Behaving badly in Paris

 

Pip image © Michael Chevy Castranova 2016

It occurs to me, as I’m reading Lesley M.M. Blume’s new book, “Everybody Behaves Badly,” about how Ernest Hemingway came to write “The Sun Also Rises” — which I’ve read at least a half-dozen times — that in the mid-1920s Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, JohnDos Passos and others would have been in Paris. That is, around pretty much the same time when the Scarlet Sparrow lives there.

So my thought is, as Tyler, Pip and friends, as about to return to Paris, maybe they’ll drop in at la Closerie des Lilas or le Dingo and spend some time with these famous expats.

She will, after all, need all the allies she can get. Remember, as this storyline moves forward from chapter 381 onward, this will be her second time through Paris in 1926. The first time saw the already-in-place occupation of western Europe by les Rongeurs. But now, after Tyler altered history — in hopes of stopping the giant rats — she’s actually made things worse. This time, the rats are in even more control, and have even larger rats with them — all due to Tyler injecting two of them with the genetic serum and giving them the idea to perfect the formula.

So, yeah, she is going to need help. Take a look right here.

Just in time for dinner

Text and image © Michael Chevy Castranova 2016

 So if you’ve read chapter375 of “Slipped,” you might be wondering what’s happening in that last panel.

The first three panels tell how the Chancellor has succeeded in sending his giant and remarkably mad rat soldiers off to terrorize western Europe — from Paris to Tzanicor, he vows — while holding the Scarlet Sparrow in his grip, and now having captured Pip the dog, too.

And his next move is to make a meal of them both.

But then — this is an adventure series, after all — something unexpected happens: Tyler appears to have a sudden out-of-body experience. (Yes, they did consider such phenomenon a very real possibility in 1926.)

What actually is going on will be explained in next week’s chapter, when a surprise villain returns … with an extremely dangerous offer.

More dangerous than Tyler getting her head bitten off? Take look next week.

S’il vous plait.

Tyler in Finland

 

Image and text © Michael Chevy Castranova 2015

I admit I’m still undecided about the Scarlet Sparrow’s hair style. I like the idea of it — the reference in this week’s chapter to Louise Brooks, star of “Pandora’s Box” and author of “Lulu in Hollywood.”

But it is tough to draw. It always, as first, looks as if Tyler is wearing some kind of helmet. So I add more. Then I erase and redraw. Then I erase some more.

But I think she likes it. Hard to tell.

In the early chapters of “Slipped” I integrated real people — Picasso was a love interest for Tyler during the 1910 Paris flood (a real event), for example. And I’d intended to incorporate Brooks going forward, but it turned out she wouldn’t have been in Paris in 1926. At least, I don’t think so.

Meanwhile, Tyler, Cartier Tour and Pip are about to meet a few new characters and make some frighteningly rapid progress on their mission in Finland.

Please keep reading.

Characters development

Cartier Tour, Mendacity Wilson, Tyler Wilson images and characters © Michael Chevy Castranova 2015

One of the cool things about Chris Schweizer’s very cool 2011 “Sketchbooks,” which I picked up at the Cartoons Columbus Crossroads earlier this month, is it’s a true sketchbook.

As he notes in the introduction, lots of so-called sketchbooks in fact show finished art. His book intentionally shows works in progress. You can see how he arrived at the ideas, the characters’ looks, that he ultimately used.

Very cool.

Meanwhile, in chapter 353 of “Slipped,” the wildebeest Delacroix somehow convinces Cartier Tour, the chrono-bounty hunter, to accompany Tyler Wilson and Pip on their part of the elaborate and, frankly, dangerous mission with which he’s tasked them.

Part Star Wars, part Seven Samurai.

Take a look, please. A new adventure is about to begin for the reluctant Scarlet Sparrow.

Labor Day special

© Michael Chevy Castranova 2015

The limits of the scanner I use retrains how big the paper I draw on can be and therefore how detailed my drawings can be. But for the holiday, here’s one good image of new character — villain or hero still to be determined — Cartier Tour, on those Paris rooftops in chapter 348 of “Slipped.”
I think I like her. How long she sticks around depends on how gets along with the Scarlet Sparrow. See what you think with this link to “Slipped.”
Last post I mentioned the “Phantom Lady” collection of comic books from the 1940s. The stories are wacky — often all the other characters recognize her on sight, but some have no idea who she is. She wears no mask, but no one, not even her dopey boyfriend, ever realizes she is Sandra Knight, daughter of a famous senator — who is rendered very differently in each story in which he appears.
And the stories make absolutely no sense.
But it doesn’t matter, as the drawings and poses of the characters — mostly by Matt Baker and especially in volume two — are everything in this series.
I’m also enamored these days with Michael Avon Oeming’s “Powers” art. Cartoon-y people doing very serious things. It reminds me a little of the later Corto Maltese stories.

Catch up with Slipped: The adventure comic strip

Take a look at the latest chapter in Slipped, my online-only 1930s-style adventure comic strip, by following the link below.
The comic strip/graphic novel — part Terry and the Pirates, part Corto Maltese and a little bit Star Crash — has been running for more than seven years, and if you’re just tuning in, here’s what’s happening:
After many daring adventures in time and even to the moon, Tyler Wilson, aka the Scarlet Sparrow, has returned to Paris in 1926 to confront her younger sister, Mendacity, who has assumed the Scarlet Sparrow guise as a cat burglar. After a brief rooftop struggle, which Tyler wins, Mendacity says she’s up to something far more complex than simple thefts.
So here is your chance to catch up with their battles with each other, the forces of fascism and even the devil himself ….

And if you want a recap of all seven-plus years, start here.

From chapter 344 of Slipped. Slipped is © Michael Chevy Castranova, 2015