...New US Dr Who Comic Interview...

[ARRISARRIS]

...recently found this interview on the net regarding the up and coming Doctor Who US comic...



...by Michael San Giacomo...

Heâ??s a pretty familiar â??faceâ? on U.S. and British television, even though that face changes regularly as new actors take on the role. Itâ??s been over 20 years since Dr. Who has shown his face, any face, in American comics on any regular basis.

In January, that changes with a six-issue mini-series from IDW.

The Doctor is in.

The series will be written by Gary Russell, the story editor of the very cool Doctor Who television show that appears in the states on the SciFi Channel. The artist is another Brit, Nick Roche, known for his work on Transformers and the Transformers Showcase series.

Russell said this is not his first comic work. â??I wrote some stuff for Marvel UK back in â??92 when they did their big push into the US market after the success of Deathâ??s Head,â? he said. â??I wrote a thing called Cyberspace 3000 - thereâ??s some pretty damning reviews of that on the net! - and a couple of issues of Dark Angel which I really liked. I edited a few comics too. Iâ??ve done a couple of Dr. Who strips for Marvel UK too. Iâ??ve been a Marvel junkie since buying issue #158 of Fantastic Four. And still am.â?

Roche, meanwhile, has been working for IDW for about two years on various Transformers projects, or, as he puts it somewhat indelicately, â??I'm Chris Ryall's bitch.â?

Ryall, the publisher and editor-in-chief of IDW, noted that these are the first Dr. Who comics made exclusively for the American audience. He was not available to comment on whether, in fact, Roche was his bitch.

So, pretend that none of us know who Doctor Who is, how would you describe him?

â??Heâ??s a lonely traveler in space and time, the last survivor of his people, the Time Lords, who fought a massive Time War with a race called the Daleks,â? said Russell. â??No one won, everyone lost. He has a series of human companions, currently the rather fabulous Martha Jones, a young trainee doctor from contemporary London. Together they travel the galaxies, righting wrongs, unopressing the oppressed and generally having a ball being the best heroes on TV today. Its fun fantasy TV, with a real emotional heart and soul. By not being constrained to one time or place, the universe, past and present, is their oyster.â?

Roche adds that extensive knowledge of the show is not a prerequisite to enjoying the comic. â??You'll be happy to hear to don't have to be knee-deep in the show's 44-year history, the thought of which could possibly be a huge turn-off the uninitiated,â? he said. â??In fact, I would go as far as to say you don't really need to have seen any of the current Nu-Who at all, as Gary provides fresh-faced newcomers with a concise (ie: one page!) 'Who The Doctor Is and How He Came To Be' top-up as the series' very first page.

â??In fact, of all Issue #1 serves as a primer, featuring a 'Greatest Hits' of the Doctor; Whimsy, Sonic Screwdriver, Cute Assistant, Hint of Underlying Darkness...all present and correct,â? Roche said. â??And it'd be great if the comic opened up the show for new viewers. It really is a treat.â?

One of the common problems artists face when trying to turn a television show into a comic is how faithful they need to be to the actorâ??s likeness. Sometimes the comics look odd because the artist is trying too hard. One of the best examples of getting it right is IDWâ??s 24 comics, where the artist, Jean Diaz, captures the looks of Jack Bauer and friends without making them look stiff.

â??As an artist, I've never really been drawn to licensed titles based on TV shows or movie properties when the characters are so laboriously photo-reffed, that they have no character,â? Roche said. â??Obviously, your lead characters need to be recognizable, but I think it'd be a disservice to the medium of comics to have your panels resemble the publicity shots and reference material you were supplied with. I just wouldn't be able to do that anyway!

â??I've got quite an exaggerated cartoony style, but I think Doctor Who plays to my strengths,â? Roche continued. â??My style wouldn't work on CSI or 24, but Doctor Who is a fantastical, mind-bending fantasy romp. And its lead actor, David Tennant, has got quite a bouncy, animated look to him. I don't mean any disrespect when I say the bloke's a living cartoon, and a joy to draw. As is Freema Agyeman, the actress who plays the irresponsibly cute Doctor's assistant, Martha. The girl's got a very drawable face! I think capturing the essence of the character, rather than chronicling accurately the actors' moles and dimples, serves the comic better.â?

Russell agrees that â??the essence is more essential than realistic likenesses.â?

Russell said even though the series is slated for six issues, he has at least 18 plotted out in his head. He hopes to get the chance to write them.

The stories taken place within the third season, â??somewhere in between episodes 7 and 8 or 9 and 10 or 10 and 11.â?

That said, Russell added that the stories that appear in the comic were created exclusively for the comic, not for the television show. â??Whatâ??s the point in that?â? he said. â??The comic medium is unique, itâ??s brilliant and free and expansive and unfettered by budget. Why take a TV idea with all the things that go with that medium and shoehorn it into a wholly different medium? No, each issue is wholly 100% created for IDW. Besides which, I donâ??t think there are any unused/spare TV stories lying around for me to steal!â?

Roche notes that time travel frees up the writers.

â??It's the beauty of a time-travel concept: five seconds off-screen in a TV show can translate into 12 issues of adventures,â? he said. â??I think this series can give you the 'whole experience' of series 3 though. Gary, as script editor of the telly show, has unprecedented access to the showrunners.â?

Russell was asked if writing comics allow your imagination to go wild, since you were unconstrained by special effects budgets?

â??A huge space station with a bar full of aliens; a massive skyscraper exploding; a thirty foot tall cat rampaging through 1970s London, knocking buses flyingâ?? entire races of planets disappearing in a flash; People made of sand,â? he replied, a yes implied. â??I donâ??t think you could achieve all that on a TV budget very convincingly. The idea is to use the comics to tell stories that TV canâ??t do. And also to build, to seed themes, concepts and characters that again episodic TV doesnâ??t always allow for.â?

More specifically, Roche is excited about the first page of the first issue.

â??Gotta say, page one of this comic has done something you will never see in the series, (probably),â? he said. â??Seriously, Who-fans need to check this comic out for an important piece of in-canon lore realized for the first time. There's a danger of having the freedom of no-budget in some respects. There's a temptation to let your imagination wreak nonsense when it comes to designing aliens and creatures. They have to be, I dunno, almost designed with a TV budget in mind, to make sure that they feel like â??Who.â?? That's not to say I got lazy and gave everyone ridges. Oh...you'll see!â?

Donâ??t look for any crossovers into Torchwood in the series though, although Russell said if there ever was to be such a crossover in the comics, â??Iâ??d climb over the people Iâ??d just slaughtered to get to write it!!â?

But crossovers? No.

â??Although the Doctor Who/Torchwood universe is one, and the dividing line blurs once in a blue moon, thematically, doing a crossover would be a nightmare, and just a bit pointless,â? he said. â??Torchwood is darker in tone than Doctor Who â?? they both have humor and scariness at their cores, but play it out very differently.â?

So, who are the bad guys in the comics?

â??Thereâ??s a businessman called Wain youâ??ll see occasionally,â? Russell said. â??Heâ??s from the far, far future but seems to nip around other times and places via a strange limbo dimension he seems comfortable in. Thereâ??s a Pantheon of alien - not gods as such - but big scary guys. Thereâ??s a weird scientist whose bitten off more than he can chew. And a couple of aliens from the TV show, including a Sycorax warrior and some Catkind. I like the Catkind. They may crop up more than once.â?

Roche said he had fun with the bad guys.

â??Visually, the villain is based on one of my best friends,â? he said. â??So I'm going to have Wain eating Pringles on my couch at Christmas. I'm hoping Martha will pop round too.â?
   
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[Mardroid]

Looks good.
"Exclusively American" though. I know we can still access em via the internet but.... (sigh!)

[DavidXBrunt]

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[DavidXBrunt]

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[Mardroid]

I like the art. Slightly toony and vibrant.

I dislike all the hero worship ("The lonely god", please...) that goes on in the new Who though. I'm not a hater of the show like many old school who fans (in fact I was never into the old show) but there is often a strong wiff of gorgonzola coming from the TV set when the show is on.

Slightly off topic, but very much looking forward to the Christmas special though!

[TordelBack]

Hey, that's pretty good stuff!

[Shakara]

I bloody HATE the look of this. I just really don't like that art - it reeks of ridiculousness

[The Adventurer]

Well, I love it, at least they're not being ridicules and try to do "photo-realism" with character likeness. That never works. EVER.

[Floyd-the-k]

looks good to me - I wonder if it's available here? Or online?

[scutfink]

Must be able to pick it up from FP, or Travelling Man, surely it's Who, Brits are the core Audience no?