Bad Machinery

THE GIANT DAYS SELF-PUBLISHED ARCHIVE IS BACK UP!

FROM GIANT DAYS: SNOOKER COULD BE BETTER

The Giant Days x Batman special has been discussed here before. I wrote a pitch for it when Boom were publishing Lumberjanes/Gotham Academy, my editor thought I was joking and never passed it along. I don’t think they would have published it anyway, because it was HALF a joke, but only half.

But the reason I have selected this page from it is that almost exactly a year after I drew it myself, this happened at the World Snooker Championships:

While I do not believe that my comic was responsible to Just Stop Oil filling the Crucible Theatre, mid-match, with chalk dust, no one can say for sure that my comic wasn’t responsible, as life imitated art in the dustiest way imaginable.

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I am frequently asked if I will bring Giant Days back, or if we can see what the ladies are up to after university. I’m not averse to making the occasional new special, but it will only ever be a trip back for a trifle like this, not forward. I worked up a follow-up series which had various titles – PLAY HOUSE, FIXER-UPPER – and like many attempts to extend something beyond its natural end, it felt almost profoundly depressing. I got to finish Giant Days on my own terms, and you don’t get that opportunity very often. Comics these days, like political careers, often end in failure.

I had another special – SAVAGE SWORD OF SUSAN, lined up for after my ill-fated Conan story. It is still nominally on the board, for the next time I want to spend time with Esther, Susan and Daisy. Keep your fingers crossed.

NEXT WEEK: MEMORIES OF BOBBINS DOT HORSE