An illustrated story painted at the Sunken City in San Pedro with black and white enamel paint.
Scripted by Michael Hanson
Starring: Badly Licked Bear,
with: Ed, Honee and the Viking
Sunken City: the Graphic Novel (The Illustrated Whole Draft)
Page I:
Title Page: Sunken City: the Graphic Novel
Prologue: Hypernormalization
Page II:
It began as a non-linear war, a ceaseless shape-shifting that is unstoppable because it is undefinable.
Page III:
The aim was not to win the war but to create a constant state of destabilized perception, in order to manage and control.
Page IV:
It was unmanageable. The world was destroyed. Many died. Nobody thought they had won.
Page V:
Most of the world was uninhabitable, riddled with radioactivity.
Page VI:
All that stood was an empire of rats‑the others were dead or went mad.
The Saga of Badly Licked Bear
Page 1:
Badly Licked Bear uses spikes to arrange his severed head collection.
Page 2:
The car pool lane is the highest level of Los Angeles spirituality.
Page 3:
You either are a fascist, an anti-fascist or you're a fascist's bodyguard.
Page 4:
Badly Licked Bear said the late stage of capitalism is cannibalism.
Page 5:
TL:DR Never read the manual. Trust your feelings. Buy the murder bird.
Page 6:
I see a penguin and I want to paint it black #gothemperor.
Page 7:
Swords are the new false eyelashes. Idling dune buggies with rams and spikes are the new Hitachi Magic Wand.
Page 8:
The Viking. “There ain’t nuthin’ left of the nuthin’ left.”
Ed's Finishing
Page 9:
Ed was driven insane.
Page 10:
Because he knows how to live today.
Page 11:
And he knows that is impossible.
Page 12:
There are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn't true.
Page 13:
The other is to refuse to believe what is true.
Page 14-15:
Ed photos that which doesn’t want to be seen.
Page 16:
The planes fell to earth (the redacted version).
The Manchurian Candidate
Page 17:
Honee makes poison tipped arrows.
Page 18:
She was Manchurian royalty.
Page 19:
Her first memories are in a French-Catholic boarding school in Saigon.
Page 20:
Honee is a master of the healing arts.
Page 21:
She has amassed a small militia.
Page 22:
Honee wouldn't participate in barbarism.
Page 23:
She would put the deal together for cash.
Page 24:
The archer.
As It Is: the Viking
Page 25:
I wasn’t always this.
Page 26:
I turned bullies into cowards.
Page 27:
You didn’t bring enough guys.
Page 28:
Before I was a bouncer.
Page 29:
Then I was a professor.
Page 30:
As it is, you are who you are.
Few Survived for Long
Page 31:
The Viking.
Page 32:
Badly Licked Bear.
Page 33:
Ed.
Page 34:
Honee.
Geiger Counters and Canned Food
Page 35:
Did your annuity arrive in time to buy, your bunker?
Page 36:
Will the cracked-tooth bandit offering you clean water accept your VISA?
Page 37:
They talked about spirits of metallurgy, sacrificial rites and cults of speed.
Page 38:
Honee shared her meat with the Viking. Then…
Page 39:
she stole his books. It was a fair trade.
Page 40:
The deed was done. As usual, at the same moment…
Page 41:
he became less and more human.
(End of Act One).
Ice-Cold Norseman
Page 42:
No Sir, I ain't getting in somebody's business.
Page 43:
Last time it almost killed me.
Page 44:
Why did he have to go and do that?
Page 45:
How did you know what order to kill them?
Page 46:
I was lucky in the order.
Page 47:
I've always been lucky killin' folks.
Page 48:
Until I wasn't. Blam!
TomTom of Sinland
Page 49:
Badly Licked Bear knows he's a thug.
Page 50:
He had to become one.
Page 51:
Survival wasn't possible otherwise.
Page 52:
There was no difference between pleasure and pain.
Page 53:
Badly Licked Bear preternaturally survived in the wasteland.
Page 54:
He wrote until he forecast the future...then he continued. "When the Trinity Test took place in New Mexico it established total control of the environment and a capacity to use it."
Page 55:
Even a radioactive sunset reset a familiar but elusive essence, set in motion by ancestors he could not name.
Page 56:
The submissive is the master of the wasteland.
Page 57:
Where you think it will strike is rarely what kills you.
Page 58:
If we have to go down this way I'm going snarling and bloody.
Ed’s Occurrence Up Shit Creek Bridge
Page 59-60:
The Hanging.
Page 61-62.
The Chase
Page 63-64:
Revenge and Reuniting.
Page 65:
Ed’s Occurrence Up Shit Creek Bridge
Honee’s Throne of Blood
Page 66:
The wasteland was overrun with bandits.
Page 67:
“Please make me your disciple.” “First get off your knees, we’ll talk as we go.”
Page 68:
(Screaming hysterically)
Page 69:
“All dead Honee. Again-we’ve survived.”
Page 70:
“You shall not stir out of your house today Honee.”
Page 71:
“Those who threaten me, they are vanquished.”
Page 72:
The witch cackled, “Something wicked this way comes.”
Pages 73-74
Assassins.
Page 75:
Throne of Blood.
The Last Mx on Earth
Page 76:
Language is a curse without an interlocutor.
Page 77:
It is electronic media without electricity, an uncircumcised tablet.
Page 78:
How many imaginary friends can you craft before madness?
Page 79:
Becoming furry relieves the suffering of being human.
(End of Act II)
The Solitary Sower
Page 80:
All that You touch, you change, All that you change, changes you.
Page 81:
And people may rise, or people may fall/But the farmer, must feed them all.
Page 82:
Good-bye horses I'm flying over you. Good-bye horses I'm flying over you
Page 83:
I do not regret these experiences, reflecting on them has given me new insights into my real motives on the thousand occasions about which I have deluded myself.
Page 84:
So here I am, all alone on this earth… cut off from them and everything else, what am I? This is what remains for me to find out now.
Page 85:
The scavengers feed, on edge, as if their meal’s wrath may awaken.
Page 86:
The plants continue to grow.
Texts for Nowhere
Page 87:
Suddenly, no, at last, long last, I couldn’t anymore, I couldn’t go on.
Page 88:
Someone said, you can’t stay here. I couldn’t stay there and I couldn’t go on.
Page 89:
I’ll describe the place, that’s unimportant.
Page 90:
The top, very flat, of a mountain, no, a hill, but so wild, so wild, enough.
Page 91:
Down in the hole the centuries have dug, centuries of filthy weather, it slowly drinks.
Page 92:
They are up above, all round. I can’t raise my eyes to them.
Page 93:
Do they see me, what can they see of me? Perhaps there is no one left, perhaps they are all gone, sickened.
Page 94:
To change, or, it’s not me, or fate, I feel that other coming, let it come, it won’t catch me napping.
Page 95:
All is noise.
Page 96:
To change, to see, no, there’s no more to see, the harm is done, that’s what possessed me to come.
Page 97:
We’re of one mind, deep down, we’re fond of one another, but there’s nothing we can do for one another.
Page 98:
The mist will clear, the wind freshen and the night sky open, including the Bears, to guide me once again on my way, let’s wait for night.
Page 99:
I don’t try to understand, I’ll never try to understand any more, I won’t be afraid of the big words anymore, they are not big.
Post-Anthropocene
Page 100:
Badly Licked Bear never knew of a half-brother who survived, barely as before the war.
Page 101:
The people were spared by freak winds and geographic isolation.
Page 102:
Genetic mutations were a common manifestation. Everything from before was lost.
Page 103:
A new human emerged with no context for the ruined world they inherited.
Page 104:
The landscape responded to their farming impulses and rewarded their diligence.
Page 105:
They knew the tools they modified were made by people they would never meet. They sent offerings to those spirits.
Page 106:
The world nurtured and savaged them with fickle, unpredictable behaviors.
Page 107:
They found plenty of evidence of their antecedents’ mysterious writing. They understood of its impulse to preserve.
Page 108:
They intuitively knew of writing’s failure to preserve anything.
Page 109:
Writing was a bad magic, by turning language concrete it released a plague upon the world. They would never turn to it.
Sunken City (The Graphic Novel) Notes and References
Prologue: Hypernormalization is from a film of the same title by Adam Curtis. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fh2cDKyFdyU
Page II: Quoted directly, It began as a non-linear war, a ceaseless shape-shifting that is unstoppable because it is undefinable.
Page III: Quoted directly. The aim was not to win the war but to create a constant state of destabilized perception, in order to manage and control.
Pages IV-VI: Are quotes from the film La Jetée by Chris Marker https://vimeo.com/309034119
The Saga of Badly Licked Bear is based off posts, comments and other texts by artist Badly Licked Bear. I collect posts and use them directly in this section.
Page 1: I make Badly Licked Bear’s outfit from elements from the film Escape From New York and the boots are from the film Zardoz https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0070948/mediaviewer/rm909847040
Page 3: Is a photo of teen students from Kentucky's Covington Catholic High School, mocking Omaha elder Nathan Phillips as he sings and drums. The students were taking part in an anti-abortion rally, while Mr. Phillips came for an Indigenous Peoples' March. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-46935701
Page 6: Is a post by Badly Licked Bear referencing the Rolling Stones, Paint it Black. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O4irXQhgMqg
Ed's Finishing is based off the artist Ed Giardina of his art collective Finishing School http://finishing-school-art.net
Pages 10-11: Are from his project Deep State. The image for page 11 is from an experiment with monkeys on isolation by Harry Harlow https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Harlow
Pages 12-13: Are from his project Double Blind and use a quote from Søren Kierkegaard
The Manchurian Candidate is based off the fashion designer Honee https://www.houseofhonee.com
Pages 22-23: Are images from the film The Deer Hunter https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OuGSXflBoWU
Geiger Counters and Canned Food
Pages 35-36: From a Facebook post by Badly Licked Bear.
Page 37: Paraphrased from a Facebook post by Badly Licked Bear.
Ice-Cold Viking
Pages 42-44: The lines are from the John Wayne film Big Jake. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RdQbsa5E4ZQ
Pages 45-7: The lines are from Clint Eastwood in the film The Unforgiven .
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mjkt4UgcTmg
Page 48: The pose, the gun and clothes are from the final scene of the film Scarface.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hRLKJ09JmGo
TomTom of Sinland is a pun off the artist Tom of Finland.
Page 49: Is from a drawing by Tom of Finland https://www.davidkordanskygallery.com/artist/tom-of-finland
Page 50: Small figure is a Crystal Gem from Steven Universe: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yTKEKTUkBlQ The bullies are from the film My Bodyguard. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QexN6K0kq5I
Page 52: The Syringe wielding doctor is Robert Preston from the film SOB. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=axzKFG0K4h0
Page 56: The pose and costume are from artist William Pope L. from his performance Tompkins Square Crawl. https://vimeo.com/190326648
Page 55 and 59: Uses the clothes from the end of the film Conan the Barbarian. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qih55rWcsvM
Ed’s Occurrence up Shit Creek Bridge is based on the film An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge. https://vimeo.com/163730099
Pages 61-63: Is from the film Marathon Man. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J4XuEDOtOkA
Honee’s Throne of Blood is titled from the Akira Kurosawa film.
Pages 66-69: Are quoted from the film Seven Samurai. mhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7mw6LyyoeGE
Pages 70-72 The lines are taken from the play Macbeth. http://shakespeare.mit.edu/macbeth/full.html
Page 75: The image is directly taken from the film Throne of Blood. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3GvVzvoEx4w
The Last Mx on Earth is a reference to the film The Last Man on Earth. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZuPgXDWMB-Q
Page 76: Is a Lisa Frank onesie: https://www.thehunt.com/the-hunt/CCTFTP-lisa-frank-onesie-
Pages 77: The image is a Robert Crumb Drawing. https://www.pinterest.com/pin/490329478165418429/?lp=true
Page 78: The image is from artist Hirsch Perlman https://frieze.com/article/hirsch-perlman-saved-avalanche
Page 79: Is based on “becoming animal” from A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia by Deleuze and Guattari https://www.sas.upenn.edu/~cavitch/pdf-library/DeleuzeGuattari_Becoming.pdf
The Solitary Sower
Page 80: From Parable of the Sower by American writer Octavia E. Butler https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6iVGuMyKFgA
Page 81: Quoted from The Farmer by Amelia E. Barr https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nziA33FrhoI
Page 82: From film Silence of the Lambs, song by Q Lazzarus. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vNcoHQrveEQ
Pages 83-85: Direct quotes from Reveries of a Solitary Walker by Jean-Jacques Rousseau https://archive.org/details/confessionsjjro01rousgoog/page/n37
Pages 84-85: Uses an Image of the overhead shot from the death of Walter White from the Tv show Breaking Bad. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6AlEEcanbus
Texts for Nowhere
Pages 87-99: The entire scene uses direct quotes from Samuel Beckett’s Texts for Nothing (from section 1 and 2)
https://manoftheword.files.wordpress.com/2016/03/beckett-storiestextsnothing_3_4.pdf
Post-Anthropocene
Pages 103-104, 107-109: The figures are based on models of Neanderthals and Homo_Floresiensis http://humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/human-fossils/species/homo-floresiensis