For those of you new to this experiment, welcome.
We've been doing this since March of '92, and some
interesting "conversation" has resulted. Folks from all over
the world have read this and asked Dave questions, often
following up from Dave's response to another person's. If
you've any questions for Dave, send them to me at
[jim ottaviani] at [um.cc.umich.edu]
(or [bv 446] at [cleveland.freenet.edu], though the umich address
above is much better for me) and I'll
forward them to Dave -- unless they're repeats of previous
questions, in which case you'll want to read the end of this
post to find out how to get those answers...
To let you new folks know what you'll get if you buy a
mini, I've started this posting with a sample of some
questions and answers from earlier installments.
***
Arthur C. Adams ([a--d--s] at [aplcen.apl.jhu.edu]) -- Is there
any reason Cerebus is an aardvark (story-wise), or
is it just a neat idea?
Dave Sim -- The original idea was to capitalize on the success of
Howard the Duck. There was an explosion of funny animal material
in the mid-seventies, but is consisted mostly of all funny
animal casts. I decided the success of Howard could be
attributed to the "funny animal in the world of humans" motif.
Of course by the time I was working on High Society, the larger
issue seemed to be alienation and its nature. Each of us has to
see ourselves as unique. We are all the single funny animal in
the world of humans. Each of us has something that sets us apart
or makes us feel as if we are set apart. Consequently there is,
again, a ready identification with Cerebus by the reader. Most
particularly since Cerebus is not a "winner" and most people
don't think that they are "winners" either. John Lennon
did not write "I'm a Loser" in a whimsical frame of mind I don't
think. The guy who used to come on stage with a toilet seat
around his neck and got into rock n roll because he couldn't
figure out how they DID that to Elvis probably got a clearer
look at the nature of karmic forces that I'm trying to document
in Cerebus than anyone else in living memory. "Instant Karma"
"No one, I think, is in my tree". Death must have come as quite
a relief.
Andrew Weiland ([aw 1 s] at [andrew.cmu.edu]) -- Where did [you] get
the idea for Weishaupt's bowl cannons in Church & State I?
Dave -- The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci, the guy who penciled
that brilliant run of Ghost Rider in the late nineteen seventies.
Jerry Sweet ([j n s] at [fernwood.mpk.ca.us]) -- Has anyone "seriously"
optioned Cerebus for an animated series recently? If you would
still like to see Cerebus done as an animated series someday, how
much control would you insist on exerting over such a project, say,
to prevent the perversions we see with typical Hanna-Barbera
cartoons?
Dave -- Oh, hey, Jer. Whussup? Hey I know you. You hang around
inside these contraptions, too, do you? Far out. Hey is Arthur C.
Adams, like, Art Adams? Artie, is that you? Everything is so
strange in here.
I never really intended to do Cerebus as an animated series. I like
the look of cels and backgrounds together which is why I did The
Animated Cerebus, but I am under no illusions as to what sort of
treatment I could expect to get from television and/or movies with
a character no one has heard of (We love the whole thing, Dave,
really we do. The guys in the art department think he should be a
light purple so he, you know, stands out). Taking option money
would be inviting the worst of the worst possible end result.
Besides no one in Hollywood would just buy the film rights, they'd
want all the vomitus corporate product food rights as well; what
they called at DC The Big Score (we could do a mini-series like
you're proposing and you'd make a few dollars and we'd make a
few dollars, but we think its a better idea to go for the Big Score).
Creators don't "insist" on anything. You take the money they give
you and tell everyone how happy you are. No corporation will ever
pay a creator enough to sue them successfully.
tyg ([t--g] at [hq.ileaf.com]) -- Why Aardvark Comment?
I enjoyed it when you printed
your responses, and I'd enjoy it if people commented on Cerebus,
but the vast amount of non-Cerebus related letters have me
skimming over it at extreme speed. Why not run more Single
Pages or other creative material, or even just drop the pages
entirely and lower the cost of the book a bit (or make more money
by dropping the pages and keeping the price the same; I doubt
anyone will drop the book if AC in its current form disappears).
Dave -- You can't please all of the people all of the time. I have
started answering the letters on the letters page again, but as soon
as people start criticizing me personally and being insulting again,
I'll stop again. You would be wrong in thinking that no one would
drop the book if Aardvark Comment was dropped. You just aren't
in the Aardvark Comment faction. You're in the Aardvark
Comments Sucks faction. The most notable trait of the two groups
is that they don't associate with each other and deny the other
faction's existence; except as isolated whining. Both groups are of
about equal size and feel very strongly that I'm the strongest
proponent of their views and if they just reason with me a little bit
I'll expand Aardvark Comment/cancel Aardvark Comment. May
you have fans some day.
tyg -- What's your opinion on the upcoming Image line, in terms of
it apparently being set up as sort of a "mainstream" Tundra? My
understanding is that Malibu is doing the grunt work of publishing,
but the creators will get very substantial percentages of profits.
Dave -- It is very much a mainstream Tundra. In the same way that
Taboo and Brat Pack are perceived as Tundra books, Spawn,
Youngblood and others will be known as Malibu books. If you
want to be an independent, you have to deal with the distributors
yourself and have the checks made payable to your company.
Otherwise you're just an employee of the company. The substantial
percentage of the profits is the key difference between Malibu and
Marvel as far as the industry is concerned. From the perspective of
the medium, the key difference is creative control. It remains to be
seen if McFarlane and Leifield and those guys have any fans of
their own beyond the bogus collector's item first issues. It was
conventional practice among dealers to cut orders on the Marvel
books they did as dramatically as possible after the number one. If
Spider-man (sans adjective) had made it to issue 50, it would
probably have had the same circulation as Cerebus (any dealers in
this thing want to back me up on this?). If they stick to four and
five issue mini-series, they might be able to fool all of the people
all of the time, but I doubt it.
Jeff Vogel ([j--og--l] at [jarthur.Claremont.EDU]) -- Read Sandman?
Whaddaya think?
Dave -- Sandman is brilliant. If DC would stop treating the artists
on the title as after-thoughts and interchangeable cogs in the
machinery it would have had the potential to be the best written
_and_ drawn title in recent memory. They're doing the same thing
they did with Swamp Thing; spoiling the writer shamelessly and
treating the artists like crustaceans. Why? No idea. The practice
dates back to Jerry Seigel and Joe Schuster evidently.
Pat Hall ([p--h--l] at [as.arizona.edu]) -- In #156 you mention
that _Misspent Youth_ is on your list of
top ten comics. I'm sure it's not a hard-and-fast list, but what might
some of your other favorites be?
Dave -- Hate, Naughty Bits, Sandman, Groo, Eisner's new stuff,
RFrom HellS, Flaming Carrot, Yahoo, Yummy Fur, Joe Matt's new
book which I forget the name of [Peepshow].
kreme ([k--e--e] at [isis.cs.du.edu]) -- Why don't you have access to
the Usenet? I would think it would be amusing for you to read
all these posts, especially if no one knew you were there!
:-)
Dave -- I really don't think computers are possible, so I
don't own one. It's already getting to be quite a chore just
to get through the morning mail every day. I'm sure you guys
will let me know if I miss anything important.
Hector Lee ([h k lee] at [magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu]) -- Do you plan
to have extra printings of the issues that are in between the
phone books, like issue 51 or the prologue to Jaka's Story,
etc.?
Dave -- At this point, I am planning a slim reprint volume
which would reprint the "in-between" stuff. Issue 51,
112/113, 137, 138, Demonhorn, the Silverspoon strips, "What
Happened Between Issues 20 and 21".
On the other hand, maybe it won't be _that_ slim. First we
have to get all of the "phone books" to the distributors by
the end of the year, so it would be 1993 at the earliest.
Jim Ottaviani (jim [o--v--i] at [um.cc.umich.edu]) -- Are there
any writers that you would like to draw for, or any artists
that you would like to write for? Not necessarily on Cerebus-
-in 2005, perhaps. Are there any past writers/artists that
you would have liked to work with had you been able (or even
aliveI)?
Dave -- I was thinking of offering to do the last issue of
_Sandman_ if Neil promises never to work for those Infernal
Bastards again. I haven't because I almost definitely
couldn't find the time and I'd probably develop a painful
rash and locusts would devour the back yard of the Off White
house. After 2004, I'd like to do a story with Alan Moore or
Neil Gaiman. I wish I had done more stories with Gene Day
when he was alive; you never know the clock is ticking, do
you? We always meant to have a picture taken of us together,
as well, but never got around to it.
Jeff Reilly ([j w reilly] at [mipos2.intel.com]) -- Dave, do you ever go
back and reread past Cerebus issues? Or are you always looking
forward to doing future issues?
Dave Sim -- The only time I really go back and read Cerebus back
issues is if I'm checking a story point or a costume design or
whatnot. On occasion I have found myself reading a bunch of
consecutive pages in the reprint volumes. It's always a funny
experience when I make myself laugh with a sequence I had
forgotten. I do try to keep the re-reading to a minimum so that
the Cerebus story-line is more like a real life and Cerebus'
life is like a life to me; remembering past events as opposed to
re-experiencing them.
***
Enough history, eh? Please check out the mini-comic ordering
info at the end of this, okay? Now here's installment VIII in
it's entirety.
***
RM ([bn 981] at [cleveland.Freenet.Edu]) -- Everyone remembers the
question of what happened between issues 20 and 21 and how
it finally was resolved. What I want to know is, why did
you decide to drop the plot that had been developed in the
previous issues, the planned attack on Palnu, and the
general who planned to overthrow Lord Julius after
successfully defending Palnu. It seemed that you had put a
great deal of effort into the story, introducing at least
four new characters. Yet the plot was dropped like a hot
potato.
Dave -- That was my first attempt at breaking from
traditional story-telling methods; the notion that you don't
develop a plot-line unless you intend it to figure
prominently in subsequent events. A giant step sideways and
dragging everyone along with me. The effect I hoped for was
a greater identification with Cerebus as a central figure
swept along by events. From the time I introduced Lord
Julius, the reader was given the impression of having the
traditional over-view of the story-line; dropping the story-
line was part of several efforts to make them feel as out of
place and out of touch as Cerebus.
Joe Gorde ([Joe Gorde] at [um.cc.umich.edu]) -- Hi Dave. Met you at
the Detroit stop, thanks for the Young Cerebus sketch!
Anyway, here are some questions I didn't have a chance to
ask you:
There are several scenes, especially during Church & State,
when Cerebus expresses a fear of "everyone laughing at"
him. Since this particular phrase is so recurrent, I was
wondering how much this insecurity serves as a
motivation for Cerebus' actions?
Dave -- I think it's a very human trait shared by everyone;
it's just magnified in those who quest after power. Which is
odd, if you think about it, because figures of power are
always the targets of the most merciless humor.
Joe -- In a Note From the President near the end of Church &
State, you say that Jaka's Story will have seven parts; what
happened to the other four?
Dave -- That was before I decided to play with the structure
of the story, alternating the text pieces with the central
story-line. At the time I said that, Jaka's Story was going
to be told sequentially and was going to include her life
after she left Palnu and before she met Cerebus; I'm now
saving those parts for a later date.
Joe -- Although you've repeatedly said that the book will
end with Cerebus' death in issue 300, and that you have a
good idea of the story-line to that point, how adamant are
you about the 300-issue rule? Put another way, what happens
if you hit issue 270 and you realize that in order to pace
the story properly you'll need to end at issue 294, or,
alternatively, extend it to issue 307? You're not setting a
hard-and-fast end-date for Mothers & Daughters ("about 50
issues", you've said) so why do so for the whole series?
Dave -- Why? Jeez, I don't know _why_. I think it would be
much harder to serve a prison sentence if they told you you
might get out in 2002 or it might be as late as 2005. There
are quirks to the story-line (what size and shape and
subject is that short one between Jaka's Story and Mothers &
Daughters wasn't resolved until very late in the day).
Mothers & Daughters is four very different one year boxes
with two issues on the end. Why? I don't know. Why did you
choose to wear that shirt today?
Joe -- In Mothers & Daughters, we see that the Roach is
aware of the chess game between Po and Cerebus. When did he
become omniscient?
Dave -- The Roach became omniscient on page 5 of issue 154.
He was also omniscient at several points in the latter part
of Church & State. Like anything else, I suspect that
omniscience is subject to entropy and gravitation. I trust
that's obscure enough an answer for you.
Ken Small ([k--s] at [psc.lsa.umich.edu]) -- Hi Dave- just saw you
in Royal Oak; thanks for the sketch. My question is: Are
the disembodiment's of Necross, Elrod and Claremont related?
It seems that all three died in Cerebus' presence, only to
come back as possessing spirits. Also, has the same thing
happened to Weisshaupt? Is that one of the reasons he called
for Cerebus at his deathbed?
Dave -- You're the first one to notice this. Go to the head
of the class. Weisshaupt was unaware of that effect except
at an unconscious level. Consciously, it was not the reason
he called for Cerebus. Unconsciously, it probably was.
Jim Ottaviani ([jim ottaviani] at [um.cc.umich.edu]) -- I found
your observation about Reformers not choosing who they
inspire in issue 160 excellent. Is this semi-
autobiographical and in part prompted by your experiences on
tour?
Dave -- It's pretty self evident if you contemplate any
relationship of Inspiration and Inspired. What Jesus would
think of the net effect of his attempts to reform orthodox
Judaism would be worth a book in itself.
***
Upcoming tour dates:
September 13
Washington, Ramada Hotel in Falls Church, VA -- Exit 10-A
at 495 (Closet of Comics in College Park, MD on September
11)
October 4
Phoenix, Omni Adams Hotel -- 111 North Central Ave.
(Atomic Comics in Mesa on October 3)
October 18
Seattle, The Red Lion Hotel -- 18740 Pacific Hwy. South
(Zanadu Comics -- Downtown on October 16, Zanadu Comics --
University District on October 17)
If you can make it, go to a tour stop and meet Dave -- both
he and the fans I met in Detroit were
cool/personable/interesting/fill-in-your-upbeat-adjective-
of-choice. And if you can afford original art, _by all means
go_: You know what Dave's pages look like in comic size.
They look even better full size in slightly glossy blacks on
illustration board. Worth a hell of a lot more than $100.
Too much cash? In perspective: That will barely get you a
mint New Mutants #87 these days. DonUt think about _that_
too hard or you might feel a bit ill.
***
And finally, I have a few of the Usenet interview
mini-comics left. Here's the original posting. The
Diamondback decks are of course LONG
gone -- the first six orders were for either 5 or 10 copies!
Thanks again for your interest.
>For those of you who read about this in rec.arts.comics or
>rec.arts.comics.misc, thanks for coming over. For those of
>you who didn't, here's part of what that message said:
>>
>> The mini-comic is finished, and is advertised for sale in
>> rec.arts.comics.marketplace. I won't tell you much about
>> it here since I dare not risk the flaming. What I will
say
>> is it turned out well, we sold a lot at Dave's Detroit
>> appearance, the first four orders of 5 (or more) will get
>> a free Diamondback deck, all proceeds go to the Comic
Book
>> Legal Defense Fund, and Dave said nice things about it.
>> Thanks again, Dave.
>>
>> Agh!
>> The flames are starting to lick at my heels. Better stop
>> for now. See you over in rec.arts.comics.marketplace.
>
>So, the Usenet interview of Dave Sim, held from March to
June
>of this year on rec.arts.comics, is now available in print
>form. It costs only one thin dollar, and includes the
>amazing origin letter and some fairly nifty artwork, if I
>do say so myself. To get your copies -- perfect for
friends,
>neighbors, and having Dave sign at tour stops -- send a
check
>for $1.62 (you can send cash but I may never get it and
>then you AND I will be mad) to
>
> Jim Ottaviani
> 1100 H.H. Dow Bldg.
Engineering Library
> University of Michigan
> Ann Arbor, MI 48109-2136
>
>(The extra 62 cents is for postage and an envelope.)
>
>Remember too that all proceeds (about 55 cents/book) go to
>the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund -- a worthy cause
>promoting creative freedom and fighting for your right to
>buy the comics you want.
>
>The first four orders of 5 or more will get a free
>Diamondback deck, for which I'll pick up the extra postage
>cost. If you live outside the U.S., please send me some
>extra money for stamps. I'll put anything above the
>mailing cost into the CBLDF fund.
Sorry to post the .marketplace message here, but I got at
least 20 responses from folks who don't receive that
newsgroup, and got tired of e-mailing my address to them.
By the way, I just wrote a check to the CBLDF for $100.93,
which is what I've collected so far (less my printing and
mailing costs)!
That's all (and no doubt quite enough) for now. I look
forward to your questions.
seeya
jimO
--