2024-W47 EOW Report

Highlights This Week

• Rough week energy wise. Despite coffee, was yawning nonstop by 11AM, and needed to crash on the couch. It’s me trying to do too much again. I know that. But I got another newsletter issue for Client B done and shipped off. I onboarded an employee for Client A. Unfortunately, on the flipside, it looks like we may end up closing PHC. Finally, American Thanksgiving this week. Will be more quiet for me to do deep work.
• The eldest passed his driver license road test on the first try. Wife was not expecting that. I was neutral. But that also means my insurance just went up $700 with a new driver. This weekend was the first time all three went out at the same time. So much chauffeuring and logistics.
• Christmas Tree is up.

Project Status Dashboard

The following are ongoing fiction writing projects broken down to what stage they’re in. Legend in footnote¹

Did another zTHB. This one with A Witch’s Guide to Escape (2018) by Alix E. Harrow.

Four Thousand Weeks

Another week where I don’t have many notes. Just general exhaustion. Bad sleep. Insufficient sleep. Attempting too much. It’s going to be like this until the end of this year. Conversations with LJK and Olivia i/r/t fiction continue to revolve around why I’m not writing.

Book Reading

• A lot of re-reading and writing. Read the miniseries Green Lantern Corps: Recharge (2005) again. Really validated what I love about work-family stories. We have a subplot where a renegade is asked to mentor. We have a subplot where someone is reluctant to join the force. We have a subplot where opposing rivals are asked to see past the decades-old mass murdering of each other to fight together. We have a subplot where fucking SPACE SPIDERS are creating a subspace web-network of black holes to take over the world. We have subplot of the guardians being shady-as-fuck and pulling so many strings. It’s just the kind of story I love.
• I’ve decided to drop Wolverine, and I’m not going to bother giving the Milestone Universe a chance. But of course, I had to question why and dissected the fuck out of both issues on a second read. So i/r/t to Wolverine, here’s my theory. I think what makes the loner-renegade character arc works is that they genuinely want to be part of a family, but are always constantly leaving. That’s what creates those emotional moments. They leave because they don’t think they’re good enough, they leave because they think they might end up huriing their found family, they leave because they think they have to take care of it themselves, they leave because they did hurt them, they leave because they can’t forgive themselves, they leave because they want something from them they know they can’t have (Jean Grey). The loner-renegade arc only works when they are around others. And when they leave, they invariably go find another found-family, sometimes toxic, sometimes wrong, sometimes too good and they can’t deal with it. This is the story for Don Draper, for Raphael, for Wolverine. And what we’re getting from this run is… a lot of running around in the snow hunting and being hunted. There are no layers. There’s no arc. Nightcrawler came by and told him to put on a suit. OK? He has to save this kid who turned into a Wendigo. OK? Cyber set him up to take the fall for some murders and there’s a gold version of adamantium. OK? It doesn’t show how Wolverine is loyal to his found-family and wants the best for them, but punishes himself by leaving them. That’s his arc, over and over again, and it works every time. So that’s why I’m dropping Wolverine.
• And i/r/t to the Milestone Universe. OK. Wow. There’s a column of fine print to catch me up. And then “cool things just happen”. But I don’t know the characters, I don’t know the stakes, I don’t know their arcs. And there’s no voice to guide me. No captions of inner thought that tell me what they’re going through, where they came from, the past they’re struggling with, their perspective on the current situation and why it matters. It was scene after scene of “cool”. Alva kills the boss/CEO on some private jet? Then Rocket prevents someone from getting recruited? Then Hardware and Rocket fight, then Alva recruits some tech genuius, then Rocket stops some heist, only to get transported to some different dimension to be recruited by The Shadow Cabinet. It’s all very cinematic and cool, but I have no idea why any of it matters. Now contrast that with Ayodele’s Storm #2 this week. It just knows what it’s doing. It’s confident in it’s voice, it’s confident in establishing the stakes - both the ARC (Storm’s sick after telling the truth about Oklahoma) and the PROG (pirates are attempting to take a cargo ship). There are layers to the characters. Doctor Daye has a clear reason why he won’t help the X-Men, playing on Storm’s biases. Or contrast with Segura’s Question #1, a character I’ve never met before. I know exactly what Renee Montaya is dealing with within the first few pages. She’s an alcoholic. She lost her job on the GCPD. She also just got recruited by the JLU, so she’s got to do her job. There’s something going on on the Watchtower. She has a CLEAR VOICE. And that voice shares her inner struggle, past, and current stakes with us.
• This week’s pulls: Phoenix, Catwoman, Ultimate Spider-Man, and Exceptional X-Men continue to have great character writing… but it was The Power Fantasy this week that was so heavy. It wasn’t necessarily a new plot twist I haven’t seen before, but it was executed well. How do you keep a sentient nuclear warhead appeased and calm so it doesn’t blow up? Really loved Moon Dogs too. Yes, the social commentary was on the nose, but I’m OK with that. In fact, I invite and enjoy it.
• And I’m back on Geoff John’s 2005 Green Lantern run. Want to get through it all.

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