Well, now that I’ve finished the first issue of the 2002 story, it’s time to go back to 1992 and wrap it up. It’s a rather unfortunate way of doing a comic book but given the burnout I was facing in October of last year, it was really my only choice if I wanted to keep producing this book. In the end, the break from the 1992 story and the excitement of writing the 2002 arc revitalized me. I ended up rewriting everything in the 1992 arc, condensing it from 80 pages all the way down to 60. The rest of the story is fast and furious with no breaks in the action until it’s all over. Part of my problem with the original draft is that I wanted to set up too much right off the bat. Half the comic was centered around characters sitting around, talking to one another about how things were playing out. It was boring. You don’t need to know everything about the characters right off the bat and in my attempt to make Variables unlike most other superhero books, I wrote out all the action. I didn’t want the bulk of the comic to read like two guys in tights punching one another until one miraculously falls down. It was a foolish move. No matter what I do with Variables, it will never be that kind of book. On the other hand, comic books need action. Not all the time and it doesn’t have to span entire issues of content, but it needs to be there. Hell, any story needs action, whether it involves people fighting or just a “call to action” for a character to get up and do something.

Anyway, before I end up writing a thesis on the subject, the rest of the 1992 arc was rewritten and is much better for it. I only tweaked the rest of issue two because the final ten pages didn’t need a ton of work. The final Blake pages are interesting and from the moment I first wrote it, the way the issue concludes with Isabel and Candice is fantastic.

Now to the art preview. As you can see here, Blake looks, uh, different. It’s been over six months since I drew Blake  and my art style has shifted considerably. I briefly thought about reeling back my style changes to keep a story flow but I don’t think I could keep it up for ten more pages. So, I decided it’s better to just draw as well as I could, which is how I’ve always approached Variables. If there’s a shift in art style mid-story, so be it.

Want to brush up on the 1992 story arc? Then click here to jump back to the issue in progress.

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