Mark Russell Discusses The Flintstones

Editor's note: This interview was conducted before the release of Booster Gold/The Flintstones Annual #1.

Critical Writ: Were you ever concerned about the potential for public backlash based on the more politically-inclined tone of the new Flintstones comic?

Mark Russell: No, because you simply can't write looking in the rear-view mirror like that. I assume there will be backlash regardless of what I write. That liberates me to say what I really want to. I've written books and I've written comics and the big difference is that when you write a book, people will wait to read it before deciding they hate it. Most of the backlash from The Flintstones came immediately after the project was announced, before I'd even written a page of it. Some people imagined that their childhoods were being tampered with. Others thought a Flintstones reboot just sounded like the worst idea anyone had ever had. The irony is that I've written a book about the Bible and people weren't half as upset about that as me messing with The Flintstones.

Critical Writ: If you had the opportunity to go further with the series, what would you have liked to introduce in future issues?

Mark Russell: One storyline that I kept cutting out of the final draft was Bamm-Bamm falling in love and having his heart broken. Most people spend years preparing themselves to have the sex-talk with their children, but nobody ever speaks to their kids about dealing with heartbreak and it's far more traumatizing. If your kid is having sex, that at least they're doing okay socially. Feeling unwanted and rejected and not having lived long enough to put it into context is a really painful reality most of us have had to deal with. And deal with alone, for the most part.

Critical Writ: Do you have a favorite cut joke or deleted idea from the comic?

Mark Russell: I had written a scene with a cocaine-addicted rat at the Science Cave, but they made me cut it.

Critical Writ: Next week, the Booster Gold/The Flintstones Annual #1 special will arrive. What was it like to mix the goofy tone of a Booster Gold story with the more socially-aware Flintstones cast? Did you have trouble combining the two or did it come naturally?

Mark Russell: It felt surprisingly natural. I still wrote about the same sort of subjects, but from the perspective of Booster Gold, who is over-confident despite being largely inept and for whom things just sort of seem to work out anyway. I relate to him a lot, actually.

Critical Writ: Steve Pugh's work on the series has been consistently fantastic, especially with including small background jokes, such as the standard Flintstones parodies of modern-day stores and restaurants. How close was the collaboration on that? Did you think of some of the jokes or did Steve just let his imagination run wild, so to speak?

Mark Russell: I come up with a lot of the puns and background jokes and then Steve adds even more, trying to top me. It's weird when there is references I don't get in my own comic.

Critical Writ: On that same note, The Flintstones has been praised for having a sense of social justice in a similar vein as Prez, one of your previous projects. Did working on Prez help to prepare you for this?

Mark Russell: To me, this is the fundamental mission of comic books. To identify what is wrong with the world and create characters who can set it right. This is what the really good superhero comics do. They're about the power needed to address the deficit between the world as it is and what it should be. I know that, in reality, superhero comics often end up being more like professional wrestling. Good guys matching up against colorful villains they haven't fought for a while occasionally forming tag-teams with other heroes. But at their heart, I feel like superhero comics are meditations on power. The Flintstones tries to do that, too, albeit without people in capes who can fly.

Critical Writ: Finally, the last issue of The Flintstones is scheduled to arrive in June. Can you offer any kind of hints as to how the series will end?

Mark Russell: The Great Gazoo has to make his final report to the gambling authorities on his home planet of Las Vega. He struggles over how to set the odds on the survival of the human race. Oh, and there's a bowling tournament!

The Flintstones Vol. 1 is now available for purchase. You can find it online or at your local comic book shop.

Zachary Krishef is an evil genius. Do not question his knowledge of Saturday Night Live trivia or Harry Potter books.

Christopher Hastings Talks 'Gwenpool', Mixing Humor With Drama, And The Intricacies Of 'Longshot Saves The Marvel Universe'

Critical Writ sits down with writer Christopher Hastings, to discuss the origin story of The Unbelievable Gwenpool, Longshot, and what's next in the wacky side of the Marvel Universe.

Critical Writ: Many of your comics straddle the line between comedy and drama. How do you properly keep the two balanced, depending on what you want to convey in the story?

Christopher Hastings: I wouldn't necessarily declare myself the master of this quite yet. That balance is something I'm very interested in, and strive for, but I think I'm squarely in the middle of my education on it. Right now, I find the best way to keep that balance, to "keep it real" is to treat the characters honestly, think about their drives and desires, and how they'll be affected by different situations. That can drive comedy, or it can drive drama. Things can get silly, but so long as it comes from an honest point of view, it surprisingly can get balanced with some real feelings too and not be jarring. But again, I feel like you're asking someone who's in the middle of working on their degree in this topic, and doesn't quite have it figured out yet, heh.

Critical Writ: Did you have any other concepts for Gwenpool before the final iteration of the character?

Christopher Hastings: Not really. The entirety of her character really stems out of that "normal girl from real world knows she's in a comic book" idea, and everything grew out of that. That idea came from trying to figure out a way to create an original character, but match what an audience's expectations would be from that costume, from that name. To me, that meant fighting with weapons instead of super powers, and breaking the fourth wall in a similar way to Deadpool, but for different reasons.

Critical Writ: Is there anything that you can say about how your ideas for the first Gwenpool story arc changed from the initial brainstorming to the completed project?

Christopher Hastings: Oh sure. It was initially going to be a lot darker, with her being forced to work for and train under Bullseye. But Bullseye was not available, so my editors suggested MODOK instead. It really shows how much rewriting on the fly, and working as a team with your collaborators and editors can affect a book. I think what it turned into was a lot of fun, and I'm not sure I would care for my original version of the story anymore.

One of my favorite panels from Irene Strychalski.

Critical Writ: Irene Strychalski and Gurihiru have been doing a fantastic job on the art. Were you always aware that their respective styles of art would work well with the series or was it a surprise? Now that the comic has six month's worth of issues, has your collaborative process changed in any particular way?

Christopher Hastings: I first worked with Gurihiru for the Gwenpool short in the Gwenpool Holiday Special, and that completely blew me away. And then once we got the series together, from that initial short, I had a pretty good idea what the book was going to be like. And I had seen samples from Irene, and I could see she would do an amazing job picking up those two issues off the tone that Gurihiru had already laid down, while of course making those two issues totally her own. She does some great character acting that I would have never thought of that really elevates scenes.

Working with Gurihiru for this long, I like to think I've adjusted my writing style to suit them better. They pretty much do everything amazingly, so I would honestly have no idea if I'm doing something they hate in the script, or doing a bad job that they are secretly spinning into gold. But I do see little comedic moments that they latch onto, or work in themselves, and I love them, and try to find more opportunities for them to get them in. Our upcoming issue has a fantasy sequence where they let loose in another style and it's pretty fabulous. (Editor's note: At the time of this interview, Gwenpool #8 had not yet been released.) Sometimes I'll lay out the basics of the scene and say that specifics on how it's executed are up to them. I completely trust them, and getting the artwork in is a highlight of every month. I could go on and on how much I love their work and why, but I imagine it could get kind of dull to read, instead of just looking at some of it.

Critical Writ: In the past few years, Marvel has been making a significant effort to showcase diverse legacy characters. So far, Gwenpool has interacted with Thor and teamed up with Miles Morales, two characters that jump-started the change. Is it possible that future issues could showcase some appearances from LGBT characters?

Christopher Hastings: I see no reason why not! I will say Thor and Miles showed up in Gwenpool simply because I really like their books myself. There was no push for that from the company. So if I have a good reason to stick say Iceman or Angela in there, I totally will. Actually as I'm writing this now, I'm already thinking of some fun stuff for Iceman, so that could be sooner than later!

Critical Writ: What was your approach going into the Longshot Saves The Marvel Universe miniseries? If possible, would you ever want to write for the character again?

Christopher Hastings: Longshot was pretty much just "have the craziest things possible happen due to over powered luck" and figure out ways to show that it was Longshot's luck doing it, and weird coincidences and connections, instead of it just being random. I think that unfortunately, a lot of readers missed those little connections.

Like, in the very beginning of the book, Longshot doesn't have money for tacos at a taco stand. He uses his luck, and suddenly there's an explosion that rains down money. That explosion is caused by burglars which he stops by activating his luck, causing their guns to jam. A few pages prior, there was a scene where a newspaper in the background mentioned the recall of a certain brand of faulty guns, which is what the criminals were using. Saving the people from those criminals caused Longshot to encounter the cosmic cube that messes up the universe, splitting the Inbetweener into Chaos and Order. Order is on a spree to stop magic, and is fought by a small group of remaining magic users, including Deadpool with a magic wand he found, a seemingly random addition to the party. Order manages to take control of this small group, including Deadpool. Everyone is hunting for where this cosmic cube is hiding, and Deadpool races Longshot for it when they find it's back at the house that had the explosion in the very beginning (due to other circumstances.) Longshot is not much of a threat to the fighting abilities of even a brain controlled Deadpool, and it looks bad until... they get to the house, where that taco truck is, and the lure of tacos breaks Deadpool out of his spell. Because it's Deadpool, and his beloved Mexican food. This leads to Longshot being able to get the cosmic cube and etc etc happy ending.

So reading it, it may seem that stuff was random, but it wasn't! That taco truck, Deadpool, Longshot, they were all connected, because of Longshot's luck, and it came back around in the very end. The book is full of stuff like that, and it was my main focus for the miniseries.

I would certainly enjoy writing Longshot again. I think I've matured as a writer since then, and I certainly learned a few things writing the book. I tried to cram way much into it, and as a result, many people found it confusing. I've learned a bit more about when you need to be more gentle with your reader, and where you can trust them to make the leaps themselves.

Critical Writ: If you had the freedom to do an original graphic novel similar to Ryan North and Erica Henderson's Unbeatable Squirrel Girl Beats Up The Marvel Universe, what characters would you want to write for? Would it be based on characters that you have written for in the past or would you want to go into an entirely new branch of the comics?

Christopher Hastings: Oh I would LOVE to write an OGN like that. (And SG Beats up the MU is amazing, everybody.) I really love writing Gwenpool right now, so she's probably be my initial choice. The exciting thing about doing an OGN is you don't have to worry about the reader's experience getting interrupted with a month long gap every 20 pages, so you can do some things with the storytelling you can't necessarily do when you're too busy making sure to reintroduce who your character is in every issue along with a cliffhanger at the end of every one.

Critical Writ: Finally, can you tease anything about your upcoming plans for The Unbelievable Gwenpool?

Christopher Hastings: This current arc gets into a little bit about how perspective might be all that separates a hero from a villain, if everybody has just cause and motivations. After that arc, we've got a few shorter stories that explore some different genres for the very genre savvy Gwen to riff on (horror, fantasy). And then after that... we finally reveal Gwen's origin, and things go utterly bananas, and I am just excited that my editors approved my pitch for how things go bananas.

And Deadpool's finally showing up. ;)

Critical Writ: I remember the December solicitations stating that Deadpool would appear in the second holiday special, Merry Mix It Up. I'm not sure of how much you're allowed to say about it, but does it function as a standalone story or a small bit of foreshadowing for the eventual appearance? On another note, how involved was the process of writing such an interconnected story for the first holiday special?

Christoper Hastings: I can tell you his appearance is part of the shorter stories that take part through the book, and is not related to his upcoming appearance in the main Gwenpool series.

I really like the interconnected story aspect of the previous holiday special! For someone who's origin has yet to be revealed, it's kind of funny that I've had to introduce Gwenpool to new audiences three times over the course of a year. Her appearance in that special was one of them. So we had 10 pages to show people what her deal was who didn't read the Howard the Duck backup stories she debuted in, and make it Christmas-y, and also get her to that party somehow. Thankfully Howard the Duck is a mutual friend of Gwen and She-Hulk's, so that was a good way to get her to the party. Also after I turned the script in, we discovered I accidentally made it 12 pages, and I had to condense it even further.

The new Gwenpool holiday special also has that interconnected story aspect to it! It's really cool to see what the other teams did on the book.

Critical Hits and Misses #14: August 25th, 2016

Jamilah King on why "The Get Down' is the Queer Hip-Hop History We've Been Waiting For." (Tova)

Here’s a gorgeous animation done by Ashley Nichols to the Steven Universe end theme, Love Like You. (Dominik)

Karen Walsh over at the GeekDad blog just posted an awesome interview with fabulous comic book artist Alex de Campi, in which feminism plays a large role in their chat. (Ivonne)

Critical Hits & Misses Musical Performance of the Day: Hop Along perform "Horseshoe Crab," "Well-Dressed" and "Sister Cities," from their 2015 album Painted Shut. (Etienne)

Critical Hits & Misses Question of the Day:  Some sets are members of themselves, others are not. What about the set of all sets that are not members of themselves?

—Critical Writ has a super-duper strict comment policy that specifies a single rule above all others: don't be a frelling drannit.

Interview with Jae, author of Shaken to the Core

Today we're interviewing Jae, who's just published Shaken to the Core, a new historical adventure and romance set in San Francisco, during the massive earthquake of 1906. She's a well established author in the F/F community, and her exquisitely slow romances and great plots make her a reference for the genre.

Rachel: How would you describe Shaken to the Core?

Jae: Shaken to the Core is a lesbian historical romance. The novel is set in 1906, during the Great Earthquake and Fires in San Francisco. It’s the story of Giuliana, a working-class immigrant from Sicily, and Kate, the daughter of a rich family. They are both struggling to find their place in the world—Giuliana so she can make a living as a single woman without a family in America and Kate because she wants to be a newspaper photographer, not just a socialite who entertains rich suitors and is supposed to marry and reproduce.

Despite their different backgrounds, they become friends when Giuliana starts working for Kate’s family as a maid. But then the earthquake hits, and they find themselves fighting for their lives.

Rachel: On your website, you detail the (significant!) amount of hours spent on the different processes that make a book a reality. Do you prefer to do historical research or contemporary research?

Jae: I don’t actually have a preference. I love research—any kind of research. I call myself an “information junkie” because I love learning new things. And I learn something new with every book I write. For example, my romance novel Just Physical features a character with multiple sclerosis and another character who is a stuntwoman, so I did a lot of research on the stunt business and on life with MS.

But, of course, historical fiction requires a lot more research than a contemporary romance. I spent hours finding out one little detail that later took up only half a sentence in the book. Finding out more about the way people lived in past centuries is fascinating, so I often have to force myself to stop doing research and start writing.

Rachel: What was your research process for this book? Did it differ from other works?

Jae: I’m working on novel number fourteen right now, so my research process is well established and doesn’t change much from book to book. For historical novels, I start by doing general research into how people lived and how they thought in the era I’m writing about. What kind of food would they eat? What kind of medicine was available back then? What did they do for entertainment? How did the usage of language differ from ours? What new technology was invented during that time?

That general knowledge about the time helps me establish my characters’ personalities and backgrounds, and it also helps me to plot my books. Once I know what kind of scenes I will have in the book, I start doing more specialized research. For Shaken to the Core, I put together a timeline of events. When did the earthquake hit, and when did the aftershocks happen? What course did the fires take? How bad was the destruction in different parts of the city?

I only start writing once I’ve gathered all the information I know I will need.

Rachel: You write Kate braving the interdiction to take pictures to let the truth out— did the army really try to censor what was happening?

Jae: Pretty much every detail I mentioned in Shaken to the Core is based on facts. City officials wanted to portray San Francisco as a safe place to live and invest in, so they reported a death toll of under 500. Nowadays, the death toll is estimated at 3,000, possibly even 5,000 to 10,000 victims.

Officials also didn’t like anyone taking pictures of the destruction, especially not of the earthquake damage. Earthquakes are more unpredictable and uncontrollable compared to fires, and they were afraid that reporting the truth would scare away investors, so they downplayed the magnitude of the disaster and encouraged newspapers to report just the fire, not the earthquake.

Rachel: How did you decide you wanted to write about the San Francisco earthquake? Has it been a project long in the making, especially so long after Backward to Oregon? I remember you teased it in the Hollywood series, was it already in the plans then?

Jae: I don’t exactly remember when I first came across the Great Earthquake of 1906, but I have been interested in that era and in writing a novel about a natural disaster for a long time. I started doing research at the beginning of 2013, almost three years before I started writing the first draft of the novel.

When I wrote Damage Control, in which one of the main characters, Lauren, writes a screenplay set during the Great Earthquake and Fires, I already knew that I would write a novel about the same event and I also knew a lot of the scenes already. If you read Just Physical, the novel in which Lauren’s script is filmed, you will recognize several scenes from Shaken to the Core.

When I first envisioned Shaken to the Core and its characters, I didn’t plan on connecting it to my Oregon series, but once I had created Dr. Lucy Hamilton Sharpe, who’s much more comfortable with her sexual orientation than other lesbians of her time, I realized that I had to give her a background that would explain why she considers it perfectly normal to fall in love with women, not men. That’s when I decided to make her the granddaughter of the characters from Backwards to Oregon.

Rachel: What are your projects for historical fiction? Will we see more of the characters from Shaken to the Core?

Jae: I definitely plan to give Lucy her own novel. The book will focus on the Chinese community in San Francisco and the discrimination they faced, before and after the earthquake. I knew that someone like Lucy will need a strong partner who can be her equal, so she will become involved with a woman who fights to save young Chinese girls from slavery and prostitution.

Rachel: Do you have other projects in the work?

Jae: At the moment, I’m wrapping up revisions on Heart Trouble, a contemporary lesbian romance with an unexpected twist.

After that, I will write the story of one of Heart Trouble’s supporting characters. That seems to be a trend with me: I often become fascinated with the minor characters I created and will then give them a book of their own.

I’m also planning a follow-up novel to my popular romantic suspense series that started with Conflict of Interest and Next of Kin.

Rachel: You’ve shown skill with a lot of different genres: historical fiction, urban fantasy, contemporary fiction, procedural fiction… Do you plan to explore new territories? Science Fiction? Maybe gothic horror?

Jae: I don’t want to pigeonhole myself as a writer, so I love to explore new genres. I could definitely see myself writing science fiction or fantasy, since I devoured novels of those genres as a child and a teenager. There’s also a paranormal mystery on my books-to-write-one-day list.

Horror is pretty much the only genre that I never truly became interested in, so I’ll probably skip that one.

Rachel: I like how you’ve shown great diverse and complex characters in your bibliography. I know this is me preaching for my chapel, but do you plan to create a trans character one day? Maybe a lead?

Jae: I’ve learned to never say never. A diverse cast of characters is important to me. By the way, a lot of my readers read Luke from my historical novel Backwards to Oregon as transgender. While I didn’t set out to create a trans character in Luke, I understand how she could be viewed that way. At the very least, she’s what you would call genderqueer today.

Another story on my books-to-write-one-day list is a novel with an asexual main character. I have two asexual friends, and they don’t see themselves represented nearly enough in fiction.

Rachel Vigo is a would-be critical geographer from Paris (the one in France, not the one in Texas). She is an avid devourer of books and plays video-games far too much.