Teaming up with the ridiculously talented artistJohanna The Mad, Fence follows Nicholas Cox as he joins the world of fencing at an elite boys school and becomes embroiled in the drama of competitive sports, team romance and rivalries, and good old self-discovery.
On finding inspiration for Fence, C.S. Pacat says, “I got really into sports comics in Japan, where I lived for about five years. I love the intense rivalries, the striving, the way you can take characters to their breaking point. Haikyuu!! and Hikaru no Go are easily some of my favourite comics of all time. Fence is like my love letter to the genre.
At the same time, I’m interested in female gaze and queer gaze art. I wanted to make something that had all the drama and intensity of a sports comic, while also being joyously and unabashedly queer. I was really inspired by Ngozi Ukazu’s fantastic hockey web comic Check, Please!, and the recent Japanese animation Yuri!!! on Ice. I started to wonder, what happens when those energies come out in a combat sport—when you add in the danger and stakes of fencing?”
“Fence means the world to me,” says Johanna The Mad. “It has always been one of my biggest dreams to draw comics, but I never thought I’d be able to work on one that I’d end up fangirling about!”
“Johanna’s artwork captures everything that is hot, dangerous, and exciting about fencing,” adds Pacat.
Fence #1 hits comic shops in November, and it’ll have covers from Johanna The Mad and Kevin Wada (and maybe someone else we’ll seeee~) and colors from Rebecca Nalty.
I love the “Battle Hymn of the Republic” tune because all three songs that are sung to it are badass. It is either “avenge an abolitionist” song, a “God is destroying slaveowners,” song, or a “unions will destroy capitalism” song.
There is no bad option.
wait a minute what lyrics for that tune are about destroying capitalism?
When the union’s inspiration through the workers’ blood shall run
There can be no power greater anywhere beneath the sun
Yet what force on earth is weaker than the feeble strength of one
For the Union makes us strong
CHORUS
Solidarity forever, solidarity forever
Solidarity forever
For the Union makes us strong
Is there aught we hold in common with the greedy parasite
Who would lash us into serfdom and would crush us with his might?
Is there anything left to us but to organize and fight?
For the union makes us strong
It is we who ploughed the prairies, built the cities where they trade
Dug the mines and built the workshops, endless miles of railroad laid
Now we stand outcast and starving ‘mid the wonders we have made
But the union makes us strong
CHORUS
All the world that’s owned by idle drones is ours and ours alone
We have laid the wide foundations, built it skyward stone by stone
It is ours, not to slave in, but to master and to own
While the union makes us strong
CHORUS
They have taken untold millions that they never toiled to earn
But without our brain and muscle not a single wheel can turn
We can break their haughty power gain our freedom when we learn
That the Union makes us strong
CHORUS
In our hands is placed a power greater than their hoarded gold
Greater than the might of armies magnified a thousandfold
We can bring to birth a new world from the ashes of the old
For the Union makes us strong
CHORUS
Can you link a video of that verse, I wanna see it performed
Tsarina Jissa's Tumblr 