So I’m doing this thing on Kickstarter, as you may have noticed, and that means I’ve spent some time there over the past few days and, being there, I’ve paged through a bunch of other peoples’ current projects. This one slapped me right upside the head: Michael Kaluta and Elaine Lee are crowdfunding a sequel to their Starstruck comics from the 1980’s in a 176 page graphic novel format. If this team needs any introduction, the blame falls on you.

I’ll just mention "science fiction" and "noir" and "freaking Michael Kaluta" to get you started.

If the project meets its $44,000 goal the book will be published in glorious black and white; that’s not ironic, which I mention for the benefit of anybody who hasn’t seen Kaluta’s inks. But if they meet their stretch goal of $69,000 they’ll be able to add color to the pages, which would also be pretty wonderful.

As I write this the project is nearing the $36,000 mark and it’s still got 24 days to run. So I’d say they’re pretty much on track for one wonderful thing or the other.

Over the past year or so we’ve seen Kickstarter used in ways that don’t always warm my heart; that Veronica Mars project, for example, just looked like a way for a major studio to produce a film (and, they must have assumed, its buzz) without ponying up any cash for it, thereby increasing their profit margin. That doesn’t thrill me. But seeing individual creators of this stature go straight to the public to fund an independent project… it’s happy-making. Go check it out.