SMASH! The DAMM Interview – A World of Superheroes Exclusive!

By DAMM

In my pursuits to bring the best in creator owned superhero stories, I felt that when web comics were exemplary and content was quality, I should promote and embrace them as much as possible. One of the most endearing and even a little sentimental favorites in the many I have stumbled on is Smash! Chris Bolton is ½ the creative team and he decided I was OK to talk to. Seeing how he has no restraining orders on me and I would like to keep it that way, I interviewed him by email.

DAMM – So let’s begin with what I think is the core of every great comic – characters. Tell us about Andrew Ryan, how he became Smash.

Chris Bolton – Hey DAMM — thanks for the interview! We really appreciate this opportunity, and hope your readers enjoy SMASH.

Andrew Ryan is a 10-year-old kid from a divorced home who lives with his mother (a nurse who mainly works night shifts) and his older brother, Tommy, who’s every single bit of 15 (in all the worst ways). His superhero idol is Defender — the only hero in his world who has actual super-powers — and when Defender is accidentally blown up by his arch-villain, the Magus, his powers land right on top of Andrew… literally! The first season focuses on Andrew getting accustomed to his powers, dusting off his Defender Halloween costume, and assuming his hero’s mantle by becoming Smash! (Which isn’t the name he wants to be called, but it’s the name the media latches on to.)

DAMM – Where did this concept came from?

Chris Bolton – The concept came from an idea I had in the ’90s to focus on an adult superhero who’s grown disillusioned with his life and powers, and who hasn’t lived up to his potential. (At the time, I think I felt a personal connection to that story.) The comic would focus on three different timelines: the character as a child, when he first got his powers and fighting crime was fun; the troubled teenage years as he struggled with his identity; and, finally, the adult years, as he pulls himself out of the gutter and reclaims his legacy. Eventually, I realize the tones were far too different to mesh together, and that the most enjoyable part of the concept was the fun stuff with the kid — which, at the time, was sorely missing from the comic book scene. Since Kyle and I grew up together and were huge comic readers as kids, it wasn’t at all difficult to tap into that enthusiasm to team up on SMASH.

DAMM – The character is a 10 yr. old so how does this translate from the psyche of a grown male? Are there challenges to keep him from appearing too adult when writing him? Are you drawing on your elementary school memories or nightmares?

Chris Bolton – Writing a 10-year-old is different from writing an adult, it’s true, but every character is different — it’s really just a matter of tapping into a person’s machinery and figuring out what makes them “go.” When you’re 10 years old, the world looks and functions very differently than it does as an adult, so I have to keep reaching back in my own head to recall what the world looked like to me at that age. Fortunately, I don’t seem to have advanced in maturity so far that I can’t glance back without too much neck-stretching.

DAMM – The usual kinds of supporting cast – teachers, bosses, and parents are all in here but they are not your run of the mill people. Are there any other characters that stand out as your favorites? Are there any that you relate to more?

It’s tough to pick favorites, although I would say Andrew/Smash, the Wraith, and the Magus are my favorite characters to write, especially when they come into direct conflict with one another. Arguments are just more fun to depict, and I like their stubbornness.

DAMM – Every great superhero needs and arch foe and Magus is amazingly appropriate for Smash, will you tell us about your thinking when writing a villain for Smash?

My thinking for every character is that s/he should not think or speak like anyone else. They each need a distinct voice. One thing Kyle and I agreed on with SMASH is that we didn’t want our villains to just be a costume, a super-power, and a sneer; each one should have his own personality so the character is every bit as interesting and distinctive outside the costume as inside. With the Magus, I wanted an “evil mastermind” type, but he needs to have a reason for sneering. In his case, there are very personal reasons why he wants to take Defender’s (and, later, Smash’s) powers — but also, deep down, he’s just a man of impeccable tastes who’s offended by all he sees around him that he deems beneath his standards. (For that quality, it helps to hear Kelsey Grammar’s voice in my head when I write the Magus’s dialogue.)

DAMM – Season One will soon be published by Candlewick Press was it always your intention to publish as well as do the web comic?

Chris Bolton – When we initially conceived SMASH, we knew nothing about web-comics and had high hopes of seeing the series in print. We sent it to every independent publisher that accepted unsolicited submissions and got a lot of polite rejections saying, in essence, that kids don’t buy comics anymore. (What a difference a few years can make!) It was only when we looked into the realities of self-publishing comics — and thought about having boxes of unsold comics piled up in the garage or attic — that we started considering the web-comic venue.

DAMM - Are there more titles for the web comic in the works? What about new genres? Are there creators clamoring to get a Bolton brother approved web comic at Smash?

Chris Bolton – Kyle and I are batting around ideas for a second comic series, although we’d like to set a new one up with a publisher right off the bat, rather than taking it to the web first, or self-publishing. It’s still too early to give much in the way of details, but it would be outside the superhero genre and aim for younger readers again.

No one has contacted us about getting a “Bolton brother-approved web comic” at Smash. In fact, I still feel very much like an outsider in the web-comic arena, waiting to be discovered online. We have a small but dedicated readership that I love, and in reposting the first season in our page-a-day ComicPress format, we’re finding new readers all the time — but there certainly hasn’t been an explosion of awareness.

DAMM – Web comics in general get confusing for fans, traditional book loyalists get angry and e-comic app downloaders often do not want to stay logged on to read an entire season even a chapter, yet you seem to have side stepped both of these and are now pretty well received. Do you know any reason other than perseverance and a good product that you find yourself in high regard on both fronts?

Chris Bolton – I think, for the reasons you mentioned and countless others, serialized comics continue to be at a disadvantage, while online strips generally rule the medium. Our publishing schedule certainly hasn’t helped. Due to all kinds of delays, including the book deal, it’s been more than a year and a half since we wrapped up our first season. The second season will finally kick off this summer, as soon as we finish reposting Season One, but I would guess a fair number of readers got tired of waiting and drifted off to other things.

DAMM – Tell us a little about the Tues/Thurs posting schedule and how this approach is beneficial for this kind of project. Is it because instead of a whole 30 pg. issue to get ready the page by page format is liberating? What about the pressure to be on time 2 times a week instead of once a month?

Chris Bolton – Initially, we posted a ten-page episode every two weeks — or aimed for that. That turned out to be a pretty punishing schedule, and this past year we started noticing that even serialized comics tended to post just a page at a time. When we did the math and realized what two pages a week would mean for our production time — putting us about five months ahead of schedule before we even post the first page — we redesigned the site to accommodate it. With this new schedule, we’re hopeful there won’t be the same sort of lag between seasons 2 and 3, and this time we can build and hold onto a steady readership. Tuesday & Thursday seem the less popular days to post web-comics, and we feel like those are good days to get a regular dose of something new and fun every week, especially if you’re stuck at work.

DAMM – You created this amazing project with your brother Kyle, I have a hard time doing DINNER with my brother sometimes, how do you guys do being family and co-workers?

Chris Bolton – Well, working with family is always tricky. There’s a reason this is our first successful collaboration in 35 years of being brothers! Kyle and I don’t have the same tastes in nearly anything, so it took some time and effort to find common ground where we were both invigorated by the character and the series. It probably helps that I live in Portland and he lives in Seattle, and we only see each other a few times a year. (Email is a great way to communicate without any punches being thrown.) That said, we are close in age and grew up together, and we have a genuine fondness for each other that wasn’t readily apparent during adolescence but has become stronger in adulthood. And SMASH is our baby, so we’ve got that bond.

DAMM – What is the process you guys use is it scripted first? Does Kyle plot as well is what I guess I mean or do you write it and pass it off?

Chris Bolton – One thing that has helped is working closely together. Early on, we had some struggles where I was THE WRITER and he was THE ARTIST and neither one could pee in the other’s pool. It quickly become clear that, for the good of the comic, we had to put aside our own egos and self-interests, and make sure this was a true collaboration. When plotting the arc of a season, I make sure to find out what Kyle’s interested in doing, what he wants to draw, where he wants to see Smash go, what characters he’d like to use, etc. I write up an outline and send it to him, he responds with suggestions and criticism, and we go back-and-forth until we’re in agreement. We can have some enthusiastic debates, but they’re never personal anymore — the main goal is to do what’s best for the comic, and keep fighting until that happens.

DAMM – Is the family dynamic crucial to the family dynamic in the book in as much as that you guys share a childhood but have different views on different events in that childhood so when you create from those experiences are there different ways you interpret say bullying or “wearing the dunce cap?”

Chris Bolton – It isn’t rare for us to disagree about an element of SMASH. One of us has one idea, the other has a different idea, and we keep mashing those two together until we come up with something that pleases both of us. And what we’ve learned is, that final version is not only the best of both worlds, but a much, much better idea than the one we started out disagreeing over. So, after all this time, we’ve come to trust that process and count on it leading us to the strongest choice for the comic.

DAMM – So much of this comic is in the presentation and Kyle’s art is really great, can you as a comic reader and writer not as an artist describe his style and what you like most about it. Does his style remind you of anyone else’s?

To me it felt like a video game in places, like Rayman maybe, the pace is frantic and 10 year old hyper. Why is the quick pace of this book so important to its overall success?

Chris Bolton – I am Kyle’s biggest fan in the entire universe and always have been, so don’t expect an unbiased answer from me about his artwork! I think he’s truly phenomenal and I’m delighted beyond words every single time I get to see his new penciled pages. I’m baffled that every major publisher hasn’t beaten down his door to have him come to work for them, but that’s hardly the most confusing element of the comic industry for me.

Basically, SMASH is the comic I’ve always wanted to read, and my trick is to write the kinds of pages I’d love to see Kyle draw. He’s had a lot of influences, from Warner Bros. cartoons to video games, from Michael Golden to (more recently) Gabriel Rodriguez of LOCKE & KEY, but I think what distinguishes his work is that he absorbs his influences without wearing them on the page, resulting in a style that’s truly distinctive, dynamic, and unique. There’s literally NOTHING he can’t draw and make it look great. I could go on all day, but I’m just going to sound more and more like a squealing fanboy, so I’ll stop there.

DAMM – What are the dreams goals and aspirations of Smash? Where do you see yourself in 5 years?

The main goal of Smash Comics, LLC, is to keep producing SMASH, hoping both the web-comic and the published books find a sizable audience to keep it going. The series isn’t open-ended — we have a nine-book (or nine-season) end goal in mind. I would love to reach that point and be able to wrap up our saga the way we want to. Beyond that, I’m working on a lot of my own projects that I hope will see publication — including a Middle Grade book series and a YA novel — and there are always more comic series to develop with Kyle.

DAMM -Are you a regular comic book fan? If so do you prefer Marvel, DC, Image or Indy? What do think of the DC re-launch? Do you believe in extended continuity or is continuity important at all to you?

Chris Bolton – I grew up spending my entire allowance at the comic shop once a month. Like many readers, I stopped late in high school when a burgeoning social life took over all my attention. I was drawn back by the SANDMAN collections in the ’90s, and since then I’ve been a regular reader of graphic novels and book collections. I don’t buy monthly issues anymore — it’s just not economically viable for me, nor is it a rewarding enough experience as a reader. I’m all over the place with graphic novels — recent favorites include BLACKSAD and LOCKE & KEY — so I can’t say I prefer one publisher over another. I don’t generally read much from Marvel or DC, though. The last of their titles I followed with any regularity was ULTIMATE SPIDER-MAN, for about the first ten books, which I thought did a really nice job of reinvigorating a character that’d gotten too tangled up in his own continuity nightmares.

DAMM – How do you compensate for income that the print media gets like in-store signings and con circuits (do you do them?) Having full editorial control is a great luxury a lot of creators do not have, would you sacrifice some of that for a large distribution deal, say in TV or games if not having a company like Marvel adapt it to print?

“Never say never” is probably too easy an answer, but I have to say, if a mainstream comic publisher made us an offer, we’d be fools not to at least consider it. I’m not wild about a lot of choices the Big Two have made, but given the chance to take a crack at an icon we grew up loving, like Batman or Spider-Man, who’s to say we wouldn’t jump at it?

I haven’t read non-Vertigo DC Comic in probably 15 years. The main thing I can say about DC’s re-launch is, I’m curious enough to buy a few issues and try them out. There really is something daunting about all decades of tangled continuity and the way so many superhero comics are written to prop up the readers who love to sort it all out. Starting from scratch makes it seem a lot easier to climb on board. (Then again, the notion that the re-launch might fail and they’ll be back to normal in six months is equally daunting: do we dare risk the investment in something that might not last much longer than Marvel’s New Universe from the ’80s?)

DAMM – What do you think of the direct comic market and its co-existence with web and app comics? Is it possible? Are we going to see the extinction of the one truly American cultural event? (and baseball!?)  – Comics in your opinion?

As far as the direct market vs. web and app comics — this is hardly a unique situation to comics. Brick-and-mortar bookstores are fighting the same battle against E-books, and the film industry is similarly at war with streaming and downloadable video formats. We’re in an age where most of our entertainment and information sources are no longer tactile and the old channels are changing very rapidly, which is causing every creator and distributor to rethink their decades-old business strategies and come to terms with new formats. I’m curious to see where we’ll end up when the dust settles, but I honestly have no idea where it’s headed. I can imagine scenarios where the direct market and online sales manage to coexist, maybe even bolster each other — but it will depend on how much the “old” is willing to working with the “new,” and vice-versa.

DAMM – Finally, are you going to the San Diego Comic Con? If so can we stop by your table and say hello?

Not this year. We might go the year SMASH is published by Candlewick — we’ll have to see. Personally, I prefer the conventions that focus on comics and animation over other media, but we attended Comic Con in 2007 and it was a fun, if sometimes overwhelming, circus. We’d definitely like to see it from the opposite side of a booth or table!
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Chris A. Bolton

Writer/Co-Creator, SMASH
www.SmashComic.com