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ShawnVanBriesen — Sarah Jane Smith: Final Report 3
Published: 2012-07-12 16:23:01 +0000 UTC; Views: 2157; Favourites: 12; Downloads: 41
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NEXT PAGE COMING SOONPREVIOUS PAGE HERE: [link]
FIRST PAGE HERE: [link]
This is the new webcomic by and myself.
Paul and I had discussed this while we were working Doctor Who: Fade Away. [link] This is the companion piece.
Paul says: A much less Whoniverse-y page here. It can't be fanwank all the time, folks. Sometimes ya actually gotta develop characters and stuff.
There is actually a huge left-field ref to another beloved TV show here (besides THE COLBERT REPORT- that one's obvious)- and if ya don't know which one, you don't watch enough TV.
Fun bit of trivia: it was one of Lis Sladen's favorite TV shows, so I'd suspect she would have been tickled to see it cross over with Sarah Jane's world (in an indirect way).Also- if while you're enjoying this comic, you feel like giving us a "tip", may I suggest giving to your local cancer charities. US readers may want to donate to this one:[link]
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Comments: 37
Not sure if this is an actual error, but Ive noticed in one box it says "WANTED ME WANTED ME" rather then just "WANTED ME".
Aside from what I'm sure is an error, this is really good. I look forward to the rest of it
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Good catch. I've told Paul.
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For some reason I'm getting a slight Watchman vibe off this comic 
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It wasn't a bad thing
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Hopefully, its the good storytelling.
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I think the story is part of it
Obviously following the analogy through, I'll be looking forward to the Zack Snyder movie version of Final Report
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I'm definitely taking cues from Moore's TOP 10 and LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN w/ all the cross-referencing and cameos. Wait'll ya get to page 7.
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I'm enjoying it very much. I think there's something about the narrative style that's giving me the Watchmen feel as well. Either way it's very good.
Did I read somewhere you submitted the Brig story to DWM and they refused it? Such a shame really...
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Yeah, sadly (and IDW too). I didn't even get a response (which is generally what passes for a rejection nowadays), so it's very possible they didn't even read it. Even though I've had a few things published, I'm still an "unknown" in most editors' books (especially as a writer). I try to break outta that box every day, but it can really hold ya back sometimes.
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I assume IDW probably only works on a commission only basis (though I'm sure you'd know far more about it than I would), but I'm surprised that DWM weren't open to submissions. Full Circle wouldn't get made these days...
Are your published works all art, or have you had some writing published as well?
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Well, I do have a pitch "on the bubble" for one a one-shot issue of one of IDW's other properties (i.e. it'll get made if the sales for the "parent" book get up high enough)- so they aren't completely adverse to non-established writers pitching. But obviously, it helps to already have a working relationship with an editor.
If "published" includes Champion Magazine (which is an e-mag, but still a "real" magazine and not a fanzine or the like), then yeah. That's a pretty decently paying gig, and I write as well as draw the "Commission Impossible" segments for each issue.
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Oh wow, you're that close to getting an IDW commission? Well, in that case please keep submitting. It would be brilliant for you to get one done. I suppose IDW is probably a little more accepting than the bigger houses
Any paid work is definitely "published", so yes, that's outstanding. I didn't even know that magazine existed - something else I shall be getting hold of for a read
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Yeah, it's weird- the more I think about it, it seems like 90% of success in this industry is luck and good timing. The two big comic gigs I've gotten to date (Buckaroo Banzai & Godzilla) were just b/c someone brought an opening to my attention at the right time, and the editors I made contact with were in a friendly mood. Actually, I'm fairly certain if I'd pitched my "in limbo" pitch a little earlier, it would've gotten made, no problem.
Ironically, I think my work's been getting WAY better in the last year, and yet this has been a horrible dry spell for pro gigs aside from Champion. This month, I must have sent 12 emails out about potential gigs to people I'd worked with in the past or had some manner of previous association with, and EVERY SINGLE ONE didn't even respond. 100% shutout. Three of these people I'd even go so far as to call "friends" (in a comic industry kinda way). Sometimes ya just have horrible luck with this stuff, and ya just gotta press on and keep the faith.
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I think a lot of creative industries require more good luck than good management to be successful
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Oh! Well, that's very kind of you to say. I greatly admire Dave Gibbons' work. Especially his Doctor Who comics. Although, I'd have to fall on the side of Alan Moore on the Zack Snyder take. I thought Watchman was visually astounding but it didn't have any of the layers and depth of the graphic novel.
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I've always loved Gibbons' work too, and indeed I actually do prefer his Who stuff which was always very distinctive for me when I was younger
Alan Moore may be a complete fruitcake, but I think the problem with a Watchman movie was always that, of all comics, Watchman is more a product of its times, and a product of its medium than most. The movie may have looked like a great representation of the comic, but as you (and of course Moore) say, it lacked the depth of the graphic novel, and part of that comes from an inate inability to create the social context the comic came from. That, and at the end of the day, I have to say it was just boring. I'm a big believer that movies should take as many liberties as they like when adapting other media; at the end of the day they're different media and they *should* be different. It's the reason why Kubrick's The Shining is so great, while the television miniseries is so boring. V For Vendetta is a much better movie adaption because it keeps the spirit of the original comic, which Watchman really couldn't hope to keep because of the change in political climate.
Gosh, I should get off my soapbox shouldn't I?
The final point being - your art has a very nostalgic feel for me
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I totally agree with ya that adaptations have to have the courage to be their own thing. Though strangely, in the case of WATCHMEN, I don't think slavish recreation was the problem. Though much of what's in the book is recreated in the movie, the TONE is what's really off. The Kubrickian, clinical, objective detachment of the book was replaced by what seemed like an excitable little child snickering behind the camera. It was a reading of the text by an excitable 15 year-old- the sex is sexier, the action was way more over-the-top and fetishistic, and any more nuanced characterizations (like Silk Spectre's cynical, sarcastic edge) fell by the wayside. And then there was the disturbing homophobic jokes at Ozymandias's expense (a misreading of the text, where Moore was making fun of Rorshach's reactionary attitudes by having to classify Ozy's disaffected, intellectual personality as "possibly homosexual" (a misreading which carried over to the Before Watchmen stuff, btw). And don't get me started on "clever" additions like Nixon's penis nose, or how Snyder superficially "homages" (rips off) APOCALYPSE NOW, DR. STRANGELOVE, 2001, and so many other movies by smarter filmmakers- like some bored little A.D.D. case who can't concentrate on one message.
And like ya say- so much of the book is tied to it's medium. There's simply no way in hell to replicate on film what the "Fearful Symmetry" issue did with its page layouts on film. Even if he matched the shots, angle, and cuts to get that "mirror" effect, you can't "flip back a few pages" on film, so it'd be lost on the audience. And then of course, there's the fact that the story has been literally cut to the bone- all that's left is the skeleton of the book. All the "real" people, who were such a part of the impact of the story- the newspaper vendor and the kid, Rorshach's psychiatrist, the detectives, the locksmith, the cabbie- they're all reduced to silent cameos (if they even appear at all).
That said- there's still a lot that's great in that movie (how can it not be- even watered-down WATCHMEN is still gonna have a touch of brilliance), but it's a capital crime that someone adapted it and only came up with a two and a half star movie.
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Certainly Zack Snyder was completely the wrong director to give Watchmen to (and in truth I don't have a great sense of anticipation for Man of Steel either to be honest), and I sort of agree and disagree with you in that the slavish recreation was the problem in so far as Snyder seemed determined to have the comic frame he saw appear on the screen but didn't seem to have actually read the context that that frame come with - as you say, the characterisation and misreading all were examples of a man who was only superficially concerned with what he was adapting. The casting, I think, was fantastic, but just wasted on a director who was trying to be a lot cleverer than he actually is.
And can't agree more with what you said about the medium. What Moore and Gibbons did with Watchmen was to create something that could only be achieved in the comics medium. Once the word adaption came along, there was always going to be so much of that work that would be lost. And in that respect, it's easy to see why Moore is so bitter, really.
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Yeah, it's just a work that's so wrapped up in it's medium it's kind of a Quioxtic gesture to try adapting it. It's like when people try to adapt Vonnegut. The guy's stories come off as absurd and kinda dopey without his voice contextualizing it all.
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I haven't read any of Vonnegut, I have to admit, so this is the new thing I'm learning for today
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Vonnegut's excellent- one of my favorite writers of all time. The book of "Slaughterhouse" is amazing (buries the movie, which was an honorable attempt but fell short), as are "Mother Night" (my personal fave) and "Breakfast of Champions". "Cat's Cradle" (no relation to the 7th Doctor novels) ain't too shabby either.
And ya gotta love an author who doesn't take himself too seriously: [link]
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Hahah
Well, you've most definitely convinced me - I'm going to track down a copy of "Slaughterhouse" for a read
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Man. That's totally it, Paul. It's the 'snickering child syndrome' style of directing that really puts me off. I still can't NOT fast forward through Laurie and Dan's 'love' scene. I actually just watched 'the directors cut' of it. The extra footage just kinda made it worse.
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Yeah, the director's cut adds Hollis's death, which is effective, but it turns into just one more lazy homage/ ripoff (this time of RAGING BULL). I shouldn't be thinking of better Scorsese movies while I'm watching a beloved character die.
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I agree with you. It was a case of being a very different political climate. Besides, The Watchmen was deconstructionism. Even worse are the awful Before Watchmen books. They've added nothing to the original and if anything pretty much take away any imagination or depth that was so present initially. Kurt Amacker conducted a great interview with Alan about it here: [link]
I've always studied the old guys in illustration. I've heard that a lot -that my comic work is 'retro' or 'nostalgic'. I'm quite happy with those titles.
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That's a fascinating interview. And he's so right about Before Watchmen, which is one of the silliest ideas that's ever been mooted. There are some works that exist quite independently, and don't beg for sequels or prequels because there's no need to tell that story. Regardless of what people think of Prometheus, for example, I think it was a story that really didn't need to be told - it's not necessary to know who the space jockey is, or where the Xenomorphs come from. But that's another argument
The one problem I have is that, while I agree with everything Moore says about Watchmen (and clearly he was really badly treated by DC back in the day), he is clearly a little paranoid, and sometimes just...well, I don't know whether he's specifically trying to be rude or just he's ignorant, but to say that J Michael Straczynski did Before Watchmen as it "will probably be the only opportunity they get in their careers to actually be attached to a project that anybody outside of comics has ever heard of", is just absurd. And poor old Dave Gibbons gets caught in the middle of DC's desire to make money, and Moore's anger at the world in general.
Yeah, retro is a good word to describe your art
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Alan isn't one to hold back his opinion if asked -that's for sure.
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Which is to his credit I suppose
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My heart really goes out to Gibbons on the whole Before Watchmen thing- he was put in an impossible place. I think he's been very classy (and wise) to go with the short, neutral statement he gave followed by a lot of, "Thank you, but no comment" answers.
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There does seem to be a sense of Alan Moore railing against the storm, while Gibbons is just accepting of the inevitable. Unfortunately it seems that DC were going to do Before Watchmen whether they had Gibbons on board or not (clearly they knew there was no chance of Moore being there 
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I wonder if Alan would approve more if they credited him as "Alan Moore (who f***ing hates this)".
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I was hoping the last credits would be
Relative Indifference by Dave Gibbons. Utter loathing by Alan Moore.
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Did you read that interview, Paul? It sounds like he and Moore had a pretty bad falling out over it all. Which is a real shame.
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