Americana

Today sees the release of the Vertigo anthology The Unexpected, and includes an 8-page story I wrote for Emily Carroll to draw. This story has some history behind it.

Years back, ABC News did this special called Earth 2100. I was asked to write these “graphic novel” segments, that would be animated in a limited manner and intercut into the documentary. I gave it a whirl but clashed unpleasantly with the requirements of the job and bowed out (I think some other Brooklyn cartoonists got the gig). What I was left with was an awful lot of material that I created and still owned. And so I filed it away. Some of it is being incorporated into The Massive, but the story itself I retooled for this 8-pager, called Americana.

My original story detailed the journey of a young woman through a century of climate change and all that entails. That’s a huge story, and for a long time I thought maybe there was a series to be written about this. Or at least a graphic novel. But I thought why not take it to an extreme, going the other way? Compress a story that spans a hundred years of world-changing events into 8 pages, and purposely using as little information and text as possible, just enough to communicate the story.

I love how it came out. I love Emily Carroll’s art, and in truth I wrote this story for her, specifically, to draw. On the surface it’s not your typical story from me, but I dunno, maybe it is at its core? Anyway, here’s a page from the story. Check it out. See it larger here.