Highlights for Aardvarks

Hi, Everybody!

The "Manly" one returns with Kickstarter Highlights from Dave Sim:

(FROM DAVE SIM): Dave Sim, creator - This was typed into my CEREBUS ARCHIVE NUMBER EIGHT Notes at the Walper Terrace Hotel 9 July 19, 8 am ET and posted by Eddie when he came in at 9:30 to continue work on STRANGE DEATH OF ALEX RAYMOND Volume Three.

Productive R Us.

Howdy, Kickstarter Supporters! It's really helping to do these shorter Kickstarters more frequently. I think one of the things we want to do either next time or soon is to post daily where we are relative to POSTCARD FROM HELL No.1 and No.2.

Why?

That ties in with my New Theory:

New Theory: We're all on the same 2019 financial roller-coaster ride, only some of us are in "bare subsistence" mode and some of us in "whoa! I have disposable income. How did THAT happen?" mode. Consequently, on any given campaign we're counting on the latter PLEDGE PARTNER HEROES (and HEROINES) -- people who, for whatever reason, are CRESTING and, consequently, feeling a little more secure financially HERE AND NOW i.e. just prior to July 20, 2019 -- to take up the slack for the PLEDGE PARTNER HEROES (and HEROINES) of campaigns past who are either "in a trough" or think they are. We have SOME people who NEVER go into a trough (and where would we be without them?) but most people, I think, are like me. I either FEEL wealthy or I FEEL poor in any given month. If you FEEL poor this month, please don't let the CIH? make it worse by FEELING you have to Pledge.

We're all trying to do better financially and for David Birdsong, Sean Robinson, Benjamin Hobbs and me that means making more money this time than we did last time. Doesn't really matter HOW much more, just as long as our income doesn't go DOWN (like our circulation keeps doing: THE IRON MANTICORE is now, officially, the rarest CEREBUS No.1 in existence at roughly 1,600 copies)

Sorry I missed opening weekend. Eddie Khanna and I are "workshopping" the succession after my death so everything has been in flux since he arrived last Wednesday.

Since the last campaign, I've finished my part of THE AMICABLE SPIDER-VARK No.1, our second 48-page annual scheduled for July 2020 (now, officially, David Birdsong's new favourite issue) and David's about 6 pages into finishing the final digital version. And I'm about 6 pages into the August 2020 SPIDER-WHORE in the mock-up stage and about page 10 in the rough scripting. As long as I'm a year ahead, I'm good. Being a year and part of a month ahead, I'm a little more than good.

And I just got David's THE VAULT OF CEREBUS No.1 parody cover mock-up along with a list of strips that could go in that one -- some leftover zombie strips from Benjamin's THE VARKING DEAD No.1, David's 4-page "Diamondback in Hell?" -- a perfect Halloween 2020 fit (and the last issue before the 2020 US election). He says he has CEREBUS: THE LAST AARDVARK IN HELL? No.1 (parody of KAMANDI No.1). So, we're almost through 2020.

Now we just need YOUR HELP to get us from here to there!

More soon!

And:

Dave Sim, creator - Four days left to go in the campaign! I apologize for having been "out of touch" while I get caught up on everything now that I'm actually back in residence at the Off-White House. Hopefully, we're at or close to (or, being wildly optimistic, HIGHER than) the revenues of POSTCARD FROM HELL No. 2 at the comparable "four days to go" point. I will definitely be posting the last hour or two on Saturday the 20th as we bring this one end for a landing.

Belated thanks to Sean Robinson for his HILARIOUS treatment of the IRON MANTICORE THEME and Ralph Bakshi-ca. 1966 "animation" which I got Eddie to show me on the WIFI at the hotel.

You know, looking at it, I think to myself "it would be great if the stores could use Sean's video to promote TALES OF SOPHISTICATION #1 and IRON MANTICORE #1." But I don't think there's any way to make that happen through the traditional channels, i.e. You can't just link TO the video, you have to provide the stores WITH the video and label it as being in the public domain. "PLEASE use this on your store website to generate sales."

That is, I think it might be one of those things that is only going to work through the CEREBUS LCS links which exist between individual CEREBUS fans -- YOU GUYS -- and your LCS. Show the video to the store owner on your phone and ask if he or she has a way of using it on the store website. Find out what format they need it in and ask Sean to provide that format for you or email it directly to the store.

I'm mentioning this here, because you're a core CEREBUS IN HELL? reader (by virtue of reading the COMMENTS section on the POSTCARD FROM HELL? Kickstarter). We all remain (perhaps foolishly) optimistic that SOMETHING will work to generate sales and either slow the drop in circulation, level it off or improve it, even though nothing has worked so far.

And:

DAVE SIM CREATOR to Chris Johnson!
Hi Chris! Okay, I think we're looking for the GOLDILOCKS SPOT here: We, Your Obedient CIH? WORKAHOLIC TEAM are trying not to take a CUT in pay on POSTCARD FROM HELL No.3 and we're about $300 shy of that (according to my ever-more-porous Grampaw memory, anyway), so if you can come UP from the $150 to $300, we'll give you as much space as you need to get the story told AND commit to tying your story into whatever-CIH?-issue you end up in...
(I have about 10 pages left to go on SPIDER-WHORE No.1 -- August 2020 -- and I'm hoping to have that wrapped up in the next week. The next one I'm working on -- I think -- is BATVARK PENIS No.1 -- September 2020 -- the parody of BATMAN DAMNED No.1 to 3. So far, I've sorted David Birdsong's Dore images into "comedy gold" and "not sure what I would do with this" piles. Another possibility is VAULT OF CEREBUS No.1 -- October 2020 -- which is looking like a bits 'n' pieces horror pastiche and might be easier to link directly to your story. Other possibilities are STRANGERS IN CEREBUS No.1 from Benjamin and Laura which is theoretically done but I haven't seen any of it yet.) (and David Birdsong's JIMMY CEREBUS NO.1 parody of JIMMY CORRIGAN which would tie in with the Chris Ware Typography Gone Mad motif)
CEREBUS IN HELL? is really about (or, rather, About) Creative Freedom -- the closest analogy being comedy club improvisation. Just Be As Funny As You Can. So, if you're interested in "playing" (and you can hit the $300 plateau either in a lump sum or $150 now and $150 over the next few weeks? Months? Goldilocks Spot again) what we would do is put you "in the loop" for the next while on the books that are in progress, e-mailing you our pages as they're finished and you would put us "in the loop" on your story.
We'll keep it confidential, but if we're going to "riff on it, the more we know about it and the farther ahead we know about it the better the link we can do WITH it and TO it.
Like I did with Alan Moore and Neil Gaiman and Frank Miller on SPAWN. Told Alan to throw in a panel or word balloon making Level 8 in Hell some kind of big HEEBIE JEEBIE Terrifying Deal and sent Neil and Frank my script as soon as it was done so they had it to "riff" on. It would have been NICE to SURPRISE all of them with SPAWN 10 but it was more SENSIBLE to help them tie the whole thing together (so we could at least PRETEND we were all worth our 6-figure UR-IMAGE paydays).

And:

DAVE SIM CREATOR

The following was originally sent as a private message to Chris but, on second thought, I think it's a
(maybe? For somebody?) GENERAL INTEREST UPDATE.

You can see the amounts we're dealing with at this point to try to keep the Team from taking a "Kickstarter" pay cut, so "Ask what CEREBUS IN HELL? can do for you AND what you can do for CEREBUS IN HELL?". WE think the CEREBUS IN HELL? No.1 s are really cool and funny. And we believe that [AAGH Dave has typed the following with a strikethrough but Kickstarter is dropping the formatting]2100, 1800, 1700, 1600 people agree with us (little “struck through" humour there: I always wanted to use that function on my MacBook for something). Look at it as "This is your chance to be a part of the RAREST CEREBUS No.1 in existence!". What are the sales going to be DOWN TO a year from now? I've been bumping up the orders for the Cerebus Archive from 1 o or so the first year to 20 to 45 and being VERY stingy about who I give them to. Even though that was the original idea: freebies to hand out to people in town when I try to explain to them what I do for a living. "Comics? Like ... in the newspaper?" Signing the Cerebus Archive copies of LGBTQETC. and FORNICATORS INC. only increased my stinginess to Scroogian Proportions: it felt like having a desktop full of X-MEN and FF #1 'sll MINE! ALL MINE!

Just as I was typing this Chris agreed to play in our sandbox and boost his pledge to $300! VERY COOL! Anybody else up?

And:

DAVE SIM CREATOR - I keep forgetting I have to type that.
Okay, here's a definitely weird/definitely interesting idea as the clock ticks down to "0".
WHAT IF the CIH? TEAM agreed to do a cross-over print with another Indy creator on Kickstarter (whose campaign is doing well and still has a couple of weeks to go)? What we'd be looking for is a Cerebus compatible character. 8.5 x 11 b&w print that we would all sign and the indy creator would make a stretch goal on his or her campaign. And the Cerebus fan who FOUND them and got them to agree to it, would get a cut and a copy of the #1 print.
On a "it doesn't hurt to ask" basis and in Your Official Capacity as Official Cerebus Fans. You're TELLING Dave Sim and Team that they NEED to do a print with (name of Indy creator, name of indy creation).
Anybody want to give it a try.

And Gary Boyarski asked:

Dave, now the the drawing hand is somewhat functional. How about a series of Kickstarters doing a single trading card?

And Dave replied:

Hi Gary! Not being a big trading card fan, I would be loathe to "use up" my EXTREMELY limited drawing capacity on them. It's starting to sink in exactly how little drawing I can do (a few hours at best) so I want to save it for things like a SPIDER-WHORE drawing I can get 24 pages of comics plus out of.
I'm glad you're here at the end again since I didn't get a chance to answer your question last time. I would LOVE to have you do more CIH? covers, but, given my druthers, I'd really prefer that you do more issues of JACK GRIMM instead. Your call, but...

So, 81 backers pledged $2,013 to help bring this project to life. (Yay us!)

Next time: 

"Who wants to see my Alex Raymond impression?"

Dave! NO! We KNOW you CAN'T drive!!!