A MOMENT OF CEREBUS: A Moment of the Strange Death of Alex Raymond: Day 21 Update

Tuesday, 24 January 2023

A Moment of the Strange Death of Alex Raymond: Day 21 Update

Jen DiGiacomo, Interim Head of SDOAR Division, Aardvark-Vanaheim, here with yet another weekly update on the SDOAR 2023 GoFundMe campaign, plus a pull quote!

"The Strange Death of Alex Raymond is one of the most spectacular comics I have ever read or seen. I can't recommend it enough, although you may hate it. Bizarre and beautiful and completely unique." - Jim Rugg, Cartoonist Kayfabe, Street Angel, The P.L.A.I.N. Janes

Let's check in on the official SDOAR 2023 GoFundMe tote board -- for those of you old enough to remember such things:

$2075 raised in 21 days from 40 donations
14 new pages released as mocked up by Dave Sim from June 11 to July 14, 2021
35 total pages available on Dropbox when including Dave's 2019 mocked-up pages
$125 away from the next unlocked page

Those of you following along at home will note that we are slowing down, so if you have considered donating in the past but haven't gotten around to it, I strongly encourage you to donate $5 or more to the SDOAR 2023 GoFundMe campaign and I'll get you added to Dropbox so you can read the new pages that have been unlocked so far.

SDOAR 2023 GoFundMe -->> https://gofund.me/4e2e1c96 <<-- SDOAR 2023 GoFundMe

But wait -- there's more! Being a Doctor Who fan in America, I grew up with lots of PBS pledge drives over the decades. Local PBS stations would interrupt your favorite programming to ask for donations to continue showing the kind of specialty programming that couldn't be found elsewhere. Doctor Who, Monty Python, Mystery, Cosmos, Nova, Sesame Street, and I, Claudius spring immediately to mind. Aside from merely appealing to viewers over programming, they also offered incentives to those who donated larger sums -- outrageous sums TBH for tote bags, specialty VHS tapes, and sometimes items signed by their guests. But it was all for a good cause, right?

That got me to thinking. What do I have that I can offer for inordinately large pledges? Well, digging through my stack of Dave Sim duplicates, I have found the following items I will personally contribute (to start) for the SDOAR 2023 cause:

Hermitage Awesomes Silicon Session, Prototype V 4.0 signed by Dave Sim #3/11, also inscribed to me on page 3 by Carson Grubaugh. What, pray tell, is Hermitage Awesomes? It's a parody of the Heritage Auction preview books by Dave Sim and Carson Grubaugh and includes an 8-page Strange Death of Alex Raymond Prequel, plus high-res images of original art by Dave and Carson up for auction from Glamourpuss, You Don't Know Jack, Cerebus, and Dave Sim commentaries on the IDW Rip Kirby reprints. If you are into Glamourpuss and SDOAR -- well, you need this. Back cover price was $50.
Cerebus the Newsletter #11: Very clean copy.
Cerebus Archive #11 POD: Still in original bag it came in.
Cerebus Number Zero Gold Edition: Also very clean copy.

How much for each? I have no idea. Email me at jen@typingmonkeys.com with an offer. If I get multiple offers for the same items, then I'll see how high the highest bidder is willing to go. If you have items you're willing to donate to the cause, email me as well, and we'll see about including those on future lists. Cool? Cool.

Finally -- each week, I like to include new Dave Sim art -- these are from December 8, 2022. Reminder that if your donation unlocks the next page (every $200), Dave will send you a piece of SDOAR 2023 production art of his choosing. We tried to fulfill specific requests of posted art, but that ended up being more complicated that we realized.

In addition -- any big donation will usually result in a pile of SDOAR art at your doorstep. The $1000 donation we got in the first week was a big wow! for Dave -- and hopefully an even bigger wow! for the donor once their art arrives!