kierongillen

[kierongillen]

BIg questions need answers.

[kierongillen]

Honestly, the "give the cast an unlikely prop" is one of my fave things to do in The Power Fantasy.

If there was a Power Fantasy LARP, this would absolutely be a rule.

I'm just absolutely delighted by the implied scene between these two moments, where Kid Ignition flat-out refused to eat his own birthday cake, Heavy refused to have any in solidarity with his son, and everyone else apparently just split the cake in thirds between them.

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Dev & Eliza Dancing

You know they’re listening to “Ask” by the Smiths on repeat inside the Pyramid.

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THE POWER FANTASY #11. Out now.

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This week's newsletter! The Power Fantasy #11 out! The soft-debut of SCRIPT CLUB! A joke about Yoda! Links! Stuff! Things!

I also have to show the image I did for script club, as it is nonsense.

[kierongillen]

One cool thing about Caspar Wijngaard's attention to visual detail in The Power Fantasy is that, rather than having a specific trademark hairstyle or a single Important Haircut moment (TV Tropes link), everyone is characterized by their overall relationship to their hair. All six Superpowers change up their hairstyle, whether that's day-to-day or year-to-year- but they each have unique approaches to how they look, that offer clues to who they are as people.

As far as we can tell, Valentina's had the exact same haircut her entire adult life, but she styles it differently on different days, and in different contexts. I think she's known for a long time who she is and who she wants to be- specifically, she knows she's a Superpower, a hero or a danger or both, but she wants to be human, someone who can be kind and friendly and have loved ones. For her, that's manifesting as conventional femininity, which shows up in her overall sense of style as well as her hair.

That said- her hair was shorter as a kid, probably just for practical reasons. And when she goes full angel-self, it changes both color and texture- pure white, and a more stylized texture than the detailed strands of her usual hair.

In contrast, Eliza's changed her hair a whole bunch of times, and I feel like she doesn't have any consistent throughline to what she's going for. It's been all different lengths, usually worn loose but one time in a ponytail, usually kept straight but one time permed. Eliza switching haircuts so many times feels to me like she's never satisfied with who she is- she's hungry to be something else, something more. It's the opposite of Valentina having a very clear idea what her hair is expressing. Eliza's searching for something with her hair that a haircut alone is never going to give her.

However, she's repeated haircuts a couple times. Her long hair the day she said no penitent sinner would burn is similar to the long hair she received right after selling her soul to hell. And also, her chin-length bob the day Magus passed her over for promotion is similar to her 1999 hair, when she's so far been pretty antagonistic towards Magus. (Although the haircuts aren't identical. Like Valentina, Eliza's hair changes color and texture from her fully-human form to her descended extradimensional form.) Is the visual echo significant? It'll probably never be confirmed one way or the other that it is, but it's an interesting way to look at things. (Credit to someone on the Discord for sharing the insight that Eliza's 1999 haircut matches her 1986 one!)

Heavy is kind of the midpoint between consistent look and continual change- he's always had long hair, but the context keeps shifting. He's switched subcultures a couple different times, always conveniently to a look where it's fashionable for a man to have long hair- which means the exact style of his long hair varies.

Instead of chronological order, I laid this image out to show that Heavy also puts a lot of effort into styling his hair day-to-day- which is really a showcase of Caspar's attention to texture. The top row of images are ones where I'd say he hasn't done anything to his hair except maybe wash it- and so it's just slightly wavy, drawn with a crinkly kind of texture.

The second row is him the first scene he appears in, where his hair is incredibly silky-smooth at first, and then a little wilder after getting shot and flying around. I can't actually prove that he had someone blow-dry it for him that morning, but I choose to believe that he did. (My full headcanon on that is that having his hair done is a comfort thing. Like, he'd never admit out loud how stressed he was that day, but he'd have someone take care of him without having to directly ask for it... that's all just speculation and personal gratification, though.)

And the third row of images is all the other stuff he does with his hair. In order: he's gelled it back for Masumi's exhibition, then he sleeps on it with the gel in and it turns into a mess. Then you've got his tightly-curled perm from 1981 and a looser perm from probably the seventies. More than anyone else, Heavy's the one who's willing to put day-to-day time into his hair looking good. (For a certain definition of period-piece "good", with that perm.)

Etienne gradually moves from very short hair to locs, but I think the interesting part is how he grows out his beard. These are in chronological order, and you can see him go from a patchier beard when younger to a full, bushy beard by 1999. My read on this is that he's trying to look sophisticated- which means mature, a grown-ass man- and he's trying to compensate for the receding jawline that's more visible when he's a clean-shaven teenager. (Again, full headcanon mode is that he feels compelled to compete with Heavy's ridiculous lantern jaw. But again, that might just be me.)

Masumi, the character most openly inspired by anime and manga, comes very close to having anime/manga-style Expressive Hair (TV Tropes link again), meaning that it almost seems to move based on how she feels. The first row is three panels in order from the same scene- messy hair while she's grumpy, transitioning to smoother hair as she starts to relax. The second row is three panels from a different scene- hair that's been straightened at a time when she's trying to hold herself together, getting messier as she loses composure. Neither of those hair changes is completely impossible under the circumstances- maybe her bedhead is resolving itself, and maybe her styled hair is coming loose from sweating and moving around. But those changes just conveniently parallel her emotional arc.

And at other times, she puts her hair up in mini-ponytails that make her look young and cute. When she actually was younger, her hair was longer and naturally black. Ironically, I think that actually looks more mature... maybe she's made a move towards looking cute and nonthreatening over time?

Magus* has also always had long hair, but it was a bit shorter in 1978 than it has been since. I think it's interesting that he bothered to keep that neatly trimmed beard even though most of the world didn't see it- it was for the sake of himself and his inner circle. I think it symbolizes him being a little scruffy, a little countercultural- but not a total mess, as he clearly takes care of it.

By 1999, his* hair texture has changed a bit, messier and lanker... my original theory was that he stopped washing it, in line with how he's gotten too thin and he's not buying new clothes. In retrospect though... yeah I'm not taking any bets until next issue.

* it's complicated

And then there's Tonya, Isabella, Kid Ignition- I could say stuff about their hair too but I think I've gone on long enough. Even walk-on extras have visual characterization that extends to every part of their design, head to toe. It's kind of mind-blowing the amount of thought that's gone into just that one aspect of character design in TPF, and the amount of drawing skill it takes to carry the ideas through.

[kierongillen]

I often think of this bit of Red Dwarf.

It’s where Rimmer is describing his great victories in Risk, much to Lister’s annoyance. An endless string of “And then I rolled a 6!” The joke being, that no-one is interested in hearing about people’s gaming adventures.

I spent fifteen years of my life trying to prove that wrong, and get people excited about that time I rolled a 6.

Or a 1.

[More in the link]

[kierongillen]

couldn't resist drawing the trans flag Signal

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The Power Fantasy #11 has its orders finalised on Monday. Readers speak to your retailer. Retailers speak to your spreadsheet. Everyone speak to their loved ones. You never know, especially with this book.

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This week's newsletter! The Power Fantasy #11 pre-order! A step by step process of how we did a new recap and design page for the Power Fantasy! Interviews and companion rambles! Links! Chekov's Guns! More!

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Random doodles (drawn before issue 10) and quick issue 10 immediate reaction comics

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The Power Fantasy #10, out now.

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This week's newsletter! The Power Fantasy #10 out! Teasers with 😳 emojis! A little ramble about social media and its uses to a creator (tl;dr: little)! Links! Stuff! Things!

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inspired by Masumi and Isabella pixel arts in issue 11 variant cover by Luigi Formisano

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[PREVIEW] Closer [one-shot] (September 3, 2025)

writer: Kieron Gillen | artist [penciller & inker]: Steve Lieber | colorist: Tamra Bonvillain | letterer: Clayton Cowles | cover artist: Steve Lieber | publishing company: Image Comics

synopsis: It starts with birds materializing. It'll end with the death of the heavens. Cosmic horror you can dance to in a one-off apocalypse romance from Kieron Gillen (The Wicked + The Divine, The Power Fantasy), Steve Lieber (The Fix, Superman's Pal, Jimmy Olsen) and Tamra Bonvillain (Once & Future).

This one-shot collects the story of cosmic horror first serialized in the Image! 30th Anniversary Anthology issues #7-9

[kierongillen]

This week's newsletter! The Power Fantasy #10 preview, out next week! Which involves nudity! Conan! Links! Excuses!

[kierongillen]

Partly based on a personal experience. Masumi barely understanding british accent was one of the most relatable moments in this comic.