Tag: interviews

Smash Pages Q&A: M.T. Anderson on ‘Yvain: The Knight of the Lion’

M.T. Anderson has written everything from picture books to young adult novels. Anderson received the National Book Award in 2006 and he’s written contemporary stories, historical ones, fantasy and science fiction novels including Feed, The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation, and the recent Symphony for the City of the Dead: Dmitri Shostakovich and the Siege of Leningrad. His first graphic novel, Yvain: The Knight of the Lion, illustrated by Andrea Offermann, is out now from Candlewick Press.

The book is a retelling of a 12th Century epic poem by Chrétien de Troyes. Though not well known today, de Troyes is considered one of the greatest and most influential medieval writers. Anderson and Offermann made a number of striking and inspired artistic choices as far as how they approached and presented the story, which is both very much about the 12th-13th centuries, but also very contemporary in some ways.

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Kirby Q&A: Ed Piskor

The ‘X-Men: Grand Design’ and ‘Hip Hop Family Tree’ creator reflects on the work of comics legend Jack Kirby.

All this week we’re celebrating the life and influence of comics legend Jack Kirby, who would have turned 100 on Aug. 28. You can find other Kirby-related articles here.

Ed Piskor was already well known for comics like Wizzywig, Macedonia and other work, but it was Hip Hop Family Tree that really brought his work to a new audience and won him an Eisner Award. Right now Piskor is working on X-Men: Grand Design, a series from Marvel that he’s writing, drawing, coloring and lettering that launches at the end of the year. Piskor has talked about his love for Kirby in the past and we reached out to talk about his thoughts about the man and his work.

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Kirby Q&A: Mike Allred

The creator of ‘Madman’ talks about the ‘power’ of Jack Kirby’s work, the difference between Kirby’s Marvel and DC work, and his love for the Silver Surfer

All this week we’re celebrating the life and influence of comics legend Jack Kirby, who would have turned 100 on Aug. 28. Watch for more interviews and posts as the week continues.

Mike Allred is the perfect person to talk to about Jack Kirby for a number of reasons. Right now he’s drawing two books, the ongoing Silver Surfer series at Marvel and the miniseries Bug! The Adventures of Forager at DC. Both characters are Kirby creations, as was Allred’s previous project, Marvel’s FF. Allred remains perhaps best known for his own creations, though, which range from Madman to Red Rocket 7 to The Atomics to iZombie. More than simply being an immensely talented creator, Allred is one of those creators who has long acknowledged his debt to Kirby and his style, and he talked a little about what that has meant to him.

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Kirby Q&A: Tom Scioli

The artistic creator behind ‘Gødland’ and ‘The Transformers vs G.I. Joe’ discusses the influence Jack Kirby had on his art and career.

All this week we’ll celebrate the life and influence of comics legend Jack Kirby, who would have turned 100 on Aug. 28. Watch for more interviews and posts as the week continues.

Tom Scioli has established a reputation as an artist who is working in what many have described as the Kirby tradition. In work like The Myth of 8-Opus, American Barbarian, Gødland and The Transformers vs G.I. Joe, Scioli has demonstrated the clear influence of Jack Kirby on his work, but Scioli isn’t an imitator. Kirby’s sensibility and style is one of Scioli’s biggest influences, but he’s carving his own path and crafting a style that is recognizably his own from that. This month he’s been posting comics and drawings about Kirby on his Twitter feed to mark the centennial, and he spent a few minutes to talk about Kirby’s work.

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Smash Pages Q&A: Guy Delisle on ‘Hostage’

Delisle talks about the 15-year long process of making the book and its storytelling challenges.

Guy Delisle has a reputation for crafting a series of travelogue books that detail his travels and the long periods of time he’s spent in places like Myanmar (Burma Chronicles) and Israel (Jerusalem: Chronicles from the Holy City), the latter of which received the Prize for Best Album at the 2012 Angouleme International Comics Festival. He’s also the cartoonist behind the series A User’s Guide to Neglectful Parenting.

Delisle’s book Hostage is a different book for him. It tells the true story of Christophe Andre, an administrator with Médecins Sans Frontiéres (Doctors Without Borders) who was kidnapped in Chechnya in 1997 and held hostage for 111 days. Delisle takes this story and makes the situation of a single man in a room both dramatic and visually engaging, working in a different style and color palate that readers of his earlier books might have expected. Delisle spoke about the 15-year long process of making the book and its storytelling challenges.

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Smash Pages Q&A: Shannon Wheeler on ‘Sh*t My President Says’

Wheeler discusses his collection of illustrations of U.S. President Donald Trump’s tweets.

Shannon Wheeler has been drawing cartoons that are sardonic, sarcastic, political, angry but also strange and funny with its own unique viewpoint for a long time. Like many people I first got to know his work with Too Much Coffee Man. In the years since then Wheeler has drawn books like God is Disappointed in You, written by Mark Russell, and Oil and Water, written by Steve Duin. He’s also continued to work as a cartoonist contributing to The New Yorker and other publications.

In recent months though he’s been working on a strange project, illustrating Donald Trump’s tweets. The result is a book just out from Top Shelf, Sh*t My President Says. Since the book went to press, though, Wheeler hasn’t stopped. He’s already made a zine supplement and continues to post the comics on – where else – his Twitter feed. We spoke about how he approaches Donald Trump and why the project wasn’t just parody.

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Smash Pages Q&A: Joe Haldeman and Marvano

The author and artist discuss their comics adaptation of Haldeman’s ‘The Forever War’ from Titan Comics.

Joe Haldeman is a name familiar to most science fiction readers. Best known for his novel The Forever War, the book remains more than forty years after it was published, a brilliant, landmark science fiction novel. Haldeman has been named a Grand Master by the Science Fiction Writers of America, and has received numerous Hugo and Nebula Awards, in addition to the World Fantasy Award and James Tiptree Jr. Award, for his novels, novellas and short stories including The Hemingway Hoax, Forever Peace, and Camouflage.

Haldeman is also the author of three comics series, collaborations with the Belgian creator Mark van Oppen, who publishes under the name Marvano. Marvano is best known as a creator for his many historical projects like Grand Prix, Berlin, Ver van leper, and La Brigade Juive. Their first collaboration, an adaptation of Haldeman’s The Forever War, is currently being published in English as a six issue miniseries by Titan Comics and the two spoke about their work, together and separately.
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Smash Pages Q&A: Kim Newman on ‘Anno Dracula 1895: Seven Days in Mayhem’

The prose author discusses his comic book sequel to Anno Dracula, his own comics reading history and much more.

Kim Newman is a beloved and acclaimed cult writer. Comics fans may only know him for his 2015 miniseries Witchfinder: The Mysteries of Unland, but prose fans know him for his dozens of books which include Professor Moriarty – The Hound of the D’Urbervilles, The Night Mayor, and the Diogenes Club series. Perhaps his best known works are the series Anno Dracula. The 1992 novel is something of a what if – what if Dracula defeated Van Helsing. The resulting novel – and the sequels – mixed real life figures and literary characters in a way that is much more common today than it was when the novel first came out.

The new miniseries from Titan Comics, Anno Dracula 1895: Seven Days in Mayhem, is written by Newman and illustrated by Paul McCaffrey. The comic, which wraps up this week, is a direct sequel to the novel Anno Dracula – and a prequel to the second book in the series Bloody Red Baron, which takes place in World War I. Like the novels this one mixes real and fictional worlds. Newman was kind enough to talk about the miniseries, his novels, and everything from Philip Jose Farmer to possible comics crossovers he’s eager to write.

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Smash Pages Q&A: Bernie Mireault on ‘XVI’

The creator of ‘The Jam’ talks about his career, current projects and new short story collection from About Comics.

The new book XVI from About Comics collects short comics from the acclaimed creator Bernie Mireault. He has never been the most well-known or best-selling comics creator, but over the past few decades he’s been a key figure in comics.

His miniseries Mackenzie Queen wears its influences on its sleeves, and those influences are Steve Ditko and Doctor Strange and Harvey Kurtzman, European comics and manga, back in the early 1980’s when that range of influences was not as common – or as easy to find – as it is today. Mireault went onto draw Grendel: The Devil Inside and colored many other stories in Matt Wagner’s Grendel series. Mireault then created The Jam, a different kind of superhero comic, which appeared before many other reinventions of the genre appeared.

Mireault spoke about the new collection of his black and white comics, what he’s working on now and more.

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Smash Pages Q&A: Maggie Umber on ‘Sound of Snow Falling’

The co-founder of 2d Cloud discusses her latest graphic novel, her essay ‘Getting Divorced in Comics’ and more.

Maggie Umber’s most recent graphic novel Sound of Snow Falling is a wordless painted graphic novel. A beautiful and meditative look at a pair of great horned owls, it may her most recent comic, but in many respects it’s her earliest comics work and is a project that she has been thinking about and working on for many years. It is available now from 2d Cloud.

This book is Umber’s second graphic novel after 2015’s Time Capsule. She is also the co-founder of 2d Cloud and she recently stepped down as Associate Publisher – one of the many hats she wore at the publisher, events that she discusses (among other topics) in her much-discussed essay “Getting Divorced in Comics.” Umber spoke about her book, the essay, her short comic in the upcoming anthology Warmer, which comes out next month.

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Smash Pages Q&A: Cory Thomas on ‘Watch Your Head’ and more

Thomas talks about his long-running comic strip turned webcomic, his post-election editorial cartoon that went viral and his work with James Patterson on ‘Public School Hero.’

Cory Thomas remains best known for his comic Watch Your Head. First launched as a comic strip in 2006, Thomas relaunched it in 2014 as a webcomic, tweaking the story and characters, though it has remained the story of a diverse cast of characters attending Douglass University, a historically black university. He continues to update the comic occasionally, though a lot of his attention has been focused on other projects like the James Patterson book Public School Superhero.

Late last year Thomas got a lot of attention for a comic he made for Fusion titled “The Weirdness of being Black in White Spaces After the Election,” which struck a nerve with a lot of people from different backgrounds. Thomas sat down to talk about the response to that comics, the status of Watch Your Head, and what he’s working on now.

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Stephan Franck puts a stake in a third volume of his vampire heist series ‘Silver’

The animator returns to Kickstarter to fund a third volume of his graphic novel series that pits conmen versus vampires.

When he’s not helping to make animated hits like The Iron Giant and Despicable Me, Stephan Franck turns to his first love, comics. The son of two comic retailers, Franck started his own company, Dark Planet Comics, to publish Silver, a pulp-inspired heist story involving vampires.

Franck has used Kickstarter to crowd fund two volumes of the series already, and now a new campaign has launched for the third volume. I spoke with Franck about the project, the campaign and the appeal of working on comics.

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