The next issue of “Fell” will be here… eventually.

If there is one thing that binds us all, it’s the fact that we all have at least one unfinished Warren Ellis project that we’re waiting for.  “Planetary” was the top choice for many years until artist John Cassaday started uploading images of the final issue to Wildstorm digitally and we all found out that it would be completed.  That allowed us all to move on to wondering what the next series he stopped in midstream would be finished.  For me, that would be “Fell.”

That series was a different beast than anything else published at the time.  Still is as a matter of fact.  Published for $1.99 with a sixteen-page story and associated backmatter relating to it rounding things out, it sold very well for Image and garnered near universal critical acclaim.  Nine issues and one trade paperback (collecting the first eight) have been published so far.

“Fell” was also a shift from what Ellis was doing at the time, and has done since.  Though he gets a lot of flack for being a big proponent of “decompression” in mainstream comics, this title represented a personal challenge to himself as each story was self-contained.  Detective Richard Fell, exiled to the racing-stripe-on-the-underwear-of-civilization-town known as Snowville deals with some of the most depraved and insane characters you will see in an Ellis comic.  Period.  

You will read about murder via wine enemas.  Naked killers who think they’re protected by salt.  Suicide bombers in changing rooms.  An abusive parent who shoots his turds into his daughter’s skin.  Tying it all together is Det. Fell, a romantic pretending to be a cynic to survive in a cynical world.  Basically an archetypal Ellis protagonist in the mold of Spider Jerusalem.  The eight issues collected in the first volume were all incredibly strong and I still get a kick out of re-reading it.  I refer to myself as an “Ellis Completist” when talking about a lot of his works and efforts like this are an excellent example of the reason why I’ll continue to check out everything he does.

Of course, Ellis was only half of the equation here as the art for this compressed mini-masterpiece was provided by Ben Templesmith.  The man’s baseline style is “eerie” and he’s a perfect choice for illustrating a series about a town on the ass-end of nowhere.  Snowtown looks like an almost supernatural environment under his pen and Templesmith’s willingness to draw as many panels as necessary to tell the story really added to its dramatic impact.

That lasted for nine issues and then…. nothing.  According to the most recent missive from Ellis, issue ten has been written, but Templesmith hasn’t been available to draw it.  Given the most recent reports regarding his personal life that sounds completely believable.  As was the case when personal issues derailed the serialization of Takehiko Inoue’s “Vagabond,” it’s always more preferable that a creator get their life in order (both personally and physically) before they continue with their work.  After all, it’s more important that they take care of themselves so that they’re around to give us more great work than to work themselves to death completing a singular one.

So we’ll be getting more “Fell” eventually according to Ellis and that’s only a good thing in my books.  It may take a long, long while but this is a series that is geared more towards episodic stories than an ovearching one, I can wait.  At least it isn’t like “Doktor Sleepless” where we’re still waiting for that series to be wrapped up!