Serious Business
SERIOUS BUSINESS
“Saving the world by destroying most of it.”
“Serious Business” is a 5 issue miniseries about fearsome monsters and the giant robots whose duty it is to punch them. Set in a world where incursions from Monster Dimension are so regular that the average person treats them like we would treat hearing about a hurricane, “Serious Business” focuses on the efforts of the private military corporations whose skyscraper-sized robots are tasked with defending humanity from the beasts. All while staying under budget. While there are significant amounts of monster-punching to be had in the book, the story is centred on the crew of the Global Defence Corporation robot SRS-705 – nicknamed “Serious” – and their dysfunctional relationship. Think “Pacific Rim” meets “Archer.”
Ace pilot Sun Dong Kim is a phenom recruited by the GDC for his utter dominance of MechaForce Online, the video game that serves as a combination recruiting and marketing tool. While he is skilled at battling monsters, Sun’s immature egomania results in him being a constant source of friction in the company. His very presence is antagonism enough for Ursula Volk, who is no longer allowed to pilot Serious because the GDC’s insurance won’t cover her severely lacking depth perception. Instead, she is tasked by the Admiral with making sure that Sun’s skill isn’t eclipsed by his brash disregard for reality. Serious’ engineer, Erik Burley, sits behind the power struggle between the two aces just hoping everyone can get along. He’s also the only one who seems willing to acknowledge Serious destroys large portions of the cities it’s “saving” from monsters.
13 of issue 1’s 26 pages have been completed and are included in this package. Issue 1 will be completed in October, 2013. Issues 2-5 have been outlined and are awaiting final scripting.
“Serious Business” was co-created by Jeff Martin and Johnni Kok, Jeff handles the writing and lettering duties with Johnni doing the art. Jeff also does the pencils and inks for the back-up story, with Johnni on the colours. Both creators live in Edmonton, Alberta.
Creative Team:
JEFF MARTIN is a cartoonist, writer, and illustrator living in Edmonton, Alberta. His biggest project to date is “Jeff Martin’s War of 1812” for Renegade Arts Entertainment. It can currently be found online here: http://www.renegadeartsentertainment.com/jeff-martins-war-of-1812. Jeff also maintains a weekly schedule on his webcomic, HEAT: The Space Age of Pro Wrestling and has self-published 5 books.
Contact Information – jeff@rentathugcomics.com, 1-780-690-0577
JOHNNI KOK is a Malaysian-born artist now living in Edmonton, Alberta. His comics work includes “Flowers,” a 7 page short story for Slycey Entertainment, “Duty,” a 6 page short story for Mocktales, and a pin-up in Arcana’s “Steampunk Originals.”
Contact Information – artofjippism@hotmail.com, 1-780-932-6922
Story Outline
1. Issue 1 begins with the crew of SRS-705 (Sun, Ursula, and Erik) on a training mission, although they don’t know that until later. Sun is overconfident in his skills and the result is Serious ending up in the Mediterranean Sea. Both the Admiral and Ursula are enraged by this, for budgeting and professional jealousy reasons, respectively. Sun, having never had his skill questioned, is rattled. He doesn’t have long to deal with his mental state, as another monster attack puts Serious back in action. Sun is able to connect the game he has mastered to real life, and is able to punch the monster into space. In the back-up story, the students in the GDC Training Academy practice breaking throw attempts and a rivalry develops between top students Alan and Jennifer.
2. Picking up right where issue 1 left off, Sun brags about his success when a robot owned by GDC’s rival, Protecticorp, arrives. The pilots taunt Sun for getting himself thrown into the ocean, but are strangely polite to Ursula. Arriving back at the base, Sun receives a lot of head-swelling praise and immediately uses that as an excuse to be a pompous jerk to everyone in the base. The GDC base arc is focused around convincing the media that the Mediterranean incident was a test for an amphibious model of robot. In a sub-plot, Ursula sees the ease with which the Protecticorp robot, Excalibur, dispatches a monster. The issue ends with her getting a phone call from Protecticorp, offering her a job. In the back-up story, Sun meets the training class as they’re starting to practice with real robots. Sun asks out Jennifer, she says yes.
3. Sun, wanting to impress Jennifer on their date, decides to pick her up in Serious. Erik is also there, because he’s necessary for Serious’ operation. It’s at this point that we learn that Serious only actually needs two pilots, but the Admiral has Ursula riding with Sun as a sort of failsafe against him doing stupid things. Like he’s doing right now. Sun ends up destroying most of the block around Jennifer’s home when he arrives to pick her up, then he takes her to a drive-in movie, since that’s the only place he can really park Serious effectively. During the date, an emergency call comes in because a monster is attacking, although it turns out that attacking means sleeping in the middle of Manhattan. Serious tries to deal with it, but pheremones released by the monster just puts everyone to sleep. Sun gets reamed out, but the whole incident gives Ursula the push to call back Protecticorp and jump ship.
4. Ursula jumps to Protecticorp, and it seems like a way better place to work. The staff aren’t spending the entire time being jerks to each other, and they also custom built a robot for her, The Volk. It’s shaped like a wolf and is designed to combine with Excalibur. They beat Serious to a monster call, and Serious watches as Excalibur and Volk dispatch the monster with what looks like absurd ease. Sun is stunned at how good Protecticorp is. When the barriers are lifted, Protecticorp starts gloating, but then the swarm monster (the big “final boss” monster of the arc) appears. The fighting results in Excalibur and Serious interfering with each other more than actually harming the monster. The issue ends with the monster landing a huge blow that does serious damage to Serious. In the back-up story, Jennifer recounts her tale of “heroism” from issue 3 to her classmates in the training school during a simulator run.
5. The two corporations team up to battle against the swarm monster, but it goes poorly. Serious fires the rocket fist, but then can’t get it back, so is stuck with only one functioning arm. The Volk and Excalibur try to combine, but The Volk used metric units and Excalibur imperial, so they don’t match up and can’t combine. The pilots of Excalibur get scared and flee when they start to take heavy damage, resulting in Ursula returning to the GDC in mid-battle. While she and sun argue over how to beat the swarm monster after it grabs and starts to engulf Serious, Erik sets the self-destruct and launches the head off of the robot, destroying the swarm monster. And costing GDC a fortune.
