One of my loves has always been stage magic. I’m the guy that those tv shows about real life illusionists and every David Copperfield is for. I’ll stop what I’m doing to watch that stuff. And it wasn’t long before I discovered who Harry Houdini was. I’m not sure what it is about him – the fact that he brought a mixture of escapism to his tricks or that he was around during the height of Vaudeville or what, but I know I’ve written at least one school paper on the man.
So a comic with him (and Arthur Conan Doyle) is something that piques my interest.
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Christopher Sebela – Writer
Gavin Guidry – Artist
Marissa Louise – Colors
Micah Meyers – Letters
Kickstarter campaign ends on Tuesday, November 14, 2017 at 6:33 PM EST.
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The Pitch:
Arthur Conan Doyle & Harry Houdini.
The writer and the magician.
They were once the best of Friends.
When their friendship went to hell,
The world wasn’t very far behind.
The Story:
Harry Houdini and Arthur Conan Doyle used to be fast friends, visiting one another and writing letters back and forth, until their differing views on the afterlife set them against one another on stages and newspapers across the globe. Years after their breakup, the two continue to battle about spiritualism, the belief that the living can communicate with the dead. Doyle, creator of the great detective Sherlock Holmes, believes in ghosts, mediums, even photos of fairies. Houdini spends his time debunking the seances and the frauds who run them. The two are at war, two ideological armies whose battle of words is about to become a battle to the death for the very fate of humankind.
This Kickstarter is to fund production and printing of The Death Defying #1, the first in a series of four 30-page issues.
John’s Thoughts:
In real life Doyle and Houdini were friends, but this divide of ideologies proved to be too much. Doyle needed to believe, and I sometimes think Houdini wanted to find someone he couldn’t disprove (he never did). This feels like very ripe territory to construct a story. How does a skeptic deal with some coming supernatural apocalypse? How does a believer deal with the idea that he will be the downfall of his former friend?
Like I said, ripe territory for a story (the first 6 pages are previewed on the Kickstarter Page).
The Rewards:
This is the first issue, so there are the standard pdf only or print versions of the comic. But a couple of things jumped out at me. At the $12 level, you can get a print copy with the variant cover by Tyler Crook (of Petrograd, Harrow County, Bad Blood, and The Dark and Bloody).
For those script-writers who would like a little bit of help with their craft, Christopher Sebela will consult on your single issue script. For those of us who might not have an editor readily available, I can see this as being a relatively cheap way to get a non-biased second opinion on your story ($75 level).
And for the slightly deeper pockets you can appear in the comic you’re buying ($100 level), an always cool option.
The Verdict:
Time is running low on this particular Kickstarter with less than a week to go. I’d love to see this one make its mark and provide us all with the opening chapter of a very cool story idea.
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For more information on Christopher Sebela, find it here on his website.
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The Gilded Age Kickstarter is still going on. Check it out on Kickstarter here.
John McGuire is the creator/author of the steampunk comic The Gilded Age. Want to read the first issue for free? Click here! Already read it and eager for more?
Click here to join John’s mailing list.
His prose appears in The Dark That Follows, Theft & Therapy, There’s Something About Mac, Hollow Empire, Beyond the Gate, and Machina Obscurum – A Collection of Small Shadows.
He can also be found at www.johnrmcguire.com.
