Just One More... And Then I Gotta Go...

You'd think between playing with Old Man, writing and recording a podcast for Comic Addiction, and writing for this blog, I'd have enough projects to occupy my time. I'm now venturing into the dark and forbidden world of fan fiction. It's been surprisingly fun, so far.

The idea was pitched by someone over at the Uncanny X-Cast forum and a bunch of us regular posters (FUXers - Forum of Uncanny X-Casters) decided to give it a whirl. I quickly claimed Uncanny X-Men as my title and established the era that we would all work from. The idea is that no more Marvel Comics were published after the cover date of October 1986, right before the Mutant Massacre. I thought that would be a good jumping off point, since the X-Books start to really change around that point and there were a lot of cast change ups afterwards.

Basically, I'm rewritting history from that point forward. The Mutant Massacre will have a different end result and the cast change will not be as drastic. There will be some additions to the X-Men, but no subtractions, leaving me the cast I want to write. The reaction to the first issue has been pretty positive, so that's encouraging. Also, the first issue of another person's X-Factor project has been really good, which makes the whole project even more worthwhile. I'm looking forward to reading the other series that will eventually join the "FUX Universe". Some forum members are also going to provide illustrations so even more people can get involved.

If anything this is a fun creative exercise. I start out by writing an issue in the format of a script for a twenty-two page comic book. After that, I translate it into prose form. This way I can make sure I'm writing just enough material for a regular comic book series on a monthly basis and that the format stays consistant.