Ep 95. 82 Marvel Covers. Two Heart Surgeries. One Universe.

After 30 years at the top of entertainment, Marko Djurdjevic reached a point where nothing in client work excited him anymore. So he shifted his focus to building an entire transmedia universe, funding it out of pocket while his wife runs the outsourcing side of SIXMOREVODKA. The Kickstarter launches February 26th alongside a free playable Steam demo.

Marko is one of the most prolific cover artists Marvel has ever had. He produced 82 covers in his first year, was deliberately placed on titles close to cancellation because his art spiked sales, and ran 23 consecutive issues on Daredevil. His concept art fed the early MCU, and his studio held a seven-year exclusive partnership with Riot Games on League of Legends.

The conversation covers why client work stopped exciting him after 30 years, what The Last Unicorn at age six taught him about storytelling, how a viral X-Men redesign brought Marvel's talent scouts to his door at the exact moment he'd met his wife, and why he believes 2008 was the last great year of cinema.

Marko shares the painful lessons from Degenesis, a cult tabletop RPG that collapsed when free PDF downloads hit 3,000 per release while sales dropped to 80. That failure shaped everything about his new franchise, Orken, which spans novels, illustrated editions, graphic novels, and a video game built with Demagog Studio.

In 16 months he's produced 1,400 edited pages, over 350 original illustrations, and six books for print. He survived two heart surgeries during production. His wife thinks he's lost his mind. His son read the first novel and pitched it back as a 10-episode animated series.

This is a conversation about creative ownership, the cost of building something that's fully yours, and why the future of independent storytelling depends on small authentic communities rather than viral moments.

Timestamps:

00:00 Building a multimedia IP from scratch

01:14 Meet Marko Djurdjevic

02:35 No books at home: drawing as survival and 80s influences

04:30 Why The Last Unicorn still hits after 40 years

05:21 What's wrong with modern storytelling?

07:15 The anatomy book that changed everything at age 11

08:41 The viral X-Men redesign that brought Marvel calling

10:15 82 covers, cancelled titles, and the art of keeping deadlines

13:10 Beyond Marvel: the MCU pipeline and building a studio

15:32 Riot and League of Legends: seven years of exclusivity

19:17 2008 was peak cinema and he never went back

20:13 Orken's visual DNA: cultures the games industry ignores

23:01 Why creator-owned work dies in large teams

25:00 Degenesis: 3,000 downloads, 80 sales, and pulling the plug

27:35 How failure shaped Orken's transmedia architecture

29:11 Novels, graphic novels, illustrated editions, and a video game

30:49 The real motivation: autonomy, mastery, and running out of time

32:54 1,400 pages, two heart surgeries, and a Kickstarter

36:39 Working with his wife while betting against her instincts

42:19 The future of indie storytelling

43:55 Closing thoughts

• Orken Kickstarter (live February 26th)
• Wishlist Orken on Steam (free demo February 26th)
• SIXMOREVODKA
• Discord: https://discord.com/invite/sixmorevodka

Host: Pete Bell

Guest: Marko Djurdjevic

This podcast is produced by Purpose Made.

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