This week I would like to talk a little about Erik Larsen and his series Savage Dragon published by Image Comics. Some might only think
of Larsen as the guy who jumped ship from Marvel Comics (with six other
creators) in the early 90’s to form Image Comics. But I gotta tell you, there
is much more to Erik Larsen than meets the eye. I have been following Larsen on
Twitter for a year plus now and daily this man talks about comics in the way
that we all dream comics are, fun & exciting, full of beautiful art &
fantastic storytelling. Erik Larsen loves comics and it shows.
Recently Larsen published Savage Dragon #190. What makes
this issue so special, well Larsen not only published it in the standard comic
sized edit, but he also published it in a digest sized version. And the digest
size does not just contain the same pages shrunk down to an almost
unreadable size, but Larsen took the time and care to design each page in the
standard edition so that the panels could be reproduced at the same size in the
digest sized edition, just in a slightly different arrangement (see an example below). Oh and by the way, Savage Dragon #190 is also a great read, with some really cool art.
normal book page
digest book version of same page
This is not the first time that Larsen has done experiments
with the format of his books or story. In Savage Dragon #144 he designed a 121
panel story where each panel symbolizes a day in the life of the main
character. In issue #187 he did some experimenting with color. Instead of doing
the current realistic coloring style he used a more traditional flat color
style. He also told the story from the bad guys point of view. And if that was
not enough he used a traditional 6 panel grid to challenge his story telling
abilities. There are many other issues that Larsen has set other restrictions
on his storytelling. This guy is always up to challenge himself to improve, or
just try something fun in his comics.
Erik Larsen had become one of my idols in recent years. His
thoughts about comics, read through his Twitter feed, are a daily joy for me.
His experiments with the comic format, both in storytelling and production is
inspiring. But most of all you can tell that this guy is having a great time
creating comics and could not be happier working on his own character Savage
Dragon, which he has for the last 20 plus years and over 190 issues. If you
haven’t checked in on Savage Dragon lately, issue 190 would be a great place to
step in and see what is happening.
-Denny Riccelli
creates comics under the pen name ‘dennmann’ he currently publishes the
webcomic Cousin Harold and some mini-comics now and then, including Jenny
Spookawski Ghost Girl. He lives in Peoria, Arizona with his wife and 2 kids.
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