Chapter: 2020

Shots, Shots Shotsshotsshots

I don’t know exactly when Helen became that middle-aged white lady who pretends wine is a personality, but she’s become way more interesting as a result. Which also means she’ll pop up more frequently, because that happens every time I figure out how I want to write a character.

EMPLOYEE OF THE WEEK:

Welcome new employee Jillian Dolan! She is the artist of Kyle the Nihilist Dinosaur, Misha, and other comics! You should go check them out, they’re great. Jillian was the first new patron to take advantage of my COVID boredness-relief effort – all patrons will receive a link to a Dropbox folder with every digital comic I’ve produced that I have redistribution rights for. There are roughly 1,150 pages of comics in there, with more added every time I have a new book or short story released. It’s an ideal way to get a lot of material to read and also support your favourite artist who suddenly has no conventions or book fairs (aka a large amount of my income) for the foreseeable future. So if you think Hell, Inc. and over a thousand pages of other things I’ve drawn are worth a few bucks, hit up the Hell, Inc. Patreon and you’ll have a folder of comics within 24 hours. It will be VERY appreciated.

You can also help Hell, Inc. by voting on Top Webcomics. The comic is pretty highly ranked this month, and that’s helping to bring in new readers and keep more folks self-isolated without losing their minds. Click on the banner below to vote.

Next Week: Hell’s best crisis management team. Read it early on Patreon!

Sweaty Steve

Steve is me after I play sports. The sweating starts early and ends… never. It never ends. I look like I’ve been in a rain storm before I’m even tired.

EMPLOYEE OF THE WEEK:

Cindy Gauthier is Employee of the Week, and you did not come to see us at Dead By Con last weekend, because it was postponed due to COVID-19. Incidentally, most of my expected income for the month was from events and appearances, which are now postponed/canceled, so if you think Hell, Inc. is worth a buck or two, support me on Patreon, because that’s my only predictable form of income each month. The rest of my money comes from freelancing and selling books, which is WILDLY INCONSISTENT even without the goddamn plague.

Vote. Top Webcomics. Do it. It’s how I get more readers and keep this thing chugging along. Click the banner.

Next Week: Shots, shots shotsshotsshots. Read it early on Patreon!

Arms Like Noodles

I rewatched some Invader Zim a while ago, and was surprised at how much of it held up. I was afraid that it would be too LOLrandom upon revisiting it, but it turns out that’s just what gets quoted most of the time. I’m sure that show definitely had an influence on my joke writing style, which involves a lot of weird phrases designed to make what would otherwise be a normal scene funnier. So of course that’s what I’m writing about in the newspost for a strip that doesn’t utilize that technique at all.

If you’re in Edmonton, I’m going to be at Dead By Con this weekend. It’s a locally run horror convention. I attended it last year for fun, and it was great, so now I’m returning with a vengeance. And also to sell GWAR books. I’ve never tabled at a horror convention before, so it’ll be a fun, new experience.

EMPLOYEE OF THE WEEK:

Robbie Dorman, host of The Simpsons Show podcast, is this week’s Employee of the Week. I love the Simpsons (I would hope that’s clear from the comics I’ve made), and I love The Simpsons Show. It’s very good.

If you think Hell, Inc. is worth a dollar, you should give said dollar(s) to the Hell, Inc. Patreon, because that helps keep things running over here. Money: I need it to live.

As always, not everyone can afford to give their favourite artists money. But everyone can afford to give them clicks! Click on the banner below to vote for Hell, Inc. on Top Webcomics, which is the number one source for driving new readers to the site.

NEXT WEEK: SHOTS, SHOTS SHOTS SHOTS SHOTS. Patreon. Go there. Money. Me. Comics. Read early.

Pot vs. Kettle

“Hey, Pot? Yeah, this is Kettle. Yeah. You’re black.”

This is the kind of strip where I wish this was a cartoon so that space and time were separate elements. Doug looking back and forth between Harry and Zebub would be like 5 full seconds.

EMPLOYEE OF THE WEEK:

Sylvia Douglas is the Employee of the Week, and made a movie called Without in 2019, which you can all learn more about on her website. If you think what I do here on Hell, Inc. is worth a dollar, support the Hell, Inc. Patreon and YOU TOO can be Employee of the Week. At $2 or more, you enter the recurring rotation of Employees of the Week. Do it, I don’t have any work lined up in the foreseeable future that isn’t pitching projects to see if maybe they get picked up.

As always, votes on Top Webcomic are super helpful for growing readership. Votes early in the month are especially valuable, as those boost the comic much farther, much faster. Vote often by clicking the banner below.

Next Week: Some real Charlie Brown baseball energy. Read it early on Patreon!

Eyes on the Prize

I have returned from my vacation in Mexico, which is the first real vacation (ie. not doing a convention so I can afford the rest of the trip) I’ve taken in FOURTEEN YEARS. I feel great, which I’m sure freelancing will take care of shortly.

EMPLOYEE OF THE WEEK:

Brien Aronov is Employee of the Week! He doesn’t have anything for me to plug in these news posts, but YOU could. If you think Hell, Inc is worth a buck, head on over to the Patreon and become a patron so I can spend more time on this instead of freelancing. Stumping for work sucks, I’d much rather be making my own work to entertain you folks.

Votes on Top Webcomics are a great way to support the comic, as well. New readers = more dopamine hits from the stat ticker going up. It (and Webtoon) are the largest source of new readers, so votes are very useful. Click the banner to vote!

Next Week: Doug is on some real Charlie Brown on the mound shit. Read it early on Patreon!

Be the Cockatrice Butt

I don’t know why I’ve been going really crazy with backgrounds lately, but I definitely have. As I type this, I’m taking a break from colouring a scene that is even more full of stuff. Also, I’m typing this several days before it goes up, because when it’s live, I’ll be on the first vacation I’ve taken in 14 years. COMICS, EVERYONE.

EMPLOYEE OF THE WEEK:

Joe Amon is Employee of the Week! If you, like Joe, think Hell, Inc. is worth a dollar, kick that dollar over to the Hell, Inc. Patreon, which helps finance things like “my mortgage payments” and “drawing this comic instead of hunting for freelance jobs.” You can get rewards like early access to Hell, Inc. strips and EVERY DIGITAL COMIC I’VE EVER MADE (that I’m not legally prevented from offering as a Patreon reward). So go do that.

You can also help Hell, Inc. by voting for it on Top Webcomics, which has been the best source for bringing in new readers to the comic. Click the banner below to vote!

Next Week: Helen’s priorities are very well-defined. Find out what they are by supporting Hell, Inc. on Patreon.

Vital Knowledge

For a comic that was originally intended to test how fast I could draw a strip from blank page to finished letters, I’ve sure started spending a lot of time drawing backgrounds. This isn’t even that absurd an example of them – there are some pages in upcoming weeks where I spent as much time drawing one background as I did the rest of the strip.

EMPLOYEE OF THE WEEK:

Damion is Employee of the Week, and you can too! If you think Hell, Inc. is worth a buck, donate to the Hell, Inc. Patreon and help keep the lights on around here. As I post this, I’m sitting around waiting for a freelance gig to start so I can get my next paycheque, and I have NO IDEA when that will be! Could be tomorrow, could be October. The Patreon gives me, an artist, a predictable income, which is invaluable to me, and also to the bank, to whom I pay my mortgage.

If you can’t afford the Patreon because capitalism has crushed the value of your labour, vote for Hell, Inc. on Top Webcomics. It’s been the best way to gain new readers (and potential Patreon patrons) thus far, and voting is free! Click on the banner below.

Next Week: Butt-based comedy is the best kind of comedy. Read it early on Patreon!

If I Don’t Laugh, I’ll Cry

This is one of several recent strips where I was sure I had written way too much dialogue and it would never fit, then when I sat down to letter it I had plenty of space. That’s something that tends to happen every so often with comics that I letter digitally. Even using old strips as a guideline, there’s some guesswork involved in how much space the lettering will occupy. It’s much better to overestimate the lettering than underestimate it, though. There’s nothing quite as demoralizing as trying to rewrite text so that it fits into a much-too-small space.

Before we get to Employee of the Week, Hell, Inc. has been nominated for an award! Well, sort of. I was nominated for an award and it happened to be for my work on Hell, Inc. (and also GWAR). You can vote for me in the Favourite Cartoonist category here: http://bit.ly/smavote2019

EMPLOYEE OF THE WEEK:

Cait is Employee of the Week! You should go buy her short story collection, Dead Man’s Candle and Other Short Horror Stories, which is available for purchase as well as on Kindle Unlimited. It was produced as part of a writing challenge in October, and Dead Man’s Candle collects her favourite 13 of the 31 stories written during that challenge.

If you think Hell, Inc. is worth a dollar, you can help support my cartooning endeavours by donating to Hell, Inc. on Patreon. Patrons get to read every Hell, Inc. strip a week early, can get a shoutout as Employee of the Week, or even get access to a folder with every digital comic I’ve produced. There are THIRTY-ONE (31) comics in there right now, including the PDF versions of the print collections of Hell, Inc. that were funded on Kickstarter last year.

If you want to help Hell, Inc. get new readers, click on the banner below to vote for it on Top Webcomics! Votes early in the month are worth more as the standings reset. You can vote once a day!

Next Week: Harry imparts some vital knowledge. Does it finally answer Sara’s question? Find out early on Patreon.

Potato?

Doug is me doing my Pure Math 30 exam in high school. For non-Canadians who were in high school in the early 2000s, that’s the academic stream of grade 12 math. I sure wish somebody would have told me that I didn’t need it for university and wouldn’t need it in any capacity in the future. Turns out you don’t need pre-calculus to calculate book dimensions and figure out how much money you need to raise on Kickstarter.

EMPLOYEE OF THE WEEK:

Since the rotation is re-setting, and it’s my birthday on Friday, I’m going to pull rank and make myself Employee of the Week. That’s right, I have that power. I will plug Hell, Inc. on Webtoon, so if you like to read your comics in that format, subscribe to Hell, Inc.! There are more people leaving comments there than here, so you can also chat with other readers that way. If you think what I’m doing with Hell, Inc. is worth a dollar, support Hell, Inc. on Patreon. It’s how I pay for things like “web hosting” and, moreover, “my mortgage payments.” That second one requires a lot more freelance work than I would like, and every little bit from readers cuts down the amount of time I have to spend freelancing.

And of course, not everyone can afford to throw a few bucks at their favourite webcartoonist. Or me. But you can throw a few new readers my way by A) telling your friends to read the comic and B) voting for Hell, Inc. on Top Webcomics, which is the largest platform through which Hell, Inc. gets new readers. Click the banner to vote!

Next Week: If I don’t laugh, I’ll cry! Also there’s a new comic next week, I don’t remember what it’s about. OR DO I? This is a weird bit I’m doing here, just go support the Patreon.

Butt Fusion

After typing in the title for this strip, all I can think of is a version of the DBZ fusion dance where they touch butts at the end.

In other Hell, Inc. news, I’m almost done writing what will be Hell, Inc. book 3. I haven’t decided on a plan for releasing that one in print, yet. It will be printed at some point, but I haven’t decided whether it will be in the spring or if I’ll wait until book 4 is ready and do them together like I did for volumes 1 and 2. I haven’t really had much opportunity to sell books 1 and 2 outside of the Kickstarter, so it’s hard to gauge what the better move is. Incidentally, if you want to buy copies of books 1 and 2 and motivate me to get the next book out faster, that’s a thing you can do. And you SHOULD do it.

EMPLOYEE OF THE WEEK:

Cindy Gauthier is Employee of the Week, and you’ll be able to see both of us in meat space at Dead by Con, Edmonton’s horror convention. I expect it will be a very fun time and that Caitlin will buy a lot of DVDs again for a buck or two each. If you think Hell, Inc. is worth a buck or two, support me on Patreon, because that’s my only predictable form of income each month. The rest of my money comes from freelancing and selling books, which is WILDLY INCONSISTENT.

And of course, not everyone can afford to throw a few bucks at their favourite webcartoonist. Or me. But you can throw a few new readers my way by A) telling your friends to read the comic and B) voting for Hell, Inc. on Top Webcomics, which is the largest platform through which Hell, Inc. gets new readers. Click the banner to vote!

Next Week: Math is hard, okay? Find out why Doug is bad at math now on Patreon.