TheStandardComic.com

We’re less than a week away now from the release of The Standard #1  now, and publicity is starting to ramp up.  Part of that process has been doing interviews to promote the book.  First up is an interview I did with Richard Vasseur of Jazma Online, which can be found here:

Rich: How did you first become involved in writing comics?

John: For the longest time, I’ve loved writing, and I’ve loved comics, but it never occurred to me to put the two together. I finally got into it back in late 2008. I’d graduated from University, and a short film I’d written and had been planning to film had just fallen through, so I was looking for a new creative project to get involved in. At that point, an artist friend of mine approached me about writing a comic for him to draw. He was expecting a gritty noir-type story, and I ended up writing the first issue of The Standard instead! That particular collaboration never happened, but my interest in writing comics remained.

Rich: Why do you think “The Standard” will be a success?

John: I think that ultimately, people are interested in good stories, and I believe The Standard is a good story. But what really helps to set The Standard apart is how good it looks. Each member of the creative team has done a stellar job in ensuring that this is a comic that can proudly stand on the shelves right alongside any Marvel/DC title. I never wanted a comic that looked “good for an indie comic”, I wanted it to look good, full stop.

Rich: How did this comic go from digital to printed form?

John: The lion’s share of the credit for this has to go to Tyler James and the dedicated folks at ComixTribe, who have been hard at work promoting their publishing brand. It began with launching a successful micro-distribution network across America, and from there they managed to get Diamond’s interest. Beginning with Scam #1, ComixTribe managed to jump the hurdle of getting into Previews, and with it open itself up to potential worldwide distribution of its comics. Which feels like a big deal!

Rich: Who is the artist on “The Standard” and what do you think of their art?

John: The artist of The Standard is Jonathan Rector, and I think his art stinks! Haha, no, of course Jonathan Rector is brilliant. He’s the star of the book, in my opinion. It’s funny how often I’ve shown people copies of The Standard, and they get all excited: “Oh, are you the artist?” And you should see how their faces fall when I tell them I’m just the writer! Jon really is an ideal match for this book, and I was so lucky to have found him and brought him onboard this project. Not just because he’s an incredibly gifted artist who makes each page look spectacular, but because he’s just a fantastic, down-to-earth human being as well.

Rich: Can you describe the two men featured as the Standard?

John: Gilbert Graham is the original Standard, a classic, Golden/Silver Age style superhero from a bygone era. In the world of The Standard, Gilbert was the world’s first “real” superhero, complete with an old-school “meteorite/science lab explosion” origin. He was not a grim, tortured soul with a tragic backstory: he was just an inherently good man who became a superhero because he thought it was the right thing to do. The adventures he had in his heyday were light-hearted romps battling mad scientists, giant robots and colourful costumed baddies, apparently a product of a more innocent time.

Alex Thomas is Gilbert’s successor, the Standard of the modern age. Originally The Standard’s sidekick, Fabu-Lad, Alex took on the mantle of The Standard once Gilbert got too old for the gig and retired. But Alex is a very different kind of person than Gilbert. Soon afer becoming The Standard, Alex decided to publicly unmask and revamp his persona from masked vigilante to celebrity, trademarking the Standard brand and making a fortune from merchandise, sponsorship and TV deals. But behind all the fame and glory, Alex is haunted by the fear that he has lost sight of what being a hero truly is.

Rich: Who is the Corpse, what part does he play in “The Standard”?

John: I can’t reveal too much about The Corpse, as he’s something of a mystery man for the first half of the series. But I will say that The Corpse stands as a symbol of the darker, more morally murky world we live in today, where even the heroes are fearsome, shadowy figures. If The Standard is a hero that looks back with nostalgia of how our superheroes once were, The Corpse casts an ominous glance into the future and where our heroes may be headed.

Rich: Are there any moral lessons to be learned from “The Standard”?

John: Respect your elders!!!! But seriously, I don’t know if it’s a moral lesson as such, but I’ve long said that I see The Standard as a counterpoint to the idea that the superhero genre is some juvenile weak link holding the comic medium back, that it’s something we need to “fix”. Maybe it’s us that need “fixing”, if we’ve become so jaded and cynical that we can’t be inspired by heroism on a grand scale anymore. That’s what I want to do with The Standard: remind people how inherently AMAZING the idea of superheroes is, at its core. People who are super not just in their powers, but in their heart, who have an unerring GOODNESS that endures in the face of all hardship and doubt. My goal is to move people and to open their eyes to how special a superhero story can be.

Rich: How did you join Comixtribe?

John: That’s thanks largely to Steven Forbes, the editor of The Standard and my comics mentor. Once I’d finished scripting the final issue of the series, he put me in touch with Tyler James, who was co-founding ComixTribe with Steven. and recommended the comic as one of the upstart publisher’s starting lineup of comics. I was in a position where I could have embarked on the long, disheartening journey of trying to get a publisher interested in the book, or I could jump in at the ground floor with this emerging publisher filled to the brim with talented, passionate creators where I felt I had something to meaningfully contribute. Going for the latter option was an easy decision!

Rich: What will you be working on next?

John: The next project on the horizon for me is Black Leaf, a horror graphic novel drawn by the infinitely versatile Scottish artist Garry McLaughlin. It’s about a young boy from Glasgow who travels up to the Scottish Highlands to care for his ailing grandfather, only to discover these ancient supernatural forces in the woods that, as he soon learns, are not to be trifled with! I’m really excited about this project. Garry’s drawn a big chunk of it, and the pages he’s done look lovely. It’s a very different beast from The Standard, and it was an interesting challenge flexing different creative muscles. Looking further ahead, I have comics collaborations with a couple of other Scottish artists: talented newcomer Chris Connelly and Iain Laurie, one of my comic art heroes.

Rich: Who is Captain Clyde?

John: Captain Clyde is Glasgow’s greatest superhero, which probably makes him the world’s 537th greatest superhero.

Rich: What would you do if you had the Standard’s powers?

John: As much as I’d like to say I’d be a fearless, heroic do-gooder like Gilbert Graham, I imagine I’d end up being more like Alex Thomas. I’m sure if I woke up with amazing powers one day I’d rush to get myself a fabulous spandex costume and proclaim myself a “superhero”, but I’d probably still be too much of a wuss to get myself in real danger!

Rich: What other comics besides “The Standard” would you recommend?

John: I’d recommend Scam and The Red Ten, the other excellent comic titles from ComixTribe, as well as the publisher’s upcoming hardcover graphic novel, The Oxymoron . I’d also recommend No More Heroes, another ace superhero series by a Scottish writer, in this case Gordon McLean. Iain Laurie’s Horror Mountain is one of the best comics of 2012 – strange, horrifying and hilarious – and it’s a crime that more people haven’t read it and appreciated it. Orc Girl and Clockwork by Paul Allor are both stellar, as is Fall by Fabian Rangel Jr and Juan Romera. There are so many comics I could mention!

Rich: How can someone contact you?

John: The best way to reach me is probably via Twitter. My username is @johnlees927.

Rich: Any words for readers of “The Standard”?

John: Thanks for your patience! And thank you so much for your support and encouragement. It means so much to me and everyone else on Team Standard that this comic is being read and enjoyed, and that people want to know what happens next!

Next up is a slightly shorter, but no less enjoyable interview conducted by Chris Bennett of the Big Glasgow Comic Page, which can be found here:

Name: John Lees

Occupation: Comic book writer (“But I prefer the term, ‘dream-weaver’”)

Worst job you had before breaking into Comics: Grave-robber.

Main Influences: The scripts of murdered writers that I plagarise. Also: Grant Morrison, Jason Aaron, Scott Snyder, Vince Gilligan, David Lynch.

What have you been involved in? Several incidents of indecent exposure, and a fledgling crystal meth empire. Oh, you mean in terms of comics? I’m probably best known for “The Standard”, my debut comic series, which won the Scottish Independent Comic Book Award for Best Writer at last year’s Glasgow Comic Con. It’s a superhero drama about a superhero mantle carried on through two generations, with us jumping back and forth in time to see how the world has changed around this icon, and how that icon has changed with it. I’ve also got a story in “The Oxymoron”, a brilliant anthology hardcover telling tales of the diabolical villain from cult indy hit “The Red Ten”.

Top 5 heroes:
1. Batman
2. Swamp Thing
3. Superman
4. Iron Man
5. Commissioner Gordon

Top 5 villains:
1. The Joker
2. Lex Luthor
3. Loki
4. Two-Face
5. Doctor Octopus

What got you into Comics: As a reader, oh, I’ve been into comics forever. If I were to think back to my youngest years, though, I’d say my earliest love was Batman. The movies, the old TV show, the toys, the classic Animated Series… all of those fed into me moving onto Batman comics, and that opened me up to reading other comics, and the rest, as they say, is history. As a writer? I’d always loved comics, and I’d always loved writing, but never really thought to combine the two until late 2008. I’d not long graduated from University, and a short film project had fallen through, leaving me looking around for what to do with myself next. An artist friend of mine suggested I write a comic script for him to draw, and though that project never materialised, it got me fascinated in comics as a creative medium. And the rest, as they once again say, is history!

Favourite Comic Moment: Oh man, so so SO hard to choose just one. “He isn’t Alec Holland. He never will be Alec Holland. He never was Alec Holland” from “The Anatomy Lesson” in Alan Moore’s Swamp Thing springs immediately to mind. Or the heartbreaking moment with Death of the Endless and the baby in “The Sound of Her Wings” (“Is that it? Is that all I get?”) in Neil Gaiman’s The Sandman. Or the whole Joker/Batman funhouse showdown in “The Killing Joke”: my two favourite comic book characters at their most toweringly iconic!

Where can we see you next? Crimewatch? Barring that, “The Standard” gets its big Diamond release on 6th February, so if you haven’t jumped onboard for that yet, now’s your chance. The first 3 issues have already been released in Glasgow, and issue #4 will be on the way soon: Glasgow readers will be getting it before the rest of the world, that’s how much I love you guys! Further down the line, I’m working on “Black Leaf”, a horror graphic novel with Garry McLaughlin, which is written and currently being drawn up, with some publishers interested. I also have “Bad Sun” – a sci-fi thriller set in Glasgow, drawn by “Reality Wars” creator Chris Connelly – in development. And then there’s a project I’m collaborating on with Iain Laurie, one of my comic art heroes, which I’m very excited about. I’m hoping that at least some of these will be ready to share with you all at this summer’s Glasgow Comic Con!