Cos Ryan (born 1985 - exact date is hidden by Ryan himself) co-writes and illustrates the webcomic The Fallen with co-writer Elliott Malone. He was born in the village of Wordsley, but grew up in the town of Failsworth, Manchester, in the north of England. He attended Trinity C.E. High School and Loreto College in Manchester before moving to Worcester to read a degree in Psychology and English and Literary Studies but dropped out in his second year before completing the degree. He currently still lives in Worcester, along with fiancee Terhi Manninen. The Fallen In early 2009, Ryan announced on his Facebook page that he was to begin a new comic endeavour, with the only information being that it was to a collaboration project, based in an alternative 2009, and that it was called The Fallen. Information other than this has been kept very close to the chest. In June 2009, Ryan announced that he was to be collaborating with long time friend and former classmate Elliott Malone. Ryan had previously been involved inpost-apocalyptic fiction writing with Malone, and about his collaboration he stated that, "When I first came up with the idea of creating a comic strip based in a post-apocalyptic world, the first thing that came to mind was my collaboration with Elliott , each of us writing chapters of a story set after the zombie apocalypse. I knew that whilst I could make up the characters and the settings, I needed someone with such depth of character writing and storyline envisioning in order to make this new world of mine thoroughly immersive and believable, and there's no one I know who's better at that than Elliott." At the present time, there is no launch date for the comic, though a number of teasers are planned to be released in the run up to it in order to publicise the strip. Ryan has also mentioned that he intends to release a soundtrack album to accompany the comic. Comics History TraGic TraGic was Ryan's first major webcomic, and one he considers to be a success. The strip was in a three-panel, one-off format, starring two main characters, Jonathan Cooper and Eric Benton, whom Ryan has said were different sides of himself. The comic was an outlet for the writer's annoyances with the British music industry, with The Fray, The Magic Numbers and James Blunt being some of the many artists lampooned in the comic. On the 1st November, 2007, after a period of six months without an update on the TraGic site, Ryan published his final TraGic comic, with an announcement regarding his new comic, Dead Ends. Cos said in an interview with radio DJ Tom Campbell that TraGic was poorly written, poorly drawn, but a great "learning exercise." The day that TraGic ended, Dead Ends began. Dead Ends Dead Ends was Ryan's second major dalliance into webcomics. After the aftermath of TraGic, Ryan stated on his blog a desire to produce a more structured comic, one with a cohesive storyline and more geared toward slice-of-life styled writing. Dead Ends was intended to be set out like a sitcom in webcomic format. Instead of TraGic's three panel, stand alone strips, Dead Ends was designed to run for a series of 100 strips, with a much more realistic, fluid storyline. Like TraGic, Dead Ends was fraught with problems such as timekeeping and gaps in the storyline. Ryan blamed his prescribed depression medication among the main reasons for these problems. The Dead Ends website is still online, though there have been no comic strips since November 2008, . Ryan has said that he intends to finish the series in the future, but at the moment is concentrating on The Fallen. Other Artistic Endeavours Other than webcomics, Ryan enjoys many other creative endeavours, including fiction writing, abstract art and photography. He maintains a profile on the deviantART website, where he showcases all his non-comic work. In addition, Ryan is an avid blogger and uses his blog to rant about his annoyances and work, often giving an insight into his thoughts on his comics. Since March 2009 Ryan has been a user on Twitter, and tweets there daily. He set up his review blog Do Not Read This, where he blogs reviews on films, albums and television shows, as well as his usual ranting style. Cos and Tom DO A PODCAST Cos and Tom DO A PODCAST is a collaborative podcast with Cos Ryan and Tom Campbell, in which the two discuss topics pulled out of a hat, review films that have never been made and discuss various subjects of interest. The podcast produced two episodes before becoming dormant, only to be re-released with two more brand new episodes. The podcast has not updated since December 2008. The project has been left dormant due to work commitments by both Campbell and Ryan, but has been left open for the two of them to record again at a later date. Both parties have expressed an interest to get back to podcasting. Music Cos Ryan has been a guitarist and songwriter for over eight years, and has occasionally recorded music and songs under the pseudonym of TMDT. He revealed in his blog that he was planning to record a score for his newest online graphic novel The Fallen, which would be made available on the website for free.
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