Undisputed #2 Campaign is Over!

Just wanted to drop a quick update.

Undisputed #2’s Kickstarter campaign wrapped up this morning. The final numbers: 46 backers, $833. Hopefully we don’t lose anyone while Kickstarter collects everyone’s pledge.

Undisputed #1 finished with 47 backers. The issue 2 campaign was 2 weeks, issue 1 was 4 weeks. So, maybe we could have grown the readership if I had done a month long campaign? I don’t know.

Kickstarter is going to take the next 2 weeks to collect funds, and then distribute them to us. Meanwhile, Francesco Iaquinta has 3 pages left to color before the book is ready to head over to Marco Della Verde for lettering. Marco will also do the final prepress for us, preparing files for the printer, and creating the PDFs that will be distributed to the backers.

My stalwart editor Christopher will be preparing to turn his home into a small fulfillment center. And I believe, if everything goes right, we’ll be shipping issues sometime in November.

Now, Undisputed is a 3-issue limited series. So what of issue 3?

I’m going to talk to Chris this week and see whether we’re going to roll right into art on issue 3 or if we need to take a break. Regardless of that decision, issue 3 will come out, but it may be a while. I’m going to take my time, focus on building up the prelaunch follower numbers, and work on making the issue 3 campaign more of an event.

I want to bring back the prose anthology for issue 3, I had an idea of doing a video roundtable with people like Dr. Carl Martin, and Maven Bentley. People who appear in the comic book, but have worked in pro wrestling “in real life”. I think that might be a fun bonus. I want to call in some favors from friends still in wrestling to cut promos for issue 3.

There are a lot of ideas for issue 3. And issue 3 is going to be a make-or-break moment for us. Christopher, who’s been financing the book, needs to eventually start getting close to making his money back. Which we haven’t done yet. Each book costs about $3k (including variant covers). And so far we haven’t cracked $1,000 on either campaign. But, I think if we can grow the audience, build our community, and do strong backer numbers on issue 3, then I think we can justify continuing on with making more comics.

If you missed out on the campaign, and want to read issue 1, it’s available as a PDF from my website, pjcurling.me. If you want to read a totally different story of mine, I have a 6-page piece in Sightings: A Bigfoot Comic Anthology, which is live on Kickstarter right now. Check out that campaign page here.

Thanks for following along on the journey. I appreciate you all.

Until next time…
Support indie comics & support indie wrestling.
I love you,
—pjc.