SPECTATORS - Part 118 (and new SAGA!)
Win a signed copy of this week's SAGA #67!
Happy Saga Week!
Brian here, excited that Hazel’s next adventure finally begins with a new issue that will be available at your favorite local comic shop THIS WEDNESDAY, featuring a particularly gorgeous cover from co-creator Fiona Staples. As I said on my dumb Instagram earlier today, this new arc will have a seismic impact on our characters, so why wait for the next collected edition (out early next year), when you can join our ongoing journey and stay spoiler-free?
This issue also features a nice ad for Spectators from artist/co-creator Niko Henrichon and Saga letterer Fonografiks, so if you were brought here by that shameless plug, welcome! You can catch up on all previous 279 (!) pages of this unconventional ghost story for mature readers (if you can handle the sex and violence in Saga, you should be fine with this tale) in our Exploding Giraffe Archives.
For the moment, this epic graphic novel we’ve been serializing for the last two and half years is still free to read, but if you want to download/own these files (and unlock all past/future bonus content, including exclusive comics by Niko, some of my past unproduced screenplays, and much, much more), we hope you’ll consider becoming a paid subscriber of what we call The Tower.
Niko, Fonografiks and I have approximately five months’ worth of work left to do on Spectators, so if you’re thinking about finally joining our merry band of giraffes, I’d recommend the $5 monthly tier instead of an annual subscription (but either way, we’ll pause all billing once our story wraps later this year). Whatever level you might decide to contribute, you’ll be directly supporting the creation of a story that means the world to us, so THANK YOU.
Tower membership also gives you access to our exclusive chat threads AND automatically enters you in our weekly contests, where we give away invaluable prizes… like this page of hand-painted original artwork from Niko (normally only available for purchase over at Essential Sequential), which will be going to one randomly selected NEW subscriber who signs up anytime this week, your best odds ever to win a page:
So pretty. Would look great framed on your wall, no?
I’ll also be giving away several signed copies of this week’s Saga to you excellent existing members (and showing you a first look inside that new issue), but more on that in a bit. First, let’s catch up with voyeuristic specters Val and Sam, as our friendly ghosts continue to observe a chaotic future that appears to be on the brink of destroying itself (unlike our totally chill present, thankfully).
What does come next? Stay tuned, more in one short week.
For now, I wanted to congratulate all of the extremely worthy winners of this year’s Eisner Awards, including (but certainly not limited to) Exploding Giraffe pals Becky Cloonan…
…and Caroline Cash…
..and Kelly Thompson…
…and Daniel Warren Johnson…
…and of course the amazing creators/dear friends behind the Eisner Award-winning Friday: Ed Brubaker, Muntsa Vicente, and especially Marcos Martín, who is almost singlehandedly responsible for turning the pay-what-you-want site Panel Syndicate into one of the most successful, acclaimed, and longest surviving new comic “publishers” of the 21st century.
The third print collection of Friday hit stores last week from Image Comics, and here’s Marcos to tell you about The Complete Friday, available exclusively (and for any price you think is fair, including $0!) at Panel Syndicate:
The Complete Friday!
Just a quick note to let you know all nine issues of FRIDAY by Ed Brubaker, Muntsa Vicente and myself are now available as one convenient 336-page volume! Only in English for now, I’m afraid, for a very simple reason: I got tired of renumbering the whole damn thing and couldn’t bring myself to do it all over again in the Spanish version. So there, I’m lazy, just in case anyone needed further proof.
Anyway, if anyone missed out on this or was waiting to read it all together at once, we’ve really made it easy for you so you’ve got no excuses anymore.
And don’t forget to browse all our other series also available at panelsyndicate.com!
After all that goodness, if you still have some time to kill this Monday evening, you can download a very fun podcast I did with Chris Hacker over at The Oblivion Bar, which you can also listen to below:
Thanks to Chris for doing such a great job with this thoughtful interview; I hope you enjoy my nasally rambling.
Speaking of great jobs, as a former employee of the month at Baskin-Robbins, I was wondering: Did you ever have—or are you currently working—a memorable summer job?
Let us know in the chat, and our intern Genesis the Exploded Giraffe (who’s finally back from safari and catching up with July’s backlog of prizes) will randomly select a few of you loyal Tower types to receive a copy of Saga #67 scribbled on by yours truly.
And yes, I realize it’s not summer everywhere in the world at the moment, but I’m interested in your answers, too, Southern Hemispherians.
Finally today, here’s a first look at one full page of interior art and story from this week’s new Saga by Fiona and Fonografiks, just for you generous paid subscribers.
If you hate even the tiniest spoilers, feel free to skip this, and Niko and I will see you back here next Monday evening for more free Spectators, cool?
Everyone else, strap in…
SPOILER SPACE!!!!!
SERIOUSLY, MODERATE SPOILERS BELOW!!!!
ARE YOU SURE YOU’RE PREPARED?
THEN AWAY WE GO:
Oh, wait, that’s just a page of original artwork from Superman Family #195, written by Cary Burkett, pencilled by Kurt Schaffenberger, inked by Joe Giella, lettered by Ben Oda, and edited by Julie Schwartz, featuring perhaps the most intensely dashing version of Clark Kent ever drawn.
Which reminds me, did anyone else read this bullshit piece in The New York Times about male hair loss:
Our hair is one of the ways we tell the world who we are — and it also affects how the world sees us. So its loss can cause a man real suffering. But, by starting an open conversation with a doctor as soon as the signs appear, it doesn’t have to be that way.
“There’s tons of options, and the future is very, very bright out there for someone who’s been dealing with it,” said Dr. Del Campo. “They shouldn’t have to deal with it alone.”
They make it sound like you’re about to lose a goddamn limb!
And look, I fully support anything anyone wants to do with/to their own body, but despite discussing several drugs, injections, laser therapies, and even surgeries (all expensive and/or with multiple possible side effects), no one in this article ever mentions the simplest option for dealing this wholly natural occurrence: shaving your head and getting on with your fucking life.
One of the many reasons I love Star Trek: The Next Generation is that it posits a hopeful utopian future where there’s finally a REAL cure for baldness: society evolving to recognize that our kind is vastly superior to the rest of you mop-topped weirdos.
Sorry, I digress.
No preachy, pro-slaphead polemics in this issue of Saga, I promise!