Youthful Indiscretions

Way back in my youth, I wrote comic book letter columns, and the one I frequented most was Nuclear Reactions, the lettercol for The Fury of Firestorm the Nuclear Man. Writing letters to editors was a great thing back, and sadly, something that's faded because of space issues and the interweb. Back then, it was the only way to interact with the editor. It also was a way to find other like fans, as they'd print your address. I met a number of cool people that way.

Anyway, back in the eighties, Firestorm moved to Pittsburgh and the book changed. Different artists, the stories weren't as sharp… I just didn't like the book as much. But Firestorm was still my favorite character, so I kept reading and writing. My comments had both positive and negatives, and one of my frequent negatives was about the coloring.

At the time, a lady named Nansi Hoolihan was coloring FOF. She had a tendency to color the Pittsburgh skies red, even after the Crisis on Infinite Earths and its red skies of death. I remember taking her to task a few times for it, and I swear that there was an entire issue of Firestorm that featured blue skies because of my constant whining.

So, flash forward to now and Love and Capes. And here I am coloring the skies red. Over the last couple of years, I've been schooled in color theory pretty intensely. I'm not saying that I understand it completely, but better than I did back at the Kubert School, and definitely better than when I was in high school. I don't know if I just wasn't getting it, or if it was that I was used to the brightly colored Firestorm stories and the color pallette shifted intentionally when he moved to Steelers City, but I think I was unfair with her. So, if you happen upon this blog, Nansi, please forgive the ramblings of a sixteen year old Firestorm fan.

Now to the page itself: Page three is a Crusader/Darkblade scene. Love and Capes was designed as a sitcom, and the superhero chat scenes are designed to take place on a rooftop in Chronopolis. But, since I'm doing a comic book, two characters talking on a rooftop can be less interesting than two actors moving and talking. So I've tried to find "business" for Mark and Paul to be doing as spout reams of my dialogue.

This one is one I've had in mind for a while. They're leaping rooftops. It probably wouldn't work in live action, but in a comic I think it turned out pretty well. So well that I'm posting two panels, so you can see how they move. And make up for reading three paragraphs about my letter writing days.