Rumors of War
Genre:
Historical Period, Horror
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He died on the battlefield, giving his life for God and Country. Johnny died a hero, but he didn't stay dead. He's been taken from his dying place to another world, another place, where a war has raged since the beginning of time. Resurrected for a fight that he can barely understand, much less hope to survive. Here, even death is no end to a soldier's fight, the dead and dying returned to fight again and again. The Enemy is monstrous and the Ally is worse. Living aircraft carriers launch living fighter planes. The Enemy uses twisted pregnant mothers to birth soldiers who join the fight in minutes, born to die. And that is barely the beginning. There is nothing left to fight for but victory itself, but a stalemate has lasted for hundreds of years, until The Enemy plucked a man with unique talents from our world, a man who might tip the balance of power in the endless war. If that happens, the war on Earth will tilt towards the forces of evil in reflection of the greater war. But the Ally believes that Johnny can lead their forces to the heart of The Enemy and kill the man who could end the war. If Johnny can do that, they will give him what he wants more than anything else; his ticket home. Now Johnny must fight unimaginable enemies to preserve a war that is more than a nightmare. He might find his ticket home, but it may just cost him more than he can possibly imagine.
sorry about the lack of comments or updates. since the contest in November, I have been working on multiple projects. Art for a story in a future volume of Popgun, another story that should have a home shortly and a fairly big web-comic project I can't elaborate on yet, but will later on in the summer (I can say that it is for a decent sized publisher that is beginning the process of making a name for themselves working in the online medium).
as you can tell from reading this I haven't checked in for a bit, once again I can usually be found at:
http://fishbones-illustrations.blogspot.com/
http://fishboneportfolio.blogspot.com/
http://john-bivens.livejournal.com/
Also, Justin has been keeping busy and I'm sure you haven't heard the last of him here, so keep an eye out (I'll remind him to check in).
Excellent work, really interesting storyline and nice artwork. Snowblower -$500,Unpaid day off -$125,Bottle of Sean's Irish Cream Whiskey -$10, Discovering this comic by accident...priceless!
Brutal that it is now March and no word from anyone...
Great Comic. Make more, it will prosper, I'm sure. Zuda itself may grow to the point of making more of these ongoing sooner than we may think. More/New sponsors are a good sign!
RKB-metsuke-coffeehousscomics: we did all we could, and though we didn't win, I'm at least happy that I got this work in front of all of you Zuda-ites. Not sure where it will resurface yet... I'm hoping we get invited back for that rematch thing that they seem to do once a year, though I think Justin may be looking into other options. if anything comes of this, we'll keep you all updated.
Thanks for all the votes and support that was shown to us, and no matter what, I don't think you've seen the last of us.
YOU SHOULD HAVE WON! Why didn't you win?!?! is there any justice in this online world?! I think we need to get together as an online community and have a prop 8 style protest! (tongue in cheek) but seriously, I'm sad. I wanted to see how this would play out and now...damn. Please finish this comic...please!
Oh well...great googley moogleys...let us know when and where this will resurface. Good luck fellas.
Sorry you didn't win, but I hope the comic lives on somewhere else, and if it does let us know, I'll follow it.
Very good, I have'nt read a good horror comic in a long time!
hi!!!
very nice
you got my vote!!
yeah i'm gonna post a bulletin on MySpace. This deserves the 1st Place spot easily. I agree about the choice of baby fetus for the avatar. Honestly thought it was a Cherub at first, that combined with the title made me believe this was like an old school political propaganda war comic...well atleast that was the vibe i got. Luckily I clicked on the bad boy.
Darn. I would prefer to read a sci/fi/horror/action with great art and story than some murder mystery. Wow, I've been out of comics for a while and this is a shock. Do people really want to read a murder mystery? Why don't those people just watch tv or something. I like comics because they keep the imagination going and have the opportunity to show us some cool f...ing art that you wouldn't see in some murder mystery. I must be out of touch with comics more than I thought. Best of luck to this team. I'm pulling for you guys...
I think the problem might be the poor choice of a pink little baby thing as your comic's front page avatar. The only reason I clicked on it was because I was bored, but then I ended up voting for your comic.
It's true! I blame all of you for our third place position! ;)
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Part of the problem, I think, is that RoW is not an especially mainstream type of comic - it's got zombiefied doctors, nekkid valkries, fetus injections and no dialogue or captions for six pages. It's a good read, I think, but not one that lends itself to people dropping by casually and voting.
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Or it sucks.
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But John and I appreciate the support! We're glad people like our beastie. I hope that if we don't win here, we can continue somewhere. There's a lot of story to tell and I'll be annoyed if I don't get to.
This one gets my vote! The pacing was right on! The art was very good. I would have like to see the two main characters in the foreground on the last panel, but other that well done and good luck!
Nice work.
This has got everything and deserves the #1 spot. Come on, Zuda guys, get voting for this.
It seems like the majority of Zuda regulars (who post) have enough power in their voting bloc to get a comic up to third, and then it sits there. Damn.
This should be in first place! I hope you keep it going!
mike speaks!
OMG. Is that...? No... it couldn't be... :oO
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My vote landed here also. :o) I was really looking forward to seeing some whacked out creations.
I voted for this. That's all I'm sayin' for now.
It's my fault Steve. My vote is more cursed than anything that was ever sold on Friday the 13th: the series. :(
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I did break the curse once with Dual, so maybe it can happen again... :)
oh man! i feel for you guys... When i was in third a few months ago i couldn't get out of third either! I hop you aren't hitting your head against a wall like I was!
This is by far the best comic this month. The art is solid. The story is engaging. you have my vote. Hope you guys make a comeback.
Gross and cool. Dig it!
This one got my vote. It came down to you guys and Hijos de P (sorry Saulone for repeating you, but I had this same dilemma). Hijos de P has a great ART, but story didn't catch my attention that much. Here I like the story and it also has something that I am including in my second submission which is called "impact sentences", like "Welcome to the WAR". Good job guys. The best of luck!
This one got my vote. It came down to you guys and Hijos de P, but I keep coming back to this one and rereading it. That says a lot about a comic. Good job fellas, and I'm pulling for you.
Hey John. I sent you a message to your gmail.
Thanks to everyone up to this point for their comments, it's great reading what everyone has to say about our comic.
I also wanna say thanks to a bunch of people who took the initiative, and started promoting Rumors of War.
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Richard Pace: kick @$$ artist, writer & teacher (http://burningmonster.blogspot.com/)
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Josh Hechinger: A fellow COMIC BOOK TATTOO creator and the writer behind the comic THE GRAVE DOUG FRESHLEY (http://josh-hechinger.blogspot.com/)
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Brandon Seifert: The writer behind the sweet new comic WITCH DOCTOR (http://www.witchdoctorcomic.com/)
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Rich Johnston: The guy who writes that sweet column over at CBR: Lying in the Gutters (http://comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=18852)
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Paul: at Zuda Follower for the great review (http://zudafollower.blogspot.com/2008/11/rumors-of-war.html)
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thanks to all of you, it means a bunch that you got behind this project so strongly :)
P.S. These are the people I knew of or was told about without the use of search-engines. As it is, I need to get back to arting to meet deadlines, but if you pimped us out on the web somewhere, post a link... I would love to see it and get the opportunity to tell you thanks.
Sure as hell got my vote.
Nice work, boys.
Awesome stuff! Thoroughly enjoyed it. Love the art, love the concept.
Awesome sauce by the spoonful. Every page was more wild and whacked out than the last. Great work.
This comic hit me in just the right way. When we get to that last page, the build up to it, the horror and mystery, it completely captured for me the awe and majesty of what it must be like to see something of that magnitude, simultaneously beautiful and terrifying. I truly hope we get to see more of this world. You got my vote.
great artwork, and i would like to see what will happen next.
This was another hard month for me to pick 1, but the art and the story here is amazing to me, Justin and John you have my vote for rumors of war. Good luck on climbing the ranks!!!
DAMN I AM LOVING THE ARTWORK CANT WAIT FOR MORE.
i wish i could vote for you again... or just saved my vote from last month :)
Fascinating and disturbing stuff, can't wait to see where it goes. You've got my vote.
I really enjoy the art style, and the lack of dialog in most part allows me to enjoy that
very nice keep it up
Well John, I'll give you my vote this time, however, the Sirens need to be hotter, perhaps less "man-faced"
keep it up bro-mans! really looking forward to seeing you all snag the top.
zpoehlein-talkinboutcomics-pbdeberry- (and to the many others since I last commented)- Thank You, for your comments.
DShide- I appreciate the crit, should Justin and I move our way up the list we will just have to do our best to win you over down the road.
RKB- You put a hell of a lot of thought into your comments and I appreciate it... nice enough they even made me blush a couple of times.
troylbowen- thanks for the comments and crit. I will take what I can from them both and do my best to improve.
back to work with me... will talk more later :)
Glad to see you back Justin, and great art John!!! I liked the synopsis plenty of mystery left to the story, but you get what's going on with the battle in some other world/place affecting how things are going in the real/regular world. Also I liked the word-lite silent screens, I think they really added to the read, and grabbed me as a reader, thanks for that. I think the drab colors for the most part really fit the story, and I could read the letter's with no problem, another great job.
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SCREEN 1 I liked this screen, but it threw me off a little bit. We get a mid-level shot of his body (great art), then we move out over the next two panels to see more of the battlefield destruction, then we move back in. I ways kind of surprised you didn't do the long shot panel first then move in close on the character??? Loved the eye looking up, very well done, and a great way to lead into the next screen. Justin you did some great writing to get john to picture this in his head and then bring it out on the page.
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SCREEN 2 I liked the red-robin angel's flying down to save him I thought the layout of this screen was done very well, and the overall pace of the stories in these 8 screens were a great fit in the Zuda format. i esp. liked the look of johnny in panel 2.
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SCREEN 3 Amazing art on this page from the pile of bodies to his falling off the top and rolling to the ground. Great little mini-cliff hanger to get me to click to the next screen. Again, I love the pace it's a real page turner/ clicker.
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SCREEN 4 Best screen in the comic, and the creepiest on Zuda. Now this is a horror comic, it looks like something eli roth meets stanley kubrick would have came up with, I don't know what you think about those two guy's, but that's high praise from me. A baby fetus I.V. drip into his chest =cringe worthy = a nice scary read. Every panel here was great. I esp. liked the perspective in the last two. Amazing horror-vibe here.
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SCREEN 5 I liked the way you brought him back to life, and the blue zombie doctors reveal for the last panel. You don't need words here, the art tells you everything you need to know. As I'm sure your aware I hate text boxes, because I think they lead to passive reads, and too often a writer walks all over a artist work, instead of getting out of the way when a whole lot of info-text isn't needed. You did a great job of letting the artist rock his pages so thanks to both of you for that.
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SCREEN 6 we get dialogue, you didn't have to put in the oh God thing, but I didn't mind it. Did you ever think about making this totally a silent story with no words just sound effects, I think I would really like more of those silent on Zuda. I am so glad you didn't go caption crazy for this comic.
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I thought the layout was great, the art is still great, and again you gave a reason to click to the next screen.
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SCREEN 7 I liked the intro here and the look of the vet talking to Johnny. I also liked the little mystery set-up of the different language and the biker stero-type looking fella being surprised he could speak English. It got me asking the question: why is he surprised???, which got me to wanting to read more of the story.
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Really great pace, your story fit the 8 screen Zuda format perfect. I also enjoyed the set-up to the big cliff-hanger ending.
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SCREEN 8 welcome to the war, i loved you ended on the big bad monsters, great ending, and it really made me want to read more.
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The pace of this story is what got me, it really fit on Zuda so well, and of course i really enjoyed the story and art, I thought the colors fit very well. 5/5 stars and a fav.
This is pretty cool. I certainly like the look. I am anxious to see more of it
Strange, creative, good. Interesting concept. Gets my vote because... Art first, story next,... exactly how I choose something to critique if I'm going to voice my opinion. This one is going to take some creative visuals to please me, which it does already, so I think the story will take off if given the chance, for those people that like all the word balloons and dialogue. I like where this one is going and would like to see more done by this team. The story is there...the art is there...awesome stuff.
wow! this one gets my vote... very cool!
wow, interesting art work. By interesting I mean fun to look at. Definitely a lot of detail in each panel. I enjoyed it. I'm not sure what exactly is going on here, but I'm sure it will all be explained. Great job.