Feeling Barbaric?

You should be. Look for CONAN THE BARBARIAN #1 cover reveals and interior preview pages later this week at several of the larger comic news sites…

Until then, these Barbie-Meme pics using older artwork put together by Matt Murray and Zack Morrissette will have to suffice.

After the fantasy barrage in my previous newsletter I promised this edition would have less sword & sorcery (no such promises next week once those covers and preview pages are out in the wild), so let’s move on-

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Behind The Scenes of Avengers: No Road Home

Over on Tom Brevoort’s latest newsletter post (make sure you subscribe if you haven’t already), he posted up some behind the scene notes from the Avengers summit held May 18, 2018 at the Marvel offices where we laid the ground work for AVENGERS: NO ROAD HOME, the second weekly run for Earth’s Mightiest Heroes co-written by Al Ewing, Mark Waid, and I after our first run (called No Surrender) did well with readers and retailers.

As we brainstormed set pieces and ideas, Tom would jot good ones down on notecards so we could easily swap pieces in or out and figure out the overall structure of the story:

At the same time, Alanna Smith (assistant editor at the time, now full-fledged Marvel editor) wrote down bullet points to help us remember other bits and pieces that came up in discussion, leading to a back matter page in Avengers: No Road Home #9 that still creates a little ripple in Marvel fandom to this day-

That one note –

“Scarlet Witch is the only mortal connected to the House of Ideas”

– has been brought up by fans of Wanda Maximoff dozens of times as ‘proof’ that she has godlike power and is Marvel’s most powerful magic-wielder but, as I’ve said many times in social media posts or replies to specific messages about this – if it’s not in the printed comic, it’s not canon. As mentioned right on that back matter page, these were concepts we came up with at the meeting and some didn’t make the final cut, including that explicit connection between Wanda and the House of Ideas.

At the time I thought it could be a way to explain Wanda’s reality-bending abilities, but it never quite found its way into the final published story. Could it come up again at some future point? Sure, and I’d be happy to write that story, but until then it’s just material left on the cutting room floor.

Several times a month I get asked about the hierarchy of Marvel cosmology based on the House of Ideas concept introduced in No Road Home. I’m really proud of the work our team did and I’m glad the House part I came up with generates energetic discussion, but defining absolutes for cosmic powers in the Marvel Universe is not something I’m interested in. I don’t have a definitive answer on any of that stuff and, even if I did, whatever I say could be instantly nullified by future writers/future stories. That’s how these shared creative sandboxes work.

I’ve been a broken record about this when asked about it online and now, hopefully, by typing up a longer answer here I can point people toward this post and put it to rest, the same way I used my tutorial blog posts to provide more in-depth answers to common questions I get asked all the time, especially “How do I break into comics?”

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Snapping To Attention

Snowguard is one of the newest characters added to the Marvel SNAP digital card game and the artwork looks great! From what I’m seeing on social media, her card is quite powerful in combination with others, but I haven’t played the game myself so I don’t know for sure.

It’s nice to see Amka’s legacy continue in unexpected places like this. I hope there are more comic stories in her future as well.

If you want to find out more about our Canadian spirit-infused shape changer, her first appearance is collected in Champions: Northern Lights and there’s a Snowguard solo story I’m really proud of reprinted in Champions: Weird War One.

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Chez Zub’s – Fried Rice

I’ve been following some of the techniques covered in this video and it has seriously upped my fried rice skills using some pretty simple ingredients. Well worth checking out-

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Links and Other Things

• Line tangents are a common problem with art or photography where 2-dimensional lines from different elements look like they’re interacting when they shouldn’t, creating visual confusion. Finding clear examples of what tangents are and how to avoid them to show my students was a pain until I found the The Schweizer Guide to Spotting Tangents. Chris breaks down the concept incredibly well in this post. Read, learn, and share!

That’s it for this time. Take care!
Jim

Lots of fantasy fun this week, gang

We’ve Got It Covered

Conan dominates the cover of the Diamond PREVIEWS catalogue this month, showing off Dan Panosian’s rockin’ cover for CONAN THE BARBARIAN #1.

This is the second time in my career I’ve had a book on the cover of PREVIEWS (the first was with Stranger Things and Dungeons & Dragons in 2020) and each time it feels pretty surreal and amazing.

The ad on the inside gives you a Hyborian-charged glimpse at the art our creative team is putting together:

Stunning stuff, right? Hard to believe, but the interior story pages are just as awesome.

Rob De La Torre is drawing career-making artwork and I’m doing everything in my power to deliver soaring stories and dialogue to match. Everybody’s cooking on this one and I hope you’re excited to check it out.

Titan Comics and Heroic Signatures had the chance to snag this plum spot in the catalogue because they have so much confidence in this ongoing series, but the actual pre-order form arrives next month, so please keep an eye out for that.

CONAN THE BARBARIAN #0: Free Comic Book Day in May.
CONAN THE BARBARIAN #1: Arriving in July. Get ready.

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Dragons at the Movies

I had a wonderful time watching Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves with my family! There’s a true spark of adventure, comradery and joy that makes it all work. Congrats to the whole team.

My parents enjoyed the movie and they’re not fantasy fans in the slightest, so that tells you how wide a net they were able to cast with this film. As strange as it got, they were able to follow along with the characters and plot.

The comparisons I’ve heard to the first Guardians of the Galaxy film are pretty apt. It’s not the exact same, of course, but there’s a similar charm and momentum that carries the D&D movie, keeping it clipping along well through its 2 hour runtime.

Of course there are nitpicks I could make, but they fall to the wayside because the crew on this film kept their eye on the prize – good characters and fun adventure.

My only genuine disappointment during the D&D movie is that they didn’t give the original creators their due. “Hasbro” didn’t create Dungeons & Dragons or the Forgotten Realms. Gary Gygax, Dave Arneson, and my friend Ed Greenwood deserved at least a Special Thanks.

That said, I hope the movie continues to have momentum and generates another huge wave of new players excited to join the hobby and build incredible memories with friends and family. That’s why we do what we do.

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Speaking Of Dragons

All this talk around the Dungeons & Dragons movie reminded me how much things have changed in the past nine years.

Back in 2014 I begged IDW to try publishing Dungeons & Dragons comics again and they were skeptical because, even though they had the license as part of their Hasbro deal, their previous efforts around D&D hadn’t really taken off.

Ted Adams, head of IDW at that time, really liked the Samurai Jack comic series I was writing and asked what else I was interested in that they had access to. I said “Dungeons & Dragons or Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles“.

Kevin Eastman was coming back to TMNT so that wasn’t an option but Ted didn’t think D&D had legs anymore. IDW had previously tried an ongoing and some mini-series but retailers and readers hadn’t jumped in the way they hoped.

Dungeons & Dragons 4th edition had strayed too far from key aspects of the game for many fans and Pathfinder had risen up to take quite a bit of D&D’s thunder at that time. Funny enough, I’d just finished writing a three-arc run of Pathfinder comics for Dynamite…

A new edition of Dungeons & Dragons was in development. Launching a new comic alongside 5th edition was the best shot they had for making it work.

We set up a conference call with reps from Wizards of the Coast and it went… honestly? Not great.

Tyranny of Dragons was the big adventure launching with D&D 5e and WotC wanted the new comic to adapt that story – an epic Lord of the Rings-esque adventure with Tiamat’s return, armies clashing, and the fate of the world on the line.

What I love about D&D is a tight-knit group of found family getting into danger. Scrappy, troublemaking, fun fantasy. A pack of well-meaning fools get in way over their heads and have to fight their way out.

Tyranny seemed completely at odds with my favorite aspects of the game and a lore-dense epic would be hard to deliver effectively in the format we were looking at: a 5 issue mini-series with 20 pages of story each issue.

Everyone was upbeat on the call, but I wasn’t feeling it at all. I even told my wife I was going to turn down the gig I’d stirred up in the first place. I wasn’t the right fit for what they envisioned and didn’t want to deliver a half-hearted D&D book.

Since I was going to bow out anyway, I sent a message to IDW and WotC expressing my concerns that I was the wrong fit and also sent them PDFs of Skullkickers, my creator-owned action-comedy sword & sorcery comic series.

To WotC’s credit, they 100% got what I was saying and pivoted completely. It would be far better if I was on board and enthusiastic than just pumping something out or stepping away. How could we make a fun new reader friendly D&D comic series instead?

Internally there was talk at WotC that doing a new video game set in Baldur’s Gate would be great. They wanted to establish a couple key things in the Murder in Baldur’s Gate adventure and then leave the city alone for a while.

I clearly enjoyed the action-comedy stuff, so we struck upon the idea of bringing back cult favorite characters Minsc and Boo from the video games. I came up with a way to bring Minsc and Boo into the present Forgotten Realms timeline with some wild magic and created a smaller stakes character-driven story that ran alongside Tyranny of Dragons.

Dungeons & Dragons: Legends of Baldur’s Gate launched in 2014 and I’ve been writing D&D comics ever since.

The first three Baldur’s Gate comic stories are collected in the Days of Endless Adventure omnibus: Legends of Baldur’s Gate, Shadows of the Vampire, and Frost Giant’s Fury:

The next three stories are still available in trade: Evil at Baldur’s Gate, Infernal Tides, and Mindbreaker. Mindbreaker also acts as a prequel to the Baldur’s Gate 3 video game launching later this year.

Writing the official D&D comics had me regularly in contact with Adam Lee, head of narrative for the D&D team at that time. He advocated for me to get more involved with other projects in development, including consulting on the D&D sourcebook that would eventually be called Baldur’s Gate: Descent into Avernus.

The time I spent in the office working on Descent Into Avernus generated discussions that turned into the D&D Young Adventurer’s Guide series (7 books and counting).

And that all led to the ridiculously incredible chance to attend D&D Live in 2019 and play Dungeons & Dragons on stage on my birthday with Dungeon Master Chris Perkins (D&D) and players Matt Mercer (Critical Role), Deborah Ann Woll (Daredevil), Mica Burton (Star Trek: Picard), B. Dave Walters (Invitation To Party), and Anna Prosser (Acquisitions Incorporated).

Rick and Morty VS Dungeons & Dragons with Pat Rothfuss and Troy Little (two mini-series and a game set), Stranger Things and Dungeons & Dragons with Jody Houser and Diego Galindo, a bunch of other consulting, the upcoming deluxe pop up book…

…It’s honestly quite mind bending when I think about it.

Dungeons & Dragons changed my life when I was a kid and continues to change my life as an adult and creator.

So much joy and so many friendships. May the adventure continue ever onward.

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Would You Believe There’s Also a Bundle?

With the D&D movie kicking butt at the box office, IDW and Humble Bundle decided now would be a perfect time to team up on a digital comic bundle.

You still have two weeks left to get in on this: 29 different D&D comic collected editions (including 7 of mine) for a fraction of their retail price, with money going to support the Hasbro Foundation charity.

If you haven’t read my D&D comics before, this is the perfect time to dive in and help a great cause at the same time. Please share the link far and wide.

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Links and Other Things

If you’re an animation fan, I’m sure you’ve already seen the Lackadaisy animated pilot, based on the delightful webcomic by Tracy J. Butler and produced by Spike Trotman.

It’s a stunning achievement, especially for an independent animated production. Make sure you check it out-

Okay, that’s more than enough for this week. Thanks for reading this super-sized post. Next time, more non-fantasy stuff, I promise!
Jim

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