Sway With Me

Melodie Gore, a short story

2009-06-02T20:47:00.000-07:00

This is a picture I took of my friend Melodie back in April at her birthday party. Not only is she stunning in the picture, but I also found it quite inspiring. So I wrote a little story. I'm not much of a prose writer, but I thought the easiest way to share this with people was to write it as prose. If you don't want to read a bunch of text you should stop reading now. If you like a little fiction, please read on.

Melodie

By Jonathan Tsuei

My home is silent, void of anything that might be a distraction. No televisions, no big electrical appliances that make a lot of noise, no telephones, not even an alarm clock. I can hear the slightest noise in this place and still she broke in undetected, until I caught her scent. You ever meet that person whose smell is so strong to you that as soon as she steps into the same room, you know she’s there, despite not having laid eyes on her? I could smell her and she was on the other side of my bedroom door. I still found her scent intoxicating, despite her intent.

I have worked alongside many Congregation Assassins and of them all, she was the only one that intimidated me. We only had one mission together. A mission that, I theorize, was meant to be a suicide mission. We survived, but just barely. That was the last of my involvement with the Congregation. No matter what year you decide to hide in, the Congregation always gets what it wants. The only way to kill a great assassin is to send the perfect assassin. They want me and they sent Melodie to do the job.

My door is locked. There is no silent way to enter. I grab my sidearm from the nightstand and crouch down next to my dresser. I look down the barrel of my weapon and keep it aimed at the door. If she steps through she’ll get one bullet ripping through her throat and another through the forehead, shattering the backside of her skull as it exits. We assassins are thrilled by the hunt, even if we are the hunted. It’s not the survival instinct; it’s the feeling of dominance over your prey. Outsmarting the target, predicting their next move and ultimately holding their fate in your hands, that’s what gets us off.

The door is broken wide open. I fire off two shots. Melodie is parallel to the ground, coming in feet first and my bullets fly too high. She fucking dropkicked the door down! I duck back behind the dresser just in time for her bullets to miss their mark. Bullets shred through the dresser. As wood splinters into the air, cutting through gunpowder smoke, I realize I’m still alive. I feel a brief pause in the rapid gunfire. I know she’s already dropped one weapon and is reaching for another that has ammunition. This is my opportunity.

I peek out left of my dresser, aiming my weapon at where I believe her to be. All I see is an empty space. Where did she go? I feel a jolt across the side of my face as the sole of Melodie’s boot comes crashing into me. Being low to the ground I maintain my balance and grab her by the ankle, attempting to break it with a swift twist. She turns with my motion and brings her knee crashing down on my skull. I feel dizzy and my vision begins to tunnel. Don’t blackout! I manage to stand and just as I do, I see the bottom of her palm come straight for my nose. I manage to deflect the shot only to be hit by two more strikes on either side of my head. Where’s my gun? Where’s hers? I should be dead by now. Why is she stalling?

I step backwards until I can feel the wall behind me. I hear a high pitched hum and I can’t tell if it’s my ears ringing or something else. My vision is still handicapped, but Melodie is walking toward me. There’s something in her hand. It’s silver. Shit, it’s her blade. This is going to be a lot more painful than I thought, messier too. She raises the blade to my throat and applies pressure. The tendrils of blood coming from my skull touch the blood that now begins to fall from my neck.

“Hello again,” Melodie says to me in a soft, raspy voice.

Her scent fills my senses again and I manage to smile. “Melodie,” I manage as I fight off unconsciousness.

“You know this isn’t personal, I have orders,” she says in a voice much more commanding than before.

“I know. Listen, let’s not prolong this, but I have to ask you one thing before you kill me.”

“Ask.”

“When the Congregation found us unconscious after our mission, you told them that it was me who carried you two miles to safety and signaled for the extraction. You carried me, not the other way around.”

My vision maintains well enough for me to see the discomfort in Melodie’s face. I never did understand why she lied about the mission to our superiors. I slowly raise my hand and place it on her gloved hand and say, “Look…” I stop midsentence as I feel the blade press harder against my throat.

“Take your hand from mine,” she says with a surprisingly gentle tone. I lift my hand away from hers slowly. The reflex of my mind runs through all the possible ways to kill her from this position. When the personification of your every desire comes to kill you, what do you do? Which instinct do you submit to?

Melodie clears her throat, “My mission, like yours, was to infiltrate and destroy the Saturn Compound. We did that. My secondary objective was to make sure you didn’t leave the Compound alive. I wasn’t given a reason and I didn’t ask for one.”

“Why didn’t you follow your objective?” I ask her.

Melodie’s eyes change ever so subtly and I know she’s done talking. She kicks down on the side of my knee with her heel and nearly snaps my leg in half. I fall to the ground and do my damndest not to show her how much pain I’m in. I feel the pressure of her knee on my spine as she grabs a fistful of my hair and pulls my head back. I feel warmth on my cheek as she leans in and places hers against mine.

“Goodbye,” she says, once again in that gentle tone of voice. She releases her grasp on my hair and squeezes a spot on my shoulder. My body goes completely numb and I don’t feel the blade pierce the back of my neck, exiting through my throat. I try one last time to breathe in so that I can smell her again, but nothing fills my lungs. I try to turn my head to look back at her one last time. I can’t move. I can’t feel. My vision goes black. I say in my mind, hoping she can hear me, "Goodbye."

B&W Part II

2009-05-13T20:56:00.000-07:00

I was having a conversation with a coworker this morning while we still had some downtime. It was a continuation of a subject we came across a day or two ago when he asked me what else I had been working on in regards to my writing. My long time collaborator and I want to do a story in the future that plays with the themes of purpose and life in general.

The question posed in the story is something I believe everyone can relate to. When we are born, is it already determined for us who we will become, or is it our choices and experiences that shape us? There was a point in my life where I was an advid church goer and firm believer in the Christian faith. My faith brought me out to the middle of nowhere Minnesota because I felt as though God was telling me to move there. I am no longer a devout Christian, but I still wonder about who I am meant to be and if the choices I am making for myself right now are the "right" choices.

I went through a good portion of my late teens and early twenties not sure about what I wanted to do in life. I've tried my hand at a lot of things; DJ, bartender, insurance salesman, retail monkey, etc. I came to realize that I have a lot of stories to tell and that I'm pretty good at it. So I decided to become a writer and have been pursuing that full time for the last three years or so. I moved here to Southern California to be closer to the entertainment industry, but have yet to get my foot in the entertainment industry's door. I have however had two published works come out since I've been out here, one of which I wrote while here and the other while I was still in San Francisco, with more to come next year.

I haven't been writing all that much as of late due to a combination of fatigue, laziness and a feeling of going through the motions. I don't believe in writing only when inspiration strikes, I think that's a cop out. I suppose that's why I'm flexing my muscles again on this here blog and trying to work off some of that writer's rust. I need to get back into the daily regimen I once had and hopefully start producing quality stories again.

I don't know the answer to the question of whether or not we are born into who we are or become who we are. I like to believe that we have free will. I like to believe that if I try hard enough to accomplish something, I will. At the very least I hope to gain enough knoweldge to succeed the next time around. But talk of success is nice, succeeding is much more gratifying.

"At a certain point in our lives, we lose control of what's happening to us, and our lives become controlled by fates. That's the world's greatest lie. Whoever you are, or whatever it is that you do, when you really want something, all the universe conspires in helping you achieve it."

-The Alchemist, Paolo Coelho

B&W

2009-05-12T15:39:00.000-07:00

There are times that I wish life situations were as simple as black and white, they rarely are. However, it makes me appreciate the simple pleasures that dip in and out of your life. A smile exchanged between two strangers with no promises of anything more than a mutual greeting. Holding hands with someone who makes you feel comfortable. A cup of good coffee from a cafe where everyone greets you by name. Megatron. Waking up to a text message from someone who just wanted to say hello because they were thinking about you. Inspiration. A good inside joke that never seems to get old. A new favorite song.

I also realize it's the trying times that make you who you are in life. We all go through our share of growing pains, be it in our professional, romantic, or creative lives. I suppose you can say I'm going through my share of growing pains right now. Things are hardly too difficult for me to handle, my own selfishness just wishes things were a bit easier. Easy is relative though, isn't it? Easy is what we make of a situation. I've never been one to shy away from a challenge and no where inside of me do I intend to start. Black. White. Easy. Difficult. Life. I won't be seduced by ease. I won't be defeated by adversity.

Eric Canete's Blog?

2009-04-14T10:00:00.000-07:00

There have been a lot of questions about Eric Canete and his blog as of late. Some people have emailed me personally, others are talking about it on various message boards, some of you have gone as far as signing up for twitter just to ask me what the hell is going on with Eric's blog.

As most of you have noticed his blog is no longer active and I'll tell you why. Eric took a trip to Mumbai several weeks ago and spontaneously combusted while going through customs, taking out several metal detectors, two innocent bystanders and a drug sniffing dog. Luckily his luggage containing all his artwork was not damaged, I am not sure how that is possible. Eric was bringing all his artwork to India to start a school for young Indian artists to copy his style so he could in turn "draw" fifteen books a month. I suppose the forces that be were not happy with his decision to deceive the public and well...poof!

All the artwork was mailed back to his address and I now have all his art because as soon as I heard he had spontaneously combusted I collected everything I could knowing that it would be worth a fortune someday. I will one day sell all his art on the international black market and make a killing.

(Those of you who are convinced you spoke to him during the Emerald City Con were speaking to the Canete-bot I built two years ago. No need to compliment me on the amazing work I did there, I already know how amazing that thing is. In fact, the Canete-bot has been out and about for roughly two years now. Any face to face meeting with Eric could have been a conversation with the Canete-bot instead. You figure it out, I will not pull up the logs for you, I'm sorry.)

Eric you are truly one of my best friends and I will miss you greatly. Thank you for leaving me a key to your place so that I could plunder it and send my future children to college, you were not only a saint in life, but in spontaneous combustment as well. I love you friend and I look forward to the day where we meet again. We never got the opportunity to release our creator owned projects for all to see, perhaps we will get that chance when we jump ahead to another life.

Shit Storm Galore

2009-04-12T21:16:00.000-07:00

I've been busy as of late and god damn am I tired. Still in the process of getting my things situated in the apartment, behind on writing and found out yesterday that my position at my nine to five was eliminated. Am I out of a job? Yes and no. I will be offered a new position at a lower pay rate, but the company will pay me the difference at the beginning of each quarter for the rest of the fiscal year.

So I have a decision to make. I can either take the new position and new lower pay (which I don't know yet how much lower it'll be) or take six weeks of severence pay and try to find a new job in the shitty economy. Fun times. I have no idea what I'm going to do yet, I have some time before I have to give my employer my decision. On top of all that, I found out there was a death in the family. Funeral will be this coming Saturday I believe.

I've always been a firm believer of things happening for a reason. I just wish I had the wisdom to make reason of that reason. I always seem to land on my feet, so perhaps I should trust in that. However, it can be pretty difficult to put your trust in a cliche. Just to clarify the death in the family isn't someone I am particularly close to, but it's just a full on shit storm right now.

Not everything in my life is a mess right now, there are some good things going on. The stress level is very high though.

I took this picture one day as a joke of sorts. Heh, not so funny now, is it Tsuei?

Secret Identities

2009-03-31T08:00:00.000-07:00

So I mentioned quite some time ago about my involvement with an anthology by the name of "Secret Identities: The Asian American Superhero Anthology". Well, it's finally coming out, April 15th to be exact. What better way to spend your tax refund dollars, huh? So here's my story, entitled "9066". Yeah, that's my whole story, so you technically don't have to buy a damn thing cause there it is. However, if you'd like to support the book you can easily find the anthology on amazon.com or your local bookstore come April.

The art was drawn by my friend Jerry Ma and the voice over was by Parry Shen, both of whom are involved with the anthology in a more editorial fashion than I am. All I did was write a little story. The real props go out to guys like Jerry, Parry and all the other good people who worked behind the scenes of the book.

I tip my hat to you good sirs. Thank you for letting me be a part of the project.

Dinner with friends

2009-03-30T19:42:00.000-07:00

So the other night we all went out to eat at Lawry's in Beverly Hills. The night was a combination birthday celebration for all us spring babies, and I guess within our circle of friends there are quite a few. My birthday is coming up on Friday, but it was nice to celebrate it early with some of those who have been the most supportive of me here in Southern California.

The party was originally intended to be big with twelve people but it dwindled down to five. Good company is good company no matter how small that company is. Unfortunately I was feeling pretty sick that night and had to excuse myself early. I'm still recovering now, but I did get to eat some good prime rib.

Good eating if you ask me. Thank you to Eric for taking care of the tab you classy man you. Thank you to Sam, Axel and Jonard for the good conversation and laughs. Happy birthday to all you spring babies. I leave you with pictures.

Me heading out.

Two Chinese guys.

Axel brings the seasoned salt, Jonard brings the sexy.

A moment to consider the menu, or life.

I'm out of witty things to say.

I don't remember what story Jonard was telling, but Eric thought it was hilarious.

I don't know why Sam is pretending to concentrate, he just copied my order.

A couple more photos found on my flickr.

People you love

2009-03-29T10:00:00.000-07:00

Living on your own is great. No one to worry about but myself. I can play whatever ridiculous music I want. I can sing, I can dance, I can walk around in my underwear. The downside for me is it can be lonely at times. To help remedy that I decided to print out a lot of my photos through shutterfly.com and hang them up. I received them in the mail, now to go buy some frames (which is pretty low on the priority list of things to buy when your apartment is empty).

The photos are all taken by me, of people that are important to me. This is the only color picture I printed out, the rest are blank and white. This is a photo of my nephew Sebastian taken at my cousin's house earlier this year. Sebastian is an awesome kid. I hope I get to see him on a more regular basis sometime in the future, but right now we live far away from each other. I don't think I've ever met a kid who is as courteous as he is. He doesn't touch anything unless he has permission first and that's just not something kids do.

Miss ya kid. Be good to mom, dad and grandma.

Neglect (what's new?)

2009-03-27T14:07:00.000-07:00

I'm pretty good at neglecting this blog. I do it all the time, year in and year out. I fail at keeping an updated blog. So in keeping with my tradition of infinite attempts at updating my blog, I will indeed try again. What's different this time around? Who knows, I don't.

I've decided to include more posts about my photography, since that is my new passion. Writing hasn't taken a back seat. The two sit comfortably side by side, but photography is strapped into a child safety seat cause it's still a baby. Look at me, I'm clever.

Those who follow me on flickr know that I try to do one self portrait a day, which I also fail at. Whatever, don't judge me! I am pretty proud of how far along I've progressed as a photographer over the course of the last year. Unfortunately, I don't have anyone to photograph with, which means everything I know is based off reading on the internet along with trial and error. That's how I approach almost everything I get into. It takes me longer, but I can say it's all based on my efforts and no one else's.

So, coupled with my rants about Geekdom, ramblings about writing, I add talk about my photography. I'm not going to talk about my photography in the order in which it occured, that's too regimented for me. Just ask Canete, I don't like solid planning, that simply makes too much sense.

So today I start with a photo I took last night.

I just got my wireless flash trigger in the mail and decided to give it a run through. I couldn't get the flash to sync up with my shutter and was getting a ton of photos that were simply too dark to see a damn thing. I figured out the problem earlier today, but I'll spare you the technical details.

This image was more of a fortunate accident than a planned shot. Went into Lightroom to do some post-processing and here's the finished product. Yes, I cropped out my ugly grey fleece pants, so between you and me, I'm not wearing ugly pants, I might not even be wearing any pants, who can tell?

On a side note to all my friends who live close by, if you ever need pictures taken just give me a shout. I'm more than happy to take pictures of someone other than myself. As long as you don't mind me blogging about it and sticking it on flickr for all the internets to see. Ok, now back to cleaning up my apartment.

Premier(e) by Eric Canete

2009-01-18T20:19:00.001-08:00

Here we go!

So for those of you who don't visit Eric Canete's blog (what's the matter with you?) I thought I'd post a little about the new book Premier(e).

This book kicks off our new venture Lightbox, which is a collective of artists and writers who develop intellectual properties on both the visual and narrative aspect of properties. Right now we're a small group consisting of Eric Canete, Axel Ortiz, Jojo Aguilar, Jonard Soriano, Geoff Ong and me. At the moment we're hard at work developing our own IP's with the intention of self publishing them, but you probably won't see the fruits of that until 2010. We sent out these books showcasing Eric's work to potential clients in hopes of getting work for our humble collective and now we're making a small number available to the public. For a full run down on the story you can check Eric's blog, more specifically this post.

Anyone interested please feel free to email me. My email is in my profile so just click away and you'll find me. Please keep in mind because we have so few available, and not to mention the production value is so high, the price for this portfolio is higher than your traditional artist sketchbook, if you can even qualify it as such.

In other news, Eric and I will be at the New York Comic Con in February. No table setup, although we'll be dropping in from time to time with Dustin Nguyen and Sean Murphy. So if you see us around, please don't hesitate to say hello.

Here we are. Lightbox. You'll be seeing more from us soon.

Reboot

2008-12-21T23:46:00.000-08:00

Back row (left to right): Me, Geoff Ong, Axel Ortiz
Front row (left to right): Eric Canete, Jonard Soriano, Jojo Aguilar

It's popular but I still hate it #1

2008-12-17T11:25:00.000-08:00

So I was chatting with Eric the other day about the new X-Men Origins: Wolverine trailer that is now all over the net and I commented on how high the production levels were. The movie looks like it has a lot of potential to be a slick looking movie, but the amount of characters that show up in the trailer is...ambitious.

I think the problem with the X-Men movies as they progressed, and I suppose you can say the same is true for the comics, is the plethora of characters that show up. It feels as though the writers get so caught up in tipping their hats to the fanboys and fangirls that they let the story slip. And then there's Gambit. I don't like Gambit.

I'll probably ruffle some feathers for saying this, but Gambit really is nothing more than a cheap ripoff of all the other lovable rogues we of geekdom really love. He show's up out of nowhere with a nonchalant attitude and chases women that could potentially kill him because he just can't help himself. Oh and he's mysterious. We can't forget the "mystery" that surrounds him. I guess the mutant world didn't have enough mysterious badasses, we needed one more card playing, cigarette smoking, mystery man. But this one likes gumbo and says shit like, 'mon chere'.

I grew up with the Jim Lee era X-Men. Starting with Uncanny to the adjectiveless version and Gambit was all over those pages. As a kid, I ate his antics up, but even as a kid I could see that the same writing tricks used on Wolverine were used on him. I'll be the first to admit I don't read X-Men anymore. So my comments on Gambit are focused more on the core of the character as opposed to current continuity. So with that said, isn't Gambit just a cheap mutant version of Han Solo?

C'mon, look at these two guys. Who's going to kick whose ass?

Okay, so lets do a comparison between the two and see if there are any real differences.

Handsome rogue? Check.
Kicks ass with a nonchalant attitude? Check.
Falls in love with a woman he probably shouldn't date? Check.
Runs with the underdogs against a more powerful world order? Check.
Keeps his personal history from his friends, thus increasing his mysterious profile? Check.
Wears once fashionable outerwear over a questionable tight shirt as his preferred wardrobe? Check.

Yeah, I think the only real difference between the two is one flies a fast plane and the other one just rides in a fast plane. I guess I can see why Gambit is so popular with X-Men fans, but I still hate him.

December Rain

2008-12-15T20:30:00.001-08:00

Image by Eric Canete
Words by Jonathan Tsuei

The December rains were coming down harder than I could remember. Each drop felt like an icicle piercing my skin and left me numb. Charlie was as faithful as ever, tolerating the rain with me. He hated the rain. I knew she would be here tonight, but I had no idea she would look as beautiful as she did. It wasn’t her silk gown that trailed behind her in a magnificent train. It wasn’t how her hair was pulled back perfectly so the world could see her face. It was the gleam in her eye. She was in love; in love with someone other than me.

I called out her name tentatively and she paused, she recognized my voice. I managed a smile, but I could not disguise my longing. Charlie did his best to feign pride for us both.

“What are you doing here?” she asked me.

“I had to see you,” I managed as the rain thundered down around us.

“Didn’t have time to find an umbrella?” she said with a smile that still sent a tingling sensation across my body.

“I didn’t have time for that. Listen-“

“No,” she said as she shook her head. “I know why you’re here, but you can’t do this to me now. We went through all of this after we broke up. You would come rushing back into my life and I would drop everything to see if it could work again, to see if anything changed, but it was always the same thing with us. I love you, I have loved you for a very long time and I kept coming back to you because I thought you were the one for me. I know now that as much as I love you, I’m no longer in love with you. I have to move on, so do you.” She paused, “I’m happy now.”

That tingling sensation her smile made me feel gave way to the numbness of the cold rain. I remember telling her that all that was important to me was her happiness. I just never thought that someone else would be able to make her happier than I could. Here I was staring at the love of my life with a broken heart and reality shattered the broken pieces into nothing more than dust. I could almost see the dust get swept away in the water pouring down from one stair to the next.

“Is there nothing I can say or do?” I asked. I could feel the tears start to come on, but I forced them back.

The look on her face softened and for a split second I could see that gleam in her eye redirect it’s light on me. “There is so much you can do and say to make me come back to you,” she said almost too quietly for me to hear. “I’ve decided to move on and I’m sorry to say this to you, but I won’t let you pull me back in.”

That final look she gave me as she turned to leave was a mix of sadness and hope. However, it wasn’t a hope for us. It was a hope that she was making the right decision. It was a hope that her happiness would last this time. I wanted to run toward her and hold her, but I stood my ground and just watched her leave. Charlie let out a bark. She kept walking.

What Comic Book News Sites Do Wrong

2008-12-11T20:33:00.000-08:00

Hey look, something dragged me out of my hole and brought me to my blog. It's a new day people and something good is going to happen (until I fall back down my hole again).

So things have been interesting as of late. Still holding down the day job and writing in my free time. I'm tired as all hell, but it's a good thing. At least that's what I tell myself before I go to sleep at night, haha. I kid.

So I was perusing the web the other day and came across an article on Blog@Newsarama.com by one of the new contributors to that blog Russ Burlingame. The article is entitled "What Comics Do Wrong" and focuses mainly on the Public Enemy comic but it does mention several other licensed comics as selling only "indie" numbers and being a disservice to the comic book community. As you can imagine I was a little annoyed by the comments, especially since they felt as though they were rooted in ignorance.

If you read his article, my response is in the comment section somewhere. I'll go ahead and repost my response here.

I can’t speak for any of the other books you mentioned but I can speak for Comic Book Tattoo. You claim that these “licensed” properties sell more like “indie” books and do more harm to the medium than help it.

If that was the case with CBT it wouldn’t have sold out at SDCC, the softcover would not have gone back to print, it would not have been on the featured tables in Barnes & Noble and it would not currently be the #3 best selling Image book and in the top 100 selling graphic novels on Amazon.com.

You comments also show that you didn’t bother to read CBT, instead you just lumped it in a category that you label as “just a piece of merchandising”.

The efforts from the almost 100 different contributors of CBT, as well as the editor Rantz Hoseley (who also contributed to the content), was nothing short of inspired. You really have no right to include CBT as an example of “What Comics Do Wrong” when you apparently have no experience with the material.

Maybe you read CBT from cover to cover and hated everything in it. If so, you’re entitled to feel that way, but you should do your research before you make claims that the book only sold a few thousand copies and “cheapens” the community.

Those involved with CBT are a very talented group of people and they all worked extremely hard to make sure the book would not only be able to stand on it’s own as a collection of good comics, but that it represented comics positively to those readers who may not be comic book fans.

It's frustrating when someone feels a need to include one of your works to try and prove a weak point to begin with. On top of that, that person has no real experience with the material and just spouts off with no facts to back up his argument. I see that sort of thing quite a bit in comic book "journalism" and it drives me nuts. People really should do a little research before they start typing out their thoughts.

SDCC '08 Recap

2008-07-28T20:24:00.000-07:00

So I got back from San Diego Comic-Con yesterday and I'm exhausted, but what a great show it was for me this year. This is the first show for me where I had published work out (Comic Book Tattoo) and got to experience the con from a "professional's" perspective.

I didn't really walk the con much to go shopping, god knows I have enough pop culture related merchandise lying around already. I bought a few comics and got some stuff for free. You can't hate on free swag, especially when its good free swag (thanks for the sketchbooks Becky, Jonboy and David, you guys rock!).

The release of Comic Book Tattoo was pretty crazy. The first shipment of softcover and hardcover books could not be located and/or got stuck behind a big overturned truck on the 5 highway. Lucky our great editor Rantz Hoseley was able to get some books to the show by Friday and they sold FAST. Limited editions were going for $150 a pop, those went first. Hardcovers were $50 each and those also sold out. Softcovers were the last to go at $30 a piece. Crazy.

The best part of the show for me was signing with friend/collaborator Eric Canete. Those of you that frequent our blogs know that we have quite a few things in the works, but this was the first time something we did together was published and also our first signing together. A big thank you to Eric for every thing you've done for me, my career and everything else to come. I'm happy to say that work on [JUMP] will resume very soon and you will be seeing it in print some time in the near future.

Aside from hanging out with old friends, I got to meet a lot of new friends as well. Above is myself, Leif (a fellow CBT creator) and the lovely Tori Amos, who had not even a hint of diva attitude. Thank you for your kindness Tori and taking the time out to meet all of us. Also a big shout out to the whole CBT family of creators that I met at the show. Rantz, Nikki, Peov, Kako, Lea, Dean, Jason, and anyone else I may have failed to mention. You guys were great.

One last picture to post. Myself and rockstar artist Alvin Lee outside taking a smoke break. Always good seeing Alvin, he's hands down my favorite artist to come out of the Udon stable and just an all around good guy. Thanks to Tony and Brian for making the trek down to San Diego from San Francisco and taking pictures of the con so that I can post them up and feed my ego. Just what the world needs.

Become Legendary

2008-02-15T19:24:00.000-08:00

"Hey kid, you getting on or not?" the bus driver said to me with a tone of impatience. I looked around myself and found that I was the only passenger left to board the large charter bus. The last of the suitcases were being packed tightly into the luggage bins. Some of the passengers looked out the windows of the bus at me curiously, but most of them were prepping for the long ride, oblivious to my indecision. All I had was $50 in my pocket, a pencil, a journal and a backpack carrying a half-eaten tuna sandwich. I took one last look at the station and wondered how I became so comfortable in such a run down place.

"Well?" the bus driver called out to me.

"Yeah...yeah I'm coming," I replied as I stepped up steep stairs of the bus. The double doors closed behind me with the hiss of hydraulics.

"So where you going kid?"

I smiled at the busdriver and looked out the window as the bus started to pull away from the station. "Forward," I said. "I'm going forward." The bus driver smiled back and tipped his hat to me as he directed the bus onto the open highway.

I wrote that on Sunday, May 7th 2006 and posted it on an old blog of mine. The original post was about my life and the direction it was going in. That was right around the time that I went back into school and made the decision to pursue writing seriously. I was reflecting on all the wasted time and if I could turn things around for myself. Well, almost two years later I'm living in a different city with one of my newest and also closest friends and we have two projects seeing print in the summer.

I got on this topic after watching a Nike commercial. Here's the monologue:

Look me in the eye, its ok if you’re scared. So am I. But we’re scared for different reasons. I’m scared of what I won’t become and you’re scared of what I could become. Look at me. I won’t let myself end where I started. I wont let myself finish where I began. I know what is within me even if you can’t see it yet. Look me in the eyes. I have something more important than courage. I have patience. I will become what I know I am.

I don't have much else to say really. Michael Jordan has already said it for me. I will become what I know I am. The only person who can stop me is myself and I'm done standing in my own way.

Yellow

2008-01-25T20:17:00.000-08:00

Wow, been a really long time since I've posted anything here. Thought I'd try to get back to it, but I've said that before haven't I? So here's an old poem I wrote (that's somewhat unfinished). Poetry is fun, though I wouldn't say I'm any good at writing it.

This poem is the militant side of me, and those that are close to me know I can be pretty damn militant. Anyway, here you go.

Yellow
by Jonathan Tsuei

You say I’m Yellow
Well I say I’m Golden
And you’ve smuggled my culture
It’s stolen

Serpentine dragons line your walls
Our symbols are sold in your malls

But what do you know about me
Besides chopsticks and rice
How about Angel Island
Infested with rats and lice?

How about poetry carved in wood
Asking for a chance to make good

You preach freedom and equality
“It’s available to all,” that’s make believe
And you’re going to have to try harder
To make me believe

Free if you’re occidental
And you know that’s not accidental

I’m proud of the tint in my skin
My eyes are brown and not blue
You say they’re slanted
But I can see more clearly than you

You give me that sideways glance
You’d rather my people were never given a chance

You say I’m Yellow
Well I say I’m Golden
You’ve smuggled my culture
You can consider this pact broken

SDCC: Day One

2007-08-10T21:44:00.000-07:00

So it's been a good while since I've posted anything here. That seems to be the trend more often than not on my blog. I originally started this blog with the intent to record my pursuit of a writing career and even if no one reads this here blog, I should keep posting for myself.

I'll jump back into posting with a recap of San Diego Comic-Con. Leading up to the show was a bit stressful and exciting. Eric suggested to me to put together a sample of my writing and hand that out to as many editors that would give me the time of day. In order to pull that off Eric cranked out five more pages of "Jump" in a very short amount of time while our good friend Mikey helped letter those five new pages, the original three we used for the pitch and the four page Vega story we did.

We hit a snag during the lettering process when we couldn't find the originals for the first three sequential pages from the pitch and the cover. We had to resort to scanning in copies which did lower the clarity a bit, but not so much that they couldn't be used for my purposes. Mikey and I aren't professional letterers by any means, so figuring all that out was interesting to say the least.

We got everything finished by late Tuesday night and I bound everything together on Wednesday morning before I went into work. After work I packed my bags and Thursday morning I drove straight to the convention center.

Day one was rough. The first few people I spoke to told me that they weren't interested in any new writers. One even asked if I knew any artists instead. On top of the discouragement that came from uninterested editors came the problem of name badges. The names were printed pretty small this year and made name badge hunting much more difficult.

I found myself getting really close to people and trying my hardest to be discreet while I looked at their badges to see if the person I was spying on was indeed an editor. I got a few funny looks from people as they caught me in the act, but sometimes you have to risk embarrassment to get what you want. In my case, that would be a writing gig.

The names I did end up making out were not ones that I recognized, so I moved on. After Day One I was tired and a bit angry at myself for not doing better research on the names of editors, not to mention not really having the moxy to go up to more publishers blindly and simply ask for an editor to speak to.

I hoped Day Two would be different.

Chatter of a thousand cowards.

2007-05-31T14:01:00.000-07:00

So it's been nice and long since I've posted anything here and that's because I'm lazy. I'm so lazy I won't even use the brain power to make up the lie that I'm simply too busy now that I'm living in Southern California. No, I'm just lazy.

I was reading some articles online today, many of which had to do with the uproar that happened a week or two ago over the Mary Jane statue. Here's what that fuss is all about.

Sometime last week the attention shifted from the statue to an upcoming cover for Marvel's Heroes For Hire #13.
After reading these comments and opinions I ended up really irritated. Most of the outrage was directed at the artists of these two pieces. The statue being based on an Adam Hughes drawing and the cover by Japanese artist Sana Takeda.

First of all, come on. It's Adam Hughes. Getting upset over Adam Hughes drawing women showing cleavage is like getting mad at 2-Pac for rapping about the hood, or Hulk Hogan for ripping off his tank top. That's what he does.

As far as getting upset at Sana Takeda for her cover, well I could go in depth about the differences in Japanese and American culture, but instead I'll just say that as a freelance artist you're never the one that gets the final say in what goes to print, your art director or editor is. If you want to direct your anger at someone direct it at the people who have the power to publish.

What I really can't stand is the people who have round table discussions (be it virtual or actual) about how horribly offensive, or bad, or whatever something is and make no attempt to add to the industry they're criticizing. Don't like the statue? Go sculpt one that doesn't have cleavage showing. Don't like the cover? Go draw one that doesn't have the sexual undertones and get it published.

I don't like the way Asian men are depicted in popular media, so I wrote a short story with a strong Asian male lead and it's getting published. I don't like how most female leads in comics are over sexualized, so I wrote a story starring a strong female who isn't all pouty lips and enormous breasts and that too will be published.

If you have an opinion, fine, we all have one of those and more often than not, those opinions will differ, but expecting people to change something just because you don't like it isn't a good enough reason. It's easy to sit back and point out the flaws in someone else's creation, it's much harder to put a piece of yourself out there for critical eyes to see.

Settled In

2007-03-18T18:28:00.000-07:00

So I'm in Southern California now, Cerritos to be exact. I've been here for a week now and so far it's been good. The job search is still going, everything from the local retail store to hitting up friends to hook me up in the animation field. We'll see what happens.

This weekend was Wizard World LA and I was helping Eric Canete with his artist alley table. This is the first show where he was selling some of his 90 minute sketches and they sold well along with his new sketchbook Halogen: Halo.

This year's convention experience has been different for me. I usually roam the hall looking for artists to do sketches for me, instead I'm working a table and trying to talk to industry professionals that can give me good insight in how to break in as a writer.

I was able to pick C.B. Cebulski's brain for a few minutes and he gave me some very good advice along with a few names of associate editors that are receptive to new writers pitching to them. As fun as it is to talk to the writers and artists you admire, editors are the people you have to talk to to get work. C.B. was extremely nice and helpful (if you happen to read this C.B. thank you again for your time). He's a class act.

This year is shaping up to be an exciting year.

Packing

2007-03-08T16:57:00.001-08:00

Yep, I'm packing. That is all.

Messing It Up For the Rest of Us

2007-02-28T15:10:00.000-08:00

Well, I was planning on posting a paragraph or two regarding some tips on breaking in given to me by an associate editor at Vertigo, but I was watching the news and came across the Kenneth Eng/AsianWeek scandal. So I thought I'd address that first.

For those of you not familiar with the story, the weekly San Francisco paper AsianWeek published a column entitled "Why I Hate Blacks" written by Kenneth Eng. The article is short and filled with ridiculous generalizations by a ridiculous man. The SFGate has a scan of the original article here.

The article is upsetting and disappointing to me. I can't believe the people at AsianWeek actually printed that piece of fecal hate speech that Mr. Eng tried to pass off as writing. I could really care less about Kenneth Eng. People like him, unfortunately, are a dime a dozen. There will always be people who make sweeping generalizations due to their ignorance. I've come to realize that I can't change these people.

What truly bothers me is that this article saw print in a paper called AsianWeek. Now people are talking about the article as if it is an accurate representation of the views of Asians everywhere.

It's not.

Kenneth Eng doesn't speak for me. He doesn't speak for the majority of Asian Americans. He speaks only for himself and I hope people can see that. There's no doubt in my mind that his article will ferret out others like himself to combat his article, or even come in defense of it, all the while spewing more hate speech. Fine, do what you have to do, but don't connect the the rest of us to Eng just because we share a similar skin color.

To Kenneth Eng, I hope you get what's coming to you. Karma is a bitch my friend, a big, big bitch with a handbag full of bricks.

To AsianWeek, you should have known better than to print this piece. You deserve just as much blame for printing the work as the "writer" did for writing it. You have done a disservice to the Asian community and made all of us look bad. That rests squarely on your shoulders.

NYCC

2007-02-27T10:39:00.000-08:00

So I got back yesterday from New York. It was both a good convention and a fun trip. Sales of Eric and Lauren's sketchbook did pretty well, especially on Sunday. Thanks to everyone who came by the booth.

Aside from the convention we got a chance to go to the Empire State Building, the MET and Ground Zero (which had a group of NYC policemen playing the bagpipes when we arrived). I don't have any pictures to post up just yet, I'll get them from Eric and Brian soon.

Just a few more days and Wondercon is here. Busy times, well, I'm keeping Eric busy that's for sure. He's going to have five pages of our project done by Wondercon so we can show the project to publishers. Wish us luck.

Year of the Pig

2007-02-17T16:31:00.000-08:00

Well, tomorrow is Chinese New Year and my family is having dinner together tonight, as is tradition in most Asian households during this time of year. I suppose celebrating the end of one year and the beginning of another with your family isn't a bad tradition to have.

I've talked a little bit about beginnings and endings on this here blog and I've been surrounded by quite a bit of it in my life. Last year was a very transitional year for me with the decision to take the writing more seriously than I ever have in the past. I did a lot of reconnecting with old friends, grew closer to many new friends and also grew more distant with people that aren't positive influences in my life.

Within my own household, 2006 was a year of milestones. The birth of my nephew, Sebastian, brought on a big change in my sister and brother-in-law's lives. My own decision to move to LA and pursue a writing career obviously brings a lot of change for myself, but in turn it creates a big change for my mother as her youngest child moves away.

We often describe endings to be bittersweet, I suppose you can describe beginnings in the same way at times. I look at this beginning in that way. My friend jokingly said I talk about my last days in San Francisco like I talk about my last days on Earth. I laughed, but I suppose there's some truth to his statement. Perhaps I'm just a self-absorbed drama queen, I like to think I'm just the kind of person who is very proud of the company he keeps and is sad about leaving them. I want to make these last few weeks really count.

My family and friends represent 'home' to me. Leaving the city isn't hard, leaving them is. The city of San Francisco may not necessarily be 'home', but its a city so rich with history and I feel as though I didn't fully take advantage of that in my 27 years here. I suppose leaving adds to its history be leaving behind my own.

I was in the front yard today looking at the Chinese New Year blossoms and thinking about how they are somewhat of a mysterious plant to me. For the majority of the year they sit in the dirt looking like nothing more than lifeless branches filled with thorns and nothing else. As we celebrate the passing of December into January you might begin to see small green buds appear between the thorns and sure enough, when it's time to pass out red envelopes and light firecrackers, they bloom in their reds, whites and pinks.

I know there isn't much mystery to it if you know a thing or two about biology, but Chinese New Year always had a bit of a mystique to me. The 'coincidences' that have led to my eventual move to LA holds a similar mystique. Everything from timing, housing, people and circumstances all seem to be in alignment by someones design. Maybe there's an unknown science behind it all, or maybe this is meant to be.

Whatever the explanation is, whenever the season is right, I know I'll see blossoms on thorny branches, I know my mom will make dumplings and I know I'll hear the crackle of gunpowder bursting from it its red paper casings. Happy Chinese New Year everybody.

LA to SF to NY

2007-02-15T14:56:00.000-08:00

So I spent the weekend in LA to attend the Dink and Draw release party and look for potential employment. The event was very cool, as well as very loud and very drunk. Thanks to Eric for driving my ass around all weekend and putting up with me.

Speaking of Eric, he's posted about his new sketchbook, entitled Halogen: Halo, set to debut at the NYCC. I'll be there with him at his artist alley table pimping his wares. If you happen to be at the show please stop by and say hello.

This sketchbook is going to be pretty sweet. Aside from all the cool color images that Eric's been cranking out lately, some of his character designs for our project will also be included. So you'll not only be getting some Eric Canete goodness, but you'll also get a sneak preview of our book. Awesome you say? I would have to agree.

My plan is to have the final, final draft of the story done by the big show in NY. I'm stuck on the ending. What I have now is good, but I want it to be great. It needs that punch to the gut that makes the reader go, "Oh shit, what a fantastic ride!" I don't want my words to play second fiddle to Mr. Canete's sweet art. That's a lot to live up to, but when the book sees print, I want to be able to say I really gave it my all.

So I'm going to get back to revising the script. 7 days till I leave for NY! See you there!

Little things

2007-02-06T12:20:00.000-08:00

So I just checked my voicemail and my friend Bakie left me a message saying, "Hey, when you're down in L.A. and meeting people, pursuing your career, keep asking yourself what the reasons are for you being down there. What is it about the steps you're taking that feel right?"

As I was listening to his message I felt a bit of a warm spot. It's nice to know there are people out there thinking about you and cheering you on.

He went on to say, "The more you ask yourself these questions, the more likely you are to find those answers. I just wanted to share this with someone who's following their dream."

Feelings of doubt are always there. I wonder if this is the right step, if I'm a good enough writer, if I have the work ethic to succeed. I'm sure some of these insecurities will loosen their grip once I start making strides. I'm excited and terrified at the same time, but I feel encouraged as well.

Paranoia

2007-02-06T09:29:00.000-08:00

So I've been thinking a lot about how to talk about one of my creator owned projects that I'm working on. I want to give people a preview of the book, but my own paranoia over people stealing my ideas keeps me from doing so. I probably just need to think a little harder about how I put my words together.

I can say that the artist on this project is Eric Canete. Yes sir, Canete and Tsuei are back together again. For those that don't follow our blogs, we put together a short 4 page Street Fighter story together and pitched it to the good people at Udon. Unfortunately they passed on the backup story. This time we're doing a full length book, in fact it's more than a standard American comic book, it's 44 pages.

We have a publisher overseas that's interested in publishing us and we've also had some response from an American publisher. So we're both very excited and hopefully sometime in the very near future I can become smart enough to figure out how to talk about the project without being so paranoid about idea theft.

But along the Street Fighter and Udon lines, Alvin Lee is going to be doing a fill in issue of Gen 13 written by Gail Simone. You can find Gail talking about the book here. I've gone ahead and reposted the preview art.

I personally think Alvin is underrated as a comic book artist. I think some that has to do with the backlash towards Japanese inspired art/comics in American comics, which I find rather ridiculous. Anyway, these pages feel really fresh and inspired to me and frankly better than what he's been doing in SFII. No offense to Talent Caldwell, but if you're reading this Gail, I think Alvin would be a great regular artist on the title.

Secret Identities

2007-02-02T17:11:00.000-08:00

Lately I've been making quite a few posts about Asian American issues, but not too much in terms of what I'm doing in my pursuit of a writing career, so I'm combining the two and bringing you this here post.

Sometime last year my friend Jerry Ma of Epic Proportions contacted me about a comic book anthology, with a focus on Asian American superheroes, that he would be having a hand in putting together. I was immediately interested and told Jerry as much early on, then the call for submissions came around.

At first I had nothing. I didn't want to just create a superhero who happened to be Asian. I felt as though if I couldn't use this opportunity to say something about Asian Americans, what was the point in participating? I began to think about what I knew about the history of Asians in America and the Japanese Internment Camps came to mind rather quickly since I had done a few research papers on the topic before (and a speech, I milked that research for all it was worth).

I knew what I wanted to write for a few days, but stayed away from the computer to let the ideas marinate in my head for a little while. When I did sit down to write the short, four page story it came easily. It's about a young Nisei Japanese American superhero who gets arrested and put into an internment camp during WWII. I entitled it "9066" after Executive Order 9066.

The name of the anthology is entitled Secret Identities and you can find their Myspace page here. The anthology isn't scheduled to come out until 2008, but there will be a preview comic coming out later on this year that will have "9066" in it. Up above are some design sketches of the hero drawn by Jerry Ma.

If you plan on being at New York Comic Con stop by the Epic Proportions booth and say hello to Jerry. You might also run into me there.

Oh and new blog layout, what do you think?

Shrinking Racism

2007-02-01T17:44:00.000-08:00

So it looks like there's a little controversy going on in geekdom and it has to do with some issues regarding the new Atom, who is Chinese. I caught wind of the whole big discussion through a post on Blog@Newsarama which led me to the post on Reappropriate, which then led me to the post on One Diverse Comic Book Nation and wow, I'm exhausted.

I did in fact read through all the comments on Reappropriate, but only read a few at One Diverse because my eyes just couldn't take the strain anymore. Most of the uproar is concerning a phrase that writer Gail Simone uses in issue #2 of the new series. It's a quote that the writer believes to be a very common saying within the Cantonese speaking public in China, but the blogger over at Reappropriate took it as something that was perpetuating negative stereotypes about Asian Americans (namely the eating of dogs).

The whole debate is a entertaining read, though it dips into some ugly levels at certain points, but it really got me thinking about my own stance on issues regarding Asians. I stated in my last post that I can get pretty militant about stuff, but I hope I never get to a place where I'm just searching for fault in things when no fault really exists. I admit that I criticized the All New Atom before I had even read an issue based on the cover art that I have up above. I found the image to be a stereotypical caricature of what Asians look like and it offended me. The way I see it, that image is just two shakes away from having coke-bottle glasses and buck teeth in it.

Unfortunately, I let my offense at the image dictate my feelings about all the creators involved. That was a big mistake on my part. So I tracked down issues #1-7 and read them all today to be better informed about the comic. To be honest, the argument that the phrase used in issue #2 perpetuates a negative stereotype is a weak one to me. Why? Well, Chinese people do eat dogs. As do people of other cultures. Do I eat dog? No, I don't. Would I try dog? Sure, I love eating meat.

I've been in situations where people who are not Asian have made negative comments to me because of what I was eating, but I didn't back pedal and say, "What? No, it just says fresh water eel roll on the box, this isn't eel!"

Instead I said, "Yeah, what's your point? Eel tastes good, you want to try some you ignorant cow?" Actually, I left out the cow part, but you get the picture. There are certain things about Eastern culture that may or may not be acceptable in the West, but so what? I'm not embarrassed by the fact that people who look like me eat "strange" things. I eat all sorts of things that many Americans might turn their nose at. I grew up on this stuff. The food is as much a part of my culture as red envelopes are during Lunar New Year or lion dancers and firecrackers are at grand openings.

I suppose I don't see any flaw in fighting the good fight against ignorance, but personal embarrassment and/or shame shouldn't ever be a reason to put up that fight. I still think the cover to issue #1 is ridiculous and I also think it's alright to eat a dog or two if you feel so inclined (as long as it's not someones pet, that's just mean). I don't think Gail Simone is a racist, but I do find Ariel Olivetti's cover to issue #1 offensive. Ah well, anyone got any monkey brains? I'm hungry.

Gaijin Geisha

2007-01-06T10:57:00.000-08:00

Those of you that know me pretty well know that I'm pretty sensitive when it comes to Asian/Asian American issues. People have described my stance on such issues as "militant" and I'm ok with that, because I can get quite militant.

On my lunch break I went into the local Borders to see what new books were out and I saw the cover to the novel "Kickboxing Geishas: How Modern Japanese Women Are Changing Their Nation" by Veronica Chambers. The cover gave me pause because depicted was not a Japanese woman, but an obviously Caucasian woman in makeup and clothing resembling that of a geisha.

First off, I think the cover of a book about Japanese women should picture a Japanese woman, not a white model in an ethnic costume. Now if the title of the book was, "Gaijin Geisha: The Misportrayal of Japanese Women In American Culture" I wouldn't have an issue, but it's not and I do.

The other problem I have is the idea that young Japanese women are related to the geisha simply because that's the easiest relation to make. The popularity of the novel/movie "Memoirs of a Geisha" (which ironically starred no female Japanese actresses) has ingrained a strange idea of what the Japanese are like into the American consciousness.

If you were to ask most Americans for their definition of a geisha they would probably say, "A Japanese hooker." If that's the most common answer, why is the author tying young, successful Japanese women to a group known mainly because of prostitution?

And "kickboxing"? Why, because it's a martial art and Asians do martial arts? Kickboxing isn't fighting style that originated in Japan.

Maybe I'm overreacting. Maybe I'm just out of topics to blog about, but it's obvious to me what the publishers and author are trying to bank on by giving the book its title. This kind of thing annoys me to no end.

6 to 7

2006-12-16T21:29:00.000-08:00

So the year is coming to a close and I have to say that 2006 was a pretty good year for me. I think this year was a major turning point for me in terms of my writing career. First of all deciding to pursue a writing career and taking the necessary steps in that direction, such as the pitch to Udon.

I've also written my 44 page script for an creator owned comic. I'm still in the revision process and that's coming along nicely. I think I'm pretty close to a final draft. I've also decided to move down to LA next year to work, live and further pursue my writing career. LA is a strange place and it's really easy to get sucked into the Hollywood lifestyle. I hope I stay focused and bust my ass writing.

But the biggest news of 2006 would have to be the birth of my sister's baby boy, Sebastian, who is pictured up above. I think one of the biggest sacrifices I'm making as I move to LA is not being in near my family, but I know Sebastian will get a lot of love. I just wish I could see him more often while I'm in LA. But I'll make it up to him one day by writing stories for him.

This next year is going to be exciting. A lot of conventions to attend to try and find an American publisher for the comic. I also plan on doing lots of writing and living on my own (if you call living in someone's house for discounted rent living on your own) is going to be an adventure.

Big changes to come and I'm excited for 2007.

Rejection #1

2006-10-01T10:49:00.000-07:00

I mentioned previously that a friend and I were working on a pitch for Udon's Street Fighter II. Unfortunately I received word that they're not interested in using the material. Oh well, not a big deal.

I'm not going to let one rejection discourage me from trying again. So here you have the unused pages by the very talented Eric Canete. The Canete and Tsuei team will strike again, I promise.

The wind up

2006-09-19T23:53:00.000-07:00

The pitch is almost ready. Eric is hard at work on the final page of the Street Fighter backup story and once it's done, all the pages will be sent to Udon accompanied by a letter asking them if they would like to use our story.

I've never really done this before, so it'll be an interesting learning experience regardless of the outcome.

As soon as I hear a "aye" or "nay" I'll be sure to report here.

On a slighty different note, I made some good progress on the 44 page project today. Revised some dialogue and scripted five or so more pages. I have about 16 more pages to go. First draft here I come!

Movement

2006-09-18T09:01:00.000-07:00

It's strange when you can feel things in motion around you and you're taken by the pressure to keep pace or get left behind. This other project that I'm working on has been making some progress. My collaborator and I have been making some new contacts and we've decided to switch formats for our story, making the previous 32 pages in 44.

The change threw a wrench into my plans because I was finally settling into the 32 page format and feeling comfortable with it. Now I have to start all over again and get comfortable with 44 pages. It's a good challenge though and I'm doing ok so far. I'm about halfway through my first draft.

Once the first draft is complete my collaborator will take a read through and we'll do some revision to make sure the story has the right pacing and shot selections.

I've tried quite a few different careers in my life and I'm sure that there were times when things around me were moving forward, but because I wasn't passionate about those jobs I either ignored the forward push or didn't feel it all together. It's different for me this time around.

I can feel it around me, like the wind brushing up against my skin. I can feel it in me, as if a rope was tied around my soul and someone was tugging on the other end. It scares me and excites me at the same time. Better get back to the grind.

Pitchin'

2006-09-07T18:33:00.000-07:00

I'm still in the process of following through on that Udon pitch I mentioned awhile ago. I was originally going to pitch the backup story as just my script, but Eric Canete was nice enough to offer his blue pencil to my cause.

He's putting the final touches on the four-page story and once he's complete I'm going to email his images and my script off to the boys at Udon. Hopefully I'll be able to get some feedback from Alvin Lee first before I email the top dog at Udon.

Best case scenario, they like my story and they like Eric's art; publishing both. Worse case scenario, they reject my script and I remain unpublished. I've lived 27 years without being published, I can handle a few more.

How cool would it be to see mine and Eric's efforts in the back of Street Fighter II? Pretty damn cool if you ask me.

Eric has the first two pages up on his blog, check it out and let us know what you think.

Bible writing

2006-09-05T20:22:00.000-07:00

Things have been busy again with school back in full swing and writing the script. I took the time to write a bible for the story because I'm a stickler for backstory. I suppose my bible isn't a compilation of do's and don'ts, instead it's a series of bios, descriptions of the world and characters, along with a little history about the world. I wouldn't say the bible is "finished" but I'm done writing it for now.

I'm trying to stay on top of writing on a daily basis. There's no better way to get better than to get in as much practice as necessary. The script has been a bit difficult because I'm second guessing myself a lot. I need to trust my instincts and not edit myself too much as I write.

Good times and good things to come

2006-08-22T21:08:00.000-07:00

So, things have been pretty quiet from the House of Jon lately. I apologize to the few of you who read this blog. I've been in LA this past weekend spending quality time with some friends. Some of whom I don't get to see too often and others that will be moving away to far off lands soon. The week was a good recharge for me, now that school is back in session (man I'm so not a school person).

I'm really excited about getting my script finished so I can send it to my collaborator and get the project drawn. We got the chance to talk about which shows might be good for us to shop our project around at and our marketing strategies for the book. Next year is going to be really exciting for me.

There are a lot of cool things coming up in terms of our project. More details as the project comes closer to completion.

Support

2006-08-08T01:00:00.000-07:00

As someone who desires to work in a creative field it's easy to second guess yourself. I read a lot of comics and I often ask myself, "Am I good enough to make it?" In the moments when you find yourself questioning yourself it's good to have people around you who will listen to your ideas and cheer you on.

I think there are different camps of personal cheerleaders. There are people like your parents who will love anything you do, no matter how badly it blows, but these people don't have bad taste, they just love you so much that they are hopelessly biased towards anything you put out there.

Then there are those that you can bounce ideas off of and who will be honest about what they think. They'll tell you when your idea stinks (hopefully in nicer terms), but also encourage you to keep at it because they believe in your potential.

I'm lucky enough to have both types of people in my life. Pursuing a career is never easy, and it's even harder when it's a career where the gauge of how good you are is whether or not people like it.

I think it's important to find those people who are willing to invest their time into listening to your ideas and cheering you on. You need these people, you need them deeply. There is something to be said about those who stand by you both physically and emotionally. I believe we all have people like this in our lives, so include them and let them see your precious imaginings.

Local Love

2006-08-02T21:01:00.000-07:00

If you live in the San Francico area or plan to be this Saturday (Aug. 5th 8pm - 12am) come out to the Isotope and celebrate the release of Dave Johnson's new sketch book, it's going to be an awesome time. I'll be there, probably having a beer and talking to folks. If you're there and you see me, say hello.

Back to the keyboard

2006-08-01T18:00:00.000-07:00

It's been a long couple of weekends for me. First we had a big bachelor party for my close friend, the following weekend I was in San Diego attending the big show and this past weekend was the big wedding of said friend. Man, I'm still tired.

It's been difficult focusing on writing with so many things going on, but I'm buckling back down on working on some more ideas for the upcoming project. I think I've narrowed down all the characters for the story, but they aren't completely fleshed out yet. I'm getting close though, I can feel the pieces starting to fall into place and that's a good feeling to have.

Just thought I'd drop in a give a small update as to what's going on with me lately and where I am mentally.

Also if you're a fan of Eric Canete's work, he has two collections online available for purchase.

Beauty and the Beast
Fusion Junction

I own both and they're both awesome. Check them out, you wont be disappointed.

Breezy Again

2006-07-25T14:04:00.000-07:00

So I'm back from San Diego Comic Con 2006. That car ride home was a killer, I didn't get back home till 5:00am. Luckily, I wasn't driving (thanks Brian and Hank). The convention this year went by pretty quickly, but I did accomplish most of the things I wanted to do. I got the chance to shake hands with the folks over at Udon and dropped off two of my scripts for possible back up stories. I hope the response is a good one.

I also got a chance to talk to Alvin Lee for a little bit and do a little catching up while he worked out sketches. Alvin is such a rockstar. He handles the cosplayers, swooning fangirls, and the occasional bumbling fanboy like the pro that he is. He also took the time to work on a sketch for me, even though he was busy the whole convention. (The scan came out very blue/red and I'm too lazy how to make it more black.)

A highlight of the show for me was getting the chance to hang out with buddy Eric Canete (whose blog you can get to on the right column, he does amazing work). We got to chat, hijack Dustin Nguyen's Artist Alley table on Sunday, and had dinner over in Seaport Village after the show. Good times indeed.

Here I am trying to distract Eric while he's working on someone's sketchbook. I know, I'm a jerk. Eric, being the fantastic artist that he is, only rolls with the best. Through his hookup I was able to get two really cool pieces of art. The first by Lauren Montgomery and the second by Dave Johnson.

I was hoping to get more sketches this year but that didn't work out as planned. Next year I hope to be behind a booth selling my book and be completely too busy to walk around, how cool would that be? I have a few more pieces of art to show off, but I'll get around to those at another time. For those of you that made it out to the show, I hope you had as good a time as I did.

SDCC Is Here

2006-07-19T22:21:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the lack of posts, it's been busy around here lately and tomorrow I make the long drive down to L.A. Friday morning we drive from L.A. directly to the convention center. I'm looking forward to this year, it's going to be good times. I'll have a full recap of the con and pictures when I get back.

Weekend of Nothing

2006-07-15T14:01:00.000-07:00

Not much happening here over the weekend in terms of posts. Lots of house work to do and a friend's bachelor party to attend tonight. Recovery on Sunday, haha. More posts to come the few days before SDCC.

An Uphill Climb

2006-07-13T10:58:00.000-07:00

Over the past year or so I've really tried to find out more about breaking into the comic book industry as a writer. I've spoken to writers, artists, anyone who was willing to answer the questions of a kid who really knew nothing about where to get started. I received a lot of vague answers peppered with some real insight on what steps to take.

Eventually I started to use the internet to my advantage by checking out various different publishers and reading up on how they handle submissions from new writers. Unfortunately, most of them simply don't. Unsolicited submissions from writers just isn't something that publishers, big or small, accept readily. I suppose it's because there are simply less jobs for writers. One writer can easily write two scripts a month, some of the more successful write up to four a month. Very few artists can do more than one book a month, lets be honest, some of them can't even do one per month.

So where does that leave the fledgling writer? Looks like its time to do it yourself baby! Many of today's top writers started from the bottom doing indie books or self publishing. Hell, some of them even drew their own books. What if you're artistically challenged like me? Well, then you need to start making some friends.

The internet has a lot of resources with talented artists out there, but make it out to your local convention if you have one in your area. You'd be surprised how many great artists don't make use of all this free virtual space. I love the con scene and love to take in the sites, get sketches, sit in on panels and all that fun stuff, but these days I just try to meet as many cool people as I can. The more people I hit it off with, the better my chances of one day getting published.

I know that sounds extremely self serving, but I believe it all depends on your perspective. I don't see artists as a meal ticket or a rung to climb to reach super stardom. I see them as someone who can aid me in my vision, a future collaborator. Artists that you hear me talk about and try to promote are guys that I believe in. I believe in their art and I believe in them as good people. Maybe one day I'll get to a place where I'll just be assigned to work with someone I have no clue about, but the nice thing about trying to do your own project is you get to make that decision, not have it made for you.

So with that I'll leave you with two very good resources that feature sequential artists.

Digital Webbing
Penciljack

SDCC Swag

2006-07-11T15:35:00.000-07:00

Those who know me know that I love Alvin Lee's art. I think he's a highly underrated artist that gets lumped in with other artists that are Manga/Anime influenced. However, the fluidity and movement that is present in his pages is definitely superior to many artists working in the American comic book industry. So any chance I get to pimp his art, I try and do so. Let the pimp-age ensue.

I was over at Street Fighter Devotion and saw that Udon has some cool new swag for SDCC this year. One of which is their ever popular sketchbooks (buy one of these and get a custom sketch by your favorite Udon artist). The other is a cool oversized hardcover collecting all of Udon's first Street Fighter series, including all the backup stories. According to their site, this new hardcover is limited to only 500 pieces. I hope my wallet can handle it.

Udon's booth is usually packed with rabid fans buying up posters, waiting for sketches and whatever else they have in store each year. My favorite part is watching guys like Alvin Lee and Omar Dogan draw. Watching the socially inept try to strike up conversation with their favorite creator is also pretty entertaining. Awkward, but entertaining.

Hit up the link and see what Udon has to offer this year. Udon Swag 2006

Back It Up

2006-07-11T09:22:00.000-07:00

In preparation for San Diego I'm going to have one last back up story script for the people of Udon. This last one features Oro of Street Fighter 3 and Gen from Street Fighter Alpha.

As far as I know, the two have never met in the games or any other previous manga/comic. I thought it would be interesting to see what would happen if you put two of the most powerful Street Fighter characters together. *Hint* They're going to fight, this is Street Fighter after all.

Oro is the good equivalent of Gouki/Akuma and my little story will reflect that. The premise will be simple. Gen, dying of leukemia, continues to look for a challenge and finds one in Oro. Oro is a man so focused on his training that he has lost touch with the reasons why he started training in the first place. The meeting between the two will serve as the catalyst for Oro to take on a student.

I'm having a hard time figuring out how to start this tale. Does Gen travel out into the deserted plains to find Oro? Is Oro strolling through town for some reason? Either way it should be a lot of fun to write. Lets hope the boys at Udon like it.

Blog It Like Bloo!

2006-07-10T18:30:00.000-07:00

I love Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends. If you don't I feel very sorry for you, because you should!

Foster's is one of those cartoons that has style, a cool premise and is consistantly good. What's not to like, right? Turns out the creative team behind Foster's has their very own blog.

Here's your link, enjoy!
BLOGregard Q. Kazoo

Asian Invasion

2006-07-10T15:11:00.000-07:00

DC Comics has been on a push to diversify their cast of characters lately and as most comic fans already know, many of those characters are Asian. The first of these characters is the Chinese superteam the Great Ten.

With Grant Morrison being responsible for their creation, it's no surprise that they have some really wacky powers with names to match. I was originally pretty turned off by their names, but came to like them not because they could be literal translations of Chinese names. Nah, I liked the names because they're strange and different. August General in Iron, Accomplished Perfect Physician, and Immortal Man in Darkness are pretty fun to say.

One thing I don't understand is why we never see foreign characters speaking in contractions. Their speech is always somewhat bland and just doesn't sound natural. Here's an example from page 5 of DC: Fifty Two Week 6:

"The Great Ten were gathered to consolidate super human power for the preservation of China -- and yet we spend most of our day waiting for the green light to flash. Bureaucracy will be the death of us, Perfect Physician."

Is it just me or does that just sound typical of your everyday foreign character in American fiction? Despite my issues with the way they talk, I have an optimistic outlook for the Great Ten. I hope they don't turn all Asian villain on me in the future. I think that would be too predictable for Morrison. I also hope the people at Blog@Newsarama are wrong about this little bit of news they published last week.

The new Atom will also be Chinese. I haven't read the book yet so all I can really comment on is the art that I've seen. So without further ado, what the hell is up with his eyes in this cover? Eyes don't slant at that angle, not even Asian eyes...

All in all, I commend DC for trying to diversify their roster with characters like the new Atom, the Great Ten, the new Blue Beetle (Latino) and the new Firestorm (African American). It's definitely a step in the right direction. Let's just hope sales are high enough to keep these new faces in print.

SDCC, 10 Days and Counting

2006-07-10T13:01:00.000-07:00

San Diego Comic Con International is fast approaching and I'm bursting at the seams. This past school semester was pretty rough on my scholastically challenged self and I decided to take the summer off and concentrate on writing, in hopes of having something to show for my efforts at SDCC.

My plan hasn't exactly played out the way I thought it would, but I am ready to pitch a few backup stories to the good people at Udon. Call it fate or what have you, but Alvin Lee's cousin is a good friend of mine and I was fortunate enough to befriend Alvin several Comic Con's ago and at this year's New York Comic Con we got to talking about the possibility of me writing some stories for them.

Nothing is set in stone yet, but I do have a few short scripts finished and I plan to pitch them at this year's show. Best case scenario, they get published. Worst case scenario, they don't. My trump card is my good pal is working on one of the scripts and hopes to have it completely drawn by the time the show comes around and we'll pitch the script as a completed back up story ready for the printer.

If the story doesn't see print, I'll probably show the completed pages here. If it does see print you might get a preview. Maybe. I make no promises.

Reboot

2006-07-09T20:59:00.000-07:00

I've decided to restart this blog in hopes of recording my attempt at breaking into the comic book industry as a writer. Among the thousands of comic book related blogs out there I've seen comic book news blogs, blogs of creators in the industry and your typical fan blog commenting on the news and creator blogs. I wanted to try something a little different.

So who exactly am I? My name is Jonathan Tsuei (but I go by Jon) and I'm an aspiring writer. It's taken me quite a few years of bumming around, working lame jobs and struggling with school before I realized I wanted to write fiction for a living. I'm not limiting myself to just comic books, but that is where I'm concentrating my efforts.

I'll be using this space as a place to air my thoughts on my writing and all things pertaining to geekdom. Feel free to leave comments singing my praises or comments cursing me and all of my offspring, but have fun because I know I will.