Entertainment

Ridley Scott's 'Modville' graphic novel debuts during a tough time for comics. Can it survive?

Published

9 months ago

March 28, 2025

Ridley Scott's 'Modville' graphic novel debuts during a tough time for comics. Can it survive?

When Ridley Scott, visionary director of “Alien,” “Blade Runner” and “Gladiator,” connects with your story, it’s probably a good idea to explore it in any medium possible.

“Modville,” a four-issue neo-noir graphic novel set in New Orleans in 2169 that unfolds in a world of crime and artificial humans (known as mods), was just that story. Created by Jesse Negron, co-written by Joe Matsumoto and with art by Hendry Prasetya and Eko Puteh, the comic touches on themes of father-daughter relationships, morality and humanity. The comic series bucks the current trend of reframing superhero narratives. Instead, it’s an original idea that will go direct to consumers (versus being released by a big publisher like Diamond and Penguin Random House) and initially be printed in a prestige format (a 200-page hardcover instead of single issues). It’ll also have an idiosyncratic schedule, free of month-to-month pressures.

Negron, who had previously worked with the director and his late brother, Tony Scott, pitched the seemingly radical idea of doing a comic book to Tom Moran, senior vice president of Ridley Scott’s film and TV company Scott Free Productions.

“Tony was a big fan of Jesse’s. We met and talked about his ideas, and I said, ‘Well, what do you want to do? Film or TV?’ He said, ‘I really want to do comics, but you guys don’t do that.’ I said, ‘Why not?,’” said Moran. “As an entertainment company, especially these days, you have to evolve. We have to reach out and expand to new forms of entertainment. Honestly, Ridley was probably like, ‘We should have done this a long time ago.’ He’s such a good artist himself.”

Director Ridley Scott said doing a graphic novel felt like “a natural evolution.”

(Scott Free Productions)

“Collaborating with Jesse Negron and Mechanical Cake on graphic novels feels like a natural evolution for myself and Scott Free,” said Ridley Scott via email.

Through his company Mechanical Cake, Negron will be introducing the graphic novel, as well as a “Modville”-style booth, at WonderCon in Anaheim this weekend. Negron, Moran, publisher and editor Dave Elliott, and Anthony Francisco, a senior visual development artist for Marvel Studios, will discuss the ins and outs of the company in a panel Saturday.

Launching ‘Modville’

Negron has been working on the idea for “Modville” for at least 5 years. Negron and Chief Financial Officer Tom Sanders launched Mechanical Cake in 2015 to not only create comics but to also cultivate new ideas in multimedia.

“Mechanical Cake is a world-building [intellectual property] creation team that is focused in the sci-fi-fantasy-action-adventure genre,” said Sanders. “The goal of any creative is not only to tell the story but to get it to the world and get the fans involved.”

The company’s association with Scott already adds cachet to the title, but obtaining his blessing was only the first step.

“There’s no doubt that for me to launch at the bar of Ridley Scott, it’s a lot of pressure to be honest,” said Negron. “It’s sometimes very difficult to work at the level he works at because he’ll just go, ‘Meh, I don’t know.’ To work at his level where he goes, ‘Whoa, you guys keep doing this. Whoa, you did that!?’ That was really important to me.”

Jesse Negron sits on a motorcycle at a fake gas station.

Getting on the same page as your business partners is only one of the hurdles to overcome when launching an independent comic book. With the sale of Diamond Comic Distributors to Alliance Entertainment, the comics industry may breathe a sigh of relief, but market leaders still tend to dominate attention and shelf space, limiting sales for small presses and direct-to-market players. Diamond helped unknown titles get the word out through its Previews catalog, but with its bankruptcy and subsequent sale, it’s unclear how the acquisition will affect the comics industry.

Of the 40 most popular graphic novels in 2024 (based on units sold), only four titles weren’t published by the leading comics companies — which include Marvel Comics, DC Comics, Image Comics, IDW Publishing, Dark Horse Comics and BOOM! Studios. Those titles include “Dog Man: The Scarlet Shedder” by Graphix, “Uzumaki” and “Chainsaw Man, Vol. 1” — both by VIZ Media — and “Jimi Hendrix: Purple Haze” by Titan Comics. This trend is seen with periodical comic books too, with only four franchises outside of Marvel and DC able to crack the top 50 comics of 2024. Those all happened to be well-known ’80s titles such as Image’s G.I. Joe and Transformers, IDW’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Dynamite Entertainment’s Thundercats.

But it’s an uncertain time for all entertainment sectors. Like the movie industry, comic book sales and consumer trends indicate that introducing an original story, without an established distribution network, like the one Diamond provided for decades, is a daunting and risky task.

Film and comics have a lot in common, which is also why the union of Scott Free Productions and Mechanical Cake makes sense to the parties involved.

“They deliver like nobody else on the planet in this genre. Science fiction, action, the edge of fantasy. I can’t think of a better partner to team up with than Scott Free,” said Sanders. “Doing a comic book is like doing a film or TV show but with more details. Everything on the panel is intentionally put there, just like you do in a film or TV show. If you’ve done it right, you pretty much have laid out a storyboard that anyone should be able to follow. We want to build a world for others to create stories in as well.”

Scott, known for his detailed storyboards, was also drawn to the comics because of his background as an artist.

“To watch Ridley draw is amazing. He’s such a visionary, from mind to pen to hand to paper. You can flip through his storyboards and see the whole movie. It’s truly an art form, and that’s essentially what you’re getting from comics,” said Moran.

Bill Sienkiewicz is one of the prominent artists who will help create the visual language for “Modville,” specifically in crafting covers for the series. Sienkiewicz said he enjoys the “grunge” technology in the story, which harks back to something familiar.

Images from "Modville" showing a man in a mechanical chair and a woman in front of a house.

“What I’m enjoying about ‘Modville’ is that, while it may not be a direct corollary to ‘Blade Runner,’ it has enough of the DNA to make it feel like it’s at least adjacent. I love the idea of investigating on deeper levels what constitutes humanity and morality,” said Sienkiewicz. “When you’re doing a monthly book, you can afford to be a little more subtextual and be intriguing for it’s own sake.”

Publishing path

”Modville” has also carved out its own route into a crowded marketplace. It’ll launch with a prestige format (200-page books) and hardcovers then transition to soft covers and to a wider market. Unlike traditional comics and graphic novels, these editions won’t be reprinted, making them one-of-a-kind commodities. Elliott said he wants Mechanical Cake to be accessible to the public but also to make sure the creative process isn’t rushed to meet market demands.

Dave Elliott, in a black T-shirt with mushrooms, a blue jacket and sunglasses, smiles into the camera.

“More books are being published by Kickstarter at the moment than almost anybody else. So that model of working directly with the people who are fans of what you’re doing is something that is so important today,” said Elliott.

“But a lot of other publishers you look at, they’re trapped into that, ‘It’s a new month. We have to have something out every month.’ I’m like, ‘No, we don’t.’ We put something out when it’s ready but not before. I wanted us to treat the publishing the way the Europeans do with graphic novels and the way the publishing world used to treat novels.”

It’s a mind-set that goes against what retailers and consumers may be used to. Paul Grimshaw, owner of Burbank’s House of Secrets comic book store, prefers serialized comic books and graphic novels that “come out on a monthly basis and keep people interested,” but he says being unique is also key. One of his top-selling comics over the past year has been “Saga,” an epic space opera/fantasy series written by Brian K. Vaughan from Image.

“Honestly, all you need to do is be good. If you’ve got well-written, well-illustrated books, they will find an audience. Gimmicks are gimmicks. Gimmicks only last for a short amount of time. My favorite books are the ones that have good artists and are telling a solid story,” Grimshaw said.

Ridley Scott’s influence

Besides lending his name to the project, Scott also contributed to shaping the story and a critical eye to the art direction. It dawned on Elliott early on that Scott could see the relationship colors played to viewers onscreen and to readers on paper.

“In the beginning, the colors were a bit brighter and more vivid. And [Scott would say], ‘Maybe you can mute it a bit, desaturate it a bit.’ This was when I realized that he understood the difference between comics and film. We were talking about the fact that comics use color in a way [Scott] can’t use in film. It is a more muted palette so you can trigger emotion [differently],” said Elliott.

“I started out as an artist, sketching every storyboard for each of my films, and it’s remarkable how instinctively the visual language of storytelling in ‘Modville’ unfolds,” said Scott.

A page of art from "Modville" showing a projection of a man playing a trumpet.

Scott and Negron’s sensibilities seem to align well. Negron’s stylistic and storytelling influences are varied: from the retro technology and stylish imagery of “The Rocketeer” to a Southern Gothic aesthetic born of a Baptist upbringing.

When Negron sent Scott his first draft of “Modville,” the director made him dial back some of the more controversial and gratuitous elements. Though he had been working on the story and art for years, Negron realized that Scott wasn’t trying to change his vision, he was making sure that it would grab readers and keep them coming back.

“He goes, ‘I’ve had a room of 6,000 people turn against me.’ So we toned it down a little bit in the opening [for ‘Modville’], and I think it was a good choice.”

Movie Reviews

Movie Review: A Home Invasion turns into a “Relentless” Grudge Match

Published

1 hour ago

January 6, 2026

Press Room

Movie Review: A Home Invasion turns into a “Relentless” Grudge Match

I’d call the title “Relentless” truth in advertising, althought “Pitiless,” “Endless” and “Senseless” work just as well.

This new thriller from the sarcastically surnamed writer-director Tom Botchii (real name Tom Botchii Skowronski of “Artik” fame) begins in uninteresting mystery, strains to become a revenge thriller “about something” and never gets out of its own way.

So bloody that everything else — logic, reason, rationale and “Who do we root for?” quandary is throughly botched — its 93 minutes pass by like bleeding out from screwdriver puncture wounds — excruciatingly.

But hey, they shot it in Lewiston, Idaho, so good on them for not filming overfilmed Greater LA, even if the locations are as generically North American as one could imagine.

Career bit player and Lewiston native Jeffrey Decker stars as a homeless man we meet in his car, bearded, shivering and listening over and over again to a voice mail from his significant other.

He has no enthusiasm for the sign-spinning work he does to feed himself and gas up his ’80s Chevy. But if woman, man or child among us ever relishes anything as much as this character loves his cigarettes — long, theatrical, stair-at-the-stars drags of ecstacy — we can count ourselves blessed.

There’s this Asian techie (Shuhei Kinoshita) pounding away at his laptop, doing something we assume is sketchy just by the “ACCESS DENIED” screens he keeps bumping into and the frantic calls he takes suggesting urgency of some sort or other.

That man-bunned stranger, seen in smoky silhoutte through the opaque window on his door, ringing the bell of his designer McMansion makes him wary. And not just because the guy’s smoking and seems to be making up his “How we can help cut your energy bill” pitch on the fly.

Next thing our techie knows, shotgun blasts are knocking out the lock (Not the, uh GLASS) and a crazed, dirty beardo homeless guy has stormed in, firing away at him as he flees and cries “STOP! Why are you doing this?”

Jun, as the credits name him, fights for his PC and his life. He wins one and loses the other. But tracking his laptop and homeless thug “Teddy” with his phone turns out to be a mistake.

He’s caught, beaten and bloodied some more. And that’s how Jun learns the beef this crazed, wronged man has with him — identity theft, financial fraud, etc.

Threats and torture over access to that laptop ensue, along with one man listing the wrongs he’s been done as he puts his hostage through all this.

Wait’ll you get a load of what the writer-director thinks is the card our hostage would play.

The dialogue isn’t much, and the logic — fleeing a fight you’ve just won with a killer rather than finishing him off or calling the cops, etc. — doesn’t stand up to any scrutiny.

The set-piece fights, which involve Kinoshita screaming and charging his tormentor and the tormentor played by Decker stalking him with wounded, bloody-minded resolve are visceral enough to come off. Decker and Kinoshita are better than the screenplay.

A throw-down at a gas-station climaxes with a brutal brawl on the hood of a bystander’s car going through an automatic car wash. Amusingly, the car-wash owners feel the need to do an Idaho do-si-do video (“Roggers (sic) Car Wash”) that plays in front of the car being washed and behind all the mayhem the antagonists and the bystander/car owner go through. Not bad.

The rest? Not good.

Perhaps the good folks at Rogers Motors and Car Wash read the script and opted to get their name misspelled. Smart move.

Rating: R, graphic violence, smoking, profanity

Cast: Jeffrey Decker, Shuhei Kinoshita

Credits:Scripted and directed by Tom Botchii.. A Saban Entertainment release.

Running time: 1:34

About Roger Moore

Movie Critic, formerly with McClatchy-Tribune News Service, Orlando Sentinel, published in Spin Magazine, The World and now published here, Orlando Magazine, Autoweek Magazine

Entertainment

Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas breaks out in ‘Sentimental Value.’ But she isn’t interested in fame

Published

3 hours ago

January 6, 2026

Press Room

Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas breaks out in ‘Sentimental Value.’ But she isn’t interested in fame

One of the most moving scenes in Joachim Trier’s “Sentimental Value” happens near the end. During an intense moment between sisters Nora (Renate Reinsve) and Agnes (Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas), who have both had to reckon with the unexpected return of their estranged father, Gustav (Stellan Skarsgård), Agnes suddenly tells Nora, “I love you.” In a family in which such direct, vulnerable declarations are rare, Agnes’ comment is both a shock and a catharsis.

The line wasn’t scripted or even discussed. Lilleaas was nervous about spontaneously saying it while filming. But it just came out.

“[In] Norwegian culture, we don’t talk so much about what we’re feeling,” explains Lilleaas, who lives in Oslo but is sitting in the Chateau Marmont lounge on a rainy afternoon in mid-November. If the script had contained that “I love you” line, she says, “It would’ve been like, ‘What? I would never say that. That’s too much.’ But because it came out of a genuine feeling in the moment — I don’t know how to describe it, but it was what I felt like I would want to say, and what I would want my own sister to know.”

Since its Cannes premiere, “Sentimental Value” has been lauded for such scenes, which underline the subtle force of this intelligent tearjerker about a frayed family trying to repair itself. And the film’s breakthrough performance belongs to the 36-year-old Lilleaas, who has worked steadily in Norway but not often garnered international attention.

Touted as a possible supporting actress Oscar nominee, Lilleaas in person is reserved but thoughtful, someone who prefers observing the people around her rather than being in the spotlight. Fitting, then, that in “Sentimental Value” she plays the quiet, levelheaded sister serving as the mediator between impulsive Nora and egotistical Gustav. Lilleaas has become quite adept at doing a lot while seemingly doing very little.

“In acting school, some of the best characters I did were mute,” she notes. “They couldn’t express language, but they were very expressive. It was freeing to not have a voice. Agnes, she’s present a lot of the time but doesn’t necessarily have that many lines. To me, that’s freedom — the [dialogue] very often comes in the way of that.”

Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas in “Sentimental Value.”

(Kasper Tuxen)

Lilleaas hadn’t met Trier before her audition, but they instantly bonded over the challenges of raising young kids. And she sparked to the script’s examination of parents and children. Unlike restless Nora, Agnes is married with a son, able to view her deeply flawed dad from the vantage point of both a daughter and mother. Lilleaas shares her character’s sympathy for the inability of different generations to connect.

“A lot of parents and children’s relationships stop at a point,” she says. “It doesn’t evolve like a romantic relationship, [where] the mindset is to grow together. With families, it’s ‘You’re the child, I’m the parent.’ But you have to grow together and accept each other. And that’s difficult.”

Spend time with Lilleaas and you’ll notice she discusses acting in terms of human behavior rather than technique. In fact, she initially studied psychology. “I’ve always been interested in the [experience] of being alive,” she says. “Tremendous grief is very painful, but you can only experience that if you have great love. I’ve tried the more psychological approach of studying people, but it wasn’t what I wanted. Acting is the perfect medium for me to explore life.”

Other out-of-towners might be disappointed to arrive in sunny Southern California only to be greeted by storm clouds, but Lilleaas is sanguine about the situation. “I could have been at the beach, but it’s fine,” she says, amused, looking out the nearby windows. “I can go to the movies — it’s perfect movie weather.”

Inga Ibsdotter Lilleeaas poses for a portrait at the Twenty Two Hotel in New York City

Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas. (Evelyn Freja / For The Times)

Her measured response to both her Hollywood ascension and a rainy forecast speak to her generally unfussed demeanor. During our conversation, Lilleaas’ candor and lack of vanity are striking. How often does a rising star talk about being happy when a filmmaker gives her fewer lines? Or fantasize about a life after acting?

“Some days I’ll be like, ‘I want to give it up. I want to have a small farm,’” she admits. “We lived on a farm and had horses and chickens when I grew up. I miss that. But at the same time, I need to be in an urban environment.”

She gives the matter more thought, sussing out her conflicted feelings. “Maybe as I grow older and have children, I feel this need to go back to something that’s familiar and safe,” she suggests. “I think that’s why I’m searching for small farms [online] — that’s, like, a dream thing. I need some dreams that they’re not reality — it’s a way to escape.”

Lilleaas may have decided against becoming a psychologist, but she’s always interrogating her motivations. This desire for a farm is her latest self-exploration, clarifying for her that she loves her profession but not the superficial trappings that accompany it.

“Ten years ago, this would maybe have been a dream, what’s happening now,” she says, gesturing at her swanky surroundings. “But you realize what you want to focus on and give value. I don’t necessarily want to give this that much value. I appreciate it and everything, but I don’t want to put my heart in it, because I know that it goes up and down and it’s not constant. I put my heart in this movie. Everything that comes after that? My heart can’t be in that.”