Signed copies of Vark Wars: Walt's Empire Strikes Back(Signed by Dave, Signed by Dave and me, Signed by me after I scribble out Dave's name, Signed by my kids, Signed by my mailman, Signed by random strangers I meet on the way to the Post Office, Signed by "Jorge Luiz", Signed by You (if you get it in the mail and have a pen handy...), Signed by random Customs Agents (if you're a foreigner), Signed by Benjamin Hobbs (if you mail it and a twenty bucks to him), Signed however you want...) In stores now: Attractive Cousins
And there's a Kickstarter for Dave and Carson Grubaugh's You Don't Know Jack. The Newest Update:
Well howdy everyone!
I hope you all are having a wonderful Thursday!
The campaign continues to chug along. We now have just over two weeks before the end of the campaign, when we'll leap into action and begin fulfillment. If you haven't yet, and you have the time, we would really appreciate any reaching out you can do to other folk who might enjoy this project, be they fans of Dave Sim, fans of fantastic ink drawing, or readers who appreciate the genuine low-brow/high-brow collision that this comic embodies. Know someone who might be interested? Now is the time to let them know :)
If you missed the Waverly Press Kickstarter for the Remastered Cerebus #1, limited overflow of the rewards are available at cerebusoverload.com. Which ALSO has an update:
Hi Matt,
We posted a few new rarities on the site today.
The sample magnets we had made for the Kickstarter stretch goal that never happened, a numbered proof edition of the "Promotional" cover and a couple of error proofs that Dave signed and numbered.
We have activated a discount code of 20% off for AMOC readers good through Sunday. The code is JULY20
Cheers!
So, if you missed out on the LAST discount code, you have until the end of the weekend.
A few years ago I scanned all of Dave Sim's notebooks. He had filled 36 notebooks during the years he created the monthly Cerebus series, covering issues #20 to 300, plus the other side items -- like the Epic stories, posters and prints, convention speeches etc. A total of 3,281 notebook pages detailing his creative process. I never really got the time to study the notebooks when I had them. Just did a quick look, scanned them in and sent them back to Dave as soon as possible. So this regular column is a chance for me to look through those scans and highlight some of the more interesting pages.
Dave Sim’s Notebook #3 used to be called notebook #2a. That is because when I scanned them in, I got Albatross 1, Albatross 2, Albatross 4, Albatross 5, and this notebook that wasn’t labeled. I didn’t get them from Dave all at once. He handed off Albatross 1 and 2 to me at a convention, and mailed the others a couple at a time. So I can’t remember when I got this notebook that didn’t have an Albatross number on it, but it was the first one.
The first page of this first non-albatross titled notebook starts with issue 37. The notebook goes to issue #41, which is where Albatross 4, starts off. Yup, this notebook must’ve been the untitled albatross 3.
Notebook #3, page 1
About this page, Dave said:
“I wanted to bring in Suenteus Po at first instead of Bran Mak Mufin. Not THE Suenteus Po, but A Suenteus Po – the name Suenteus Po for illusionists is like the name Muhammad for Muslims – who would claim to be THE Suenteus Po (they do that a lot).”
The text on the page says “Cerebus pulling things energy out of his head exercise. Started doing something interesting besides it wasn’t much of a feud.”
Dave says about the next part:
“Tells story of Prime Minister [Suenteus Po the Regency Elf] had a feud with and all the weird shit he did to get rid of her. [Cerebus: Was that you?] Po: I know the incident to which you are referring. I am afraid the answer is no. That was the senior administrator of [my] own discipline in Togith. He is somewhat. . .extravagant. . .in this application of my theories of narcotic as
Dave says that is as far as he got with that Po bit. He said the other dialogue was Astoria asking Cerebus:
Astoria: Where the hell have you been? Did you know the Prime Minister waited four and one half hours until after midnight for you to come back?
Astoria: What have you got in your hand?
Cerebus: swo…
Astoria: What?
Cerebus: A. . .Cerebus’. . .Cerebus’. . .
Cerebus: . . .sword.
Astoria: Well – put – it – down. . .
But that dialogue never happened in Cerebus #37. Instead we get 3 pages of Astoria berating Cerebus after he returns with his sword after talking with Jaka.
It's the last Wednesday of the month. Typically, this is the day that the new CIH? is on sale at your LCS, but this months' book, ATTRACTIVE COUSINS #1, arrived two weeks early.
If you haven't picked up this book, RUN (or walk) to your LCS today!
(Or at least give them a call and let them know you'll be in. It will warm their hearts to hear your sweet voice.)
Cerebus in Hell?: The NEW one: Vault of Cerebus! For Order still: The "Censored for Grandma" variant: Batvark XXXXX (maybe.) Signed copies of Vark Wars: Walt's Empire Strikes Back (Signed by Dave, Signed by Dave and me, Signed by me after I scribble out Dave's name, Signed by my kids, Signed by my mailman, Signed by random strangers I meet on the way to the Post Office, Signed by "Jorge Luiz", Signed by You (if you get it in the mail and have a pen handy...), Signed by random Customs Agents (if you're a foreigner), Signed however you want...) In stores now: Attractive Cousins
If you missed the Waverly Press Kickstarter for the Remastered Cerebus #1, limited overflow of the rewards are available at cerebusoverload.com.
Dave's been faxing me up a storm, so let's see what we got:
Dave using his Remastered Cerebus #1 postcards...
Uh...before I get to the photos, I think "Grandpa" is having one of his "Senior Moments" Bob's friend (as he says in his letter,) is "Kevin". I don't know why Grandpa wrote "Keith" (TWICE!). (I have photos of Dave and I from 2004 that he signed to "Mike" and sent me, so this isn't a new "thing"...) BUT, I zoomed in on the last photo before I resized it to AMOC size, and the comics ARE personalized to "Kevin". So, we're all good there...
These are the 40th photos.
And these are the 50th. That Flaming Cerebus must be a proof, 'cause I'm pretty sure it hasn't even been solicited through Diamond... (And that's a print of a Baby Yoda Cerebus strip, and I didn't even know we were talking about/showing that off yet...)
I also got scans of the back of the photos, they read:
April 2010 "Good lord!"
April 2010
July 2020 "Oh wow!" "Look at that!" July 2020
SO, (getting back to Dave's offer,)
Know a CEREBUS fan who is about to celebrate a birthday with a "0" on the end of it? Let Dave Sim know BY MAIL (THAT should cut down on the number of participants :) ). Please include In your request some "insider thing" about the recipient that can be included in the personalization. Otherwise all you get is "To [first name of recipient] Happy _0th Birthday from [your name] and Dave Sim" and 10 years to kick yourself for not thinking of the PERFECT personalization in time.
Dave's address (for the new guys,):
AARDVARK-VANAHEIM Inc.
Box 1674 Stn. C Kitchener ON N2G 4R2 CANADA
Geez, I wonder if I could get Dave to send my mom Batvark's PENIS for her 70th?
And because, "Why not?" here's Dave's Phantom Stranger letter:
Thank you for all of the upgrades!!! Ya'll (gotta practice for my upcoming move to Alabama!) are making this campaign a wild success; currently 556% above our goal!
To help the campaign reach it's stretch-goal of $20,000, which would see all backer of $15-and-up get a digital-download of Dave Sim's mockups for YDKJ, and the "Dave Sim Edit" of the book, we have created two high-end, specialty tiers.
The first is a "One-Hour Alex Raymond Spoiler Barrage phone call with Dave Sim" for $740. This tier is a one-off called Mecha Enchilada-With Dave Sim and nets the generous backer all of the signed physical comics, a Google-Image Grab-Bag Sketch, all digital downloads, PLUS a one hour call with Dave, in which he will 'splain you how his version of The Strange Death of Alex Raymond would have ended!
The second new tier is called The Academy and is open to as many backers as want it. The Academy comes with all of the products we are offering plus a series of private drawing lessons with Carson Grubaugh, explained and previewed in this video. https://youtu.be/Xq4J48Koifs
The course is the equivalent of a 15-week semester with 90 hours of class time! $17 an hour for private lessons, plus all the other goodies!? Now THAT is a steal!
Cerebus in Hell?: The NEW one: Vault of Cerebus! For Order still: The "Censored for Grandma" variant: Batvark XXXXX (the original Batvark PENIS has been FOCed.) Signed copies of Vark Wars: Walt's Empire Strikes Back (Signed by Dave, Signed by Dave and me, Signed by me after I scribble out Dave's name, Signed by my kids, Signed by my mailman, Signed by random strangers I meet on the way to the Post Office, Signed by "Jorge Luiz", Signed by You (if you get it in the mail and have a pen handy...), Signed however you want...) In stores now: Attractive Cousins
If you missed the Waverly Press Kickstarter for the Remastered Cerebus #1, limited overflow of the rewards are available at cerebusoverload.com. I got a package in the mail of all sorts of neat stuff:
Some of these are prototypes, but versions of all this are available.
And I think the first store got deleted because I was only making masks, so the new store has all sorts of neat stuff (like t-shirts:)
ALL the money that comes in goes to Dave. (As of this writing, he's getting $40 (US).)
You can also get the Matt Dow's A Moment Of Cerebus Logo too:
(Although TeePublic DOESN'T do thong underwear like CafePress did (I didn't select that as an option to buy. Because I don't need my name on your underwear...)
Next Time: Less of this kinda thing, and more of the other kind of thing...
The NEW one: Vault of Cerebus! For Order still: The "Censored for Grandma" variant: Batvark XXXXX (the original Batvark PENIS has been FOCed.) Signed copies of Vark Wars: Walt's Empire Strikes Back (Signed by Dave, Signed by Dave and me, Signed by me after I scribble out Dave's name, Signed by my kids, Signed by my mailman, Signed by random strangers I meet on the way to the Post Office, Signed by "Jorge Luiz", Signed by however you want...) In stores now: Attractive Cousins
If you missed the Waverly Press Kickstarter for the Remastered Cerebus #1, limited overflow of the rewards are available at cerebusoverload.com. You can get 20% off with the code: "1977" until tonight.
__________________________________________
Oliver Simonsen:
So Cerebus is off to see the Wizard - the real one behind the illusions. On the road Cerebus learns many life lessons and grows as an aardvark...oh wait scratch that last bit, Cerebus learns nothing of course and repeats the same mistakes over and over...it's like the first half of Groundhog's Day?:)
Continuing with the Crystal Ball motif...not because it's a slow news day or that everything is bad out there in "social media world" or anything:)...so how do i see the future for our film - well, yeah, Cerebus will probably end up killing us of course:). But in a perfect world the film will fittingly launch a Creator Rights production company doing nothing but adapting indie comics - where all artists are treated fairly and with respect ala handshake deal with Gerhard. Of course there is only one Gerhard, but all the same...yes rigs, textures, animations often get replaced by others in the course of our production but we try to do it in way so artists will still hopefully be taken care of and in a respectful way. It's understood that we all have to stay modest if the film is to stand a chance - it's all our responsibility to make each other look good. And it bares saying that in such a sea of talented people I myself am the weakest link - not that anybody else wants this job lol. I am humbled by both starving artists and highly successful star artists that have joined and are respectful of our efforts and who ask little ol' me for Directions and I try to return the favor and live up to our company's motto of integrity. So if not always reverence things are mostly very polite and constructive - I've been kind of spoiled and probably forgotten what the real world is like:). Things have been kind of like a dream - pinch me. Now I remember people really wanted to have stuff signed to protect themselves and were working on good faith and putting their name, time and energy out there with the hope things would get signed in the end. We'll see how we can work this all out...in any case it's been a real pleasure and hopefully it will continue to be so - maybe the real movie is "the friends I've made along the way":). Everyone who has contributed is tremendously amicable and it's really been kinda woodstock-like...but i imagine at this point they honestly just want this to end and would settle for just something coming out of this. I refer to us as a team but that is probably mostly wishful thinking along the lines of us being an actual company - it's mostly a loose knit group of artists who have contributed at one point or another and then moved on. We'll see what the future holds...it's a tough nut to crack for sure, but anything worthwhile is never easy. And a generous solution has now been presented but will save that for another time...prefer to first hunt everybody down and make sure everything is hunky dory. You know they might all want to withdraw their work and then there's no movie:). Though they've already faced the 99% impossible task of trying to complete this - and then the other 99% of actually being able to release it. But yes there's a caveat, I guess, but I think it's none issue unless I'm missing something. I believe this is quite a celebratory milestone occasion - too good to be true almost. So maybe I'll share it here one day...but hey, we aren't done yet and we might still not even finish the film and then who cares?:) Might get killed in a car accident or something...this might be my last column even. OK...I guess i shouldn't tempt fate and joke about this stuff, but...
...there you go that is my seque to this week's "Strange Death Moment" - a project that we lifted the "metaphysical" part in our film's title from. Not such a super smart move on our part - turns out people really do just want to know "what happens next" (referring to a previous discussion on the SDOAR project here at AMOC) as in..."will they get the Flame Jewel?":)
And not to be outdone here's a car accident in "A Moment of Jack" - support the sensationally successful kickstarter! http://kck.st/3j2Q3zx
The voice is Steph Cook - Dave met her at his grocery store!
And here for the first time we hear from Jack herself where she calls the comic funny and important - and thinks the comic version of herself is even cooler (but watch and you'll see that's impossible) https://youtu.be/dEI9JGhs4ks
Sean Robinson adds: If you haven't taken a spin through the You Don't Know Jack! kickstarter recently, now would be a good time! With three weeks to go, we've just added several new items, including a print edition of the 72-page Hermitage Awesomes catalog, written by Dave and Carson, and a print collection of Carson's comics, entitled Six Macro Cons. We also have-- thanks to a generous donation by Dave!-- ten signed proof copies of Hermitage Awesomes.
Andre Trinidad explains: I’m working with Gerhard on a commissioned piece. It doesn’t quite fit in the cannon but it means something to me. It’s for me and my first kid and my love of the Marx brothers. And my love of Gerhard’s astounding backgrounds. I’ll share the final product when I get it.
I also posted this in the Cerebus Facebook Group a few hours before it went live and Margaret Liss in the comments said: They must be reissuing the comic that had Cerebus in it? And with an updated cover? Noice. Looks like you can get a copy of the comic or purchase the original art to the cover here: https://www.billytucci.com/store/
"Space Vark and Beaver!" the only way they can combat the vast emptiness of space is with inane conversation. No this is not filler- this is prime entertainment!:)
And here's a new feature: "A Moment of Dave". Gabriel McCann shared some additional photos not in his link so I'll spread it out...but...wait actually this one is in the link but will double as "A Moment of Comics Metaphysics" because at the very same time me and Gabe were discussing it lo and behold a similar picture came up on Dave's Patreon. Support Dave at Patreon to learn what it's all about! https://www.patreon.com/DaveSim/posts https://gabemc9.wixsite.com/website/single-post/2018/08/24/A-Day-with-Dave-Sim
What you want more Comic-Art Metaphysics? Did you know Eddie is a karaoke master? And he shared this the other day: "I went out for Karaoke and sang it last September, and the VERY NEXT pages for CIH?: VAULT OF CEREBUS Dave faxed through had Zombie glamourpuss singing 'TORN'. Also 'Total Eclipse of the Heart,' which was sang by someone else there."
Waverly Press has also published a Rolling Stones book and now Cerebus! So apropos nothing we'll close off with more Wizardry featuring random Prince Mick and Prince Keef...
Margaret Liss: page 1209 & 1210 of C&S II, aka Cerebus #111 page 9 & 10
In the comments Lee Bentley adds: In case anyone's curious about "Little Murders", from which the character of the Judge was supposedly derived: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9mGGu2Hs5lU Steve Peters: Latter Days page 378 is a nice little Feiffer homage. Stephen Bolhafner: The bit with the Judge that inspired "George" (and you can spot him immediately) starts at 37:10
John Glismann shares a flyer that covers all the bases: A picture of an aardvark-looking creature climbing a tower? An old legend about the tower growing until it reaches the stars? Rock formations on the tower that look like skulls? https://www.facebook.com/groups/cerebus/permalink/3145309088869778/
Stephen Bolhafner: And where did most of us first hear of Devil's Tower? In a movie called "Close Encounters of the Third Kind," that came out in ... wait for it ... 1977.
Keith Callbeck: Sequart had a Cerebus volume in the works years back and I know it went through a couple of editors. Anyone know what happened to the project in the end? (I had written a piece for it). https://www.facebook.com/groups/cerebus/permalink/3150577405009613/
**Oh I had/have symptoms, I just haven't been talking about it. The wife has it a WHOLE lot worse than I do. So, wash your hands, don't touch your face, and wear a mask when you're out and about.
