PART ONE
PART TWO
PART TWO PART 2
PART THREE
The first big bump in the road for Shadoweyes was a falling out between me and the collaborator I’d been developing the comic with. I thought about how much detail I should get into about it, what parts to reveal and what not to, partly because in the past the collaborator didn’t like me speaking about them after the fact. Aside from simply respecting someone’s wishes, not to mention someone who isn’t here to tell their side of the story, I guess it’s unprofessional of me to blab about it, too.
BUT it was still a major part of Shadoweyes’s development so I want to at least talk a little about it. Long story short, the collaborator felt like I took what I wanted from her then pushed her out of the project. That’s the really simple version. Whatever mistakes I made, I was devastated by the whole thing, and I really did want this person to draw the book, I even turned down one publisher who wanted to do Shadoweyes if I’d agree to boot the artist and draw it myself. In any case, the whole thing fell apart and I almost scrapped Shadoweyes entirely, I didn’t even want to think about it and it felt wrong to do it without this other person involved.
But I got over it and I moved forward with it, and tried to make it more “me” and just do it out of a catharsis of moving forward. I wrote and drew about 300 pages of Shadoweyes in 2010, I was on fire and filled with new determination. Probably the most work I’ve ever done in one year (and also the year where I made the least money, haha). I felt like if Scout was around before the collaborator came aboard, then the character could be around afterward, too. I just had to take Scout back to her roots in the Heroes Unlimited campaign and kind of start the whole thing over.
I did what I could to distance the characters and ideas from what the collaborator and I had done, including removing some characters and rejiggering others. I toned down the more traditional superhero stuff we’d been going for, including the Batman/Catwoman dynamic between Scout and Noah which was a big part of it originally.
I also realized that Scout’s neon green eyes wouldn’t print correctly, so I started fiddling with her colors and eventually settled on the blue/cyan color scheme:
I think the color change ended up being sort of a metaphor for how Shadoweyes changed course after I went solo, everything kinda softened overall in both visuals and the story. Even Scout’s design eventually evolved into her being very rounded and soft, as opposed to her earlier pointy, wiry designs.
Since all this happened, I’ve never had a falling out with someone or a project go down in flames quite like that one. I still think about it sometimes and mull over the decisions I made and what I might do differently now. I don’t know. I actually archived all the emails the collaborator and I exchanged over the course of all this, just in case, and I thought about going back and re-reading some of them for this Shadowhistory post but I decided it would be too upsetting!
Anyway, the lessons I’ve learned are: never involve anyone with anything, and never share something you love with someone else. :D
But seriously though, I doubt I’ll ever do something creator-owned with someone else again. When it comes to creator-owned, I’m an island. It’s all much too fraught.
Sorry for the kind of bummer Shadowhistory installment! Next time I’ll talk about characters who didn’t make the cut and the development of Dranac, the city the comic takes place in. B)
UNTIL NEXT TIME
So enlightening. Your current philosophy is a good one to stick with. Looking forward to the next installment.
So love the background history, even if it's upsetting to dredge up the mess. Someday, you might collaborate again. You never know what life brings. :-)