Issue 34: Just Another Summer, Joy Who Lived rehearsals, and a WonderCon screening!
We are so so busy right now.
And yet none of it covers the bills?
Seems badly designed!
NEW STUFF
Finally finally finally one of our graphic novels that we finished writing in 2024 has been announced! And it’s up for preorders! Here’s the official announcement!
You saw the (not final) cover as the lead image in this newsletter! Just Another Summer is our queer trans young adult romcom! And, would you believe, there’s a Star Trek connection? Of course you would. We gotta be us.
What that connection is, however… well you’ll have to read it to find out.
Here’s the (really good, in our opinion!) preview blurb for the book written by Maverick’s marketing folks!
When scandal sidelines two LA teen celebrities, a punishment summer on a Montana farm forces them to trade red carpets for rubber boots—and to choose between the futures they were raised for and the loves they never saw coming.
Eager for a break from their brutal schedules as A-list actors, teen sisters Hayley and Becky Huxley sneak out to experience LA on their own terms. After a big mistake gets them fired from their gig on a hit TV show, they’re sent to a dairy farm in Montana to learn a little humility!
Sparks fly when they meet farm hand Jake, who can’t believe he has to babysit some pampered rich girls all summer! But Becky's very into the cute girl at the local diner, and Hayley and Jake start to realize that they have more in common than they think. Even though she's a cis city girl and he's a trans country boy — they might just be falling for each other. But they're from entirely different worlds, it could never work! ...or could it?
You can preorder it from any comic shop or bookstore now!
Maverick let us write the most on the surface-level trans and queer story we’ve ever gotten to do. A character is trans, and it’s talked about and discussed and impacts his life. Two characters are queer, and it’s talked about and discussed and impacts their lives.
It’s so rare to be able to do that, especially when we’ve been forced multiple times to pull transness out of a character, or not even allowed to talk about trans people via allegory (even the most obtuse and oblique allegory that most people might miss).
We’re also thrilled about this book because too many romcoms focus on the rom and not the com, y’know? But this book is funny, trust us. And the two romances in it are no way sidelined or suffer at the expense of jokes. It’s an actual romcom! Truly!
We also played with the romcom form a bit, which we’ll talk about more in the Process Stuff section of this issue of the newsletter!
TICKETS ARE NOW ON SALE
for our full-cast live read/performance of our original cyberpunk action dramedy pilot, Robo Waitress Assassins!
One. Night. Only!
April 5, 12:30 pm pacific!
Live and in-person in LA, and live streaming from anywhere!
Sliding scale tickets available if you need them!
90% of proceeds go to us and the cast!
ASL interpreted!
Sorry for all the bold, but it’s our first live show and we’re very excited!
We made two different posters for it, check them out!
Get your tickets at the link! See our show! Our cast is so amazing, it’s gonna be such a great time. We’re both performing in it, too! No presh.
Zeffy
Our short film Long Away is screening at WonderCon! The convention’s in Anaheim, CA, from March 27-29. We’re not allowed to say exactly which day, or time, or panel room yet. But we’ll have that info for you in the next newsletter!
There will be a panel and Q&A afterward, with both of us, and our producer Erin Macdonald, assistant director/VFX lead/editor Jessie Earl, and stars Griffin Kelly and Justin Lawrence Barnes! Please come!
We’re not positive on this yet, but we think the panel might be filmed. If so, trust that we’ll link you to it if and when we can!
Another review of Star Trek Voyager: Homecoming issue 5 came in, and if this isn’t one of the most flattering things we’ve ever heard…
“We deserved that [ending] and we had to wait 30+ years to get it. And the bravery of these two writers to actually do this... I love you. I love you for doing this. You have a reader for life. I don't care what you're doing. I will read your stuff. You've won me in one issue. You won me completely over.”
Awwwwwww yeah.
WHAT WE’RE WORKING ON
Lately it’s been rehearsals and tons of prep for the Robo Waitress Assassins performance. It’s going to be much more than just a read, though the actors will have scripts with them to read from. But they’re going to do a lot of interacting with each other, so it’s sort of a hybrid read/performance.
Who knew so much work was involved for one performance? I mean, yes, logically we know, but dang it’s just so much. It’s wild to do all this work for one performance and then it’s over, with no more shows. But that’ll make it this beautiful unique thing all its own. Though, y’know, if some producer or executive sees it and loves it and wants to make it into a show… that’d sure be ideal.
But it’s being filmed for the livestream, so that’s super cool.
We’re also checking the final print proof for Just Another Summer on a super short deadline, so it can get to the printer on time.
The comic pitches an editor asked for resulted in the go ahead to send a full pitch for one of them, so we’re also working on getting that ready to go. Cross those fingers for us, again, if you would please.
We’ve also got to plan the WonderCon screening, which involves getting everyone their panelist badges and corralling their bios and such, and plan for the panel itself.
On top of all that, we’ve got another batch of writing due by the end of the month for another Star Trek Adventures ttrpg book.
And all of that hasn’t left time for much else!
TRANS TUESDAY UPDATE
Our Trans Representation in 2025 Media report wrapped up with part 4, which included the totals for the year of trans creatives working on things, trans people and characters appearing in things, and jokes at trans people’s expense. The jokes outnumbered everything else. By a lot. We then compared to the annual totals from the previous three years… and see things trending so much worse. By a lot.
It’s grim out there, friends.
Tilly Bridges
But in happier news, the next episode was all about the Joy Who Lived festival (that our Robo Waitress Assassins show is part of), where we interview steering committee member Aurora Zenith and talk all about it. Get all the details on this amazing burst of trans creativity and joy, and how it came about.
Tilly Bridges
RECOMMENDATIONS
Predator Badlands is a wild addition to the film series, in that it breaks with the form of all the previous movies… which were just “predator arrives, people try to survive.” The franchise has changed up who the people trying to survive were, and where and when the story was located, but this one is something new.
It’s kind of a… fish-out-of-water, enemies-to-friends action… comedy? Maybe it’s not funny enough to be called an action comedy, but its tone is so much lighter than all that’s come before.
We love it when things take big swings and try something new, especially when it’s within an established franchise, or medium, or genre. And this is also somehow fitting since we’re going to talk about playing with form in the Process Stuff section.
In any case, it’s a delightful left turn from most Predator movies, while still very much being a predator movie. It’s a good time!
THE DIRTBAG DISPATCH
So this was a surprise.
It was cold this day, and Henry, being a California Cat, was more in the mood for cuddles/heat stealing, which is pretty normal for him.
But he’s bad at laps. He’s so bad at laps. He’ll come into your lap and just… stand there, confused about what to do next. You can try to sort of guide him into laying down, but he’ll resist it all the way and then immediately stand back up. The best he usually gets is lying next to you and maybe touching part of you.
But here he was, climbing into a lap and just… laying down like it was no big deal. If it’s no big deal, why can’t you do it any other time?!
He’s so bad at being a cat.
Izzy, meanwhile, very much has The Concept of Catting down to a science.
WHAT’S IN THE BIG TIME?
Big Time issue 34 goes into what it’s like to play with the form of something, and how much you can tweak and change before you’re suddenly making something entirely new, and not playing with the pre-existing form of something else. It’s also got exclusive lead character concept art from one of our sci-fi comic pitches!
Sign up for it at birdguestbroadcast.com and help us pay rent and eat food and stuff!
THE END
We did it, we got to the end!
Of writing this.
Okay, now to go write more other things.
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