Nick Tapalansky Interview!

Nick Tapalansky Interview

<img src="http://www.aspcomics.com/bio_images/nick_tapalansky.jpg" align="left" hspace="10">If you aren't familiar with the concept of zombies, there's a good chance you've been living under a rock. Lately, just about every medium out there has caught the zombie plague in one form or another.... but if you think Zombies are a tired concept, that there's nothing new to be said about them, well, you just haven't read Nick Tapalansky's Awakening! Nick's 10 part series offers a whole new take on the Zombie genre, and just to show he means business, Nick took the time to tell project fanboy all about it...

Matt Grant: Nick, first off, thanks for taking the time to answer a few questions with Project Fanboy!

Nick Tapalansky: I’ll do my best. Some of these look pretty grueling – almost ‘Saw’ like in their complexity and razor-sharp danger quotient….

“Comic scribe – I want to play a game…”

MG: So going back a ways, how did you get interested in comics in the first place?

NT: Comics entered my life at an early age, always bullying me and taking my lunch money. Kids, take that as a lesson: buy milk and not comics or you’ll grow up to be short and have a penchant for touching your middle and index fingers to the base of your hand in the hopes that webs will fly out from an as-yet unseen orifice. Hopefully the orifice will turn out to be on your hand also.

I started reading comics when I was about 4, my first being an early Web of Spider-Man that, regrettably I no longer own. It’s my life’s mission to track it down though:

<ul><li>He’s still in the black costume (though obviously it’s post-symbiote)
<li>I think it’s an issue earlier than the 20’s, though I could be wrong.
<li>The back cover has an ad for the original Metal Gear on the NES. I have to confess that originally I thought the ad was the coolest part of the book. After all, I had a wind-up swimming Spider-Man to play with – what the hell did I need some comic for?!</ul>
If anybody has any information regarding the whereabouts of this issue (or an issue number) e-mail me at Nick.Tapalansky@gmail.com. You can e-mail for other stuff too but I’ll be your extra special friend if you help me out.

MG: When did you realize that you wanted to write comics yourself?

NT: I spent the back half of my teenaged years writing really terrible prose fiction by way of short story. At the time I had serious discipline issues and could never get, or maintain, the momentum to write all the novels I had in mind. Add to that the fact that in the folly of my youth my descriptions were extra cold; very detailed but almost detached and script-like… ‘Hmm…,’ I thought to myself. Why not WRITE A SCRIPT THEN?!

Voila.

MG: Who would you call your influences or inspirations?

NT: Well, Jeff Smith taught me what a sequential story truly is. Bone is what made me realize I didn’t just <I>want</I> to write comics, I <I>had</I> to.

After that the list gets long but I’ll toss a few out there:
James Robinson, who’s Starman changed the way I look at a superhero story (you’d think Watchmen would get the nod for that but, surprises abound, it was Robinson and Harris for me) Go pick up the first omnibus volume and tell me it isn’t amazing. I’ll wait.

Brian K. Vaughan and Y: The Last Man – huge impact and, not unlike Starman, challenged the norm by having a firm beginning, middle and end in what would be considered a mainstream book. Epic is a word that comes to mind.

Stephen King, whom I started reading at what was probably far too early an age, demented my psyche beyond repair. The result is the shattered man-horror you see before you.

Todd Dezago, who wrote some of my favorite Spider-Man stories growing up.

Alan Moore’s Swamp Thing was, by far, one of the most groundbreaking things I’d ever read, especially given the time in which it was released. Even compared to current books, it still holds up magnificently. Tottleben’s art created an unmistakable atmosphere of constant dread and horror, even during the happiest of scenes. Love it.

MG: How did you get hooked up with Archaia Studios Press?

NT: Alex and I were wandering about our first convention, just trying to get feedback on a pitch-in-progress and his portfolio. We weren’t even ready to start pitching, really. We had the finished first page of issue 1, some character sketches, my written pitch, and his portfolio. We’d hit a few booths and had little to moderate success just in getting feedback – it’s surprising how few people are willing to just give their opinion if it’s not something that directly does anything for them.

Enter Mark Smylie: mad scientist, artist, publisher. In seeking his feedback on the book he took it one step further, asking us to keep in touch as we developed the first issue. He went on to unofficially edit that chapter, offering us a contract at the conclusion of the process.

It’s such a bizarre Cinderella story when you think about it: two rubes wandering around what, at the time, seemed like a giant hall of comic insanity finding sanctuary on ASP island, having fought off elephant men, a guy dressed as Jesus, and Lou Ferrigno with nothing but our wits and a spatula. But nobody breaks in the same way as the last guy so I guess this was our way through the door.

MG: The big project right now is Awakening, which I'm in the process of reviewing (fantastic, by the way). Can you tell our readers a little bit about it?


<img src="http://www.aspcomics.com/titles/awakening/AwakeningV1_HC_Cover.jpg" align="left" hspace="10"height="400">NT: Thanks, glad you’re digging it so far.

Our letterer, Thomas Mauer, came up with one of the best short form descriptions for the book I’ve ever heard so I’ll lead with that:

Awakening is a zombie noir which may or may not involve zombies at all, taking place in a town which seems to be slowly marching towards the apocalypse.

Eh? Eh? You’re intrigued, aren’t you?

Ours is the story of Park Falls, a small city in upstate New York which has found itself caught in the throes of violence. A string of murders and missing-persons grips the city. Derrick Peters, an early retiree of the Park Falls Police Department and current private investigator receives a visit from town crazy Cynthia Ford one frosty January afternoon. She’s frantic, rambling on about they did it and it’s Cline’s fault!, claiming to have information about the murders. To Derrick’s disbelief she utters one word:

Zombies.

Not believing the accusation but agreeing that the circumstances surrounding the accused Cline Pharmaceuticals, and their recent upheaval from their location outside town, appear suspicious, Derrick begins an investigation in an attempt to find answers to the mysteries beginning to swallow his city whole.

Meanwhile….

Dr. Daniel Howe, a federally sent scientist arrives in Park Falls. Who sent him remains a mystery but he, too, is there to investigate the recent rash of murders and missing-persons. The problem is, even he doesn’t know what he’s looking for.

As the months go on and the situation slowly escalates, our steadily growing cast must work together to first come to grips with what’s happening, try to find a cause, and then discern a solution as Park Falls begins to feel the pressure of the mounting crisis.

MG: I'm a zombie fan myself, I grew up with the Romero films and whatnot, which were sort of niche at the time, but today the entertainment market, certainly including comics is saturated with zombies. I'm sure you were aware of this, were there any reservations about Awakening competing in such a saturated market? What makes Awakening different?

NT: Absolutely, zombies are the new black. Vampires are coming back into vogue this summer though so keep your fingers crossed that all those decaying, fleshless husks you’ve been clinging to will still be ‘hip’ in the fall.

I think the market is funny, in that once books like The Walking Dead and movies like 28 Days Later (and let’s not forget my favorite movie of all time, Shaun of the Dead) became huge successes in their respective industries, publishers and studios just started assuming that re-animated corpses were an easy paycheck, never once stopping to realize that the aforementioned titles were popular because they were both unique and of a quality much higher than your average gore-porn “five stereotyped survivors fight for survival against unending undead hordes” zombie schlock. Now, that’s not to say there’s anything wrong with the classic zombie model. Give me Return of the Living Dead or the original Romero trilogy any day. But the endless throng of copycats that have tried to capitalize without offering something new or different to the equation are what’s causing the glut and, as a fan, a real pain in the ass to have to sift through. Classics are classics for a reason, we don’t need something that apes it to the point of owing Romero a royalty check – we need something different, something new that speaks to the spirit of the thing but offers a new perspective and a reason for that perspective. That’s what I’ve set out to do with Awakening.

With Awakening I began by removing a key element – the overwhelming odds. From day one the cast is faced with a dilemma centered on the belief that this isn’t a monster movie, this is real life damnit! One town crazy is claiming that zombies are to blame for a recent slight, though noticeable spike in the murder/missing-person rate doesn’t make it a true statement. From there the changes domino, approaching the situation from a multi-faceted and, as the series moves on, existential point of view all set against a noir/mystery backdrop.

In short, the question of zombies is just that – a question. Whether or not they truly exist, or exist in such a way as we, the reader, are familiar with them is something we find out as we continue forward.

My only fear in terms of competing in the market is getting the word out that our book is different from the standards and making sure it doesn’t get lumped in with the glut of body parts. Once we get the book into people’s hands, I feel pretty confidant that it stands on its own.

MG: I find the cop drama/mystery aspect of Awakening a refreshing addition to the zombie genre. Are there any non-zombie influences feeding into the mystery aspect of the book?

NT: Truthfully, no not really. I wish I had something more to offer here! I’m only just recently getting into the noir/mystery genre as a reader myself. I just picked up The Chicago Way by Michael Harvey and I’m hoping to start that on my flight to California for SDCC this coming week. Film wise one of the most enjoyable and gripping noir films I’ve seen was Brick: a modern-day noir, complete with classic dialogue and delivery, set against a high school backdrop?! Absolutely fantastic, not to mention incredibly unique.

I’m a big Chris Nolan fan and loved Memento, a truly fantastic yet very modern mystery movie.

My next step is to work backwards and try to dive into some classics, both book and film. I’m way open to suggestions so if anybody has some I’m all ears.

MG: Alex Eckman-Lawn's art is brilliant, and also a very unique collage of photos, mixed media, digital effects, and traditional drawing. How did you come about deciding that he was a good match for the story?

NT: I can’t stress enough that seeing Alex’s artwork was all it took. Forget how debonair and suave he is – when I came across his illustration work it was all that I’d imagined and more. I honestly can’t imagine anybody else capturing Park Falls in the way he has. He’s truly a gifted artist.

MG: The vibe of the artwork is very loose and crazy, fitting for the story. Very often things switch from drawn, to very blurry, to photographic. How much input for the artwork comes from your side?

NT: A lot of that is Alex and how a certain sequence hits him and fits into the scope of the issue. I do write full scripts, panel by panel, and when I have a very specific idea of how something should look I share it. As we’ve gotten further along though, I’ve gotten to know pretty well how Alex will interpret a page and so I’ve had to be less stylistically specific and focus instead on more of the environmental details.

MG: Of all the horror/supernatural sub-genre's zombies seem like the most plausible. What do you think? Are you prepared for a zombie epidemic?

NT: Get out of your car and onto a bike!

Unfortunately, a lot of Max Brooks’ very sound advice isn’t applicable in Awakening. Poor Park Falls has to figure out what’s happening before it can try to fix the situation, let alone try to survive in spite of the ‘awakenings.’ And a lot of those standard conventions we all know and love don’t seem to be holding water…

MG: I saw that Awakening was nominated for four Eagle awards! How does that feel?

NT: Pretty damn cool. You always think it’s a cliché when people say “it’s just an honor to be nominated,” but it really was. In various categories our lil’ indie book was up against the giants: Y: The Last Man, Hellboy, Captain America, All-Star Superman, The Umbrella Academy. Hell, I was up against Matt Fraction and Jason Aaron for Favourite Newcomer Writer! That’s intense, and that the fans who read Awakening hold it, and us as creators, in that esteem is incredibly humbling.

MG: Awakening is set for a ten issue run. Are there any plans or projects in the works after that?

NT: Quite a few plans indeed. I’m currently developing a number of projects with quite a few talented artists, not to mention a work-for-hire gig I’m <I>this</I> close to being able to talk about.

On top of that I have a few solo ventures I’m working on, a novel and a screenplay respectively.

Unfortunately it’s way too early to talk about anything – next time we catch up I should have at least a lot more to share.

MG: Are there any pre-Awakening projects that we should know about?

NT: Not a thing – Awakening is my first published project, something I’m insanely proud of.

MG: What about Kat Man?

NT: Oh man, I <I>love</I> it when Kat Man comes up.

I was in third grade happily not paying attention in class and stapling together oversized index cards to approximate a comic book. Take a little Daredevil, toss in some TMNT (which was in itself a Daredevil spoof, something I was blissfully unaware of at the tender age of 8), and voila – you have Kat Man.

Sadly, that infamous first issue has been lost in the annals of time, something which plagues me every night as I fitfully search for solace in the twilight hours.

MG: I heard a rumor that you were raised by wolves! What's up with that?

NT: All hearsay – they were a family of well adjusted, only slightly rabid, wolverines.

MG: Alright, time for the Fanboy question: If you could work with any creators on any book, who, what, and why?

NT: Wow, this is a tough one... Hmm…

I would love to co-create/co-write something with Joss Whedon or Brian K. Vaughan. Original property, nothing licensed or for the big two here. I feel that, and this is purely based on what I’ve seen from them and what I know of my own conceptual process, we’d jive well together. Whedon has a sense of the fantastic that I hope to exhibit in one of those developing projects I mentioned before and Vaughan manages to mix that with stories that speak very directly to current societal conflicts and plights. Developing a project with either of them seems like it’d be an amazing experience.

If I wouldn’t be shaking like a leaf through the entire process, doing something with Jeff Smith and Steve Hamaker over at Cartoon Books would make my lifetime. I have no idea what – that’s the “anything they want” category.

Cloak & Dagger with Alex – I’ve got the perfect concept and he’s got the perfect art to finally bring these two back into the spotlight, not unlike what Fraction’s done for Iron Fist.

Spider-Man is my comic grail – when I’m ready and I have my story to tell it’s going to kill. Right now, not to get repetitive, but Alex would be my first choice for art chores. You haven’t seen Spidey until you’ve seen his.

Swamp Thing – I <I>need</I> a go at Swamp Thing. Nobody’s had any luck with him over the past few years but I would kill for a crack at it, something that might hearken back to that good ol’ Alan Moore run.

House of Mystery – I’d love to have at one of those rooms…

And all of that is just a start. I’ve got big plans buddy. MASSIVE.

MG: If I ran into you in a comic shop, what would you be buying?

NT: Dark Tower, Perhapanauts, RASL, Echo, House of Mystery, catching up on old trades (classic Spidey, Starman Omnibus, etc).

MG: Before we wrap it up here, are there any plugs, shout-outs, or anything else you'd like to mention?

NT: I definitely have to give a big thanks to my good buddy Todd Dezago for giving myself and Alex a shot at a Perhapanauts back-up story! I just finished writing it and Alex can’t wait to dive in. Look for it towards the end of this year. Other than that, keep an eye out for issues 4 & 5 of Awakening soon, followed by a beautiful hardcover collection of the first five issues.

Beyond that there’s some really exciting stuff from both Alex and I, together and separately, on the horizon. As soon as we’ve got details you will too.

MG: Well thanks for taking the time to chat with Project Fanboy, we all really appreciate it here!

NT: Thanks, Matt – looking forward to doing it again soon!

That’s what she said! ZING!

Brilliant! Great interview, Matt!
Nick's answers had me rolling on the floor lauging. NOT rotfl, I mean literally. My shirt is a wreck, but at least there's a clean spot under my computer now!