 |
 |
|
||||
 |
|
|||||
 |
|
        |
|
 |
|
|
 |
 |
|
||||
 |
|
|||||
|
|
|||||
 |
|
|||||
 |
 |
 |
|
|||
 |
|
|||||
|
|
|||||
|
||||||
|
|
|
FLIGHT 3: Kazu & Kean Introduction
You mention going edgier with your story and I admit I was blown away, it's a strong story but the tone just wasn't what I was expecting. Your past stories have had an emphasis on the seasons and a feeling of encroaching change or growth. Do you feel your work reflects this artistically? That you also place on an emphasis on consciously changing, growing, experimenting? Oh definitely. I've always been naturally drawn to work that emphasizes growth and change, and the changing of seasons provides a great backdrop for these kinds of stories. Much of it is drawn from the films of Akira Kurosawa, most notably his film Dreams. Whenever I think of how I want to present a story aesthetically, I almost always think of that film. I viewed the movie at three very different stages in my life, and my reactions to it were so varied they made me realize how much I had changed. My favourite works of art tend to be mirrors that reflect our lives, and whether or not it was intentional, Dreams had a profound effect on the way I viewed myself. I can only imagine that this is also what the changing seasons do to an individual, as I've never actually lived anywhere the seasons changed. I guess that can have an adverse affect on someone, it's interesting that you chose one of Kurasawa's most personal films as your favourite. Many people seemed to not understand it as it wasn't particularly straightforward. Do you try to create the same sense of openness in your stories, letting the reader's imagination decipher the piece rather then laying it out for them? Hmm, I may still be too young and naive to effectively pull that off without seeming pretentious. I think that with Dreams, the stories are open-ended for the audience, but certainly not for the creator.
With works like DAISY and COPPER, their design has more of a simplicity or sense of cuteness but with your FLIGHT story featuring two grown men and having to capture expressions of panic and shock, was it a challenge to work with subjects with more character in their physical appearance? No, not at all. Before I began Copper, I hardly did any work that could be considered all-ages. As far as my taste in storytelling goes, I generally prefer reading material like "The Iron Gate". As a creator, I just enjoy the challenges presented by different types of storytelling. With Copper, I was challenging myself to make children's material that wasn't too saccharine or condescending, and with Daisy I wanted to create a genre piece that transcended the category. With "The Iron Gate", I wanted to create a short story that had the power of a good war movie. These days everyone seems to be getting a book deal so tell us how having an agent helped further the reach of FLIGHT as well as your own work. We're still at the early stages of all this, but so far my agent Judy Hansen has been instrumental in helping us establish a great foundation upon which to build. Agents generally don't make the opportunities happen so much as help you navigate the territory once the interest in the material is there. Without Judy, I would have had book deals, but they wouldn't be very good deals. She made it so that we were protected from poor contracts, given much bigger advances, and she guides the project even beyond completion by following up with publishers to make sure they're on the ball. In short, Judy has been like a guardian angel. In fact, I just see her as my third mom now (the first being my own, and the second being Amy's).
Well, my fondest wish is to see the people that are already here return to the plate. I want to see them get better and better within this book, and not have to look for new talent. I love this team already, so I don't make an active effort to seek out new people. However, when someone with talent and the right sensibility strolls along, we definitely extend an invitation. This whole process actually happens very naturally and organically. What the current schedule for FLIGHT? One volume per year? Six months, eight months, etc? It is currently being published at a yearly schedule. You've some experience with writing screenplays and a lot of the FLIGHT creators lend themselves well to animation in their artistic styles. Do you see film as a next step for your work? Even the collective/collaborative nature of the FLIGHT crew reminds me of other such groups as PIXAR. When I was in high school, I was pretty determined to become a filmmaker, but somewhere along the line I realized that without good storytelling, there would be no good films. And if there were no good films, there could still be good storytelling. That's when I saw that comics -something I had always done throughout my life- afforded me a great way to develop storytelling skills without taking on the kinds of risks a film would entail. I wouldn't rule out eventually being involved in film, but for now, I think I would rather focus on my comics and let the film people deal with the films. What was the inspiration for AMULET? It seems to have elements of Alice In Wonderland, Labyrinth and Disney all mixed together? Simply put, it's the comic book that I wished I had as a kid. I wanted to create something that would have made me sprint like crazy to the book fair before all the copies were sold out! Heheh. Seriously though, one of my career goals has been to create some of the greatest fantasy graphic novels ever made. Daisy Kutter was my warm up session, to see if I could do it, and Amulet is theory in practice.
As for the style of the piece, aside from the obvious love for Miyazaki, I have been very influenced by the work of Steven Spielberg, most notably E.T. and Jaws. Another major recent influence has been H.G. Wells's The Time Machine. I read an old printing of it (from 1912), in a small book format, and it felt like reading an exhilarating graphic novel since it was so short. It reminded me of the potential of powerful short form narrative, and bolstered my confidence in trying to create something that was short in length but epic in scope. AMULET is the largest single volume piece you've taken on and your approach to the story has changed somewhat as you work on it, at its very core though what do you want to say about your characters personal journeys? I am hoping that children and parents alike will be able to read this story and see their own relationship with each other. The idea being presented is that adults are simply older children, and that children are simply small adults. If the two can understand each other, they can begin working together. In the books, I want to chronicle the growth cycle of one family by following Emily and Navin's journey into adulthood. Do you feel there's a drive to tell more all ages tales? Not just in your work but in general, there appears to be a great desire to create something that will appeal to a younger reader. In light of the themes in Amulet, without younger readers, we can't have older readers. If we only cater to the people sitting in the middle -who often have no desire to have children- then who will pass these books down to the younger generations? If comics want to grow, then they'll have to reflect human growth as well.
I actually have no problems with formulas. They can even be very helpful. The condescending aspect of the storytelling comes when there is an obvious disconnect between the author and a young reader. I don't feel the Harry Potter books fall prey to this very often, since I can tell that J.K. Rowling does genuinely care for her young readers, and wants to teach them about life while talking to them on the level. When I create a story, I usually think about that one cynical kid in the back of the classroom, who usually has a vicious distaste for anything that isn't genuine, and I write for him. Luckily, when I was a kid, that was me. For more Kazu visit Boltcity.com.  Kean Soo
Working on something like JELLABY that's an all ages story, what pushes you to fashion these pure fun loving characters? Does it help to keep that younger audience sensibility when you're surrounded by other creators working in the similar vein? Really? I don't see them as fun-loving characters, more of the opposite, really. In my mind, I see Portia and Jason as those two weird kids in class that kept to themselves and never really talked to anyone very much. JELLABY so far has been more my rumination on childhood and growing up, and these two characters have been an opportunity for me to dig around and reflect on that period of my life, because children can be just as alienated as adults are, sometimes even more so. I do think the fact that they can have fun is also because of the fact that they're children, and all that weighty stuff can just roll off of their backs in the moment, like it sometimes does. Childhood is filled with all kinds of contradictions like that. I've been making it a point not to think too consciously about the fact that I'm writing for a younger audience, or writing the characters as 'kids', because then you can fall into the trap of talking down to your audience, which was the biggest turn-off for me whenever I was reading anything when I was younger. I loved Ronald Dahl's books for that very reason, because he treated the reader as an equal, and that's something that I've been very aware of as I work on JELLABY. Besides, it's not like I've ever really moved out of my adolescent phase anyway, so I suppose it's easy to treat a younger audience as equals... However, it has been interesting hanging out with the Flight crew, because they can bring my attention to things I might not even think about. Chris Appelhans once mentioned to me in an off-hand sort of way that children often play differently than adults do, because of how their brains aren't necessarily weighed down by the logic of the working world. That was something that really stuck with me as I've been working on JELLABY, so I suppose it really does help in a subconscious sort of way, being surrounded by like-minded people.
Yeah, I think children definitely have a stronger sense of curiosity about things, and less of an awareness of the right and wrong of them. I suppose as we get older, we look at this kind of trait as being 'adventurous', but I think that kids don't really see themselves as being that when they're in the moment. At least, I like to think that I was that way when I was at that age. I look back at my own childhood and realize that I did a lot of crazy things, and I was a pretty bookish lad to begin with. You and I both have heard a lot of different opinions about all-ages material, like 'kids don't want to read about kids in school', but I think the wide range of opinions is influenced by a greater diversity of children and their tastes when, quite frankly, they like what they want and they'll find what they like. Being awesome helps. Definitely. Using broad generalizations like 'kids don't want to read about kids in school' would preclude you from a whole wealth of possibilities -- like Harry Potter, for instance -- I don't think there's any 'right' way to tell a story, let alone knowing how to 'manufacture' a story that people of all ages will genuinely like (aside from just telling really good stories). I mean, something like Iron Wok Jan seems like it's built specifically for a niche audience, but I would be willing to put good money on the fact that there are kids out there that are just loving that series. What do your duties entail in regards to helping create and edit FLIGHT? It's mostly just a supporting role. Kazu's typically the guy that takes on the brunt of the production work, but I'm usually there to help pick up the slack on anything else that needs doing, whether it's flatting colours (particularly for Rodolphe's stories from FLIGHT 2 and 3), or helping people with rewrites (I had worked closely with Joana Carneiro for her story in FLIGHT 2, helping to clean up her dialogue and narration), I just work to fill in the gaps where ever it's needed.
As to your recent book deal, how did you hook up with your literary agent? Did they scout you or did you seek out representation? I was the one that sought out representation, but I actually did it completely ass-backwards. When I was first contacted by a publisher with interest in JELLABY, I didn't have any kind of agent or representation at the time. After talking to Kazu about it, he had recommended that I get in touch with Judy Hansen, FLIGHT's agent (as well as Kazu's), who had just brokered our move from Image to Ballantine. We had met in Los Angeles right after the previous San Diego Comic-Con, and after seeing my work, she agreed to represent me in negotiations, and the rest is history, as they say. Will the JELLABY book begin anew from scratch or will the book take off from the webcomic? The first JELLABY book will include the material from the webcomic and continue on where the web content ends. I've always had the full story swirling around in my head ever since I started posting material to the web. I should note that one of my goals in the coming months will be to reboot the Secret Friend Society website to better reflect where Hope and I are now with SALAMANDER DREAM and JELLABY, seeing as Hope has since had her book published, and JELLABY is well on its way to seeing print. I'm still planning to post some new JELLABY stories to the site in the coming months though, so hopefully the SFS site will still be around in some shape or form for the next couple of years.
Haha, I would love to do a JELLABY cookbook. I definitely think my bizarre interests and odd personality quirks are slowly starting to filter into the characters themselves, but actually doing stuff that's outside the confines of the graphic novels is probably the farthest thing from my mind right now. I would love to slip stuff like that into the graphic novels, but I don't think there's much room for that as it stands at the moment. I really want to focus on putting together the best story I possibly can right now, and then maybe I can think about all that other fun stuff afterwards. The Jellaby BLT. Oh man. My favourite variation on the classic BLT is to throw a fried egg into the mix, so that when you're cutting the sandwich, the egg yolk will break and the goopy mess is soaked back up into the sandwich. It's really damn good. Messy, but good. So exactly how much of JELLABY was inspired by HELLBOY anyway? Very little, actually. I've always been fascinated by Mignola's page layouts and pacing more than anything else, and while I can't deny that that's been an influence on me, it's just one of the many things that has shaped my 'style' for JELLABY. When do stuff for yourself do you break out of your artistic style or do you find you fit whatever your drawing into your personal view? It's probably more of the former rather than the latter. I really enjoy messing around in different art styles and trying new techniques on the off-chance that I'll actually be able to learn something new that I can apply back to my comics. My problem is that I'm still at a very elementary stage of learning how to make 'real art' -- I'm slowly trying to teach myself how to use watercolours, and it can be difficult at times, and I do sometimes fall back on what feels safe and comfortable, which frustrates me a lot. For me, I'm more interested in growing and expanding my personal view to include a wider palette, rather than just focusing in on one particular style or only one way of telling a story. To be honest, I just enjoy learning and trying new things. I really do feel like I'm constantly doing that whenever I'm making comics and art, and I hope that doesn't ever stop. What's your work process like now that the JELLABY book has become a fulltime gig for the foreseeable future?
Sanity is overrated. Now Insanity, that shit is the bees knees yo. Well, you'd definitely need to be a little less than sane to actually want to start drawing comics for a living. For More On Kean visit Keaner.net. Introduction
 Interviews Conducted by Co-Editor in Chief, Jonathan Ellis. E-mail Us To Comment On This Article.  PopImage Forum - Discuss this message at the PopImage forum. E-Mail Us - E-Mail Us To Comment On This Article. Flight Comics.com PopImage FLIGHT 2 Interviews Industrial Archive - Read past Industrial articles |
