Happy Blog Day Everyone!
What's that? It's not Wednesday?
...
Well I decided to be spontaneous!
What? I've only done it today so the Valentines comic I drew would go out on Valentines day?
...
Scandalous lies and slander! You can perish the thought that this was why I've pushed the schedule ahead, but since it is Valentines...have a comic!
The Comic Tales of Brennan and Riz
This is the first appearance of Luna outside of my #vss365 on twitter (#vss365 stands for very short stories and there is fantastic authors working within that space). I haven't fully worked out I'd she'll join in the written stories yet. Either way she'll be around here, having some fun.
Folklore Redux Pt 4
Ahoy mateys! Let's start this edition off with a piratey tale!
The Rat Who Served on the Flying Dutchman- When I learned that my publisher was planing a pirate themed special, I quickly got to thinking of how I could get Brennan and Riz in on the act. There's plenty of tales about the sea, whether it'll be the denizens that lurk in it, or a ship that sails on it...Yes, I quickly honed in on the angle I wanted.
I used it as an excuse to take the tiniest peek at Riz’s history, something which I do plan to do again, hopefully in the near future.
The oldest written mention of the Flying Dutchman is from the late 18th Century and it gives the impression that the ship was well known amongst Dutch sailors of the time. The ship was seen as a portent, often of bad weather in the early forms of the tale. Later stories expanded the burgeoning myth by adding parts about the crew, giving rise to the idea that those aboard were being punished. One feature that came into play with my own story was that it was said that if they made contact with another boat, they'd pass along messages to those on land, which of course, the inciting incident.
Like the Christmas special before it, the pirate special was given the rebranded-treatment and became Harvey Duckman Presents Volume 11 (get your copy here!)
The Kuchisake-onna in Teesside- I've had Brennan and Riz visit other countries but what if I brought the folklore to them? This is where this story comes in. The Kuchisake-onna is a figure from Japanese urban legends, a malevolent spirit wearing a face cloth to hide the lower part of her face. The legend plays out thusly: the spirit will appear before an unfortunate victim, or two. She'll ask them a simple question.
"Am I pretty?" Or words to that effect. If the person answers no, she stabs them with a pair of scissors. You answer yes, then she takes her face mask off to show you her lovely scar that runs from cheek to cheek, giving her a ghoulish visage. She'd ask again:
"Am I pretty?" Regardless of the answer here you're not long for this world as she will kill you with those scissors.
Getting her into the story wasn't difficult given that I took advantage of the fact that this was written with A Boy and A Rat in the rear view mirror. Yes, for the first time (the American Trilogy doesn't really count, not like this), continuity became a thing as Gallows appeared to spread his fun. Only problem was that A Boy and A Rat didn't make its release date (I'll talk about that another time), thus this became Gallows first published appearance.
Want to see how Brennan and Riz dealt with this scary tourist? Then you'll find the story in Harvey Duckman Presents Volume 8 (get your copy here!)
That'll do for this week, join me next week as we deal with the last two stories that were released as part of the Harvey Duckman Presents series.
Till then,
Keep on writing!
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