"Dead Dreams"

A one-page comic about work

I’ve been teasing this project for some time and it’s finally here! A bit of background before the comic itself: I had originally pitched this story to an anthology that was to have been built around the theme of “Memory.” If I recall correctly, the full call for submissions was for one-page comics about someone realizing they’d forgotten something.

This immediately set me to thinking about two things: the number of people I knew who had allowed their careers to define them as people to the point where they’ve forgotten why they started those careers in the first place and the Gene Wolfe short story “Forlesen,” a brutal satire of corporate life about a man who wakes up during his lunch break with amnesia.

The anthology required full creative teams to submit, including a colorist and a letterer.

Brian Hawkins

was kind enough to introduce me to Jef Sadzinski, who had previously won the Mad Cave Talent Search. I met colorist Benjamin Melton on a Discord server and found letterer Buddy Beaudoin via Twitter. They’re all very talented people and I can’t thank them enough for their contributions to this project.

Unfortunately, my pitch was rejected, but I decided I wouldn’t let that stop me. I had a full team assembled and it was only one page, I reasoned, why not just go ahead and make the comic?

So, without further ado, I present to you “Dead Dreams.”

And there you have it! My first completed comics work. I’ll post about the process that led to its creation eventually. Let me know what you think in the comments! Thanks so much for reading.