Coming in Epic Canadiana, V2: Sgt. Sawchuck And The Red Surge!

The information below was shared by Nelson da Rocha on the Canadian Superheroes Facebook group on the weekend and, with permission, I am quite pleased to share it here too!

Here are a couple of pages for a CANADIANA Vol. 2. story I wrote about a loveable fascist Mountie and his boss/sidekick.  

The story is called SGT. SAWCHUCK and the RED SURGE. Story by me, pencils by Alex Greychuck (fantastic artist whose work can be seen in Toronto Comics Vol. 1 & 2), and inks and lettering by Stephany Lein who did art for my first story in Toronto Comics Vol. 1 and does the art for Daniel Reynolds' story, Redevelopment and Reunion for Volume 2 out in May this year.

All right, so let's break that down a bit...

The mention of Canadiana is in reference to the Cloudscape Comics anthology. I loved the first book and was pretty happy to come across a preview of the second.

Alex Greychuck's work can be found here. While going over his portfolio I was pleasantly surprised to come across the pinup of 8-Ball from Heroes of The North copied below, but there's plenty more to see so float on over and have a look.

There are a number of superhero stories in the second volume of Toronto Comics Anthology, and we'll have a closer look at those as we get near the book's release date.  But in the meantime here's a page from the Major North story (Sam Noir and Christopher Yao) included therein. A Major North sketch page was displayed here in late January. That image is followed by a pin up of Sgt. Sawchuck.

Many thanks to Nelson for providing/clarifying the information and material.

CODA is in the books!

It feels a little pointless to discuss a book that was released several weeks ago now, but since the material will find its way into a trade paperback at the end of the year, let's think of it as a preview and forge ahead with some observations.

8-Ball was not among my favourite characters when I first discovered the HotN, but he has quickly become one.  Including his appearances in the web series, he has the most clearly-defined relationships with the various other members.  There's obvious mutual respect between he and The Canadian, the amusing back and forth teasing with Nordik, and he may be the only character even capable of teaming up with Black Terror on occasion.  The Canadian is the team's leader but 8-Ball brings the whole thing together.  He's developed into a very flexible character.

While he sometimes shares the load, Yann Brouillette writes every story in the book (even letters some of them) and shows a lot of versatility in doing so.  You never really know what you're going to get next.  You might read a dark, moody, violent story about 8-Ball stopping a corrupt city official's abuse of power, then flip the page to humour involving the New FLQ.  The story might be 20 pages long, or it might be all of two pages in total.  The unpredictable story structure helps keep these books interesting.

Moving from stories to art...You know who's good?  Geof Isherwood is good.

For one thing, I'm impressed by someone who is able to draw a wide variety of facial expressions.  Isherwood has that skill down.

He also occasionally includes certain details that not every artist will.  Here's what I think is a good example: Look at the picture of Nordik below (easiest thing you'll do all day...)

Now have a look at her posture on the page scan below, particularly the first panel, from the first story in the book.

Isherwood draws a story further into the book which features Madame Doom.  Doom doesn't have that prominent back arch that Nordik has above. "Nordik drawn" looks like "Nordik live".  Madame Doom does not.  Isherwood avoids cookie cutter art.  As a fan, I love that.

There was another instance where the attention to detail was appreciated.  In the Madame Doom story mentioned above, close ups of Doom show the scarring past the edges of her mask.  Not every artist would bother including it, but that scarring is a significant factor in her character so it shouldn't be ignored.  Isherwood's ability with facial expressions was often on display in that story as well.

Isherwood doesn't have a monopoly on eye-catching art detail, mind you.  The maple leaf pattern on the sole of Black Terror's boot was a nice touch by Olivier Raymond. ;-)

Now then...I guess it can't be considered a spoiler anymore if the HotN posted it on their own Facebook page but flashbacks aside, that should be the last that we see of Nordik after this book (and perhaps episode 20 of the web series) right?

Well...I'm not convinced.  There is too much of a genetic manipulation element to these stories for me to buy into the notion that Nordik is gone.

Is THIS Nordik done?  Heroes of the North claim that when their heroes die, they stay dead, and I believe them.  But there are ways around that self-imposed rule and I look forward to seeing which one is applied in this case.  ;-)

Great read again, HotN!  Bring on the trade paperback!

Heroes of The North: Coda (solicitation)

First Comics News announced the Ardeen Entertainment solicitations for December earlier today.  I updated my own Solicitations page accordingly, but there's so much content and talent on display that I wanted to make it more prominent.  My house, my rules. ;-)

HEROES OF THE NORTH: CODA

Writers: Yann & Michel Brouillette
Artists: Geof Isherwood, Olivier Raymond, Gibson Quarter.
Cover by Olivier Raymond
Price: $6.99
Full Color, 80 Pages
8 Ball is confronted to the madness of municipal politics, prompting much soul searching. Madame Doom wants an heir and hires Medusa Commander to engineer her a son worthy of her greatness. Discover how a lowly civil servant becomes the sewer lurking menace known as King Komodo! 8 Ball and Black Terror head out to North Korea to free The Canadian and Nordik from the evil clutches of Medusa Commander. What happens will change the Heroes of the North universe forever! All that and much more in the 80 pages conclusion to the first Season of Heroes of the North!

If it hasn't already, it shouldn't be long until "Missions" hits stores as well.  I want to be sure I get my hands on that because these books seem to move pretty fast.

HEROES OF THE NORTH: MISSIONS solicitation

Heroes of the North do as good a job as anyone of using various forms of media to get the word out about their product, but nonetheless I wanted to include the solicitation for the next Omnibus on here.

HEROES OF THE NORTH: MISSIONS
Cover by Geof Isherwood
Writers: Ty Templeton and Yann & Michel Brouillette
Artists: Richard Pace, Dan Parent, Geof Isherwood, David J. Cutler, Gibson Quarter (with Guilermo Ortego).
Price: $4.99
Full Color, 80 Pages Nordik and 8 Ball team up to elucidate cold blooded murders.  8 Ball and Black Terror bring down a counterfeiters ring.  The Canadian, Fleur-de-Lys and Nordik thwart a zombots attack in Riverdale, Toronto. A CDO agent discovers what it means to be The Canadian. A young orphan becomes Acadia.  All that in more in this 80 pages follow-up to the Heroes of the North: Dark Origins!

Last we'd heard, they had intended for this to be available in July but it bears pointing out that Ardden now includes it among their September releases. This clashes slightly with what Heroes of the North recently posted on their blog.

Mr. Richard Pace, who was to pencil and ink the most excellent Ty Templeton scripted comic of The Canadian had to bailed out of those duties for health reasons. Consequently, we now welcome Daniel Wong to the team, who will pick up on Mr. Pace’s duties and will heroically attempt to nevertheless help us deliver the book on time for the end of the month for the upcoming Heroes of the North: Missions comic book coming out this summer via Ardenn Entertainment. Which is where we remind you to order the book from your favourite comic book retailer!!! Hopefully we manage to make that deadline and get that wonderful story in the book!

The above was only posted on June 12th.  It would seem unusual that plans have changed that drastically in such a short time so perhaps the book will be available for purchase from their website before actually hitting stores in September.  In any event, it should be a good one!

Heroes of the North at Ottawa Comiccon

Ottawa is sometimes referred to as "the town that fun forgot".  I'll say this about the city though; when it decides to support something, it does it to the hilt.

Ottawa Comiccon VIP tickets sold out a couple of weeks before the event and Saturday passes around mid-week. The place was crawling with folks of all ages in costumes of all kinds on Sunday as well.  The Ottawa Citizen estimated 25,000 visitors for the two-day event.  That's fantastic.

Among my goals for this event (relevant to this blog) was to attend the Heroes of the North panel and booth.  Easy enough mission, and therefore accomplished.

The room was nearly full for the three-person panel in which we were told of how the Heroes of the North concept came about, the basics as to how the movies are produced and the backgrounds of its originators.  Teasers were shown for the various character origin stories, most (all?) of which can be viewed on their website now.  The spectators were enthusiastic and participative, which was good to see.

Speaking of good to see...

I joked on Twitter that 8-Ball above (Anderson Bradshaw) could have been a telling us all that the room is about to be filled with poisonous gas at that moment and I (and several others no doubt) would have had no idea.

Hornet (Marie-Claude Bourbonnais) was one popular lady at that place.  I wandered around a bit after the panel and noticed that things were significantly quieter at the HotN table.  Hornet gets back and in no time the aisle is clogged with guys wanting a picture with her.  Oh, and one lady telling her husband to watch where he's going.  Lol...

As one of the "founding fathers" of HotN, Bradshaw is a natural to discuss the project and is an entertaining speaker.  But the other gentleman on the panel, whom I believe was producer Christian Viel, gets the game ball for persevering despite being in the process of losing his voice.  Man's been busy these past couple of days!  I struggled to hear his name when he introduced the panel so if he is misidentified, I apologize.

They had a wide variety of items for sale at their booth such as prints, shirts, figurines, hats, photo books, etc.  It's probably accurate to say that HotN offer a greater selection of merchandise for their characters than Marvel does for Alpha Flight.  Go figure.

The dense crowd made getting a good picture of the HotN booth difficult, but I did get to sneak in shot of the zombot armour and the Canadian Shield's...shield.  No doubt the HotN will offer a far better view on their site soon, as they did for the Calgary convention.

It was a great time and everyone involved, whether organizer, exhibitor or visitor, should take a bow.  There's every reason to believe that this event became an instant tradition.  See you next year.

Heroes of the North Oscar Night

It's Oscar night! And I couldn't care any less!

Except that it's good set up to give a few props to the folks behind the Heroes of the North web series. I've been enjoying these for a while, checking in periodically.

They currently have 16 episodes up (of 20) in season one but we'll only be looking over the first 15 since they combine to create the first three storylines; Origins, Recruitment and Madame Doom.

I don't think they require much more introduction than what is offered up on their website, other than to point that the order changed at some point so we're working with the one offered up on this page now.

So much like the Oscars unload their less popular awards "off camera", let's get some of the feedback out in quick bullet point form.

• The French guys, the NFLQ, are hilarious. :)


• The music is cool throughout, but seemed particularly effective in episode seven as 8-Ball runs a gauntlet to whup on a prick named Baxter. From the moody "build up" at 5:10 to the fight scene against Steel Tiger, the tunes complement the visuals very well.


• I have no idea how difficult it is to produce, but Fleur de Lys' lightning effect is done quite well.

Now then, on to the "big" awards (by comparison only). Of course, this is all personal opinion and done for kicks.

Best actor: 8-Ball (Anderson Bradshaw)


Bradshaw does his best work in his character's origin story, episode three, as he's being offered the gig. His changes in facial expression (from about 2:30 to 2:38), when he's told about having killed a police officer, stand out. He's also entertaining in his back-and-forth with Nordik in episode seven when he feels he's doing all the heavy lifting.

Honourable mention to Black Terror (John Fallon) for his intensity. When he walks into a scene, you know an ass is about to be kicked with authority.

Best actress: Masquerade (Pia Metni)


Metni accomplishes an awful lot with just a raised eyebrow. She does a terrific job in episode 13 of first showing curiosity and disdain at Madame Doom's operation, then concern over Black Terror potentially being loose nearby. I'd hazard a guess that she has the deepest acting background and/or experience of any of the cast members. Edit: Her bio here seems to bear that out.

Honourable mention to Anne-Marie Losique as the previously-mentioned Madame Doom who is very entertaining as a cold, shallow, volatile fashionista. She's funny while still being frightening because of the suddenness and extremes of her losses of composure. Also to the young lady playing the teenage version of Nordik for getting everything across without dialogue.

Best episode: Canadian Shield
This is actually kind of tough. Most of what I enjoy is included in episodes seven and 13. But overall, I enjoyed episode six best. Perhaps ironically, I believe it's actually the first video they shot so let's be clear that I don't mean to indirectly suggest that work quality has decreased since. But six's battle scene is well executed and it ends on a obviously-significant cliffhanger. The aged video effect is a nice touch, and the scene of Shield running, firing his gun and blocking bullets at about 2:45 is quite cool. The episode mixes a lot of interesting components quite well.

This is a fun series and the enthusiasm shown by the folks involved is contagious. And we haven't even seen (in episodes) several of the characters that they promote, like Hornet, Acadia and Pacifica. They clearly have plenty more stories to tell and their use of multiple formats with which to tell them (diaries, magazine covers and photo albums as examples) is another entertaining aspect. They're obviously having a good time doing this and as such, I find them easy to get behind. More power to the HotN and see you at the Ottawa Comicon in May.