Written by Ioan Morris and illustrated by Josh Hicks, Orig: The Fearless Life Of Orig Williams tells the wild and adventurous story of Wales’ first professional wrestling icon. The book is part of Broga Books’ poplar series Welsh Wonders, which narrates inspirational Welsh lives in picture book format, highlighting the talent on Welsh doorsteps. Orig is a story made for children who love rough-and-tumble play.

Morris and Hicks are Cardiff-based wrestling fans and cartoonists who started working together after bonding over their similar interests at the pub. Years later, they attended many wrestling shows and comic fairs.

Having created a wrestling comic previously, Hicks was approached by Broga Books’ editor to work on Orig. Morris joined the team to take on the writing side of things and worked with editor Huw to mould a story that is truthful yet interesting for children. The book is curated for children to tell a mild but historically relevant story with a structure that reads like fiction.

Hicks’ colourful and bouncy cartoonist style perfectly complements the children’s book genre. Hicks explains that he “tried to capture Orig’s presence in a way that would be appealing to children”. He wanted to subvert the convention of 1970s and 1980s wrestling graphics that are shot from high angels, making the images look like a sporting event, and capture the movement and emotion of his figures so they look as if they are involved in “life or death action”.

To create these action-packed, fun illustrations, Hicks took influence from sports manga and comics. His wrestling scenes are drawn in a larger-than-life way to engage child readers. Hicks says that working with picture books challenged “a different skill set in terms of composition” as it involves working with big images as opposed to comic panels. That said, he enjoyed the challenge and hopes to work on more children’s picture books in future.

A passionate storyteller, Morris says of the writing process: “It ended up being a fun challenge. To convey the information and the sense of a person’s character with a restricted word count, limits on the vocabulary, and so on, was almost a puzzle to solve, and I found that satisfying. It’s definitely something I’d consider doing again.” 

Who was Orig? Orig was a competitive child who loved to fight. His sporting flair led to being a professional footballer, but his love of fighting meant red cards, injury, and an early end to his footballing career. He turned his fighting instincts to good use by becoming a professional wrestler, and toured the world as El Bandito, before returning to Wales to found Reslo, an S4C wrestling show unique in the UK at the time.

As wrestling fans flood the streets of Cardiff for Clash At The Castle this Saturday, there will be a stall on St Mary Street celebrating and promoting the publication of Orig.

Josh Hicks and Tinkerbot Games’ Bevan Clatworthy’s Kickstarter campaign for Glorious Wrestling Alliance: Ultrabrawl, “a fast-and-frantic pro wrestling card game, based on the comics of the same name” is also currently live. Info: here.

Orig: The Fearless Life Of Orig Williams, Josh Hicks and Ioan Morris (Llyfrau Broga Books)

Price: £5.99. Info: here

words EVE DAVIES