WRITER Tom Simmons

“I have been a Burroughs fan for a very long time,” says screenwriter-graphic novelist Tom Simmons. “At the age of 12 in 1962, I read the ACE paperback edition of Pirates of Venus, and never looked back. I’ve read everything else ERB wrote in the interim, many of the stories several times over.”

Perhaps it is fitting, then, that Simmons was given the opportunity to adapt ERB’s two historical novels, The Outlaw of Torn and I Am a Barbarian, into online strip format. The writer has a History degree, and his other material is in large part of that genre: in 2015 he adapted his screenplay Crispus Caesar about the 4th century struggle between paganism and Christianity into a graphic novel, and a year later he completed a spec script entitled Darling Eddy on the final horrific days of Edgar Allan Poe. Also on his writing desk are screen adaptations of Gore Vidal’s novel Julian about the so-called “apostate” Roman emperor and Richard Slotkin’s stark Civil War novel The Crater.

“Edgar Rice Burroughs advanced his storytelling expertise mightily between 1912 – when “Outlaw” was written – and 1941, the year of “Barbarian,” says the writer. Both stories have proven a massive challenge to adapt, and scale to online strip and eventually graphic novel format – but that’s a huge part of the fun.”
Tom was nominated in five categories at the Action on Film (AOF) festival in 2010.

ARTIST Benito Gallego, 118-

Benito Gallego (born in Madrid, Spain) decided he loved comics at a tender age, even before he had already learnt to read and he’s been drawing all his life filling with his doodles any blank space in every piece of paper that fell in his hand. For a long time he collaborated providing comics and pin-ups for fanzines and publications in Spain while attending the Faculty of Fine Arts in Madrid. And he continued drawing comics later while developing a parallel career in advertising and graphic design that paid the bills for many years.

After contacting Roy Thomas, Benito got his first professional assignments working with him in his series Anthem and Captain Thunder & Blue Bolt published by Heroic Publishing. Since then he’s been working with other top talents in the comics medium like Cary Bates and Sal Buscema at DC Comics, Brian Azzarello or Paul Kupperberg. Benito has done a various range of illustration work including trading cards with the Marvel characters, monsters or dinosaurs for Upper Deck. And he has also done illustrations for books like the Diego’s Dragon series written by Kevin Gerard.

Benito has recently finished the art for a graphic novel on the life of reggae star Bob Marley written by Jim McCarthy while is also working on Apama The Undiscovered Animal, a comic series based in concepts and characters from the movie Hero Tomorrow created by Milo Miller and Ted Sikora.
Benito lives in Alicante, in the East coast of Spain, with his wife Soraya and daughter Alona who are the most ferocious but also grateful critics of his work.

You may follow Benito’s art at https://www.facebook.com/benitogallego.art/

ILLUSTRATOR Jake Bilbao, 1-117

Jake Bilbao is a Filipino Comic Book Artist. He has worked on Wolverine for Marvel Comics, Pathfinder for Dynamite Entertainment, Bloodrayne for Digitalwebbing Presents, and other Indie Comics. Jake is now working with Tom Simmons and L. Jamal Walton to make The Outlaw of Torn novel by Edgar Rice Burroughs into a comic strip format.

The Simmons/Bilbao/Walton team published a graphic novel set in the Age of Constantine called Crispus Caesar (see Simmons bio).

LETTERS AND COLORING
L Jamal Walton, 1-117

L Jamal Walton is a web and graphic designer by day, and an illustrator, colorist and letterer by night. He is currently living in Durham, NC and enjoys working on all types of projects, but he especially likes working on projects that involve coloring and lettering.

Most recently, Jamal has been focusing more of his time working on his own comic creations: Warmageddon; Ungoodwise; and Captain Evil and Diabla.

Jamal has also made the leap into the art world and has been displaying his work at various art exhibits, shows and conventions within the RTP (Raleigh, Durham, and Chapel Hill area of the state NC).

For more information on Jamal, check out his website at: www.ljamal.com