Draft:Madly Ever After (comic)

Madly Ever After is a graphic novel, written and illustrated by Skottie Young that was released in five parts throughout 2015 and 2016 by Image Comics, as the first volume of the American comic book series I Hate Fairyland, set in the Image Universe. Part 1 was released on October 14, 2015, Part 2 was released on November 18, 2015, Part 3 was released on December 16, 2015, Part 4 was released on January 20, 2016, and Part 5 was released on February 17, 2016.

Following Gertrude "Gert", a bitter, hard-drinking, sarcastic, murderous young woman who has spent the last twenty-seven years on a "one-day quest" through Fairyland on being transported there for the key that will allow her to go home, trapped as her unageing six-year-old self with pretty green curls and a bow, and accompanied by her equally sarcastic, top-hat-wearing housefly quest companion Larry. After the impatient Queen Cloudia decides to summon a second child, Happy, to take Gert's place, Gert must complete her quest before Happy lest she be trapped in Fairyland forever. It is followed by the story arc Fluff My Life.

Receiving a universally positive critical reception, a coloring book adaptation of the volume was released on June 1, 2016.

Part One
Meet Gert—a six-year-old girl who has been stuck in the magical world of Fairyland for thirty years, who will hack and slash her way through absolutely anything with her trusty giant battle-axe on a delightfully blood soaked journey in order to find her way back home to Earth.

Part Two
Sick of the destruction Gert has brought to Fairyland, Queen Claudia sends out an assassin, Bruud the Brutal, to dispatch the eternal child, both warriors embarking on an epic battle with their respective mighty battle-axes.

Part Three
Bending the rules of Fairyland in hopes to rid their world of Gert once and for all, Queen Cloudia summons another human child to Fairyland, named Happy.

Part Four
Finally having her face-to-face with Queen Cloudia, Gert takes on the former benevolent queen.

Part Five
Finding herself with some "super dark evil powers", Gert must face-off against the innocent Happy and battle it out for the Key back to their world.

Development
In October 2015, Young stated the concept behind the volume was developed when he was working on 2009's The Wonderful Wizard of Oz limited series at Marvel Comics, with the idea that Dorothy would eventually "be super annoyed by all these characters", with Gert being an adult stuck in a child's body being inspired by Young's experiences as a new father, the overall tale described as an "Adventure Time/Alice in Wonderland-style epic that smashes its cute little face against Tank Girl/Deadpool-esque violent madness", Young describing the story arc's conception as:

"'My initial plan with this, when I came up with this idea years ago, was it was just a 48-page little one-shot, and as I thought about it more, I actually thought, 'Oh, that 48-page one-shot is probably just the first little story in a sequence of a bunch of little tales of the girl who travels this world.' Then it occurred to be more a vignette, which was basically just a bunch of short story, pretty similar to episodic television, where every episode you jump in, you learn more about a world, you travel, and every now and then you might have an arc. As I developed it more and more, and I turned that 48-page story into a five-issue story, but now that I know that the support's out there, and the retailers and the fans are behind it, and readers are behind it, I'm kind of leaning back into what it was always intended to be, which is a really episodic book about a girl stuck in this world. It's given me a chance to tell stories of different lands that are in this world and move away a little bit from the story on rails type of arc storytelling that we do sometimes. That way, similar to the way that I designed the world, I want to tell the stories as off the cuff and whimsical as I can think. If all of a sudden, mid-issue, while I'm working on issue six or seven or eight, an idea occurs to me of where to take them next, I can do that in the next issue, whereas with something that's a little more on rails and is heading towards the plot target… This is allowing me to really be a little bit more nimble with an overall idea in mind that I'm aiming for.'"

In June 2016, Young stated that "originally I wanted to tell a story where Gert was a boy. I wanted to drop him in Fairyland and come back thirty years later, portraying him as a full grown man. That idea came from my love of Lobo and Tank Girl. The original elevator pitch was, essentially: “what if Lobo was in Wonderland?” However, as I developed that idea, the book started to veer too far away from humor and too far into brutality. The goal of I Hate Fairyland was not to tell a hyper-violent story, but to explore a world the character just sees as annoying. I turned the character in a woman and then a girl. I thought it would be funny to put a big axe into Alice's hand and have her act lead Deadpool. There’s a lot of humor to that!", considering Gert a breakout character, in having initially intended to have the story past Madly Ever After eventually move beyond just her to other characters as a semi-interconnected anthology series, before electing to keep her the focus, with where Madly Ever After was "the movie", subsequent arcs would comprise "the television series".

Reception
The first issue was released on October 14, 2015, seeing an estimated 50,300 copies and being the 42nd-best-selling issue of the month by units.