Story Synopsis

I realized as Jeff was uploading some character sketches that, other than the first four pages of the comic readily available on the site, not many people reading this have much idea what the comic book is about or who the main players are.

The title 60 MINUTE BROADWAY comes from wrestling lingo for a 60 minute time limit draw. Back in the days of the traveling world champion, the local hero would take on the (usually) villain champion in a title match when he came to their town. Not wanting to have the money drawing champion lose but still wanting to make the hero look like he took that champ to the limit, the matches would often go to a broadway. To be able to go 60 minutes was a mark of distinction for the champion, as it meant you were talented enough in your craft to engage an audience for an hour and also make your opponent look good as well. Guys like Ric Flair, Ricky Steamboat, Harley Race, Terry Funk among others were famous for these types of matches. It was once said that Flair could "have a good match with a broomstick", meaning that no matter who he was in the ring with, he could make them look convincing and like the proverbial million bucks.

One of the major points to get across is the tone of the story. I don't treat professional wrestling as a "legit competitive sport". We know it's not "real" in the sense of the winners are predetermined. Although it's a lot more real than most people think and especially for those who are in the business. This story is about one guy trying to rediscover his passion for his chosen life and remember why he wanted to get into this in the first place.

So with that in mind, I present the "official story synopsis". There are a few twists and turns and some other characters, but I want to leave something for the actual comic! What follows is the basic outline of the story. After a week or so, I'll move a version of this to the links on the sidebar for regular perusal.

THE STORY: Ace Hazzard spent his youth dreaming of becoming a professional wrestler. When finally achieving that goal, he finds out there's a tremendous gap between his dreams and his reality. Ace isn't a big name superstar with his face on t-shirts and lunch boxes, instead he is a member of a group of wrestlers known as "jobbers". No-name wrestlers whose sole job, while solid workers in the ring, is to lose to the big name wrestlers and make them look good. He is a preliminary guy, total opening match. And there he sits, jaded, bitter and burnt out for the majority of his career, never being given a chance to break out...until the day he's fired for not being "marketable" enough.

Now, in the twilight of his career, he is forced to work the purgatory of the independent circuit. Landing in Laredo, Texas working for Texas Championship Wrestling, Ace meets grizzled old veteran Jackie Dugan. Jackie is a hard drinkin', 55 year old veteran of the sport. He's seen it all and done even more and, despite damaged legs that would barely support a coffee table, he still leaves it all in the ring to entertain the people that spent their hard earned money to see him. This is a quality that Ace lacks and the two men butt heads and fists over this and form a rocky friendship. It's here that Ace also meets Dr. Marisol Ruiz who has her own secrets from the past that draw her and Ace together. Ace begins to find his passion again toiling away in high school gyms and armories, but as time is running out for him, he wonders whether he'll ever be able to live his dream...to main event Madison Square Garden.

Meet Jackie and Marisol

Note from John: In reading Jeff's post I realized that people reading this aren't that familiar with the characters. I'll try to do a rundown of the main characters and post them later. For the meantime, Jackie Dugan is a grizzled old veteran of the independent circuit. He doesn't like Ace at all, but can Ace earn his respect? That remains to be seen. Marisol Ruiz is the love interest of the story. A doctor of Mexican descent in Laredo, TX and none too happy with Ace putting his body on the line on a nightly basis. OK, now I leave you with the post:

Sorry for the long hiatus between postings. A lot of things have been going down lately, and unfortunately, 60 got placed on the back burner for a bit. As of this past weekend though, 60's back in a big way and John and I are cookin' up lots of cool stuff to get a draft of the first issue of 60 completed in the next few months. First, we need to get all the character sketches done and that's what this past weekend was all about.

John came over Saturday afternoon and we sat down with a mission to get the characters of Jackie and Marisol done. To the upper left you'll see our finished Jackie. I love how he came out. He has a weariness and pain about him, an almost vacant look in his eyes that shows just how much he's been through. This pencil sketch will be refined until I get the simplified look of the comic, but I think this is a great model to work off of.

Marisol's here, to the right. I think she needs a bit more work, but I like what we've got here so far. I need to get her a bit more mature, more Latina, more experienced. I want her more sexy than cute, and this is getting there, but it needs a bit more tweaking. John has the earlier drafts which I'm sure he'll post, and you can see her evolution.

A bit about the process, this weekend: For the most part, John had already given me many ideas of what he wanted for the characters, and I had drawn pages of rough outlines for them over the past several weeks, but just wasn't feeling completely comfortable with where I was going with them. Having John there while I was drawing helped speed up the process because the feedback was so immediate. Once I finished a sketch, I could hold it up to him (he was working on his laptop, tweaking the 60 script) and say, "Whaddaya think?" and he'd be like, "I like the eyes on this one, but the face on the other one," and I could make edits on the spot. I really liked this way of working and I'm very happy with how things came out. I'm thinking once we establish ourselves, we might need to open up an office or get a space where we can work together. That would be ideal.

We have a few more characters to develop, then it's onto more page layouts. Things are getting exciting again!