August 11, 2025 • 47 mins
Artist and illustrator Jonathan Wayshak joins Dave to talk about his upcoming Cul-de-sac comic book with Bad Idea, his recent work for Heavy Metal, and signing at the Todd McFarlane Spawn booth at SDCC.
Wayshak reveals the materials and methods behind his creative process, explains why a strong script in comics makes all the difference. Plus: vampires, David Lynch, and Billy Joel!
Way$hak on Instagram : https://www.instagram.com/wayshak/?hl=en
https://www.westcoastdavengers.com/direct-edition-podcast
Big Thanks to my producer Daniel Koren, find him here https://www.instagram.com/chibald_smith/
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:11):
Welcome back to DIRECT Edition, a podcast about nothing and
everything. I'm your host, Dave.
It's me, Today's guest, a great interview with my buddy John
Wayshak. Wayshak is a artist and
illustrator and a mad scientist on paper.
He's got a new book out with BadIdea called Cul-de-sac, written
(00:32):
by legendary comic writer Mike Carey.
And you know, we had a nice chatabout it today.
I know John for probably around a decade at this point.
I met him through Dave Korea andAlex Pardee when he was part of
the Zero Friends collective. They had a show at Cotton Candy
Machine in Brooklyn, which is Tara Mcpherson's gallery.
(00:53):
And I had already known Dave andAlex, but I knew about Way Shack
and when I went there, I think Igot there the night they were
setting up and just hung out andgot to know him and ended up
buying a piece that weekend. And, you know, I'd see John
sporadically whenever I took trips to the Bay Area and always
a nice, nice time seeing him. And the thing that always stuck
(01:14):
out to me was whenever we'd talk, we'd talk about Todd
McFarlane and our mutual love growing up reading his comics.
And you know, it just, it's beennice to watch John's career grow
in the comics world. Seeing him at both of the OA XS
in Orlando and watching people have their mind blown looking at
his art and watching friends getcommissions from him, it really
(01:37):
made me happy. And, you know, I've been able to
support John over the years by buying a bunch of art and it's
just great to to watch his audience grow.
And that's why I brought him here today is to talk about the
book, but also to introduce him to some people that may not know
anything about him and his artwork and his story and how
much dedication that he puts into his art.
(02:00):
Earlier this year he had an issue of Violator through Image
Comics and, you know, McFarland Productions and a lot of people
really got to see his work on paper for the first time.
And now cul-de-sac coming, well,that's a whole new world.
cul-de-sac is already out as we speak.
You are hearing this podcast about five days after it was
(02:21):
released. So if you can pick it up at your
comic store still or have them moderate, I think you'll be
pleasantly surprised about this awesome vampire horror book that
he did with my Carrie. So without any further ado, I'm
going to bring to you my interview with the man they call
Rashak Rashak. Rashak, Rashak.
Rashak. Hi everybody, welcome back to
(02:49):
DIRECT Edition today. My guest.
It has a new book coming out from Bad Idea called cul-de-sac.
You know him from seeing him at the Oax videos and from the
covers he's done on Emory Warriors as well as of issue a
violator he did this year. And as Billy Joel said on
Anthony's song, Moving Out, who needs a house out in Hackensack?
(03:12):
Well, who needs a comic that's not done by Wayshack?
And I'm talking to John Wayshack.
Hey, how you doing man? Good, good.
I, I, you know Billy Joel's always on the brain as a Long
Islander, and you know, you, youthe last name rhymes.
Your last name rhymes with it. Would you believe I've never
heard of Billy Joel song? Come on, there's no possible
(03:32):
way. And you've been on this planet
for almost half a century and you've never heard of Billy Joel
song? It's we didn't start the fire
right. That is a Billy Joel song that
came out in the 90s. That was a very big hit.
That was the 90s. Yeah, that was like 90.
It might have been 89, but I'm pretty sure.
It was 90. Well, that's the only one I
know. And I just know that from like
(03:53):
quiet rock stations from back inthe day, right?
Because that, that wasn't on like mainstream radio, was it?
Oh, it was no, that was his. That was a big single.
I mean, you know, he had his singles and career in the 70s
and 80s, Piano man and with a big shot and, you know, all
these good, you know. I can go on and on.
But we're not going to talk about Billy Joel too much today,
(04:14):
but we are going to talk about your your new book.
But I wanted to ask how you justgot back from San Diego.
How was the Comic Con? Comic Con was great, Things went
really well. We did a panel for Bad Idea.
Of course, we got the Tiki Partyagain and seems like there are
more people than ever at the Tiki Party and it was just a
great time. A lot of a lot of cool people.
(04:35):
Did a signing at Mcfarland's booth for the Violator issue,
You know, we put out some printsand did some commissions.
Just crazy show just a lot. I mean it seems huge this year
and I and I and I always go and it just it just seems bigger
than normal this year. I don't know why.
I, you know, I was talking to Dave by the way Dave says hi.
(04:55):
I was talking to Dave today and,and we were talking about how
that Marvel not being there might have something to do with
the fact that everything had a little bit more room to breathe.
You know, they didn't have the Hall age panel, which brings in
X amount of people. Plus, I think on the bad idea
end a year ago, they didn't have, you know, planet death
hadn't come out yet. And with cul-de-sac right around
(05:17):
the corner like people are, there's blood in the water.
Let's just say, you know, like there's people that are looking
to be interested in these books right now.
Yeah, and I miss Dave. That's in San Diego.
I, I, I, I this Dave Korea we'retalking about.
I'm nothing without Dave. I've done X amount of shows and
(05:38):
still no a tablecloth and that'sbecause of Dave.
Dave always provides me with a tablecloth.
Dave is like the backbone to me and probably not Alex so much
anymore. But you know, Alex doesn't stuff
together. I don't.
I think that Alex also was Mr. Dave a little bit at calm this
year. That's safe to say.
(05:59):
But The thing is, is like by day2, your table looks like a, you
know, an atomic bomb hit it. And by day three you know your
table starts, or at least behindyour table starts to look a
little bit like the the trash compactor scene in A New Hope.
Yeah, I mean, normally I'm like in on the edge.
I was, I was given like a reallynice spot this year where
there's like a lot of foot traffic, but I'm just a big guy
(06:20):
and like I can't move once I'm behind the table.
So, but you know, what can you do?
Right. Well, so let me ask this because
obviously I mean for the listener that maybe not knowing
me at all. I've known John for about a
decade now and you know, over the course of just the last
year, the violator book, a bunchof the Emory Wars covers and
(06:44):
obviously cul-de-sac. Did you feel the, did you see a
change in the amount of people that approached you at your
table this year or did you see alot of people coming up to you
at the spawn signing the spawn booth signing, saying like, hey,
I didn't know who you were, but I saw this issue and I really
enjoyed it. Like did you get a lot of that
this year? I've been getting that in
(07:06):
general at the shows. I've been getting interest from
people who don't know my work, but I'm also getting a lot of
return people, which, you know, I'm always grateful for.
It's a, it's a nice mix, the spawn people, the people came
out of spawn signing. They're like some old friends
and then some new people as well.
But, but be quite honest, I justtry and talk to people.
(07:28):
It's when it comes to like analyzing things like that.
I'm, I'm terrible at it. And generally I prefer not to
know. So I don't, I really don't think
about it too much. I just try to give everybody my
attention and speak to them as much as I can, you know?
Sure, sure. Well, that's why you have people
like me that are happy to say that like over the year I've
(07:49):
watched more people being turnedonto your work and people
talking about it more and more and looking at it more and more.
So you know, I'll be the analyzer for you.
That's. That's There you go.
I hope so. I mean, it's cool, especially
since the work's getting so wild, almost too wild.
The the heavy metal stuff that I've been doing.
(08:09):
Issue 2, I think came out yesterday.
Yesterday. Yeah.
So that's been really cool because I'm really just
seriously left of my own devicesand those, strangely enough, I'm
almost to a point where I almostwant to pull back just because
everything's been so kinetic. But I'm not sure.
(08:30):
I mean, that's just me talking. That's just me talking off the
cuff. I'm sure a lot of people don't
know that I have a style that, you know, that's a very quick
sketch, like a very simple styleand it's actually very
enjoyable. So I find myself thinking about
like wanting to work in that vein more and more, but probably
(08:51):
not for the foreseeable future. Look, these are things, these
are me like talking out loud as I'm talking to you.
My process really is, is a lot of just I know when I sit there
and and cul de sacs probably a good example of that because
with cul-de-sac, I'm they're conscious.
I'm trying to make conscious changes where I'm just like I
(09:12):
want this to be this and I want to be this to be different and
I'll let pages sit. Reason being is I'm just like I
need to think about this. I need to figure it out.
But each time I've done that with cul-de-sac, nothing's come.
And for most of my work as well,that's generally not happens.
I'm trying to be even approaching my process
differently with cul-de-sac, butnothing comes and nothing gets
(09:34):
done on cul-de-sac until I sit down and do it, if that makes
any sense. So it does.
So there's no pre planning on mypart right now, unfortunately,
which which is, which is great, but it is nerve wracking and
sometimes doesn't work, you know?
Right. It's risky speed.
I mean, risky is is an interesting word.
(09:56):
Like cul-de-sac, which comes outAugust 6th.
Bad idea. Mike Carey is the scripter and
you're the artist and colorist. You've been working on this
project for several years, right?
Like it's been at least a year and change if not 2 to 3, right?
Yeah, it's been, it's been a while and it's allowed us to.
(10:16):
Originally it was a traditional comic and then it became
something a little bit Wilder. And then there's a certain point
where the book was colored. A friend of mine colored it
actually David Baron, and he fired himself.
It's he's he goes, he goes, you just fire me and just have
Waychat color it. And that's kind of the genesis.
(10:38):
And then, and then Dinesh saw mywork and he's like, why don't
you do it like this? You know, more like my
sketchbook for those of you who haven't seen it.
And that's kind of the genesis of where this comes.
So it's allowed us to like startthe book, go back and refine it
and make edits, which normally is a luxury you don't have with
comics. Usually you're working so fast.
(10:59):
Nothing, you can't do anything. You know, I've always wanted to
draw like a hundred 5200 pages and edit later, which we we were
able to edit, but we weren't able to go to that extreme on
cul-de-sac. I'm just talking about my own
fantasy project where like I go through and cut out pages almost
(11:20):
like a film and cut out entire sequences, you know, 20 page.
I don't think that's ever going to happen though, because
logistically it doesn't even make sense.
Yeah. Yeah, so let me ask you this
because I I was listening and watching.
I read the first issue today. I had a blast with it.
(11:43):
It it I wouldn't say it exactly has some twists, but it doesn't
go the way you expect it to go, which is, you know, different
than A twist. It's not a gimmick, but I feel
like this is a vampire story, but kind of unlike anything I've
read in a long time. When you got first got my script
did it. Was it super detailed?
Was it an outline, a plot outline?
(12:04):
Like what were your first thoughts when you were hired to
do this or when Dinesh and you talked about it?
First of all, I got the script from Mike and then Mike, the
script was great. You know what, what's really
great about Mike's script is it's really solid.
It's really well written. It's really well thought out.
It doesn't rely, you know, I know what you mean.
(12:27):
You're like, it doesn't go in the way you think.
Reason being his, he doesn't useany gimmicks.
It's all just solid writing. It's just, you know, what do we
need to get here? How do we explain this
character? And there's nothing, there's no
shortcuts, there's no gimmicks to it.
There's no like, oh, shock value.
It's like, how do I make a really great story?
(12:50):
And it's because the, the, the, the foundation is there.
That's what allows me to go off as much that I do on the
artwork. And while I'm have a heavy duty
focus on storytelling, it allowsme to break some of these
storytelling rules. And part of that is because we
have such a strong foundation that holds it all together.
(13:11):
It's kind of like an experimental band where you have
like some experimental guitar orwhatever it is you want to be,
but the bass holds it together. It's that thread that holds it
together. So it's because my script was so
great that I'm allowed to do these things.
If the script wasn't so strong and me doing my thing, it very
(13:33):
possibly goes into nonsense, youknow, or just.
Abstract like pure abstract. Which is fine.
I actually love that kind of stuff personally.
You know, that's why I love Eraserhead.
I was just going to say David Lynch.
Eraserhead is funny because I saw this is going to be hard to
put into context. When I was really young, like
(13:53):
21, I was working on something that was for me at the time,
extremely experimental, extremely bizarre, which my my
friends, when they saw pieces ofit, they actually laughed at me.
And they're like, what are you doing?
Like we don't get this. And I did the project.
People kind of understood more. It was very surreal.
(14:14):
It was very abstract. People understood more after it
was gone. I'm not saying it's great.
It was just a weird thing I did as a kid and it wasn't.
I saw a racer head maybe like a year later, and it was one of
those Eureka moments where, I mean, obviously nothing I did
was as good as that, but I was, it was the first time I felt
like, oh, that's what I was trying to do, right?
(14:36):
And especially in the early days, I really felt like I was
an island on my own. And it felt good.
It just, it sounds silly, but itfelt good that what I was
attempting, somebody else has done, you know?
So that's my connection forever with Eraserhead, you know,
outside of it being a brilliant film, you know?
(14:58):
Right. And you know, Lynch just being
brilliant overall. I think one of my Eureka moments
was seeing Lost Highway in the in the theater and like also
having that kind of same weird feeling like, oh, there's
somebody that makes movies that satisfy, satisfies my brain in a
way that I don't even understand.
Yeah. You know, but yeah, that's how I
(15:20):
felt about reading this first issue.
I, it's almost like a weaving path where it's it, you know,
I'm under, I know where I'm going, but I, I feel like every
turn I, I go, I'm like, oh, thisis unique or this is different
or this is a interesting take onthe story.
But your art for this issue, what really stuck out.
Obviously I knew you colored it so everything is chef's kiss,
(15:41):
but there's a lot of this book that you intentionally left
uncolored. There's a lot of black and white
in this book, certain triple panels, pieces of pages.
Can you take me through a littlebit of like that creative idea
of why leave some of it black and white and some of it, you
know, colored beautifully? Yeah, generally, generally a lot
(16:03):
of that happens is I'm attempting to control pacing.
And what I mean by attempting isbecause it's experimental nature
and because I'm going by a lot of like stream of consciousness
and gut feeling really, which bythe way, I don't recommend, you
know, if there's students here, I don't recommend that way to
work. I really don't.
(16:23):
It's something I kind of do, butit's not smart and it's time
consuming and it's kind of dumb.But anyway, the reason for a lot
of that is I try to keep when the actions going, what I'm
trying to just tell a story. I actually try to keep the
artwork simple. That way you kind of just move
(16:44):
on and you kind of just see it, you know, ABCD and then I tried
to do the color for like the bigmoments when I want to have a
full stop, you know, like, so then there'll be like a part
where it's like you'll see the, the character's face.
Like there are a few spots whereit's like fully painted, which,
which was never the intention ofthe book, to be honest there,
(17:05):
there was never an intention to have fully painted panels.
It just happened, but they're teeth.
They're I'm treating them as full stops to stop the pacing,
to get you to think or maybe something major happens.
And then again, it goes into black and white when I just want
to move the story along. Or sometimes in case of like
certain characters, I want them represented a certain way.
There's one character that I draw very loosely because that's
(17:30):
how I want to represent the character.
And I also, I also do it for audience participation, so they
can kind of fill in the blanks, which is, which is the way I've
always seen my style is like, I wanted people to participate in
it. That's why I leave things out.
I don't draw things or things are loose or things are obscure
(17:51):
because it's more interesting ifpeople are able to, like, fill
that in, you know, can do a lot of that.
Yeah. I'm a big fan of film noir, and
that was like a big thing of film noir, you know, leaving,
you know, of course. And it was like the restrictions
they had as well. But I felt like a lot of it was,
you know, effective. Yeah.
Yeah, it was, you know, there's certain things that I can think
(18:14):
of just color wise, like the thesun when they get to the
campground, it's beautiful colored.
But even you've always been ableto do Reds in a way that I don't
think I've ever seen. And one of the guys, the
soldiers, we'll call them soldiers, but the red on the the
goggles, I was like, man, I don't, you don't see red like
that. And I was reading this digitally
and you know, so it's, it's impressive how you're able to
(18:37):
very much use your color to takeus on a journey somewhere and
like you said, fill in kind of alot of it with our imaginations.
Yeah, I mean, I'm not trying to be realistic in any way.
That's not what I want it to be a comic too.
I want you to look at it and go like, that's a comic, you know?
(18:58):
So that's why there is that kindof intensity with the colors.
You can't get away with that anywhere else.
No, no, I mean that's why the comic medium is so special.
You're able to do things that you can on film, you can in
animation, you know, you can in video games, Anything
inspiration wise, like for you in the vampire genre that went
(19:20):
into any of the art, you know, anything that, that you're like,
Oh, I, you know, I love certain movie or certain comic about
vampires and I, I leaned on thatfor inspiration because not that
you're like, I can't really point to anything, but I was
just wondering. Actually no, nothing vampire
(19:41):
related. This book is influenced by
illustration more than anything,so there isn't really any genre
specific stuff I'm reference, referencing or even related to
it. The person that's always on my
mind and not that I'm referencing, I mean, I guess I'm
(20:04):
referencing it, but the person that's always on my mind is Bob
Peek for this work, the illustrator Bob Peek, because
Bob Peek probably next to Mark English art is probably.
One of the wildest illustrators and one of the best illustrators
there ever was. And I mean, not as experimental
as Mark English because he's berserk, but Bob Peek took all
(20:29):
kinds of wild chances as the mainstream illustrator and he he
left a lot of stuff unfinished as final illustration, whether
by intention or not. To be honest, I've never been
able to figure that out. Either way, it works, you know,
and I'm not, you know, I don't have his book next to it.
(20:50):
Then cul-de-sac might look better if I was referencing it
that way. But for this project in
particular, Bob Peek is the one who's always on my mind.
I guess that's who I'm trying tochannel, for lack of a better
term, but that's the one I keep thinking about.
I actually been meaning to meaning to get out his book and
(21:10):
go through it, and I haven't. I've left it on the shelf this
entire project, but I keep goinglike I should look at it.
But I know his work well enough.I keep thinking about his work.
So more than anything, I would say that's the biggest
inspiration by cul-de-sac on a visual level.
Cool. Well, I, it's, it's nice to know
that it's I, you know me. I love, love hearing about
(21:31):
people's influences. How many issues is this or is it
still? 5.
Issues, five issues. OK, so five issues, man, the the
story, I mean, I, I'm sure it was a treat just reading that,
you know that script the first time you got it?
Because I had fun reading this comic the first time I got it
and I can't wait to read it again.
(21:53):
What are you finished with all five issues in the coloring and
everything at this point? We're still going through
things, Yeah. But you know, but it's just,
it's just a lot of fun. Yeah, yeah.
You know, I, I feel like I have part ownership of the characters
(22:14):
right now. So I'm very, I'm very invested.
You know, a lot of people, a lotof comic artists and a lot of
people who talk about, you know,like kayfabe would talk about
certain artists that aren't ableto draw children.
But you've done it in like, I feel multiple, multiple projects
you've done and the children in this, which are the focus, at
(22:34):
least what it seems like at the end of this issue.
You know, they look like TV characters.
They look like kids that would have been on TV, like the stars
of shows, which they are, you know, in a way they stars of
this book. Is that, is that something that
you figured that you're like, you got down pat pretty quickly
with this book is like getting kids and making them not look
(22:56):
like horrendous monsters like comic artists have done like.
I mean, it's like any other project.
It takes about an issue for me to like kind of really get
things figured out. But I'm I'm the kids are the
most fun part for me to draw in this book, like all the monster
(23:16):
and all the blood and good stuff.
Like that's all great, but that's actually not my main
interest when I draw. I actually really enjoy drawing
the kids. And it's, it's when I was
growing up, I wanted to be a character designer for Saturday
morning cartoons. I had, I had no, yeah, I had no
interest in Disney cartoons. Like they didn't interest me in
(23:37):
any way. I watched a lot of Saturday
morning cartoons. So I wanted to be a character
designer. And I always consider myself a
cartoonist before an illustrator.
So the way I draw those kids is just the way I want to draw.
And I guess I've done it enough where it works, you know?
I mean, I guess make them cute. I do.
(24:00):
They're cute, but I I feel like you're.
When I see. You do faces and and figure work
and also distorting faces. There's a lot of emotion.
There's a lot of attitude. Like you draw almost every
character with some kind of attitude facially.
And I, it's something that I, until I was reading this book
that I really jumped out at me with the kids.
(24:20):
There's some attitude in those faces and that, yeah, it reminds
me of Saturday morning cartoon kids.
Yeah, if you can't relate to thebook, if you can't identify with
the kids, the kid, the book, that probably doesn't mean
anything. So like that's I'm trying to get
you to sympathize with them. And back to the Saturday morning
(24:42):
cart thing, The funniest thing about the Saturday morning
cartoons, there's a lot of like guys I really liked.
And I used to pause the credits so I'd know the names of these
guys. And one of the guys I really
liked at the time was the guy who did Captain and the Game
Master. I don't know his name anymore,
but he, and I mean this in the best way possible.
(25:03):
He was always interesting to me because he designed the ugliest
characters. But they're like kind of cool if
you remember that cartoon Captain and the Game Master.
And again, I mean, it's the bestway possible.
It's an ugly cartoon, but I always kind of.
Enjoyed. It, yeah, it was a Nintendo
thing. It's just a Nintendo commercial.
It's a Nintendo commercial. The characters had nothing to do
(25:24):
with the games, but you know, it's like whoever was writing
it, they didn't care. They had like Zelda and Lincoln
and at one point. But that's the example that
stands out to me. And I think it stands out.
It's not that it's like, you know, big influence on me.
It's just it's just with cul-de-sac for some reason.
I think about that because, likeI said again, I don't want to
insult artists in the best way possible.
(25:46):
I think the character design is so cool.
But I was always liked how ugly it was.
And I thought that was interesting because, you know,
especially in that world, it's aworld where everything's like
very pretty and very cute and more so today than back then,
you know, like back then I'm just like, oh, Disney's too
cute. Disney's too cute now
everything's cute, you know? So yeah, it's kind of different
(26:10):
now. Like everything is cute.
Yeah, nothing has nothing has ugly edges to it.
Nothing. Yeah.
I mean, yeah, I can't think of anything.
Yeah, you know, but it could be just a taste thing as well.
Yeah, it also could be a push back of like, you know, things
are a little bit more in the last 10 years, a little bit
(26:32):
scarier in the real, real world.So if we if everything's cute in
the fake world, maybe we won't think about the real world.
For anybody that's seen John at a convention or gotten to look
through your, your sketchbooks or anything and, and seeing what
your, you know, your personal work looks like, you do focus on
(26:57):
distorting a lot of faces and making things ugly.
And I think it's like you said, it's not something you see every
day. And I, I get it.
That's why your sketchbooks are so personal to you, even though
you share them with us all. Yeah, and also that's that
sketchbook style is hard to incorporate into comics because
a lot of that distortion requires physical space to draw.
(27:21):
And what I mean by that, it's bigger pages.
So having to distort and exaggerate in a 2 inch frame is
like near to impossible because there's just not enough room to
draw, you know, unless you want to take like a really tiny pen,
which I've done this stuff I've finished recently.
I used like a really tiny pen and I hate it.
I'm throwing it out. No, I use the the Japanese Maru
(27:44):
pen, which is what a lot of the Japanese like really detailed
guys use. I've used it before.
I haven't used it in a long time.
Otomo uses it and I read an interview where he doesn't he's
afraid of using it again. Not afraid, but he just treads
using it again. I know what he's saying like
it's, it's very, it's a very easy pen to draw, but it's just
a easy pen to use. But it's, it's very and it
(28:07):
allows me to draw like really fast.
Like that's the that's the attractive thing about it.
I can draw extremely fast with this gift pen and but it's just
it's not very expressive and it's very thin, you know, can.
You does it lend itself to doingintricate detail?
Like Like what what Tomo was doing in the backgrounds and
(28:28):
stuff or no, it's the opposite. It does.
It allows you to do like very thin detail, very fine detail.
And like I said, it's a great pen.
It's not what I'm looking for, but the the attractive part to
me is I can draw extremely fast with it.
I can draw faster with that pen than any other dip pen I have,
like faster and more accurate. But it's just not giving me what
(28:49):
I want, you know? Yeah, but I do that a lot.
I switch tools between pages. So it's actually a pretty common
thing for me to do something like this to a few pages and I'm
like, I'm not using this. And then watch, probably like
next month. I'll do I use it again, you
know? Does that, does that kind of
routine of switching stuff keep you from getting bored in a way?
(29:13):
Or is that? Or is it just you want to just
have it look a tiny bit different so you switch tools?
It's really not that thought out.
It's, I mean, I mean, I wish it's, it sounds so artsy fartsy,
but it's literally like decisions are made when I sit
down and look at the page. It's just, it's just natural.
(29:34):
Like I told that goes back to what I was saying about some of
those cul-de-sac pages. Like I'm trying to figure
something out and it just doesn't happen until I sit down.
And and like I said, the fully paint, like fully painted, like
some of the fully painted faces,like that was never the intent
ever, ever. That was never even a
consideration. Like I'm not painting, I'm not
(29:54):
painting. I'm not doing full painting in
this book. And it turns out there's a lot
of full painting in the book. And that's purely just what I
felt like doing. You know, it's something that
you you'd said about like suggesting younger cartoonist
not to do 30 years ago. If you had gotten this project,
how different not only do you think it would look, but how
(30:15):
different do you think you'd approach it or do you think you
would have approached it the same way?
It's just like sitting down and whatever happens, happens.
It's a different book. It would be a different book for
sure, because I would have been like more precise, for lack of
that's not the right term, but it would have been more noodly.
Or as the old guys say, there'd be a lot of hay everywhere, but
(30:39):
it'd be very noodly. It'd be cul-de-sac is actually
much more simplified than what Iwould have drawn it when I was
folder. It has like much bolder tools
using it. That goes back to why the marrow
pen was not cutting it because cul de sacs very bold and then
with that pen it was making everything very precise again
(31:00):
and it just didn't make sense. You know, it's it's it's yeah,
it's just different. It's, it's just in a different
direction and it's more bold, it's more big, it's more
spontaneous, you know, it's, youknow, I'll give another example
again for music like the first Iron Maiden record, which I love
(31:25):
to death. It's very noodly.
You know, it's very like, it's almost like a young man's thing
where it's like very noodly. You're going in with like every
little thing and I got to hit every chord.
You got these little things. And it's, it's quite different
even from something like Mark ofthe Beast, which came got that.
It wasn't that much that many more years.
But Mark of the Beast is a very different record from the very
(31:45):
first one. I mean, you can make that same
association with Metallica when you go from Kill Them All, Ride
the Lightning Puppets to justice.
Like they're going from, you know, just these power cord, you
know, thrashy, crazy fast songs to 8 minute intricate, well
thought out pieces of music. And some people think it got
(32:06):
worse, and some people think it got better.
Yeah. You know, I'm trying to remember
who said this quote. I I can't remember where I got
this quote from and, and I'm just paraphrasing, but it's
something to do with like the older you get, the more you
became a slave to style. I think they're talking about
how the older you get, you startappreciating form and then you
(32:28):
became slave to form, something of that nature.
But in youth, you don't give a shit about it, right?
You're not trying to. Perfect.
Anything. You're just trying to like, do
the thing, have fun, and like try all these different things
at once. Yeah, Yeah.
Well. You know, I, I do want to ask
you because a lot of people knowthat this piece exists, but you
(32:50):
know, your process on approaching something is one
thing for a comic, but what's the process of approaching a
piece of art like this? Well, but you had me draw jar.
Jar jar is stupid. It's pretty simple as the hat
man, you know, but like it was the only, it was the only way I
was going to have fun with that piece.
(33:10):
I, I don't even know what the hell of Darth Jar Jar is.
I mean, the only Star Wars movies I really, really like are
Star Wars an empire. I mean, I like Jedi, but I, I
think Jedi's like A6, you know, out of 10, but like, you know,
except for the space battle at the end.
But like, I only really like Empire and Star Wars.
(33:30):
So outside of that, I don't knowwhat anything is.
I don't care what anything is. I saw the prequels and I figured
this is my only time I'm ever going to Jar Jar Jar.
And like, that's what made it interesting to me.
That's, and surprisingly a lot of people liked it.
I didn't think anybody would care, quite frankly, you know?
Well, because you're talking about like a character that
(33:51):
whatever people think about, butdepicted in a way that nobody
has. And I think that's what really
sets you apart. And I look at your commissions
that you do for a lot of people.I've seen a lot of them in
person couple myself, but it's the approach of like this is
your style is to do something that you know out there what
(34:13):
whatever it is, and I think that's why everybody appreciates
it. I don't know if it's the, you
know, seppuku aspect of it that people appreciate, but I think
it's one of the reasons that theoriginal art world, the card
world, the people that collect are really taken aback by your
work because in a good way, because it's unlike anything,
(34:36):
you know, I mean, I can maybe name Warner.
I mean, the couple artists that you probably appreciate the most
in comics are the guys that anybody could say, oh, well,
I'll put this next to my St. Cabbage piece, or I'll put this
next to my Kent Williams piece. Or, you know that it's it's in a
way, in a style that doesn't really exist in comics.
I guess I still have no businesshanging up to those guys.
(34:58):
So, I mean, especially Kent, youknow, I mean, Bill, Bill's the
mover and Shake. Bill's the one who changed
everything. But right, Ken is just, I just
greatly admire how that guy draws and paints, you know?
I mean, you know, you go to the convention and I walk around.
(35:18):
I mean, really, there's not verymany people better, if there
even are, you know? I mean, it's, you know, I'm so
glad the Spiegel booth is alwaysthere so I could look at these
things at San Diego Comic Con. You know, it's the only time I
ever get to look at them, you know?
But yeah, I can. Something else, man.
Really. One of a one-of-a-kind.
(35:41):
Seriously. And seeing his art, obviously
when I was a kid on Havoc, Wolverine, Meltdown and a couple
other books, like I didn't understand it, just like I
didn't understand St. Cavage.
But as soon as I learned to appreciate art, I go look back
and I'm like, holy shit, how didthis even happen?
How did this get, you know, likethe green light?
Because it's so different, but in the best best way possible.
(36:06):
Yeah, it's, it's the simplicity of his line.
I mean, his paintings are a whole different thing, but the
simplicity of his line and his figure drawing is what I find
very interesting. It's hard to do that, you know,
it's like, you know, it's like out to drawing simple.
It's like the simpler you draw, the harder it is, you know.
(36:26):
So I always respect people that can do that.
Like, like I said, there's no context for it, but that loose
style that I enjoy doing that's very simple, it's actually very
hard. It's it's there's, there's like
out of like every 1015 drawings,I only get one good one.
You know it's hard to control. You know, and, and you're
(36:49):
obviously as most artists, rightfully so, you know, you're
a big critic of yourself and like, you know, you want your
stuff to look the way you want it.
But I've also seen you do these sketch cards for people, which I
know, you know, it's like not the easiest thing for you
because it's the size, but people are blown away by what
they get. And you know, I, I know you're
(37:09):
like, I don't, I, you don't really like drawing on sketch
cards, as you know. Yeah, I hope people like them.
It's not that I don't like drawing on them.
The size for me makes them extremely difficult.
You know, there's there's reallynot a lot of room to like move
around and because the paper small, I have to hold it like
this. And then it's, it's hard to be
(37:30):
like kind of free with your stroke, you know?
Yeah, yeah, I think your work definitely looks best on
anything that's larger. I mean, your covers,
commissions, you know that. It's just it's always nicer to
see when you have the room because I feel like, yeah,
you're free. You're free to do it the way you
want. I wanted to ask about the
(37:55):
cul-de-sac stuff, like your process.
Do you do thumbnails layouts like what on a page?
How does your? How do you construct the page
for a book like that? So there's extremely loose
thumbnails, so I at least know where I'm going with it, but the
thumbnails really don't mean much.
They're like literally circle squares, like not even like
(38:17):
stick figures much. It's just to like kind of get me
thinking about it. And the actual layout happens
when I look at the page and whenI look at the page, that's when
like it actually happens. And then I'll go through 5
pages, sometimes more at a time,and I just block everything in.
They're basically as loose as mythumbnails.
(38:37):
But the difference between beingwith the page is I'm actually
setting things up. That's the panel that's, excuse
me, that's where things are. And then I go through another
phase of tightening those. And when I say tighten, they're
still like extremely loose breakdowns.
I try to get as much as a form as possible and then once those
get approved, the inks is where everything's kind of figured
(39:00):
out. And that's the part where if I
had more structure, things wouldbe faster.
If I did like John, John do semikind of breakdowns where all the
structures there or Gil Kane, it'd make things much easier.
But I'm not that disciplined when it comes to penciling.
(39:20):
I don't under penciling doesn't speak to me in any way.
So I can't, I can't do pencilingbecause I can't.
It doesn't make it just doesn't speak to me.
There's no, there's nothing there.
So all the drawing happens in the inking, all the decision
making happens in the inking andthe inking is where there's
enough structure where I can decide.
(39:40):
That's where I move on with the color.
I try to make the everything look as good as possible on the
ink so they can't stand alone sothat the color is just an accent
and they're not necessarily carrying things so much.
But there are cases where I've tried to like really color and
ink less on the pages. The only issue is when that
(40:00):
process starts, it starts turning into a fully painted
book, which is not what I'm trying to do.
So more often than not, I'm trying to do most of most of the
work in the inking and the coloring.
Just this accents the. The ink, the inking disciplines,
the fact that yeah, you're not going to go full in.
Which is, you know, a lot of thefriends that we have that we
(40:23):
share are big fans of the inkingstage and, you know, call it a
lost art. You know, Sean Crystal talks
about it a lot and Mafu talks about it a lot.
And you know, Klaus there, you know, you hear him talking about
inking and it's like that's a real art form.
So it's nice to know that there's people still
concentrating on that aspect of it.
(40:43):
It's, you know, it's whatever works for you really.
It's whatever material you feel like expresses what you're
trying to do. Like I'm, I'm doing, I was doing
something just before I got on here.
I was doing it with a fountain pen because I was doing it to be
really fast. First of all, you don't even
save that much time using a fountain pen.
It's more of a laziness kind of thing.
But it, it really wasn't doing the effect I was doing.
(41:06):
So like I just put it to the side anytime I try to use any
kind of shortcut because this isnot what I'm doing, what I was
doing before. This is not an important thing,
you know, it's not a full illustration.
It's not something that you know, it's not, it's, it's not a
big deal. But whenever I use like these
frown pens, brush pens, all thatstuff like that, there's,
(41:29):
there's a, there's a disconnect there because first of all,
they're not that good. And then second of all, they're
just, you know, there's a tactile kind of texture to
everything else that nothing that offers convenience can
provide. And I say that out of experience
(41:50):
because I've used everything. It's very rare that somebody
recommends something to me that I haven't tried or I haven't
used. And yeah, there's just a for,
for me personally, for what I'm trying to accomplish with my
work, there's just a disconnect for me when I use those kind of
things. Interesting.
I mean, like you said, it's it'salso dependent on the person,
(42:11):
the artist, you know. Oh, absolutely.
I mean, yeah, it's whatever expresses what you're trying to
do. There's beautiful work done on
iPads. There's beautiful work on done
with markers. I mean Torata, you know, Torata
uses all markers and Torata doesincredible work.
Duncan, I'm going to say his name wrong.
(42:31):
Forgotto Forgetto for. Grado.
For Grado, he does amazing stuffwith markers that I think are
absolute garbage, but he, he outdraws me with these markers.
I mean, it doesn't matter what the tool is.
It's, you know, it's who the person is.
Obviously everybody knows that, you know.
Yeah, well, you know, there's a lot of people that think that
(42:52):
they know different, but yeah, it all boils down to the artist.
And everybody that's doing the art and creating the art will
exactly say it's all about the artist and not the tool, you
know? I guess the only thing I would
add to that is try every tool before you make your decision,
though I feel like there's not alot of that.
I feel like there's a. Piece of advice though.
(43:13):
Yeah, try, try everything and then make your decision.
Don't just try a few things and go like, oh, this is cool.
You know you might be missing out on something.
And that's a great piece of advice in general just for
living. Like try, you know, I, I did a
episode of this recently where Italked about like exploring food
when I was younger and trying sushi for the first time.
And then you're doing all these things for the first time.
(43:35):
Like, they made my life better. Even if there are things that
didn't stick, there's always going to be things that do
stick. And the things that you learn
that you tried and you loved, you know?
Yeah. I mean, this, this podcast in
general is me just trying something.
And here we are 60. You might be the 69th episode,
either 68th or 69th. I'd rather be 69, not like that.
(43:57):
You're a Comic Con. You'll be there, right?
I'll be in. You're a Comic Con, Yeah.
OK, Cul-de-sac issue 1 is going to be 5 or 6 or six days old
after this podcast comes out, but anything else in the works
with Dinesh or any other things you want to promote coming out
covers anything? No, not, not at the moment,
(44:21):
just, yeah, not at the moment. Maybe maybe trying to like kind
of wrap everything up. You know, we're trying to wrap
everything up and I think I needa little bit of a break after
this. It's been a, it's been a pretty,
pretty hectic like couple of years, yeah.
They know you've been. Held busy not just called a SEC,
which is like everything there'sall kinds of things going on.
(44:42):
So if I, I feel like I need a little bit of a moment to
recharge because there's, when you're really trying to be
creative, it's, you know, you want some time to sit around.
So I need some time to sit around and kind of figure things
out, you know, I hear. That well, hopefully good to see
you before OAX, but if not next February in Orlando, we'll do it
(45:05):
for a third year in a row. That's right.
So after the great show, I love going out there.
Oh. Yeah, I think I see nothing.
I see nothing but the hotel. Well, maybe I'll drag you out.
Well, maybe I'll drag you out toa coffee shop at some point
during the weekend next year. We'll grab some coffee during
the day, breakfast in the morning.
(45:26):
But all right, well, look, cul-de-sac is out as we speak.
Bad idea issue 2. It's a monthly or is it every
two? Months.
Monthly. Monthly.
Monthly, I believe. Yeah.
Yeah, Mike Carey, John Way Shack.
And you know, John, it's always a pleasure talking to you and I
wish that you have all the success with this book.
(45:47):
I'll do my part part in telling people to buy it.
All right. Thanks for having me.
Hope everybody likes it and thank you for all the support in
San Diego, everywhere else. You all know who you are and all
the new people. Thanks for coming.
By all right, friends. Well, I hope you enjoyed that
(46:09):
brief interview with John and I hope that you either pick up the
book or have picked up the book and read it.
The next issue comes out in September from Bad Idea.
I'd also like to tell you to watch my interview with Dinesh
Shamdasani from a few months ago.
He is the founder and CEO of BadIdea and we talked a lot about
his company and his ideas and what makes him enthused to
publish comics. Also, if you are watching this
(46:31):
on YouTube, once I hit 500 subscribers, I'm going to give
this McFarlane Spidey Jazz Hand Secret War statue away.
I'll be giving it away over on West Coast Avengers.
So just look for the post about the live stream where I just
give this away for free. And if you're new to the
podcast, I'd appreciate you subscribing on whatever platform
(46:52):
you're listening to. I'd also encourage you to rate
it on Spotify by scrolling up and giving it five stars or on
Apple by giving it five stars and a little blurb of a review.
And if you're watching this on YouTube, you can always hit the
like button, drop a comment, basically enter any interaction
with you. Helps me grow This podcast helps
me get more guests and stuff andthings right.
(47:15):
Anyway, my name is Dave. This is direct edition.
I hope you have a great week andI'll see you next week for
another great interview. All right, bye.
Welcome back to DIRECT Edition, a podcast about nothing and
everything. I'm your host, Dave.
It's me, Today's guest, a great interview with my buddy John
Wayshak. Wayshak is a artist and
illustrator and a mad scientist on paper.
He's got a new book out with BadIdea called Cul-de-sac, written
(00:32):
by legendary comic writer Mike Carey.
And you know, we had a nice chatabout it today.
I know John for probably around a decade at this point.
I met him through Dave Korea andAlex Pardee when he was part of
the Zero Friends collective. They had a show at Cotton Candy
Machine in Brooklyn, which is Tara Mcpherson's gallery.
(00:53):
And I had already known Dave andAlex, but I knew about Way Shack
and when I went there, I think Igot there the night they were
setting up and just hung out andgot to know him and ended up
buying a piece that weekend. And, you know, I'd see John
sporadically whenever I took trips to the Bay Area and always
a nice, nice time seeing him. And the thing that always stuck
(01:14):
out to me was whenever we'd talk, we'd talk about Todd
McFarlane and our mutual love growing up reading his comics.
And you know, it just, it's beennice to watch John's career grow
in the comics world. Seeing him at both of the OA XS
in Orlando and watching people have their mind blown looking at
his art and watching friends getcommissions from him, it really
(01:37):
made me happy. And, you know, I've been able to
support John over the years by buying a bunch of art and it's
just great to to watch his audience grow.
And that's why I brought him here today is to talk about the
book, but also to introduce him to some people that may not know
anything about him and his artwork and his story and how
much dedication that he puts into his art.
(02:00):
Earlier this year he had an issue of Violator through Image
Comics and, you know, McFarland Productions and a lot of people
really got to see his work on paper for the first time.
And now cul-de-sac coming, well,that's a whole new world.
cul-de-sac is already out as we speak.
You are hearing this podcast about five days after it was
(02:21):
released. So if you can pick it up at your
comic store still or have them moderate, I think you'll be
pleasantly surprised about this awesome vampire horror book that
he did with my Carrie. So without any further ado, I'm
going to bring to you my interview with the man they call
Rashak Rashak. Rashak, Rashak.
Rashak. Hi everybody, welcome back to
(02:49):
DIRECT Edition today. My guest.
It has a new book coming out from Bad Idea called cul-de-sac.
You know him from seeing him at the Oax videos and from the
covers he's done on Emory Warriors as well as of issue a
violator he did this year. And as Billy Joel said on
Anthony's song, Moving Out, who needs a house out in Hackensack?
(03:12):
Well, who needs a comic that's not done by Wayshack?
And I'm talking to John Wayshack.
Hey, how you doing man? Good, good.
I, I, you know Billy Joel's always on the brain as a Long
Islander, and you know, you, youthe last name rhymes.
Your last name rhymes with it. Would you believe I've never
heard of Billy Joel song? Come on, there's no possible
(03:32):
way. And you've been on this planet
for almost half a century and you've never heard of Billy Joel
song? It's we didn't start the fire
right. That is a Billy Joel song that
came out in the 90s. That was a very big hit.
That was the 90s. Yeah, that was like 90.
It might have been 89, but I'm pretty sure.
It was 90. Well, that's the only one I
know. And I just know that from like
(03:53):
quiet rock stations from back inthe day, right?
Because that, that wasn't on like mainstream radio, was it?
Oh, it was no, that was his. That was a big single.
I mean, you know, he had his singles and career in the 70s
and 80s, Piano man and with a big shot and, you know, all
these good, you know. I can go on and on.
But we're not going to talk about Billy Joel too much today,
(04:14):
but we are going to talk about your your new book.
But I wanted to ask how you justgot back from San Diego.
How was the Comic Con? Comic Con was great, Things went
really well. We did a panel for Bad Idea.
Of course, we got the Tiki Partyagain and seems like there are
more people than ever at the Tiki Party and it was just a
great time. A lot of a lot of cool people.
(04:35):
Did a signing at Mcfarland's booth for the Violator issue,
You know, we put out some printsand did some commissions.
Just crazy show just a lot. I mean it seems huge this year
and I and I and I always go and it just it just seems bigger
than normal this year. I don't know why.
I, you know, I was talking to Dave by the way Dave says hi.
(04:55):
I was talking to Dave today and,and we were talking about how
that Marvel not being there might have something to do with
the fact that everything had a little bit more room to breathe.
You know, they didn't have the Hall age panel, which brings in
X amount of people. Plus, I think on the bad idea
end a year ago, they didn't have, you know, planet death
hadn't come out yet. And with cul-de-sac right around
(05:17):
the corner like people are, there's blood in the water.
Let's just say, you know, like there's people that are looking
to be interested in these books right now.
Yeah, and I miss Dave. That's in San Diego.
I, I, I, I this Dave Korea we'retalking about.
I'm nothing without Dave. I've done X amount of shows and
(05:38):
still no a tablecloth and that'sbecause of Dave.
Dave always provides me with a tablecloth.
Dave is like the backbone to me and probably not Alex so much
anymore. But you know, Alex doesn't stuff
together. I don't.
I think that Alex also was Mr. Dave a little bit at calm this
year. That's safe to say.
(05:59):
But The thing is, is like by day2, your table looks like a, you
know, an atomic bomb hit it. And by day three you know your
table starts, or at least behindyour table starts to look a
little bit like the the trash compactor scene in A New Hope.
Yeah, I mean, normally I'm like in on the edge.
I was, I was given like a reallynice spot this year where
there's like a lot of foot traffic, but I'm just a big guy
(06:20):
and like I can't move once I'm behind the table.
So, but you know, what can you do?
Right. Well, so let me ask this because
obviously I mean for the listener that maybe not knowing
me at all. I've known John for about a
decade now and you know, over the course of just the last
year, the violator book, a bunchof the Emory Wars covers and
(06:44):
obviously cul-de-sac. Did you feel the, did you see a
change in the amount of people that approached you at your
table this year or did you see alot of people coming up to you
at the spawn signing the spawn booth signing, saying like, hey,
I didn't know who you were, but I saw this issue and I really
enjoyed it. Like did you get a lot of that
this year? I've been getting that in
(07:06):
general at the shows. I've been getting interest from
people who don't know my work, but I'm also getting a lot of
return people, which, you know, I'm always grateful for.
It's a, it's a nice mix, the spawn people, the people came
out of spawn signing. They're like some old friends
and then some new people as well.
But, but be quite honest, I justtry and talk to people.
(07:28):
It's when it comes to like analyzing things like that.
I'm, I'm terrible at it. And generally I prefer not to
know. So I don't, I really don't think
about it too much. I just try to give everybody my
attention and speak to them as much as I can, you know?
Sure, sure. Well, that's why you have people
like me that are happy to say that like over the year I've
(07:49):
watched more people being turnedonto your work and people
talking about it more and more and looking at it more and more.
So you know, I'll be the analyzer for you.
That's. That's There you go.
I hope so. I mean, it's cool, especially
since the work's getting so wild, almost too wild.
The the heavy metal stuff that I've been doing.
(08:09):
Issue 2, I think came out yesterday.
Yesterday. Yeah.
So that's been really cool because I'm really just
seriously left of my own devicesand those, strangely enough, I'm
almost to a point where I almostwant to pull back just because
everything's been so kinetic. But I'm not sure.
(08:30):
I mean, that's just me talking. That's just me talking off the
cuff. I'm sure a lot of people don't
know that I have a style that, you know, that's a very quick
sketch, like a very simple styleand it's actually very
enjoyable. So I find myself thinking about
like wanting to work in that vein more and more, but probably
(08:51):
not for the foreseeable future. Look, these are things, these
are me like talking out loud as I'm talking to you.
My process really is, is a lot of just I know when I sit there
and and cul de sacs probably a good example of that because
with cul-de-sac, I'm they're conscious.
I'm trying to make conscious changes where I'm just like I
(09:12):
want this to be this and I want to be this to be different and
I'll let pages sit. Reason being is I'm just like I
need to think about this. I need to figure it out.
But each time I've done that with cul-de-sac, nothing's come.
And for most of my work as well,that's generally not happens.
I'm trying to be even approaching my process
differently with cul-de-sac, butnothing comes and nothing gets
(09:34):
done on cul-de-sac until I sit down and do it, if that makes
any sense. So it does.
So there's no pre planning on mypart right now, unfortunately,
which which is, which is great, but it is nerve wracking and
sometimes doesn't work, you know?
Right. It's risky speed.
I mean, risky is is an interesting word.
(09:56):
Like cul-de-sac, which comes outAugust 6th.
Bad idea. Mike Carey is the scripter and
you're the artist and colorist. You've been working on this
project for several years, right?
Like it's been at least a year and change if not 2 to 3, right?
Yeah, it's been, it's been a while and it's allowed us to.
(10:16):
Originally it was a traditional comic and then it became
something a little bit Wilder. And then there's a certain point
where the book was colored. A friend of mine colored it
actually David Baron, and he fired himself.
It's he's he goes, he goes, you just fire me and just have
Waychat color it. And that's kind of the genesis.
(10:38):
And then, and then Dinesh saw mywork and he's like, why don't
you do it like this? You know, more like my
sketchbook for those of you who haven't seen it.
And that's kind of the genesis of where this comes.
So it's allowed us to like startthe book, go back and refine it
and make edits, which normally is a luxury you don't have with
comics. Usually you're working so fast.
(10:59):
Nothing, you can't do anything. You know, I've always wanted to
draw like a hundred 5200 pages and edit later, which we we were
able to edit, but we weren't able to go to that extreme on
cul-de-sac. I'm just talking about my own
fantasy project where like I go through and cut out pages almost
(11:20):
like a film and cut out entire sequences, you know, 20 page.
I don't think that's ever going to happen though, because
logistically it doesn't even make sense.
Yeah. Yeah, so let me ask you this
because I I was listening and watching.
I read the first issue today. I had a blast with it.
(11:43):
It it I wouldn't say it exactly has some twists, but it doesn't
go the way you expect it to go, which is, you know, different
than A twist. It's not a gimmick, but I feel
like this is a vampire story, but kind of unlike anything I've
read in a long time. When you got first got my script
did it. Was it super detailed?
Was it an outline, a plot outline?
(12:04):
Like what were your first thoughts when you were hired to
do this or when Dinesh and you talked about it?
First of all, I got the script from Mike and then Mike, the
script was great. You know what, what's really
great about Mike's script is it's really solid.
It's really well written. It's really well thought out.
It doesn't rely, you know, I know what you mean.
(12:27):
You're like, it doesn't go in the way you think.
Reason being his, he doesn't useany gimmicks.
It's all just solid writing. It's just, you know, what do we
need to get here? How do we explain this
character? And there's nothing, there's no
shortcuts, there's no gimmicks to it.
There's no like, oh, shock value.
It's like, how do I make a really great story?
(12:50):
And it's because the, the, the, the foundation is there.
That's what allows me to go off as much that I do on the
artwork. And while I'm have a heavy duty
focus on storytelling, it allowsme to break some of these
storytelling rules. And part of that is because we
have such a strong foundation that holds it all together.
(13:11):
It's kind of like an experimental band where you have
like some experimental guitar orwhatever it is you want to be,
but the bass holds it together. It's that thread that holds it
together. So it's because my script was so
great that I'm allowed to do these things.
If the script wasn't so strong and me doing my thing, it very
(13:33):
possibly goes into nonsense, youknow, or just.
Abstract like pure abstract. Which is fine.
I actually love that kind of stuff personally.
You know, that's why I love Eraserhead.
I was just going to say David Lynch.
Eraserhead is funny because I saw this is going to be hard to
put into context. When I was really young, like
(13:53):
21, I was working on something that was for me at the time,
extremely experimental, extremely bizarre, which my my
friends, when they saw pieces ofit, they actually laughed at me.
And they're like, what are you doing?
Like we don't get this. And I did the project.
People kind of understood more. It was very surreal.
(14:14):
It was very abstract. People understood more after it
was gone. I'm not saying it's great.
It was just a weird thing I did as a kid and it wasn't.
I saw a racer head maybe like a year later, and it was one of
those Eureka moments where, I mean, obviously nothing I did
was as good as that, but I was, it was the first time I felt
like, oh, that's what I was trying to do, right?
(14:36):
And especially in the early days, I really felt like I was
an island on my own. And it felt good.
It just, it sounds silly, but itfelt good that what I was
attempting, somebody else has done, you know?
So that's my connection forever with Eraserhead, you know,
outside of it being a brilliant film, you know?
(14:58):
Right. And you know, Lynch just being
brilliant overall. I think one of my Eureka moments
was seeing Lost Highway in the in the theater and like also
having that kind of same weird feeling like, oh, there's
somebody that makes movies that satisfy, satisfies my brain in a
way that I don't even understand.
Yeah. You know, but yeah, that's how I
(15:20):
felt about reading this first issue.
I, it's almost like a weaving path where it's it, you know,
I'm under, I know where I'm going, but I, I feel like every
turn I, I go, I'm like, oh, thisis unique or this is different
or this is a interesting take onthe story.
But your art for this issue, what really stuck out.
Obviously I knew you colored it so everything is chef's kiss,
(15:41):
but there's a lot of this book that you intentionally left
uncolored. There's a lot of black and white
in this book, certain triple panels, pieces of pages.
Can you take me through a littlebit of like that creative idea
of why leave some of it black and white and some of it, you
know, colored beautifully? Yeah, generally, generally a lot
(16:03):
of that happens is I'm attempting to control pacing.
And what I mean by attempting isbecause it's experimental nature
and because I'm going by a lot of like stream of consciousness
and gut feeling really, which bythe way, I don't recommend, you
know, if there's students here, I don't recommend that way to
work. I really don't.
(16:23):
It's something I kind of do, butit's not smart and it's time
consuming and it's kind of dumb.But anyway, the reason for a lot
of that is I try to keep when the actions going, what I'm
trying to just tell a story. I actually try to keep the
artwork simple. That way you kind of just move
(16:44):
on and you kind of just see it, you know, ABCD and then I tried
to do the color for like the bigmoments when I want to have a
full stop, you know, like, so then there'll be like a part
where it's like you'll see the, the character's face.
Like there are a few spots whereit's like fully painted, which,
which was never the intention ofthe book, to be honest there,
(17:05):
there was never an intention to have fully painted panels.
It just happened, but they're teeth.
They're I'm treating them as full stops to stop the pacing,
to get you to think or maybe something major happens.
And then again, it goes into black and white when I just want
to move the story along. Or sometimes in case of like
certain characters, I want them represented a certain way.
There's one character that I draw very loosely because that's
(17:30):
how I want to represent the character.
And I also, I also do it for audience participation, so they
can kind of fill in the blanks, which is, which is the way I've
always seen my style is like, I wanted people to participate in
it. That's why I leave things out.
I don't draw things or things are loose or things are obscure
(17:51):
because it's more interesting ifpeople are able to, like, fill
that in, you know, can do a lot of that.
Yeah. I'm a big fan of film noir, and
that was like a big thing of film noir, you know, leaving,
you know, of course. And it was like the restrictions
they had as well. But I felt like a lot of it was,
you know, effective. Yeah.
Yeah, it was, you know, there's certain things that I can think
(18:14):
of just color wise, like the thesun when they get to the
campground, it's beautiful colored.
But even you've always been ableto do Reds in a way that I don't
think I've ever seen. And one of the guys, the
soldiers, we'll call them soldiers, but the red on the the
goggles, I was like, man, I don't, you don't see red like
that. And I was reading this digitally
and you know, so it's, it's impressive how you're able to
(18:37):
very much use your color to takeus on a journey somewhere and
like you said, fill in kind of alot of it with our imaginations.
Yeah, I mean, I'm not trying to be realistic in any way.
That's not what I want it to be a comic too.
I want you to look at it and go like, that's a comic, you know?
(18:58):
So that's why there is that kindof intensity with the colors.
You can't get away with that anywhere else.
No, no, I mean that's why the comic medium is so special.
You're able to do things that you can on film, you can in
animation, you know, you can in video games, Anything
inspiration wise, like for you in the vampire genre that went
(19:20):
into any of the art, you know, anything that, that you're like,
Oh, I, you know, I love certain movie or certain comic about
vampires and I, I leaned on thatfor inspiration because not that
you're like, I can't really point to anything, but I was
just wondering. Actually no, nothing vampire
(19:41):
related. This book is influenced by
illustration more than anything,so there isn't really any genre
specific stuff I'm reference, referencing or even related to
it. The person that's always on my
mind and not that I'm referencing, I mean, I guess I'm
(20:04):
referencing it, but the person that's always on my mind is Bob
Peek for this work, the illustrator Bob Peek, because
Bob Peek probably next to Mark English art is probably.
One of the wildest illustrators and one of the best illustrators
there ever was. And I mean, not as experimental
as Mark English because he's berserk, but Bob Peek took all
(20:29):
kinds of wild chances as the mainstream illustrator and he he
left a lot of stuff unfinished as final illustration, whether
by intention or not. To be honest, I've never been
able to figure that out. Either way, it works, you know,
and I'm not, you know, I don't have his book next to it.
(20:50):
Then cul-de-sac might look better if I was referencing it
that way. But for this project in
particular, Bob Peek is the one who's always on my mind.
I guess that's who I'm trying tochannel, for lack of a better
term, but that's the one I keep thinking about.
I actually been meaning to meaning to get out his book and
(21:10):
go through it, and I haven't. I've left it on the shelf this
entire project, but I keep goinglike I should look at it.
But I know his work well enough.I keep thinking about his work.
So more than anything, I would say that's the biggest
inspiration by cul-de-sac on a visual level.
Cool. Well, I, it's, it's nice to know
that it's I, you know me. I love, love hearing about
(21:31):
people's influences. How many issues is this or is it
still? 5.
Issues, five issues. OK, so five issues, man, the the
story, I mean, I, I'm sure it was a treat just reading that,
you know that script the first time you got it?
Because I had fun reading this comic the first time I got it
and I can't wait to read it again.
(21:53):
What are you finished with all five issues in the coloring and
everything at this point? We're still going through
things, Yeah. But you know, but it's just,
it's just a lot of fun. Yeah, yeah.
You know, I, I feel like I have part ownership of the characters
(22:14):
right now. So I'm very, I'm very invested.
You know, a lot of people, a lotof comic artists and a lot of
people who talk about, you know,like kayfabe would talk about
certain artists that aren't ableto draw children.
But you've done it in like, I feel multiple, multiple projects
you've done and the children in this, which are the focus, at
(22:34):
least what it seems like at the end of this issue.
You know, they look like TV characters.
They look like kids that would have been on TV, like the stars
of shows, which they are, you know, in a way they stars of
this book. Is that, is that something that
you figured that you're like, you got down pat pretty quickly
with this book is like getting kids and making them not look
(22:56):
like horrendous monsters like comic artists have done like.
I mean, it's like any other project.
It takes about an issue for me to like kind of really get
things figured out. But I'm I'm the kids are the
most fun part for me to draw in this book, like all the monster
(23:16):
and all the blood and good stuff.
Like that's all great, but that's actually not my main
interest when I draw. I actually really enjoy drawing
the kids. And it's, it's when I was
growing up, I wanted to be a character designer for Saturday
morning cartoons. I had, I had no, yeah, I had no
interest in Disney cartoons. Like they didn't interest me in
(23:37):
any way. I watched a lot of Saturday
morning cartoons. So I wanted to be a character
designer. And I always consider myself a
cartoonist before an illustrator.
So the way I draw those kids is just the way I want to draw.
And I guess I've done it enough where it works, you know?
I mean, I guess make them cute. I do.
(24:00):
They're cute, but I I feel like you're.
When I see. You do faces and and figure work
and also distorting faces. There's a lot of emotion.
There's a lot of attitude. Like you draw almost every
character with some kind of attitude facially.
And I, it's something that I, until I was reading this book
that I really jumped out at me with the kids.
(24:20):
There's some attitude in those faces and that, yeah, it reminds
me of Saturday morning cartoon kids.
Yeah, if you can't relate to thebook, if you can't identify with
the kids, the kid, the book, that probably doesn't mean
anything. So like that's I'm trying to get
you to sympathize with them. And back to the Saturday morning
(24:42):
cart thing, The funniest thing about the Saturday morning
cartoons, there's a lot of like guys I really liked.
And I used to pause the credits so I'd know the names of these
guys. And one of the guys I really
liked at the time was the guy who did Captain and the Game
Master. I don't know his name anymore,
but he, and I mean this in the best way possible.
(25:03):
He was always interesting to me because he designed the ugliest
characters. But they're like kind of cool if
you remember that cartoon Captain and the Game Master.
And again, I mean, it's the bestway possible.
It's an ugly cartoon, but I always kind of.
Enjoyed. It, yeah, it was a Nintendo
thing. It's just a Nintendo commercial.
It's a Nintendo commercial. The characters had nothing to do
(25:24):
with the games, but you know, it's like whoever was writing
it, they didn't care. They had like Zelda and Lincoln
and at one point. But that's the example that
stands out to me. And I think it stands out.
It's not that it's like, you know, big influence on me.
It's just it's just with cul-de-sac for some reason.
I think about that because, likeI said again, I don't want to
insult artists in the best way possible.
(25:46):
I think the character design is so cool.
But I was always liked how ugly it was.
And I thought that was interesting because, you know,
especially in that world, it's aworld where everything's like
very pretty and very cute and more so today than back then,
you know, like back then I'm just like, oh, Disney's too
cute. Disney's too cute now
everything's cute, you know? So yeah, it's kind of different
(26:10):
now. Like everything is cute.
Yeah, nothing has nothing has ugly edges to it.
Nothing. Yeah.
I mean, yeah, I can't think of anything.
Yeah, you know, but it could be just a taste thing as well.
Yeah, it also could be a push back of like, you know, things
are a little bit more in the last 10 years, a little bit
(26:32):
scarier in the real, real world.So if we if everything's cute in
the fake world, maybe we won't think about the real world.
For anybody that's seen John at a convention or gotten to look
through your, your sketchbooks or anything and, and seeing what
your, you know, your personal work looks like, you do focus on
(26:57):
distorting a lot of faces and making things ugly.
And I think it's like you said, it's not something you see every
day. And I, I get it.
That's why your sketchbooks are so personal to you, even though
you share them with us all. Yeah, and also that's that
sketchbook style is hard to incorporate into comics because
a lot of that distortion requires physical space to draw.
(27:21):
And what I mean by that, it's bigger pages.
So having to distort and exaggerate in a 2 inch frame is
like near to impossible because there's just not enough room to
draw, you know, unless you want to take like a really tiny pen,
which I've done this stuff I've finished recently.
I used like a really tiny pen and I hate it.
I'm throwing it out. No, I use the the Japanese Maru
(27:44):
pen, which is what a lot of the Japanese like really detailed
guys use. I've used it before.
I haven't used it in a long time.
Otomo uses it and I read an interview where he doesn't he's
afraid of using it again. Not afraid, but he just treads
using it again. I know what he's saying like
it's, it's very, it's a very easy pen to draw, but it's just
a easy pen to use. But it's, it's very and it
(28:07):
allows me to draw like really fast.
Like that's the that's the attractive thing about it.
I can draw extremely fast with this gift pen and but it's just
it's not very expressive and it's very thin, you know, can.
You does it lend itself to doingintricate detail?
Like Like what what Tomo was doing in the backgrounds and
(28:28):
stuff or no, it's the opposite. It does.
It allows you to do like very thin detail, very fine detail.
And like I said, it's a great pen.
It's not what I'm looking for, but the the attractive part to
me is I can draw extremely fast with it.
I can draw faster with that pen than any other dip pen I have,
like faster and more accurate. But it's just not giving me what
(28:49):
I want, you know? Yeah, but I do that a lot.
I switch tools between pages. So it's actually a pretty common
thing for me to do something like this to a few pages and I'm
like, I'm not using this. And then watch, probably like
next month. I'll do I use it again, you
know? Does that, does that kind of
routine of switching stuff keep you from getting bored in a way?
(29:13):
Or is that? Or is it just you want to just
have it look a tiny bit different so you switch tools?
It's really not that thought out.
It's, I mean, I mean, I wish it's, it sounds so artsy fartsy,
but it's literally like decisions are made when I sit
down and look at the page. It's just, it's just natural.
(29:34):
Like I told that goes back to what I was saying about some of
those cul-de-sac pages. Like I'm trying to figure
something out and it just doesn't happen until I sit down.
And and like I said, the fully paint, like fully painted, like
some of the fully painted faces,like that was never the intent
ever, ever. That was never even a
consideration. Like I'm not painting, I'm not
(29:54):
painting. I'm not doing full painting in
this book. And it turns out there's a lot
of full painting in the book. And that's purely just what I
felt like doing. You know, it's something that
you you'd said about like suggesting younger cartoonist
not to do 30 years ago. If you had gotten this project,
how different not only do you think it would look, but how
(30:15):
different do you think you'd approach it or do you think you
would have approached it the same way?
It's just like sitting down and whatever happens, happens.
It's a different book. It would be a different book for
sure, because I would have been like more precise, for lack of
that's not the right term, but it would have been more noodly.
Or as the old guys say, there'd be a lot of hay everywhere, but
(30:39):
it'd be very noodly. It'd be cul-de-sac is actually
much more simplified than what Iwould have drawn it when I was
folder. It has like much bolder tools
using it. That goes back to why the marrow
pen was not cutting it because cul de sacs very bold and then
with that pen it was making everything very precise again
(31:00):
and it just didn't make sense. You know, it's it's it's yeah,
it's just different. It's, it's just in a different
direction and it's more bold, it's more big, it's more
spontaneous, you know, it's, youknow, I'll give another example
again for music like the first Iron Maiden record, which I love
(31:25):
to death. It's very noodly.
You know, it's very like, it's almost like a young man's thing
where it's like very noodly. You're going in with like every
little thing and I got to hit every chord.
You got these little things. And it's, it's quite different
even from something like Mark ofthe Beast, which came got that.
It wasn't that much that many more years.
But Mark of the Beast is a very different record from the very
(31:45):
first one. I mean, you can make that same
association with Metallica when you go from Kill Them All, Ride
the Lightning Puppets to justice.
Like they're going from, you know, just these power cord, you
know, thrashy, crazy fast songs to 8 minute intricate, well
thought out pieces of music. And some people think it got
(32:06):
worse, and some people think it got better.
Yeah. You know, I'm trying to remember
who said this quote. I I can't remember where I got
this quote from and, and I'm just paraphrasing, but it's
something to do with like the older you get, the more you
became a slave to style. I think they're talking about
how the older you get, you startappreciating form and then you
(32:28):
became slave to form, something of that nature.
But in youth, you don't give a shit about it, right?
You're not trying to. Perfect.
Anything. You're just trying to like, do
the thing, have fun, and like try all these different things
at once. Yeah, Yeah.
Well. You know, I, I do want to ask
you because a lot of people knowthat this piece exists, but you
(32:50):
know, your process on approaching something is one
thing for a comic, but what's the process of approaching a
piece of art like this? Well, but you had me draw jar.
Jar jar is stupid. It's pretty simple as the hat
man, you know, but like it was the only, it was the only way I
was going to have fun with that piece.
(33:10):
I, I don't even know what the hell of Darth Jar Jar is.
I mean, the only Star Wars movies I really, really like are
Star Wars an empire. I mean, I like Jedi, but I, I
think Jedi's like A6, you know, out of 10, but like, you know,
except for the space battle at the end.
But like, I only really like Empire and Star Wars.
(33:30):
So outside of that, I don't knowwhat anything is.
I don't care what anything is. I saw the prequels and I figured
this is my only time I'm ever going to Jar Jar Jar.
And like, that's what made it interesting to me.
That's, and surprisingly a lot of people liked it.
I didn't think anybody would care, quite frankly, you know?
Well, because you're talking about like a character that
(33:51):
whatever people think about, butdepicted in a way that nobody
has. And I think that's what really
sets you apart. And I look at your commissions
that you do for a lot of people.I've seen a lot of them in
person couple myself, but it's the approach of like this is
your style is to do something that you know out there what
(34:13):
whatever it is, and I think that's why everybody appreciates
it. I don't know if it's the, you
know, seppuku aspect of it that people appreciate, but I think
it's one of the reasons that theoriginal art world, the card
world, the people that collect are really taken aback by your
work because in a good way, because it's unlike anything,
(34:36):
you know, I mean, I can maybe name Warner.
I mean, the couple artists that you probably appreciate the most
in comics are the guys that anybody could say, oh, well,
I'll put this next to my St. Cabbage piece, or I'll put this
next to my Kent Williams piece. Or, you know that it's it's in a
way, in a style that doesn't really exist in comics.
I guess I still have no businesshanging up to those guys.
(34:58):
So, I mean, especially Kent, youknow, I mean, Bill, Bill's the
mover and Shake. Bill's the one who changed
everything. But right, Ken is just, I just
greatly admire how that guy draws and paints, you know?
I mean, you know, you go to the convention and I walk around.
(35:18):
I mean, really, there's not verymany people better, if there
even are, you know? I mean, it's, you know, I'm so
glad the Spiegel booth is alwaysthere so I could look at these
things at San Diego Comic Con. You know, it's the only time I
ever get to look at them, you know?
But yeah, I can. Something else, man.
Really. One of a one-of-a-kind.
(35:41):
Seriously. And seeing his art, obviously
when I was a kid on Havoc, Wolverine, Meltdown and a couple
other books, like I didn't understand it, just like I
didn't understand St. Cavage.
But as soon as I learned to appreciate art, I go look back
and I'm like, holy shit, how didthis even happen?
How did this get, you know, likethe green light?
Because it's so different, but in the best best way possible.
(36:06):
Yeah, it's, it's the simplicity of his line.
I mean, his paintings are a whole different thing, but the
simplicity of his line and his figure drawing is what I find
very interesting. It's hard to do that, you know,
it's like, you know, it's like out to drawing simple.
It's like the simpler you draw, the harder it is, you know.
(36:26):
So I always respect people that can do that.
Like, like I said, there's no context for it, but that loose
style that I enjoy doing that's very simple, it's actually very
hard. It's it's there's, there's like
out of like every 1015 drawings,I only get one good one.
You know it's hard to control. You know, and, and you're
(36:49):
obviously as most artists, rightfully so, you know, you're
a big critic of yourself and like, you know, you want your
stuff to look the way you want it.
But I've also seen you do these sketch cards for people, which I
know, you know, it's like not the easiest thing for you
because it's the size, but people are blown away by what
they get. And you know, I, I know you're
(37:09):
like, I don't, I, you don't really like drawing on sketch
cards, as you know. Yeah, I hope people like them.
It's not that I don't like drawing on them.
The size for me makes them extremely difficult.
You know, there's there's reallynot a lot of room to like move
around and because the paper small, I have to hold it like
this. And then it's, it's hard to be
(37:30):
like kind of free with your stroke, you know?
Yeah, yeah, I think your work definitely looks best on
anything that's larger. I mean, your covers,
commissions, you know that. It's just it's always nicer to
see when you have the room because I feel like, yeah,
you're free. You're free to do it the way you
want. I wanted to ask about the
(37:55):
cul-de-sac stuff, like your process.
Do you do thumbnails layouts like what on a page?
How does your? How do you construct the page
for a book like that? So there's extremely loose
thumbnails, so I at least know where I'm going with it, but the
thumbnails really don't mean much.
They're like literally circle squares, like not even like
(38:17):
stick figures much. It's just to like kind of get me
thinking about it. And the actual layout happens
when I look at the page and whenI look at the page, that's when
like it actually happens. And then I'll go through 5
pages, sometimes more at a time,and I just block everything in.
They're basically as loose as mythumbnails.
(38:37):
But the difference between beingwith the page is I'm actually
setting things up. That's the panel that's, excuse
me, that's where things are. And then I go through another
phase of tightening those. And when I say tighten, they're
still like extremely loose breakdowns.
I try to get as much as a form as possible and then once those
get approved, the inks is where everything's kind of figured
(39:00):
out. And that's the part where if I
had more structure, things wouldbe faster.
If I did like John, John do semikind of breakdowns where all the
structures there or Gil Kane, it'd make things much easier.
But I'm not that disciplined when it comes to penciling.
(39:20):
I don't under penciling doesn't speak to me in any way.
So I can't, I can't do pencilingbecause I can't.
It doesn't make it just doesn't speak to me.
There's no, there's nothing there.
So all the drawing happens in the inking, all the decision
making happens in the inking andthe inking is where there's
enough structure where I can decide.
(39:40):
That's where I move on with the color.
I try to make the everything look as good as possible on the
ink so they can't stand alone sothat the color is just an accent
and they're not necessarily carrying things so much.
But there are cases where I've tried to like really color and
ink less on the pages. The only issue is when that
(40:00):
process starts, it starts turning into a fully painted
book, which is not what I'm trying to do.
So more often than not, I'm trying to do most of most of the
work in the inking and the coloring.
Just this accents the. The ink, the inking disciplines,
the fact that yeah, you're not going to go full in.
Which is, you know, a lot of thefriends that we have that we
(40:23):
share are big fans of the inkingstage and, you know, call it a
lost art. You know, Sean Crystal talks
about it a lot and Mafu talks about it a lot.
And you know, Klaus there, you know, you hear him talking about
inking and it's like that's a real art form.
So it's nice to know that there's people still
concentrating on that aspect of it.
(40:43):
It's, you know, it's whatever works for you really.
It's whatever material you feel like expresses what you're
trying to do. Like I'm, I'm doing, I was doing
something just before I got on here.
I was doing it with a fountain pen because I was doing it to be
really fast. First of all, you don't even
save that much time using a fountain pen.
It's more of a laziness kind of thing.
But it, it really wasn't doing the effect I was doing.
(41:06):
So like I just put it to the side anytime I try to use any
kind of shortcut because this isnot what I'm doing, what I was
doing before. This is not an important thing,
you know, it's not a full illustration.
It's not something that you know, it's not, it's, it's not a
big deal. But whenever I use like these
frown pens, brush pens, all thatstuff like that, there's,
(41:29):
there's a, there's a disconnect there because first of all,
they're not that good. And then second of all, they're
just, you know, there's a tactile kind of texture to
everything else that nothing that offers convenience can
provide. And I say that out of experience
(41:50):
because I've used everything. It's very rare that somebody
recommends something to me that I haven't tried or I haven't
used. And yeah, there's just a for,
for me personally, for what I'm trying to accomplish with my
work, there's just a disconnect for me when I use those kind of
things. Interesting.
I mean, like you said, it's it'salso dependent on the person,
(42:11):
the artist, you know. Oh, absolutely.
I mean, yeah, it's whatever expresses what you're trying to
do. There's beautiful work done on
iPads. There's beautiful work on done
with markers. I mean Torata, you know, Torata
uses all markers and Torata doesincredible work.
Duncan, I'm going to say his name wrong.
(42:31):
Forgotto Forgetto for. Grado.
For Grado, he does amazing stuffwith markers that I think are
absolute garbage, but he, he outdraws me with these markers.
I mean, it doesn't matter what the tool is.
It's, you know, it's who the person is.
Obviously everybody knows that, you know.
Yeah, well, you know, there's a lot of people that think that
(42:52):
they know different, but yeah, it all boils down to the artist.
And everybody that's doing the art and creating the art will
exactly say it's all about the artist and not the tool, you
know? I guess the only thing I would
add to that is try every tool before you make your decision,
though I feel like there's not alot of that.
I feel like there's a. Piece of advice though.
(43:13):
Yeah, try, try everything and then make your decision.
Don't just try a few things and go like, oh, this is cool.
You know you might be missing out on something.
And that's a great piece of advice in general just for
living. Like try, you know, I, I did a
episode of this recently where Italked about like exploring food
when I was younger and trying sushi for the first time.
And then you're doing all these things for the first time.
(43:35):
Like, they made my life better. Even if there are things that
didn't stick, there's always going to be things that do
stick. And the things that you learn
that you tried and you loved, you know?
Yeah. I mean, this, this podcast in
general is me just trying something.
And here we are 60. You might be the 69th episode,
either 68th or 69th. I'd rather be 69, not like that.
(43:57):
You're a Comic Con. You'll be there, right?
I'll be in. You're a Comic Con, Yeah.
OK, Cul-de-sac issue 1 is going to be 5 or 6 or six days old
after this podcast comes out, but anything else in the works
with Dinesh or any other things you want to promote coming out
covers anything? No, not, not at the moment,
(44:21):
just, yeah, not at the moment. Maybe maybe trying to like kind
of wrap everything up. You know, we're trying to wrap
everything up and I think I needa little bit of a break after
this. It's been a, it's been a pretty,
pretty hectic like couple of years, yeah.
They know you've been. Held busy not just called a SEC,
which is like everything there'sall kinds of things going on.
(44:42):
So if I, I feel like I need a little bit of a moment to
recharge because there's, when you're really trying to be
creative, it's, you know, you want some time to sit around.
So I need some time to sit around and kind of figure things
out, you know, I hear. That well, hopefully good to see
you before OAX, but if not next February in Orlando, we'll do it
(45:05):
for a third year in a row. That's right.
So after the great show, I love going out there.
Oh. Yeah, I think I see nothing.
I see nothing but the hotel. Well, maybe I'll drag you out.
Well, maybe I'll drag you out toa coffee shop at some point
during the weekend next year. We'll grab some coffee during
the day, breakfast in the morning.
(45:26):
But all right, well, look, cul-de-sac is out as we speak.
Bad idea issue 2. It's a monthly or is it every
two? Months.
Monthly. Monthly.
Monthly, I believe. Yeah.
Yeah, Mike Carey, John Way Shack.
And you know, John, it's always a pleasure talking to you and I
wish that you have all the success with this book.
(45:47):
I'll do my part part in telling people to buy it.
All right. Thanks for having me.
Hope everybody likes it and thank you for all the support in
San Diego, everywhere else. You all know who you are and all
the new people. Thanks for coming.
By all right, friends. Well, I hope you enjoyed that
(46:09):
brief interview with John and I hope that you either pick up the
book or have picked up the book and read it.
The next issue comes out in September from Bad Idea.
I'd also like to tell you to watch my interview with Dinesh
Shamdasani from a few months ago.
He is the founder and CEO of BadIdea and we talked a lot about
his company and his ideas and what makes him enthused to
publish comics. Also, if you are watching this
(46:31):
on YouTube, once I hit 500 subscribers, I'm going to give
this McFarlane Spidey Jazz Hand Secret War statue away.
I'll be giving it away over on West Coast Avengers.
So just look for the post about the live stream where I just
give this away for free. And if you're new to the
podcast, I'd appreciate you subscribing on whatever platform
(46:52):
you're listening to. I'd also encourage you to rate
it on Spotify by scrolling up and giving it five stars or on
Apple by giving it five stars and a little blurb of a review.
And if you're watching this on YouTube, you can always hit the
like button, drop a comment, basically enter any interaction
with you. Helps me grow This podcast helps
me get more guests and stuff andthings right.
(47:15):
Anyway, my name is Dave. This is direct edition.
I hope you have a great week andI'll see you next week for
another great interview. All right, bye.
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