E-merl.com ~ New Experiments In Fiction

The Archivist is now live on the web, with new updates to come for the Pop section throughout August and September. This is probably the most ambitious hypercomic project I’ve attempted since Sixgun back in 2001, so I’m pretty excited to finally see it out there. And of course this time the web is only the beginning – tonight The Archivist’s physical installation opens in London at the Pumphouse Gallery as part of Hypercomics: The Shape Of Comics To Come. The show runs until September 26th and I’ll be there in person for the opening tonight and as part of the Comica Comiket on Sunday 22nd August. See you all in Battersea!.

I’m currently hard at work on a new comic called The Archivist, which is my contribution to the Hypercomics exhibition taking place at The Pumphouse Gallery in Battersea Park. The show’s being curated by Paul Gravett and will feature hypercomic installations by myself, Adam Dant, Warren Pleece and Dave McKean. The show will be running from August 11th to Septhember 26th and you can get the full low down here and here.

This weekend I’ll be taking a brief break from my frantic scribbling to head into London and sell some comics. The London Film & Comic Con is taking place on the 17th and 18th July at Earl’s Court and you’ll be able to find me there, sharing a table with Sean Azzopardi. We’ll have a wide selection of fine comic products with us that we will be more than happy to offer to you in exchange for small (but perfectly formed) sums of cash money.

(Oh, and for those unable to attend, the new 100 Planets mini comic is also now available right here at E-merl via the wonders of PayPal. Consume!)

It’s sunny outside, the birds are singing in the trees and the London MCM Expo is almost upon us. This weekend I’ll be part of the Comics Village at MCM, sharing a table with my old pal and collaborator Sean Azzopardi. I’m going to have a brand new 100 Planets mini-comic for sale that features a whole bunch of strips that haven’t yet made it onto the web, plus the latest Rule Of Death mini for those that didn’t make it along to Uni Con. Surely there can’t be a better use of your bank holiday weekend than popping along to say hello? (Hint: there isn’t – see you there!)

This week my employers, The University Of Hertfordshire are dabbling their feet into the world of comics with Hertfordshire’s first full fledged comics festival, Uni Comics. Starting today and running until Sunday, there’s a veritable gaggle of events taking place and if you’re nearby (hint: if you live in London you’re more nearby than you think) I’d say it’s well worth popping along to a few of them.

As our own little contribution towards event, myself and Sean Azzopardi have organised Uni Con, the festival’s very own comics convention. Taking place this Saturday at the university’s de Havilland campus in Hatfield, the con is running from 10am to 5pm and will cost you the grand sum of zero English pounds to enter. The great and the good of the British comics scene will be on hand to sell their wares and shoot the breeze, plus the esteemed Mr. Noble has been drafted to organise a series of panel discussions that are sure to both enlighten and entertain. And what’s more, there’ll even be a brand new issue of The Rule Of Death on sale as a further incentive to attend – what further reason could you possibly need? See you all on Saturday!

So I think it’s time to make it official – Welcome ladies and gentlemen to E-merl 7.0! I know right now it may look a bit similar to the ol’ 6.0 design, but under the hood it’s an entirely different beast. Just one regular weekly webcomic series? Hell no! E-merl 7.0 is running three! Tune in on Mondays for the brand new 100 Planets, check us out on Wednesdays for the metafictional thrills of The Nile Journals and then pop back again every Friday for the latest episode of The Rule Of Death.

This new profundity of comics coolness was made possible by the excellent Webcomic suite for WordPress, which came via a recommendation from Jesus & Mo. It really leaves ComicPress in the dust in terms of functionality and ease of use – well worth a look if you’ve a webcomic site of your own to manage. I’m still banging around a bit behind the scenes so expect to see a few more changes and upgrades come online across the next few weeks. I might even give the old colour scheme a facelift if I can find a new one that takes my fancy – stay tuned!

Two quick bits of business! First up, as the not-so-subtle hints in this week’s strips have suggested, All Knowledge Is Strange is ending. I have a farewell sequence of strips planned so that a few of the regular cast members can get to say their goodbyes, but expect the series to wrap fully at some point in the next few weeks. Fear not though, gentle readers – you will not be without your usual dose of E-merl comics for very long. I have a brand new weekly series by the name of 100 Planets all prepped and ready to run in AKiS’s place. I’ve been quite touched by all the kind comments from regular readers expressing distress at the series’ conclusion – I hope you’ll all stick around and give 100 Planets a try. I can promise you it’ll be just as strange a trip, even if the giraffes will be singing in a slightly different key.

Secondly, I have at the last minute discovered that I am sharing a table with Douglas Noble at this year’s Web & Mini Comix Thing. That’s this Saturday 27th March in good old London town (Mile End, to be more specific). I imagine there shall be the usual small press shenanigans afoot and that those who enjoy such things would be well served by popping along to say hello. Were you to slip me a crisp £8 note during the event, I might even be persuaded to part with a personalised copy of my new, full colour Brain Fist trade paperback. See at least a few of you there, I hope!

The long awaited renovation to E-merl’s Print Comics page has completed its first stage. I’ve stripped out some of my older, out-of-print minis and added a proper PayPal shopping cart via which people can get their hands on the new Brain Fist trade paperback. That’s right, Brain Fist is finally available for purchase right here in one sleek, full-colour volume. Consume! Also added with this update is an All Knowledge Is Strange mini-comic that’s previously only been available at conventions and all the details of the Necessary Monsters trade due in February.

Stage two of the renovations will include adding some Amazon Associate features so that I’ve got my own mini-shop for selling my two AiT trades. I’m also going to add a proper list of my other print comic work, including the stuff at Marvel and various anthology contributions. Look for that lot to appear as soon as I have time to figure out how the Amazon gubbins works.

In other news, the second half of the conversation between myself, Bryan Talbot, Paul Cornell and Paul Duffield is now up here – it’s Science-Fiction-tastic. Happy New Year all!

A quick pre-Christmas post to point everyone in the direction of this here page concerning the new Necessary Monsters trade paperback. You need this book! It’ll be out in comic shops in February but you need to go and order it from your friendly comic shop owner now, because that is the way the gods of comics have decreed it. Go forth! Or alternatively, order your copy from Amazon. Go… er… fifth!

And now I’m off to finish getting ready for the aforementioned winter festival. I’ll see you all in the New Year, by which time I promise I’ll have the new E-merl shop sorted and copies of the Brain Fist trade available for sale. Oh wait, before I forget, check this out – someone let me into a conversation about Science Fiction in comics with Bryan Talbot, Paul Cornell and Paul Duffield. And then they went and recorded the whole thing too! Jings!

Merry, merry everyone!

Two quick bits of business. Firstly, Empire of Odd has completed its run at Ctrl Alt Shift. The instalments are kind of spread out around their blog and rather hard to find so I thought I’d better do a post linking to all them from one place. And here it is.

Part One, Two, Three, Four and Five. Ta-dah!

Secondly, this weekend is Leeds Thought Bubble and myself and Sean will be there, pushing Necessary Monsters and getting folks all excited for the new trade paperback collection that’s going to be out in February. Ooh, did I just let that slip? I expect I’ll be saying more about that soon then.

I’m also going to have a brand new collection of the complete Brain Fist that I’ll be selling at the show. In full colour! With a spine and everything! I’ll eventually be selling this at E-merl too, once I give the shop a bit of an overhaul. Until then, if you want to get your hands on a copy you’ll just have to pop along to Leeds on Saturday and grab one in person.

The first part of my new five-part webcomic serial, Empire Of Odd, went live this week at Ctrl.Alt.Shift. The webcomic is my contribution towards Ctrl.Alt.Shift’s new anti-corruption initiative and will be appearing exclusively on the web to help promote their upcoming print anthology, Unmasks Corruption. The story takes the recent MP expenses scandal in Britain as it’s jumping off point and then gets bigger and weirder from there. Tune in on Monday for part two.

Elsewhere on the web, another webcomic of mine that’s simply brimming with evil and corruption has just finished it’s run. That’s right – chapter five of Necessary Monsters has wrapped up, bringing our tale of darkly-daring-do to a close. Sean has at last been freed from his drawing table to skip merrily through the woods without a care in the world – at least until I chain him back down again to start working on the print edition of the series. Said print collection should hopefully be available in all good comic stores by Christmas – more details to come on that front soon.

And lastly… well, nothing to do with corruption really, but next weekend is The MCM Expo in London and myself and Sean will once again be on hand to sell you our fine comicy wares. We’ll have with us copies of the final Necessary Monsters mini-comic and – provided we can get them from the printers in time – new Necessary Monsters postcards. Yes, postcards! Free ones! Available to anyone who comes past our table and says Hi during the weekend. Hmm… I guess that’s sort of a bribe, isn’t it? Yay! Corruption wins out in the end after all!