I read comic books. I’m not one of those guys who has been reading comics since he was a kid. I came to comics at a late age. The summer after I graduated from college, I bought the first trade paperback volume of Neil Gaiman’s Sandman. I was hooked. I quickly gobbled up the rest of the Sandman volumes over that summer, and was ravenous for more. Sandman led me to Lucifer which led me to exploring most of the Vertigo section of my local comic shop (Fables, Transmetropolitan, V for Vendetta, The Invisibles, Swamp Thing ). This of course led me to explore Alan Moore’s other work and I devoured Watchmen and From Hell many years after their release. At around this point I moved to Los Angeles for grad school at USC. Comics became a bigger deal for me. I discovered Brian Michael Bendis (the brilliant Torso , Powers , and Alias ), Brian K Vaughn (Y: The Last Man , Runaways , Ex Machina ), and Frank Miller (Sin City , Batman: The Dark Knight Returns , etc). With this, I finally expanded into superhero stories after having already read dozens of graphic novels, the inverse path to most comic nerds. I also went in the indie direction loving Maus , Box Office Poison , and Same Difference . Through all this, the hook was always Sandman. I bought the Absolute editions . I bought artwork by original Sandman artists. This was the bar by which I measured all other series. Sure there were one-offs I loved such as Watchmen, From Hell, Whiteout , The Coffin , or Torso. But Sandman was the series that first showed me the epic grandeur achievable in comic books. My one regret was missing the excitement of discovering the story as it was being written. As it was being published in floppies. I now know what that feeling is like because I have started reading Locke & Key by writer Joe Hill and artist Gabriel Rodriguez. Let’s just get something out of the way right now. Locke & Key is the best comic I have read since Sandman. The story is about the three Locke siblings (Tyler, the eldest, a teenage jock; Kinsey, the alterna-rock teenage girl; Bode the young boy with a mind made for imagination). When their father is murdered by one of his students, they have to move with their mother to their ancient family compound, Keyhouse, in Lovecraft Massachusetts. At Keyhouse they discover the dark supernatural chaos under our normal world. They start to find the magical keys that can be used to change the world and people around them. All this while their father’s mysterious murderer tries to kill them too. That surface description doesn’t do justice to the brilliance of the work. This is a story about chaos and order. It’s a story about family. It’s a story about death and loss. It’s a story about beauty. It’s a story about love of all sorts. It is art. Locke & Key currently consists of two six-issue story arcs: Welcome to Lovecraft and Head Games. The first arc is available as a collection, but Head Games is currently only available in individual issues. You can also pre-order wonderful collectable editions from Subterranean Press. According to wikipedia, the complete story of Locke & Key will be told over 42 issues. Joe Hill is the son of a famous author, but I’m sure he’s sick of that bit of trivia dominating conversations about him. As far as I’m concerned, Joe Hill is now a famous author himself. His writing is powerful, clear, intelligent, and exciting from each line of dialog to the grand concept and structural ideas. He knows how to come up with ideas that are uniquely suited to the medium of comic books. Luckily he’s working with Gabriel Rodriguez, an artist whose visual talent can match the power of Hill’s prose. A perfect example is in the image I’ve attached to this post. This two-page spread from Head Games is a beautiful marriage of Hill’s ideas and Gabriel’s artwork. The siblings have found a key that can be used to look inside a person’s mind, and this is what they see in Bode’s head. This is an astonishing conceit that allows Hill and Gabriel to create stunning imagery that can illustrate story, character, subtext, motivations, backstory, and mood. Locke & Key does what any great work of art does. It takes advantage of every strength of its chosen medium. If Hill and Gabriel can keep up this quality, I have no doubt that this will be considered one of the crowning achievements of sequential art. I am a film producer, so part of me views everything through the lens of filmmaking. I do think Locke & Key could be adapted into a fantastic film. I wish I could be the producer to make that film, but unfortunately it appears that the rights are currently controlled by producer John Davis and Dimension Films. Given my somewhat bumpy history with the Weinsteins, I think it’s unlikely they’d have much interest in letting me work on the film. Or I can just enjoy the comics as a fan, and hope like with most projects in Hollywood the rights end up available in a couple years. High-res

I read comic books. I’m not one of those guys who has been reading comics since he was a kid. I came to comics at a late age. The summer after I graduated from college, I bought the first trade paperback volume of Neil Gaiman’s Sandman. I was hooked. I quickly gobbled up the rest of the Sandman volumes over that summer, and was ravenous for more.

Sandman led me to Lucifer which led me to exploring most of the Vertigo section of my local comic shop (Fables, Transmetropolitan, V for Vendetta, The Invisibles, Swamp Thing ). This of course led me to explore Alan Moore’s other work and I devoured Watchmen and From Hell many years after their release.

At around this point I moved to Los Angeles for grad school at USC. Comics became a bigger deal for me. I discovered Brian Michael Bendis (the brilliant Torso , Powers , and Alias ), Brian K Vaughn (Y: The Last Man , Runaways , Ex Machina ), and Frank Miller (Sin City , Batman: The Dark Knight Returns , etc). With this, I finally expanded into superhero stories after having already read dozens of graphic novels, the inverse path to most comic nerds. I also went in the indie direction loving Maus , Box Office Poison , and Same Difference .

Through all this, the hook was always Sandman. I bought the Absolute editions . I bought artwork by original Sandman artists. This was the bar by which I measured all other series. Sure there were one-offs I loved such as Watchmen, From Hell, Whiteout , The Coffin , or Torso. But Sandman was the series that first showed me the epic grandeur achievable in comic books. My one regret was missing the excitement of discovering the story as it was being written. As it was being published in floppies.

I now know what that feeling is like because I have started reading Locke & Key by writer Joe Hill and artist Gabriel Rodriguez.

Let’s just get something out of the way right now. Locke & Key is the best comic I have read since Sandman.

The story is about the three Locke siblings (Tyler, the eldest, a teenage jock; Kinsey, the alterna-rock teenage girl; Bode the young boy with a mind made for imagination). When their father is murdered by one of his students, they have to move with their mother to their ancient family compound, Keyhouse, in Lovecraft Massachusetts. At Keyhouse they discover the dark supernatural chaos under our normal world. They start to find the magical keys that can be used to change the world and people around them. All this while their father’s mysterious murderer tries to kill them too.

That surface description doesn’t do justice to the brilliance of the work. This is a story about chaos and order. It’s a story about family. It’s a story about death and loss. It’s a story about beauty. It’s a story about love of all sorts. It is art.

Locke & Key currently consists of two six-issue story arcs: Welcome to Lovecraft and Head Games. The first arc is available as a collection, but Head Games is currently only available in individual issues. You can also pre-order wonderful collectable editions from Subterranean Press. According to wikipedia, the complete story of Locke & Key will be told over 42 issues.

Joe Hill is the son of a famous author, but I’m sure he’s sick of that bit of trivia dominating conversations about him. As far as I’m concerned, Joe Hill is now a famous author himself. His writing is powerful, clear, intelligent, and exciting from each line of dialog to the grand concept and structural ideas. He knows how to come up with ideas that are uniquely suited to the medium of comic books.

Luckily he’s working with Gabriel Rodriguez, an artist whose visual talent can match the power of Hill’s prose. A perfect example is in the image I’ve attached to this post. This two-page spread from Head Games is a beautiful marriage of Hill’s ideas and Gabriel’s artwork. The siblings have found a key that can be used to look inside a person’s mind, and this is what they see in Bode’s head. This is an astonishing conceit that allows Hill and Gabriel to create stunning imagery that can illustrate story, character, subtext, motivations, backstory, and mood.

Locke & Key does what any great work of art does. It takes advantage of every strength of its chosen medium. If Hill and Gabriel can keep up this quality, I have no doubt that this will be considered one of the crowning achievements of sequential art.

I am a film producer, so part of me views everything through the lens of filmmaking. I do think Locke & Key could be adapted into a fantastic film. I wish I could be the producer to make that film, but unfortunately it appears that the rights are currently controlled by producer John Davis and Dimension Films. Given my somewhat bumpy history with the Weinsteins, I think it’s unlikely they’d have much interest in letting me work on the film.

Or I can just enjoy the comics as a fan, and hope like with most projects in Hollywood the rights end up available in a couple years.