BRUTE

I was talking to my cohort Owen Keenan the other day and we were reflecting on what we’ve accomplished – two completed issues of Brute – in color. That alone is an achievement that many would-be comic creators will never reach. But we’re far from done. Issue #2 is now in inking, Issue #3 is script completed and I’ve started scripting Issue #4. But the vision for what we want to accomplish with Brute is far more than getting more issues out.

I’ll break it down simply as follows:

The saga of Star Wars – George Lucas certainly didn’t break any new ground in the telling of a simple farm boy who becomes the savior. This is a classic fantasy cliché. However he created such a rich world around it, it seemed new and fresh. Even prior to filming Star Wars, Lucas had thought out want happened before and after which helped to give richness to the setting and theme. Which in the decades since have been added to immeasurably. Similarly, my vision with Brute is that there’s a definite sense of coming in the middle. There was stuff happening before our main characters meet and even when the story of Brute finishes (somewhere around issue #300) there will be a sense of what’s to come. Although each issue and series arc will tell a small story in itself in the saga of the characters lives, the series as a whole will tell one epic saga of staggering proportions.

The depth of Lord of the Rings – J.R.R. Tolkien spent decades crafting Middle-Earth and it shows in the depth of world building he did when the various races have long histories, the world is full of ruins hinting of epic battles past and occasionally glimpses of a world beyond even what we saw in the books. The world of Middle-Earth had structure and form. Enough that D&D RPGs and many other fantasy games/books/settings would use it as a basis of what a fantasy world should be. Unlike Star Wars, Star Trek and most other sci-fi tales where alien races are often seen once (often in one panel or scene only) and never again. In Brute, every race will be a part of the tapestry of the galactic story. The universe is consistent. If you see race X in this sector of the galaxy, then next time the story visits there, you’ll find race X still there, doing what they do and having an impact of the tapestry of (at least) their local galactic neighborhood. There’s a long history (and pre-history) to the galactic and what’s happened in the past will affect how things play out in the present. As readers, you’ll get to know all the common races, and know what to expect when you see one appear in a story.

The fun of MCU Guardian’s of the Galaxy – Seriously, the main character appears as a bad-tempered teddy bear – how serious can we be? Don’t worry, we take our characters, story-telling and world building very seriously, but we want to keep the series fun, upbeat, and family-friendly. This doesn’t mean bad things will never happen – but generally you can expect Brute, the comic, to be a fun, enjoyable, family-friendly ride.