The Ruthless: Issue One tickle comic production preview

Hey everyone,

It's Oblesklk here from www.the-agencies.com, home of Tickling Comics. It's been three months since we released our last tickle comic, and we've been busy at work on a few different projects. The Agencies is still alive and kicking, but I wanted to give myself and the artistic team a break on that storyline, and start/continue some other projects that have been kicking around in my head a bit.

This is one of the projects that I wanted to share with everyone. This comic book is called The Ruthless and it will serve a slightly different niche than The Agencies. The Ruthless will have darker and more sexual overtones to the stories than we've done in the past. I have some great plans for this storyline, but realize that artwork alone cannot always convey the level of character development and plotwork that I desire, at least not without sacrificing some of the tickle action of the stories. So I've decided to enclose with each issue of The Ruthless a story that sets the mood a bit more. In fact, I will most likely just include the story for free on our web site and here on the boards. That way, if the ideas presented are intriguing, you can always check out the comic book.

The first issue of The Ruthless will probably be available in December. That's our target month, I guess we'll see how the next few weeks go in production.

I have another brand new comic book that I'm not going to introduce for several months yet. It is more light hearted, and fun in nature. I enjoy writing all kinds of tickle related stuff, and wanted to give our lineup a bit more tongue in cheek and silliness to it. But that's down the road. The Ruthless is still a faux mainstream production, meaning it will take itself somewhat seriously, while looking close to the kinds of comics we all grew up reading. I want to experiment writing about more intense encounters dealing with themes as domination, sexuality, and the nature of fantasy. And I believe this comic universe will provide a pretty good place to do that. And hopefully it's something you guys will enjoy over the years.

I have chosen to use a different art studio than the one I've been using for The Agencies. I've been rather pleased so far with the level of work and professionalism these guys have taken to this project, and hopefully we can do several comics together. They have also done work for the mainstream comic industry, and hopefully some of that will show in the final product.

It wouldn't be a production preview if there weren't any pictures, now would there? 🙂

This first picture is a sketch of two of the characters in the book. The one on the right is a redhead, and could easily be referred to as the main character of the story. The character on the left has undergone some change since this iteration, but you get the gist of it.




Here's a second picture of the main character, Stacia. She's the redhead featured above, but now in a nightie, and she's now colorized. I think the artists did a good job in forming the "girl next door gone professional" look. She's a reporter for a local TV network affiliate, and that's where our story begins. She looks so sweet and innocent (looks can be deceiving)




Here's a before and after for one of the panels in the book. It's not a tickling panel, so it may not be terribly exciting, but it's at least a glimpse into the artwork as it's close to being finished. The top portion is the storyboard edition of the page, while the bottom half is the penciled, inked, and colored version of the same page. I like how the colorist represented the blonde's nylons in the right panel here.




Another before and after. Except the inset panel is just the storyboards of the beginning of the story, while the top portion is the inked version of the same. Stacia was a fun character to develop and write for, and I like the artists' ability to make her come alive as the character development phase carried on.




The Ruthless: Issue One will set the stage for things to come. It already has the most tickling action of any tickle comic we've ever produced to date (even beating out The Agencies: Issue Nine), and that trend will most likely continue as the issues go on.

The Agencies are still selling really well, so I definitely have plans to continue work on Issue Elevan. Work on that story will probably start in January, and hopefully sell by late Spring 2007. I've received a large amount of input regarding issues nine and ten, and I hope to make issues elevan twelve, and thirteen the best ones in that comic universe yet. I know we're required by law to say every issue is going to be the best one yet 🙂 But honestly, there's a lot of leadup to these next two (and more leadup to 13), and hopefully you're not disappointed by the outcome.

Dude, I cannot WAIT for The Ruthless to come out! I have been wanting something like this for you don't know how long.

I have always been a big fan of the Agencies, but to be honest, I wasn't able to keep up after TickleTown went down. I need to get the last two of these sometime in the future.

However, I don't care what it takes, I HAVE to see this new one. I've always loved the work you and your team comes up with, and have been a HUGE fan. Do me a favor, my friend....PM the second this becomes available, woudja?

Best of luck
Your friend,
Dave

This is another panel from the book. One of the secondary characters finds herself in a bit of of bind by our story's villain (hero?). It isn't lettered yet, we're still in that phase of the production process.

I love the look of the girls here. They are soooooo adorable. About the only other BDSM-art girls I can think of that are so consistently cute are the Gary Roberts ladies. (Oh, if ONLY he'd do tickling stuff...)

This looks really good, and again I can't wait to see the finished product.

Again , Oblesklk ... the artwork on these projects you put out is stellar ( a.k.a. top-notch )! I'm continually blown away by the level of artistic talent you have working on these tickle-related stories. Best of luck to you & all those involved on this project!

Dave2112 said:

Dude, I cannot WAIT for The Ruthless to come out! I have been wanting something like this for you don't know how long.

I have always been a big fan of the Agencies, but to be honest, I wasn't able to keep up after TickleTown went down. I need to get the last two of these sometime in the future.

However, I don't care what it takes, I HAVE to see this new one. I've always loved the work you and your team comes up with, and have been a HUGE fan. Do me a favor, my friend....PM the second this becomes available, woudja?

Click to expand...

No problem, man, will do 🙂

This is a different art team than what we're using for The Agencies mostly because I wanted to go our other art team a bit of a break while continuing to move forward.

The Ruthless is going to be great fun to write. There's some more sexual imagery I've had floating in my head forever, that I never felt quite right putting into The Agencies. And from the comprehensive amount of material you've produced over the years, I can tell it's more to your liking as well. I hope the first three issues we're producing don't disappoint!

Dave2112 said:

I love the look of the girls here. They are soooooo adorable. About the only other BDSM-art girls I can think of that are so consistently cute are the Gary Roberts ladies. (Oh, if ONLY he'd do tickling stuff...)

This looks really good, and again I can't wait to see the finished product.

Click to expand...

Thanks again 🙂 The women in this comic universe will have a bit more body to them than the stuff we've done with The Agencies. Variety is the spice of life, and I love the curves they've given to Stacia.

TKLMAN said:

Again , Oblesklk ... the artwork on these projects you put out is stellar ( a.k.a. top-notch )! I'm continually blown away by the level of artistic talent you have working on these tickle-related stories. Best of luck to you & all those involved on this project!

Click to expand...

Thanks man. As with anyone else in the community, if you have any requests for future stories, just PM me anytime. My door's always open!

For those on this side of the pond, I hope you all enjoy your Turkey Day.

This looks pretty great!

I love Stacia's more curvaceous figure. And nighties are always a treat. Your stories have done an amazing job in the past with gorgeous women and exciting themes and story.

I very much look forward to the more sexual overtones, and the new story line.

Consider me in line at the comic store for the first issue!

I don't want to burden you with requests (everyone likes different things) so I will simply say "goodluck" and I can't wait to read it!

Best,

Bandito

Looking good. Too bad the artist doesn't really know how to draw sexy feet - which happens often when you bring artists to a project who aren't into this kind of thing. You just can't beat Saudelli, BAC or FTKL when it comes to this.
What really bothers me is that Stacy's got two left feet in that pose picture.

The Bandito said:

This looks pretty great!

I love Stacia's more curvaceous figure. And nighties are always a treat. Your stories have done an amazing job in the past with gorgeous women and exciting themes and story.

I very much look forward to the more sexual overtones, and the new story line.

Consider me in line at the comic store for the first issue!

I don't want to burden you with requests (everyone likes different things) so I will simply say "goodluck" and I can't wait to read it!

Best,

Bandito

Click to expand...

Heya Bandito, I'm anxious to see what everyone thinks of the more sexual storylines, too. I've tended towards the more innocent side of things in everything I've ever done (photoshop fakes, video clips from tickletown, the agencies, etc.), so I figured it's about time to let loose a bit.

Congratulations on the first issue of TOB, it's quite a feeling to get that first one out there, isn't it? Now your biggest problem is getting issues 2, 3, 4, and 5 done before Thanksgiving weekend is over Looks like you guys are having amazing fun with that successful story, and that's always number 1

shock said:

Looking good. Too bad the artist doesn't really know how to draw sexy feet - which happens often when you bring artists to a project who aren't into this kind of thing. You just can't beat Saudelli, BAC or FTKL when it comes to this.
What really bothers me is that Stacy's got two left feet in that pose picture.

Click to expand...

LOL, I didn't even notice. And I consider myself to be detail oriented and anal, heh.

I've often read that people should stick to what they know in their writing. So for what it's worth, Stacia won't end up in issue one with three breasts

The artwork is lovely, no mistake about that ^^

I do have a question, though. When you say "darker and more sexual overtones," what do you mean by that exactly? That the sex in the book is dark, like the S&M style thinmg? or is the story a bit dark and there happens to be sexual overtones?

TickleFur said:

The artwork is lovely, no mistake about that ^^

I do have a question, though. When you say "darker and more sexual overtones," what do you mean by that exactly? That the sex in the book is dark, like the S&M style thinmg? or is the story a bit dark and there happens to be sexual overtones?

Click to expand...

I mean that there's going to be more overt sexual focus than what I've done in the past. With The Agencies the sexual content has been all but non-existant in the stories (except in issue six, where intimacy between two of the characters was the focus). This has always been my intent with that storyline, since I want it to steer closer to what a real mainstream comic would look like...if it happened to have a tickle themed issue for whatever reason. So given that, I've limited myself to the content I wanted to write for those stories.

With The Ruthless I've decided to remove those limits and try more sexually suggestive material. I want to write about more themes of domination, control, pleasure, pain, while always focusing on tickling as the primary driver for its characters.

As an example, I've written the story that will accompany this issue. It is available for free, but will be included with the purchase of the ecomic, in case the buyer missed it on the TMF (here's a link http://www.ticklingforum.com/showthread.php?t=93010) or our web site. It's an introduction to two of the series main characters: Stacia and Dr. Collins. Stacia has an intense tickle fetish that she's supressed most of her life. As the issues continue, this dawning realization for her will become more and more apparent.

Release Date?

I was just curious if you have a better idea on a release date for this high-anticipated tickle comic?

Fantastic stuff! Is there a larger version of that banner? Am I crazy, or is there some tickling going on among the dancers?

is it just me, or does the red head "in the pose" have two left feet?

Oblesklk said:

This is another panel from the book. One of the secondary characters finds herself in a bit of of bind by our story's villain (hero?). It isn't lettered yet, we're still in that phase of the production process.

Click to expand...

LOL where is he tickling her?

Production is taking longer to wrap up than I had originally intended. In fact we've missed our deadline by about two months now.

So we do still intend to release this issue, but now we're looking at a February release date. Much of this is my fault. I just started up grad school full time, while working full time, and trying to get 100 other things tied up, so I'm not there to crack the whip on the artists like I usually do 😱

I just looked at our banner, and we haven't had a release since August of last year. My, where does the time go?

Dude,

Between Grad chool and full time work, I'm surprised that you had time to post this thread!!! LOL. That's a lot of priorities to try to juggle.

Deadlines are a bitch (he says while furiously working on BC2). I wish you the best with the February release date, and look very forward to reading the comic!

Best,

Bandito

Oblesklk said:

Production is taking longer to wrap up than I had originally intended. In fact we've missed our deadline by about two months now.

So we do still intend to release this issue, but now we're looking at a February release date. Much of this is my fault. I just started up grad school full time, while working full time, and trying to get 100 other things tied up, so I'm not there to crack the whip on the artists like I usually do 😱

I just looked at our banner, and we haven't had a release since August of last year. My, where does the time go?

Click to expand...

LOL it could be worse for you, but cool for us if one day the agencies turns into like a flash series cartoon.

The Bandito said:

Dude,

Between Grad chool and full time work, I'm surprised that you had time to post this thread!!! LOL. That's a lot of priorities to try to juggle.

Deadlines are a bitch (he says while furiously working on BC2). I wish you the best with the February release date, and look very forward to reading the comic!

Best,

Bandito

Click to expand...

Heh I try to make do, but it's tough sometimes. Difficult to maintain a healthy balance in life when I simultaneously attempt to thwart it, ya know?

But keep up the good work with the BC. I know what a grind production is. I can imagine it's even more intense when you're creating the actual line art of the book as well. You're producing work that people love, and somehow, that always makes the light at the end of the tunnel shimmer just a bit more.

NavelTickler75 said:

LOL it could be worse for you, but cool for us if one day the agencies turns into like a flash series cartoon.

Click to expand...

Now that's always been a dream of mine, to someday animate a comic. Even if it's just a five minute short, that would still be cool. Someday perhaps 🙂

Oblesklk said:

Now that's always been a dream of mine, to someday animate a comic. Even if it's just a five minute short, that would still be cool. Someday perhaps 🙂

Click to expand...

Mmm...

The comic has finally released.

The web site can be found at www.the-agencies.com

Issue One can be found at www.the-agencies.com/ruthless/issue_one.htm

For those that purchased the comic last week, thank you very much for the feedback on this issue!

I bought a copy of The Ruthless as soon as it came out and I gotta say something....

This comic was totally awesome! I loved the new storyline. I loved the heroine. I loved the style in which the comic was done. I thought the writing was spot on (well done). And most of all - I loved the sense of eroticism, nudity, and pleasure. I know everyone has different tastes - but I gotta say - this was a true treat for me!!!

The only tiny thing I would have liked to see was girl on girl - but that is a small quibble for what ended up being an amazing tickle comic.

Thanks for all the hard work that went into this 🙂

So, when's Issue 2 coming out, lol.

Best,

B

Yum!

I concur with Bandito that this was a pretty damn good tickle comic. Beautiful tickle-toy, lots of erotic nudity, Stacia actually *loving* her tickles, and promises of orgasms in the next issue

The art was fantastic, the story good and right into the tickle action

Stacia is a total doll. A bazillion pages of her in the throws of ticklgasm bliss, begging for more and more, would never be too much

The only things that (to me) made it not quite perfect were:
-I would have much prefered girl-on-girl. A big, creepy, swearing guy just doesn't do it for me. Sorry. Babe-on-babe is always hotter 😉
-A softer way of binding Stacia. Concrete and steel don't do it for me. Wood and leather, fur, silk, etc; but that's my personal preference 😉
-The pages with the blonde, to me, detracted from the main tickle session, and could have been used for more full-on action with Stacia. Although I'm sure they'll make to feet/nylon-obsessed crowd happy

Overall, I think this is the best tickle comic yet published, apart from the Bounce Chix, which still have the #1 spot in my tickle-loving heart