I’ve been creating comics my whole life. My two current or recent projects are a historical adventure thriller set in the 18th century, and a contemporary mystery/crime story based on David Lynch’s famous 1990s TV series Twin Peaks. Find out more about them below!
⚓ OPHIUCHI FRATRES ⚓
Ophiuchi Fratres is what you’d call my “life’s work” – the project was born around 2005-2006, and I’ve been developing it ever since! It’s a pretty ambitious story planned in two volumes, which I intend to publish in paper form – I’m not yet sure whether I want to find a publisher or go for self-publishing.
Genre: historical adventure thriller
Time period: 1713-1714
Features: sailing ships, pirates, murders, a (hopefully) non-cliché female protagonist, slavery, complex characters, secrets, plot twists
Synopsis: “1713. Scarlett Wellington makes a living working for a merchant company on the London Docks. One evening, in a warehouse by the Thames, she makes a sinister discovery that will drastically alter the course of her life. Realizing she has seen something she shouldn’t, Scarlett tries to uncover the dark secrets that her employers seem to be hiding. Her journey will take her from Europe to the Caribbean, along with pirate captain Dag Ljungström, who has his own reasons to investigate the mystery and horrors surrounding the British company.”
Inspiration & intentions: People tend to think a story set in the 18th century featuring pirates can only be inspired by the oh-so-popular Pirates of the Caribbean. As much as I love these movies (at least the first three, hum), this is not at all what I’m going for with Ophiuchi Fratres. If I had to compare it to an existing pirate tale, it would be the excellent TV show Black Sails – a dark, adult story with layered, flawed characters, rough language, political subtext and gritty, bloody realism. My other inspirations tend to be well-written contemporary thrillers that are really good at developing a gripping story and surprising you at every turn – like Homeland or the Millenium trilogy by Stieg Larsson (which, again, feature incredibly well-developed characters).
♟️CHECKMATE♟️
Checkmate is a contemporary mystery/crime story based on Twin Peaks, the famous 1990s TV series created by David Lynch. As a prequel, Checkmate tells the backstory of FBI Special Agent Dale Cooper four years prior to the events depicted in seasons 1 and 2 of Twin Peaks. Three volumes of the comic have been published online. Due to lack of time, the project is currently on hiatus, but the script is entirely written, I’m excited about it, and I really hope to be able to resume updates sometime in the future!
➡️ You can read the story on the Checkmate website: checkmate.thecomicseries.com
Genre: contemporary mystery/crime thriller
Time period: 1985
Features: murders, an FBI investigation, quirky characters, David Lynch’s particular brand of dark, moody surrealism
Synopsis: Pittsburgh, 1985. FBI Special Agent Dale Cooper and his partner Windom Earle are assigned to protect Earle’s wife, Caroline, after an attack was made on her life under mysterious circumstances. As all three of them move into a safe house for Caroline’s protection, little do they know that things are about to get much, much worse.
Inspiration & intentions: Since Checkmate is a fan-comic based on an existing TV series, the inspiration is pretty obvious – it was born of my love of David Lynch’s surreal, quirky, scary, phantasmagorical work. I’ve always been a huge Lynch fan, and Twin Peaks is probably one of the best TV shows ever created (back when good, high-quality TV shows were rather rare!). After watching it, I felt that a lot of storylines deserved to be developed – and Checkmate was created.
