WHO IS ... EL GORGO!?! ... PART TWO

In part one I covered the fateful creation of El Gorgo! back in March 2007. Mike McGee and I came up with the character and basic premise: El Gorgo is a super-intelligent luchador gorilla adventurer starring in a Silver-Age-style comic book. In the first story he would start off fighting the Deep Ones as they resurrected the sea-god Dagon, then he would be transported to Titan far in the future to battle humanoid cyborg dinosaurs. And it would all be resolved in 22 pages for a black & white anthology book. Sounds easy, right? We sure thought so at the time. But it wasn't quite to be.

Mike started working on the script, and I think we both quickly realized that the story was just too big to fit into 22 pages. So it became part one of a larger story. We both decided that since we owned the characters and could do anything we wanted, we would also publish the story online, since color is pretty much free on the internet, and El Gorgo really wanted to be in color.

Mike also added in the supporting cast for El Gorgo!:

Nika: Kidnapped by the Deep Ones to be sacrificed to Dagon and originally conceived as a typical damsel-in-distress, Nika's role in the first story will be significant.

Eddie Devil: Like El Gorgo, Eddie is a freelance agent for LUCHA LIBERTY. He's a blue-colar luchador and total gearhead. His name is inspired by the legendary guitarist Eddie Angel of Los Straitjackets.

Lucy: A full-time agent for LUCHA LIBERTY, Lucy is a technical genius and assists Eddie Devil in finding El Gorgo.

Senor Grande: The mysterious blind luchador leader of LUCHA LIBERTY, his history dates back to World War II and the heroes of a bygone era. Though blind, Senior Grande is one of the greatest fighters alive today.

Gorgo-A-Go-Go: El Gorgo's surf-rock band, currently very miffed at El Gorgo for potentially ruining their biggest show to date.

By late May, the first script for El Gorgo! #1 was complete, and I started what would turn out to be a very slow process drawing the book. The first issue was finally completed in late June of 2008. About halfway through, we agreed that the first issue should be 24 pages instead of 22 to open up some of the art. By that point the anthology project had long fallen through, so El Gorgo! was now on his own, published online in glorious color!

During the yearlong effort, we continued to develop El Gorgo! and work out future stories and characters. Some spoiler-free highlights of what's coming up:

El Gorgo meets... THE YETI!!!!
-- (plus we get a brief glimpse of some heroes from World War II)

The Island of Doctor Cat-Head
-- At last! We've dropped some hints about this guy in the first story. Now, meet El Gorgo's greatest arch-nemesis, Doctor Cat-Head. He may seem a bit silly, but trust us, he's not somebody you want to mess with! This cat's got some mean claws!

Vikings!
-- That's really all I can say about it. It will be awesome though.

The Secret Origin of El Gorgo!
-- El Gorgo is stricken with amnesia and lost to his friends. Learn about El Gorgo's history and the dark secret that haunts him TO THIS VERY DAY!!!! This is a big one, as it will establish a lot of the tone for the series going forward.

More concept art:

Early Deep Ones concept drawing:

Early Dagon concept drawing:

Early Eddie Devil concept drawing:

Another Early Eddie Devil concept drawing: