Why You Need To Get John Haynes Dark Succubus

BLOCK MODEL SHEET FROM JOHN HAYNES: THE MAN WITH NOTHING TO LOSE

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Had an hour and sketched out a model sheet of The Block, the villain from the upcoming John Haynes: The Man With Nothing To Lose.

Marcus Jeffries, aka The Block is inspired by the late rapper Notorious B.I.G. aka Biggie Smalls. And just like Biggie he’s HUGE. Block is seven feet tall and six hundred fifty pounds. He’s a whole head and a half taller than John Haynes who is 5”10 and two hundred pounds. Breaking out of Rikers, he’s willing to sacrifice everything to get revenge against John Haynes, the man who got him locked up in the first chapter of The Man Who Rules The World. 

For Block’s outfit I decided to fuse hip-hop and comic books together. I drew inspiration from Bullet, a bad guy from the Awesome Ann Nocenti/John Romita Jr. Daredevil run from the late 1980’s. I loved how simple and sleek his costume was, an all black suit with one line. Minimalist like the 1980s, and I thought that design work well with the black track suits rappers like RUN DMC used to wear in the 80s. With some Jordans and a gold chain Block was ready to hit the streets as the irresistible force that becomes an immovable object and a motive to murder The Man Who Rules The World.

This isn’t the first time I’ve drawn influence from the Ann Nocenti JR/JR run of Daredevil. In Spellbound Matilda Crowley is sees Typhoid Mary as her hero and is inspired to become more assertive and find her voice by her character. And Typhoid Mary is the inspiration for the “Mad” in her Goth name Mad Matilda. It’s a great run of comics, and I highly recommend you pick them up!

In the Luke Cage Hero For Hire #14 homage Concept, Block and John’s outfits are supposed to contrast each other. Block is a man stuck in the past still trying to hold onto memories of when he ran The Block and controlled the projects. John’s outfit represents him as the common man. So as John fights Block he’s supposed to represent the everyday brother fighting against the thugs in the street to protect his woman E’steem and protect his community.

I’m Hoping to get John Haynes: The Man With Nothing To Lose out either Fall 2019 or Spring 2020. And I’m pondering putting TWO covers on this one!

you can get the latest John Haynes book: John Haynes: Dark Succubus  in Paperback or #KindleUnlimited June 18!

John Haynes: Dark Succubus Cover By Mike Williams

Just got the cover for John Haynes: Dark Succubus from Mike Williams….And it’s AWESOME! 

Mike has done an AMAZING job with this cover! It reminds me of those awesome 1980s horror movie posters for films like Friday The 13th, A Nightmare on Elm Street, Evil Dead, The Stuff and all those awesome horror movie posters I used to see at the video store. 

The mood is surreal and dreamlike, I love the composition of the figures and how they contrast each other. John’s defensive body language tell the story of a man who is conflicted about making a choice and Selene’s wicked smile tells the story of a she-demon who thinks she’s going to benefit as the result of a dirty deal that’ll be a raw one for The Man Who Rules The World. 

I’d like to take a minute to thank all the people who donated to the Patreon and Paypal, if it wasn’t for your ongoing support I wouldn’t be able to hire great artists like Mike Williams to design the covers for the books of the John Haynes series and I wouldn’t be able to get these books to the marketplace. 

John Haynes: Dark Succubus will be available in Paperback and for pre-order on Kindle this weekend. And Available on Kindle and Kindle Unlimited June 18th. And you can get the first book in the John Haynes series: A Conversation With Death and the two previous John Haynes books The Man Who Rules The World and The Temptation of John Haynes on Amazon.com in paperback and Kindle formats too! 

John Haynes: The Man With Nothing to Lose “B” Cover Concept

Sketched up another concept cover For John Haynes: The Man With Nothing To Lose.

This concept for this one is inspired by Billy Graham’s Luke Cage Hero For Hire #14’s cover. I loved the action in that cover because it was bold, dynamic and it really POPPED. It’s the kind of cover I believed would get old readers and new ones to pick up a John Haynes series book online. 

While I paid homage to Graham’s cover in my concept I changed some elements to fit John’s story for today. This one is set in the yard of John’s old junior high school in The Bronx. It’s nighttime and E’steem has been rendered powerless by the Chains of Hephestus. She watches helplessly as her man John throws down with The Block in a schoolyard brawl for his life against a former childhood bully who wants to become the stumblingblock that crushes The Man Who Rules The World. I wanted to put the Third Avenue housing projects in the far background, but I can’t draw that well.

As I changed the story of Graham’s cover to fit John’s, I changed Block’s composition in my concept because Big Ben’s composition is kind of wonky. I did my best to get him to look like the late Biggie Smalls, (who The Block is inspired by) but my drawing skills are…limited. His track suit is inspired by the Daredevil villain Bullet. I gave Block him some Jordans and a dookie rope to make him look like the kind of dope dealers who used to run the block back in the day.

I’m still figuring out which cover will be featured on John Haynes: The Man With Nothing To Lose. The feedback for both cover concepts on social media has been incredibly strong, and I’d love to pay homage to a Legendary Black comic artist with the Billy Graham concept and I’d also love to see my UK Avengers concept I posted a few weeks ago. Maybe I’ll offer two editions, one regular and a variant cover. Or Maybe I’ll offer one of the concepts as a pin-up inside the paperback and the eBook.

I’m hoping to have John Haynes: The Man With Nothing to Lose available as part of the SJS DIRECT 2020 catalog. I can’t wait to share this one with readers, it’s an action packed story that’s just like the classic Luke Cage comics of the 70s!

Robert Pattinson As Batman- WTF?

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Robert Pattinson is gonna be playing Batman in Matt Reeves’ The Batman.

Damn. Just Damn.

Run that through your head: Robert Pattinson, Mr Twilight, Mr Sparkly vampire is who WB executives thought was the best choice to portray The Dark Knight.

NO. HELL NO.

Seriously, what are these WB executives on?  Fetanyl? Cause they got to be on some strong shit to cast this dude as Batman.

Just when you thought WB and DC Comics were getting their shit together with the movies, they fall right back into the gutter. We saw a glimmer of hope for great DC Superhero movies with Wonder Woman, Aquaman and Shazam! that captured the heart and spirit of DC Comic books but the recent teaser for The Joker and this announcement for The Batman has me wondering if WB/DC will ever stop being their own worst enemy. 

I swear WB and DC comics are just like a pair of crackheads. They show everyone signs that they’re gonna clean themselves up and start making steps in that direction, then….They wind up back on that stuff again.

Shit.

WB/DC Comics casting Robert Pattinson as Batman is one of the WORST decisions I’ve seen since they decided to make Halle Berry play Catwoman or the retarded decisions to cast Jesse Eisenberg or Jon Cryer as Lex Luthor. This dude doesn’t look anything like Bruce Wayne and doesn’t have any of Bruces’ debonair presence or Batman’s dark demeanor.

Worse, he has the acting range of a pushbroom left leaning on the side of a wall. His performance in the Twilight movies was laughable, and he definitely doesn’t have the acting ability of a Michael Keaton or a Christian Bale. Both of those actors understood nuance, something that is essential to playing Batman and gave us the chivalrous qualities of a Knight in addition to the Dark.

I’ve been hoping that Warner Brothers and DC Comics would get its shit together since 1997 when Batman & Robin almost destroyed the Superhero film genre. But it seems like they just can’t stop tripping over their own feet. It’s bad enough that the studio that invented the Superhero movie With Superman in 1978  and reinvented it with the Dark Knight Trilogy lost the superhero film wars to Marvel Studios in the late 2010s and haven’t  been to make any serious efforts to regain their crown as they attempted to build a DC Cinematic universe to compete With the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Sadly, this decision to cast Pattinson as Batman shows that they still haven’t learned their lessons about the mistakes they made regarding how they make superhero films, and will continue making terrible films well into the mid 21^st Century.  

I really wish Warner Brothers could get itself together. They have the greatest catalog of superhero characters, and they have all the resources they need to make some really great superhero movies. But what they need is someone with a vision and a direction to get their Superhero films on the right track the way Paul Dini and Bruce Timm with their Animation division. Because if they had that visionary they could start working towards giving Kevin Fiege and Disney a run for his money and let them know the MCU ain’t the only superhero movie game in town.

Graphic Novel Patreon Campaign

If  10,000 people donate $1 or $2  to the Patreon I can raise the money to publish my first comic in no time! And if I can raise the funds, all the Patrons would get a FREE digital copy of the Isis graphic novel!