Webcomics are not made for serial storytelling. A lot of people are going to disagree with me on this point, but it’s my contention that if you don’t acknowledge that basic reality, you will not be able to successfully make a serial webcomic. Fact is, readers of webcomics don’t read every day (or every day [...]
The first thing you have to do with any new concept is generate story ideas. I had my basic idea: superheroes in a nursing home. I even had some of the characters worked out. But what to do with them? In the fall of 2006, I spent a few minutes jotting down whatever came to [...]
So, it’s 2006 and I’ve got story ideas, but they’re not better than gag-a-day stuff because they’re not connected to each other or to any big idea. I didn’t have anything to say, just gags. And that’s the key to serialization (for me): something to say. An idea like superheroes in a nursing home is [...]
One of the things I didn’t learn to do until Chapter 4 of the SuperFogeys was to break each Chapter down by strip. Before Chapter 4, I would write and draw a strip at a time, keeping in mind where I wanted to end up with the chapter and trying to make each strip as [...]
Once I’m confident that each strip will make a proper contribution to the larger whole of a chapter (and each chapter makes a proper contribution to the larger whole of the story), I can set the macro aside and focus on the micro: making the strip WORK. And what do I mean by WORK? I [...]
AND EVEN WHEN IT’S OVER, IT’S NOT OVER… The last thing I wanna mention is how difficult webcomics can make seeing your story as whole—even with tons of planning. I want to stress again how many times I’ve read back over a chapter I thought was pretty solid and realized it just didn’t flow right. [...]
When I was a kid, imagining I had superpowers, the power I dreamt about most often (aside from the proportional strength and agility of a spider) was super speed. For whatever reason, I was absorbed by the idea of being fast. (Ironically, I think my parents had the same preoccupation; I recall many evening hours [...]
Continuing our celebration of the 5th SuperFogeys Anniversary, here’s a poem my brother Tyler wrote up. Enjoy! You’re Just the Gal for Me My black may seem a little stale compared to blue and yellow Yet while a human spectacle, he’s not the proper fellow I love your shiny black and red, The way the [...]
Hey, did you know I like to write more than I like to draw? It’s true! Okay, so that’s a bit of an understatement. The first shot in my internal battle over whether or not I should continue drawing SuperFogeys was fired waaaaay back in December 2008 when I decided to post only one strip [...]
Well, today is the end of the big 5th Anniversary Celebration. I want to thank everyone who participated by lending their talents and showing their fandom with a chapter recap, a piece of fan art, or a short essay. I was blown away by the love and detail you all put into your efforts. With [...]
Sleep is precious to me. I’m an insomniac so when my eyes are shut and the world fades away, that’s a sacred time. I’m of a generally pleasant disposition, but if you wake me before it’s time to get up, I will rip your head off and stuff it down a toilet. Then I’ll go [...]
Hey all, I’ve got some exciting news today! The SuperFogeys was recently invited to join The Collective of Heroes, a webcomic collective that spotlights some of the greatest superhero webomics out there like Union of Heroes and Dynagirl! Check out the site and the announcement about SuperFogeys joining here! IN OTHER NEWS: My friend Ed [...]
ITEM! The Washington Post is looking for nominations for the best webcomics of 2011. The usual suspects are called out in the article–PVP, Hark! A Vagrant, Penny Arcade, xkcd, etc.–but maybe there’s room for an underdog? I dunno. If you think SuperFogeys is good enough to rank or you have another webcomic in mind as [...]
Didn’t think you guys would want to miss this one. Rob Barba over at Claude + Monet interviewed me for his first “Sci-Fi Saturdays,” in which he interviews a member of the creative community working in Sci-Fi. (I guess that means I do Sci-Fi! Who knew?) Rob asked some of the usual suspects like where [...]
It’s that time of year again when SuperFogeys takes a bit of time off and you get to step in to fill the gap! Now, we just had the 5th Anniversary Celebration. You all were fiercely participatory during that time and I couldn’t have been more pleased with the chapter recaps. Because of that, I [...]
Because I’m never one to shy away from calling myself to task (it’s healthy!) and writing a Top 10 BEST SuperFogeys moments would be incredibly self-serving, here are my picks for the Top 10 WORST SuperFogeys Moments (excluding SuperFogeys Origins–that’s a whole different list). We’re talking bad strips, embarrassing creative choices, mistakes, bad art, etc. [...]
Hey Everybody, Today marks the launch of my new website, brockheasley.com. I’ve been heading towards this for a while now, even if I didn’t realize it. In this day and age, if you’re an author–you need a website. I always saw this site as my hub, but I just don’t think it makes such sense [...]
It was recently put across to me that Chapter One of The SuperFogeys, “Insane Romance From Hell,” is the number one barrier SF has for attracting new readers. I didn’t disagree. This same person told me that, in their opinion, SuperFogeys is easily as good if not better than anything DC or Marvel are putting [...]
Which is better for webcomics, long chapters or short chapters? I realize not all webcomics use the chapter system, but for those that do (like SuperFogeys), which is best? I think about this often. The average SuperFogeys chapter is about 30 strips, but some have been much shorter, and at least one is twice that [...]
We are now officially in a brand new era of The SuperFogeys. Jerry and Spy Gal are married. I thought it might be fun to take a look back at their romance from Spy Gal’s perspective. How did she get here? Which interactions were key? Call this The Annotated SuperFogeys: Spy Gal’s Perspective. The first [...]
Hey all, how’s it going? I’m writing this post 20 minutes before you all see the 101st strip by SuperFogeys Artist Marc Lapierre. That’s amazing. As most of you know, Marc saved SuperFogeys from certain doom after I decided to shut down the comic–and leave all storylines unfinished–about one year ago. Just to give you [...]
Hey everybody, just came across this excellent review of The SuperFogeys this week and, needless to say, Marc and I are extremely flattered by the high praise. It’s been a long time since we’ve seen a proper review–and I think this is the first one since Marc took over art duties. Big thanks to Caitlin [...]
We here at SuperFogeys Central are pleased to announce the Kickstarter Campaign to support the creation of The SuperFogeys Sourcebook & Adventure Game. This is something we’ve been working on for months now, in conjunction with respected game developer Team Frog Studios. Back in April, the Team Frog guys approached me to ask if we’ve [...]
This week is the big launch of the Kickstarter Campaign for the SuperFogeys Sourcebook and Adventure Game. Follow this link to check out the campaign, and here’s my blog post on the whole thing with details on how this whole thing got started and what it means for SuperFogeys fans. This is big and it’s [...]
Hi there. Can we talk for a second? Cool. It’s funny. The sixth anniversary of the SuperFogeys flew by last month and I barely noticed it. I have so much fun working on the strip that I forget about stuff like that. Just creating the SuperFogeys is its own reward, one I’m only too happy [...]
It’s that time of year again when SuperFogeys takes a bit of time off and you get to step in to fill the gap! You guys really came out in a big way to support SF this year. From the last minute guest strips we needed over the summer to the Kickstarter, I want to [...]
Hey all, great, short new interview with Marc here. He talks about why he decided to work on SuperFogeys, what makes SF different from other webcomics and hints at the future of his own webcomic, Spooky Doofus. Check it out!
Hey all, sorry for the frustration of late with the website. I’m not entirely clear on what happened to cause the downtime and the subsequent issues we’re having with access, but I think we’re close to having it licked. One thing we’ve done already is move to a new server. Soon, we’ll be making a [...]
The SuperFogeys were created on September 22nd, 2006 off of a suggestion from Tad Hansen, my fake internet friend, that I “do something stupid like a comic about superheroes in a nursing home.” Three days later I posted the first strip as part of a five day experiment to see if could do a daily [...]
Even though we’re taking a small break as we gear up for Chapter 19 (still tentatively titled “The Man Who Sold the World”), last week I did used the SuperFogeys Fanpage on Facebook to do a little retrospective on the “00″ strip–100, 200, 300 and so on. We drop all kinds of cool little stuff [...]
Okay, I’m not entirely sure what to make of this (is it legal? is it not?), but a commenter linked me to it and I had to share because it’s, basically, very cool. Check out… SuperFogeys in RUSSIAN! Near as I can tell, this is an ongoing project with new posts every day. The amount [...]
UPDATE! This morning I heard back from the unauthorized Russian translator of SuperFogeys and here’s what I found out: • Even though there’s 231 pages/strips posted on the site as of today (they’re halfway through the Society of Heroes Origin and just started Chapter 7 – Visiting Day), the first posting was on July 18 [...]
Hey, everybody. I’m really, REALLY excited about this news–SuperFogeys just launched on the premiere digital comics store Comixology! SuperFogeys has been available digitally on mobile before, but, unfortunately, the quality of the presentation just wasn’t there. Comixology, however, provides the very best digital presentation possible. These are high resolution pages–much higher than you’ll find on [...]
Just a quick note here to let everyone know that Issue 2 of SuperFogeys (Containing Chapter 3 “The Techno Shuffle” and Chapter 4 “Dictator Tot’s Revenge”) is now 99 cents on Comixology! That’s down from $1.99, a savings of 50%! If you’re like me, 99 cents is kind of the no-brainer price. I, personally, will [...]
Hey everybody, our Patreon has been up for about a week and a half now (you can see the video all about it right here: SuperFogeys Patreon Video (sorry, can’t embed)) and, true to my word, I’ve been posting to it like crazy. While we do have a $0.50 level in which you get our [...]
THIRD UPDATE 5/11/15: In case you missed it in the blog, SuperFogeys will be moving to a 3-times-a-week schedule when we return in June to make things a bit easier on our patrons. Also, SuperFogeys issue 3 is now available on Comixology! SECOND UPDATE 5/5/15: Whoa! Just a few hours after we hit our first [...]
Many of you have been asking about this for a while now and I’m pleased to report that the next issue of The SuperFogeys just went live on Comixology! Issue 3 collects both Chapter 5 “The Redemption of Dr. Rocket” and Chapter 6 “Funeral for a Frenemy.” Chapter 6 has actually NEVER before been collected [...]
Wow, just a week later and Issue 4 is up on Comixology! This issues features SF Chapters 7-9, including the big, BIG reveal that turns everything you thought you knew about SuperFogeys on its head. These chapters have NEVER been collected in print, so this is a great way to refresh or try SF out [...]
Three weeks in a row with new SF Comixology issues. How cool is that? Just 99 cents… for now. That WILL change soon. That means you could get all 5 issues of SF on Comixology for just $4 (first issue is free). You can’t argue with that price. You can try, but you would fail.
We’re just five days away from SF’s big return for Chapter 20, “Crossing Worlds,” but, as those who are already our patrons on Patreon know, we’ve been revealing all sorts of stuff already. I imagine some of you are wary of supporting us on Patreon. After all, SF has always been free. Why should you [...]
Woo-hoo! 6 issues of SuperFogeys are now available for your reading enjoyment on Comixology! The 6th issue is a big one as it contains Chapter 12, “Jackpot!” I consider Chapters 1-12 the first half of the SuperFogeys saga, so it’s great having all of them up and available as a group. The price of issue [...]
Greetings, SuperFans! I’ve been getting lots of messages recently asking what’s up with SF and if it’s even coming back. Let me settle that question straight away… YES. It’s coming back. But it’s coming back a little more slowly than either you or I would like. Fact is, Marc and I are in very different [...]
Man oh man. We did not intend to be gone so long! We’ve never taken a break like this. NEVER. A full year. Wow. We hope to never do it again. Why have we been gone so long? C’mon, you don’t really care. You just want to know when SuperFogeys is coming back. Well, I’ll [...]
Hey SuperFans! I know it’s been a long time, but I wanted to pop in and assure you that work on SF Chapter 22, “The Dastards” is in full swing! The biggest reason for the delay is simply that Marc wants to get a BIG buffer in the hopper so we can minimize if not [...]
Hey SuperFans! We’ve been hard at work on the next chapter and I’m pleased to report Marc has done some level of work on EVERY SINGLE episode of Chapter 23 (minus one) and things are looking really good for a late July launch. The current plan is to give you all of Chapter 23, then [...]
Hey everybody, this is just a quick note to let you know that you can now buy copies of The SuperFogeys Vol. 1: Inaction Heroes directly from the publisher right here! This is the print version of the same book most of you got, from the print run YOU helped fund. In other big news…the [...]
