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I thought this scenario would make for some great personal drama. Now the heroes have to keep a secret from one of their own. Not only their friend, but the unifying element that brought them all together. But it’s for his own good, right? Even they don’t know for sure. The next few issues are rehashes of stories I did in college, so it will be interesting (for me, at least) to see how they play out with this new story element in the mix.

The next page is a big landmark for me! Found out exactly why next week…

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Man it’s hard to draw Hailey older, especially since one of the powers that runs in her family is slowed aging (which you will see when you meet her real mom and grandmom) and it’s not THAT FAR in the future this scene takes place (15-20 years?). Hailey does have prematurely graying hair though (due to a certain very stressful event in the future) as well as a noticeably bigger bust and butt. I think she and particularly her dress turned out really good though.

If you’re wanting to know what exactly is going on in this scene, I’m gonna warn you: this scene takes place simultaneously in the final issue (probably issue #39), so you’ll be waiting a while for the answer. Just wanted to let everyone know that I do, in fact, have a Master Plan.

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A few months ago I happened upon a webcomic that seemed like it would appeal to me. The initial draw of “Space the Comic” was nostalgia for me: it is made with and as a tribute to the Lego Classic Space theme! Immediately I was like “Oh! I had that guy/ship when I was a kid!” It was neat to see some of my favorite childhood toys (who unlike Transformers and G.I. Joe never really had any “official” fiction behind them) having wacky adventures. I was horribly behind on my own comic at the time, so I bookmarked it for later and kept an eye on the new updates via the FaceyPlace.

A few weeks ago, I got a chance to dive into the archives and get caught up with the story. When I did and saw that the strip went back to 2008, I thought “Awww, man. I could have been reading this for the last 4 years?”  While the strip is mostly a sort of space sitcom, I was pretty amazed with how author Kevin J. Guhl (no relation to Ra’s Al Ghul – that I’m aware of) interweaves elements of science fiction and horror (yes, Lego horror). The storyline “The Last Face You See” is sheer terror on an existential level, being a bit reminiscent of Ambrose Bierce’s short story “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge” in that they both present a doomed man’s frenzied but futile struggle to survive and have somewhat similar twist endings.

Whether comedy or horror is the prevalent theme of the current storyline, Kevin does a great job of infusing those little brick fellas and fillies with tons of personality. In fact, I was so inspired by Valkyrie’s sporting goods shoplifting spree and little exchange with poor, lucky Lawrence in “Bootlegs” Part 7, that I drew this fan art. There are a lot of webcomics I like, but his is the first one I’ve ever enjoyed enough to be compelled to do a fan art for. So, if you enjoy my art of Valkyrie (or even if you don’t, but want to see how awesome a comic’s gotta be to inspire me to draw fan art) please check out the source comic.

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“It’s a Toledo Salamanca Broadsword worth about a million bucks.”

Well actually, it’s a flea market-quality look alike I picked up in Gatlinburg on a shopping trip with Jake and his ex-sister-in-law like 13 years ago. Man, I have a good memory when it comes to shopping. Have you ever been to Gatlinburg, TN? Unless you want to shop for over-priced shoddy swords or cheesy, air-brushed tee-shirts or go to the aquarium, don’t bother. You have to sit in traffic for an hour to move 3 blocks and you have to pay to park everywhere.

Man, that sword’s hilt is a bitch to draw. No wonder I had it get broken in the 3rd issue of the previous iteration of the Radicals.

I did another background for the shoreline using the same technique I used for the jungle on the last 2 pages. Any opinions on how they turned out?

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The human race has never been in a better position to cause or prevent its own extinction. If an asteroid like the one that killed the dinosaurs was headed for Earth now, there is a good chance we would be able to detect it in plenty of time to plan and put a defense into action. We do have the technology to alter an asteroid’s path, be it by attaching ion engines to it, tapping it with low-power lasers, or even towing it with a spacecraft’s own gravity. Looks like since the Shuttle program was retired without an alternative in place, we’ll have to leave that to the Russians though. Some day life on Earth will end. It could be when the Sun exhausts its hydrogen in 5.5 Billion years and expands, consuming the Earth. It could be when Ahmadinejad gets nukes and goes crazy-go-nuts next week. It could be an asteroid at any moment. The point is that at some point Earth will cease to exist or at least cease to be inhabitable, but that doesn’t mean that the human race has to end with it. Carl Sagan always advocated that the human race needs to be at least a two-planet species. No sense keeping all your eggs in one basket when it comes to the survival of the species. While it may be centuries before we have the technology to relocate the human race, we should at least be steering in that direction and able to defend ourselves from incoming threats in the meantime.

I understand that in times of economic instability it is natural to realign priorities, but trusting the communications, security, and potentially even survival of not only America, but possibly the entire world to a friendly-at-the-moment foreign power is not an acceptable option, especially considering the number of American jobs that could be created by the effort. I am glad to see that the private sector has stepped up to the challenge of Space Race 2.0, but the fact that the majority of our elected officials no longer saw the need for the shuttle fleet before a functioning alternative (civilian or otherwise) was available is saddening and short-sighted.

As a child I had untempered optimism and believed anything was possible – one day I would fly the Space Shuttle. As I have aged and started writing science fiction, I have become increasingly cautious in my optimism. When I look back at the comics I drew in 4th grade, 2005 was the far-flung future of flying Volkswagens, giant robots, and sleek, “Star Trek”-style ships. In high school I had pushed it back to 2010, and scaled things back to grungy classic “Star Wars” and “Alien”-style technology. By college, I had pushed it back 2020 and downscaled the level of technology to hover-y versions of things that usually aren’t hover-y. It is now the amazing space year 2012, and I now rarely even attempt to guess at how the future is going to disappoint me. Little of significance has changed technologically in the 23 years I’ve been drawing, with the exception of this amazing thing called the internet. We now have all kinds of nifty gadgets that allow us to avoid actually interacting with other humans. Space travel technology has, if anything, regressed, while our dependence on the communication and defense satellites the space program put in orbit has increased.

If God exists and truly is a being of wisdom and goodness, then he surely would not have made a universe of such complexity and vastness for the sheer sake of baffling us. If there is life out there, we are meant to find it and our place in a bigger community; if not, then the universe was meant for us , both to live in and to tap for resources. Even if there was no God and the universe is just some fluke result of decaying primordial particles, why not take advantage of the opportunities of space? The Earth is now inhabited by over 7 billion people and counting. No matter how high we build apartment complexes, we’re eventually going to run out of places to put people. “Because it’s there” is a sufficient motivation to go to space for me; for everyone else, the long-term survival of life on Earth and perhaps the universe should be enough.

Just a reminder, America: space matters.

Looks like this is the only shuttle I'll ever be flying.

With the exception of Hailey, Dr. Reilly Marnel is probably my favorite character to draw. He’s really taken on a life of his own since I started drawing him. He’s a little Jon Pertwee and a little Rooster Cogburn. If he were riding a dinosaur he would be the coolest thing even imaginable!

By the way, if you’ve forgotten the filmstrip Hailey mentioned you can go back to where the characters watched it here in Issue 2.

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SHE’S AN ABSOLUTE BAD AXE!!!

A continuation of the “Sexy Girls and Swords” series… although I guess now I should change the name to “Babes and Blades”. I couldn’t think of another type of sword to use, so my friend Dan said “How ’bout an axe?” I hadn’t drawn Gail in so long (about 3 years ago in issue 3), it was a lot of fun.