Are you ready for a state-of-the-art surf comic? Hiroshi Mori brings us "Island Kingdom: Surf or Die," and incredible surf survival story, in which our heroes have to surf for their lives.
The plot is intense, dark, and truly original, and it was conceived by Hiroshi Mori, a Japanese-American computer graphics previsualization artist who lives in Los Angeles. He is one of the member of Ashfire Moon, an artistic collective dedicated to portraying lost civilizations, time travel, and alien planets.
"'Island Kingdom' is inspired from growing up in Honolulu and combining Hawaii's surf culture with the movies, TV and comic books I grew up with, such as 'Mad Max: Road Warrior,' 'The Yagyu Conspiracy,' 'Escape From New York,' and 'Conan the Barbarian' just to name a few," Hiroshi Mori told SurferToday.
"'Island Kingdom: Surf or Die' (Part 1) is a scene from what's planned to be a graphic novel-length epic story. I've been wanting to create a comic book for a long time, and I finally took a stab at it and came up with "Surf or Die.'"
Mori, 50, has already worked on several Hollywood movies, including "Mad Max: Fury Road," "Avengers," "Men In Black 3," "Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith," "Surf's Up," and many other feature films.
He started bodyboarding in Oahu, Honolulu when he was a young grom. Hiroshi Mori still remembers when he went out at Sandy Beach, Makapuu, and Diamond Head.
"It was the 1980s bodyboarding heydays. It was so cool to see Jack 'The Ripper' Lindholm at Sandys all the time. I took up stand up surfing when I was in my late 20s. I'm not a good surfer or anything, but I still get out once in a while. When I get back to Hawaii, on a decent summer swell, my favorite waves is Waikiki on a decent summer swell," adds Mori.
"Surf or Die," whose second part will be unveiled here by Summer 2017, was originally designed for the Scrollon digital storytelling format created by Doug Lefler.
