| Mad Dingo Productions - Randy Lander's Writing (If I were a graphic designer, there would be a nifty logo here. But I'm just a writer, so words are the best I can do.) |  |
| Scripts
In addition to being a comic-book reviewer, I have at times had aspirations to be a comic-book writer. I had one story published in the anthology title Love in Tights, and wrote a few follow-ups which never saw publication... one was a sequel to the original story, and the other was a completely different story. I also did work a few years back on an original series called Treasure Hunt, which was inspired in broad strokes by Danger Girl and the videogame Tomb Raider, but with less of a cheesecake approach and more of a humorous/Indiana Jones adventure style. Unfortunately, with the profileration of books similar to Danger Girl, including a Tomb Raider comic, it's now hopelessly unoriginal. Despite the fact that it's probably one of my wife's favorites, it's unlikely to ever see print. I also recently went and took a fresh look at it, and I think I was once again trying to cram too much action in... honestly, I'm not sure even the best artist could draw the script as written. Forgive the formatting on the Treasure Hunt pieces... they were translated directly over from a Microsoft Word template, and I haven't had time to reformat yet. Also included here is an alternate future project I wrote that was intended as a Captain America vehicle (I still like the premise and would still like to write this one) and a short piece that was sort of a comedy bit for the JLA and I had hoped to get into an 80-page Giant or something along those lines with a little revision.
MV1 At one point, I was heavily involved with the MV1 Fanfic Project, editing the Four Corners Branch and writing several titles, including Web of Spider-Man (which I co-started with Mark Bousquet), New Warriors (which I relaunched) and my own creation The Vault. Links to the issues I wrote are below, along with my notes on where the stories were going before I got too busy to contribute. 
 At any rate, this is also the series that I wrote the longest at MV1. The first year was probably the strongest, but I was picking up speed in the second, and I think some of my strongest work in all of MV1 was on the Tales to Astonish story (an anthology tale) and the Holiday special (another anthology tale.)
 At any rate, almost all of these stories are co-written by Mark Bousquet, usually with the two of us plotting, me doing the first draft and Mark revising and adding. Right after "Who Is Norman Osborn?" ended, my enthusiasm waned for the book, and roles reversed such that Mark was doing a lot of the first draft writing. I came back for a fuller role in "Spot Quest" and the beginnings of the Sinister Six storyline, but then just couldn't work up the enthusiasm to finish the story.
I had two ideas for new series cooking before I realized I didn't have time for MV1 anymore. Click here for details on Paladin and the Chosen One. |
Collected Thoughts
When the opportunity arose to write a column for Reactor magazine, I decided to do a companion of sorts to my Snap Judgments weekly review column. That turned out to be "Collected Thoughts," a weekly analysis of a graphic novel or complete comics story that I had read probably more than once and had some time to think about. The column moved with the ninth column to its new home at The Comic Reader, and then when I found myself squeezed for time, eventually ended. As with so many other things, this site that I wrote for appears to have disappeared, and I will at some point recreate these columns here.
Monitor Duty This was the continuation of the column I wrote at Psycomic, in spirit if not in name and exact purpose. It was my industry analysis/punditry column, running at IGN.com for a little over 9 months. Alas, IGN suffered the same lack of funding problems that plague so many dot.coms, and I was one of the freelancers let go. The column seems to be missing from IGN at this point, and so I'll eventually put the contents back up here. In addition, the column continues, in both name and spirit, as an occasional column on my new site TheFourthRail.
Don't Call Me Chief! This, on the other hand, was the column I wrote during my six-month stint as Editor in Chief of Psycomic. It ranges from industry analysis to sheer fanboy indulgence, and closes off with my farewell to Psycomic (and my "fuck you" to the people there who screwed us and tried to pretend it was a happy parting of the ways).
Etc. Here is basically my "everything else" category. There are links for my So Anyway... monthly ramblings column located on my home page, my part in the SIP Challenge (a freeform writing exercise that was essentially Strangers in Paradise fan-fiction), a speculative exercise on re-casting the creative teams on the Superman books and two college essays which are... rough, but still have bits I like.
Gaming In addition to being a writer and comic-book geek, I'm a gamer. In Colorado, while attending college, I played for three years in a campaign centering around the superteam Wildside. In fact, I came back for a couple "guest appearances" after moving to Austin, as the campaign ran for two or three years after I left. I've played with a group in Austin ever since I got here, and though the membership has changed a lot and the campaigns even more, I still enjoy a weekly gaming night. Below is a proposal I wrote for Digital Hero that was pitched as "The Ultimate Superteam" and a whole lot of fiction that I wrote based on the original Colorado campaign. Most of that fiction is probably really hard to get and appreciate if you don't know the characters involved, but I put it up here anyway. Basic Information Golden Dragon #0
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