Walter Koenigs Things_to_come

Howard lee (order #5592814)














THINGS TO COME, THE GRAPHIC NOVEL

Book one: Ressurection

By

Walter Koenig

Note: can we change the SHAPE of the FRAMES, and, perhaps, one other physical detail in the layout of the book to distinguish time and location from the first part of the story (comic book pages 1-4) to the second part (comic book pages 5-19) and then back again to the third part(comic book pages 20 – 23)?

PAGE 1

PANEL 1

CLOSE on the face of a giant mutant bat with fangs, looking menacing, as it flies FORWARD filling the FRAME.

PANEL 2

The PANEL expands to show the body of the creature. There is a SECOND head buried in its chest just below its neck. Its talons are OBSCURED by the bottom edge of the FRAME LINE. Its flight trajectory is the same –COMING STRAIGHT AT US–and so is the expression of violence in both its faces.

PANEL 3

LARGER PANEL. SAME physical action as before but in MID-GROUND to reveal that the creature flies through a THICK MUSTARD COLORED SKY carrying a naked toddler in its talons gripped by the shoulders. Its sex is not identified but it’s obviously male. His hair is blonde and wavy and quite long for someone so young. His face is very pale, almost white and his body is thin with ribs outlined. The fingernails on the slight limbs are long and pointed. There is little expression in his deep set eyes and solemn face, certainly neither joy nor fear have a home there. Is he in a state of vacant eyed stupor, is he resigned to some terrible fate, is he already half dead? The malevolent appearing creature carrying the limp child makes us assume the worst.


PANEL 4

ESTABLISHING a very tall sheer cliff in the mountains of Tibet and the DISTANT FIGURE of the bat landing at a cave mouth near the cliff top and releasing the toddler from its grip.

PANEL 5

CLOSE on the child’s INEXPRESSIVE FACE as he watches the bat fly away.

PANEL 6

FROM BEHIND as the toddler turns to face the dark somewhat ominous opening in the cliff before him.

PAGE 2

PANEL 1

COLLAGE: TWO small panels in one WITHOUT FRAME LINES. 1. FROM BEHIND as the na-ked toddler stumbles unsteadily down a narrow, dimly lit cave tunnel about five feet high. IN THE BACKGROUND, ancient carvings of horned animals and horses. (check Google – The Rock Art of Lake Namtso – Robert A. Hefrner)register on the walls. 2. CLOSE on his face, wide eyed but passive. More light plays across it as he arrives at an open area. He is look-ing at something before him.

PANEL 2

LARGER. POV: the bodies of six people lay on the ground. They are all dying, savaged by the poisoned air but not yet dead. There is a haze of mustard colored cloud hanging at the top of the cave ceiling. A woman in her mid-twenties, skeletal and diseased, barely able to hold her head up, reaches out to him with one feeble hand from the collection of bodies. This is MIA, identifiable by the scarf she wears.

PANEL 3

The toddler cuddles up in her arms tight to her neck. Mia wears a faint smile of content-ment. Under other circumstances, this would be a scene of nurturing. Under these circum-stances, there is something grotesque in the juxtaposition of woman and child.

PANEL 4Howard lee (order #5592814)

PANEL 4

CLOSE on the toddler’s open mouth displaying two sharp fangs on each side as he sinks his teeth into Mia’s neck. The expression on her face is of fear and horror.

PANEL 5

Mia has reached over and caught the toddler’s arm. Almost incidentally, the birthmark of a torch is visible there. IN THE FOREGROUND, in sharp focus, her fingernails are seen em-bedded in his wrist.

PAGE 3

PANEL 1

Mia’s eyes are closed. Is she dead? The child looks “healthier”. ”There is some color in his face. He leans over her stroking her hair. Blood drips from his wrist on to her mouth.

PANEL 2

Mia’s eyes flutter open as droplets of blood slip between her lips.

PANEL 3

Mia, in the BACKGROUND now conscious, watches as the toddler drinks from an OLD WOMAN propped against a cave abutment. The Woman holds the lifeless hand of her OLD MAN husband beside her. INSERT Mia’s face watch-ing benignly.

PANEL 4

LONG RECTANGULAR FRAME. Mia drinks from the Old Man at the RIGHT BACKGROUND EDGE

while the toddler drinks from SHRONE, a red haired scar faced man who would resist if he could, at the FOREGROUND RIGHT EDGE. He appears to be furious. Set up diagonally this way, the space between them is an area cov-ered in bodies scattered on the ground.


PANEL 5

In the BACKGROUND the Old Woman props CONSTANTINE , a seventeen year old boy, in her arms as she drains his blood. In the FOREGROUND, MIA (who is beginning to look a little better) stares into the eyes of BENEDICT . He is a man of forty with an aquiline nose and sharp facial planes made deeper and more hollow by starvation. She smiles wanly at him, the sharp double row of incisors visible. Too weak to move, he stares back grimly at her. He knows she’s going to take his blood.

PAGE 4

PANEL 1 FULL PAGE

The setting is dark and ominous. People are scattered everywhere in couples and groups engaged in an orgy of sensual vampirism against the background of a cave that is reminis-cent of Dante’s Inferno. In other words, the acts of bloodletting are deeply arousing (not violent) but the design of the scene tells us that mortal sin is being committed. Those pres-ent are about forty in number.

Note: Can the following full page, in some way, replicate the struc-ture of the preceding full page? In other words, even though the images on both pages are totally different could there be a design sense that is identifiably similar? Bad example: if the images were laid out to form a “Z” on one page, could they also be laid out the same way on the second page and, to the astute reader, be recog-nized? The writer intends to consciously draw parallels between the two worlds throughout the story.








Walter Koenigs Things_to_come

Entertainment & Humor

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larger panel

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naked toddler

toddler cuddl

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