Started Spooky Season Term with a trifecta of Bonfire Night / Halloween and a visit to Button House. Absolutely unbeatable collection of things to do, and pretty much a cheat code to get you through those tricky first few weeks of Initially Unwelcoming Darkness.
(That’s Mike and Alison’s actual car!!!)
(I made a little ghost sauna to celebrate the plague pit sauna scene.)
This week’s been mostly meetings, calls and chats about potential upcoming work. Thought Bubble’s next weekend. Maybe see you there?
The kiddo and I were absolutely delighted to see so many Amazing Digital Circus cosplayers at London MCM and then again for Halloween this week. We went to the cinema to see the final episode of DATC with a couple of her buddies and it was great!
MCM was as busy as usual, jam-packed with great comic creators and a few big name celebs (Daredevil! Kingpin!)
It was pretty weird watching the cops give Spidey a formal warning last week at NYCC – for ‘unsafe climbing’! Don’t they know who he is? I can’t remember how far the comics lag behind real life, but I’ll be really sad to read this issue… (He got down willingly, but mumbled something about responsibility?)
I did get to meet all the biggest heroes in New York. Here’s me and Dog Man! (Dog Man on the left).
It’s been a couple of years since I flew over for NYCC, but it was great to get back to what makes working in comics really worth it at the end of the day: the rooftop party.
London MCM next, to catch up with friends and enemies, and then the Comics Xmas Party known as Thought Bubble.
It’s that time of year again and I’m in New York City for NYCC.
Most of the comics freelancers who travel tens of thousands of miles to be here do so to meet like-minded deviants willing to work in the mines of the best, most exhausting medium in the universe.
Me? I’m here for the best pizza slices to be found on any street corner in the modern world! #freethepineapple
Captain Underpants here (his actual name, I’m not bullying him!) was actually in the foyer of the Scholastic offices – my one (blessed!) trip outside of Midtown. It was great to meet him, and swap haircare tips. He also throws a mean party!
Best Thing head and Mr Fantastic butt you’ll see all year – guaranteed!
Aphmau wasn’t there, and none of the staff running her booth said they knew her personally, but they did let me (a grown adult) pull the lever on this enormous fruit machine. Ding ding ding!
Took off to Paris for a well-timed family trip before term starts again.
I’m trying to think of my working seasons as terms, which fits in with the actual terms of my kiddo’s school. Scheduling jobs and projects to fit or straddle the six terms in a calendar year helps me visualise what I can actually get done in the time the Blessed Universe has gifted me.
It also automatically builds in the holidays and down-time necessary to stop Jack From Being a Dull Boy.
Paris is great. I worked on a really interesting project there with comics magician Daniel Merlin Goodbrey and Valerio Ferrari – an Italian architect with surely the best name in the business! – some years ago. I loved hanging out in Paris, and sort of regret not pursuing some more freelance work on that side of the Channel.
Fabulous Frank Quitely artwork adorns the new Forbidden Planet store in Glasgow. His Fanglesga Four is just amazing!
One side of my family is Glasgow all the way back to the caves, which is maybe one reason I really love making the trip there. I worked in The Barras market as a teenager selling dodgy videogames, and it was great to see it thriving in the Year of Our Stan 2026.
I once wrote a series for Vertigo, the ‘grown-up’ / goth arm of DC Comics, and set it in Glasgow. I spent almost a full year raiding libraries and galleries all across the city for stories and ideas. I also got to feature my favourite bits and landmarks – I sent artist Meghan Hetrick a million rain-splashed reference photos, and she even made the trip over to see it for herself. (We had a mini signing tour, the pinnacle of which was probably the old Glasgow FP!)
It’s a great city – and as much as I love Edinburgh, if you’re visiting Scotland and you skip Glasgow, you’re missing out on something really, really special.
There’s also TARDISes all over the place. It’s brilliant!
When the early summer Comic Con rush subsides I love to escape for a few days (weeks, if I can get away with it!) to Edinburgh for the Fringe.
Comics are great, but the vagaries of the business can drive you absolutely mad if you’re not careful, and I love being able to spend a bit of time thinking about something as equally creative and financially maddening – the comedy industry!
(I once had a 4-issue miniseries approved by Massive Hollywood IP Holders, only for it to be downgraded to a backup strip. Instead of 48 pages, I had to tell the same, already-approved story… in 8 pages! Luckily it was just before the Fringe, so I turned in the job, travelled north and pretended that comics didn’t exist for a week!)
Every August Edinburgh becomes temporary home to an international band of buskers, comedians, troubadours and bards, attracting millions of people to the city and enraging a million local residents who just want to be able to walk down some streets without being flyered.
This year I saw a ton of absolutely mind-blowingly incredible shows, and even wrote some reviews for new comedy website https://thepunchline.uk
I haven’t had a blog for years. If you were around in the early 2000s, you’ll know that blogs used to be cool.
There’s been a bit of a return to blogging in the last couple of years, and I’ve secretly fancied having a low-obligation space to post stuff. Somewhere without an algorithm that penalises me for taking a day (week/month/year) off.
Anyway, unless I change my mind this will be that place – an online storage location for notes, photos, promotional scraps and maybe even a thought. Probably not two.
