Street Code
Street Code is © Dean Haspiel
Genre:
Modern, Drama
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Jack, a native New York bruiser, is fed up with living in the dregs of a drug-addled Alphabet City where his neighbors are insane shut-ins and his bicycle is always getting stolen. So, Jack escapes from Manhattan to Brooklyn to make a fresh start in Carroll Gardens only to face a new strain of street logic where most everything he stumbles upon is not as it seems. Jack steeps in the hazing of eons old rituals as a polarized community begrudgingly changes hands between tribes. With STREET CODE, Dean Haspiel returns to his semi-autobiographical roots and explores the emotional truths between prime and primate.
Street Code is, more than anything else, different from the rest of Zuda and the concept of a comic. It isn't something fantastic or ground breaking or unbelievable. It is an imitation of real life.
Our narrator is a real human being, not without fault or prejudice, but able to quickly learn a situation and change. You make a point of sympathizing characters that are removed from the narrator.
All the usual suspects end up being jerks.
This is both a strength and potentially a weakness for the story. Its all fine and well that he's noticing the Latin thugs who called in for the old maid. The same for the Black hulk who ends up being a big brother. However, you must be careful to give equal shares of good and bad to what he knows and what he doesn't. In my opinion that is most important to the realism you're aiming at. The setting itself is perfect and I wouldn't change it for the life of me. New York is real enough for the whole world.
Brilliant. One of the best things on the site, and certainly the most emotional powerful and relevant. The dark parts are rather painful, and even the most uplifting is rather raw.
I really love this. It's one of the better things I've read, in print or not.
Story telling most fine. I really enjoyed that beginning to end.
just loved it :D (and still do ;))
animal rights accent-genius;
I'm from Poland- so I really laughed from the part about the polish guy (it's prtly truth btw ;))
just to many things I liked, to write them all down.
congratulations! :)
Lovn it Dean! M&A in da howse!
Dean's work is what comics are. Pure, honest and simple. He commands the compositions like Eisner did and makes you feel as though you are right there with him. It's just ink on paper, and we feel as though we are right there....amazing. I hope that Dino creates more of these shorts, as I feel this is quintessential comics. A serial can be short stories that move, get to the point, and no one has to fight to save the world. Every day stories are more powerful as we've all been there. I've lived in Brooklyn my entire life and I am honored to have Haspiel share this borough with the rest of us. I've been an illustrator - sequential guy for a while now....and EVERY time I read Haspiel's work, I am re- inspired. Street Code is a classic.
its embarrassing to me that this strip, which I applauded from the first time it was announced here at Zuda, fell beneath my radar in the past few months. I'm only finally getting around to it now, Dean, sorry.
Is that because I knew how strong it would be when read as a whole?
Is it because Dean's amazingly strong sense of naturalism works best when the stories are read in individual pockets?
Is it because he doesn't need my attention and praise in the way younger Zuda talent (no less worthy) might be bolstered by it?
Yeah, probably all of that.
Dean's work on STREET CODE richly rewards each of us comic readers who think that Zuda might be able to offer something extra. Something stronger or more personal than material found each week in a comicshop. Each of the stories shown here are quiet, specific little poems to living in a city you love. Yes, they're about New York, but it's an unspecified New York, the "Big City made Normal" that all urban dwellers identify with.
Dean, through the Zuda model, has brought us something we've all been looking for; Will Eisner's dreams of Dropsie Blvd, the world of a normal life of any one of us rendered as heroic through the context of comics.
Dean, its exactly what I expected, but I'm sorry for not commenting sooner.
If this work doesn't come back to Zuda in the fall when Dean has time for it, well, we'll all be missing something that we really came here for in the first place.
-Rob
When I first read Street Code I thought I recalled your drawing style from an issue of American Splendor and sure enought there you were. Working w/Harvey Pekar had to be a great culmination of many thiings, I would imagine? Then today I took lil' Marley to the bookstore and I found The Quitter. Great work! You have an extremely expressive style to your inks and my eyes followed the story like a pounding freight train. Keep on building an impressive body of work. I will enjoy following your success. Next up for me to read is The Alcoholic.
Thx to everyone who read and weighed in on STREET CODE. I'm taking a long hiatus to draw a new graphic novel for Vertigo. I aim to return to STREET CODE in the Fall to complete season one. Until then, happy webcomix reading!
Thx to everyone who read and weighed in on STREET CODE. I'm taking a long hiatus to draw a new graphic novel for Vertigo. I aim to return to STREET CODE in the Fall to complete season one. Until then, happy webcomix reading!
I've enjoyed this series more than anything else you've done. Eisner would be proud, and I'd love to own a book of this stuff.
Great stories, I particularly like your nine-eleven tale, very subtle and evokes similar memories for me as well. Great writing.
great...
60 screens already? They went by so fast! Congratulations!
Wait...How did you know that cop was Irish?
I enjoy this one (Quality of life) more than most because I wasn't in Studio Deep Six to watch you create it. I read it all here first. That was a perfect last page!
Hey Dino,
I waited too damn long to read Street Code, but caught up in a big way today. These stories so captivate and catapult me into your world, that I want to visit you in NYC, like tomorrow...
And, your story about lost love reborn is WONDERFUL!
Hope you and Sara will come back to Austin soon for a looonger visit...
Later,
Wayne
Thoughtful. Lyrical. Human. I just love these stories.
This reminds me of the time I got pulled over for pot. They searched my car, told me my eyes were dialated (they just asked me to step out of the light), asked me what I was out doing out past 12am (my play just got out), and why I was shaking so much (it was cold and I have AS). I should of pulled out the Mental Disability card, but didn't.
This is just an incredible book. I can't wait for it to be printed.
Yeah, just think - you could've run over Jonathan A. coming out of a bar!
Excellent, especially when you give the cop what for.
at least you didn't get charged as a terrorist
yeah, David, that was a quality face-plant!
Bravo, Dean! Bravo. I love that last page, in particular.
You're lucky Officer Douchenozzle didn't catch you talking on your cell phone while riding a bike. That's against the law, too. And people wonder why NYPD isn't known as New York's Cuddliest.
Holey moley, was that 60 pages? It went by so fast! It didn't seem like enough! For example, we never really found out why he was sportin' bandages on his face from page 1!
Anyway, congrats, Dean, on fulfilling your contractual obligations with style!
Thx, gang. I'm glad the romantic departure in "When I Knew" was received so well.
Just wonderful.
this is excellent storytelling.
It's hard to decide which love story/montage is better: the memory page from Melody or these 4 pages.
Both really hit a home run with the imagery of a memory & made you feel like you're recalling an exact moment in time.
Outstanding work.
A lovely, simple and succinct episode and a welcome break from the tension in the previous episodes. It can be difficult to strike the right tone with this subject matter and not get too cornball about it but you've managed to succeed. Nice work, Dean!
Heartwarming and beautifully told. The rack of shoes really got me.
Maybe she just wanted to use up her minutes.
I kid.
Good stuff, Dino. Chilling and real.
Wow. That new chapter is pretty amazing.
Gang--
I apologize for my tardy replies to your msgs. I was busy dealing with press and signing's for THE ALCOHOLIC [my original Vertigo graphic novel collaboration with author/pal, Jonathan Ames] the month of October while juggling freelance work, which included an 8pp Frankenstein's Monster vs Werewolf By Night for Marvel.com, a 6pp story for Giant Size X-men First Class #1, my usual editorial duties for NEXT-DOOR NEIGHBOR at SMITH Magazine, and wrapping up BILLY DOGMA in FEAR, MY DEAR at ACT-I-VATE.
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I want to thank all of you for your kind responses to STREET CODE, thus far. I appreciate it very much and it's the kind of currency I wouldn't trade for all the gold in the world.
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ALSO, I wanted to thank Schwapp!!! for giving STREET CODE a nice review: http://www.schwapponline.com/2008/11/zuda-dean-haspiels-street-code.html
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I hope you folks enjoy "Breathe."
Great stuff, Dean! Really enjoyed the story :D
Dean, the running theme through all these stories appears to be about having your (and our) preconceptions shattered. Love the drawing in 'Master Plan' and it's beautifully inked too. The page of the boy in the wheelchair is great and beautifully observed, your blending of cartoony and figurative art hits the right tone for the stories you're telling here.
Cool Stuff on 9/11. Great Work. I Like B&W stuff like yours with the strong inking. "DOORED" was classic.
Your best story yet, Dino! Not only is it well drawn, but the story packs a heart wrenching nudge in the smallest amount of time and space. The way short stories should be done, really.
heart-warming stuff.
I require more Street goodness.
Very cool stuff. Great to see a major talent like Dean Haspiel here doing his thing! These stories are very down to earth, and very real. The main character is a great every-man archetype and his trials and travails in our very real world, again, one entirely too strange to NOT be real, blow me away!
Man, I love your writing. It's always so human. From the subtle humors to the harsh-realms of personal thoughts.
Makes you realize how infinitesimally insignificant some of our conflicts are in the grand scheme of things. Like the other vignettes, this one goes straight to the point- truly enjoyable.
Dino,
the latest story is amazing, not only in the simplicity and down to earth quality of the story, but also your storytelling is top notch (not that I'm telling you something new, anyway). The scene of the bike-door slam and subsequent fall is a great example of what a great storyteller can do.
Another great Auto bio. The bike/ door crash itself was very effective on the screen. You make those 9-11 day seem like yesterday. Which is to say, good writing on your part, bad memories for us in NYC.
wow...
Effing-Aye. You moved me.
Dean,
This was a heart rending tale. Touching, deeply personal, and tragic. STREET CODE's best vignette yet.
-Bob
Heartbreaking final panel, indeed. I remember trying desperately to give blood for survivors, and then watching day after day go by with none found. The memory is still shocking to me.