Why The Sire Means So Much To Me

And why we should follow our "Missions", not our "Dreams"

When I was in sixth grade, one of my best friends (to this day) handed me a copy of Spectacular Spider-Man #157. It featured Electro shooting an electricity blast towards a leaping Spider-Man and man o man, did I fall in love with superhero comics.

So much so, that I went on to create over 150+ of my own superhero “mini-comics”, a veritable universe akin to the Marvel books I was quickly and fervently consuming. From that moment in sixth grade on, until all the way until I graduated college, I had one thing on my mind (aside from sports and girls) and that was making comics. And more importantly, doing it for real.

But in all the hoopla from friends, family members and well-wishers, I have never once, ever, just followed my “dream”.

I followed my mission.

A small sampling of the 100+ mini comics I made as a kid from 6th grade thru college graduation.

Now, before I explain any deeper, I want to remind folks that The Sire: Aftermath #1 is currently campaigning on Kickstarter. It’s the 14th chapter in the series, but there’s plenty of recaps and rewards that can help you catch up if need be.

And I mention this because, thanks to my perserverance as a youth, I’ve amassed a pretty epic story that I can’t wait to unfold, chapter by chapter into your patiently waiting hands.

Now, I’ve made some mistakes along the way, both story and promotion wise (alas, a future substack waiting to be written), but I’ve never deterred from my goal to tell this, and a host of many other stories. Because as I mentioned above, crafting this tale is not just a dream come true. It’s been my mission since I graduated…and it’s that kind of attitude that’s helped me get to this point today. And it’s something I’m pretty proud of.

Yep, I still have THOSE comics I made as a kid too. Maybe it’s time I put together a YA Kickstarter?

I started making comic books back in 4th and 5th grade respectively, alongside my aforementioned friends. We’d take heroes from the Legend of Zelda (the video game) or Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (the cartoon) and craft our own stories, our own adventures. From the image above, YES, I still kept those comics too!

But once I read that Spider-Man comic, coupled with the Marvel Trading Cards to help build out the Marvel Universe for me, I immediately set about creating my own superhero universe and populated it with as many heroes and villains as I could create. Cutter, Montor, Streak, Scorpion Claw, you name it, I created it, at a pace akin to Stan Lee back in the 60s.

But there was one hero I created that I absolutely just kept coming back to: StreetFighter. The tale of a lazy guy who finds a costume in his attic that gives him the power to fight crime. Simple. Easy. Fun.

Behold the first three issues of Streetfighter! And yes, obviusly I had to change his name. First to Crossfire, then to Sire!

From that point on, I became “the comic guy”…and you know what? It was cool to have that as an identity – even before it was “cool” to like comic books! But really, I never treated it like my calling card or felt anything except a determination to accomplish my goal of making comics. And more specifically SIRE comics.

And it’s something I find to be the most important piece of advice I can give anyone trying to break in to any field today: be a goal oriented person. It makes for a rewarding life.

I read somewhere that if you want to climb a mountain, but stop every two steps to think about how you feel about climbing that mountain, you’re never going to get to the top. With all the self-reflection social media has afforded us, I find it can be so crippling for folks to get anything done these days. I know I lose myself in a scroll field way too often myself. Often, it can be difficult to move forward.

I turned that same message into lyrics for one of the songs called “Impasse” from my A.G.O. band days. “Going straight’s not the same as moving forward.” Have a goal. Create a plan to acheive that goal. If it fails, regroup and come up with another plan. It may not be easy, but it is simple!

I ran into a high school classmate at a reunion some ten years back. He won “class artist” in the yearbook and believe me, he earned it. He was phenomenal. But he said to me, with some praise in his voice, “You did it! You actually made it happen.” He was genuinely in awe that while a group of us always dreamed of being comic book artists, or in my case, making comics and succeeded. And yeah, there’s some pride there, but I’m not done yet. My mission isn’t quite complete.

And that’s why the SIRE means so much to me. It’s given me so much to aspire to and so much to strive for. It keeps me moving forward.

The Sire Aftermath

Okay, time for some quick updates. As I mentioned there is less than a week to go on The Sire: Aftermath #1 Kickstarter. The good news? We are fully funded! The great news? We have unlocked our first stretch goal: DIGITAL WALL PAPERS!

Now, we’re onto our SECOND stretch goal: SIRE Bookmarks!

And hopefully we can cross the second goal of $2000 and unlock the third mystery goal that I’m super stoked about:

Click the button below to back the latest campaign. I’ll shoot out one more update next week before the campaign ends with some updated interior pages to show.

And thanks as always for the support!

-Mike