Who's at Supanova? Jason Rand

A four day spotlight on the Australian creators that will be appearing at Supanova

Jason Rand
Jason, is a guy from Sydney, who is now writing Small Gods, published by Image. He doesn't frequent the boards now, but towards the end of Ozcomics run he popped in and seemed quite cool. (Though his supanova pic is kind of dopey - with a mild resemblance to Shannon Noll if he starred in the Matrix - if on saturday night i start singing 'what about me' can someone muffle me)

I can imagine its quite hard for writers to break into the Big 4, most writers in the 90s were editorial staff or mates of those staff; casey, lobdell, priest. Today many of the writers come from indie roots; bendis, brubaker or from different fields (theatre, tv, movies).
but in any case, I'd imagine you would need to know the editors to get your foot in the door. So being in Australia, not able to pitch your comic in 30 seconds at a con or being able to make a submission by mail (Marvel and DC long closed their doors on blind submissions), must make it tricky to get a project up and running.

But Jason did, which is commendable.

Also Small Gods is pretty tight. The first story arc is surprisingly good. I'm not a fan of the art but i can live with it. The characters and the situations felt real, even though it involves mind reading (usually something i shy away from). The pacing was right on and there's great use of cliff hangers. The first arc is a dirty cop procedual; kind of like "the Shield". Now, with cop shows/comics it doesn't take much for them to be a bit cliched, in this case - Rand uses mental powers to distract from the inherent cliches that always pop up in cop shows. All the cop shows are doing it now, doing something a bit left field to make them seem different; Medium (she can read minds and solve crimes), Blind Justice (he's blind and solves crimes), Jag (they're in the navy and solves crimes), Inspector Rex (he's a dog and solve's crimes).
The second arc started off really well but the lastest issue kind of lost it for me. There's an element in hollywood bgrade movies where when a male and female are in danger they get the urge to get naked and hump like bunnies. (Best example is Fair Game; where Cindy Crawford while getting some Baldwin action picks up a gun and shots an assassin. Mid-shag!) Now, when i get pulled over by a breatho the last thing i want to do is slip in the backseat with the missus, so its pretty silly when the protagonist and his exgirl friend, who are being chased by murderous dirty cops wanna take a minute or two and go the root. It feels like cheap titalation and cheap thrills. It feels like its only in there because its supposed to be a mature comic and that means sex and guns.

Of course - i'm commenting on stuff mid story and it could all make sense in the conclusion. But this is the internet.

Small Gods is one of my few monthly buys and i do like it. I think Jason did work on "dead at 17' and he has a new title called Helios.