Revisiting Kieron Gillen's comics writing masterclass
Or why I took the same comics class twice
Editor’s Note: It’s Wednesday, so that means it’s New Comic Book Day and another edition of Amazing Journey!
The Amazing Journey column will touch on a comics-related topic, such as writing the first issue of a series, what it’s like to run a comic book store, working with artists, and how writing comics is different from writing prose.
Amazing Journey back issues
True believers unite (#1) | My comics origin story (#2) | Comic event series (#3) | The comics of Kickstarter (#4) | Single issues or trades? (#5) | From prose to comics (#6) | Adapting a celebrated fantasy series into a comic (#7) | Charting a career in comics (#8) | Comic book spoilers (#9)
I subscribe to Kieron Gillen’s1 newsletter, and he recently included an item about an upcoming comics writing masterclass he was teaching for Guardian. I took his two-hour class last year, but thought that given the reasonable price and the passage of time, it was worth taking again.
The class was yesterday and while I had internalized some of the lessons from the first time around, I had forgotten a great deal more. Including the fact that the prior class was two years ago.
One thing that stuck with me from the first time was Gillen’s script-writing process. As he said, a lot of people when they write a comic for the first time start at page 1, panel 1, and go from there, panel-by-panel, page-by-page. Which is what I did when I first tried writing a short comic three years ago.
But his process is different. In his words, he tries to keep the script as fluid as possible for as long as possible. That means blocking out scenes with a couple of words, inserting a bit of dialogue, and then iterating through again, adding more detail and dialogue. Then, finally, when that’s all done, he goes back and does the panel-by-panel descriptions and full dialogue. Doing it this way avoids the unnecessary work of detailing full pages that might not make the final cut once you’ve reached the end.
This is somewhat of a departure from my novel-writing process, where I write toward the five main story beats of each section of the novel, but don’t necessarily plot out anything in between until I get to that chapter. Part of the fun for me in writing novels is discovering the plot along the way. So it has been a unique challenge to work in the way that Gillen does.
But at the same time, there is a limited number of pages to work with in a comic. Whereas I can add a couple of unexpected chapters into a novel and have flexibility on the overall length, most comic issues are 20-22 pages. Adding extra scenes to an issue not only can bog down the pacing (another thing Gillen stressed in the class), but each extra page increases the cost of your comic, in terms of printing and art.
Overall, I got a lot out of the class (again) and think it will be really helpful as I finish my first script. Unfortunately, a class replay is not available for purchase, but if you’re interested in Gillen’s writing advice, he’s assembled a writing master post on his Tumblr, as well as a great column about first issues (which I’ll revisit in a future edition of Amazing Journey).
That brings me to the Question of the Week and our June giveaway! The giveaway will be going on all month long. To enter, simply leave a comment with your answer to any of the Questions of the Week in June.
Have you ever taken a class from a creator (or other well-known professional) and if so, what was it?
This month, I’m offering two prizes, both from indie comics creator Curtis Clow. First, for U.S. residents only, you can win a copy of Clow’s Beastlands Volume 1.
Second, if you’re outside of the U.S., you can win a digital copy of issue #1 of Slightly Exaggerated (please indicate in your answer if you are ex-U.S.).
What I’m reading this week
It’s a new month and that means we have a full slate of comics this week! Let’s take a look!
Immortal X-Men #12: We lead off with Gillen’s current flagship X title, Immortal X-Men, which has been spotlighting one member of Krakoa’s Quiet Council each month. Today we’ve reached Colossus, and if you’ve been reading the X-Books for the past two years, this promises to be an issue where everything comes to a head.
Daredevil #12: With only three issues left (including today’s), there is a lot of ground to cover, but I’m confident that Chip Zdarsky and Marco Checchetto will stick the landing. After that, it’s only a year wait until their first Daredevil omnibus is released!
Loki #1: A new mini-series that sees the newly reformed God of Stories travel across the Ten Realms to collect powerful weapons from his past before they can be used to bring about Ragnarok! With season 2 of the eponymous show coming later this year, I am also hoping we will get an MCU variant featuring the show at some point (pretty please?).
X-Men #23 & Invincible Iron Man #7: I’m enjoying Gerry Duggan’s run on IIM and how it’s intertwining with X-Men. This week, we see the debut of the Stark Sentinels in X-Men with Tony in “build-a-new-suit-of-armor-maybe-in-a-cave” mode over in his own book. Also, as an intellectual property lawyer by day, I appreciated these panels from a recent IIM issue, and remain on standby if Marvel ever wishes to incorporate more IP stories into its books.
What are you picking up this week?
If you are unfamiliar with Gillen, he is known for his smash indie series Wicked+Divine, recently finished off two other creator-owned titles (DIE and Once & Future), and is currently writing Immortal X-Men, after recently finishing an excellent run on Eternals.
Not usually a horror fan but I just put an order in for Bone Orchard Mythos - Tenement by Lemire. I liked the Ten Thousand Black Feathers so giving this one a shot too. Other than that I finally picked up Strange Academy Year One to read (per your reco). Have a good one.