Flight Log ‹ Airship27

ON VACATION

On 10 Oct | '2025

Val and the Air Chief are in New England on a long overdue Fall vacation. Will return to the hangar and business on Oct 23rd. Till then be good and God bless. Ron – Over & Out!

Greetings Loyal Airmen, and here we go. As you read this entry, Val and the Air Chief only have two more days before we fly off to Wells Beach, Maine for a two and a half week much needed vacation. The plan is to visit with family and friends and eat lots and lots of amazing seafood. Oh, yeah. No laptops, no PCs, just down-time to relax from what’s been an incredibly busy year to include our recent bout with breast cancer and of course all our many comic projects. More on those in a minute. Meanwhile, this Flight Log will return Friday the 24th Oct.

THE BLACK TERROR 2.0

Production on BLACK TERROR 2.0 continues smoothly. Here is Pg 12 as drawn by Dell Barras, colored by David Rios with letters Dami. This is a great dream and all of us are having fun on this one.

JIN & TONIK # 2

The action is starting to heat up on this issue, as Captain Darya Tonikova and her Spetnaz commando team prepares to go into action. Cesar Feliciano’s art is always gorgeous and just gets better and better.

CHIVALRY INC.

THE GREAT RUSS HEATH

Whenever anyone asks us who was our favorite comic book artist ever, we immediately answer Russ Heath. In the mid-1950s, as a new comic book fan, we discovered his series, “THE SEA DEVILS” and were mesmerized by how he drew underwater scenes. We’d later go on to recognize his magnificent work in other DC titles such as “THE HAUNTED TANKS” and many others. This past week, Sept 30th was the anniversary of his birth, born in 1926. He passed away in 2018 at the age of 92.

REST IN PEACE, JAIME RAMOS

We were informed Tuesday evening that our good friend, and fellow pulp writer/editor Jaime Ramos has passed away. For over a decade Jaime fought failed kidneys and diabetes, never giving up on life, cherishing his wife Phyllis and son Thomas. He was a vibrant force in our New Pulp community. May God bring him to his eternal home and give him everlasting peace. Farewell, old friend.

CAMPAIGN ALMOST FINISHED

And wrapping this final Flight Log before going on vacation, it is now Oct 3rd and our BROTHER BONES ORIGIN GRAPHIC NOVEL – Kickstarter Campaign has only ten days left to reach our monetary goal. As the Air Chief writers this, we only need $799 to get us over the finish line. Better, all fingers are crossed, Loyal Airmen, and heartfelt thanks to all of you who got us this far.

Lastly, as the Air Chief wraps this up, mark your calendars. We will return with a new entry on Oct 24th in plenty of time for Halloween, oh yeah. Until be safe and God bless. Ron – Over & Out!

THE BEAT GOES ON

On 26 Sep | '2025

Greetings Loyal Airmen, as you can see by the new Brother Bones drawing by artist Joe Arnold, our Kickstarter campaign for the origin graphic novel continues. For those of you who helps us reach this current level of $1,191 many grateful thanks. We are almost at the 50% mark, needing $1,309 to succeed. So we do still have a good ways to go, so keep spreading the word. And on another super good note, the first issue will be 50 pages long, not 40 as we’d announced last week. And still for only $10. Now you know that’s a bargain not to be passed up.

CHIVALRY INC.

While the inks, coloring and lettering proceed with issue # 1 of this three issue mini-series, artist Javier Lugo keeps sketching away at issue # 2. In the magnificent rough above, our hero, Valerie Chevalier enters a Catholic church seeking help from her chaos and confusion. The Air Chief can easily imagine how beautiful this will look when completed.

JIN & TONIK 2

And once again the wonderful team of Cesare Feliciano (artwork) and Matt Webb (colors) delivers another gorgeous page from our spy thriller’s second issue, “JIN & TONIK.” Honestly, they just get better and better withe very single page.

BEYOND THE STARS UPDATE

For all you Loyal Airmen who have been following our six part sci-fi saga BEYOND THE STARS, for Silverline Comics, we’re happy to let you know issue # 5 has been done for a while now and is currently being lettered by Mike Belcher. As soon as the powers-that-be at Silverline tell us when it will be printed, we’ll announce it right. Oh, and artist Andrea Bormida is only 4 pages away from wrapping up the sixth and final issue. Good news indeed.

THE BLACK TERROR 2:0

Finally this week we’ll exit with giving you all a peek at another page from BLACK TERROR 2:0 – Story by the Air Chief, pencils and inks by Dell Barras, colors by David Rios and letters by Oluwadamilola Akinwale Akinayo. We had a good laugh when, upon closer inspection, we realized a certain Air Chief makes a cameo appearance on this page in panel 3. That was a fun surprise on Dell’s part. Hopefully we’ll have more to show in the future as this first issue moves along.

And that Loyal Airmen is if for this week. Thanks for stopping by and we’ll see you back here next Friday morning. Until then, this Ron – Over & Out!

Our Kickstarter So Far

On 18 Sep | '2025

Greetings Loyal Airmen and welcome to this week’s Flight Log. We thought we’d start the entry by letting you know how are we’ve come in our Kickstarter Campaign to get $2,500. So far we are at $1,016.00 (in just one week) meaning we have 1,484.00 left to raise. To all of you who have already gotten us this far, thank you so very much. We appreciate every single dollar donated. Artist Joe Arnold and the Air Chief are all too aware of how crowded the independent the comic market is these days and thank you for picking us to support. We promise you, issue # 1 of this four part series will feature 40 of the finest comic pages ever assembled between two covers with a great opening to our saga and stunning artwork; both by Joe and Rob Davis. Never mind top notch lettering from our pal Mike Belcher. So thanks and please, keep spreading the word among all your friends. We’ve still got a ways to go. Oop, almost forgot, the great illo above is of course of the Undead Avenger and his aid, Blackjack Bobby Crandall, courtesy of Rob Davis.

BLACK TERROR 2.0

MAN IN THE MASK NEWSLETTER

As ever, pal Mike Belcher’s “Man in the Mask” series remains our favorite independent comic out there today. All you Loyal Airmen can sign up for Mike free newsletter here. Tell him the Air Chief sent you.https://millertongazette.substack.com/

JIN & TONIK # 2

Colorist Matt Webb turns in the latest page from “Jin & Tonik” issue 2 over the art of the amazing Cesar Feliciano. This shaping up to be another stellar chapter in this fast paced spy thriller.

BONUS STRIP IN BONES CAMPAIGN

So we’ve mentioned multiple times now that the first book in the Brother Bones Origin Graphic Novel series will feature a special 6 page bonus adventure illustrated by our own Rob Davis. And we thought it only fair to tease all of you with the first page of that strip called “Nowhere To Run.” Both the Air Chief and primary artist Joe Arnold were blown away by the beauty of these pages. Enjoy Loyal Airmen. And when you the 40 pg comic arrives in your mail box, you’ll get the see the remaining 5 pages.

CRIMSON NUN # 2 FINISHED!!!

The Air Chief is delighted beyond measure to announce issue # 2 of THE CRIMSON NUN is finished? A few days ago, artist Mike Belcher completed his beautiful lettering of these 23 pages illustrated and colored by Jesse Thomas. The files are now on Antarctic Press’ own Ben Dunn. Wahooo! And the Air Chief has a feeling it’s not going to take Ben long to get this comic assembled and out there. Above is the first page which we wanted to show off. Our heartfelt thanks to both Jesse and Mike. This story is coming along way-way better than we’d ever dreamed. Thank you gentlemen.

And there you have it for this week, Loyal Airmen. The Air Chief still can’t believe how generous all of you are and how well our Kickstarter is doing. That’s totally thanks to all of you. Please don’t stop now. We still have a long way to go, so keep sharing the word and the link. Till next week, God bless your all.

Ron – Over & Out!

The FCCCCC Returns!

On 12 Sep | '2025

After a summer hiatus, the Fort Collins Comics Coffee Clutch Crew reconvened last Sat morning at Grand Slam Fort Collins. Thanks to Gaby, Olivia, Zane Lorelai, Alexis, Sam, Jesse, Tyra and Abe for joining the Air Chief. It was a fun two hours of catching up.

Here’s hoping Future First Sat hook-ups will include more of our amigos.

JIN & TONIK # 2

We honestly cannot say enough good things about Cesar Feliciano’s amazing artwork on this project. Wow seems not enough. And wait till these pages are colored. Oh, yeah.

BLACK TERROR 2.0

Meanwhile Dell Barras delivers another fantastic page of our new BLACK TERROR 2.0 issue # 1 intended for Ben Dunn and his Antarctic Press when completed. Till then, enjoy this sneak peek.

BEYOND THE STARS # 6

At the same time, over in Italy, the fantastic Andrea Bormida is drawing his fingers to the nub to finish our six part sci-fi saga, BEYOND THE STARS for Silverline Comics. Above are the early rough pencils for pages 13 & 14 of that final issue. Whereas, we guess the gang at Silverline is putting the finishing touches on issue number 5 and should be announcing its release any day now. Stay tuned, Loyal Airmen. Things are heating up.

BROTHER BONES KICKSTARTER

Today is the official launch of the Brother Bones Origin Graphic Novel Kickstarter Campaign. As we write this, it is Thursday afternoon and we don’t have that official link yet. Whereas artist Joe Arnold did post a You Tube video here (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a-F_DsRvpPs) so check that out. The Air Chief hopes to be appearing on lots of podcasts in the coming weeks. We really need you support, Loyal Airmen, in making this dream come true.

REST IN PEACE CHARLIE KIRK

Yesterday a man we admired a great deal was murdered in a cowardly act of violence; a violence he personally abhorred and always stood against. Yes, were filled with anger today, but not hate. Never hate. There is a difference. We leave you this week with this quote from Saint Paul’s letter to the Colossians. “Brothers and sisters: Put on, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, heartfelt compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience, bearing with one another and forgiving one another, if one has a grievance against another; as the Lord has forgiven you, so must you also do. And over all these put on love, that is, the bond of perfection.”

Ron – Over & Out!

Mark Your Calendar

On 5 Sep | '2025

Greetings Loyal Airmen. Last week we told you the Brother Bones Origin Graphic Novel Kickstarter Campaign was in its final stages. This past week, artist Joe Arnold has been busy getting it all set up to include a link to where you can go to sign up. (https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/brotherbones/brother-bones-origin-01) Simply cut and past this link and go and sign up. That way you will notified when the site goes live with all kinds of goodies, including a page from Rob Davis’ short Bones strip, “Nowhere to Run” that you won’t want to miss.

Believe me, Loyal Airmen, we are wicked excited about this project, but it won’t happen unless we have your complete support. So start spreading the word and as ever, our heartfelt thanks.

JIN & TONIK # 2

Meanwhile artist Cesar Feliciano continues producing amazing pages on our second issue of our modern day spy thriller JIN & TONIK. We can’t say enough good things about Cesar’s work on this project.

ANOTHER BACK IN PRINT

As he’s done in the past, Art Director Rob Davis has taken one of our earliest titles at Airship 27 Production and gotten it back in print from all you Loyal Airmen who have been requesting this. Lots of our old titles are currently only available on Kindle, which is really where they sell the most. But being a bibliophile ourselves, we understand when one of you Loyal Airmen reaches out asking for a hard copy. And so here it is, and it’s a great one with some really classic Agent X adventures by Sean Ellis, B.C. Bell, Kevin Noel Olson and Greg Gick.

POST CANCER JOURNEY

Okay, this past week has been a roller coast ride with all kinds of appointments and few surprises along the way. Mostly all of them good as you will see. Today Valerie and the Air Chief visited the Cancer Center and met with a “teacher” nurse who spent an hour with us. Her task, and not an easy one, was explaining each of the medications we are going to be taking once Val and return from our New England vacation, on the 26th of October. While detailing the two specific pills, she told us in way too many medical termsn what each of those pills was designed to do in our body to prevent those nasty old cancer cells from taking another beachfront in my body. All well and good, but then came the second half of that talk wherein she ran through the list of possible “side effects.” And no, Loyal Airmen, but that we do not mean “good” things. We mean things like sore muscles, depletion of calcium, headaches, nausea and let’s not forget our favorite, diarrhea. At which point you wonder, is cancer the real bad guy here. Excuse the bad humor, it’s what helps us get through all this. Valerie is a real trooper, and with the nurse, instantly began asking how diet would affect all of this, to which she replied a super healthy diet would certainly minimize the chances of ill effects. So how much do we want to do the work? Val’s already started planning out a new day to day diet which will be high on calcium, proteins and short on bad carbohydrates. Honestly, Loyal Airmen, it’s not all too far for how we live now. Anyway, the hour came and went and the good nurse practioner shook my hand and directed upstairs to get my first special shot. One not given in the arm. Ha. We’ll be taking four of those a year.

BROTHER BONES KICKSTARTER LAUNCHES 12 SEPT!!!

And there you have it, Loyal Airmen, for another week. Thanks ever for stopping by and if you’d like to keep Val and the Air Chief in your prayers, we’d be sincerely grateful. God bless.

Ron – Over & Out!

BROTHER BONES UPDATE

On 29 Aug | '2025

Greetings Loyal Airmen, this week we kick off things with an update on the forthcoming Brother Bones graphic novel. Last weekend the Air Chief sat down with project artist Joe Arnold and he brought us up to speed on how far he’s progressed with bringing the character’s origin graphic novel to life. Thus far Joe has completed the first two chapters from the 133 pg script. You can two of them above. Joe is doing pencils, inks and gray-scaling with Mike Belcher adding the lettering. With this amount of work completed, Joe is now finalizing the last pieces to launch the Kickstarter Campaign for issue # 1. It will feature 33 pages of the actual script plus a complete six-page Brother Bones short done by artist Rob Davis called “Nowhere to Run.” The issue will also feature two covers, one by Joe and the other by Rob. Meanwhile, both Joe and the Air Chief want to let everyone know, we are available to guest on comic related podcasts, if anyone would like to invited us on to talk about this project. The Air Chief created Brother Bones over 15 years ago and he’s appeared in five prose books from Airship 27, a 48 pg one shot comic, several shorter strips, a role playing game module and two separate film companies tried to bring him to the silver screen. Sadly neither got beyond the casting stage, but it still showed the popularity of our Undead Avenger. Now, for the first time ever, his complete origin story will be told in a comic. Stay tuned, hopefully by next week we’ll have a link to share with you.

BLACK TERROR 2.0

R.I.P. MORT TODD

**MORT TODD (9 Nov 1961- 24 Aug 2025)** Over the past few days, the comic book lost another wonderful talent taken from all of us way too soon, Mort Todd. Mort was truly an all around super talented creator from his ability to write, draw, edit and color. Mort’s career had him editing the humor mag Cracked, doing storyboards of television and films. He worked for lots of companies including Marvel and Charlton. We crossed paths when he reached out to the Air Chief and artist Gary Kato letting us know how big a fan he was of our comedy super-hero Mr. Jigsaw Man of a Thousand Parts. Via his own mag, Charlton Arrow, Mort reprinted several of our Jiggy black and white strips and colored them for us. We were so impressed, we asked him if he’d be willing to color our special Christmas issue. Mort agreed if we’d let him do the cover and delivered a priceless image of Jiggy having to save Santa Claus. Farewell, Mort, may the heavenly bullpen in the sky welcome you with open arms. You will be missed, old friend.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mort_Todd)

JIN & TONIK # 2

CHIVALRY INC. PENCILS

Meanwhile, Florida based artist Javier Lugo is busy doing roughs and pencils for the CHIVALRY INC. series due out from Silverline one of the days. Issue one is still being inked and colored. Our humble thanks to Javier who is at the same time dealing with some serious health issues, but maintain a solid productive pace which says tons for his professionalism. Hang in there Javier, and God make you complete well soon.

AND THAT’S IT for this week, Loyal Airmen. As ever thanks for stopping. Be well and we’ll catch you all back here next Friday morning. Ron – Over & Out!

Now For Something Special

On 22 Aug | '2025

Greetings Loyal Airmen. Last weekend the Cartoonist Society held their awards ceremony for 2025 and the one of our own artist at Airship 27 Production won big time. Check this out.

Artist James Lyle has won this year’s Reuben Award for Best Book Illustration for his work on three Airship 27 titles. TOWERS OF METROPOLIS Vol Two, SHADOWS OF LOVE and METROPOLIS – RESURRECTION. Congratulations James. (https://nationalcartoonists.com/reubens-2025/)

JIM & TONIK # 2

While on JIN & TONIK # 2, super colorist Matt Webb continues to do his magic coloring over artist Cesar Feliciano’s wonderful artwork. Every one of these pages excites us in a very good way.

RADIATION TREATMENTS FINISHED

This past Monday morning, the Air Chief completed his 30 day post-mastectomy radiation treatment at the UC Health Cancer Center’s Radiology Clinic. Valerie was on hand to see one of the dozen of wonderful therapist, Laura, give us a certificate of completion and then watch us HIT THE GONG!! Over the past month she, and Caitlin (in the photo above right) were two of the dozen of truly amazing women who took care of us with their kindness, professionalism and love. We will never ever forget them. Now, it’s back to living our normal (often times wacky) life without cancer. Thank you God, for every blessing you rain down on us. And to all you Loyal Airmen who kept the Air Chief and Val in your daily prayers.

CHIVALRY INC.

THE CRIMSON NUN # 2

The page above is one of the last pages of issue # 2. It arrived a few days ago courtesy of artist Jesse Thomas who now has only two more pages to color!! Then it’s off to Mike Belcher for lettering and then it gets submitted to Ben Dunn at Antarctic Press. Cannot tell you how excited the Air Chief is to bring you this one. Oh yeah.

THE GREEN HORNET CLAN

Five years ago a big fan of our old Now Comics Green Hornet series commissioned my artist partner, Jeff Butler, to do a piece that would feature all the Hornets and Katos from those issues. A few days ago Jeff posted it on Facebook for all the world to see. And here it is. Facing off you have our “new” heroes, Paul Reid and Mishi Kato versus the first ever radio characters, Britt Reid and Ikano Kato. While in the background on the wall is a framed photo of the 60s TV Britt Reid and Hiyashi Kato, under the picture of John Reid, better know as the Lone Ranger. And in the left doorway, Jeff even managed to add his pin-up babe, the Green Hornette. Oh yeah, we so had to share this with all of you Loyal Airmen. Hopefully Jeff will eventually get it colored…and maybe sell prints.

And that wraps up this week’s Flight Log, Loyal Airmen. As ever thanks for stopping by and we’ll hopefully see you back here next Friday. Ron – Over & Out!

MORE FUN STUFF

On 15 Aug | '2025

Greetings Loyal Airmen, we thought we’d kick off this week’s Flight Log with some really fun stuff in as yet another peek at BLACK TERROR 2.0 – courtesy of Dell Barras, David Rios and Oluwadmilola Akinayo. These gentlemen are doing an amazing job with this comic. Stay tuned.

ANOTHER TITLE BACK IN PRINT

Considering all the titles Airship 27 has produced over the past more than ten years, it is understandable that over time many of our earlier titles have gone out-of-print at Amazon. Though they still remain available on Kindle, the paperback editions are gone. Over the past few years, many of our readers have bemoaned not being able to pick up those early volumes. Example, our Secret Agent X anthology series has produced six volumes. He’s one of our favorite classic pulp heroes. So when a few fans asked Art Director Rob Davis if there was any chance they might see Vol One of this series back in print, Rob immediately set about making that happen. And he didn’t just dust off the old files, but Rob actually reformatted them in such a way that they would take up less pages and thus be able to offer our readers a slimmer, less expensive book with all the same material as the original; which you see above at left. To the right is the new “Reprint Edition” now once again available at Amazon in paperback. Rob did a great job tweaking the original cover and adding a little pizzaz. We hope you Loyal Airmen enjoy that extra touch.

IMAGINE A MOVIE

Recently JIN & TONIK artist/creator, Cesar Feliciano was playing some internet games and had the opportunity to have a faux-poster made of our comic series; imagining what a movie for the story would look like. The Air Chief for one, thinks our story would make a fantastic action thriller. What do you Loyal Airmen think?

And finally, by this time next week we will have finished our six week radiation treatment. Hopefully we’ll have photo to show of our last day at the Radiology Clinic. So be back here next Friday. Until then, take care and as ever thanks for stopping by. Ron – Over & Out!

Andrea’s Patreon Page

On 8 Aug | '2025

Artist Andrea Bormida now has his own Patreon page. (https://www.patreon.com/MakingComics001) Andrea is one of the finest, most talented artist the Air Chief ever had the pleasure of working on. Our sci-fi series, “Beyond the Stars,” for Silverline Comics is nearing it end.

CNI CLASSIFIED Vol 5

One of the best action-packed New Pulp adventure series to appear in the past few years has been the “Code Name Intrepid” series created by writer Robert J. Mendenhall. Bob premiered this series featuring an all military team fighting Nazis prior to World War II at Airship 27 and then branched off to start his own publishing imprint, Blue Planet Press. Shortly after that, he launched a separate series he called, “CIN-Classified” wherein he invited other pulp writers to contribute stories featuring his great characters. The Air Chief had a tale published in last year’s Vol 4. While at this year’s Windy City Pulp & Paper show in Chicago, Bob informed us that he was going to be wrapping up the series with Vol 5 and asked if we’d be willing to write an Introduction to the book. We were flattered and honored to do so. That volume has now been published and is available at Amazon. We recommend it, and the previous four, to all you Loyal Airmen. Truthfully, it is a really awesome, fun pulp series. Don’t miss it.

ROCKY MOUNTAIN CON 2025!!!

Another major excitement, the first ad for this year’s Rocky Mountain Con, as delivered by pal and promoter, Tim Moret. This has been the Air Chief’s home-con ever since we moved here to Colorado. Tim rolled out the red carpet for us and every since it has been a great show. Looking forward to this one big time.

BLACK TERROR 2.0

BEYOND 30 by Edgard Rice Burroughs

It’s here at last and Airship 27 Production is thrilled to present to today’s pulp readers a long-forgotten tale by the Master of Adventure. In 1915, Edgard Rice Burroughs, the master of adventure fiction, wrote “Beyond 30,” a prophetic vision about our world locked onto a course certain to lead us to a horrendous World War. That global nightmare became a reality in ways the brilliant Burroughs couldn’t imagine and so he never returned to the apocalyptic setting he’d created. This was a rarity for a writer who loved to pen series, ala Tarzan, Barsoom, Pellucidar and many, many others. Given the opportunity to publish a long forogtten book by Edgar Rice Burroughs there was no way we were going to pass it up. Now Pulp Factory Award Winner and Art Director Rob Davis has embellished this wonderful novella in a brand new, beautifully illustrated edition available from Amazon in both paperback and on Kindle. It also sets the stage for the sequel written by Harding McFadden and coming soon from Airship 27 Production. Loyal Airmen, you don’t not want to me this one.

JIN & TONIK # 2

Finally, shades of Bruce Lee, as artist Cesar Feliciano delivers another great page from “Jin & Tonik” issue # 2. He’s really whipping through this one, Loyal Airmen and we couldn’t be happier.

And with that we wrap up a pretty full and hectic week. The Air Chief has just a little over one week left on his cancer radiation treatment and happy to report all is going well. Thanks for all your continued well wishes and prayers. Okay, see you all back here next Friday. Ron – Over & Out!