V.elka

The Job

Currently, I’m offering a few hundred dollars for an initial development phase: sketches, concept art, and your time to make sure we’re creatively aligned.

Once we’re on the same page, I’m prepared to pay professional rates for a high-quality, fully colored, 9-page sample sequence. This will serve as the foundation for a pitch packet, representing the final vision of the graphic novel. This process will be collaborative: I want your input on direction, style, and execution. However, at this stage, I will retain full ownership and rights to all materials created. That said, I believe in respecting artists and ensuring your contributions are properly acknowledged.

Looking ahead, I’m open to extended collaboration. There are many paths to publication, and if we work well together and you believe in V.elka as much as I do, I’d be happy to discuss deeper involvement, co-ownership, and long-term creative partnership. If this project remains a one-time collaboration, I want to part ways professionally, with your work respected and credited.

Note: This is a self-funded passion project. I’m committed to respecting your time, skill, and creative boundaries and I ask the same consideration in return. My goal is a fair, transparent, and professional working relationship from day one.

The Premise

V.elka is a character-driven graphic novel concept set in a world manipulated by AI-molded propaganda. It features in-depth sci-fi elements that coorelate with character development, and a layered world based on history and the present.

The narrative begins following Liora Falk, a gifted student introduced in the aftermath of a horrific tragedy. From that tragedy, Liora rebuilds and empowers herself through martial arts and the eerie heroism Velka (the fictional nation) embodies. Aware of itself, the narrative leans into the clichés of the genre and utilizes the uncanny (think Freud) to develop familiarity with key superhero tropes and direction.

However, V.elka is not a archetypal hero narrative. The narrative plays off of the expectations and genre tropes thoroughly established to deconstruct conventions and to create something bold and new.

Meet the Protagonist

Liora Falk is introduced in the immediate aftermath of a horrific assault. Instead of emphasizing the assault and tragedy, the narrative emphasizes her recovery and begins to weave a familiar tale of empowerment. However, her strive to recovery is grounded in a persistent undercurrent of violence and power seeking. She is an exploration into the idea: what happens when vengeance and heroism are taken to their logical extreme?

This is what makes Liora such a captivating subject for the first issues of V.elka. She is a character grounded in the right reasons and capable of achieving the right outcomes. However, tiny decisions and tiny influences from her environment mold her into something unexpected and gruesome.

Liora is also a critique of the modern female superhero archetype. Too often, today’s heroines discard feminine complexity in favor of simply inheriting male-coded traits: aggression, stoicism, violence, stripped of nuance. Rather than redefining strength, they are repackaged male heroes with a different face. In this light, Liora is satire and an intentional challenge to the performative, faux-feminine hero.

The Sci-fi of V.elka

The world of Velka is grounded and follows my '+1' rule. It starts with a foundation of the present and considers: What if there was one major advancement that had trickle-down effects? 

With this rule, the world is a familiar dystopia. Propaganda is realistic and familiar, because we employ it today. Battlefields are grounded, unless they are exploited for war profiteering and propaganda creation. Finally, the largest suspension of disbeliefs are grounded the most solidly in character.

The technology in V.elka doesn't exist in isolation. Instead, it is a consistent reflection of character personalities, philosophies of governance, and virtue or vice.

This is what make Velka, the titular nation of V.elka, so captivating. It is a combination of traits from American and Russian life, a commentary on the dangerous of hero worship and glorification of violence, and a representation of the horrors we could be brewing at this very moment.

Inspirations and Associations

Each of the primary 3 protagonists (Liora Falk being the first) are original creations; they are not rebranded version of current characters. However, the world they inhabit is layered with deliberate allusions, inspirations, and cultural echoes.

Take Uncle Nikolai (pictured left), Velka’s carefully curated face of power. He is my reimagining of Orwell’s Big Brother: a kind-faced dictator who governs through image, AI-driven media, and relentless narrative control. His power rests on hero worship, language distortion, and the repackaging of cruelty as “kindness through strength.” His name itself nods to Tsar Nicholas I, the paranoid, autocratic founder of Russia’s secret police; the original KGB (then known as the Third Section).

Visually, Velka’s identity (its orange, black, and white aesthetic) draws inspiration from the oppressive tones of Half-Life 2. The world’s sci-fi roots tap into the layered, conspiratorial energy of Metal Gear Solid, Half-Life, and other works.

Tonally, V.elka lives in the bleak, grounded spaces of Children of Men, while its character complexity draws from films like There Will Be Blood. Some scenes (especially in the first issue/episode) push the narrative into violent horror; violence plays a key role thematically.

Martial Arts

Martial arts in V.elka are more than action. Movement is the language of character, power, and propaganda. In Velka, combat is spectacle, weaponized by the state much like Rome’s gladiators, America’s obsession with football and MMA, or Russia’s manipulation of masculinity through military imagery. Heroism itself is reduced to a tool that is designed to exploit insecurities and shape identity.

Despite these negative uses, I want to narratively honor martial arts as both tradition and storytelling device. Each fighting style reflects the character’s psychology, history, and flaws. From Muay Thai, boxing, wrestling, and Jiu-Jitsu, to Karate, parkour, drunken boxing, and Jeet Kune Do, every technique functions as an extension of the person wielding it.

For example, Liora Falk fights with aggression and dominance, mirroring Mike Tyson’s peekaboo boxing style. Her approach is brutal, shaped by internalized weakness and a need to control. He strength is compounded by Velka’s bio-engineered technology, which she uses to override her physical limitations. She fights to dominate because the world dominated her. Reference: Link 1; Link 2.

Angeline Quinn, by contrast, embodies fluidity and redirection. Her style draws from drunken boxing, Jeet Kune Do, and freerunning. Through constant movement and unpredictability, she disarms opponents without reliance on brute force. Reference: Link 1, Link 2.

In V.elka, fighting is not empty spectacle. Instead, it’s an extension of character, philosophy, and consequence. Every fight carries real stakes, often with lasting, mortal outcomes. It is both a utilization combat for entertainment and spectacle, but also for thematic weight and serious meaning.