FRIDAY DIVERSIONS: Raggedy Ass Monster Manual

It's been a trying week, so I am feeling a little more fragmented than usual. Here are some interesting links well worth following.

RAGGEDY ASS MONSTER MANUAL
New Zealand-based artist Scrap Princess (who I've posted about here, who was the inspiration for my foray into illustration the Slaad from the Dungeons & Dragons book Fiend Folio and who sent me these laceratingly wonderful Nazgul drawings...





...has so much energy and drive it terrifies me. She runs several blogs, all of which are so worth your time. There is the Monster Manual Sewn From Pants, which is self-explanatory, there is her Kludge Witchery, described as "totems of an automated machine blindly aping sorcery," and there is now a Tumblr titled Raggedy Ass Monster Manual where she is posting her drawings of the monsters from that book. Follow it, heart every post, and be transported.

MEDUSA by MARNIE GALLOWAY
The very multi-talented Marnie Galloway debuted a new mini-comic at last weekend's Toronto Comics Arts Festival titled Medusa. I found it surprisingly powerful and phenomenally beautiful and fortunately Marnie has a few print copies left. You can preview the entire thing at her site here and you can buy a copy of it, as well as many other delightful prints and comics, in her Etsy shop. I can't resist sharing a small preview image...



ALBUM OF DINOSAURS by TOD McGOWEN and ROD RUTH
I LOVED this book when I was young! I had not thought about it in quite some time, but somehow I stumbled across this blog post at The Haunted Closet featuring the books and many of the incredible illustrations it contained. So good to finally have an artist, Rod Ruth, to associate with those images! It's long out of print, but it doesn't look like copies should be too hard to find. Take a look at that post if you have fond childhood memories of dinosaurs. Here is the cover.



GIANT GOD WARRIOR APPEARS
I'm about to start reading Hayao Miyazaki's Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind for the very first time, and I am quite excited. I was looking around online a bit to see if I could find any information to give me some context for the manga, and I discovered that just recently Studio Ghibli director Higuchi Shinji created a short, terrifying live-action / CGI hybrid film showing a giant God Warrior, a being from the manga, descending on and ultimately laying waste to Tokyo. This is intriguing because in the manga, the God Warriors are from the distant past, and are directly connected to the massive global apocalypse which created the world that Nausicaä and the other humans live in now. So this seems to be a way to take a look into the past which may be our own future. The 8 minute film's narration and text is entirely in Japanese, but it is so well done that it is worth watching for the visuals alone. Check it out near the bottom of this Collider.com article.



ELECTRICAL BANANA
The always-fantastic site Sci-Fi-O-Rama has a well written and lushly illustrated review of the recent art book Electrical Banana: Masters of Psychedelic Art in this post. A long overdue appraisal of some of the best and most visionary practitioners of psychedelic art, the book covers Heinz Edelmann, Martin Sharp, Dudley Edwards, Marijke Koger, Mati Klarwein, Tadanori Yokoo, and one of my all time favorites, Keiichi Tanaami. Click over to that post for much more.



PORPOR BOOKS BLOG
I've been visiting the PorPor Books blog for some time now, but I keep forgetting to mention it here. I'm finally fixing that. While I am not sure of the name of the blogger, he does an admirable job posting reviews of classic sci fi and fantasy novels, old issues of Heavy Metal, comics from Eerie and Creepy and much more. The blogger explains the title PorPor Books as "a derogatory term my brother used, to refer to the SF and Fantasy paperbacks and comic books I eagerly read from the late 60s to the late 80s." It's a regular destination for me, and if you like any of what I described, you should visit as well. You'll see a great deal of wonder, like this...



HOW SHE SEES THEM
Artist and animator Jessica Knights, who seems to go by the name Invisible Arm online, has a Tumblr of the same name where she posted a few of her drawings of the characters from Mervyn Peake's Gormenghast trilogy. These are utterly unlike Peake's own drawings, and very different from how I have always seen the characters, but quite remarkable and fascinating. Here is her vision of the chef of Gormenghast, Abiatha Swelter, and you can see a few more at this link...



THE CANBERRA SKYWHALE
Thanks to my good friend artist Tom Williams for passing this along to me. This link will take you to an article describing artist Patricia Piccinini's soft sculpture titled The Canberra Skywhale, a "fanciful, breast-studded lighter-than-air cetacean." It's actually very impressive, somewhat disturbing, and very very curious.

"A mass of yellow grapes, blood-flecked and irregular-sized..."

I had been thinking about my last trip to Yellow Springs, Ohio and all of the amazing old sci-fi and fantasy paperbacks I had picked up at Dark Star Book so last week I decided another trip back was in order. The shop has a rather large black cat, and my wife is shockingly allergic to nearly all animals, so every trip through those stacks feels in some ways like a treasure hunt with a time limit. That actually adds to the excitement. This trip, I spent more time than usual browsing through the back-issue comic bins, and yet again I found some real gems. Check it.

The magazine-sized Marvel Super Special comic adaptations for both The Dark Crystal and Krull. Interestingly enough, both were drawn by Brett Blevins, but the difference in quality is notable. The art in The Dark Crystal is fairly lush, calling to mind early Mike Ploog in some ways, and quite beautiful. Krull on the other hand looks rushed, rough, and almost mailed in. The characters, especially Prince Colwyn, look drastically different from page to page and even panel to panel. It's awful. Krull is one of my wife's favorite movies though, and I have come to love it as well, so we picked this up out of morbid curiosity.



I was initially drawn to this by the absolutely grandiose and ludicrous title and cover image. Marvel Preview Presents MAN-GOD. What in the world could this be? Again, it was magazine-sized, like the Marvel Super Specials, but I had never heard of Marvel Preview Presents and I was a little surprised that Marvel, even in the 70s, would risk calling a character Man-God. When I bought this, I barely noticed the additional cover blurb about this being based on the book Gladiator by Philip Wylie but once I got it home and started flipping through it, the connections became much clearer. Gladiator was written in 1930 and tells the story of a scientist who invents a serum to "improve" humanity by granting people the proportionate strength of an ant and the leaping ability of a grasshopper. The scientist injects his pregnant wife with the serum and their son, Hugo Danner, is born with great speed, strength and invulnerability. It has been widely conjectured that this novel was the inspiration for the creation of Superman although there is no evidence that Siegel and Schuster ever read the book. This should be a curious read.



The Uncanny X-Men #156 is the first comic book I ever bought with my own money. It has great nostalgic value for me and I was excited to see it. I haven't read it in years. More on this soon.



I don't know much at all about this mini-series other than dimly remembering the name and how I always thought it was stupid. I hadn't realized it was drawn by Paul Gulacy though, so I decided to dig in.



By the end of college, I had largely dropped out of reading comics. While I enjoyed the work of Dan Clowes and Los Bros Hernandez to a degree, I was never as wild about them as most of my peers were. I still craved the wonder and fantasy that comics could deliver, but I found that completely lacking in contemporary superhero comics as well as the black and white indie books. Still, every now and then, something really unique would catch my interest and keep me connected, even if tenuously, to the world of comics. Sam Kieth's The Maxx was one of those books, as was Hellboy. I also remember this one, Oink by John Mueller. The mini-series I remember better was called Oink: Heaven's Butcher and I think this one, Oink: Blood and Circus was a sequel. Both contained gorgeous, fully painted art, similar in some ways to a rougher Simon Bisley. I'm anxious to see how well this holds up.

EDIT: Looks like Mueller has a web site with all sorts of art, info about Oink and a blog as well. Good to see this!



I'm so fond of Marvel Comics' Deathlok. Created in 1974 and, as has been noted numerous times, before the advent of Cyberpunk, before Robocop and before the Terminator, here was one of the very first cyborgs from a dystopic future. The initial appeal of Deathlok, for me at least, was his appearance. That dead, gray almost rotting skin contrasted with the shining technology grafted onto it and the futuristic military uniform. Very appealing to a young boy. But the idea and execution of the character holds up well too. Colonel Luther Manning is fatally injured and re-animated in the future as a cyborg. He has ongoing conversations with the computer in his brain, which he calls 'Puter, and struggles to find some semblance of his lost humanity. The character has gone through several iterations since then, but at the core of each is this struggle between humanity and technology, control and independence, and loss. He is a man who is literally locked in death. I hadn't read these comics, which I think were recently reprinted as Deathlok: The Living Nightmare of Michael Collins, but I had wanted to for some time. I hadn't realized that they were squarebound, 48 pages each, and all with different cover artists, which appealed to me. Here are issues #1 and #2 with covers by Joe Jusko and Bill Sienkiewicz...



And here are issues #3 and #4 with covers by Kent Williams (!) and the series' penciller Denys Cowan...



Sometimes you gamble, and sometimes you lose. This was one of those times. If you read this blog regularly, you know of my great fondness for knights and for the myths and legends of King Arthur. I was naturally intrigued by this three issue Marvel limited series King Arthur & the Knights of Justice. The covers were actually quite beautiful for comics of that time, and I am always interested in how different writers and artists explore the myths. Once I got the comics home and out of their bags, I was in for a rather disappointing surprise. The art was incredibly cartoony and not in a good way at all. Further searching revealed that, as I suspected, this was a comic adaptation of an early 1990s animated series which ran for two seasons. You can read more about it here. Apparently it has also been ranked as one of The 10 Most Ridiculous Adaptations of Arthurian Legend (2009) and the 8 Mostly Forgotten '90s Cartoons by some web site named Topless Robot. And all of that shows. These issues are pretty awful.



I remember buying these Warlock comics at someplace called The Newsstand in Quaker Square in Akron, Ohio! It was some time in the early 1980s (I was probably 13 or 14 years old) and this was one of the very first direct market comic shops I had ever been to. It was a wonderland. So many books I had never seen before. I had heard of Adam Warlock from the Marvel graphic novel The Death of Captain Marvel but I had never read any of the comics. Still, something about the character really fascinated me. I remember reading these, which were utterly unlike anything I had experienced before. Anywhere. Ever. These comics, in the most literal sense of the phrase, blew my mind. This material has since been reprinted a few times, most recently in an Essential Warlock and a Marvel Masterworks: Warlock hardcover, but reading it in a floppy stapled comic just seems so right. Also, these stories hold up incredibly well. Some of the best cosmic comics ever produced, by any publisher. Great stuff.



I like Frank Brunner's art quite a bit, but had never heard of this two issue miniseries The Unknown Worlds of Frank Brunner. I was not disappointed by the contents at all, although Brunner is definitely an acquired taste, I think. I remember, as I was showing my wife all these comics, her remarks about the cover to issue #1 was "That looks kind of cheap." I love how she is always so blunt, honest and straightforward about these things. It's always amazing to hear her take on this kind of stuff.



I've been steadily assembling a complete run of Marvel's Micronauts comics. I've already got all of Micronauts: The New Voyages and am now working on the earlier series. This has been a slow process, but thankfully it has not been nearly as expensive as I was worried it might be. The second issue below, issue #57, is notable for being the first Micronauts issue I ever bought since it was the first time in a while that the comic had been available through the non-direct market again. I still love that issue. A self-contained story about a primitive, backwater world in the Micronauts' galaxy where a single warrior saves his planet from Baron Karza through a heroic act of self-sacrifice.



Two Micronauts Annuals, both, amazingly enough, drawn by Sturdy Steve Ditko himself. So weird to think that his career at Marvel started with the creation of Spider-Man and Doctor Strange and ended with him drawing toy spin-offs like Micronauts and ROM.



So, the initial incentive for this visit was to spend some time looking for vintage paperbacks. Although I spent almost all of my time and money on the comics, I did find some interesting books. My wife found The Anomaly by Jerry Sohl and, good lord, as if the psychedelic cover, a bizarre photomontage of female faces and scantily clad bodies with a swirling multi-colored patterd wasn't enough, the back cover copy sold us immediately. It goes like this:

"She was wracked with a terrible pain deep inside her. It welled up - and then she felt empty and enormously relieved."

"'Gilgri,' she said, 'Are you alright?'"

"'Yes, Mother.'"

"She felt him at her side, the warmth of him. She opened her eyes to look at him..."

"What she saw was a mass of yellow grapes, blood-flecked and irregular-sized, some as tiny as pinheads, others the size of beans, a compact group, each vesicle attached to a stem which supported others, and each stem leading to a larger stem which ultimately joined two thing fibrous limbs below the clusters.

"She stared in horror at the pulsating thing. Then she screamed."

WOW! How could one not be at least marginally curious about how potentially awful this might be? The Demolished Man by Alfred Bester almost pales in comparison, although that cover is also remarkable.



I'm not really much of a Piers Anthony fan, having read a few of his Xanth books back in high school and leaving them behind long ago. Still, I thought that maybe there would be something worthwhile in his earlier, less-formulaic science fiction attempts. They did have attractive covers, after all. I had recently picked up a copy of ORN and still needed the other two parts of the trilogy, OX and OMNIVORE. Shortly after I bought these, I saw this well-written but disappointing review of OMNIVORE at the PorPor Books Blog, so I don't imagine I will be reading these any time soon. Still, nice covers.



And finally, a bit more Pierre Barbet and perennial favorite Jack Vance. All in all, a nice haul.

Into the Shadows...

I was at a Half Price Books in Columbus, Ohio over the weekend and I saw this, much to my surprise. I'm not quite sure how to feel about it.

The mystery of IRON MAN #39 by Gerry Conway and Herb Trimpe

On account of last weekend's Iron Man 3 earning a bazillion dollars at the box office, I thought it would be interesting to share one of my favorite Iron Man stories. This issue first came to my attention back in 2005, on the now sadly defunct Comics Journal message board. There was a thread discussing the oft-repeated rumor that 1971's Iron Man volume 1 issue #39 was, for unknown reasons, a rush job and that the artist Herb Trimpe drew the entire thing in about 24 hours. I believe the thread began with the semi-joking contention that this in fact was the first 24-hour comic.

I was fascinated by the stories and rumors spinning out of the thread and keen to see the issue for myself, but that proved difficult. At that time, Marvel's Essentials and Masterworks reprinting Iron Man had not yet caught up to issue #39 and my only real alternative was to track the thing down myself via eBay. The issue wasn't terribly expensive, but at the time I had much less disposable income and no real desire to spend it chasing down a lark. So I waited.

A few months ago I saw the issue for sale on the back issue wall of the fine Laughing Ogre comics shop in Columbus, Ohio and I had to solve the mystery. The issue was affordably priced so I paid for it and hurried home to finally take a long look at Happy Herb's supposed 24-hour comic. I was not disappointed. Now keep in mind that Herb Trimpe is a very good comic artist, and I like his work a great deal. In general, his art shows a high level of quality and craftmanship, which makes it fairly easy to determine that something was amiss with this issue. There are numerous stories and rumors about other comic book issues that were completed in a weekend, generally by a "committee" of artists holed up in some hotel room passing pages back and forth and working late into the night. But this was the first I had heard of an entire single issue being completed in such a short time by a single artist. I've scanned a few of the pages to share here, and I think these images will demonstrate that Herb was indeed flying through this as fast as he could. In a lot of ways, I have a great amount of respect for this, in spite of the sub-standard art, because as a professional, Herb was doing what so few artists these days seem to be able to do - meeting a deadline. The art, while quite rough and even poor in some panels, is at least serviceable and communicates a visual narrative well enough. I've also since learned, from this 2008 post on The Comics Reporter that Herb did indeed rush this issue. Someone named John Vest actually asked Herb about the comic at a panel at some comic book convention. Herb remembered the issue, described it as a "rush job," completed the cover in "two hours" and the remaining 20 pages of art in "a couple of days." Let's take a look at the evidence.

I'm tempted to assume that Herb worked through the issue in a linear fashion, starting with page 1 and finishing with page 20. I see some evidence from that in this first page, which shows a simple but interesting composition and more nuanced line-work. One thing you will notice here that carries through this entire issue is that there is little to no variation in the line weight and thickness, as if Herb was using the same pen the whole time. That is one of many ways to make art more quickly and efficiently, and it seems as if Herb was doing just that. While there are spot blacks and shadows, if you look carefully at the lines in Tony Stark's head and clothing, Jasper's head and bedding, and the ghostly Iron Man helmet, they are all the same weight.



Again with the same line weight, but I see more evidence of rushing here.



Ordinarily, when continuing the same visual elements through multiple panels like in the bottom half of this page, there should be some specific reason to do so. Some idea should be communicated through the use of that technique or it looks either gimmicky or, worse, like a single panel arbitrarily chopped up into multiple panels. I look at these five panels and I can see no reason why they needed to be drawn this way. It's the kind of thing that at first seems to add complexity to the page, but upon closer examination actually clouds the storytelling. For example, if Herb was trying to show the steady sinking and drowning of Tony Stark, as would appear from panels 1 and 2 where Stark's face appears independently, then that pattern should be continued. Instead, Stark's head goes from large in panel 1 to small in panel to much larger and spreading across panels 3 and 4 before then becoming a close-up of an eye in panel 5, all with a disjointed visual narrative across the top of the panels.



And I am fascinated by the way Herb drew Stark's drowning face here. In some ways, it actually looks shockingly modern, which is bizarre considering the date of this issue and the circumstances around its creation.



For me, it was always the mustache. It's one of the first things I remember seeing when I flipped through this issue, and it's proof to me that Herb was rushing. On this page, you see the White Dragon's mustache (and goatee) not once, not twice, but three times.



And each time, they look just like this. A quick squiggle. A rushed up-and-down with the pen. A fast scratching of ink to communicate the idea of facial hair, and on to the next page.



Page 10, and possibly the most poorly drawn page in the entire comic. There is so much wrong here, so much evidence that Herb was drawing as fast as humanly possible just trying to get the issue done on time. In each panel, the figure of Iron Man looks haphazardly slapped together and awkwardly posed. Proportions are wrong, foreshortening is badly skewed, and the character looks more like a child's mangled doll than the Golden Avenger.



Is Iron Man soaring, or has he been tossed? And what is going on with his left hand?



Again, poor foreshortening and the fingers are simplified into near abstraction.



As for this panel, where to even begin! The proportions are astounding. Iron Man's right arm appears to be longer than both of his legs. His fingertips would be brushing his upper calves if he was standing up straight. The chest is massive and appears bloated, I have no idea what those legs are connected to, and I'm struggling to see knees. I'm not trying to be unfairly critical here. I know I couldn't draw this any better, and I understand that Herb had to make every second count. But it's amazing to see something like this in print!



Suddenly, somehow, the Avengers show up. With no real foreshadowing at all. I'm not sure if I missed something from the previous issue, which I didn't read, but this seems a bit out of left field so I am wondering if one of the reasons that this issue was a rush job was due to a script change at the last minute. Pages like this sure seem to support that idea.



What strikes me about this panel, and this has been seen over and over and over in this comic, is the identical line weight for all figures. There is very little aside from some clumsy foregrounding to situate these characters in the panel, and the faces all look rushed. I mean, look at the scales on Captain America's costume.



The penultimate page. Some awkward panel to panel transitions, and an almost hilarious depiction of an unconscious Iron Man in panel 3. I am wondering if this wasn't some subconscious self-portrait, showing the perceptive reader just how Herb might have been feeling after this brutal and unforgiving drawing marathon.



Poor Herb!



On an unrelated but strangely coincidental note, this was the ad on the last page of the comic. So many parallels!



This was a fascinating read for me, and it's an intriguing part of American comics history. In every way, I have a lot of admiration for Herb Trimpe and he is one of my favorite Silver Age artists. His run on The Incredible Hulk was brilliant, and he will always be known as the artist who drew Wolverine for the first time. He drew nearly every Marvel character ever, at some time, and he was penciled all but two issues of one of my favorite comics ever, Marvel's Godzilla. Herb's contributions to American comics are legendary, and he deserves to be recognized for that. But this issue will always stand out to me as a thrilling aberration and a remarkable curiosity of American comics.

FRIDAY DIVERSIONS: 40 Days in the Desert

Wednesday May 8th was Moebius' birthday. To celebrate, the wonderful Moebius-focused Tumblr quenched consciousness ran seven posts sharing the entirety of Moebius' visionary 1999 masterpiece 40 Days in the Desert. The book consists of 70 silent, panoramic drawings depicting a figure meditating in the desert and experiencing visions. I have seen a variety of interpretations online, few of which jibe completely with my own, which leads me to believe that this is truly the rarest of things...a work of art that can bear the weight of a disparate variety of explorations and still remain essentially intact and unique. The image above is from the series of drawings, and you can (and should) spend some time with the rest of it.

--Part 1 of 7

--Part 2 of 7

--Part 3 of 7

--Part 4 of 7

--Part 5 of 7

--Part 6 of 7

--Part 7 of 7

NOT ALL FANS ARE WRITERS, BUT ALL WRITERS ARE FANS
That's the title of this intriguing piece by Sam Allingham over at the Tin House blog. There are some at times uncomfortable parallels between his own tale of his mother, her writing, and her obsession with Moby-Dick and my own visual love letter to the novel. Perhaps my work too was really just a kind of fan fiction? I don't know. Part of that is due to the fact that I still know less than I would like about the wide world of fan fiction (or is that a disparaging term? I mean no offense if it is) and the majority of what I have been told has been negative. Which I know is unfair.

YET ANOTHER SELF-SERVING QUESTION
It was recently suggested to me by a new friend that I should try ordering from Amazon Canada or Amazon France in order to get some of the foreign graphic novels I am looking for. I live in the U.S. but the idea seems very sound, and I think I am going to try it. Has anyone reading this that lives in the U.S. ever ordered from those sites, and if so do you have any advice for me? Many thanks!

Pre-order HEART OF DARKNESS

I recently traveled to Berkeley, California to give a presentation for the sales force that will be handling the promotion and distribution of my upcoming illustrated Heart of Darkness. I was able to talk about the project and what inspired it and I shared some of the art as well. It was a very good experience and I was thrilled to see how my book was received with such enthusiasm. I also learned how pre-orders play a significant role in the success of both a book and a publisher, whether these pre-orders come from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, brick or brick and mortar bookstores. Honestly, I do want this Heart of Darkness to do well, both for myself and for my publisher Tin House Books. They are a small, independent outfit with a true vision for championing unique new voices, and they are fearless. They took a big risk on me with my first book Moby-Dick in Pictures and they have been a dream to work with. Also, if this second book, Heart of Darkness, does well, it will open up even more opportunities for me in terms of future projects, which is something I long for.

So, the official release date for Heart of Darkness is November 12, 2013. I realize that is about 6 months away, but this is the sweet spot in terms of stores deciding how many to order and stock. If you would like a copy, please do pre-order it from one of the fine shops below. Currently, on most of these sites, the book is selling for around $15 which is almost 40% off the cover price.

--Try your local independent bookstore. There is an excellent online tool right here where you can enter your zip code and find the nearest independent store. I am sure they would be thrilled to pre-order the book for you.

--Add it to your wish list at Powell's Books right here.

--Pre-order from Amazon right here.

--Pre-order from Barnes & Noble right here.

(EDIT: If anyone knows of any other pre-order links, especially those from specific independent bookstores and sellers, please either email me or post them in the comments and I will be more than happy to add them to this post. Independent bookstores MUST survive and thrive.)

I am at peace in posting this because I really believe in this book. I am proud of it, the illustrations are precisely what I envisioned, and I truly do think that this will be a gorgeous, haunting, disturbing edition of Heart of Darkness and a reading experience like no other. Many many sincere thanks for reading.

OVER THE TOP!

Indulge me for a moment.

Generally, I keep this blog focused primarily on art (my own, and that of others), books, design and similar topics. I keep my politics to myself, and I keep my personal life fairly private. This, however, was just too exciting to keep under my hat. Yesterday, my wife took 2nd place in a ladies' arm wrestling competition, out of 22 fierce, brutal, kick-ass women. The event was sponsored by P.U.S.H. Dayton and was created to raise funds for some much-needed renovation and remodeling at the local Planned Parenthood clinic. My wife was a total dark horse, almost unknown to just about everyone else in the tournament. She had been looking at the photos of the other arm-wrestlers online and really wasn't sure of her chances. But three years of kickboxing, weight lifting, and self-defense courses have hardened her into a terrifying warrior, and she battled her way into the championship bout. It wasn't easy, and several of her matches pushed well over the 60 second mark, but she gutted it out, never gave up, wrestled clean and triumphed. To say that I am proud of her is not accurate, and seems to imply some kind of vaguely condescending, paternalistic feeling. No, I am in awe of her. I live with her and even I had no idea she was that strong, that indomitable, and that ferocious. She was awesome, in the truest sense of the word.

The event was full of theater and boasting, with many of the arm-wrestlers choosing nicknames. My wife was the Filipino Fist of Fury, and her first bout was billed as "The Iron Maidens." Here are a few photos from a night of good, high-spirited brutality and combat!

As one half of the "Iron Maidens" match, she took the spirit of things to heart. Interestingly enough, aside from the heavy make-up, this is pretty much how she actually dresses.





A group shot showing all 22 of the combatants and their costumes.



The custom-made arm-wrestling table, where the warriors met.



All of the bouts in the first round had names. I was quite fond of "The Iron Maidens" as a title.



She enters the arena for her first match. Face paint was added at the event.



She calls out her first opponent. Overconfident? I must admit, I was worried at first. But she put those fears to rest quickly.



Settling in for the first match. In round one, all of the matches were best two out of three.



So close...



And victory is declared!



Looking appropriately demonic and terrifying in her victory celebration.



Heading to the table for her third match. This one was to get her into the championship bout.



Despite being a total unknown and coming from out of nowhere, she won the hearts of the crowd as the underdog. While waiting for the championship bout, she was given an impromptu arm massage by a member of the audience. Gotta keep those guns warm!



The final match, for the belt! She was pitted against the terrifying masked luchador known as Mysterio!



She fought hard and long, but in the end she went down and Mysterio claimed the prize. Still, she gave as good as she got and made a damn fine show. An amazing night, a triumph for my wife, and a ton of money raised by P.U.S.H. Dayton! Now I am kinda worried she's going to want to practice on me. And I don't know if I can beat her anymore!