making Comics/Economics of Comics tutorial posts around that same time.

Maybe you’ve enjoyed other comics or creative work I’ve done since then.

Whatever brought you on board, I’m thrilled you’re here.

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Movie DNA

A couple weeks ago I was a guest on a podcast called Cinema Splash Page where host Michael Brodie and I went through key films from my youth that had a major influence on my storytelling sensibilities. Most of the interviews I do are about comics or RPGs, so this was a nice change of pace.

When I went back through those films, it was a bit surprising how deeply they drilled into my brain and still inform my work. If I had to summarize three key aspects-

• Heading into the Unknown: Venturing forth to somewhere new, mysterious, and unexpected.
• Swashbucklers, Underdogs, and Lucky Bastards: The protagonists I gravitate to tend to be caught off guard and in over their head. They’re doing the best they can, and will need to use everything in their arsenal to keep up with situations they find themselves in.
• Adventure and Wonderment: Things move quickly and the stakes are worthy, but there’s always time for a touch of comedy or a moment of awe to break up the action.

Being able to see those broader patterns and understand my taste in fiction is valuable. It helps me make clearer creative choices that really click for me.

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Murder, For Fun and Profit

Last week, Murderworld: Game Over was released at your favorite local comic shop. It was the final chapter of a 5-part story co-written by Ray Fawkes and I all about Arcade, the classic X-Men/Spider-Man villain. Since Arcade always loses to the super heroes he faces, we wanted to show how he actually keeps his whole Murderworld enterprise afloat, while making him a much more effective and sinister presence all around.

Ray and I originally pitched Murderworld to then Marvel Editor-In-Chief Joe Quesada back in 2004, so this pitch was old enough to vote by the time it finally got the green light thanks to current Editor-In-Chief C.B. Cebulski, X-Men editor Jordan White, and our own amazing editor Sarah Brunstad.

It’s now my go-to example on why you shouldn’t publicly blab about old storylines or other ones that got away. You never know when you may be able to take another shot or repurpose ideas down the road. I go more in-depth on how Murderworld finally came about in this video:

At each step of development, Sarah Brunstad championed Murderworld, encouraging us to tell the darkly twisted tale in our outline and made sure we didn’t have to sand down any sharp points. Every script I thought we were going to get push back, but she saw it through.

Our art teams – line artists Jethro Morales, Farid Karami, Carlos Nieto, Luca Pizzari, Lorenzo Tammetta, colorist Matt Mila and letterer Cory Petit – delivered the goods every issue.

Ray and I have known each other since college. We’ve watched each other navigate the highs and lows of the comic business. We’ve cheerleaded and commiserated on each success or setback. Finally getting the chance to work side-by-side with him on a project has been such a blast.

At the end of our Murderworld story, we sowed the seeds for a possible sequel and obviously we’d love to see that come to fruition but, whatever happens next, just having this story finally told after all this time feels like a huge win.

The trade paperback collection arrives in June and we hope people check it out if they missed the five interconnected single issues as they were released (Murderworld: Avengers, Spider-Man, Wolverine, Moon Knight, and Game Over).

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Links and Other Things

• This digital drawing tutorial about how to get clean ink lines in Photoshop posted by BaM Animation was a nice one to pass along to my students:

• Questing Beast cracks the code on original Dungeons & Dragons worldbuilding and timekeeping. I grew up playing in the first edition era and yet the specifics of how it used to work in the rules as written (aka. RAW) still really surprised me here:

• Also, my buddy Karl Kerschl’s new Kickstarter campaign is looking sweeeet. Go get it: Death Transit Tanager

Okay, that’s enough for this time.
Thanks for your support and *ahem* zubscription.
Jim