Planetary – Sleep Therapy – MK Stangeland Jr.

(6 Panels)

Panel 1: Long panel in the swamps of FLORIDA, where the top of CTHULU’s head can be seen poking up over the treeline. Off to one side, where the swamp is less forested, a PLANETARY vehicle of some kind that would be appropriate for this kind of thing is parked, with a touch of SCIENCE! instruments set up nearby. JAKITA WAGNER and THE DRUMMER are standing nearby, with DRUMMER looking at the instruments and JAKITA standing nearby.

Panel 2: ELIJA SNOW exits the thickest part of the swamp – he is removing goggles from his face. JAKITA and DRUMMER sit up and take notice as ELIJA approaches.

JAKITA: ItsAboutTimeYouGotBackDoYouHaveAnyIdeaHowLong…

DRUMMER: Jakita, you’re doing the run-on thing.

JAKITA: So tell me what happened in there already!

Panel 3: ELIJA takes the goggles off his head and points with his thumb over his shoulder.

ELIJA (1): Good news – big, green, and ugly’s reputation is overexaggerated.

ELIJA (2): All he really wants is to hit the snooze alarm and fin a place to sleep where people will quit waking him up.

ELIJA (3): Bad news – we have to figure out how to put Cthulu back to sleep.

Panel 4: ELIJA tosses the goggles to DRUMMER, who sloppily catches them.

ELIJA: Also, Drummer, your tech wasn’t worth $#*^ in there.

ELIJA: I’m pretty sure I still went crazy while talking to him.

Panel 5: DRUMMER looks at the goggles.

DRUMMER: So how do we put Cthulu back to sleep?

Panel 6: JAKITA and ELIJA both look at DRUMMER.

JAKITA: You’re the information guru, Drummer. You tell us.

(END PAGE)

Skullkickers - The Musical! - R.A. Wonsowski (the American Zombie)

Panel 1 - BALDY and SHORTY are running left to right full bore across the barren plains of Leng, chased by CTHULHU.

SFX:  (of their running) HPL-HPL-HPL-HPL

Panel 2 - BALDY, SHORTY, and CTHULHU skidding on their heels to a stop.

SFX:  SKID-D-D!

Panels 3 to 6 - Artist's choice.  BALDY, SHORTY, and CTHULHU dancing in perfect synchronization, in cartoony exaggeration, looking towards the reader as if sitting in the audience.  Copy is as follows:

Panel 3 -

Caption:  (sung to the melody of "Hakuna Matata" from The Lion King)

BALDY & SHORTY:  Cthulhu f'thagn!  What a won-der-ful phrase!

Panel 4 -

BALDY & SHORTY:  Cthulhu f'thagn!  He's R'lyeh set in his ways!

Panel 5 -

BALDY & SHORTY:  We'll be batshit insane - For the rest of our days!

Panel 6 -

BALDY & SHORTY:  It's us two pleasant sods - Against an Elder God...

Panel 7 -  Big finish!  All step toward us, giving us the jazz hands, BALDY and SHORTY enthusiastic.  CTHULHU is smiling beneath his cepholapod tentacles.

ALL:  Cthulhu f-tha-gn!!

Cthulhu – The Tick vs. H.P. Lovecraft – MK Stangeland Jr.

(Cthulhu has successfully come to The City. The Tick has proven to be immune to the effects of such, however, on account of his simpler mindset and the fact that he’s kind of insane already. This has left him as one of the few citizens of The City not reduced to a bubbling idiot or whatever it is Cthulhu does to people.)

(5 PANELS)

Panel 1: The setting is on the roof of THE TICK’s apartment building. ARTHUR has succumbed to the influence of CTHULHU. THE TICK holds ARTHUR by the shoulders as he looks at his sidekick in shock.

THE TICK: EGAD! Arthur! Not you too!

Panel 2: THE TICK shoves ARTHUR aside as he turns his attention to CTHULHU (Off-Panel). The force of this is greater than THE TICK intends, but it’s not enough to cause major damage to ARTHUR.

THE TICK: Don’t worry, Arthur! I’ll do everything I can to turn you back!

Panel 3: THE TICK begins to run towards CTHULHU, who can be seen poking its head up above the rooftops in another part of THE CITY, seemingly minding his own business.

THE TICK: If Hollywood has taught me anything, it’s that the only way to turn a zombie back into a person is by killing the head zombie! And to kill the head zombie, I have to destroy its brain!

Panel 4: THE TICK launches itself off a rooftop into the air.

THE TICK: Beware my justice, Giant King Zombie Monster! I’ve even prepared a means to feed it to you!

Panel 5: A long panel across the bottom of the page, showing the skyline as THE TICK leaps towards CTHULHU, who can be seen off at the edge of the panel. THE TICK himself is tiny in this panel on account of how small he is compared to THE CITY and CTHULHU, though his voice can be heard just fine.

THE TICK: SPOOOOOOOOOOOOOON!!!

CTHULU: (Tiny) ?

Cthulhu - Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit - Grant McLaughlin

1 – Night time. A straight shot of the Capitol Building (from the side of the Mall for those familiar with D.C.). It is a foggy night. I imagine a very loose, expressionistic art style here. Dark and moody, if possible, but the building and place should still be recognizable.

CAPTION: Some people refer to it as the “Machine of Government”.

2 – Pull out a bit. Something like a ¾ shot, still centred on the Capitol Building. Maybe see some traffic and various night time stuff going around.

CAPTION (1): As if the whole thing is an unthinking automaton that doesn't have a plan for the individual citizen.

CAPTION (2): For you.

3 – Pull back even further. Getting closer to an aerial shot, but still not quite there. The lights are starting to meld into a bigger image, but it isn't yet clear.

CAPTION: But what would you say if I told you that these people were thinking too small? That things are on a much larger scale than they realize.

4 – An aerial view at this point. With the final change in angle, the pattern becomes clear: the tracks of grass behind the Capitol Building form dark eyes, the Capitol Building a maw, and the Mall and roads coming from it are long, continuous tentacles. First caption at the top of the panel, second caption at the bottom.

CAPTION (1): Government isn't a machine.

CAPTION (2): ...it's a monster.

Cthulhu – Tournament of Suns – Ryan K Lindsay

PAGE 1 – 1 PANEL

This is a double page splash. Deal with it.

1. Here we have the mega-tournament of the gods going down. Our lead in character, Henry Beauchamp (new character, no reference), stands to the bottom left, dwarfed by the rest we see. What we see is, a fighting arena set into a volcanic cliff, Frazetta clouds sing in the sky, and there are seven distinct ‘species’ of monster. The tentacled Cthulhu stands proud but we also get, a many-legged spider monster, a tree-style monster, a strange water-creature monster, a monster of what seems to be only eyes and teeth, a completely armoured monster, and a plant monster. Go crazy with the design, this is your page to shine, (unnamed artist).

Caption-Henry: For years, I worked to protect our lives, our world, from the madness of Cthulhu.

Caption-Henry: Little did I know there were such worse monsters available.

Caption-Henry: Cthulhu had won the right to be our tormentors. The lease was now expired…they all have a chance to be up next.

Cthulhu - The Day Is Almost Here - Rol Hirst

Panel One.

A public park. In the play area children are swinging, sliding, hanging from climbing frames, messing around on the roundabout and seesaw. A group of bored parents stand watching. One woman stands with a pram: the baby inside is squalling. Two dads are talking about last night’s game. A mother is smoking a cigarette, lost in her depression. Another woman is talking to a friend on her phone.

Dad 1: Defense was all over the place last night.

Phone woman: So I told him, if I catch him doing anything like that again, I’ll take him for everything he has.

Baby (unseen, from pram): Waaaaahhh!

Panel Two.

Two boys (7 / 8 year olds) have pushed a fat kid off the roundabout. The kid is snivelling on the ground, nursing a bruised knee. The bullies are laughing at him. In the background, the woman rocks her pram to try and calm her crying baby.

Boy 1: Goes much faster without you slowing it down, lardybutt!

Boy 2: Ha ha, lardybutt, lardybutt, ha!

Fat Kid (small letters in bigger balloon): I’ll get you, Garrett. One of these days…

Baby: Waaaahhhhhh!

Panel Three.

The sports talk has turned to an argument – the two dads are pushing and brawling with each other now. The woman with the baby frowns at them – this isn’t helping keep her little one quiet.

Dad 1: O’Neill’s got to go.

Dad 2: Whu--!? O’Neill’s the best player on the whole team!

Dad 1: Get out of here! Are you for real?

Baby: Waaaaaaah!

Mum: Shhhhh.

Panel Four.

The phone woman gets another call. She holds out her phone to see who’s calling, while still talking to her friend who’s on the line. Behind her, the depressed mum presses her cigarette butt into her arm. The baby continues to cry in the background.

Phone woman: Oh – hang on, Tru, I’m getting another call. Ohh – it’s Anthony! You remember, Friday night?

Phone woman: Gotta take this, Tru – a woman has her needs, after all.

Baby (off-panel?): Waaaaaaahhh!

Panel Five.

Main panel. The mum with the pram has had enough of all this commotion. She pushes the pram away, towards us. Behind her, the kids continue to bully (tormenting a little girl on the swings), the dads continue to argue, phone woman starts flirting, depressed woman starts to cry.

Although we’re looking straight into the pram, in the foreground of the image, we still can’t see the baby. All we can see inside the pram is darkness.

Dad 2: Like you know anything--!

Little girl: Get off! Leave me alone!

Phone woman: Hey, big boy – missing me already?

Baby: Wah-wah-waaaaaaah!

Mum: Hush now, Cthulhu, they’re not ready yet. Soon, though. Very soon.

Cthulhu - The Battle of R'lyeh - Ben Rosenthal

I haven’t written a splash before, and this seemed the perfect opportunity to try.

1. Full Page Splash

The bottom third of the page shows the backs of people. They are drawn small, as we are seeing this panel from quite far away. The mass of people are gathered on a wide cliff face, looking out across the sea to the horizon.

Three quarters of the page are taken up by two monstrous beings. One is Cthulhu, the Water elemental. It is grappling with the Air elemental Hastur the Unspeakable, who is floating above the ocean floor.

The two are battling a great distance away, which gives you an idea of how big these two beings are. They are locked into their final battle. It is an awe inspiring site. We are but spectators between this epic battle.

CAPTION

“...the Old or Ancient Ones, the Elder Gods, of cosmic good, and those of cosmic evil...

...for there are the Water Beings, hidden in the depths; those of Air that are the primal lurkers beyond time; those of Earth, horrible animate survivors of distant eons.” - August Derleth. The Return Of Hastur, 1937.

Cthulhu in "Rubble and Dust" by Danial Carroll

PAGE ONE (three panels)


PANEL ONE, HALF-PAGE SPLASH
A man stands on the edge of a lookout. Before him lies the ruin of a large city. Most of the city is rubble and the buildings that are still standing have large sections missing. A giant bipedal creature, the size of the tallest visible skyscraper, is ambling between them. It is green, bat-winged, and has a face full of tentacles--Cthulhu.

CAPTION: This is what has become of the world--reduced to nothing more than RUBBLE and DUST.

CAPTION: It has been this way now for over a year…
CAPTION: Ever since that ABOMINATION and its ARMY revealed themselves from beneath the waves to wage war on humanity.


PANEL TWO
As of the man’s POV, we see a close-up of Cthulhu carelessly brushing past a building, its wall collapsing.

CAPTION: I call it a WAR…
CAPTION: However--truth be said--it was more like a MASSACRE.
CAPTION: For the most part, the attack was unexpected, unprovoked, and particularly brutal.


PANEL THREE
Close on the man’s face, looking saddened.

CAPTION: There were some who were forewarned of this APOCALYPSE, however--
CAPTION: --A select few who were SENSITIVE ENOUGH to hear the creature’s calls through their DREAMS.
CAPTION: I probably wouldn’t have believed it possible...

CAPTION: … if I hadn’t been one of them.

Why Cthulhu?

There once was a little-known pulp-writer who went by the title of H.P. Lovecraft. Now Mr. Lovecraft had a penchant for naming the “gods” of his tales with very unusual names. There was Nyarlathotep, Azathoth, Yog-Sothoth, and Shub-Niggurath. However, there was one in particular that transcended the rest to become a staple of pop-culture. This character has seen spin-off stories, films, video games, RPGs, plushies, two albums of carol parodies (I kid you not), a plethora of fan-art, and of course, comics.

Who is this popular fellow? Why Cthulhu of course.

What’s that you say? You’ve been living under a rock for the last 83 years? In that case, I should give you a brief run-down on who he is:

Like all of Lovecraft’s “gods”, Cthulhu is actually an alien. He is green, gelatinous, has bat-like wings, and looks like a fat man with a face full of tentacles. He is also dead, but not really. He’s kind of just been sleeping… for a really long time. To clear things up, here’s a small quote from the Necronomicon:

That is not dead which can eternal lie,

And with strange aeons, even death may die.

Make more sense now? It is also said that ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn. No, I didn’t just have a stroke, that’s alien-speak for, “In his house at R'lyeh dead Cthulhu waits dreaming.” You should probably be thankful of this, as it has been prophesised that when he awakens--when the stars are right--the whole world will plunge into madness and insanity… sweet, sweet insanity! Mwahahahaha!!!!