THE CURRENT IMAGE: SPEARS & G ON REPO

[MattBrady]

by Benjamin Ong Pang Kean

This June, the team that brought you Teenagers From Mars and the artist of The Couriers would like to repossess your heart – if you’re a clone!

Created by Rick Spears and Rob G, Repo is an all-out action comedy from Image Comics about two small-time repo men named KD and Emil. Usually their job is repossessing cars from deadbeats who owe the wrong kind of people money. This time around, the job is different—the repo of an escaped clone’s heart.

Newsarama.com sat down with the creators for a chat about their new series as well as upcoming plans from Gigantic Graphic Novels, the Brooklyn-based press founded by Spears and G in 2005.

Newsarama: Rick and Rob, you guys had previously collaborated on the acclaimed series Teenagers From Mars, which Rick had once summed it up as “The Goonies meets Fight Club directed by John Hughes," and Dead West, a blending of spaghetti Western and zombie films. So, how did Repo come about then?

Rick Spears: Well, Rob and I are always talking about new stuff. Seriously, I already have a folder crammed with possible projects. I guess for my part I just wanted to do something really crazy fun and Rob is such a natural with the highly intensity action I knew I wanted to write him something he could really cut loose on --and so came Repo.

Rob G: We were talking on the phone about doing something that we could continue as an ongoing series, and also wanted to do something that had lots of action. And I think I was watching a lot of Lethal Weapon and Running Scared on TBS at the time. So all of those factors led to Repo.

NRAMA: Both Teenagers From Mars and Dead West were published by your publishing set-up, Gigantic Graphic Novels, right?

RS: Yep, both Teenagers From Mars and Dead West are published by Gigantic Graphic Novels.

NRAMA: The both of you turned to self-publishing in 2001 when you were unable to find a home for Teenagers From Mars. Since then, other than the two projects mentioned earlier, Gigantic had also put out James Callahan’s Rotting In Dirtville and Macon Blair and Joe Floods’ Hellcity. Now, I know that the both of you had contributed stories to the Image anthology, 24 Seven, and also an 8-page short in the new Belle & Sebastian Anthology, also published by Image, and Rick and Vasilis Lolos had produced Pirates of Coney Island as well. But how did Repo end up at Image Comics?

RS: Actually, Repo was at Image first. I got an email back from Robert Kirkman suggesting I talk to Image about possibly publishing something. So Rob and I worked up the Repo pitch and sent it in. Eric Stephenson at Image was just so damn cool about everything I pitched him The Pirates of Coney Island too. As it worked out with scheduling and everything Pirates just happen to come out first.

NRAMA: Does this mean that you guys have given up on the self-publishing business, an initiative that you once cited creative freedom as the whole point for you to venture into the world of self-publishing in the first place?

RS: Oh hell no! I like to joke that Gigantic is the small company with the big name. As things are I can only afford to put out 2 books a year there. Publishing through Image just allows me to do more books. See, now that Pirates and Repo are being published at Image, I was able to take the Gigantic money that would have been used for those books and do Rotting In Dirtville and Hellcity. Then if the day ever comes where Image gets tired of publishing Pirates and Repo, they will fold back into the Gigantic line.

Also, my diabolical plan is that now that I have the opportunity to publish through other companies like Image and soon Oni, I want to tap into those companies fan bases and enlighten them to the great books we are doing over at Gigantic. It’s working too. I loaded up the back of Pirates with ads for Teenagers From Mars and Dead West and Rotting in Dirtville and we’ve seen an increase in sales for those books as all the Image fans discover our little Gigantic part of the world. I also have a book called Black Metal with artist Chuck BB coming out from Oni this summer and hope to bring the Oni fans over to Gigantic, too.

We also have new Gigantic books on the way. We had a little bit of a set back when our book trade distributor PGW went bankrupt and that has shifted things around a bit but we will be publishing Hellcity Vol. 2 and my next graphic novel Hard Core with artist James Stokoe this year.

RG: I don’t think we’d ever give up self-publishing entirely. It’s nice to work for Image right now, let them do a lot of the heavy lifting on the sales side and allow us to concentrate on production. Not to mention the fact that we can do books in color, where as self-publishing in color is… ah… not feasible.

RS: Like I said, Image allows us to get more work out there. Image also brings us a bit more of a mainstream audience and those retailers that might not get past the front part of the Previews catalog. Image also prints in color which I just can’t afforded to do at Gigantic. And on top of it all, Image has been just amazingly awesome. They’ve allowed us to do the books exactly the way we wanted to do them, exactly the way we would have done them at Gigantic and I hope to do more projects with them in the future.

NRAMA: Where did the inspiration for Repo come from? Was it influenced by Dolly the Sheep or did movies that dealt with cloning such as Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Star Wars, Blade Runner and others provided inspiration for KD, Emil and the Clone Liberation Army?

RS: Well, obviously Repo Man was a big influence and to a bit of the cyberpunk stuff from Blade Runner. But also buddy action films like Lethal Weapon and Running Scared (not the new one but the Billy Crystal/Gregory Hines one).

RG: And Akira. The main goal is to make it fun and funny

NRAMA: Can you tell us more about the main leads, KD and Emil?

RS: KD is basically Keith David from They Live and Men at Work. He’s cool with a toothy grin, smart and effective but with a mean streak you don’t want to meet. He’s showing Emil the ropes and hoping to make one last big score so he can buy a boat and retire to Jamaica.

Emil is a punk-ass kid with a big mouth and quick temper. If Emil weren’t becoming a Repo man, he would most likely just be a straight up criminal. He also has a not-so-secret crush on Lola Bella of Cross-town Repossessions and their archenemy.

NRAMA: What about the Clone Liberation Army?

RS: The Clone Liberation Army is made up of escape soldier and sex clones who’ve liberated themselves and formed the C.L.A. to help other clones find freedom and resist the “unique individuals”.

NRAMA: Why do you think it would appeal to comic fans and the mainstream fans?

RS: I’d say this is our most mainstream book to date. Not to say it’s not our usually insanity but it’s just packaged in a sweeter pill. It’s a buddy action comedy kinda thing in the vein of Lethal Weapon and it’s packed with smack talking and car crashing and German magicians!

RG: We put a lot of thought into what we could do to make our book taste more “mainstream” which is generally difficult to define, but here it means that we were looking to use the rules of the craft to our advantage as opposed to doing whatever we want regardless of “how it’s done”. I don’t know if that makes any sense or answers the question.

RS: Rob and I are constantly evolving our working relationship. We talk all the time and really try to challenge each other to be better and Repo continues that. And Repo is quite an evolution for use in terms of production. Before, I was mainly writing film style screenplays and Rob was adapting that into comics but I’ve started paginating and breaking it down into panels. Then Rob works out the whole issue in what we call a “plot” which is basically a page-by-page sketch of the whole issue with lettering so we can read it and make any necessary changes. Rob and I are always trying to improve what we call the “third thing”. There’s writing and there’s art but it’s only the “third thing” that comes from putting those two parts together counts.

RG: One of the main differences I think is that usually we are telling a story that works toward a specific ending where everything is finished nicely, but with Repo, we are looking to tell a story that doesn’t really have a specific ending but something that could continue on if we wanted to, which is very new for us to do.

NRAMA: It’s obvious that Repo is a very personal project for the both of you…

RS: Well, every time I gotta write anything, it’s personal. I mean, these things are hard and they take up a lot of time and become sort of what you do with your life so they are always personal. I wouldn’t waste my time with just some ________.

RG: I really love it. At first, we were looking for an excuse to show dudes getting shot up, and to say some funny dialogue, but now that we’ve really put a lot of time into it I really am liking it more and more. Especially the character Lola, she’s really fun. As are the 2 Chinese brothers Ming and Ling.

NRAMA: In saying that, is the planned TFM trilogy still in the works? How’s that going?

RS: As for more TFM, after looking at our plans, we’ve trimmed it back to just one more mini series that will be called the Curse of the Teenagers From Mars. We’ve talked about it a lot and fans ask me all the time when it’s coming out but honestly we aren’t sure yet. I’ve been working on the story slowly in the background and it’s very wild and it really will turn the world of TFM on its head but it’s still developing. Rob and I both sort of made a promise not to just bang out a crappy sequel just because the first series was such a success. We’re taking our time with it and crafting a true sequel that will be worthy of the first series. I’m hoping if all works out it Curse of TFM will start in 2008.

NRAMA: So, guys, other than Curse of TFM and Repo, Rick’s got Black Metal and Hard Core. What about you, Rob?

RG: I’m working on a original graphic novel with Martian Manhunter writer Andy Leiberman. But we’re only just getting started on it so I can’t really say too much about it now. And of course, we’d like to keep Repo going for as long as we can.

NRAMA: On the Gigantic Graphic Novels front, have you found a new distributor for your books?

RS: As I said, we took a bit of a beating when PGW our book trade distributor filed bankruptcy. So, that has pushed all the Gigantic books back. However, we have signed with a new distributor, Perseus and were even able to regain a (small) portion of the money we were owed. But we are aiming to have Hellcity Vol. 2 and Hard Core out by years end or early 2008.

[chris genung]

This June, the team that brought you Teenagers From Mars and The Couriers would like to repossess your heart – if you’re a clone!

didn't Brian Wood write The Couriers?

[rickspears]

Yeah, thanks for pointing that out-- Of course the awesome Brian Wood wrote The Couriers with Rob G on the art. It was supposed to say, “and the artist of The Couriers” but that gaf was my bad. It came from an earlier poorly worded Repo press release that I’ve since corrected but seems to have snuck back in here. Sorry for the confusion. And if any of you out there haven’t checked out The Couriers do so it’s a great series of books.

-Rick
www.giganticgraphicnovels.com

[sexyjesus]

This looks great!

[Darquehex]

Curse of the Teenagers From Mars, FINALLY!

So Rick, you really like that whole "Liberation Army" name, don't ya?