Changes, part 1

Hi. Yeah, I know ... it's been a while. You look good. Me? Well...

...I've been through some changes.

Before I start, let me just say these changes aren't life changing changes, they're just ... changes. Since I was last here I've qualified from the Open University with a First Class Honours (yeah baby, a First; check me out!), I've begun the journey to becoming a teacher, several of my heroes have died, I've written my next book...

...And I've started writing for tabletop games.



Baron von Fancyhat

One particular studio I'm working for is Goblin King Games, creators of the beautiful Moonstone. A fantasy skirmish game, Moonstone has recently been Kickstarted, and has completely changed my opinion on 3D sculpting. Previously I felt 3D sculpting produced very bland, characterless miniatures, but now, having seen Tom Lishman, Dave Kidd and Raul Tavares' bold and charismatic work for Moonstone, I'm a convert. The rulebook— written by Tom Greenway and Richi Paskell and featuring lavish illustrations by Micah Epstein— will be published soon. Said rulebook not only promises to be a thing of beauty, but will also contain fiction by your truly. If you'd like a wee preview, here's The Ballad of Baron von Fancy Hat. You're welcome.



Shabaroom, one of Moonstone's less lucid denizens.

Oh, and that Myasthenia Gravis I'd been wrestling with since 2002? It's gone into remission. so, yeah, like I said, I've been through some changes. And on reflection? Maybe I was wrong...

...Beating Myasthenia Gravis? That's pretty life changing, not least because I know that if I can beat that, I can beat anything. So look out world ... 'cos you ain't seen nothing yet.

A Gaggle of No-Good Goblins

If you have enjoyed this blog, please consider making a donation to my preferred charity, the Myasthenia Gravis Association. Thank you.

Food for Thought: the UK's "Soft Power" and the small press

Monday 19th’s edition of Andrew Marr’s Start the Week began with the premise that, whilst the UK continues to labour under a harsh economic climate, we are now the world leader in “Soft Power”, a term coined by Harvard scholar Joseph Nye to describe a country’s global influence through politics, diplomacy, business, sport, education … and the arts.

This last measure struck a particular chord with me, having just spent the proceeding weekend at Leeds’ Thought Bubble comic art festival. Now established as one of the country’s leading festivals of sequential art, Thought Bubble encompasses indy film screenings, exhibitions and seminars delivered by some of the leading lights of the industry. And at the festival’s core lays the Thought Bubble convention, which fills two sizable halls at the Royal Armouries. And how it fills them. Everywhere you look there are—amongst artists sketching and stalls selling various toys and comic/TV related memorabilia and merchandise—tables crammed with a dizzying host of comics and graphic novels. But we’re not just talking the big franchises like the Avengers, Batman and 2000AD here, because at Thought Bubble the UK’s indy press was out in force.

For the past few years I’ve been stunned by the increasingly impressive output of the UK’s indy publishers, and this year was no different. From ongoing series and one-shots to graphic novels and anthologies, the array of titles is astonishing. Equally astonishing is the quality. Gone are the days of A5 photocopied black and white comics stapled together in someone’s bedroom. As Thought Bubble demonstrated, modern indy publications can boast full-colour covers and glossy pages, hardback covers, pull-out and pop-up sections, and DVD ROMS. And it’s not just the production values that are so impressive. The artwork, concepts and writing bless us with imaginative stories and beautiful artwork. Leading indy publishers like Accent UK, Murky Depths and Time Bomb Comics offer fabulous titles like Who on Earth Was Thaddeus Mist?, Dead Girls, and Dick Turpin and the Crimson Plague. Add the likes of Brian Talbot’s incredible Grandville series and Paul Scott’s consistently inventive Omnivistascope—any one of which boasts more innovation than most of Marvel and DC’s uninspiring cross-overs and movie tie-ins that drown the shelves at your local comic shop—and the UK’s Soft Power ascendency is very much in evidence.

But Andrew Marr’s radio program made me wonder if this invention and craft were enough in the face of these austere times. As rewarding as it is to read these beautiful examples of small-press publishing, do they offer the same fiscal rewards to their creators? And how badly had the UK’s economic downturn effected our indy scene?

“Well […] to even think about starting a business you need optimism in gargantuan proportions, and a bottomless wallet,” says Terry Martin of The House of Murky Depths, award-winning publishers of such titles as I Dream of Ants, Going to the Moon and Probably Maybe Perhaps. “You hear tales of small press publishers mortgaging their houses, and I could have saved up and been able to buy a brand new BMW with what The House of Murky Depths has cost me, but we struggle on with our dreams. Marketing is the downfall of the small press—we just don’t have the budgets—and social media isn’t all it’s cracked up to be for the majority who try to use it for promotional purposes, unless you just hit lucky. High quality limited editions still seem the best bet for small press, but then production costs are higher and margins lower. The downturn has certainly a lot to answer for but I think it’s always going to be difficult for small press publishers. We still struggle on with paper too, when online content is beating us down. Bottom line? If there hadn’t been a recession there’d be a lot more comics around but we probably wouldn’t be that much better off.”

So it could be easy to dismiss the effects of the downturn as—for the small press at least—as something of a culling process, an economic filter that shields conventions like Thought Bubble from a greater glut of indy titles. Could it even be said to aid the average publisher by the simple process of eliminating some of the competition? This would certainly seem to be the case with FutureQuake Press, an indy publisher which continues to enjoy success with titles such as Something Wicked, FutureQuake and 2000AD fanzines Dogbreath and Zarjaz.

“This year is a little down on previous,” says editor Dave Evans, “so the economic situation may well be a factor there, but before this year sales have been on a steady growth since we first started publishing back in 2005. Granted, the actual turnover is low, but until this year we experienced growth, and for all I know this year may well just show the start of the sales reaching a rough balancing point.”

Dave West, editor and co-founder of Accent UK also offers this insight: “The downturn has effected sales in stores more than anything else. Retailers seem to buy fewer of our titles these days and I think this is due to the huge number of Watchmen Prequels, 52s and AvX or whatever Marvel are coming up with at the moment. At Cons we are getting more and more customers, new and repeat, and sales are usually better than the same Con the previous year.”

So, whilst it appears that conventions like Thought Bubble are vital to indy sales, Terry Martin maintains it isn’t quite that clear cut. “It’s very difficult for those of us who have tables at conventions to fully appreciate their success or otherwise,” he states, “particularly if you’re the only bod manning the tables. We tend to gauge success purely by our sales, and one dealer can do well while the next dealer has a bummer.”

As real as the effects on the recession on the indy scene are, therefore, they do not appear to be insurmountable. Yes, economic reality dictates that retailers like Travelling Man and Forbidden Planet must dedicate the majority of the shelf space to big selling titles featuring the likes of Batman and the Avengers, but this does not spell the end for the indy scene. Conventions like Thought Bubble, Hi-Ex and Kapow! give the small press a priceless shop window to display their wares and attract new readers … and the small press seizes this opportunity with both hands. As I saw at Thought Bubble, indy publishers are stepping up their game and transforming the small press beyond all recognition, and that can only be good for not only the consumer, but the creators also. Anybody who harbours any ambition of breaking into the comics industry at the grass roots level now knows the bar is set very high indeed, with a level of professionalism undreamt of by the likes of Eastman and Laird. And that can only be a good thing for publishers and punters alike. And whilst the small press, by definition, may make only the tiniest contribution to the UK’s Soft Power, it is a microcosm of the greater imagination and passion that has propelled our country to the top of the pile. And as a writer and contributor to the indy scene, that makes me feel very proud.

If you have enjoyed this blog, please consider making a donation to my preferred charity, the Myasthenia Gravis Association. Thank you.

Their Law: A review of the "Judge Minty" fan film ... and why it's better than "Dredd"

My name is Paul L Mathews, and I’m a Judge Dredd fan … and a fan film has finally done justice to the character I love.

I’ve been reading 2000AD for the best part of three decades now, and, naturally, Judge Dredd is amongst my favourite characters in the comic. Imagine, therefore, my excitement when I saw this trailer for something called the Judge Minty Fan Film:-

I mean, c’mon, that things got it all right? Judges, Lawmasters and the coolest rendition of Mega-city One you’re ever going to see on screen, fact. Hell, there’s even a reference to Rowdy Yates Block, for Grud’s sake. Surely, I thought, this is in with a shot of being the best rendition of the Dredd universe committed to screen. And now, some four months on, having finally seen Judge Minty, I have my answer. My suspicions are confirmed, and judgement is served…

… But first a short interlude. Between seeing the trailer for Judge Minty and the film proper, I saw its big-screen cousin Dredd … and I hated it.

(Fair warning: if you like Dredd, or don't want to read any SPOILERS, you might want to look away now ‘cos it’s about to get ugly).

I had initial misgivings when I first saw the poster, publicity shots and trailer, and the film only confirmed my initial fear: Dredd is not a Judge Dredd film. Yes, it features a man called Dredd, who acts like Dredd, and who dispenses justice like Dredd … but, well, it just isn’t the Judge Dredd I grew up with.

For a start, that sure as hell doesn’t look like him. From the bulky body-armour to the supersized helmet, the Judges’ uniforms in Dredd are just as generic as the movie’s vision of Mega-City One. Looking for the soaring towers, sked-ways and flying traffic captured by the likes of Ezquera, Bolland and McMahon. Tough. Dredd’s vision of Mega-City One looks like nothing more than Johannesburg with a few CGI blocks imposed on it. Have a fondness for the the ‘Drokks’ and ‘Stomms’ used by the characters in the source material? Unlucky, ‘cos they’ve been dropped for liberal doses of ‘hard-hitting’ expletives like ‘fuck’ and ‘shit’. And as for the violence… Well, I know a lot of people—and people whose opinion I genuinely respect—say Dredd perfectly encapsulates the mood and feel of the titular hero and his unique city, but I disagree. Dredd was nothing more than an average dystopian sci-fi with Joe and Cassandra crammed into it, and which tried to distract its audience from its lack of authenticity—and, indeed, excitement—with oodles of bloodshed and needless gore more suited to the pages of Action comic than 2000AD. How can this possible be mistaken for the genuine article? Where is John Wagner’s wry humour or sly commentary on contemporary culture? Or McMahon and Ezquerra’s visual creativity and flare? Maybe they left it on the cutting room floor, ‘cos I couldn’t see it. It was also completely devoid of any tension. Not once did I get the impression Joe or Cassandra were in any kind of trouble, and that had a lot to do with a piss-poor choice of villain. I mean, c’mon, Ma-ma? With all the classic villains Joe’s faced, they seriously couldn’t do better than a drug dealer with a few bent coppers on her payroll? It’s barely credible. Hell, even the derided Stallone effort made a good fist of the Angel Gang, for Jovis’ sake!

Suffice to say, I left the cinema with a bitter taste in my mouth, and that taste—not to mention some trepidation—was still there when I sat down this week to watch Judge Minty. Could this, a short film with a tiny budget, really capture the unique essence of the comic? Could it do justice not only to Joe and his city, but also to the anticipation created by its trailer?

Yes, it could. And then some.

Let me be blunt about this; Judge Minty rocks, and it doesn’t just rock as a Judge Dredd film; it's a prime example of short, punchy and economical film-making. In a week I also saw the overlong and cumbersome Skyfall—which took a full 143 minutes to leave me feeling bored and unsatisfied—Judge Minty took only 25 to intrigue, amaze and exhilarate me. Yes, the plot is simplistic and, yes, it covers ground—and themes—already familiar to any Judge Dredd reader, but it’s no worse for it. And what it gives away in this department it more than makes up for in all others, from direction and camera to props and wardrobe. How a film with this budget has achieved such results is astonishing, and speaks volumes for the obvious devotion to the subject matter felt by all those involved. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the costume and prop designs of Daniel Carey-George, with the Lawmasters and Judges’ outfits deserving particular praise. Not only is the design of Judges’ uniform true to the source material, but it allows the actors to move about with speed and fluidity. Better still, they just look right.

Furthermore, Judge Minty’s excellence revolves around one thing, without which all this eye-candy could easily have been crusty make-up on a Sump-ugly tart; and that one thing is actor Edmund Dehn.

Dehn—cast in the titular role of the aging Judge Minty—perfectly captures a man struggling against the physicality of his advancing years, and hitherto liberal notions of appeasement and understanding. Contrast this with Dredd, where Karl Urban conveys little more than a man struggling against a flimsy script and an overly large helmet. And whilst Dredd lacks any hint of tension or emotional gravitas (yes, Joe gets shot blah blah blah, but, as with all heroes in a franchise, we know he’s going to survive, right? And Anderson—no matter how hard both the script and actress may try—can’t take up the slack either. Who really didn’t anticipate she’d survive and earn her full shield?) I spent the entirety of Judge Minty, however, expecting the hero to die, and the resulting tension as he fights his age, his environment and his delightfully visualised adversaries is augmented by a blended performance from Dehn which mixes determination, fear and a suprising melancholia which I felt gave Minty a subtle vulnerability. I truly haven’t felt that level of anxiety for a central character in any of this year’s blockbusters, and that includes the vaunted The Dark Knight Rises.

In conclusion, Judge Minty is the quintessential Judge Dredd film. It perfectly encapsulates the mood and feel of Wagner and Ezquerra’s unique creation, and the equally unique Mega-City One and its surrounding Cursed Earth. It is also a wonderful, bite-sized piece of sci-fi drama which will exhilarate, engross and surprise, and I feel both grateful for the cast and crew for creating it, but also thankful I’m one of the few who—to date—has seen it. I only hope more 2000AD fans are allowed the opportunity to see it, and they too enjoy it as much as I did.

If you have enjoyed this blog, please consider making a donation to my preferred charity, the Myasthenia Gravis Association. Thank you.

I Remember Now

Um. Hi.

I'm sorry if this all sounds a little vague, but I don't quite remember what this entry is supposed to be about. I know it had something to do with release of issue #18 of the award winning Murky Depths magazine. I'm also pretty sure I wanted to mention the fact you can get this latest issue and any other of your choice for only £10.00 (that's right. £10.00. Bargain!)

But there must have been another reason. I mean, let's face it, every other entry on this blog exists so I can blow my own trumpet. Why would this post be any different? Maybe issue #18's contents list contains some clues. Let's see...

Oh! What's this? It contains a 4 page steampunk comic entitled I Don't Remember, as written by myself and drawn by artist Dylan Williams? Ahhh! Now I remember. That's what I wanted to say:-

Issue #18 of Murky Depths. I'm in it. Buy one. And another issue of your choice for only £10.00. It's a bargain. And don't you forget it.


If you have enjoyed this blog, please consider making a donation to my preferred charity, the Myasthenia Gravis Association. Thank you.

The Magical Mystery Tour

Hello and welcome aboard this whistle-stop tour of what's new(ish) in the Paul L Mathews' House of (Recycled) Ideas.

Looking to our right we can see that, since my last entry, the latest edition of the magnificent Murky Depths magazine includes my comic strip Desire, as drawn by the jazzy James McLean. Previous visitors will know that Murky Depths won last year's British Fantasy Society's award for Best Magazine/Periodical, and issue #17 shows exactly why. Edited by Terry Martin, Murky Depths is a mixture of comics and illustrated prose featuring zombies, demons, bullfighting and black flatworms amongst a whole load of other weird shit. All that and the stunning Dead Girls comic strip by Richard Calder and Leonardo M Giron. Well worth £6.99, don't you think?

To our left, we can see Polish sci-fi mag Nowa Fantastyka have released a Polish translation of my Victorian fantasy Weak. The tale of a fatally ill sorcerer and his wife as they attempt to evade a relentless killer, Weak has yet to be published in English. So, unless you speak Polska, you'll have to take my word that it's really really good...and read the English version in my forthcoming anthology Ten Cobbler's Tales.

Looking ahead, that purveyor and publisher of fine anthologies, Accent UK, is due to release both their Predators and Zombies 2 collections in short order. One of these tomes includes my WWII comic Clean, as drawn by the prodigious Pedro Lopez, and the other my one-pager iZombie, as drawn by the devilish David Golding.

A little further down the road... Can you see there, just toward the end of 2011? The beautiful Mirror Dance e-zine is scheduled to publish my historical fantasy Little Sister (Romans, alchemists and and golems! Oh my!) and issue #18 of Murky Depths will include my steampunk comic I Don't Remember. If that isn't enough for your inner maschocist, you may also wish to check out the forthcoming Mythos Dossiers RPG supplement. Released by Cubicle 7, it's a weird and wonderful collection of source material and background information for their excellent The Laundry Role Playing Game (itself based on the works of Charles Stross and HP Lovecraft). It also includes a bucket load of material by me! That's right folks, I've been let loose in a Lovecraftian sandbox. Oh, the tentacled lack of humanity!

And that concludes tonight's tour. I hope you've enjoyed your short stay with us, and we look forward to you travelling with the Paul L Mathews House of (Recycled) Ideas again in the near future. I know you had a lot of other blogs to choose from this evening, and I thank you for choosing mine.



If you have enjoyed this blog, please consider making a donation to my preferred charity, the Myasthenia Gravis Association. Thank you.

A Taste of Things to Come

Recently my partner-in-crime David Miles Golding and I collaborated on a one-off publication for San Diego Comic Con. Entitled Tales of Dynamic Adventure, it showcases not only Dave's incredible artwork with a fabulous collection of sketches, but also two short comics drawn by Dave and written by yours truly.

By chance Ain't It Cool News got hold of a copy. Their subsequent review, as seen on their world-famous website, went a lot like this:-

"Those of you lucky enough to pick up this little ditty at SDCC this year know what I mean when I say that the artist & writer featured in this book are definitely going places. This is more of a sketchbook with two short stories
than anything, but it is a perfect sample of the awesome talent of the gentlemen who put this book together.

Artist David Golding, who I’ve seen mature into an amazing artist in Dare Comics’ THE HUNTER and STARMAKER LEVIATHAN books shows here with his “Pardus: The Last of the Leopard Men” strip that he can do pulp just as well as he can do the cosmic. Pardus is an amazing jungle man character and this short story is overflowing with teeth-gnashing action and art that pops off the page and slaps you in the face. “Legendary Gods” written by Paul Mathews and drawn by Golding is a Kirby-ian tale of a cosmic conqueror in search of a world to overthrow. This book is old school comic booking and those who love those old NEW GODS and other Kirby greats will love all of the winks and nods to this type of story. There’s even a very cool TWILIGHT ZONE-like twist at the end which caused me to chuckle.

The rest of the book serves as a sampler of sorts with many character designs and pin-ups by Golding. Some we see the evolution of both the character and the artist’s style through the years. I fully believe that in the coming years, we’re going to be seeing a lot of David Golding’s stuff. The pages in this book look simply outstanding. "

If you'd like your very own copy of the limited edition Tales of Dynamic Adventure then please don't hesitate to e-mail me for details. Each and every one will include a unique sketch of any character of your choosing by Dave. You won't be disappointed. Just ask Ain't It Cool News...



If you have enjoyed this blog, please consider making a donation to my preferred charity, the Myasthenia Gravis Association. Thank you.

Flesh for Fantasy: A mini interview with Jonathan Green

A freelance writer, Jonathan Green has written for the likes of Games Workshop, Abaddon Books, and the Fighting Fantasy series of adventure gamebooks. His other credits include not only non-fiction books but stories and gamebooks featuring popular characters such as Doctor Who and Sonic the Hedgehog.

PLM: Having written novels and short stories for the likes of Games Workshop and Abaddon as well as Fighting Fantasy books for Wizard Books, how does the challenge of writing an adventure gamebook differ from writing a conventional piece of prose?

JG: In some ways, writing an adventure gamebook is easier than writing long form fiction. Characterization is more straightforward, because other than the protagonist (who is the reader anyway) characters appear only very briefly. Also, psychologically you’re only ever writing a few hundred words at a time, per section, rather than several thousand words for one chapter.
The other thing I like about gamebooks (because I’m quite an indecisive individual) is that you can include every option of what could happen and what you would like to appear within a book.
However, plotting gamebooks is another challenge altogether. Then there’s balancing the game play and the whole muddling up the sections to accommodate clues, puzzle answers and illustrations evenly spaced throughout the finished book.

PLM: One assumes from the number of titles you’ve written for Abaddon and Wizard that you that you have a strong relationship with them. How important is it for writers to develop such a relationship their clients?

JG: I would like to think I have good relationships with all the various publishers I’ve worked for. If you want to make writing your living, then I think it’s very important to develop strong relationships with those who are likely to employ you. Partly because if people know you’re easy to work with and can take criticism well, and meet deadlines (although that last one isn’t always my strongest area), quite simply they’re going to be more likely to come back to you again in the future.
An example of this is that having written my Doctor Who Decide Your Destiny gamebook The Horror of Howling Hill, the editor I had worked with on that title approached me to write a Clone Wars DYD which became Crisis on Coruscant.

PLM: I understand you were a full-time teacher when you first started writing. How long did you wait before leaving your previous profession and becoming a full-time writer? Was it a difficult decision?

JG: Technically, when I started writing I was a full-time student. My first book was published when I was still at university. When I left uni I had a go at being a freelance writer for two years, doing supply teaching to pay the rent. However, I did end up teaching full-time for twelve years. I’ve been a full-time for two years now.
There was a fair bit of soul-searching involved in the decision to give up because I now have a young family. However, as a friend of mine said ‘You’ll never lie on your death-bed wishing you hadn’t given it a go’ and although things haven’t always been easy, I’ve never regretted the decision.

PLM: How challenging was it to balance the rigours of such a demanding job with the time required to get your writing career off the ground?

JG: Very hard. I would be in work for just after seven, leave about eleven hours later, then put the children to bed, have something to eat, do what school work I had to do for the next day and only then could I sit down to write – when I was feeling completely knackered.
And then the weekend came along and that was family time and everything else that’s involved in keeping house and home together.
While I was teaching I was writing one or two books a year. Now it’s about five plus various other projects.

PLM: And, finally, what advise can you offer nascent writers in a similar situation?

JG: If you want to be a writer you need to write – everyday. There’s no point talking about wanting to be a writer unless you’re prepared to put the work in. And you should read everything you can, and not just the sort of thing you want to write either. And develop a very thick skin, ready for all the times people reject your stuff. Oh, and good luck!


If you have enjoyed this blog, please consider making a donation to my preferred charity, the Myasthenia Gravis Association. Thank you.