It's really weird for me to do one of these as I'm not really one for self-promotion. Almost everything I do in the journalism space is about someone else's thing, or some company's newest thing, and rarely - if ever - do I feel free to talk about myself openly. Then again, I've never really had a thing I had to promote. Almost every project or accomplishment I've ever worked on was part of a team or a collaboration with that in mind. The Tomb of Baalberith anthology is very much this sort as well, it’s just, still strange to me to see words I wrote turned into imagery. The campaign was created by my good friend and comics veteran Mark McKenna, along with a cohort of writers and friends such as Jad Kaado and Mark's own son Kyle.
What's cool about this project is we take on a sort of horror comics of the 50s approach. It's Tales from Crypt-styled horror - though never too much or too little in terms of excess. The story that I'd written is called ‘Beautiful’ with thoughtfully stunning artwork from fellow newcomer Jameson Matunas. To be quite honest, a good reason why I've been missing posts and such lately is our collaboration, as we've been working on this and talking about collaborating on a bunch of projects together in the future. Safe to say, Jameson is my new artistic partner and together, we plan on unveiling stuff that isn't just about his sexy scratchy art style, or my verbose and often turning the trope on its head style of writing - but rather, we strive to make stories that make a difference to today's world. Which is sort of my goal as a writer and ours as creatives.
We want to make art that doesn't just entertain but actually says something. Tells hard-to-listen to truths about the world and brings it to the forefront of the conversation.
Why?
Is because although escapism is nice. Entertainment feels overripe with it right now. The world needs to talk about its issues. So I've made a vow to always write about the truths that never get addressed in conversation and in media. Basically showcase, why the world is so full of gray right now - in an era where everyone has become black and white. Us versus Them.
I want to say in my art that life is complicated.
I want us to do something about it, which is why I write the way I do.
To try and change the world.
For 'Beautiful', the best way I can describe our short is I wanted to make something with a female demon/monster since the original Baalberith was missing a bit of that. Yet, immediately when I had to think about female demons - I couldn't think of many. Sirens. Maybe. A Gorgon. Possibly. Maybe. Definitely? Something with eyes looking into the heart of your soul. As Souls was a big thing in the original comic.
It was then I thought. Ya know. It would be really cool if I could tell a story about my cataract surgery back in 2013. Basically, what it's like being awake while a doctor slices away at your eyeballs. Because I've done that. I've lived that. Most people would be horrified by the kind of melting orange colors you see that is your puss seeping out of your eye lenses. So I originally went with a Gorgon, and to do so, I thought, well, the original story in Perseus looked into Medusa's gaze... This ugly creature who couldn't see herself.
Which to be honest... then brought me to the idea of tackling a topic on Beauty. Or BEAUTIFUL which is what I called the story so as to not be confused with the BEAUTY comics by Image creator Jeremy Haun (also a great comic btw).
I thought about it for a while. What if I did a story about modern beauty fanatics? How social media is destroying women's personal body images of themselves - particularly on Instagram. Influencers and girls who are obsessed with selling their looks. I also had a beauty influencer friend from high school that I reconnected with in 2022 named, Jessica DeFino. Who'd kinda gotten famous on Substack talking about Beauty Culture and her days working for the Kardashians...
Anyway, I knew where this story was going but I really wanted to make sure it didn't come across as misogynistic. I needed to stress what I was doing was empowering and not victimizing this person. So I wanted to make a statement about the culture rather than the subject and talk about the toxic nature of chasing fame and having this become everything you wanted... the real-world problems of when you have a be-all-end-all mentality to anything in life.
I realized soon after that The Gorgon wasn't gonna cut it. The pages I'd written for that, contrasted very hard with the plotting of what I wanted to say in this story (it's kinda hard to make a compelling snake woman story where she's hiding from the world and essentially can't look at anyone, else they turn to stone).
But I had this character that I already made for this named, Brandi. A play on the word 'Brand' and also a bit of a valley girl namesake by ending it with an i. I knew the only way this would work was if she obsessed over her pictures and beautiful images - and then throw in a conflict where we take that away.
To build the horror elements, David Cronenberg's body horror movies came to mind almost immediately. But if not a Gorgon then what else could the monster be?
And it became obvious. A Succubus.
Though again, I didn't want this to be outright naughty for the sake of selling copies. A lot of people do that in the industry and I don't want to be like other people necessarily - so I needed the story to stand out. The idea was something sexy in terms of imagery but with no nudity. In fact, what if... and bear with me.... what if we did a succubus story without any actual sex involved? Would that even be possible and how could it tie to the mythos established within Volume 1 of this story?
The result is what I ended up writing. However, I can't help but feel uneasy about the launching of this. As I am slowly realizing this is the beginning of a very long journey I've been prepping for a long time.
I can't deny that I'm a bit fazed. A bit flabbergasted. A bit all over the place regarding the launch.
Anyway, please do support my first breakthrough into comics. Click the Kickstarter. Pledge a few dollars. Buy a copy, a bottle opener, and a T-shirt. And more importantly: watch our video.
Because I scripted that too.
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/markinker/the-tomb-of-baalberith-v2
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