Happy 3rd birthday, Jade Shade!

Year 1.
Year 2.

All right, year three now!

2015's milestones...

• Eidolon turned 1.
• Dr. Herbert turned 4.
• Chokecherry turned 2.
• And I've chipped away, and gotten 18 chapters into season 2 with #19 on the way.

Most proud that I finally cleared the Freed Radicals recruitment drive chunk of the story.
I knew that was gonna be hard.

Now, like the Eidolon, Dr. Herbert, and Chokecherry anniversaries, let's do origins.


The origin of Dusty Irwin.

So, it's either 2012, or 2013, and I'm watching "Tales of the Rat Fink", on Ovation, and the origin of Rat Fink was, Big Daddy Roth hated Mickey Mouse, and all the cloying cute-ness he stood for, so he doodled Rat Fink on a napkin as the radical antithesis of every trait Micky had, and boom, a mascot of a mini empire was born.

I was stuck for ideas, so I followed the same process.
"Twilight", was at its height, and I hated it with a seething passion, so I took Edward, and made his anti-matter opposite, a fat, old, slovenly, surly, unkempt Ghostbuster/Vampire Killer.

Then, I needed a name,
So, among my favorite characters are Ambush Bug, and Ash.
So, Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Dust. Dusty.
Ambush Bug is Irwin Schwaub. Irwin.
Dusty Irwin.
Bam, there you go, it was that easy.

I was gonna base a whole book around him, but couldn't muscle up enough ideas, so it went into the "for later", pile.

Later on, I needed a secret identity for Jade-Shade, so boom, Dusty Irwin was pressed into service.

Then, I didn't wanna lose that character, and JS/Dusty wasn't that original guy anymore, so I took Dusty's original body, and gave it to Captain Descrambler in "season 2, chapter 9".
And, he can be seen here.

SO, the real significance of that chapter, is that it's the two Dustys meeting each other.
Nothing goes to waste with me.


Origin of QD's overall structure.

This also goes back to about 2012/2013, I came up with the idea to do a radical reboot of Harry when the 25th anniversary rolled around, where Harry would ACTUALLY be 25, and start over in a real world with no supernatural or sci-fi elements, and place him in a world like my hometown.

Well, that fell by the wayside, but I re-absorbed it into Quantum Dissolve.
I made Dusty 25, and I started the story the day after Harry's birthday, so they'd be right next to each other, so I'd always remember, and realistically age JS accordingly.

Then, I crossed JS over with Harry, and more Harry-verse stuff is on the way.
So, that all worked out anyway.
Again, nothing goes to waste.


The origin of QD's overall idea.

Again, about 2011/2012/2013, I was totally lost in a blizzard, blind as a bat, had no idea what to do.
So, I just started writing about shit that I like just to make myself happy, and de-stress my brain.
First, Freddy Krueger.
Then, all the genre slashers.
Then, to segue-way, the crossovers between horror characters, and superheroes.
Then, all the crossover comics period, which exploded forth huger than I could have possibly imagined, but I had fun making the puzzle fit together.
And in putting the giant puzzle together, a pattern emerged, and a plan emerged from the pattern.
If I could be like Witchblade, or Vampirella, I could create a character solely out of crossovers.
BUT, you need copyright permission to officially crossover with established characters.
BUT, Evil Ernie crossed over with parody versions of the heroes, and Superman crossed over with a parody version of Popeye.
SO, if I built my universe out of parody crossovers, and got my little universe to snowball, maybe someday, I could crossover with the real characters, and integrate myself into the universal cosmic canon.
But, I had to get that first fucking book done.

And then Jade-Shade emerged, and then I made him Dusty Irwin.


The origin of Jade Shade.

Okay, the bit where Dusty sees the mask at the grocery store, and it calls out to him?
That really happened to me.

But here's the backstory to that.
The Green Monster was a real thing done by some teenagers, and it ended up in the paper, and my mother showed it to me when I was a teenager.

So, when I saw that green mask, it resonated for me, and I almost bought it, and if I had, I would have done the Green Monster sequel.

But, I chickened out, and regretted it, but the adventures I imagined having with that mask turned into the first couple chapters of QD.

I had the 25 year old Harry reboot idea, I had the parody crossover idea, I had Green-Mask-Guy idea, and I had Dusty Irwin, and the pieces all came together.

BUT, "Green Monster", was too generic sounding, so just as I wrote it into the story, I just ran it through a thesaurus a zillion times until "Jade Shade", just kinda popped out.

Bam, there it all was.

And of course, I had Hyla do up the mask differently, so it wasn't a total ripoff of the store one, and then Paladin's version built off that.


The origin of Quantum Dissolve.

I was always obsessed with two things, and you can find my writings on the subjects without too much fuss, so I won't even link it.
Those two things, the Star Trek transporter, and acid.
And, they both break things down.
Just one can rebuild, and the other can't.
But, the one that can't is real.

So, I wanted to get artsy fartsy with the title, and I wanted it to be a metaphorical image that applies across my whole life, and has personal significance, and after trying a LOOOOOT of word combinations on a  HUUUUUGE list, "Quantum Dissolve", finally stumbled out, and it was just fucking right.

And, I think I broke down the meaning of it all pretty well in "season 2, chapter 18".
Everything's getting written into this canon.
Nothing's getting left out.


Anyhoo, I think that covers the whole story pretty well.

As mentioned with the Harry 27th anniversary, this stuff counts for the bonus material in QD the book just like the Harry stuff will be in Harry book 5.

So, that was this year.
Stay tuned for more.