Moderator: Mark Waid
Panelists: Scott Snyder, Eric Powell, Joe Hill, Rebekah Isaacs, Mike Mignola
"Everybody, thanks for coming to the Disney Princess Panel..." -Joe Hill
What about comics as a medium lends itself to horror?
-Snyder: Growing up, my favorite comics were about heroes being challenged by something that terrifies them about themselves.
-These confrontations have an immediacy to them that others don't.
-Characters must be loved by the audience to matter at all.
-Hill: In the 1940s and 1950s, superheroes weren't that important. Horror, however, was huge.
-Mignola: "I think of myself as drawing monsters, not horror comics."
-Powell: "We wanted to be able to draw anything we wanted."
-Comics lend themselves to horror because they are a visual medium
What drew you to this work?
-Isaacs: Readers can dwell on horrific images for as long as they want to.
-They are able to take their time and examine every single element of a horrific scene.
"Comics are an interactive medium. Only the reader and the page, on their own time." -Rebekah Isaacs
No sudden surprises or "jumps" can exist in comics, except for in the top left corner of a new page. Instead, you have to earn the scares. Even if they're not looking, the audience will see things later on the page out of the corner of his/her eye.
What informs your work?
-I: "Fear of EVERYTHING."
-"If you make a monster look like a penis, it's always scarier."
-Love of the genre.
-Geeks love watching the cool kids get killed.
-S: You look forward to getting scared.
What makes a really good horror story?
-H: The scariest things in my memory are all from Star Wars. (Isaacs agrees.)
-H: Comics are the hardest way to scare someone (vs. film/TV, radio, books) because you are working with a mixed visual and read medium, but without the aid of camera tricks or sound cues. The audience can use their imagination, but in some ways, it is limited by having the images/words on the page in front of him/her.
-H: Once you care about a character and relate to them, then you can be scared for and with them.
Comics can be the most intimate art form: It's just you and the page.
You can't jolt the reader, so just put the scary thing THERE, and then make it worse and worse with every panel.
Atmosphere and mood are very important. People will project and look for emotional and environmental cues.
The trick, though, is to only show part of the scary thing. Once you see the monster, it's almost always stupid.
The scariest things in comics were done by Gene Colan.
-All about ambience.
Mignola worked on a Dracula adaptation based on Coppola's Dracula.
What, as fans/consumers, do you find yourselves drawn to?
-Animal Man
-Y, the Last Man (Brian K. Vaughan)
-Rachel Rising (Terry Moore)
-Black Hole (Charles Burns)
-Dracula (Gene Colan's)
-Ray Bradbury
Failures in current horror:
"Boobs are NOT scary. More character. Less boob. Maybe more penis?" -Joe Hill
-Regarding the proliferation of sexpot women as horror villains.
What were your first horror films? Favorite horror films?
-S: Star Wars/Night of the Living Dead (original)
-P: Nightmares/The Exorcist
-H: The Swarm/Jaws (vetoed by the rest of the panelists as a non-horror), so The Exorcist, also, Sleeping Beauty made me cover my eyes.
-I: Star Wars/The Mist/Troll 2
-M: Beneath the Planet of the Apes/The Birds, also The Innocents, The Haunting
What should people who can't afford to keep up on comics do?
-"BitTorrent, if you can't afford it. The most important thing is to have people reading them." -Joe Hill
What is the scariest type of monster? Zombies, Vampires, Aliens, etc.?
-S: Just do them right. That's why they have stood the test of time.
-Take something safe and turn it into the thing that wants to kill you.
-P: Ghost stories.
-I: Zombies, because you can't reason with them.
-M: Anything, when done well.
-H: The Devil.
In this politically correct world, monsters are the last thing that you are allowed to hate.
Walking Dead: Horror or Soap Opera?
-Both, because you MUST develop characters. Only having zombie action isn't sustainable.
The Crooked Man and Others
-Where did the idea come from?
-M: Appalachian folklore character
"Villains are the sum of the hero's worst fears." -Mike Mignola
How do you filter ideas? What is your favorite scaring technique?
-The biggest scares come from characters you care about being put in jeopardy.
How did you keep your head up when starting out?
-P: An absolute fear of hanging drywall if I failed.
-S: The thrill of doing what you love and being happy versus the fear of being miserable.
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