Idiot Press Preview

For several years I always had this idea to preview the books that the company was publishing. Not just a preview book with part of the story from the books coming out but an entirely new short story featuring the character in the books. I loved when a company would take the time out to do these types of previews but nowadays you get sketchbooks and preview books with just black and white artwork of the book that you're going to buy.

When I expanded Idiot Press Ivan, Kevin and I were on the road of doing just that. A preview book with our characters in it. The stories were worked on but mine was the only one not completed. At the time I was working 80 hours a week and didn't have too much time to draw. This is the cover that was done for it and in many ways, I'm glad it never happened. That is just one God awful logo I drew. I enjoyed the rest of it though. A nice colab between the creators. Ivan provided three characters from Unit 1, the three gals sitting behind the couch. Kevin provided Rastlin (I'm not shure nor remember what the working title of the book was but I think it was Epic) who is sitting in the middle of the couch. I did four of the Dorks which are on either side of Rastlin, Gratitude who is making himself a Dagwood sized sandwich and Attitude is off in the corner sleeping in a beanie bag. I did all the background junk.



Many years later my dreams came true with the only preview book published by my company. Instant Press 2002 is still a cherished memory and publication for me.

Jose R. Mesarina Part 1

You may know this name from the Unbelievable Laundry Detergent Man comic book series. Back in 2001 when we started talking again Nino had done a crazy load of Dorks drawings for me. Some of them are just outstanding and eye catching. Others were, well, they seemed like Dorks mixed with acid. I'm posting the eye catching ones first as to not distract from them with the crazy ones he did. Trust me, when you see part 2 of this blog you'll thank me then beg me to take them down.

I thought this was the best one of the lot. It's a very fun pic showing the Dorks being...well Dorks.


Here is one of the rival gang, The Idiots. Oooo I hate those Idiots.

Here the Dorks and the Idiots get together to protest against their biggest enemy, ME! What could be worse?


This. My Dorks characters being number one fans of Nino. Humbug I say. Humbug!

-Rene

Happy 2010!

Here's to the New Year. I hope to do more with Dorks this year now. BOTW has been finished for some months now and it was fun as hell to do. I hope to be working on another project with Dave soon but first up will be the long awaited (by me) Dorks 10th anniversary collected edition. It's going to be like the original collected book except it'll be printed the way I had intended to back in 2000. The funniest part of the story is that I wanted to print it in the smaller format which wasn't really popular back then, but I wanted the smaller fomat done to go with the the printing of the original books which were printed as ashcans. The printer had told me that he doesn't print in that format though. I argued with him though since he had prices listed on his flyer for the smaller format. That was the least of the printing issues with Dorks though. Like I've said, the cover just falls rite off as soon as you open it. Alot of other things were my fault because I rushed it but I've been working on this since I finished Bride Of The Wolfman so this time around no excuses. There will be alot of new goodies in it and also an exclusive new story written by Dave Gruba (Bride Of The Wolfman, Gondor, White Knife) and drawn by myself. You've seen the pinup supplied by Stan Tanaka colored by Benny Fuentes and it just knocks my socks off each and every single time I look at it. There's a couple more goodies but they're surprises so I won't spoil it. Just be ready for the newly improved Dorks: A History collecting issues 1-6 of the original series and then some. Until then I hope you all a Happy New Year and I'll be seeing you at the conventions.

-Rene Castellano January 1st, 2010

As a special treat, here's a peek at the new cover. This is how I had intended for the original to look like.

Orthodox Man

Back in the day when I started drawing Dorks I created Orthodox Man. I had no idea what the word meant but just thought it sounded cool. Later when a teacher explained it to me I still don't think I really understood it but his origin story was that he was a priest and he was outside doing stuff and a big fireball hit him. Thus giving him powers. In the one picture you can see Orthodox Man fighting Attitude who is not sporting his signature "horn" and for some reason he's wearing a cape. And they're in the mountains. My friend at the time put his character in the background who was also a type of silly hero who's power was a stretching neck. So there he is trying to save a guy from falling but at the same time there's a bunch of rocks about to crush him. We were real genius' back then huh.

I don't know why Orthodox Man is sporting a "Have A Nice Day" chest emblem nor a smiley face with an arrow thru it on his arm. I think I was just throwing stuff together just for the sake of it. His adventures were short lived and he never really stayed in the Dorks universe. He won't be missed and nobody will care and quite frankly, neither will I. :)


Update:
As I was doing this post I was sketching Orthodox Man. I guess sometimes you just feel a bit nostalgic.

Before Instant Press. Before Idiot Press, there was...

...Rene Comics! I know. Real original. You should see the credits inside. I listed each chore and put my name under each one. Story: Rene, Pencils: Rene, Letters: Rene and so on and on. I must've restarted Dorks so many times over but this is one of the few that I never really reproduce or show. Not that I'm ashamed of it but it's hard to get good scans of it cause of the pencil work. I could only find a copy of issue 1 and the quality is terrible. If I can find the original version I'll scan it and post it for people to see. It was a 12 page story and pretty much was the same thing as the first issue from Idiot Press. Maybe one day I'll post the seldom seen third try of the series. Yes, there was a third attempt. Same cover, same story etc.

Mist of the Caped Wonder #2...sorta

I was preparing the next issue of MOCW but something wasn't working out on some of the pages. For some reason my settings changed on me out of the blue and everything I converted got all pixelated and crappy. *Holds for jokes* I'll just be posting the pages that successfully made it and explain a bit until I can get the rest of the pages sorted out properly.

In this installment the Idiots went on their search for the remaining Dorks members. In their hunt they were ambushed by the Mr Men and Little Miss group. Oh Noes!

Mist of the Caped Wonder Issue #1

Mist of the Caped Wonder was an odd idea for a book. What made it even more odd was that I did this all in my sketchbook. I had penciled two twelve page issues and part of the third issue before getting bored. It was kind of a daily journal of comic panels that I would do at my job at the time. I had a choice of either arriving three minutes late or one hour early everyday and after getting written up for the three minutes I decided to just do the one hour. In that hour I would draw this comic. The idea was that it was post-Dorks. The gang has disbanded and the members have moved on with their lives. The Caped Wonder was the focus now and I made shure to throw in everything and the kitchen sink (kitchen sink not pictured) into this story. None of it was intended to make sense and to this day it still doesn't. One interesting thing though, I've been rewriting the Dorks story and there is an element in the MOCW that does take a big part in the main story. I can't wait to reboot that series once and for all. For now, here's the first issue of Mist of the Caped Wonder.