warren ellis ate santa
 

bad signal
WARREN ELLIS

The sky's gone the colour of death.
Big storm coming. I'm going to be
trapped in the pub. Very bad.

You retailers who are having success
with FELL and DESOLATION JONES
should be made aware that Image
still have stock of the LAZARUS
CHURCHYARD, CITY OF SILENCE and
MINISTRY OF SPACE collections.
There's a happy little display for
you. You could probably sell LAZ
and CITY to anyone who's ever
bought TRANSMET from you anyway.
And SCARS from Avatar would go
particularly well next to FELL.

There. I am the fucking Xmas elf now.

Spent the last half-hour on
newuniversal notes. Still haven't
decided on the particular techniques
and tools for the book, but the plot
development is stitching itself
together absurdly easily. They had
one single story here, and for
whatever reason they just couldn't
see it. Of course, I've been fiddle-
farting around with some of the
central concepts, but it was all
laying there. My only issue is trying
not to replicate elements of other
"ground-level" sf-oriented treatments
of superhumanity. There was one
that proved a bit unavoidable, but
I'm working my way around it. It's
a tough book, in terms of the craft
and discipline challenge.

Luckily, I'm always doing my own
stuff too, and can let rip on things
like BLACKGAS -- because when
you've been working a commission,
there's nothing better to recover
with than, you know, zombies,
black drool and brain-eating. Part
one, in line with the American
horror-movie style I'm using, is a
slow burn, but you still get your
zombies at the end of the issue.
And then it's beatings and braaaains.

My filthy assistants on the Engine
break into the admin system every
night and change my user name.
Today I am ZOMBYS LUV PANCAK.

This is possibly because I said
yesterday that I was going to have
them all spayed for Xmas.

Because I am the Xmas elf. Yes.


---
Sent via mobile device
probably in the pub

it pained me to read that

bad signal
WARREN ELLIS

I will accept death as an alternative
to the pain of being awake, at this
point.

Single of the year: any thoughts?
The monstrous nun-eating awe of
Xinlisupreme's "Zouave's Blue"?
Was Afrirampo's wondrous "Want
You" released as a single? (Yes,
yes, I know some people still think
it's the sound of evil clowns
chickenhawking in a playground late
at night. Those people are Wrong,
and also Communists.) Can I forget
that I actually liked a Bright Eyes
song, and therefore became a 17-
year-old girl with bad skin and no
friends? ("Landlocked Blues.") And
there was "Us" by Regina Spektor,
the Tori Amos for people who
actually like music. (If that was
indeed this year. I forget. I know
that Wolf Parade's "Dear Sons &
Daughters Of Hungry Ghosts" was
last year -- was "I'll Believe In
Anything"?)

This year, the US got The Go!Team,
whom I've been listening to since
the Junior Kickstart EP. Which
makes up for exporting Coldplay,
I guess, for which we should have
been prosecuted under international
war crimes law. But, you know, you
keep fucking with us at airports and
we'll keep sending you educationally
subnormal ponces with socks for
hats.

Disappointments abounded; it seems
more and more like the bands I
like only have one album in them.
The Kills broke my heart with that
thing they followed the Black Rooster
EP up with. I kind of wonder if that's
not a speed-of-culture thing: like
the Western world's on internet
time now, and even music and comics
seem slow compared to the velocity
of novelty we've gotten used to.

Time for Red Bull 3.

---
Sent via mobile device
probably in the pub

Red bull?

RED BALLS NIGGA!

[img]http://www.ebaumsworld.com/images2/computervintage2.jpg[/img]

oOo:

the fuck? oOo:

stick to posting pictures of you with severed heads

bad signal
WARREN ELLIS

Writing comics? Still the best job in
the world. I sit around all day making
shit up and see it illustrated, in 99%
of cases, exactly as I imagined it,
if not better. I've been doing this
a long time now, and I'm going to
do it until I die. Which probably
won't be long, given the constant
insane deadline pressure. But fuck
it. Anything worth doing takes work.
Some people do question if it's worth
it, given that the industry makes no
friends and takes no prisoners and
is not kind to people without the
chops or the commitment or a
thick skin. You know what? I've got
forty books out there that some
people wear on their fucking skin,
and I didn't manage that by arsing
around on the internet all day.

That's right. I managed it AS WELL
AS arsing around on the internet all
day. I have powers.

I had a good year in comics. FELL
worked. JONES reached its audience.
The Apparat books all sold out.
That's enough for me. I feel like I
achieved something this year. No
doubt people will argue, but fuck
them. Where's their books?

(Only in comics will a small amount
of pride in a year's work be taken
for stark arrogance.)

Did comics have a good year? It's
seemed slow, hasn't it? I haven't
seen a lot of stuff. But, this year:
SHARKNIFE? Rey just released a
preview of a new work on The Engine
and his LJ, and it's a quantum leap.
Hope Larson's SALAMANDER DREAMS.
The first issue of LOCAL. THE PUSH
MAN in an English-language
collection for the first time. I've
only skimmed the new Renee French,
but it looks gorgeous. Continuing
superb work on the web from Jeff
Rowland, R Stevens and PERRY
BIBLE FELLOWSHIP, FETUS X and
a bunch of others. And all of that
is just scratching the surface.

Not a bad year. I ask a lot of my
medium, and certainly a lot of things
could have gone better. But not a
bad year.

I'm still getting my arms around it,
to an extent. I still have concerns
about the major companies, and
even more about the indies. I have
the feeling that ground was laid
this year for some truly horrible
things to happen to the indie market
next year, and a lot of it will be of
their own doing.

And there have to be a lot of
conversations about marketing.
The old toolbox -- some of which I
helped create -- doesn't work so
well anymore. You can't just hit a
few message boards, get a
Newsarama puff piece and wait for
the money to roll in. I became more
aware of this a couple of weeks ago,
talking with Josh Fialkov, the writer
of ELK'S RUN, on The Engine. It was
the work of five minutes -- and
probably 15 years experience -- to
write him an ad that actually
communicated narrative context.
No slight on Josh -- not everyone's
mind works that way. But something
clearly must be done.

Anyway. Out of time. Ramble off.




---
Sent via mobile device
probably in the pub

Anything worth doing takes work

bad signal
WARREN ELLIS

Apparently it is Wrong, when finding
carol singers at your door, to yell
"Hail Satan! See you in Disneyland!"
and slam it on them. But I don't want
to be Right.

Stopping off in the pub to recharge
before heading into town to complete
Phase Two Xmas Food Shopping.
Phase Three is tomorrow, when we
go to our butcher to pick up the
goose, and stop off at the local
beer specialist to get a case of
heather ale and maybe some
Samiclaus (sp), the superpowered
Christmas beer that pours like
treacle and paralyses the brain.

My back is killing me. I can feel things
moving around in it. It is a singularly
unpleasant sensation. Almost as bad
as watching Xmas television. Caught
part of a documentary on the
recording of "Fairytale Of New York"
last night. What the fuck happened
to Shane McGowan's head? It's
shrunk. Someone told me that
they're re-recording it with Katie
Melua doing Kirsty McColl's lines.
Horrible. I heard her doing "Just
Like Heaven" on Jools Holland or
something the other month. Audio
Valium. She should have been
arrested.

Weird start to the day. I got a
package from Peter Kuper. Which
is weird because I don't know the
bloke at all, never spoken to him. It
was a comp copy of the new issue
of WORLD WAR 3, the political comics
anthology. I suspect he must've
gotten my address from the Top
Shelf comp list and just sent it
without having the faintest clue who
he was sending it to. Nice looking
book, that works hard to try and
avoid that Air America-style
shrillness. Haven't read all of it yet,
but the Joe Sacco was very good,
as was the photo-story from Iraq.

People are starting to drop off the
grid for Xmas now. And I'm next,
I think. See you on the other side.

-- W


---
Sent via mobile device
probably in the pub

STOP.

Dan, are you using drugs?

I think the problem is that he STOPPED using drugs...

yes...currenlty running tsp ver 4.0(0.22)