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Radiation Interrogation: Jim Hardison
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Location: Blogs Atomic Fallout |
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| Posted by: Jake Bell |
Friday, October 10, 2008 3:15 PM |
JM: From all aspiring writers out there, how did you break into the business? How long had you been trying?
JH: I’m just now coming to fully understand that how I broke into the business was pretty atypical and that I was just too much of a novice to realize that I was doing it wrong. I’m a complete newbie to comics, although I’ve been writing in other fields for almost a decade. Anyway, I work with someone who used to work at Dark Horse and I asked her if she might be able to get me in front of an editor there to pitch a few ideas. She set me up with Senior Editor Dave Land, who liked the Helm—which was a five page prose treatment at that point. He laughed at the tag line—what if you had a magical superpower…and it hated your guts—and felt he could sell the story internally. He pitched it to Mike Richardson, who gave it a go, and then I had to learn how to write comics. I’ll let you know if and when I think I’ve got that figured out.
JM: Man you really created the “everyman” of this demographic didn’t ya? Do you think that people may take this a little too personally when they read that first issue? More specifically do you have any friends that are no longer talking to you after issue #1? Kidding.
JH: Matt is kind of an amalgamation of a bunch of people I’ve known, with an unhealthy dose of me thrown in to top it all off. He’s basically the embodiment of all my nerdly wish fulfillment fantasies, tempered by that annoying little voice that pokes holes in all my best fantasies. So far, I haven’t met or heard from anybody who has seemed particularly offended by the characterization—or at least, no one has said anything if they are offended. My hope is that no one gets too hung up on the specifics of Matt and his situation, but that they connect with the conflict he faces between personal comfort and bigger dreams—a greater destiny. It seems to me that everyone wrestles with that struggle, regardless of their physical condition, the job they’re in or whether they live at home with their mother or not. I know that I’m frequently blocked from trying to do better and make more of myself by my desire to lay around and play video games, watch T.V. or have another slice of cake. Also, I kind of felt like I was entitled to write Matt Blurdy as I am pretty out of shape, lived at home with my parents well past when they should have rightfully kicked me out and worked at a video store for several years so I could “keep my creative options open.”
JM: Where did you draw inspiration from your book THE HELM? Is there any of you in the protagonist?
JH: I came up with the idea for the Helm several years ago when I was playing with the concept of underdog characters. I thought it would be funny to write an underdog who was so unworthy of his superpower that even the power didn’t like him. That seemed like a fun angle into an exploration of what it means to be a hero. As I mentioned before, a lot of who Matt is, his struggle, flows directly out of my own weaknesses and failings. I’m sure that any magical superpower would be gravely disappointed in me.
JM: How many books on old English grammar did you have to dig up to get all the dated language used by the Helm itself?
JH: I’ve got a file that I’ve been keeping for years of old fashioned insults and sayings—it’s part of this huge rat’s nest of half-baked ideas I’ve been collecting since high school. Of course, now most of it has been transferred into the computer, so it’s easier for me to access an appropriate slam for the Helm to spit out than ever before. Apart from the file, I tracked down some papers and internet sites on ancient Norse and Old English, and then I also had a number of discussions with my editor about how far to take the “Olde Speak” as we dubbed it. In the first draft, the Helm used a lot more thee’s and thou’s than made it into the final book.
JM: Bart Sears really is rocking on this book. Did you know him before this project? How closely do you two work together to bring each issue to life?
JH: I feel very lucky to have Bart doing my pencils. I had no idea who he was when my editor suggested him—I just really liked his art. I had thought it would be a nice ironic commentary to have a kind of Conan the Barbarian feel to the illustrations, and Bart’s stuff totally nailed that. After Dave showed me Bart’s work, I went home and Googled him and found out that he was a big name in comics. I think that if I had known who he was before hand, I would have been too intimidated to request him.
JH: I’ve never actually met Bart in person. Pretty much all of our correspondence takes place over the computer. I send script pages and he sends back sketches. He’s pretty much added to or nailed everything so well that we rarely have to go back and forth at all. He’s been a real pleasure to work with and I always look forward to opening his latest emails. Now that the fourth issue of the Helm is nearing completion, I’m starting to worry that I’ll experience Bart withdrawal symptoms.
JM: Will we see anymore of the big “hero” guy from the first issue?
JH: Hmmm. I can’t tell you.
JM: Do you have anymore upcoming projects that we can plug here?
JH: Well, I’ve got outlines for more Helm stories that I’m hoping might turn into additional mini-series if there turns out to be an audience. Apart from that, I just finished pitching some new ideas—including a vampire series I’m pretty excited about. Too early to release any details yet, but I’ll definitely keep you posted. Who knew comics writing was so fun? |
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