[heroic music] ♪ ♪ ♪ >> Hello and welcome to Comic Culture.

I'm Terence Dollard, a professor in the Department of Mass Communication at the University of North Carolina at Pembroke.

My guests today are writer Joey Esposito and artist Sean Von Gorman.

Gentlemen, welcome to Comic Culture.

>> Great to be here.

Thanks for having us.

>> Great to be here.

>> You two are the creative team behind a fun new book called The Pedestrian.

So I was wondering if, Joey, if you could tell us a little bit about what The Pedestrian is about.

>> On the surface, The Pedestrian is a story about a hero who never breaks the law to fight crime, ostensibly protecting the citizens of Summer City.

But really underneath the surface, it's a character drama using the superhero structure that tells the story about an ancient war brewing linked to the secret history of street signs.

We like to call it sort of like a superhero Twin Peaks.

>> [LAUGH] I was struck by just how much lore there is in the, I was reading the trade, so I'm not sure how many issues it was originally.

But there's a lot of stuff that goes on in there.

And the way that you bring in superhero conventions into the unexpected, like you talk about the crossing guard is a member of a secret society.

So as you were coming up with these connections between street signs and superheroes, how are you sort of going back to maybe the books that you used to read that you really enjoyed and maybe something absurdist?

Like maybe you were a fan of Monty Python or the state or something, and that kind of influenced how you wanted to tell stories.

>> Yeah, I think we're both have a wide range of influences.

And we often talk about the pedestrian being something that we've poured everything that we love into and not just comic wise, but also television and fiction.

But in terms of the comic specifically, something that we talked a lot about was the early 90s era of Superman, the triangle era as they call it, surrounding the death of Superman and the return of Superman.

But what that era had was a really strong supporting cast of characters.

You had Clark and Lois, of course, but then there was all these peripheral characters.

And with four monthly books, their stories just were a little bit more involved than I think we're used to seeing today with superhero comics really sort of zone in on the characters themselves in a way that they didn't always.

And so we talked about that a lot and just sort of almost bringing what would traditionally be a supporting superhero cast into the forefront.

And the heroic stuff sort of happening around them or sort of underneath the surface or in the background as their lives are just continuing on in the face of all of it.

>> We tend to think of, especially if you watch like a Marvel movie, that third act, that big battle that is going to finally defeat Thanos.

But really most of the interesting part of those stories is what leads up to the characters saying, you know what, I've had enough, I'm going to stand up and do the right thing.

And we do kind of see that in the pedestrian because, I mean, honestly, the idea that a crossing guard is able to figure out right away, yes, I'm part of this ancient order.

It's fun the way you're stitching that together.

And I will use a very bad segue here to stitch over to Sean to talk about your approach to the art in The Pedestrian because, again, this is a book that has a sense of humor to it, but there's also that seriousness to it.

So how do you sort of bridge the gap between the traditional superheroic look and also perhaps something that's a little bit more realistic or something that lends itself to something that could be at times goofy and humorous?

>> I think I really wanted to have this feel like the real world that we're living in.

I didn't want it to feel like a comic.

There are comic tropes to it, but I wanted it to feel kind of like Ghostbusters where this is the world we're living in.

This isn't a wacky comedy except for this one thing.

I wanted it to seem what if someone actually put on a superhero costume and went out into the world?

And a lot of the thinking of that went into what would that look like if someone could just pick up something really quickly and put it on and kind of look like a superhero and then go out into the night?

And then what would they do?

Once someone puts their hands on somebody in the real world, you're going to jail.

So really a lot of this was put together during lockdown 2020.

So a lot of what we're seeing on television seeped into the mix as well of social justice, isolation, communities being separated by large corporations.

I wanted to bring that into this world and talk about these bigger ideas and this very simplistic good versus evil conversation.

>> And this story is set in a city and kind of like Metropolis, it's not a real city as far as I know.

So as you are sitting down and collaborating with Joey and thinking about what this city should look like and making it a character, how do you sort of find those little pieces that maybe are going to be a real part of what makes this story unique and another part that's just a car going by?

>> The visual aspects of this city I think are borrowed from Joey and my hometowns where, you know, there were neighborhoods that used to be very prominent and had fallen on hard times.

Businesses closed down, people moving away because it's no longer a good place to live and kind of bringing those aspects into the visuals here.

There's lots of businesses that are run down, people have stopped caring about this community.

They're not alive, they're just kind of existing.

>> It's also kind of fun to see the way you sort of design different things and Joey, I think this goes back to your script as well and I'll talk a little bit about how the two of you collaborate in a moment, but you have this recurring theme of pizza and pizza delivery and there's a commercial that pops through.

So, you know, Sean, as you are sitting there and you are coming up with maybe a logo for this pizza chain or what this shop should look like, how much of this is, it's just the pizza shop that I remember growing up, but how much of it is because it has to be part of this story, I need to put a hint in here on page two that by page 50, you're going to say, "Oh man, how did I miss that?"

>> It's not like one of the bigger chains, but pizza was definitely a very big thing for anyone growing up in the 90s, especially corporate pizza and there was definitely a bleed over in comics, especially in the early 90s with the popularity of the X-Men TV show for anyone who remembers going to a sit down Pizza Hut and also getting a VHS tape of the X-Men cartoon as well.

So that insidious aspect of you really want this mediocre pizza because we're really selling this to you and I've always loved the insidiousness of this pizza's better because we have better advertising.

The product isn't better, but we're a large business corporation and we're going to make you prefer our pizza better than the local pizza you have from the mom and pop shop making it down the block from you.

>> In a way, I mean, when I think about The Pedestrian, it is sort of the mom and pop comic compared to the big three that are I guess the Domino's and Papa John's of comics.

Now Joey, you are obviously working with a collaborative partner, so how do you sort of bridge between what you have in your mind and what Sean can bring to the project and what the two of you might hammer out during a discussion to put together a script that is uniquely you but also uniquely Sean?

>> Well, I think the magic of comics is that it's all born of collaboration.

Unless you're a solo creator doing everything yourself, every single, and even then, there's editors involved, there's marketing people involved, all that stuff goes into what a final product looks like.

But Sean and I have known each other for a long time, and so as far as collaborators go, we have a very fluid style, especially on The Pedestrian, which began, Sean presented me this character design he had come up with, a name.

I was like, "I don't know, do you think you can do anything with this?"

And I was like, "Yes," and I had a million ideas.

And then we just sort of go from there and I'll write a bunch of stuff, we'll talk about it, he'll give me his thoughts, they're like, "I was kind of thinking maybe this would be different here," and then I'll adjust until we're at a place where we're both happy, we're both saying what we want to say with the characters and with the story, and the end result is just something that neither of us would have arrived at without the other.

And I think that's why I love making comics, and that's what makes this project in particular so fun to work on, but also very meaningful to us.

>> There's a lot of work that has to go into creating a comic before you can actually start to create a comic, if that makes sense.

So in that time of, I guess, during the pandemic, during that lockdown, the two of you might be talking about this idea and how to put it all together.

How much work are you doing before you go to an editor or to a publisher and say, "Look, we've got this great idea"?

>> Too much, I would say.

Especially when you're starting out, and this hasn't changed.

Pedestrian's done pretty well for us, but it's still, every project you see, the book coming out is the tip of the iceberg, and then underneath the water is just all the heavy lifting that's gone into it from not just writing the script and drawing the pages, it's developing a pitch deck, it's developing a pitch proposal that does a complete synopsis of everything that happens issue to issue.

It's doing character designs, it's doing a marketing beat sheet so we can show people that we know how to sell this book, because that is, you know, our book is a little bit weird.

It was a question that came up time and again, it's like, "We love this, but we don't know how to sell it."

And so eventually we just came up with that plan ourselves, and we're like, "And here are some ideas on how to sell this."

So there's a lot of unpaid heavy lifting that goes into any project, but for us, this was a big one.

It's definitely the most persistent I've felt we've been in a project, and really validating to have it finally come out, and people seem to dig it, you know?

>> It is a fun read.

The story is very clever.

The art is very slick, and again, storytelling is clear and a lot of fun to read through.

And Sean, I'm just wondering, you know, you are an artist.

You are working at a drawing board or a table, a tablet all day.

How do you balance your schedule so that you can maybe take care of the stuff that pays the bills, but also work on this project that means so much to you, and still have time to, I don't know, sleep?

>> I do have a day job where I work full-time at a day job.

I have a family, a beautiful wife and two kids.

And the thing I try to do is I always try to chase the things that will make me happy, and I don't try to chase down projects for a paycheck.

I only try and work on things that I would enjoy or think I could bring something to.

Sometimes there's a balance between that.

Maybe sometimes it will be like a high-profile thing where, you know, I'm working on a book with a rapper right now.

I've got another project in development with some acting talent.

But at the core of it, it's things that are weird that I think I could bring something to.

I don't see myself as a traditional comic artist.

I don't see myself as the big two DC/Marvel guy, although we do have some ideas for those if you're watching DC or Marvel.

I found it's best to not get yourself in a situation or work on a project that is not going to bring you joy.

The projects that only give you a decent paycheck are always the most soul-crushing, and it's very hard to, you know, inspire that within yourself to get that juice flowing when your mental health is so dependent on getting that workout that you should only chase things that you think are going to make you happy.

Don't chase the awards.

Make the awards chase you.

>> Joey mentioned that you came to him with a sketch of the pedestrian, and yet in this book, the pedestrian is featured probably the least out of all of the characters.

I mean, he is there, and he is driving the action in so much as the other characters are doing something to find out, to solve a mystery, essentially.

So once you create this character, and I mean, on the surface, it does seem a little one-note, but you're able to build this universe around it that suddenly it's this symphony.

So when you are sitting down and you start creating with Joey, how do you start approaching the different characters and the world that they live in, so that way you've got a character who is a villain who is really compelling and speaks to you, and then, you know, a crossing guard who's really compelling and speaks to you?

>> Yeah, I did have, you know, just the initial idea of the image of the fella walking around in a white suit, thinking, what if there was a character sort of like the Flash, but doesn't really run particularly fast?

Maybe just walks really well, sort of like, take like a New York City kid, put them in the suburbs, like they could walk that 7-Eleven, and that would be seen as a superpower.

And I had the design, had the name, The Pedestrian, and justice has the right of way, an idea of like, maybe he just walks at real time chasing down people, and not more than, you know, maybe would work for maybe like a comic strip or a couple of bits.

Remembering a couple years ago, Joey and I worked on a book called Pawn Shop, which was a day in the life in New York City, four different perspectives, and each chapter was a different perspective of the events of that day.

And remembering how great Joey was at writing these really rich, believable characters, that's when I brought this to Joey to say, do you think you could do something with this?

And he had lots of ideas.

We started talking a little bit, and then lockdown happened, and then we had a chance to really kind of work on this unencumbered, thinking pawns aren't a thing anymore, what are we going to do now?

And also remembering that after Pawn Shop had come out, it had been an indie darling, it had got a little bit of heat for us, but that next project never really took off, where Joey mentioned a lot of the work, most of the work you do for the project comes in the pitch.

So you're essentially making the book, but only producing six pages of it, and then waiting for permission from a publisher to go ahead and make that thing.

We didn't want to do that anymore.

So we said, F those guys, you can either help us out or get out of our way, we're making this book, and no one's going to stop us.

And we worked on it in secret for a year.

We didn't show anyone, just a pure, creative vacuum, where we produced probably the first two and a half pages of content of what would be the first two print issues before we even started showing it to anybody.

At the end of that, we were like, this is pretty good, let's not just put this out, let's show this to every publisher we can.

And showing this to other creatives like Mike Allred, Dean Hathaspiel, both dug it and said they would do covers for us.

And then we showed it to every single publisher looking at pitches at the time.

We either had contacts or we kicked doors open, we did the legwork of getting those contacts, everyone passed, where we got to a point where we were at C2E2 a couple years ago having dinner, like what are we doing here?

And then we were just like, you know, the publisher we need doesn't exist yet.

And then shortly later, that's when Magma Comics started existing and Bobby, who was at IDW, who saw pedestrian back when he was at IDW, that was our first publisher we pitched it to, in a very roundabout way of having to go on this journey and develop this work and develop what we were doing with this.

We sold a six-page ashcan of just the first little bit for $10 a pop at shows for years, where we either sold or gave away three to 400 copies of this thing to other creators and shops and building up this goodwill before it ever became a thing.

>> There's a whole other side of comics beyond what we consumers get to learn about.

And I do want to touch a little bit about, Joey, you mentioned a pitch deck.

And I'm wondering, you know, for those of us who are on the other side of that world, what do you mean by a pitch deck?

>> Really, it's just a docu...

I mean, I say deck because I did work in the corporate world for a little while and I'm working on weeding those words, that corporate jargon, out of my body, but unfortunately it slipped through.

But in comics, at least the way that I do it... Well, first I should say, there's no standard for scripts, there's no standard for what pitches should look like in the same way that there is a standard screenplay format.

It's sort of a little bit more loosey-goosey, which I enjoy, so you can kind of like figure out what works best for you and how to get your ideas across.

But for me, a pitch document, you know, breaks down all the elements.

It'll have a log line that's just sort of like a really basic one-sentence summary of the plot.

And then it'll sort of go into the story, what the story is.

And publishers want to know the whole thing.

You know, you don't have to get into super big detail, but they want to know that you have a plan beyond like one solid issue number one.

And so the pitch just really lays out all the characters, all the plot beats, it shows off the art or any concept art that you have.

Or in our case, we had a lot of fantastic covers already, so that I think also helped us bolster sort of the project with like, "Hey look, we have a Mike Albright cover, that's cool."

And that's more work that the publisher doesn't have to do for themselves, you know?

So it's just really just putting all those assets together in a way that would get a reader, in this case, the editors, the marketing people, the publishers, excited about what story you're trying to tell.

>> If you are a writer, if you are an artist, you might not necessarily have the business mindset.

And I know you both mentioned that you had worked in other arenas before, and may still.

So at what point do you have to become more of an administrator and less of a creator in order to get this book out?

And what sort of things do other people need to do if they're interested in doing this?

What should be something that they focus on to make this successful?

I guess I'll throw this back to Joey.

>> I would say, so I made the mistake of really only focusing on the creation part, like from the get-go, but I would encourage anyone who's starting out to really start with treating it as a business, treating it as though you're self-employed, and making sure that you have an entertainment lawyer who can look over contracts.

Even if it's your very first contract, yes, it's exciting.

You just want to slap your name on there because someone wants to make your thing.

But there's a lot of predatory contracts in comics specifically.

So I would encourage anyone to just really save up and spend the dough to have a lawyer look it over because it will be worth it in the long run.

And you'll learn a lot.

And I think that goes a long way as you make your way through the business side of the industry.

Because we've both been doing this for over 15 years, but it's really only in the last few where I've fielded more work for higher opportunities and gotten more opportunities to pitch my creator on work.

And I feel as though the growth that I've had in the 10 years previous to that of learning the ins and outs of contract negotiations and lawyers and all that stuff has really helped me in the position that I'm in now.

So I think starting early with that stuff and trying to understand it is only going to be beneficial for you in the long run.

>> Sean, I mean, again, as somebody who is a lot of times, you know, when you work, you're working in an isolated environment.

To get out and put your mind into this, I've got to protect my IP.

How much sort of planning and research do you need to do to make sure that you are protecting your work before somebody who might be predatory is deciding, oh, you didn't sign that just right.

So now I'm going to, you know, yoink, make it, it's mine now.

>> Well, we've had some bad deals in our careers.

We've had, we've gotten screwed by small indie publishers in the past.

People saying that, yeah, we're going to do this, this, and this, it's going to be great.

And then those things never really paying off.

And that's been kind of the great thing of working with Magma Comics is that they've never lied to us.

They've always been very straightforward.

Whereas a lot of times you're dealing with a small comic publisher there's a sort of Godfather mentality where they treat it like they're working in the mob of there's a secret plan that only we know about.

You just can't even fathom all the things that we're doing because we're the puppet masters.

So if someone's lying to you, you kind of, you can kind of feel that something doesn't make sense and kind of go with that instinct.

Because if it's a small indie publisher, like nine times out of 10, it's probably a lie or it's, it's a wish that they have, but they don't have the juice to fill.

I've become known as a strong, you know, personal promoter of my work, of getting the word out through social media, through locking myself to the outside of comic shops, breaking out of straight jackets, kind of doing everything that I can to get the word out about what I'm doing.

Because every aspect of the back end of this, I feel is part of the art.

The pitching is part of the art.

The content you generate to put on social media is part of the art.

The way you present yourself and pitch yourself to other editors at shows is part of the art.

But at the end of the day, you yourself are the product that you're, that you're producing.

Like Sean Van Gorman and Joey Esposito are making a book.

I want to read that book.

Sean Van Gorman and Joey Esposito are writing Superman.

I need to read that version of Superman because of what we bring to the table that other people do not bring, and being able to communicate and deliver on these promises that you make to yourself and to your editors and to your fans.

>> And, you know, I think a lot of people just tend to think about the comic as it comes out and not about the hard work that goes into just even getting it to that point.

But you do mention, you know, a lot of times we will follow a creative team from book to book, even if we don't necessarily think that that would fit right.

So I'm thinking of Geffen, DeMatteis, and Maguire going from the Justice League to the Defenders over at Marvel.

And I read that book because I love those creators, and I would follow them on just about anything.

So, you know, as you are creating this brand, how do you sort of, and again, it's tough in this era of digital media, you have a lot of ways to get your word out, but you also have a lot of people doing the same thing.

So how do you sort of use social media to cut through those clutters, to cut through that clutter and reach out to that group of people who are going to be interested in what you have to do?

And as bad as it sounds, we have about three minutes in our conversation.

So you can take it from there.

>> In all things, it's a matter of being different.

How are you different from other people?

Making things that are engaging on their own merit, like we put together like a fake toy commercial, 'cause we thought that would be fun.

We put together an animated trailer where I taught myself how to hand draw animation.

And on top of that, you think you're screaming into a vacuum sometimes, but people do see the things you put out and they'll see what shows, be like, I really love that toy commercial.

I really love that video you did.

Because everything in comics is a business of goodwill, where you're talking about following creators from different books.

That's goodwill that they've built up from all the projects that they've made.

Maybe you met them at a show and they were nice to you, and you're gonna keep following and supporting those people.

'Cause as soon as you're to somebody or you do something that cashes in or sours the goodwill that you've done in this business, you're done.

And you're never gonna get those people back.

So you just have to remember to show your appreciation for the people who read your work and support your stuff.

And if you're watching, thank you so much for your support, especially to viewers like you and all the people who read our books.

Because we would not be able to put these out until you pick them up.

And thank you.

>> Joey, if the folks at home wanted to find out more about you or The Pedestrian, where can they find you online?

>>You can visit my website at joeyesposito.com.

I'm also on the socials, on Blue Sky and Instagram.

>> And Sean, if the folks at home wanted to find you on the web, where could they find you?

>> On the internets, Instagrams and Blue Skies.

I'm also going to be doing appearances at local schools in the New York State area.

So if you're a DOE employee, I have my DOE vendor number.

So if you want me to talk at your class, hit me up.

I'll be there.

>> Well, gentlemen, they are telling us that we are out of time.

I want to thank you so much for taking time out of your schedule to talk with me today.

It's been a fun half hour.

>> Thanks for having us.

>> Thanks again to viewers like you.

>> And I'd like to thank the folks at home for watching Comic Culture.

We will see you again soon.

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