We had a request last week from Reginald P "I'd like to see sketchbook pages for the "So" issues -- Cerebus' interrogation of Astoria." So issue #94 it is. Issue #94 can be found in notebook #7, which covers issues #87 to 95. The only cover to a notebook that has been shown so far (as far as I can recall) is the first notebook, albatross #1. So here is the cover for notebook #7:
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| Cover to notebook #7 |
As you can see, this notebook appears to have been handled quite a bit. Of the 200 pages in this particular notebook, there were only 115 pages to scan. Dave had put notes on it for me when I scanned them in (I scanned the covers, inside and out of all the notebooks, this cover I scanned twice, once with Dave's notes, and once without). His note by the lipstick kiss is "lipstick print of Kallin the stewardess I went out with for a few weeks. I was seeing her off at the Valhalla Inn in town (they ran an airporter service out of the lobby) and she wanted to leave me a forget-me-not of some kind."
But I digress.
Dave drew a sketch of Astoria's cell on page 85 of the notebook:
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| Notebook #7 page 85 |
He did some different sketches of Astoria with her hands in chains. The sketch at the bottom of the page with the large SO is a sketch for page 1 of the issue, page 857 of Church & State II.
Then on page 91 of the notebook we see a thumbnail of page 5, page 861 of Church & State II.
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| Notebook #7 page 91 |
The finished page has only 5 panels while the thumbnail has 6: Dave removed the final one of Cerebus (panel 6) and then switched a couple panels. The dialogue around it is the dialogue to the page and the next couple of pages, though it went through another edit before it hit the final page.
Down the left hand corner of the bottom of the page is a quick outline of the next couple of issues coming up, including the one for issue #94: "You're not Tarim on. Cerebus falling asleep after raping Astoria." All the way up to issue #100 - which he didn't have a short outline of, but perhaps just wanted to have the number down on the page.
5 comments:
1) Kallin was the name of the woman in 'Reads' who said to Victor Reid that everything was just foreplay with him (just reread that part). I think Gerhard also mentions her in an interview with Adrian Reynolds (reprinted on the Cerebus Fangirl site):
Sim: And that's the very troubling thing about me - some friend said at one point 'There's no such thing as a casual conversation with you'. I suppose not. They sit there, very unsettled and you're being very cryptic and it's like 'No I'm not, I'm not being cryptic at all'.
Ger: And the woman who said 'It's all foreplay with you, isn't it?'
Sim: That's right - dating, the whole ritual...
Ger: 'There is no casual conversation, this is part of the foreplay.
2) (spoiler warnings) I always wondered if Astoria really did know a secret way out of the cell, or if when she later gives Cerebus his options and tells him his only way out of the situation is to let her knock him unconscious so she could escape through a secret passage, that she was actually going to kill him, thereby becoming the Eastern Pontiff (in addition to having already become the Western Pontiff by killing the Lion of Serrea), and uniting the churches under her rule. That cell always looked pretty secure to me.
Thanks again Margaret!
These are also some of my favorite issues. Looking forward to seeing more of the sketch books as you have then time to provide them.
Steve
Chicago, IL.
Not surprising that Astoria is familiar with Ayn Rand, is it?
Thanks Margaret! These are a nice weekly treat.
Would love to see more High Society. Perhaps something from Cerebus' first meeting with the Countess?
- Reginald P.
Eddie - wowza! Great catch! I didn't even remember her name from anything. As for Astoria's "escape" method you suggested, that seems more plausible to me then a literal way out of the cell that was hidden in it.
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