Jack of Harts

The story of the art I used for the cover of Rebirth is literally older than the story itself. Way back in the 1990s, not long after Fort Max died in the comics, I had this story pop up in my head of Fort Max being rebuilt and fighting the Cybertronians. The story that would become The Rebirth came to me three decades ago. And it was big enough in my mind that I found an artist who did fan art of Transformers back then and paid him to draw that scene. Fort Max standing on a vanquished Cybertronian, with fortress mode and Cerebrus standing in the background. Because… why not?

I paid him, he did the drawing, and he sent it to me. The physical piece of art that I scanned this image from is hanging in my house, and I don’t even know who did it. He did it 1998 and he signed his art with an M. That’s all I can you tell you now, after three decades. I wish I could tell you who he was, because that piece of art is why I’m writing The Rebirth now. Because for three decades, I’ve walked by this piece of art and remembered the scene I imagined in my mind so long ago. The scene I still haven’t written to this day. He made the scene real and visceral, and something I’ve never given up on putting to paper.

And now I will. I don’t know how long it will take. I don’t know how many parts there will before this scene happens. But everything I’m writing leads this scene. And I hope I can do this art justice when it comes time to write it. Because it has been in my mind as I’ve walked past it for almost thirty years. It is the story I’ve never been able to fully walk away from, even as I did other things with my life. And one day it will be told. Because of this art.

They say that images speak a thousand words, and they are right. They can also speak for many decades.

And recently, for fun, I put it into Grok Imagine and asked it for a series of scenes based on the image and the story I wanted to tell. Head on over to my substack to see one of the examples that came out, and the one I thought best caught the idea of what I was going for. Fort Max standing and delivering as explosions go off behind him. It did a good job, and I liked it enough to share it all with you.

https://jackofharts.substack.com/p/the-rebirth-art