MARCH MADNESS!

Welcome to March! And also… how is it March already? I swear it was just November. TIME IS MOVING TOO FAST! SLOW DOWNNNNN!

THIS MONTH

GREEN LANTERN #9 comes out next week.

Xermanico is outdoing himself in the art department. I’m always so gobsmacked by what he turns in.

Here’s a bit of a preview for next week! WARNING…A COUPLE OF SPOILERS HERE.

JAY GARRICK FLASH!

And we’re nearing the end of the Jay Garrick mini-series *sob*

Here’s a sneak peek of Diego Olortegui’s incredible art.

Also next week, I’m headed off to Toronto!

AUGUST 22 - 25, 2024

METRO TORONTO CONVENTION CENTRE

I’ll be signing books at the COMIC SKETCH ART table all weekend, and on Saturday at noon I’ll be on a panel with my good friend Tim Sheridan where we’ll be giving away some goodies. I did a little video to explain.

But wait there’s more!

MARCH 29-31
ANAHEIM CONVENTION CENTER

I’ll be there the first two days signing and running around. So please come by and say hi!

IN OTHER NEWS

I found out a DC animated movie I wrote is going into production, so look forward to that in a couple of years.

AND

I’m also finishing up being the Head Writer on a LEGO project that I can’t wait to talk about more fully.

CRAFT SERVICES

The industry has done a bit of a contraction since last year. My opinion (which isn’t worth much) is that for the last several years, the studios have been swiping their corporate card a little too much, making anything and everything they could think of. Eventually, the bill came due and the corporate overlords checked the Profit and Loss spreadsheet only to realize they might have overestimated (by billions of dollars) what they though a streaming subscriber base would bring in.

Now, that means a lot of people are out of work. A lot of writers are looking for their next gig.

That leads me to talk about the “industry” and how to survive in it.

If we were to look at the SUPPLY and DEMAND angle of wanting to be a professional writer, the reality is there are WAY more people who want to do this than there are jobs available.

I might have mentioned this before, but when I first moved to Los Angeles, I was driving to Universal to interview for an assistant position (didn’t get it). I thought I should get a burger before the meeting so I wouldn’t be hangry, and pulled into a Carl’s Jr. just off Lankershim.

As I was waiting in the drive-thru, I saw the driver of the car in front of me reach out to grab his Western Bacon cheeseburger (because it’s the best) from the worker manning the window. He got the grease-soaked bag, and then, before he could drive away, the worker reached out the window and handed HIM a screenplay.

That’s when it hit me. Everyone wants to do this. Drive thru workers, janitors, every assistant to anyone in town…everyone.

Some people come here and they get success right away. That wasn’t my story. It was over a decade before I got my first credit. So, if you want to be a professional writer, you have to REALLY WANT TO BE A PROFESSIONAL WRITER.

In concrete terms, that means finding a job that is IN or AROUND the business. A job that won’t sap too much of your energy to write, but gives you enough money to live.

In between working at Blockbuster, and being a PAGE at Paramount, I temped as an assistant just about everywhere just trying to make enough money to survive. And I was barely doing that.

Even when you finally get paid to write something, most of the time, the money you make is only able to sustain you for a couple of months.

So be smart. Persevere. Keep going.

It’s all about having a job that can pay for your dream until your dream can pay for itself.