Another Way To Breathe

Spoilers, obv.

Issue 44 comes out tomorrow at the time of writing. As I’m on the west coast of the USA, it will be just after midnight GMT by the time they’re online. So abstractly, this is the first time ever which we come out when the next issue is out. Abstractly. I’d say the day counts as where I am, and doesn’t Comixology come out a little later? We’ll see.

It’s also been so long that I almost wrote notes for issue 44. This is a weird goodbye, this period.

Anyway – Issue 43, wherein we finish explaining all the big stuff we’re going to explain.

I mean, there’s more in issue 44 and 45, but it’s all details, with the denouncement really being based around the characters’ response to this issue. They know the truth. Now what are they going to do about it?

That was the main note I gave in the script to the team – if there’s any really big questions you are confused about, now is the time to say, as this is the best clarification it’ll get. As such, we worked on it a lot to nail what we wanted to say – and what we didn’t. Sometimes this meant actually simplifying a little to avoid repeating huge amounts of stuff and leaving people even more confused. More often it involves sliding in a little nod to something someone would be thinking about.

It’s an interesting issue, I think. It’s where we show a lot of our hand.

It also involved a lot of crunching.

Jamie/Matt Cover

Cassandra finally gets her head cover. Normally a cover relates to a key beat, which isn’t true here – except in the widest possible sense that it’s where Cassandra gets to say I Told You So to everyone, including herself.

Jason Latour Cover
One of the fun things about commissioning these covers is getting to see a creator’s process close up. Jason’s process on this was amazingly never-ending – he was always tweaking, and trying things and moving in a different direction. Where he ended was stunning – very him, and very WicDiv too. I remember us and the Jasons semi-jokingly about swapping books for an issue – they do WicDiv for an issue and we do Southern Bastards. This cover absolutely makes me wonder how amazing that hypothetical issue would have looked.

(Our story would have been about a Taylor-Swift-esque-singer/songwriter-before-she-got-big in the town. And probably murder, as it’s Southern Bastards, right?)

IFC

That “Life goes on” still creeps me out.

1-2

Opening vignette that lets us establish what Minerva’s plan is now, as well as re-establish Beth and her crew, and actually let us define their current position, and even give their codenames, which have existed in the Bible document since issue 1, I believe.

(Oddly, calling people “Boss” is one of my verbal ticks. It seemed fun to give it to Beth here.)

As such, Minerva immediately HiveMinding them when they’ve just stated their agency is plain harsh. Jamie’s large panel on page 2 sells it incredibly well – the statues, Minerva walking away from us – it’s all so casual.

It’s also the running theme of the issue – what Mini has been doing all these years. This is just a particularly direct example of it.

Three panels on second page to try and stress the seriousness of what this is (Space = Meaning, remember). Of course, as the issue shows, this isn’t the real part of the issue – but you have to at least believe this is a real gambit. And it is – I mean, it’d be awful if Mini pulled it off. But in people’s guts they’d realise this isn’t how WicDiv goes, right?

Minor glorious Matt Wilson note – the crackle of green in panel 3 is wonderful. Give that guy another Eisner. He deserves a hat trick.

3

Show time in the showbiz and the “time to show you everything” sense.

4

Establishing the stakes and situation for the heroes. There’s a draft of the issue I wrote which is a couple more pages long, which would have pulled this out a little more. In the end, we decided it worked better shorter – I’ll tell you why when I get there, and we could use the space elsewhere.

Key thing is showing some response to Cam’s actions at the end of last issue – it’s important to know that they haven’t just walked away, right?

In the first panel, the “identify who is speaking” is a tricky one. The “say the character’s name” is a little brutal move, and I avoid it. We’re not that book. Dio is easy – and Lucifer, bless her, is immediately identifiable by her idiom. Her line also reminds people of what she’s like, which sets up the last page.

Laura’s captions here again, doing a lot of the heavy lifting.

It says so much about this issue that the last two panels are only a half page total. These are big rock and roll images, presented in a tiny space. Jamie’s composition makes it land really well, selling the drama.

Page 5

It says even more that we did all this in a page.

Tara’s move in the original version was basically a page, but looking at it structurally it actually left it even more underwhelmed – a fight kicked off, and then heroes were losing, and then Tara does this cool thing, and they’re winning, before immediately the hive mind kicks in and they’re losing again. This does not sell the joy of Giant Woman.

This works better, not least for sheer audaciousness. I used to have a thing about tableau based storytelling – the idea that you can create a large image which people can explore and juxtapose it with a few captions to create a larger conceptual space. This is very much that.

“People treating people like meat” reminds me for the second time when re-reading this issue of the line from Pratchett: “Sin is treating people like things.” The first time was the puppets bit. I’d agree with Pratchett, clearly.

In the original draft of the script I had a line “You want more? Go re-read Rising Action” which is a bit too cute, so I lost it. It’s not really the sort of thing WicDiv does, anyway.

Yes, Giant Woman is a Steven Universe nod. Putting aside that image of Giant Tara kicking ass which has been in my head forever, there’s so much to love in the image – to pick a small part, how about the Norns blasting in triplicate? We rarely see them act like this.

You can also trace via the colouring which of Beth’s crew have duplicated which God’s powers.

Page 6

There’s been a lot about people copying people’s powers in WicDiv, and trying to find out what someone can and can’t do, and then using it against them. This switches it up. The thing about being creative instead of a straight plagiarist that creative people make up new shit. That’s kind of the point of them.

Once more, Matt showing the dance of the colouring between the Woden green (haunting the series like a ghost now) and the joy of Dio is (er) a joy.

Page 7

Another Matt moment – we step out of the club, and we drop to greys, before building the energy up.

I’m not quite sure how long Robin has wanted to punch Beth for. Or how long I planned to do it, even. I can imagine Robin thinking of this a lot though – she’s the one who takes a long time to snap.

There’s a dual structure here too – there’s two main compare-and-contrast bands in WicDiv. Beth’s and Cass’…

Page 8

And this is a very different kind of band break up.

The problem here is different – I want to give much more space. First draft it seemed that they got talked into it really easily. But it’s all the space we had so what to do? Once more, captions. Silent panel with captions can be timeless, and gives room for our minds to populate it. It’s been so long I can no longer remember if the fact the two almost-silent characters are shouting, but we’re not allowed to hear, because it’s private seems relevant.

Page 9-10

Hard cut made easier with the caption. Captions are great. Trust captions.

The shot of Mini at the edge, just looking back with space either side is great. Just the isolation of it.

The “try to sing” on the page turn seems a meaningful reveal. Can she?

No she can’t. This is another very old beat in the founding documents – it’s hinted at on page 9. Mini says that she gave it up – and she said the same in issue 9. I’m not sure I believe her. When planning it I realised that some people would take it as a comment on Work for hire – don’t get stuck keeping a story alive forever, as it will eventually atrophy your talent. It wasn’t planned, but I’d be fine with it as a reading. When Chrissy read it, she took it as “Don’t get stuck in art management.” which works too. Readings are fun.

Anyway – a performance. That the big thing in the issue is a performance rather than a fight is very much WicDiv turning towards its core concept as we head towards the final straight. Of course we’d do this.

Yeah, Matt and Jamie, killing it on the final panel of the second page – the Persephone-esque tentacles made something else, because she is something else now. The numinous expression of Minerva. Amazing.

Page 11

The borders in this sequence harking back to the Persephone performance in issue 18.

I may actually try to tweak this sequence in the trade and have a different execution of “When I was 14” and all the rest, to work a little more like a LOC CAP rather than a speech. We couldn’t make it work given the time before deadline. That’s the odd thing about our extended issues – just because it’s taking longer doesn’t mean we have more time to do tasks, right? Some things are only possible when the whole thing is together. It works, I think, but part of me wants to push it harder.

Anyway – these two. I loved writing them though. I said it back in the other flashbacks, but how the two of them dance is a delight. Hell, doing them across a lifetime is a delight.

Okay – I’m going to give you a name for Ananke’s sister. It’s the one I used in my notes. It’s no more her name than “Ananke” is really Ananke’s.

It’s Demeter. Ask me about it another time.

Page 12

The “god” in panel 2 is a Proto Norn.

This primal gathering brings to mind issue 9 as well.

Demeter’s expression in the penultimate panel? Love it.

Page 13

The captions are Laura’s style, but changed colouring. That Laura is helping Minerva performs means it comes across in her voice, was our thinking.

Captions are once more useful though – trying to get something that is evocative, but also clear was the battle.

(The Colours here!)

She-in-Thirds is a name-behind-the-name. The Maiden/Mother/Child archetype – the one which Ananke subverted in a few pages time.

Page 14

I find myself thinking whether the return to a close-to-eight panel for much of this is meaningful. This is kind of Bronze Age Phonogram.

Reading this I wish I had capitalised The Rebel – it’s another archetype. Proto-Lucifer. I’ll tweak for the trade.

I forget when the metaphor for a song for the “godhood” in WicDiv came to me, but it feels like the right one. It’s how songs often feel to me.

Page 15

If you go back to issue 34, you’ll see some of the details of this plan are different to the plan that Ananke has put into play there. In fact, the deal that she strikes in issue 34 is akin to what she wants here. It’s mainly for clarity – the reader needs to be reminded of what’s actually going on, as they won’t necessarily remember the details from way back then. I figure this is the plan she wanted to do, then found something else when Demeter wasn’t into it, before swooping around to something closer.

Page 16

“After all my friends were dead” gives a little flex in the timeline.

I do like Ananke’s hat.

“The Great River” being the Nile, and the pantheon we saw back in issue 36.

In terms of lists of things in this issue I was looking forward to write, the first meeting between Ananke and Minerva was certainly one of them. I tried to get something of the oddness here. Jamie and Matt manage to get the mood of issue 34 again too – I really do like this bronze-age western vibe. There’s a project I keep on thinking about doing, and it has some of that too it. Hmm.

Yes, page width panel of character delivering a line remains a key WicDiv tool. There’s so much I love here – the touch from Ananke, whose PoV we’re in. Minerva speaking to herself, speaking to us, etc.

That the knife is just sentimental is a minor beat I’m very fond of.

Page 17

Once more, Captions, as Laura makes sure we all Get It.

One of the debates in WicDiv fandom has always been whether the gods are picked by Ananke (i.e. Anyone could be a god) or whether they’re actually people with a gifts. Of course, the answer is that it’s both.

The thing I least like about WicDiv’s mythology is that the 12 people are people with this gift, for obvious “Ugh Chosen Ones” reasons. There’s some things that mitigate that a little, I hope, and not least that it’s clearly transferable to wherever you are in life. The core of it is “if you find yourself with a gift, be careful with it and use it responsibly.” It’s a book about the power, privilege, dangers and seductions of being an artist and all that. It’s only when writing that sentence do I realise how tired I am. This has been a busy week. Excuse me if the writing is looser than usual.

Anyway, I’m probably over-worrying. If X-men is fine, we probably are too.

So – end of the page is a download of some of the explanations of stuff folk will inevitably be going “Wait – what?”

And then Tara steps up.

When you’re writing a large group scene, with limited space, there’s choices you make of who speaks and who doesn’t. Who’s going to have the strongest counter-argument to something? Who’s going to have the biggest reaction? Them. They’re the one who carries the scene.

Which is Tara. Perhaps you could make an argument for Baal, but Baal is reeling through all these issues – plus if you choose one or the other, you tie-breaker would be who hasn’t had spotlight.

Page 18-21

And the counter is equally inevitably Cassandra (who is also in the process of beating herself up). Being Cass, she puts it harshly. Clearly, this is going to get a response from Tara.. and Cass opens up herself and makes herself vulnerable. Which is a hell of a thing for her, right?

I’ll stop this – I’m just walking through the emotional flow, but I love these two women here.

Which segues into the last formalist style thing of the issue. Once again, we have a space = meaning problem. This is clearly the most important sequence of the issue, but we have so few pages. We turn to one of the core WicDiv moves of black panels in a six panel grid, and loading them up with text. Suddenly we have a sense of ritual, a lot of dialogue produced in a stylistic way and most of all a whole extra page (hence an extra page of weight).

It’s also a complete showcase for Matt. The last godly panel of them is them at their most Godly, this final little iconic burst. A confession, and it’s gone.

I cried when I got the colours for this. I forget which one it was – there’s just some wonderful Jamie expressions in there as well.

Choosing the confessions was definitely tricky. We have space, but too much is too much. Some of them I kept simple, and others needed a little space to explain. The ordering was also one of those processes where you feel out the character, and think how they’d speak. Dio would clearly jump in, then Inanna, then Mimir trying to just piece it together, and all leading to Baal.

I did try and write a Baal caption, but any words were just too small.

And then, of course…

Page 22

You’ve probably seen me talking about year 4 as Solving The Equation. Yes, we knew lots of the key things, but there’s lots of elements of the execution were worked, and rethought and discovered. I may be able to talk a little more about this in the last issue’s notes.

This was a big one. I was chewing over the synopsis and thinking… a battle against Ananke/Minerva is a little underwhelming after everything, right? At this point in the story, Minerva is a busted flush. In reality, Laura (and Demeter) won the intellectual battle against Minerva in Mothering Invention. She’s already beat her. It nagged at me. There was something else.

Then there was the other thing – I knew that Lucifer was going to get her body back, but I wasn’t entirely sure what she’d do when she had it.

The two came together: of course, the final confrontation isn’t between Laura and Minerva. It’s with Lucifer, the person who brought Laura into the world, the person who brought us all into the world. The girl who wanted to be on stage, no matter the cost. That’s the final battle.

And best of all, I had no idea what would happen.

Well – not quite, but suddenly a whole lot of things was up in the air.

Page 23

Song reference, obv. Always connected to something in my head in my early career. If I do writer notes for the playlist, I may actually tell you.

Oh – some people wondered whether all the skulls meant everyone was dead. No – it’s just there’s no god in the slot. I’m not that kind of shithead.

Anyway – issue is out tomorrow. Or maybe today, depending on where you are. It ends the story, with 45 being an epilogue with a somewhat different tone. Clearly, it’s a huge issue, so be a little careful with your tweeting. The last cover is especially a big spoiler.

Thanks for your patience and thanks for reading.