Mindless Ones

Due to an obscure sentence passed by an unflinching god, the Mindless Ones will be at Thought Bubble 2024 in Harrogate this weekend. We’ll be at tables B3-4 in DSTLRY Hall on Saturday 16th and Sunday 17th November, trading hard drawn comics for hard earned cash, and shouting at tech bros whether any are present or not.

Scourge of Scotland’s east coast, the mighty Paul Jon Milne will be with us throughout the weekend. Paul is the sort of talent that comics have always attracted – a genius that can do anything except admit to its own existence. If the following interview leaves you with a desire to hear more from the man himself, we’ve blethered to him before here. If you want to check out his work – as all tortured aesthetes and muscle magic aficionados should – you can either pop round to Harrogate this weekend or visit his online shop.

Perverts who enjoy writing about comics are directed to my post on Paul’s “superheroes on the dole” comic Guts Power.

Anyway, enough of my shite. Let’s hear from the man himself!

1. Who are you and how did you get here?

I am Paul Jon Milne (He/Him) and I’ve been making comics and Art Stuff for ages, in Edinburgh and sometimes in Fife. Done all sorts of drawings for things. Drew some pics with a pal for a short film that had Gail Porter in it, a lifetime ago. Only saw it recently, via youtube. Was not mentioned in the credits. This is my ‘career’ in general.

2. What will you be bringing with you to Thought Bubble 2024?

Limit Formation Inertial! A comic about a wee lad who gets home from a space adventure, with consequences!!! 

These Aren’t My Brutes! A collection of fan-art pics I made this summer, now scanned in, printed and monetised.

Creep Heap 2025! A collection of drawings and comics from this year, mostly never seen before!!! Unless it doesn’t show up in time from the printer in which case no-one’ll see any of it.

Torse! Comic from 2023 about a training dummy. Nominated for ‘best art’ at The Selkie Awards (see question 4)!!!

3. What are you looking forward to at the convention?

Seeing pals! Avoiding the eyes of customers! Shivering and shaking as I try to handle money, hoping to god someone else can do everything for me as I try to become as small as possible behind the table. Also looking forward to sighting someone in fancy dress as Cole Cash, The Grifter.

4. We hear your Torso has been nominated for a prestigious award. How did that happen and what does it mean for the future of Scottish beefcakes?

I saw a tweet advertising a new awards thing and entered it as I am a very arrogant man. Doubt I’ll win but it’s nice to imagine I could. I’m hoping if I win it’ll lead to all the Scottish gym bozos reading Torse and seeing that being radicalised by a culture of joyless body fascism is a bad scene, and make being a musclebound oaf fun again.

[EDITOR’S NOTE: we were hoping to provoke Paul into discussing his own reputable Torso, rather than the (excellent) comic book Torse, but modesty and good taste have lead us elsewhere and who are we to deny those fine characteristics when they present themselves in this blighted world?]

5. What has been holding back despair when the inevitable disgust with all things comics creeps in during the dark of night?

Nothing, really!!! ‘LOL’! Been watching all the Alien and Predator films, though. I have the same opinions as everyone else about all of them except now I prefer Predator 2 to Predator 1, and Alien 3 (extendo edition) to Aliens. Dunno if this is ‘holding back despair’ but it’s certainly making me an interesting contrarian with a raised eyebrow and smug smile, ready for Discourse.

6. Which is the best Marvel vs. Capcom game and why? 

Difficult to answer!!! In theory it’s Marvel vs. Capcom 2 as it has one million characters, crucially including Cable and Marrow of the X-Men, and (yawn) Technical and Involved Gameplay. However, it also has shitey 3D backgrounds.

Was recently reacquainted with Marvel vs. Capcom 1 and while it has a tiny wee roster, it also has lovely 2D backgrounds and the ability to go two slightly different versions of the Hulk at once. It’s slightly less hectic than 2 for the most part and I feel more like I know what I’m doing. Also the end boss is Onslaught which seems a terrible idea but I’m very glad he’s there being legitimised by Capcom, one in the eye for the “LOL 90s amirite” crowd.

So MvC 1 is the best one. Maybe.

All I know is Marvel vs Capcom: Infinite is dog shit as it has no X-Men and stinks of ‘movie synergy’. No! No.

Comics?!?!?

For the first time since the last time, the Mindless Ones will be at Thought Bubble 2024 in Harrogate this weekend. We’ll be at tables B3-4 in DSTLRY Hall on Saturday 16th and Sunday 17th November, trading comics for cash and WNDRNG WHT YRTS.

Some handsome bastard called David Allison will be there flogging zines and comics in the hope of attracting the right crowd. His first big new release of the weekend is An Intervention, his second Pocket Chiller.

An Intervention is a tale of random encounters, submerged responsibility, and concrete angels. Like a chimp attempting to make fire by hooting at some twigs, David has made a crude trailer for the comic, which you can watch below.

David’s other new release is The Grave and The Good, a Choose Your Own Adventure zine.

Here’s how David is trying to entice the unsuspecting this time out: “You wake up with the taste of earth in your mouth. Everything else about you is cold and damp, but you sense that you were on the verge of learning something horrible and true about the world. The only question is, can you dig deep into this feeling and survive?”

David will have copies of his previous Pocket Chiller, The Candidate, for sale at the weekend. If he gets his act together, he will also have a range of zines and mini-comics with him, including: Uncle Frank, Cut-Out Witch, and Mini-Witch (all illustrated by Shaky Ghost); Beyond Whiles (adapted from the work of Alasdair Gray); BARRY, or “The Robot”; and Grave Tidings, an eight page comic made of reprocessed art from The Grave and The Good.

In a startling turn of events, the Mindless Ones will be at Thought Bubble 2024 in Harrogate this weekend. We’ll be at tables B3-4 in DSTLRY Hall on Saturday 16th and Sunday 17th November, trading comics for hard cash and pre-chewed vowels.

It wouldn’t be a Mindless meet-up without big massive genius Gary Lactus aka Fraser Geesin in the mix, so we’re all delighted to know that we’ll be able to look upon the face of bad backs this weekend. This time out Fraser will be debuting the latest issue of Pricks, his ongoing collaboration with Laurie Rowan.

Here’s a Mindless micro-review of the latest issue, just to get yr receptors tingling:

Ever feel everything closing in as you flop about in next door’s bins trying to find a new accessory? Ever wonder what’s happened to your brand, and how you were convinced to have it burned into your flesh in the first place? Ever find yourself not mad but laughing, actually? If so, congratulations, Pricks #4 is the comic for you! If not, amazing, Pricks #4 has experienced all those things so you don’t have to! 

The previous three issues of Fraser Geesin and Laurie Rowan’s Pricks established a tone and a set of characters, none of them particularly stable. Just when you think you’ve got a grip on what’s going on with Darren – hunched in a slum property, dressed in only a rubber glove for warmth – Pricks finds a new shape to squeeze him into. This is high, horrible absurdity that will appeal to fans of Michael Kupperman and Steve Aylett, made all the more potent by the way Geesin’s art grounds even the book’s wildest gags in the everyday.

Pricks looks and smells every bit as routinely abhorrent as the modern world. What a miracle, then, that it’s also the funniest comic of the year.

Alongside all four issues of Pricks, Fraser will be selling the following hand crafted wonders this weekend: his ace autobio comic The Cleaner; Ikea-themed anthology Komisk; prints depicting Ikea Products From Hell; his collaboration with big pimpin’ Andre Whickey, Tales From 500 Songs; the Pocket Chillers Speckle and Ash and Jeff (the latter with Dan Cox); and Journey To The Surface of the Earth issues #1-2.

As if all that wasn’t enough, Fraser will be stripping off his civilian identity and going full Gary Lactus at the SILENCE! to Astonish panel at 2pm on Saturday 16th November in Panel Room 2.

Goodie Lactus will be joined in this endeavour by his trusty co-hosts, The Beast Must Die and “Affable” Al Kennedy, and by special guests Chrissy Williams, Ram V, David Brothers and Stephanie Phillips. Expect odd questions, inexplicable challenges, and totally unexpected and double plus special guests in this, the ninth occurrence of comicdom’s most pointless and shambolic panel show.