The Dude Speaks! His Comments on Thuneworld
With Thuneworld fully funded and sent to the printers, the Dude wants to look back on the epic odyssey, sharing his favorite pages and his thoughts on their production and result. For backers, look out for your copy soon!
Take it away, Mr. Rude!
"As I began my second foray as artist and writer of new Nexus material, many exciting and daunting challenges were assured to come about."
"This first new undertaking was in the form of a 100 pg. story, written and drawn by myself, taking elements from a story of several decades ago. These ideas came from writer Mike Baron, which were characters he invented named Gourmando and Gnosis, the ideas being based from fans urging to do our version of Marvel's Jack Kirby creations, Galactus and the Silver Surfer. I don't quite recall the thrust of Baron's original story.
"Decades later in 2015, while detecting the gem of a good idea within that story, I brought about recalling those characters and found a way to use them in the story I did the majority of the writing on; The Coming of Gourmando. I felt the current storyline didn’t match what I had envisioned, now leaving it up to me to make something.
"The production of these up-till-now 100 page hardcover books was a huge production undertaking, one completely new to myself and Jaynelle, the husband and wife team comprising Rude Dude Productions. Despite our best efforts, we saw not the slightest profit, rather putting us in the red by thousands of dollars. If there was ever a way to gauge how important continuing Nexus was for me and Jaynelle, it would be in that fact alone.
"Ironically, for me at least, having to create entirely new characters for Thuneworld is normally something most people would figure out ahead of time. But this was me writing, going by what felt right and natural despite rules dictating otherwise. This process was normally something I had to warm up to by at least breaking down the story into thumbnails, which one can see on the very first splash page.
"Several memorable thoughts and trials that I recall standing out on Thuneworld:
"Pg. 9. Mike Baron wrote this amazingly succinct 4 pg. reintroduction to Nexus originally for the Gourmando story Rude Dude produced before Thuneworld was published. We reprinted it here because of the long gap of fan inquiries complaining that no new Nexus stories were forthcoming. With some concern, even the comic book shops remained entirely clueless about these new offerings long after their release. No one seemed to remember much about Nexus other than it being a nostalgic act--part infuriating and part understandable in my mind.
"This 4 page recap of the Nexus origin is Baron's writing at his absolute apex. After hounding him about the script quality for over 15 years, reason (and exhaustion) finally saw the light. With everything about my future at stake, I had to move on."
"Pg. 14 through 17 is a continuation from the Gourmando story, as anyone would include to set the story up with what came before. Pg 18 continues the actual Thuneworld saga from there.
"What I recall mostly about this second, newly created 100 page story venture, was trying to cover every element in the story to make sense, something I was still getting adjusting to after Gourmando. The goal however was simple and straightforward to anyone attempting story coherence: to make Nexus as I remembered it, a book with flawless writing and the expected level of myself having to properly visualize the story."
"The process was as exhausting as anyone who's ever attempted such a project might relate. Jaynelle and I, mostly poor Jaynelle, wore ourselves ragged trying to cover every single perceived flaw in story or art. After going through it far too many times to maintain mutual sanity, we still somehow managed to completely omit the dialogue for pg. 48, a pivotal page in the story. Once corrected, this page had to be reprinted as intended with dialogue now intact and sent out with every issue from our converted garage that housed the entirety of Rude Dude."
Big thanks to the dude for his insight on these spectacular pages! Follow this blog and Rude Dude Production's social media accounts for updates on future projects and more!
