A month of playing pack the parcel.
Frantic Scribbles & Senseless Ramblings January 2025
The new year has well and truly begun and you’re reading Frantic Scribbles and Senseless Ramblings, the monthly newsletter of Asa Wheatley.
Making progress
It’s been a busy month but also one muddled with some disappointment. Let’s start with the disappointment. I did what probably 90% of the population did and started the year with a ‘everything’s going to change, I’m going to be better attitude’ and I’ll be honest I don’t think I lasted two weeks. For one reason or another, despite a pretty good start, I quickly became overwhelmed and over tired all the time. The world falling apart outside doesn’t particularly help either. With all that in mind I’m surprised at how much I’ve actually achieved this month. Is it the ridiculous amount that I set myself at the start of the month? No. Is it more than I expected once I was realistic with myself? I think so.
In mid-January I got a very large and exciting delivery of Sagas of the Shield Maiden Book Four. I’d got my copy of the proof just before the holidays but had to wait for the printer to re-open before being able to get all the comics for sending to backers. It looks fantastic and I’m incredibly happy with it. It’s already started arriving with backers and I can’t wait to hear what you all thought.
So far I’ve packaged up and sent out about 250 packages. Which has been a lot. It’s way more time consuming than it looks from the outside but I’m slowly making my way to finishing the fulfilment for the campaign. Packing and labeling the rewards has however been a good opportunity for me to catch up on Podcasts, with Off-Menu and My Brother, My Brother & Me current favourites.
On the writing side I’ve been digging my teeth into Project Slasher. From the project title you can probably guess this is my attempt at the Slasher genre. It’s a genre I have a great love for and have been dying to write a comic in for a long time. I’ve got a good 1st draft for the first issue’s script done so far. I’ve been adding a page here and there in between printing out labels and packing up parcels for Shield Maiden. It’s been fun to write in the horror world again, it’s been a while.
Speaking of Shield Maiden. I wrote up a very rough outline for one of the stories in Book Five. I was initially planning the story to be totally different to how it now reads but I’m more excited for this new version. The old version of the story will definitely be repurposed for a later story in a future volume though as it’s a style of action that I’d love to write. All this is very vague and I realise I’m very much talking around what I’m writing but the exciting part is that early progress on volume five has begun.
I put up some awesome new pages for Of Ichor & Bone over on Patreon. We’re delving into some of the more horror and action elements in theses ones and it’s been a lot of fun seeing the final art come in from Sammy & JP.
So all in all a pretty productive month I think. Alongside it all I’ve been trying to more carefully plan my creative year and what I’m hoping to achieve. We’ll see how well I stick to my plans by the end of the year.
Sagas of the Shield Maiden Book Four - Fulfillment in progress
Of Ichor & Bone - Currently releasing pages monthly on Patreon.
Project Queen - Thumbnails for 1st issue are in.
Project Slasher - 1st issue 1st draft complete.
Project Murder - Artist has begun layouts/character designs.
Sagas of the Shield Maiden Book Five - Rough outline for 1 story done.
All consuming, consuming all
Nosferatu - I loved this but then again I went in expecting to. I’m a big fan of Robert Eggers’ work and I adore a scary Vampire. I wrote up more in depth thoughts over on my Patreon which you can read for free.
The Beast Must Die - This mix of 70s British Horror murder mystery with a tinge of Blacksploitation thrown in was a very strange watch. A famed hunter hosts 6 people suspecting one of them to be a werewolf. It has elements of a classic murder mystery and even puts the emphasis on the audience to solve the ‘case’ by adding in a Werewolf Break late into the film where the film literally pauses itself for a minute and you submit your guess as to who the Werewolf is. It’s an idea I was immediately sold on and honestly think if Rian Johnson remade it now it could be a fantastically fun time. Ultimately the film itself is a little lackluster and slow while having some fun moments peppered throughout.
Little Nightmares 2 - We started the gaming year with Little Nightmares 2. I adored the first game and it's weird freaky horror and so this was a must play and it did not disappoint. It’s not particularly long but the story (the little of it you are exposed to) develops at such a nice pace and is the perfect follow up to the original game. Little Nightmares 2 also has maybe one of the most terrifying sections of a game I’ve ever played. Those mannequins are no joke.