Warren Ellis makes my Fridays
2 Oct
I woke up all excited because I thought it was Friday. Only it’s not, which is depressing.
“Katey,” you’re thinking, “What the hell? You don’t have a job, what do you care?”
Well, that’s a good point. But Friday is Freakangels day.
Freakangels is a (free!) weekly web comic by the amazing Warren Ellis and the new-and-overly-gifted Paul Duffield. And when I say “weekly web comic” I’m not talking about the newspaper-style four-panel strip. I’m talking six pages a week, full color, old-school serialized steampunky goodness. Near-future drowned London, 12 kids born with psychic powers, and what they’re doing after the end of the world.
If you love comics or graphic novels, this is for you, whether you prefer spandex or not. Then again, if you love comics or graphic novels, you’re probably already reading this.
But maybe you don’t love graphic novels. (The idea frightens and disturbs me, but anything outside my bubble world usually does.) If you’re willing to give one a shot, this one is free and beautifully done, with Ellis’s trademark rawness and humor, and Duffield’s perfectly complimentary style– the modern illustrator’s clean lines and carefully chosen colors. (Yes, he does it all. Every week. Really.)
The going is a bit slow– Ellis knows he can take his time letting us get to know his characters and his world, and we do. “I mean, god, we’re two hundred pages in and it’s still only around 6.15pm on the first day of the story,” he says. But I eat it up, because his characters are always so wonderful. I’ve been reading it since I saw a link somewhere (I’m guessing his site, actually) to one of his off-week rants about that age-old question “how he gets his ideas.” He starts talking about emitting psychic sex rays and accusing Grant Morrison of wearing the skin of younger comic book writers.
It’s hard not to love him, even when the Duffield has a week off and he fills the pages with randomness like that, really.
But I saw a Newsarama interview with Ellis touted on the Tor Blog yesterday, and it reminded me that I’ve never mentioned the love here. Seems remiss. So have at it, and let me know what you think. If nothing else, you can waste another couple of minutes a week, right? We all love that!
Yeah. I know what I want for Christmas, and it’s only October.
I like graphic novels. I just can’t keep up with them (money wise). Then X-Men got all weird on me : P
Yeah I stopped reading X-Men once they turned Northstar into a zombie :/ And don’t get me started on Spidey. Broke my heart AGAIN. (The clone thing did it when I was a kid. This is intolerable!)
But Freakangels is FREE! Kinda neglected to mention that… *edits*
The collection coming out next month will be buyable, but it’ll always be free online. Yum free entertainment!
Every time I swear I’m not going to procrastinate any more, someone throws something wonderful at me…
Eek — a free , top quality online graphic novel. If I dive into this I’ll get no work done for days! Oh, the temptation to take a peek at episode one…
Must! Resist!
Cate, normally I’d try my hardest to help. But when it comes to Warren Ellis, I’m powerless. Let’s blame him! I really hope you like it.
Mike, I know man, tell me about it. It won’t take you that long to get through it all once you start, at least… but you won’t want to do much else until you do
I’m quite proud of myself – I read through to episode 4 and dragged myself away. Will check out more later.
Oh gods. I HAVE to send this link to Kier. This is RIGHT up his alley.
Much <3 for word-of-mouth!!
Cate, that is TRULY an accomplishment. When I found it I ate through the whole thing, looked at my clock and went, “crap, I just lost an hour!”
Megh, yes. Man. There’s more time to catch up too, because Duffield apparently has mosquito-borne cockrot this week. (Or not. But hey, Ellis said it, not me.)