Development Process, Part 2

I had figured out the way I was going to draw it. I knew the lengths I wanted the "chapters" to be. I had the rough idea of how it would connect to the themes I was looking to explore.

Unfortunately, as I'm sure more knowledgable and experienced creators in the industry would tell you, having just those things, does not a story make.

Thematically "Thanks Jules" comes from my long thoughts about two things which, I believe, have a pretty close connection: love and the loss of hope in the future. Its easy to tackle those things seperately, certainly there's a lot of ground to cover with each. It was just... the more I thought about them and the more conversations I listened in on, made me realize there was a general feeling of uncertainty people have, with both.

In that furtile ground I wanted the story rooted. But with a need for visual flair (not to mention a desire to challenge myself at creating visuals I wasn't accustomed to doing) I had to find some element to infuse a taste of adventure and action. So, to rack up tension as a container for those existential themes, I decided to place Julius (the "Jules" in the title) in a setting which would demand it. I tinkered with a few ideas and landed on the idea of tapping into the realm of sci-fi. Thus came about F.E.N.C.E. an acronymed organization that keeps the world safe from "impossible threats" whom Julius is an agent of.

F.E.N.C.E., oddly enough, isn't just a place he works though. I decided to create a back story for Julius which would allow us to, mostly, stick in the moments as he experiences them, foregoing the need for a lot of catching up or overblown exposition. Jules has amnesia and was discovered at the center of a an incursion from another world. The organization could find no relatives or past history on him, so it became his legal guardian. That simple. My thought was, if you experienced things as he did, it would allow a closer connect to the situations and emotions he would experience.

With his place in the sci-fi setting, I would have all the adventure I needed to juxtapose those very human emotions I desired to explore, while creating swift and fun tales that would be interesting in both visual and meta-textual ways.

But how would I make the book work for people who run at the sight of "sci-fi," regardless to if it has depth or not?

The answer to that would be...rather interesting.

 Rough sketch of F.E.N.C.E. logo.

Rough sketch of F.E.N.C.E. agent coat/armor .