Student publishes comic book
Most everyone has heard of heroes with the names of Superman, Batman and Spiderman, not to mention less well endowed characters like Archie and Jughead. While the comic books inhabited by these personalities have been staples for generations of adolescent readers, if one young man has his way they’re going to have to clear some rack space in the local bookstore.
Jose Sanchez, Reporting
At some point in time most teenagers try to discover their artistic talents. Sixteen-year old Sean Gibson of SJC is no different, except that his attempt has evolved into the publishing of a comic book.
Jose Sanchez
“Did you expect your book to be published?”
Sean Gibson, Author
“I didn’t think so. I was just going to photocopy it just as I did in elementary school. Just find comics and photocopy and sell them around class and everything. I didn’t expect them to become this professional.”
“It’s like a play on artificial intelligence. It’s not really a serious comic, it’s a mixture of action and comedy. It’s focused around a group of twenty artificial intelligent robots who must save the human race. Because at this time humans are making robots at will so at this time robots will serve them, become their slaves to do their house work, do their chores and everything, and what they’re trying to do is to establish some kind of equality between the humans and the robots.”
The comic book, entitled “Major Destruction,” is published by Yasser Musa’s Factory Books. Musa believes that Gibson has a great future in the arts.
Yasser Musa, Publisher, Factory Books
“Last October I asked him to prepare some of his many cartoons that I’ve seen him draw sporadically at school and he presented me with a very professional book called Total Destruction as well as another book called Skyler. I looked at it and said that definitely this is worth publishing; that’s not an issue for me. This young man has a great ability, not only artistic ability in terms of his visual strength, how he makes characters and invents characters, but also a kind of literary power because you can’t have these things just say nothing, they have to have conversations, plot, and all these things.”
Though Gibson’s imagery is futuristic, his literary themes encompass Belize’s colonial past. The robots are slaves, some of them want to protect their masters, while others want freedom. If Major Destruction is a success, he will make an entire series of comic books.
Sean Gibson
“I’m planning to bring out one called The Skyler, and that’s more of a serious one, a dramatic one. It’s set on a different planet, but its development is just like earth. There’s a lot of social issues, there’s war, there’s prejudice, there’s political corruption and all that.”
Gibson plans to pursue a future in computer animation, a field he plans to conquer soon as he graduates from high school. Reporting for News 5, Jose Sanchez.
Gibson based the characters in the comic on his classmates. Major Destruction costs five dollars and is available at the Image Factory.
