Animated trio: Young entrepreneurs turn their passion for comic books into a career.

• Author: Ross, Ian
• Position: Brief Article

These are not the comic books you grew up with. These are not the tacky and cheap kiddy rags at the bottom of the magazine rack, or the mouldy-smelling rags buried at the back of some dingy used bookstore.

Comic books, if you have not noticed, are enjoying a healthy resurgence in popularity, their titles and quality of scripts even spreading onto the big screen.

No longer printed on the thin newsprint-like paper with ink that smears when rubbed, the pictures are digitized on a computer, the covers and paper are glossy, and they sell for $3 (US).

Now three young Sudbury entrepreneurs have set out to make their mark in this fast-paced and compact industry where only the best writers and artists survive.

Doodle Me Sane Comics, consisting of its punkish founder Richard-Louis Guerin, 25, Randolph Lalonde, 27, and Marc Froment, 26, is believed to be the only independent comic book publisher in Canada.

By and large running between 18 and 24 pages, the characters and plots of today's "graphic novels" are more grown-up with alternative and real-life stories that explore contemporary events.

Wildly popular in Europe and especially in Japan, where the books are three to five times thicker and are the most-read form of literature, they can hardly be considered juvenile fare, but have evolved into today's pulp fiction.

On any given day, the trio can be found in a downtown Sudbury coffee shop fuelled by caffeine and cigarettes, editing their scripts, sketching out characters and making business plans on their way to formally incorporating their company this fall. Their first series release will make its North American debut in spring 2002.

Comics have been an enduring passion for Guerin who has spent the past year growing his all-consuming writing and drawing hobby into a business involving 16-hour days filled with meetings with lawyers, accountants, advertising agents and e-commerce experts, all while learning the ins and outs of publishing on the run.

The more buttoned-down business world he is about to enter almost seems light years away from 50-cent story zines Guerin used to sell in high school with warped and twisted titles like "A Nightmare on Sesame Street."

"I never thought I'd actually like business, but since I've had to deal with it so much in the last couple of months, I've discovered I have a knack for it," says Guerin, who worked as a graphic artist and had a brief fling in College Boreal's funeral directorship program until instructors...