Big Sexy Interview With Ricky Lima / TEUTON Vol.2 News

Back on Free Comic Book Day @ Stadium Comics, Fred and I spoke with intrepid web-reporter Ricky Lima about TEUTON Vol. 2; namely how the wonderfully talented Agnes Garbowska will illustrate a back-up story for the new book! I thought this addition to the book was meant to be a surprise, but I totally forgot we spilled the beans on camera.

The story Agnes is illustrating pertains to the actual Lithuanian folklore behind some of the key players in Volume Two. Agnes' trademark style serves as a great contrast to my heavy inks, and from what I've seen of her early drafts she really drives it home. I'm truly excited!

It's surreal to see another artist render your creations and bring them to life. In a strange way, Agnes' pages substantiate the book as a real thing in my mind. As Kramer said when J. Peterman published his life stories, "I've broken through--I'm part of popular culture now!"

I'm on the home stretch with TEUTON Vol.2 with just a few pages left to go, then the cover, and then... I can't think that far ahead. The ending of this one packs a wallop and I'm eager for people to read it all in one go!

 

TEUTON Vol. 2, pages 67-71

The Komtur is leaving a bloody trail across the Lithuanian wilderness in his search for Perkunas' Axe. Even after the devastating ambush on the French legion, the fabled weapon eludes his grasp. As it turns out, the Axe was seized at Constantine's Crossing, a distant trading post on the borderlands (pages 54-66). Now in the hands of Maximillian, a Teutonic Knight in charge of the trading post who is unaware of the weapons heritage, it is only a matter of time before the Axe is discovered--but by whom?

Meanwhile, Perkunas is looking for answers. Hot on the heels of his battle with his godling Nephews (pages 46-51), Perkunas sees the web of conspiracy surrounding him. Now he plans to deal with those who would supplant him, starting with Velinas.

 

TEUTON Vol.2, pages 58-59

Pages 58 & 59

Blood and fire fill the cold Lithuanian air as the Komtur's undead forces rush the fractured French soldiers! Does this outnumbered band of knights stand a chance?

Meanwhile, not content with watching the mayhem from afar, Ziburnis decides to enter the melee incognito by taking the garb from an unsuspecting undead warrior. What is this assassin's angle?

Stay tuned!


Process

These last few pages were some of the most fun and challenging I've yet drawn for TEUTON. Pages 58 & 59 in particular have been my Everest for the last week.

Fred wanted this segment to raise the bar for our story. One of his strengths as a writer on this book is his knowledge of medieval warfare. He carefully laid out for me what was to unfold, and while listening to him it was clear how cinematic it was in his mind. In Fred's imagination, TEUTON is the greatest swords and sorcery B-Movie ever made, and would star Karl Urban as Andrus. He even drew me maps of the bridge and the troops and wagon train to show me how the action would take place. I'm sorry I can't find it otherwise I'd post it.

Feeling the importance of this story beat, I saw it as a worthwhile challenge to up my own ante as an artist. So far in Volume 2 there's been much action and violence with Trolls and Gods, but neither of those had the scale of open war. So what you see below is a collage of roughs, thumbs, sketches, and scrapped drafts.

With almost every page in this segment I added more panels. Fred intentionally wrote fewer panels for me to be able to jam more details and action into each frame. What I found after reading the scripts and drawing my thumbs was that would require me to draw super elaborate details wideshots while trying to establish new characters. Take page 52 for example, where we establish a new setting and introduce the Komtur into the book. I was worried that not giving him a close up would be jarring when readers reach that page, so I opted for smaller panels garnishing the main establishing shots.

Another interesting challenge was researching what tools and practices back then to do things like dig a trench or make catapults from logs. I've never done any of those things before and had no frame of reference for them. So when Fred's script simply says Skeleton warriors are digging and fortifying trenches as others assemble siege weapons, I knew it was time to do some homework.

Page 54 was my next hurtle. After showing my thumbs to Fred, we discussed over the phone the idea of a blizzard suddenly moving in. The rationale being a blizzard would provide convenient cover for the Komtur's forces, as well as disorient the French wagon train when attacked. However, when I was midway into the page I felt I wasn't properly rendering the scene with my inks. The wispy, wavy lines and oblong snowflakes were a bitch to do and ultimately looked messy. I re-drafted that page several times inking it this way and that. Finally I gave all the figures heavy black and splattered the whole damned thing with white acrylic paint.

Finally, the double-page spread you see above was actually scripted as two separate pages. Below are my thumbs for both.

One thing Fred insisted was the whole thing needs to feel big. He wanted the armies to feel large and full. Rightly so. When I first flitted through the pages of the last trade, I couldn't help but see things I drew that needed beefing up. Even now I look at the Troll battle and feel a nagging itch to draw and replace things here and there. Those feelings in mind, I didn't want reflect on these particular pages later on and feel I skimped. With that I examined my thumbs for 58 & 59 and immediately said to myself, "no boxes." In our very first issue, virtually every page contained vertical boxes. While that was completely intentional, I've grown to regret my decision to do that, and I don't want to fall into that lazy trap again.

This was by far the most rewarding page to work on, although it took me longer than either Fred or myself would have liked. There are much grander battles coming, so I had to start building muscle here.


Enjoy!

TEUTON vol.2, pages 44-45

Continuing from where we left off, our heroes are met by a band of Teutonic Knights...



Their leader, a scarred and hardened looking captain named Ritt (whom I don't believe is explicitly named in this scene. A note to Fred...), proclaims the woods are rampant with unspeakable dangers. This after stumbling upon a massacre of forest trolls. Thank you, captain obvious.

These two pages close the whole encounter with the trolls. Stayed tuned for Perkunas' earth-shattering meeting with his brother, Bangputys!

TEUTON MYTHOLOGY

It's now exactly a week since Fan Expo started. As I type this it's 10:54 AM, and I remember distinctly driving down a long and winding ramp to the convention loading bay around this same time last Thursday. I felt like a tie fighter zipping down that bright, cavernous tunnel. Pew! Pew!

Anyhow, I'm still flying high off the release of our first trade. I'm well and truly proud of it, as you can tell. More than that, I like the book Fred and I are making. It's grown on me. Several times on this blog I've written about first hooking up with Fred. I think so, anyway--I start entries and delete them after 30 minutes of typing. I've written heart-breakingly beautiful things you'll never read because I suddenly decided to toast Eggo waffles and watch Dragon's Den, but I digress... When Fred first pitched me his idea I was just excited that a cool pseudo celebrity wanted to make comics with me, and would pay me to do it. I was saying yes no matter what. But he said "knights" and a part of me winced at the thought of drawing horses and armor. That shit can get complicated.

That's all to say that I liked it then, but I love it now. What's always impressed me with Fred and his script--and indeed, anyone who hears Fred talk about Teuton concedes--the guy did his homework when it came to researching the history and the obscure Lithuanian mythology that serves as Teuton's backdrop. There's nothing random or arbitrary about the places and names involved in the plot. It's interesting stuff. As we carry on with our story, I would like to give readers a chance to compare our comic with the history and mythology it borrows from.

If you've read the trade, you'll know it ends with the arrival of a new character: Perkunas.

A fearsome and courageous being, Perkunas can easily be described as the Lithuanian equivalent of Thor. His great strength and power are akin to mountains and thunder storms--in fact, he is deity to both, as well as to the rain, the sky, and oak trees. Indeed, everything about Perkunas is elemental and way over our heads. He reigns in the heavens above and commands the trees and mountains that rise up to him. He is bad ass. We hope that was made clear when he lands on the scene in our two-page spread.

Perkunas' name has been dropped several times before his arrival in our story. Issue one opens with the raid on a Pagan village, and it is there the fabled Axe of Perkunas lies hidden in a shrine, protected by Lithuanian worshipers Aras and his foxy apprentice Asura. Charged with retrieving the axe is the Teuton Komtur, who is secretly working for Maras, one of three death gods in the pantheon. It's important to note that Perkunas' Axe is the most devastating weapon in all creation. Imagine wielding an instrument capable of such destruction, it could level mountains with thunder and raise them up again with an earthquake. That is why it's kept hidden from other power hungry gods in a shrine where only mortals can enter.

After the Komtur is unexpectedly killed in the ensuing melee, Olbert assumes command and sends the axe to Konigsberg for political points with his superiors. Aras, however, believes the axe to be taken to the hill fortress of Pilenai, which the Teutons have assumed control of. Believing he is doing the bidding of Perkunas himself, Aras performs a ritual before the Stelmuze Oak (an actual tree in Lithuania where Perkunas was worshipped. It's estimated to be 1500 years old.) and transforms Olbert into one of Perkunas' fearsome Oaken Sentinels. Well, it gets nasty for everyone inside Pilenai, but we'll get more into the plot in later posts.

As for my vision of Perkunas, I modeled him after Tom Hardy in Bronson. My reasoning behind it was simple: I just didn't want him looking much like the Thor we all know. I wanted my thunder god to look blunt and heavy, like a polish butcher. I've debated putting a cape on him, but am leaning towards the negative. Vakiris, one of several antagonists in the first volume, was given a flowy cape. Although I modelled him from 80's wrestling costumes and Flash Gordon. I always intended him to be a bit of a doofus in appearance, but takes himself very seriously. Perkunas on the other hand is the real deal. I'm excited he's here in our new volume, and I think it'll make for fun storytelling.


Stay tuned for more as this story develops, more will be revealed!

SUNDAY SPECIAL: Teuton, Teuton, Teuton! (and one other thing)

Much has been happening lately in preparation for printing our trade paperback edition of TEUTON. Most of it exciting, some of it utterly mundane. Let's begin with the mundane!

Back when I drew our first issue of Teuton, I had forgone buying traditional comic art boards with helpful blue lines. I didn't even have my own scanner until I was over 10 pages in. Instead, I would buy 18x24 pads of watercolor paper, cut them down to 11x17 and would measure the template dimensions by hand--and I didn't even stay true to that sizing either! When it came time to drop all our finished pages into the template our printer, Ka-Blam, provided, it was discovered that my sizes and image resolutions were all over the place. Numerous pages were cropped and re-sized in the 11th hour. Since our first issue saw print, we all know our deadline was made and good times were had.

However, we're on our fourth issue now, and one can't help but look back on the mistakes of the past. Since issue one will be reprinted in our trade, Fred and I are taking the time to correct our most glaring flaws. This is a very liberating thing! With all my mistakes and regrets in life, I've finally found one I can literally take an eraser to! I won't waste time saying exactly what will be changed--I'll let readers discover it for themselves--but I will say it's become incredibly taxing on my time. That's it for the mundane.

One exciting aspect of our upcoming trade will be a pin-up gallery comprised of work by thrilling guest artists. We have an amazing roster of talent contributing. So good, in fact, you'll wonder why they aren't drawing the book instead. While I'd like to keep details a secret, I'll tease with this:


This splendid piece was done by Portland, Oregon artist Adam Moore. He's an illustrator of great skill whose work revels in the golden age of 80's cartoons and comics. I absolutely encourage you to check out his blog and DA gallery.

Now just to remind anyone reading that I'm not such a shabby artist myself, below is a recent page from Teuton #4, featuring my good buddy Doug as the recently resurrected and now totally evil Teuton Komtur!... Finally, there are 10 (60-69) spanking new pages of our ripping yarn, Teuton, up on Big Sexy Comics. Read them if you haven't already, and look for the subliminal message! (hint: there is none.)