What a stunning page, eh? The creative team of artist Jonathan Rector, colorists Ray Dillon and Mo James, and letterer Kel Nuttall all came together here to craft a stunning splash which perfectly encapsulates the persona of Gilbert Graham. And yet, in the first draft of the script, this page wasn’t present!
The first draft of THE STANDARD #1 was 22 pages long. But during the editing process with Steven Forbes, we decided to up each issue to 28 pages long. We figured that there was nothing to stop each chapter being oversized if there was enough story to justify it: one of the advantages of indie comics is that you’re not beholden to any set template. And in adding 6 pages to this first chapter, we figured we needed a nice, concise way of filling in the blanks between Gilbert Graham becoming The Standard and The Standard showing up, 30 years in the past, as an established hero with a sidekick in tow. That’s over a decade of time that passes between the events of the past couple of pages and the next page, and we felt we needed something to reflect that passage of time.
Jonathan Rector knew that I loved this page, and so he sent me an incredible gift. The original art of this page, signed by Jon, now hangs proudly on my wall.
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