VALENTINO ON THE RETURN OF normalman

[MattBrady]

After a decade in limbo, Jim Valentino’s normalman returns in July from Image with a very timely 20th Anniversary Special. Considering what Valentino has been through in the past few months, “timely” is putting it lightly, as the special’s story puts a target squarely between the eyes of the industry, fans, retailers, conventions, pros, and publishers. There might be a kitten in there that gets away unscathed, but then again, it might be satirized as well.

For industry followers, the special will also be an interesting read as well for the fact that, according to Valentino, the story of his departure from the Publisher position at Image will be contained within the story.

We spoke with the creator about his book, nomalman, and the secrets contained therein.

Newsarama: First off, let’s hit the recap. For those who came in late, who is normalman?

Jim Valentino: normalman - always lower case to de-emphasize - was rocketed as a baby from the planet Arnold by his junior CPA father who believed the planet was going to explode. When it didn't, his wife shot him for shooting her baby into space! The rocket drifted for twenty years until it landed on the planet Levram - spell it backwards, where everyone and everything had super-powers, except him. Thus, he was the only normal man. He was befriended by Levram's most powerful being, Captain Everything, who has the ability to negate all known laws of physics but is so dumb he can forget how to fly in mid-flight, and is married to the beautiful Sophisticated Lady.

NRAMA: Historically, what kind of stories do you use him for?

JV: The original series was a love letter to the comics I grew up with--Silver-Age DC's and the early Marvel Age. It was, essentially, an outsider's view looking in, thus it concerned itself more with the conventions of the medium while telling a progressive narrative.

NRAMA: But it’s also your tool for satire, right?

JV: Right - later, as I became more entrenched in the biz, it became an insider's view of the industry and moved more towards satire than parody.

NRAMA: This is the first issue in a decade. Why’s it been so long between issues?

JV: You’re right - it's the first one in ten years, the last being the normalman-Megaton Man Special in August, 1994. As for why so long, I think it's just the nature of the beast.
The first series was a parody. The first story I did after that was a satire about a live action TV show that was to star Peter Scolari - he the non-Tom Hanks Bosom Buddy, as normalman, so it satirized Hollywood. The norm-Megs special satirized Image Comics and the industry as it existed a decade ago and this one, well, we'll get to it in a bit.

NRAMA: So in this issue, where do things pick up for normalman?

JV: This story just starts. There is no more Levram - that's the only piece of continuity I'm keeping--it was blown up in the 3-D Annual that ended the original series, but other than that, it's loose. Characters like norm, Cap, Sophie and Man-Man are in it. This one starts with Cap becoming the star of his own comic, hence the title "Captain Everything--Super-Star." It's a satire of "making it" in the wonderful world of funny books, if you will.

NRAMA: Given that you’re taking a very sharp look at the industry, and pubsihing through Image, …you’re really using that rule where the partners have no say in the content of each other’s books to the hilt, aren’t you?

JV: Well, that's just it, Image has no say in the content of any book it publishes, partner or not. But if you're asking me about sacred cows the only thing I have to say to that is they make great burgers!

NRAMA: Looking at the issue itself, you quickly move from broad, industry-wide satire to pointed barbs as norm and Captain Everything visit the San Diego Comic Con. How long has this story been stewing? Were you observing things from the Publisher’s chair, and saving them up?

JV: This particular book started percolating in October of last year. Eric Stephenson was trying to talk me into reprinting the whole oeuvre into a phone book sized Essential or something and I was reluctant to do that. The following day, oddly enough, a buddy of mine, Todd Tochioka was over at the house smoking some beers and told me that he thought that all of these horror stories I told him about other peoples' experiences and mine would make a great vehicle for a new normalman book.

I chewed on it for a few months, and then wrote the first half of the story in early January. I took a few days off in the middle of February - do the math, folks - to begin penciling it, then wrote the later half in the end of February, finishing the art in March.

NRAMA: Speaking of that mid-February math, realistically, is this something you could have written and drawn while you were Publisher of Image? I mean, you don’t see Paul Levitz or Joe Quesada coming out with satire books poking fun at each other’s companies and each other, personally…

JV: Well, as talented as both men are, I don't believe that either Paul or Joe do satire, but I do know what you mean. And my answer is, no--I fully intended to publish this book while sitting in the Publisher's chair. I figured, screw it.

Like I said earlier, satire can hold no sacred cows if it's to be effective. The wonderful thing about satire is that it gives you plausible deniability, "Oh, that isn't you!" "It's nothing personal" “It's just a joke." So, even if you piss somebody off, which I personally think the satirist has an obligation to do, they can't rail against it without looking thin-skinned at best.

NRAMA: Of all the adventures norm has with Captain Everything, are any drawn from your own experiences? For example, the appearance at a store with no guests, and a shop-owner who just wanted to go out to dinner?

JV: Yeah, actually that one is a real-life story that happened to an old friend of mine named Mark. I won't say his last name--but I was so outraged by the story I had to use it. The thing is that I know certain retailers are going to say that this is my view of all retailers, which is just ridiculous. It's my take on bad retailers. I have many retailer friends--Joe Ferrara, Joe Field, Bill Liebowitz, Chuck Rozanski, Brian Hibbs, Rory Root, Jim Hanley, tons more whom I respect and admire enormously.

But, back to the question, yeah a lot of this stuff comes from real life incidents the who and the where isn't relevant. The fact that ring so true is exactly what makes them funny.

NRAMA: So, how much of your personal, more recent history went into this?

JV: Uh...none. None at all. Only the names have been changed to project the indecent.

NRAMA: Taking the story as a whole, while funny, it is somewhat pessimistic in regards to the future of comics. Do you really see things in the way they’re shown here?

JV: I don't see it as pessimistic, although I guess it can be viewed that way. I see humor as being pragmatic. The humorist must project things as they are. It's that recognition of our own idiocy and foibles that make things funny. When the humorist points it out we recognize it within ourselves, but have enough of a distance from it that we can foist it onto others. I believe that is what makes us laugh.

NRAMA: So what’s next for normalman, as well as you, personally?

JV: A good friend of mine, Charles Brownstein, head of the CBLDF and I spent a drunken night plotting a new Captain Everything solo story - these plotting sessions only seem to happen when copious amounts of alcohol are consumed. This one concerns itself with a "reality show" called "Who Wants to Be the President?" Since Cap is the least qualified person in the universe--he wins!! This one will, obviously, be more political in nature.

Beyond that, I've written my first all-new ShadowHawk story since the aforementioned anniversary book and I have a new super-group in mind that I'm developing - all of these will be one-shots. I'm also working up my courage to finally finish A Touch of Silver as a graphic novel called Standing on the Corner of Four Dead-End Streets. It, of course, will be a musical comedy on paper.

Beside these comics projects I'm in the final discussion stages with a major book publisher about a prose book and I have ideas for about eight others on a wide variety of subjects, most of which are not comics related.

If I may, I would like to send dual congratulations to Dave Sim and Jeff Smith for finishing their magnum opus's on their terms and I'd like to say to OM--bud, this new book's for you, hope you enjoy it!

[from the gutter]

even if this book isnt for me, I am very happy its coming out. I love this! We need more comedy in this dark take on the industry that has been prevailing. Not that Im not a fan of Gotham Central or Catwoman (those torture scenes with Black Mask were brutal) but I also love(d) comics like What The!!! that were complety satire and made fun of everything.

[AlexLothos]

This isn't usually my cup of tea either, but I am curious about it...

[mrhelm]

Valentino is an awesome talent. I'm seriously looking forward to seeing what he'll do now that he can go back to semi-regularly creating comics.

[Ryan Scott Ottney]

Does anyone else remember ... oh, about 10-years ago ... there was an episode of DARKWING DUCK that pretty much did this exact same concept?

Darkwing was taken to a far away planet by the superpowerful (and super stupid) Comet Guy. Only, when he got to Comet Guy's homeworld of Mertz, he discovered that everyone had superpowers but him, and they needed him to be their new "ordinary guy," so they could have someone to save.
And the former "ordinary guy" was tired of always being "saved," so he turned into a supervillain.

I'm not saying normalman is a ripoff, however, because I really think it's just more coincindental.

[halflingsinger]

he won't be able to do more than four issues a year due to his new hand diagnosis.

[halflingsinger]

osteoarthritis






www.halflingmusic.com

[servo]

Originally posted by Ryan Scott Ottney
Does anyone else remember ... oh, about 10-years ago ... there was an episode of DARKWING DUCK that pretty much did this exact same concept?

Darkwing was taken to a far away planet by the superpowerful (and super stupid) Comet Guy. Only, when he got to Comet Guy's homeworld of Mertz, he discovered that everyone had superpowers but him, and they needed him to be their new "ordinary guy," so they could have someone to save.
And the former "ordinary guy" was tired of always being "saved," so he turned into a supervillain.

I'm not saying normalman is a ripoff, however, because I really think it's just more coincindental.

normalman is 20 years old - the Darkwing Duck episode was a ripoff/satire of norm, not the other way around.

[render man]

Originally posted by Ryan Scott Ottney
Does anyone else remember ... oh, about 10-years ago ... there was an episode of DARKWING DUCK that pretty much did this exact same concept?

Darkwing was taken to a far away planet by the superpowerful (and super stupid) Comet Guy. Only, when he got to Comet Guy's homeworld of Mertz, he discovered that everyone had superpowers but him, and they needed him to be their new "ordinary guy," so they could have someone to save.
And the former "ordinary guy" was tired of always being "saved," so he turned into a supervillain.

I'm not saying normalman is a ripoff, however, because I really think it's just more coincindental.

Only thing is, is that Normalman was around before Darkwing Duck, so if anything Darkwing Duck is making the ripoff, but most likely its a simple enough idea to be done by various peoples in various stories.

I'd be interested in checking this comic out as I havent picked up a normalman series in close to 10 to 15 years. Plus Valentino's art looks much better than it used to.

[CylverSaber]

I am in the beginning stages of osteoarthritis as such it hurts my hands to write, let alone draw. There is no way that I can return to "creative pursuits" on a regular basis, I'm only capable of producing perhaps one book per quarter, max.

*******

I chewed on it for a few months, and then wrote the first half of the story in early January. I took a few days off in the middle of February - do the math, folks - to begin penciling it, then wrote the later half in the end of February, finishing the art in March.

*******

A good friend of mine, Charles Brownstein, head of the CBLDF and I spent a drunken night plotting a new Captain Everything solo story - these plotting sessions only seem to happen when copious amounts of alcohol are consumed. This one concerns itself with a "reality show" called "Who Wants to Be the President?" Since Cap is the least qualified person in the universe--he wins!! This one will, obviously, be more political in nature.

Beyond that, I've written my first all-new ShadowHawk story since the aforementioned anniversary book and I have a new super-group in mind that I'm developing - all of these will be one-shots. I'm also working up my courage to finally finish A Touch of Silver as a graphic novel called Standing on the Corner of Four Dead-End Streets. It, of course, will be a musical comedy on paper.

Beside these comics projects I'm in the final discussion stages with a major book publisher about a prose book and I have ideas for about eight others on a wide variety of subjects, most of which are not comics related.

Well, good. I took his first statement to mean that he felt he was finished creatively, and I'm glad that's not the case. He isn't stopped, just slowed down. I'd rather see him creating than managing anyway. Jim, you were always my favorite of the Image partners. A real class act. Congrats on your return, and keep it coming.

[Chip]

I'm gonna check this out.

[MicroZone]

I used to read the original version of this. Great stuff.

[Scott Wherle]

Can't wait!

[Ryan Scott Ottney]

I think some of you are assuming I was either being sarcastic or that I was accusing Jim of stealing ideas from Disney.

That's honestly not the case. I really do think it was just a coincidence. I doubt either Jim or Disney stole anyone's ideas. I'm fairly confident that the ideas just overlapped on another.

I was just pointing out the similarities because it reminded me of that particular episode. So please lower your weapons before someone shoots something off that they'll regret later!

[Vyper]

Originally posted by Ryan Scott Ottney
Does anyone else remember ... oh, about 10-years ago ... there was an episode of DARKWING DUCK that pretty much did this exact same concept?

Darkwing was taken to a far away planet by the superpowerful (and super stupid) Comet Guy. Only, when he got to Comet Guy's homeworld of Mertz, he discovered that everyone had superpowers but him, and they needed him to be their new "ordinary guy," so they could have someone to save.
And the former "ordinary guy" was tired of always being "saved," so he turned into a supervillain.

I'm not saying normalman is a ripoff, however, because I really think it's just more coincindental.

I remember that episode!!! It was one of my favorites, along with the one where Darkwing ends up in a parallel world that Negaduck comes from. That's a classic

[FIG]

You know what, I don't buy satirical comics normally but I'm so stoked Jim is creating again and I really liked those pages that I'm buying this comic. I still remember Shadowhawk and really like dthe Walter McDaniel run. I wonder what hes up to?

[Erik K]

I'm just remembering that this was published a while back under the Aardvark-Vanaheim banner, before Dave Sim decided he should only be publishing Cerebus. I loved both that and Neil the Horse. Flaming Carrot was okay, but never my favorite. But I have real fond memories of the normalman series, so it's up to the attic I go in search of those issues.

[Raphe Cheli]

This is the stuff that I remember Jim Valentino doing -- when he moved over to Marvel to do his Guardians of the Galaxy, I was somewhat shocked (and disappointed). His hero work never did anything for me (especially Shadowhawk, which I thought was pretty terrible), but his humor and more personal work always had something there. I may just pick this up.

[Positive Man]

I loved the original normalman series, so this is very good news.

I can't wait.

[Hannibal Tabu]

Originally posted by MattBrady
Characters like norm, Cap, Sophie and Man-Man are in it.

Man-Man?

Whoa , wait a minute ... he can't possibly mean Man-Man, who was bitten by a radioactive man and has the proportional strength, speed and powers of a man.

If he's in, I'm in. That changes everything.

[Jim Valentino]

Originally posted by Hannibal Tabu
Man-Man?

Whoa , wait a minute ... he can't possibly mean Man-Man, who was bitten by a radioactive man and has the proportional strength, speed and powers of a man.

THAT'S really good!
Sounds like something that would have been in Megaton Man, though.

And FTR, I never saw Darkwing Duck, but I doubt they ripped me off. Superman in reverse, come on, I can't be the only person to have thought of that!

Jim

[djcoffman]

This is new to me, I'd heard stories about Jim's underground type work , or industry satire stuff but have never seen it. Looks good, I'll have to wait to see the thing in a chunk, but the industry is sorely lacking any industry satire at all--- Good satire can really "lighten the mood" -- hehehhe--

Thumbs up to Jim!

[J.R. Rand]

Well...my editor will kill me if I don't get this, but I was going to anyway.

[KristenS]

As one of the few people who have read this book in its entirety....I have to say it's guaranteed to make everyone smile at least ONCE!

I may be biased (being the editor) but I think Jim's wit and sarcasm are second to none. He's my idol, I can only hope to achieve somewhere near his level of sarcasm one day.

(And yes, Jason, I would kill you. )

[OM]

Jim Valentino sez:
and I'd like to say to OM--bud, this new book's for you, hope you enjoy it!

[blush]
...Aww, shucks! So that's what Matty was hinting at in that first part of this interview! Thanks ;-)
[/blush]

...For those curious, a few months back Jim had popped up on another thread, and I'd raised the notion of doing a new normalman mini, based on the fact that the industry had gone through a LOT of changes since he did the original one. Jim's reply hinted at something coming that would really appease my desire, but in no way did he hint that something like this was in the works. Hell, I'd figured it was a guest appearance in Spawn or Savage Dragon, which as bad luck would have it are two books I never buy :-P

...But yeah, if there's one book everyone needs to buy, it'll be this one, even if it only lives up to half of the storyline's promise to totally expose all the industry's sacred cows and other closet skeletons. And even then, it'll be worth it to see how Jim deals with the fact that Man-Man appears in this one-shot after he was killed when Levram was destroyed by Dark Fluffy begs explanation, but I'm sure it *has* to involve a magic bong...:-)