HEART-SHAPED SKULL

SR 1 PAGE SIXTY-NINE Not much on this page but a whole lot of mechanical pencil grinding. The text mentions trolls, though, so why don’t we look at some old drawings of Crestfallen critters? This is probably the first drawing of a troll, ca. 2000. Basically nothing like the final version, except for the hairiness.…

SR 1 PAGE SIXTY-SEVEN I haven’t done enough DANGER SCARY.  Oh sure, there’s a bunch of upsetting stuff in book two, a freaky moment or two in book three, and ELDRITCH! has some proper horror scenes, but mostly I’ve been bumping along in the spooky cute groove. That’s fine! My tastes generally wobble in Burton-esque…

SR 1 PAGE SIXTY-FIVE Mary Ann can been seen holding that “Gumdrop Gang” penguin in my second Serenity Rose student film, Good Guys Wear Black. I guess it’s a popular show in their world! Part of the fun of world-building is figuring out what kind of pop culture people are into.  Lots of references to…

SR 1 PAGE SIXTY-THREE Finally, a major character who wasn’t created in my little cubicle at CalArts! Skarsdayle was designed for this issue, doodled on some sheet of paper that’s inexplicably gone missing even though I save everything. The universe itself wants no record of her! Skarsdayle’s look is 100% “Evil Chrissie Hynde.” Chrissie Hynde…

SR 1 PAGE SIXTY-ONE Hold on…Does Sera use medical bandages for binding? This is not the physician-approved way of doing it, Sera! Ace bandages can cause serious breathing problems and chest pain, even punctured lungs. Please invest in proper binding technology to explore your gender identity (seriously)! Of course, as a shapeshifting witch, Sera doesn’t…

SR 1 PAGE FIFTY-NINE Why is Sera’s bed floating? Why wouldn’t it be floating? It would be crazy for it not to be floating! If you can float your bed and choose not to, you should go to jail. Because of her crazy supernatural powers, sleepytime is probably the only time Sera feels physically vulnerable.…

SR 1 PAGE FIFTY-SEVEN This page full of TV screens was definitely inspired by Frank Miller’s The Dark Knight Returns. If you were a kid in the late 80’s, The Dark Knight Returns was the COOLEST THING IMAGINABLE. Batman throws a little batarang through the Joker’s eyeball! THROUGH. HIS. EYEBALL. This was a big deal…

SR 1 PAGE FIFTY-FIVE Hey everybody, it’s Lois! I love Lois! Yet another character who first bubbled to life on my animation desk at CalArts ca. 1998-2000. Here’s the earliest sketch I have of her: Lois’ last name, “McCreedy,” is a reference to Kurt Russell’s chopper-flyin’ flamethrower boy in The Thing, R.J. MacReady. I try…

SR 1 PAGE FIFTY-THREE Into issue three! And #3 is a big stinkin’ deal, because it’s the first issue made under contract with Slave Labor Graphics (SLG). A webcomic no more, Serenity Rose had made it to the big time: PAPER PUBLICATION (just like Swank). And with the country’s foremost distributor of goth-tinged funnybooks, too,…

SR 1 PAGE FIFTY-ONE I LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE drawing big crowds of background characters.  Except that there’s rarely any time to draw big crowds of background characters. But when there is…HOO BOY. I love getting into each of their heads while I’m drawing them. And with the laborious pencil rendering style I was…