Comic Book Herald

This week on Creannotators, I talk Wake: The Hidden History of Women-Led Slave Revolts with writer and historian Dr. Rebecca Hall. We talk about what it means to live in the wake of slavery, the process of converting historical research to a graphic novel, and much more.

On Comic Book Herald’s ‘Creannotators’ I’ll be interviewing some of my favorite creators in comics about specific runs, graphic novels or series, looking for their insights on the inspirations behind the work and ideas or hidden material readers may have missed. Creannotators is an audio annotative guide to enjoying the intricacies and thinking in the art. Thanks for listening, and enjoy the comics!

Learn more at: https://rebhallphd.org/

Wake: The Hidden History of Women-Led Slave Revolts Is:

Writer: Dr. Rebecca Hall

Artist: Hugo Martinez

Publisher: Simon and Schuster

Selected portions of our conversation follow, and have been edited for clarity. 

CBH: Early in Wake, there’s a visual of you in in present day New York mirrored against the colonial years essentially, in the puddles in the streets. As your first time scripting a comic, or graphic novel of this length, you know, can you talk about how you collaborated on visuals and depicting these scenes with illustrator Hugo Martinez, what was that process?

Dr. Rebecca Hall: You know, I had only ever written and published in academia before. So I’m, even though I read graphic novels and love the medium, writing for a visual medium was not something I’ve ever done before. And when I tried to find resources that could teach me how to do it, you know, like, that’s kind of my approach, like find 20 books and read them. There really is very little out there on writing for this medium if you’re not the artist as well, so the process of collaborating with an artist, we ended up having to wing it really. And it was also, you know, Hugo’s first big project. I mean, I think he had done some web comics before. So it was really kind of a learning curve for all of us.

I got an appreciation for how much work each page was, you know, each page had multiple storyboards, multiple pencils. You know, some are harder than others. It’s not like a normal thing to turn your dissertation into a graphic novel. And so some of these concepts were pretty hard to figure out how to convey visually. So some were harder than others, but all of it was a lot of work.

CBH: How did you know then that comics were the right medium for this story?

Dr. Rebecca Hall: I’ve always been a fan of the genre and how powerful it can be. You know, particularly for me, two books that really resonate with me art is Art Spiegelman’s Maus, and then the graphic novel Persepolis as well. Because the documents, the primary sources on this topic were so fragmentary, it’s a little hard to just sort of, you know, kind of write it as a book. There needed to be a way to juxtapose the past and the present in order to tell the story.

CBH: That makes a lot of sense. No, it definitely works as a graphic novel. I was curious, because I think we don’t often see historical excavation, I think in comics, and this is a very personal story in many ways. When did you know, you wanted to incorporate as much of yourself in the work sort of illustrating the historical process?

Dr. Rebecca Hall: So the research that I’m describing, that research process that’s described in Wake, occurred almost 18 years ago, when I was doing my dissertation, and then I published a couple, like, scholarly articles on the topic. So the historical research had been complete, long before I thought to create a graphic novel. I had no idea that my story was going to be, but when I sat down to create the graphic novel, I didn’t realize that my story was going to be as prominent as it was. It became clear right away that I needed myself as a narrator in order to deal with sort of the fragmentary nature of the primary sources. And as I was writing that, I realized the people needed to understand what my investment in this was. What’s the heart of the story? What like, drew me to this work? And also, I wanted people to understand what the historical research process was like, and the obstacles that I faced. But you know, it’s kind of one of those things where you plan to write run one thing, and then you end up writing something, maybe completely, not what you were expecting, right?

 Check out the audio podcast for the full interview!

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Music for Best Comics Ever by Anthony Weis. Check out more music at anthonyweis.com.

Subscribe on iTunes

To learn how you can support Best Comics Ever and receive more exclusive content from Comic Book Herald, check out the Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/comicbookherald

For the Comic Book Herald reading club through every year of Marvel Comics, check out mymarvelousyear.com

The post Creannotators #54: “Wake: The Hidden History of Women-Led Slave Revolts” with Dr. Rebecca Hall appeared first on Comic Book Herald.

Marvel comics of 1991. The Muir Island Saga, and the relaunched X-Men and X-Factor!

On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):

Up Next: My Marvelous Year – 1991 Pt. 7

You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:——————————————————————————————————————

The Complete Marvel reading order

mymarvelousyear.com

Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.

Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Spotify, Pod Feed

If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!

The post 1991 Pt. 6: X-Men vs Shadow King! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.

Zack & Dave continue their coverage of the Ultimate Marvel line of comics!

Topics discussed include:

* Are we starting to feel the effects of the 10+ year Bendis run of USM?

Comics covered in this episode:

-Ultimate Spider-Man #78-85

Up Next for Episode Fifteen (02/01/21):

-Ultimate Spider-Man #86-96

You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:

mymarvelousyear.com

https://www.comicbookherald.com/the-complete-marvel-reading-order-guide/ultimate-marvel-universe-reading-order/

Music for My Ultimate Year is credited to By Divine Right. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.

Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play

If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review to help us reach more readers & listeners!

The post MUY #14: Spidey & the X-Men! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.

This week on Creannotators, I talk with the I Walk With Monsters creative team about one of our favorite comics of 2021! We talk monster design, writing deeply personal horror metaphors, Sally & Dearbhla’s upcoming horror work with Peter Milligan, and much more!

On Comic Book Herald’s ‘Creannotators’ I’ll be interviewing some of my favorite creators in comics about specific runs, graphic novels or series, looking for their insights on the inspirations behind the work and ideas or hidden material readers may have missed. Creannotators is an audio annotative guide to enjoying the intricacies and thinking in the art. Thanks for listening, and enjoy the comics!

I Walk With Monsters Is:

Writer: Paul Cornell

Artist: Sally Cantirino

Colors: Dearbhla Kelly

Editor: Adrian Wassel

Publisher: Vault Comics

Selected portions of our conversation follow, and have been edited for clarity. 

CBH: Let’s start with you, Sally. One of the things that definitely hooked me first, with I walk with monsters was the monster design. It is not a traditional monster horror comic necessarily, and we’ll talk about that. But how do you determine the visuals for the designs of these monsters because they were very, very appealing and they very much pull you in?

Sally Cantirino: Paul was very clear from the beginning that we weren’t drawing a traditional like werewolf. It’s not a werewolf. It doesn’t have that cultural baggage that comes with werewolf stories. It’s more of a shapeshifter it the monster is what David needs it to be and then later on, there has to be a similar but different monster.

So I wanted to create something that had this staticky feel to it. Like the way that um, the way that the light looks at dusk or dawn, when your eyes are adjusting and things are sort of fuzzy, and staticky. Or, like it’s a blur in the corner of your vision. I wanted it to have this texture.

CBH: Dearbhla there’s a looseness to the coloring of the monsters that I think helps them it makes them feel somewhat unknowable, which is always scarier. It’s like it could transform at any moment. How do you determine kind of your your palette and like your approach for these transformations, which again, like the book is very, it’s very non monster based. It’s very human centered and character focused. But then when you get these moments to explore and explode with color, like what’s what’s your approach there?

Dearbhla Kelly: The monsters are this kind of big empty space in reality nearly so I kind of went for this very one color approach. I actually wanted to do something that’s extra where the colors bleed out from the edge of the monster and just kind of feel like the lights being sucked into them you know, like they’re pulling your eye to this darkness. This big kind of like, black holes, kind of monster.

CBH: Paul, as far as this story goes, it’s, there’s clearly a very personal element to it. But then your writing is very understated throughout, what was the relationship like, with you in the creative team here in terms of working together to make sure that like, the story has clarity, even with less dialogue, with less exposition with those sorts of things? How was that process for you?

Paul Cornell: Well, it’s been one of the best creative partnerships I’ve ever been involved with. With this amazing team. When one is writing something so very personal, it’s actually just the best possible luck to find people who can add so much to the material. And who seemed to have an implicit understanding of the material. So many times I find myself taking dialogue out because Sally could do it with the acting. And one of the reasons the book is so stripped down, is because the acting is so great.

Check out the audio podcast for the full interview!

——————————————————————————————————-

Music for Best Comics Ever by Anthony Weis. Check out more music at anthonyweis.com.

Subscribe on iTunes

To learn how you can support Best Comics Ever and receive more exclusive content from Comic Book Herald, check out the Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/comicbookherald

For the Comic Book Herald reading club through every year of Marvel Comics, check out mymarvelousyear.com

The post Creannotators #53: “I Walk With Monsters” w/ Paul Cornell, Sally Cantirino, & Dearbhla Kelly appeared first on Comic Book Herald.

Marvel comics of 1991. Jim Starlin & Ron Lim’s Silver Surfer setting up… The Infinity Gauntlet!!!

Our guest today is Matt Draper. Find more from Matt:

On Twitter

On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):

Up Next: My Marvelous Year – 1991 Pt. 6

You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:——————————————————————————————————————

The Complete Marvel reading order

mymarvelousyear.com

Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.

Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Spotify, Pod Feed

If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!

The post 1991 Pt. 5: Infinity Gauntlet Event (w/ guest Matt Draper)! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.

This week on Creannotators, I talk with Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles writer and artist Sophie Campbell! We talk all things “Turtles Reborn,” how long Sophie’s planning to stay in the Turtle-verse, the debut of Tokka and Rahzar in the IDW Ninja Turtles comics, and creator-owned works like Shadoweyes!

On Comic Book Herald’s ‘Creannotators’ I’ll be interviewing some of my favorite creators in comics about specific runs, graphic novels or series, looking for their insights on the inspirations behind the work and ideas or hidden material readers may have missed. Creannotators is an audio annotative guide to enjoying the intricacies and thinking in the art. Thanks for listening, and enjoy the comics!

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Is:

Writer: Sophie Campbell

Artists: Sophie Campbell, Ronda Pattison, Jodi Nishijima

Story: Kevin Eastman

Editor: Bobby Curnow

Publisher: IDW Comics

Selected portions of our conversation follow, and have been edited for clarity. 

CBH: First question I have for you is I was reading up on some interviews you had done in the past. And one was in the comics journal circa like 2016, you mentioned that you were offered ongoing artwork as the artists with the turtles, but that you  felt like you were maybe too much of a fan. Like you’d be too invested. And I’m curious now that you’re doing it: What changed?

Sophie Campbell: Before the northhampton Ark, back then, you know, Tom waltz was still, you know, doing his thing, but they offered me like a full run doing the art. I can’t remember what like, if it was just one story arc or what. But, yeah, I said no, because the Leonardo micro issue, which was the first one I did in like, 2011, it was just like, it was a real ordeal for me.

Yeah, I think everybody was kind of just like, you know, walking on eggshells a little bit. And, you know, every fan has, like, their own idea of like, what the characters are going to be and what they’re going to look like. I like the turtles with tails, like in Mirage; Everybody has their own idea. And, you know, being a fan, you know, I went into it, like, Okay, I’m just gonna draw the turtles, like how I do in my fan art all the time, or whatever, without kind of any regard for what [others were doing] and that kind of stuff.

That was no good. I drew them kind of shortened stumpy. And, you know, they’re, like, the turtles are a little too short. You know, could you make them a little bigger? This really minor stuff that like, nowadays would be like, no problem, like, sure. Taller turtles. You got it? But like, at the time, you know, it was like, my first full turtles issue that I’d ever done. So I was just like, Okay, this is it, it has to be the best. That’s the like, you know, like, this is what I’ve been waiting for since I was a child, you know?

Mentally I was just like, losing sleep over it and stuff like that. Like, it’s too much. You know, I was too invested. And when they offered me like a bigger job, I was just like, I can’t imagine doing like, you know, say 12 issues of like, you know, like take that Leonardo experience and multiply it by 12. I don’t know if I can handle that emotionally, it’s a little too much. So I said no. And, um, you know, they managed to get me back for northampton, which was great.

Things loosened up, everybody kind of loosened up. And, you know, there were a lot less notes that I would get back, you know, approval process was like, you know, in the old days, it was just like this hair pulling process or whatever. But nowadays, it’s like, you know, no problem, approval process, no big deal. And I think that was a lot of it, where, you know, they let me spread my wings more. And also, you know, I’m, like, 10 years older, I’m, like, more jaded, I guess, in the industry. And, you know, I like to think I’m more flexible now. You know, if my editor is like, you know, this one thing isn’t quite working. I’ll be like, sure, fine. Let’s change it. No big deal. Yeah. My editor Bobby, his best piece of advice was don’t sweat the small stuff. And at the time, I was just like, That’s insane. The small stuff is important. But like nowadays, I’m like, yeah, you know, don’t sweat the small stuff. Sure.

I changed as a person and a creator. And, you know, it’s just yeah, it just felt it felt right. To do it. And, yeah, um, I actually had said, no, when Bobby offered me to take over writing at first. I was like, wow, that sounds like a lot of stress. I was working on another book at the time. I was like, Yeah, I kind of want to finish this, this other book. And then, you know, I slept on it, you know, for like, a day or so. And I was like, Yeah, I should really do that. That sounds great. And then, you know, luckily the position was still available. Because it was pretty early on. And, you know, it’s been great.

CBH: And here we are. It’s been a fantastic run. So for those who are less familiar, we have post turtles #100 here. Basically, your run begins with this turtles reborn era. So we have mutant town setup where we have, like, humans who have recently been turned into mutants, like the turtles, right, whereas the turtles were kind of always turtles, these are humans who had human lives, and now have to react to life as like a giant porcupine, or, like, you know, the way we see in this universe. There’s a metaphor of one state of being to like transitioning to something else that’s evident here. And I think it runs through some of your works, too, like Shadoweyes. She turns into, like, kind of an alien superhero sort of thing. What are you most interested in about, like the setup of mutant town in this era of turtles in what it allows you to do? In story and in this kind of societal commentary that you’ve integrated into your works, you know, through the years?

Sophie Campbell: I’ve always been really interested in, like, people being transformed against their will, you know, whether it’s like a werewolf thing, or like the fly, you know, it’s like one of my favorites. There’s something  fun about people being just transformed against their will into something else like whether it’s, you know, fully transformed into like a monster or transformed into like another person or maybe their arm is like a monster arm or something. And then, you know, they have to figure out, like, what to do, and how do they adjust and, you know, whether they, you know, take drastic steps to change back or something.

I didn’t want to turn it into like a body horror thing with like, the mutagen bomb. I didn’t want it to be like, you know, people like running around in the streets with these, like, animal instincts that they have now and stuff like that. Because it’s, you know, it’s never really been like that in turtles. But at the same time, you know, there’s like, the kind of, like, you know, societal implications where, like, obviously, if, like, all of a sudden, you’re like, you know, a mutant cow, or something, you can’t just go back to your job.

Originally, I wanted all of Manhattan to be mutated. Why don’t we just expand it to, you know, the entire city or whatever, and have it all walled off, like Escape from New York? Would have been really cool. But, you know, we were like maybe that’s a little too big. So so we just had it, you know, this kind of specific borough or whatever, of Manhattan, which was fine.

So there’s this area, there’s just mutants now, like, oh, the turtles they can walk around, they don’t have to, like, hide in the sewers anymore. Yeah. What does that mean? Like, what would they do? Like, what would they get to do? You know, stuff that they’ve never done before? And I thought that was really interesting.

CBH: So the plan right now is this is an ongoing, you’re on it until you decide otherwise. Which is for…

Sophie Campbell: The foreseeable future. I won’t be drawing as much because I have to, like, you know, I like I have to go off and have to finish my shadow eyes book. And I have some other stuff I have to do, that I can’t talk about, but, you know, I’ll still be writing it. I’m still going to draw #123 even though it’s not a final issue anymore. Um, so yeah, that’s gonna be good. I’m excited about it.

Check out the audio podcast for the full interview!

——————————————————————————————————-

Music for Best Comics Ever by Anthony Weis. Check out more music at anthonyweis.com.

Subscribe on iTunes

To learn how you can support Best Comics Ever and receive more exclusive content from Comic Book Herald, check out the Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/comicbookherald

For the Comic Book Herald reading club through every year of Marvel Comics, check out mymarvelousyear.com

The post Creannotators #52: “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” with Writer/Artist Sophie Campbell! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.

Zack & Dave cover your questions as we read through the Marvel Comics of 1991!

Topics discussed include:

Up Next:

My Marvelous Year – 1991 Pt. 5 —

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You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:

mymarvelousyear.com

https://www.comicbookherald.com/the-complete-marvel-reading-order-guide/

Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.

Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Google Play, Pod Feed

If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!

The post 1991 Variant Cover B: Definitive Runs For Every MCU Avenger! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.

Krakin’ Krakoa live with Verno from the Cerebros podcast and Ernie from Blerd Without Fear! We talk all things X-Men comics, including Planet-Size X-Men #1 and tons of theories about what’s to come!

Blerd Without Fear

The Cerebros

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Music for Best Comics Ever by Anthony Weis. Check out more music at anthonyweis.com.

Subscribe on iTunes

To learn how you can support Best Comics Ever and receive more exclusive content from Comic Book Herald, check out the Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/comicbookherald

For the Comic Book Herald reading club through every year of Marvel Comics, check out mymarvelousyear.com

The post Planet-Size X-Men Post-Game Review (Live w/ Blerd Without Fear and The Cerebros)! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.

This week on Creannotators, I talk with New Mutants artist Rod Reis on a special Creannotators/Krakin’ Krakoa crossover! We talk all things Krakoa, differences working with writers like Jonathan Hickman and Vita Ayala, and what’s to come from the Shadow King!

On Comic Book Herald’s ‘Creannotators’ I’ll be interviewing some of my favorite creators in comics about specific runs, graphic novels or series, looking for their insights on the inspirations behind the work and ideas or hidden material readers may have missed. Creannotators is an audio annotative guide to enjoying the intricacies and thinking in the art. Thanks for listening, and enjoy the comics!

New Mutants Is:

Writer: Vita Ayala

Illustrator: Rod Reis

Publisher: Marvel Comics

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Music for Best Comics Ever by Anthony Weis. Check out more music at anthonyweis.com.

Subscribe on iTunes

To learn how you can support Best Comics Ever and receive more exclusive content from Comic Book Herald, check out the Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/comicbookherald

For the Comic Book Herald reading club through every year of Marvel Comics, check out mymarvelousyear.com

The post Creannotators #51: “New Mutants” with Artist Rod Reis! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.

Marvel comics of 1991. Barry Windsor-Smith’s Weapon X and then Larry Hama Wolverine returns to Weapon X!

Our guest today is Jeremy Greer. Find more from Jeremy:

On Twitter

On this episode we cover the following issues (all available via Marvel Unlimited):

Up Next: My Marvelous Year – 1991 Pt. 5

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You can find more Marvel Comics guides on Comic Book Herald at:

The Complete Marvel reading order

mymarvelousyear.com

Music for My Marvelous Year is credited to Disasterpeace. Support for My Marvelous Year comes via Patreon backers, for as little as $1 a month.

Make sure to subscribe now in order to get every reading list for every year of Marvel Comics! Subscribe to the Podcast! — iTunes, Spotify, Pod Feed

If you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on iTunes, or your podcast player of choice!, to help us reach more readers & listeners!

The post 1991 Pt. 4: Weapon X Wolverine (w/ guest Jeremy Greer)! appeared first on Comic Book Herald.