Comics With Slightly Dark Themes: My 30 New Comics From My “Sheep And Cloud” Series

I get a lot of ideas that don't fit into my kids' books but are still a lot of fun. Generally, the more wholesome, kid-friendly ideas make it into picture books and graphic novels, and the more subversive and cynical stuff gets reserved for Sheep and Cloud.

When it comes to my comics, I try to pick out the most universal themes in modern life to include in my webcomic to reach as many people as possible. I love making fun of hypocrisy the most, so if I ever identify it or other types of irrationalities in the way we live and love, I try to represent it in the 4 - 6-panel format.

José the Stabby Stabby Duck is one of my favorite characters to emerge from the Sheep and Cloud universe. I can't tell you how much I'd love to make a picture book about him, but no self-respecting children's publisher would ever touch it (for good reason). I love bad guys, anti-heroes, and mean-spirited humor.

I work on Sheep and Cloud every Saturday morning for fun. No one owns them, so I can do whatever I want with those characters; it's a liberating creative feeling. The rest of the week, I teach at a primary school (grade 4 - 6 art teacher) and work on my kids' books. The books I produce for the commercial market are highly edited and subject to the whims of many people, so I don't have as much creative freedom over those as I do over my little webcomic. It's special to me.

I'm the art teacher at the primary school I work at, and my best buddy is Dave, the PE teacher. We both have a black sense of humor, and I always walk away from our conversations laughing with tons of material for Sheep and Cloud. Dave is like my unofficial collaborator on the project.