[SPEAKER_04]: What's up everybody welcome to comic book club.
[SPEAKER_04]: I am Alex.
[SPEAKER_04]: I'm Justin and we are standing on the con floor in artist alley at New York Comic Con with the always awesome Chris Condon Chris.
[SPEAKER_04]: Welcome back to the podcast.
[SPEAKER_02]: Thank you very much Coming up very excited to have you here.
[SPEAKER_04]: This has been a huge weekend for you.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah
[SPEAKER_04]: I don't even know where to start, but I kind of do.
[SPEAKER_04]: I want to start at the beginning of the weekend, first panel, first big panel on the con.
[SPEAKER_04]: Vertigo, you and Jacob are doing a title as the launch of Vertigo before we even get to the book at all.
[SPEAKER_04]: How does that feel?
[SPEAKER_02]: It is a dream come true.
[SPEAKER_02]: So the first of all, the fact that it's a vertigo book, it blows my mind And part of the re-launch like the one of the first on the first panel on the first panel about vertigo and we were I Pretty sure we were the first asked to do a vertigo Yeah, to be in that position to talk to Chris Conroy and have him ask
[SPEAKER_02]: And first of all, revealed to me that they are going to bring Vertigo back and then ask us to create a book there.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's very excited about just that news.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: Wait, me?
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, so it's actually really funny how it all happened.
[SPEAKER_02]: But this is a story that I've had kicking around my head for a very, very long time.
[SPEAKER_02]: I was drawing it and writing it myself in high school and then in 2020 when that Texas blood was on hiatus because they pushed back the schedule because of COVID Yeah Jake and I started doing brutal dark on our patreon We were doing in as eight page chapters and then Texas blood got hooked back on so we had to stop doing it But we always thought well, we'd like to get back to it at some point and Here we are
[SPEAKER_02]: and it's it's pretty incredible to have that opportunity to be able to tell that story especially under that vertigo inference for people that don't know can you lay out the story because I really like it it's a big story or that in many chapters
[SPEAKER_01]: it feels like.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, it is a very big story.
[SPEAKER_02]: Much bigger than the type of stories we usually tell in that Texas blood, which are very, you know, tight character pieces.
[SPEAKER_02]: This definitely has character to it, our main character as we're cane, is so first of all, the title is parallel to the brutal dark.
[SPEAKER_02]: Um, and you may be wondering what is the brutal dark, and you will find out in the comic.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm not going to reveal to you.
[SPEAKER_01]: Good.
[SPEAKER_02]: That's a great starting play.
[SPEAKER_02]: But, the way that I would describe the book is, uh, it's, uh, it's, in the underchones of Indian and Jones was also a hard-boiled detective story.
[SPEAKER_02]: Um, it's all set in New York, um, it's not a globe-trading adventure, um, but we, we get to explore history.
[SPEAKER_02]: We get to explore, uh,
[SPEAKER_02]: each Nardefax, they might have some sort of a fantastical element to them, so they're really hilarious.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, so it's a really great story and I kid you not, by the way, it is the best work Jacob Phillips has done in his house.
[SPEAKER_02]: He's doing them on these extra large boards and they're just gorgeous.
[SPEAKER_02]: I've been lucky enough to be in a studio and to look at them and it
[SPEAKER_02]: It's almost evoking Mike Minyola the way that he's inking it.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's really, really, really interesting.
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, if you could see the preview, I'm sure the preview pages are online.
[SPEAKER_01]: We saw it at the panel and it's a little different from his work on that text.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's blood too, which is really cool.
[SPEAKER_01]: To expand in that direction.
[SPEAKER_04]: The other thing, you're kind of starting to touch on this, but there's a different release schedule for this as well, which I thought was pretty interesting.
[SPEAKER_04]: Like, it feels like, so for anybody who doesn't know who's listening, six issues in an arc, and then it's done, but it's still an ongoing series.
[SPEAKER_04]: So you're going to be doing six issues, six issues, six issues, six issues, six issues.
[SPEAKER_04]: It feels like mystery novels, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: Yes, exactly.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so yeah, so the idea was that this is going to be like our Philip Marlow, you know?
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: So we are going to tell a story and that story is going to have its own title.
[SPEAKER_02]: So we will have peril the brew dark, and then we'll have another title, and every single one of them will be branded in as a cane mystery.
[SPEAKER_02]: And the idea of doing them in these six issues, pieces would be...
[SPEAKER_02]: we also get to do that Texas blood in between and we are coming back to more of that Texas blood which we're very excited about.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's great to hear because you're in the next.
[SPEAKER_01]: I thought you were getting a little busy.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm not too busy.
[SPEAKER_02]: But I'm not too busy for my boy Joe Bob.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: So I'm really excited to get back to back to Ambrose County.
[SPEAKER_02]: But yeah, so the idea is we'll do six of brutal dark six of that Texas blood.
[SPEAKER_02]: So that's kind of the idea.
[SPEAKER_04]: This is a little off of your department, but one thing I was really struck by at the panel was here in Chris Conroy, who is the editor of Burger Go Line, as well as Plac Label and absolute and everything else.
[SPEAKER_04]: But he was talking about part of the reason he brought you guys on and all of the other teams on is because you had already worked together.
[SPEAKER_04]: And so you are in a certain sense or reliable quantity.
[SPEAKER_04]: How much of that was part of the conversation?
[SPEAKER_02]: how this happened was that Jake and I, I mean, we have a strong partnership, I think that's, I think that's pretty clear to our readers, to Chris, who's a big fan of that Texas button, the Enfield gang massacre, and from my perspective,
[SPEAKER_02]: you know, doing an image book with Jake.
[SPEAKER_02]: We work on back end, you know, so we're, you know, we're just doing it for the love of doing it.
[SPEAKER_02]: But to do it with that, that DC, you know, cloud, the fur to go cloud coming back, being part of the first line, it was, it was, I, I, I felt like it was a, I don't know, it's, it's, it's hard to describe, but it's,
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm just really stoked that Jake and I are getting to have the opportunity to tell our stories and not just in our small pocket universe that we're telling and that text is blood, but in a larger canvas and just they trust us.
[SPEAKER_02]: That's the other thing of working with creators that have done this before, whether it's Kyle Starks or Steve Bug or
[SPEAKER_02]: or Jen's camp and a steep on Morion.
[SPEAKER_02]: These are people that they can trust that they know we'll get the work in and get the work done and have it be good.
[SPEAKER_02]: So I think that's probably, yeah, it's just an incredible opportunity.
[SPEAKER_01]: I love Kyle big up to you right at the end of the panel.
[SPEAKER_02]: Oh yes, I love Kyle.
[SPEAKER_02]: He's a crazy person.
[SPEAKER_02]: He's a crazy person, but it's nice to be on the good side of the crazies.
[SPEAKER_04]: and just before we move on to something else you guys obviously you've been doing this like it's a certain aspects from high school but you've had a pretty long time to get ready for this like you've been working on it behind the scenes for well over a year now it's been about two and a half years oh wow that's so jakes had the first issue done since
[SPEAKER_02]: Let's say February of this year.
[SPEAKER_01]: Wow.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm going to fully draw on it's a lettered by Hassan Attsman Elhavs.
[SPEAKER_02]: Amazing, amazing letterer.
[SPEAKER_02]: And we're also going to be bringing Hassan onto that Texas blood as well.
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, cool.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm going to be really cool.
[SPEAKER_02]: And
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, but it's been it's been the thing with having that amount of space to work on it that you can really fine tune it, you know, whereas I mean we work pretty quickly but to have that ability to to look at the finished product and see if
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, what do we, if there's anything we want to add to it is that we, how does, how does this feel, you know, in terms of back matter, like what back matter will support this way, which there will be back matter of course.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, yeah, you got that back.
[SPEAKER_02]: So, yeah, it was a really long runway and I'm thankful for that.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's a rare opportunity to have a runway that long.
[SPEAKER_02]: So,
[SPEAKER_01]: everyone talks about the the artist being ahead but with a long lead like that how far had do you get are you like oh I've been finished for a long two but I mean like on successive like iterations of it are you like ah this idea it's so far why am I writing this down but it like comes to you and I mean so like that text is but like I have all of the arcs like written and in terms of like what the stories will be I haven't written the scripts yet
[SPEAKER_02]: Um, but I have figured out what the stories will be DC vertigo knows.
[SPEAKER_02]: What those stories will be and they're excited about them.
[SPEAKER_02]: So it's, yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: So I mean, it's, yeah, just, you know, planning ahead is it's important for me to kind of understand where we will go, what we will see, what kind of characters we can introduce that we, we wouldn't have met otherwise, so it's, yeah, so it's, it's, it's really nice to have that long run with like I said, yeah.
[SPEAKER_04]: I want to flip from the beginning of the con to right before now in the con they just announced the Marvel panel that officially the ultimate universe is ending.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yes, believe it.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: Well, a lot of people leave it.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: I believe it.
[SPEAKER_02]: All right.
[SPEAKER_02]: Well, I'm doing 16 issues of ultimate Wolverine
[SPEAKER_04]: yeah well i think i feel like you're in a slightly different position in terms of believing about that announcement because you're you're extended right yeah like the title was going a little shorter now it's going up to sixty so you think they're going to extend it yeah no i mean everybody at the reaction when they announced it back at the retailer day was like oh right yeah right well yeah
[SPEAKER_04]: But there was a quote in the press release from Dad Buckley about making sure these are good trips that like they can live on the shelves forever.
[SPEAKER_04]: So obviously, whatever happens past that happens past that, but in terms of ultimate Wolverine, what has been like been able to tell the full arc of this story.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, so I'm a big fan of a good ending.
[SPEAKER_02]: I try to do that in all my stories.
[SPEAKER_02]: Like, I'm really proud of the Enfield ending, for example, like, I'm really proud of that one.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm really proud of the ending of News from the fall.
[SPEAKER_02]: Like, I really, I pride myself on finding a strong ending.
[SPEAKER_02]: and I'm so thrilled to know that this is not just going to be a soap opera that will continue on into infinity, you know, that this actually has an ending, Wolverine has an ending.
[SPEAKER_02]: In fact, there's really two endings because 12 is sort of an ending, you know, it's a capper.
[SPEAKER_02]: And, and how I feel about it is that issues 13 through 16 are actually the Coda.
[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, cool.
[SPEAKER_02]: And that's, yeah, it's, and I set on the panel and I'll repeat it here.
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, especially issue 13, very magic focused.
[SPEAKER_02]: And we get to explore magic because we'll moss my editor on, ultimately we'll
[SPEAKER_02]: I wonder why magic looks the same way she does in 616.
[SPEAKER_02]: And I started thinking about that, so that's something that we're investigating.
[SPEAKER_03]: That's cool.
[SPEAKER_01]: I feel like ultimately Wolverine feels like you feel the chapters in so many comics.
[SPEAKER_01]: It feels like sort of one long thing and this feels very much like.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I wanted it to be like a cleaver coming down each time, so each one has to be intense.
[SPEAKER_02]: It has to have its moments and then you get out.
[SPEAKER_02]: And then each one almost works as a one shot too, which is, I thought it was important to me approach.
[SPEAKER_04]: No, I was just going to say speaking of clevers or you said, you're not going to get to do fucked up shit to the X-Men anymore.
[SPEAKER_04]: because every issue I'm like, that's gross, that's a gross thing that's happening to that character.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I mean, that's part of the amazing thing about doing the ultimate line is the freedom that you're given.
[SPEAKER_01]: Take a cleaver to everything.
[SPEAKER_02]: Well, yeah, I mean, yeah, this, I, if you're doing a Wolverine book, it's got to be intense.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, think about the origin of this character.
[SPEAKER_02]: He's, he's had metal implanted into his body.
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, he's been invaded.
[SPEAKER_02]: His body has been invaded.
[SPEAKER_02]: His brain has been in his brain has been turned to mush and he's come back again.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so, yeah, it's important that this is an intense series, and I think it has to be.
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't think that it could have really existed if it wasn't intense.
[SPEAKER_02]: And this is something that I feel pretty strongly about.
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, I think it also in certain ways, I think that that's what the character should be because of weapon X. Very interesting as weapon X, which I think is really the defining book for the character in my mind.
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, and honestly, it feels like there's a strong connective tissue between ultimate and the original weapon X series.
[SPEAKER_01]: That was the intent.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, that was the intent.
[SPEAKER_01]: From the start.
[SPEAKER_04]: I want to ask you while we're talking about ending is one thing that did end a little earlier than expected is green arrow, which is a pretty big bummer.
[SPEAKER_04]: Do you feel like that came to a conclusion that at least you feel satisfied with it?
[SPEAKER_02]: I am so satisfied with the conclusion.
[SPEAKER_02]: Issue 31 is actually didn't intend for it to go the way that it went.
[SPEAKER_02]: Sometimes this happens and you're working on a script and sometimes you submit your solicit text and you go.
[SPEAKER_02]: Oh shit, this isn't going the way I wanted to go, but it went the way that it needed to go.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: And I think it is the perfect ending for what we did.
[SPEAKER_02]: And honestly, yeah, it's a bummer that we didn't get to do more would have been really cool.
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, I had some plans for things that we could have done beyond this.
[SPEAKER_02]: And I also just really enjoyed getting to tell stories that I felt were important to stories.
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, as you know, I mean, fresh water kills, the first story arc was based on love canal.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, it's a real environmental disaster in Upstate New York.
[SPEAKER_01]: When I loved that especially because it felt like a reflection of the Alley stuff that we don't hear about as much is like activism and politics.
[SPEAKER_01]: Feel like it's gesture to a lot, but it felt like a real deep dive, but it was dark.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, necessarily, I think.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I think a lot of... I don't want to speak for other writers, but I... I feel like if some people may be leary to wait into those political waters.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, but I felt like it was important for the character, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: That's the character to me.
[SPEAKER_02]: Um, so I had to tell that story, um, and same thing with, with crimson sands or, or current arc.
[SPEAKER_02]: Um, you know, it's, it's a part of the character and it is, this is, we're, we're, we're in conversation with one of the greatest stories of all time, Sterbord's, don't fly.
[SPEAKER_02]: it's it's been there since then.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it's core.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, exactly.
[SPEAKER_02]: So it's I think it's important to talk about these dark things because you know we live in a world that like I wish me could you know it was a bubble gum world where everybody was just you know happy go lucky but unfortunately there are a lot of dark things in the world and I'm you know one of the recent issues.
[SPEAKER_02]: was able to have greener or save somebody with an oxen, which was important for me to show people that this is a thing that we see in our real world.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, and that you can save somebody, and so, and it's not, you don't have to just be a super-are-you don't have superpowers.
[SPEAKER_02]: You can be a normal human being and just have an impact.
[SPEAKER_04]: I want to ask you something that might be a little too inside baseball, but I thought it was very interesting when Green Arrow was canceled and birds of prey were canceled.
[SPEAKER_04]: Both you and Kelly Thompson went online very quickly in very different ways, but like I thought very classy ways talking about what happened behind the scenes.
[SPEAKER_04]: So what happened behind the scenes that kind of led to those messages?
[SPEAKER_02]: I, I did not talk to her about it.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm really love what we're doing on Green Arrow.
[SPEAKER_02]: And I feel very strongly that some of my best work.
[SPEAKER_02]: And it was also, I mean, just like, all cards out there.
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, this was my first superhero ongoing that I was doing.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's a character that is rare and important to me that Daniel Neil Neil Adams run was a formative book for me And so this character means a lot to me and so When I talk to the fans about it
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, I've known that it was canceled for a minute.
[SPEAKER_02]: And I would go to cons and talk to fans and they would ask me, how long is your run going to be?
[SPEAKER_02]: Like I'm so glad it's continuing.
[SPEAKER_02]: And I'd have to just grin and, man, you know, so I wanted to be able to tell the people that we're enjoying the book and we're, you know, feeling an impact from it felt that it was important to them.
[SPEAKER_02]: is that it it hits them in and the right place that it should.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so yeah it was it was important for me to just get out there and just say something about it because if I you know I don't want to speak for DC but it it felt to me that they you know they weren't going to announce that it was going to be canceled.
[SPEAKER_02]: They just would not solicit 32 so and I'm telling that would be a real shock.
[SPEAKER_02]: So I wanted to say something and say my piece and I am very excited for what's coming down the road especially Gabriel Hardman doing his black label series the green arrow and batman in the question and also a porn site piece of trod is doing absolutely green arrow.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm just so stoked to see what somebody else is going to do with the character.
[SPEAKER_04]: That said, do you think it was rude that they canceled the black canary book and a green arrow book in the same month?
[SPEAKER_02]: They have something to talk about.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't really want to wait into those moments.
[SPEAKER_02]: No, I don't.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: The thing is, I do think that people love those books so I think that it was a rub bummer to a lot of people.
[SPEAKER_02]: For sure.
[SPEAKER_02]: These two books got canceled simultaneously.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: But, you know, there's, there's, there's things ahead.
[SPEAKER_02]: So I'm, I'm excited for those.
[SPEAKER_01]: you were saying before we turn on the mics that news from the fallout has been really selling here like how do you feel about that a book that is like very intense and also artistically very different than other comics.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah I think it's the most unique book on the shows right now and I think I'm so proud of Jeffrey L. Love and the work that he's doing and I've said this time and again and I will repeat it.
[SPEAKER_02]: Edna as you know he deserves a place in direct mark of comics and I think this is proof At both of our tables we have been selling out of the book The book has been selling well consistently with retailers and the things that we hear from sure The artwork might not work for everybody and that's fine the writing might not work for everybody That's fine, but it has been Having an impact on people people are seeing something that they've never seen before and yes
[SPEAKER_02]: And I think that's exciting.
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, that's it's like picking up new mutants by Wilson Cambridge.
[SPEAKER_02]: Seeing something that is just totally unique in comics and going wow I didn't know it could be this and I think that's there's nothing we're exciting in that and that's that's the beauty of comments Yeah
[SPEAKER_04]: That book is great to you.
[SPEAKER_04]: I feel like I'm forgetting a million things.
[SPEAKER_02]: So real quick anything else you want to plug Just how great you guys are Stop being never get plugged so thanks.
[SPEAKER_04]: That's so nice.
[SPEAKER_04]: Chris congratulation on everything can't wait to read your conclusion Unultsman Wolverine and everything else good luck at the rest of the car.
[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you.
[SPEAKER_01]: We've been huge fans from the beginning So shout out to you, man.
[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you to you.
[SPEAKER_01]: I appreciate it.
[SPEAKER_01]: Good.
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay
[SPEAKER_00]: It's just a time to remember Yeah, we'll listen tonight, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah I want the beat, there's no gonna mind We'll take time and see ourselves And it's time now, we'll listen I don't deserve it, I don't deserve it It's our power
[SPEAKER_00]: They sit on crappy couches and they let us see the moon And he's just a monkey, they'll let us let your guests speak So grab your ring, hammer, don't be late for it, though