Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Welcome back to another episode of the Capes and Tights podcast right here on Capesandites.com. I'm your host, Justin soderberg this episode we welcome David Desmelchin and Leah Kilpatrick to the episode to talk their heart, their short story in the Headless Horseman annual number one one shot over at Dark Horse Comics called Horror House. David is an actor, writer, producer. All those things who's appeared in movies, like The Dark Knight, Prisoners, the Antman Trilogy, the Belco Experience, blade Runner, 2049 Bird Box, the Suicide Squad, Dune, the Boogeyman Oppenheimer, the Last Voyage of the Demeter Gotham, Flash and so many more. He also has an independent show coming up that's hoping to be on screens at some point in 2024 called Late Night with the Devil. However, he's here to talk about comics that he co wrote with Leah Kilpatrick as well as comics like Count Crowley over at Dark Horse Comics. Leah is an actress, comedian and host. She's been in things like lovers divided, sunny family, cult, baby splitters, free the nipple gateway and more. She also hosts Superfan Builds on Netflix. She co wrote this story with David over at Dark Horse Comics. So enjoy this episode, everybody. But before you do, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Blue Sky as well as subscribe, rate and review on Apple, Spotify and all your major podcast platforms. This is an episode with David just Mulchen and Leah Kilpatrick talking. The Headless Horseman annual number one at Dark Horse comics. Enjoy, everyone.
Welcome to the podcast. David and Leah, how are you guys?
[00:01:42] Speaker B: Good, how are you?
[00:01:43] Speaker A: I'm wonderful. I'm wonderful. I'm here in Maine. You guys in California?
[00:01:47] Speaker C: Yes, we're in California. And it is the beginning of October now. So for us it's very exciting. We are jointly throwing a really big Halloween party together this year. So yesterday we were like going through all the crazy decorations and getting ready for that costume preparation, makeup preparation. It's a very exciting time of year. We've got horror comics. What a life.
[00:02:11] Speaker A: It's so much fun. October is amazing in my opinion. Here in Maine, we get leaves changing too, so there's that.
[00:02:17] Speaker B: We have to put fake leaves in.
[00:02:19] Speaker C: Our just we just graffiti the real trees. Yeah. I love Maine. We'll be not too far from you. We're going to be in Connecticut next weekend doing some book signings. This weekend. Holy crap. Oh my God. Time is flying.
[00:02:38] Speaker A: You're not busy at all, are you?
It's one of those things I always loved and say thank you to the people who jump on the podcast because their lives are way more busy than mine are. And it's just so thankful for you guys to be on Mean, I guess. Let's talk a little bit about who you are and how you got into this, writing a comic book. So I mean, Leah, are you a comic book fan as well? I mean, I don't know much about you, so let's talk a little bit about who you are.
[00:03:04] Speaker B: Yeah. So I'm originally from Minnesota, and I grew up with really all sorts of nerd. Um, my main ones were even into high school, I would go over to sleepovers with girlfriends and I would be the one waking up at seven in the morning to watch Saturday morning cartoons. Like, well, until I was like, 1718, which people always thought was questionable, but I knew got good content when I saw it.
Comic books were always kind of there in my life. I think it wasn't until later in life that I really hit them hard. I steered a bit away from reading just because it was a bit of not my strong suit. So what I appreciated with comics was the artistry and just being able to even if I had moments where the writing was too much for me, which sounds silly looking at comic book writing, but I would be able to see a story fall in love with it just by the imagery alone. So that was always kind of a big inspiration for a lot of my creativity in later life, was visuals and tangible medium. That's why I was so excited when we wrote this comic together, because I haven't had something published that I could physically touch. So that was a huge victory for me that I have David to.
[00:04:32] Speaker A: Know. Obviously. David, you've written a few comics, but have you been a comic book fan your entire life, too, or has this.
[00:04:39] Speaker C: Been something I have, I've been collecting. First comic I got in third grade was, where is she? Well, she's around here somewhere.
Yes, there she is. Avengers number 249.
They were facing demonstorm and I kept that. I got it off of a spinner rack at Minute Shop and never got rid of that. And I'm very kind of methodical about how I bag and board stuff, and I have been since I was a kid. Yes.
In fact, I'm reorganizing my boxes as we speak and I got really turned on to the world of horror and horror comics as well, at a pretty young age, which was something I really loved. And I think for me, I liked reading a lot.
But I did struggle with, I guess, I don't know, they were, for me, like comics, comic shops, comic culture were always this just like, amazing place where I could escape in my imagination and get lost in characters and ideas and worlds that felt as filled as they were with menacing villains and potentially galaxy ending catastrophes. It still felt a lot safer sometimes than the world I was living in.
So it's been really a gift for me. Obviously, in the world of acting, I've had the benefit of getting to work in a number of cool comic book properties. And I'm so in love with the way that comic books have been adapted to film and television since I was a know, since the saturday morning cartoons. I used to love Spider Man and his amazing friends, and I loved the Justice League. I loved watching Super Friends and was addicted to all the hall of justice. But I was more into, actually.
I felt like the villains and the Rogues gallery on, like, Justice League were the best, man. They were my then. So, yeah, getting the opportunity to write and create comics now, it's wild, man. It's such a such a surreal reality for me.
[00:06:45] Speaker A: I love how you mentioned organizing comics and things like that. I wrote a piece about two years ago now about the idea that it's like a mental break for me just to organize comics and go to the comic book store.
The idea of collecting comics and reading comics is this broader thing than just physically turning the pages in a book. It's the bagging and boarding. It's the organization, it's the displaying them and all that stuff. So I'm glad you're somewhat in the same boat as me in that sense.
[00:07:11] Speaker C: Yeah, no, it's a whole thing. And I think for people who don't collect comics, it can be intimidating. And I'm trying to encourage and it's been cool seeing the boom of what the MCU and the DCU and other independents have done with film and television because I see a lot of younger people going in and it's like, just go buy that comic. Go check. It's like a really cost effective, affordable form of entertainment. It's a great thing for parents to do with kids. It's a great thing for grown ups to do who've never been to a comic shop in their life. I know it can seem intimidating, but it's like, you don't need to know the best writers, the best artists. You should walk into a shop, walk along that wall, and just pick up the first thing that really you can't take your eyes off of. I still do that to this day. I have my favorite things that I follow, but I love to just walk along a wall on a Wednesday and see something new with an artist that does something that I'm like. Holy crap, that's awesome.
[00:08:08] Speaker A: Yes, it's a fun experience going into comic book stores, that's for sure. But I mean, not only is comics this big thing, and obviously we focus a lot on comics on this podcast, but we also love the horror genre. So obviously we're in October now, and this is a fun month for a lot of us horror fans. I don't know why it has to be in one month, really. We can be horror fans all year long. But Ali, have you been a horror fan since you were young? Is this something that you've always been attracted to?
[00:08:32] Speaker B: Yeah, horror and gore has always been something that I lean towards.
I think my mom always thought it was just, like, a little weirdo because any type of violent stop it. Any type of violent, scary movie like Freddy Krueger was, while I had this interesting relationship with him where I was terrified, I was constantly obsessed. And I think that's where I found myself a lot of times with horror things was the fear made me like them more, which I'm talking in therapy about. But with all the classic monsters, creature from the Black Lagoon is still today one of my favorites. I just have this fascination over Creature.
And then when I got to La. It was fun because I got to act in this Friday the 13th music video and I got Jason to kill me with what are those called?
[00:09:36] Speaker C: Like garden shears head genres.
[00:09:37] Speaker B: Yeah, it was a replica from Friday the 13th a New Beginning. So I got to play the dead chick. It was awesome. So it was like something that I've been such a fan of for so long to then be able to live in. It was such a dream. But horror stuff has always my dad would always I hated it, but he would always play little videos to torment me with it. And it's a whole genre that I've always just been obsessed with.
[00:10:07] Speaker C: It's a great means of disciplining children. I do that myself when my kids are bad. I'm like that clown down in the crawl space.
[00:10:14] Speaker A: Well, we have that as a regular thing. I live in Bangor, Maine, which is the home of Stephen King. And so we have that as a normal. It doesn't scare as many people here because I know that guy lives on the West Broadway. I know where he lives.
[00:10:26] Speaker C: Have you ever run into him around town?
[00:10:28] Speaker A: Yeah, here and there. He lives nowadays mostly in Florida, but he does come up here and there and people stop by his house to take photos of his house because it's creepy. And he's got gargoyles out there and like bats on the fences and all that stuff. And a lot of his books he did write in this place. So it is if you're a big Stephen King fan or horror fan, it's nice to see this place. But really he's not up in this area as much anymore. He spends a lot of time in Florida and at Red Sox games and things like that into a writer's retreat, though. He's turning it into a place where.
[00:11:00] Speaker C: Horror writers oh, that's cool. That's awesome. I love that. Yeah, he's definitely one of my biggest inspirations. He's such a hero and what an incredible guy.
That's how Lee and I actually met, was through, like, horror Sci-Fi. She had come out of a film school in Chicago, Columbia, and I had been graduated for a long time, but I had started my theater career in Chicago and then was doing some cinema and short films. And she produced a short film that's like a Sci-Fi horror film called Gateway. And that's when we met. That's when we became friends, which would have been back in 2010, 2010. So 13 years. We've been in some capacity working together and known each other for, like, 14 years.
And I think your viewers would appreciate, speaking of gore and makeup and stuff, her Instagram and YouTube, you got to link it on here. Like, the makeup she does because she's not a makeup artist, but she does it for fun.
Her vision makeup was amazing, but the zombie Captain America is one of the coolest. I show it to all my professional makeup friends, and they're like, who the f is this? This is incredible. It's so impressive. Yeah, it's really kind of you have.
[00:12:26] Speaker A: It pinned, I think, right? Is that correct?
[00:12:28] Speaker B: Yeah, I did a Clicker mask. That was like the thing, though, is when you said earlier, it was like, why does Halloween have to be one month? It was so funny to me because every Halloween I would build up to getting excited about what my costume was and what I could create and how I could be different and how I could make it. And then last year, I was like, Why am I limiting it to and then people are like, yeah, that's what cosplayers do. I was like, yeah, okay. But I don't want to put myself in that category because they're so talented. You know what I mean? They're, like, so multitalented and making so many things crazy.
[00:13:02] Speaker C: Anybody who sees what you've done would be like that would win prize. You'd win trophies at Cons, for sure, with some of those looks.
[00:13:10] Speaker B: But that was, like the thing that I forgot for a period of time was you can celebrate these things all year round in different ways. And even just being creative, like, with the Clicker mask I made, that was, like, in, I don't know, April.
[00:13:25] Speaker C: They're so awesome.
[00:13:28] Speaker A: They are. I second that opinion on going to your Instagram and looking at everything because it is all wonderful.
It's one of those things that if you're, like, trying to get to know something, you're like so you're just a makeup person. That's what you'd get. You tell jokes and you do makeup. That's who you are.
[00:13:45] Speaker B: It's very confusing. I know too many things. I got to put one down.
[00:13:48] Speaker C: That's why I knew when the prospect so we were talking about, oh, we should work, or at least I was thinking I wanted to work on stuff with Leah. I don't know if she felt that way, but I was certainly like, I'd love to work on stuff because I've been following her creations for years in comedy, especially. Like, she's just done a lot of really funny sketch work over the years that I've liked. And I thought when Megan Walker, who is the editor at Dark Horse who has helped Shepherd Count Crowley for me over the last five years, is also a really amazing friend and artistic collaborator for me, when she told me that she was doing this anthology special for Halloween and she wanted to start doing this like an annual for dark horse called the Headless Horseman. And would I be interested in coming up with a short piece for it?
I immediately thought of Leah because I've been in a space lately with a lot of my horror writing where I'm trying to incorporate the gallows humor and the tone of things that I love, but that I don't necessarily have the skill set for. So I was like, Would you be interested in helping me collaborate on creating something? And she was like, who are you? $5 million?
[00:15:16] Speaker A: How much are you going to pay? Of course.
[00:15:18] Speaker B: But that was like the challenging part because I had written scripts and TV pilots before. So then changing your creative brain to writing a comic is different. And so I was able to learn so much from David, who had so much experience already with it.
And that was such a cool thing just to learn about creatively, how you handle panels and how you can the different ways you can use text and the page flip. And he taught me all that stuff, which I think is such another added layer that maybe people who read comics don't think about, they experience it, but then when you write for it, I think it's such a tool that creators can use to pull people in even more to their story.
[00:16:05] Speaker C: I didn't think about it and I was consuming comic books for decades and I never really got into the and then you read like Bendis gave some great there's tons of great writers who've created texts for you to learn how to write comics. But I would say just having to dive in and tying in, wouldn't you say that there is a connectivity between script writing, comic I'm glad we have that language. We've spent years developing how to write screenplays. But bringing that visual medium into then a way that you can basically be sharing a bunch of emotional, tonal ideas with your artist, who for us is three states know and we never see in person. It's all done through us sending ideas, his words on a script and then to see what the artist can do. And then to have the gift of somebody as talented as Tyler was like, what an amazing kick ass way to kick this thing off together. Right?
[00:17:09] Speaker A: Is that something that Dark Horse connected you to together? Or how did the connection with Tyler come?
[00:17:15] Speaker C: Know, a couple years ago, in the midst of the pandemic, there was, as we know, so much like social and political upheaval and all the different workspaces I think people were involved in were just feeling these shifts away. From what could feel to many people, like, oh, it's just the way this is, as opposed to the people who were suffering under that. And I think the comic space has been going through a lot of transitions in the last five years where people are recognizing that everything from power structures to toxic work environments to the way relationships can happen between just like in Hollywood, just like in corporate America. It's just like in Washington. Very powerful people who could just kind of do what they will and if they generate enough coin, kind of live. So Tyler and I had heard enough stories from people in particular women who were being treated in ways that we were like, this is just not cool. And so we bounded together with a group of other artists and writers and creators to say, like, we stand in unity with needing to make a change. The way that HR accompanies HR operates in the space is really important.
So he and I started talking on the phone a lot. I was already a massive fan of his artwork. I fell in love with him as a person through that process of just talking about, what can we do? We're comic book creators or I'm an actor. How do we have any impact on this totally crazy world that we're living in?
[00:18:57] Speaker B: And.
[00:19:00] Speaker C: I just admire him. So so then when Megan approached about this, megan and Leah and I and my wife Eve, we all went out for breakfast and it was a great hit it off conversation. She was like, what artist do you want? And I was like, oh, my God. So I was thinking and thinking. We were talking and talking and looking and looking. And there was one artist who we really love, who we thought was going to be able to do it. And then he couldn't with schedule. And I was like, he's never going to say yes, but I should ask at least I should shoot for the know you got to shoot for the moon. I was like, I'll ask Tyler Crook. And then if he says no, which he will, then we'll have Megan maybe help us figure somebody that she knows. And he said yes? Not at first. He was like, I need to read it. And then he was like, let me see how my schedule is.
And then it just started to go and it was awesome because he's very hands on.
[00:19:54] Speaker B: He was wonderful.
[00:19:55] Speaker A: Yeah. And the art in this whole Headless Horseman annual number one is great throughout the entire thing, the different styles, but literally Caitlin over at Dark Horse sent me a copy in digital, and I was reading it and I was like, okay, I'm going to get to their story here pretty soon. And it changed the page. And I was like, I really hope this is their story.
And it was like one of those weird things is it didn't have like a splash page. Like your name of your story was technically on the building. So it's one of those things that I got to it. I'm like, I really hope this is it. And I got to flip back on the PDF to the front. I'm like, yes, it is, because the artwork in that page was so amazing. It's like, I love Count Crowley, and I love, obviously, the stuff that David would do on screen. And so I was excited to read this book story as it was, and then I was, like, looking at your Instagram Leah and stuff like that. Like, okay, this person's funny, so I'm hoping this person has some input on it, makes us a little funny. And it was unbelievable, and I don't want to give away too much about it. I think people need to to read the story, but it's not your typical haunted house, for sure. I'll say that.
The only line I want to say is hipster tennis. That's all I'm going to say.
I'm not going to go any further than that.
I read books at night with my iPad. My wife sleeps. And I'm like, I have a little mount that I read it with, and I'm reading it. I literally laughed out loud. She's like you. Okay?
The one line of the entire story that stuck with me was that one line hipster tennis. But no, it's not your typical haunted house. How did this story come about? How did this form did you guys go back and forth on this? Was this an idea for a lot?
[00:21:28] Speaker C: We were working in the same space, which was cool. We were sitting up here in my office talking.
[00:21:34] Speaker B: Yeah, we were just kind of trying to think of what we're interested in Halloween, and we see it so much from our point of view as humans. We were like, what do the monsters do on Halloween? Which isn't necessarily an original thought, but we were interested in putting our spin on it. And what do teen monsters do? What do they think scary? What do they see and pretend that they're not afraid of because they're too cool? And we were just kind of dabbling in the fact of I think after the pandemic, I think a lot of people came out being like, are we good people? What's our priorities?
And we just kind of wanted to have a little hint of who maybe really is the real monsters in these worlds and how we can play into that.
[00:22:24] Speaker C: Absolutely. I get asked lately more and more to do because of my acting business, like, oh, be a talking head kind of thing on these different horror. We're going to talk about horror movies. We're going to talk about horror fiction. We're going to talk about whatever. But we do panels now, as comic know, we were at San Diego Comic Con, and we're getting ready to do New York Comic Con. So anybody who's watching, come and see us at New York. And we're also going to be at the famous Monsters of Filmland Festival in October.
A lot of opportunities to talk about horror. What does horror mean to you? What are monsters?
And I always quote her because I think she's a genius. But Emile Ferriss talks a lot about good monsters and bad monsters, and I think that in my now intellectual analysis and thoughtfulness on what are monsters, I always land on the side of, like, I'm the most scared of just people.
And I think the metaphorical or creative mythological, modern or classical mythological ways that we manifest monsters in our storytelling are meant to take those things to the extreme. But it's still the thing that scares me the most. So I was like, we could make this really dower and dark, or with the help of my amazing writing, like, we could find some way in this that makes it more fun and fluid and like, you know, that experience of going to a haunted house, I'm sure you have them in Maine, we have them in California. We just did Horror Nights together the other night. I love haunted houses. That experience, I wanted our readers to get to have turning the page, like, what's the next room? What's the next horror we're going to see?
[00:24:07] Speaker A: And it just increases from that point on.
It's so great because I love it's a short story, too. That's the point, too. I feel like it would be drawn out almost in a full length comic book where you'd get like, okay, I get it. Let's go. This being a short story in an anthology actually works really perfectly for it. But I like your point about the monsters being people, because I've always tried to explain that to people. Like with The Last of US for an example, or The Walking Dead and all these things. And people are like, I'm not into zombies. I'm like, it's not really about the zombies.
It's a vessel to get the story moving, but it's really about the people and how the people are really the scariest part of these post apocalyptic zombie filled worlds, or monster filled worlds. And that's what I see. You watched the news, you watch everything, and it's like these horrible people that are out there, and this is like, what's the scariest things that are in the world right now? And that's kind of what you guys did with this story, but also had some jabs and some comedy in it and stuff like that was really good. It was very well written story, and it's my favorite out of the book, but you guys are on here.
[00:25:09] Speaker C: Thanks, man. Thank you.
You have to be willing to poke fun at yourself, too. Obviously, we're taking the piss out of all different kinds of people in this, but I'm certainly the guy who talks about my feelings ad nauseam. And I think that that's one of our first panel. Got it out of the way, rip it right off.
[00:25:31] Speaker B: And I'm avid in pickleball.
[00:25:33] Speaker C: Avid? The guy who sits around. Yeah, and I do it, man, if I'm in a fancy restaurant or not even a fancy restaurant. If I'm somewhere cool and I see that and the food is laid out in a way, I'm like, here I am thinking about how do I post a picture of this? As opposed to just consume the freaking food, man. Just enjoy this moment, be present.
Yeah, yeah. It's gorgeous. And we're lucky know Lucas Kettner, who does Count Crowley did the COVID for the headless Horseman. And then there's two variants. Mark Spears did a great variant.
Beautiful, beautiful. Yeah, totally Mark Spears style. And then of course, the legend himself, Double M.
Super rad.
[00:26:21] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:26:24] Speaker C: We'Re really surreal. I can't wait to go. Like, we got these in the mail the other day and I'm so excited to go to a shop. I go to a couple of different comic shops in California and I'm psyched for us to go walk into a shop a week, two weeks, october 13 18th. Yeah, okay, a couple of weeks.
[00:26:46] Speaker A: I got you back here.
[00:26:48] Speaker C: Thank you.
[00:26:50] Speaker A: What's the experience like going to be for you, Leah, to go in there and see something like on the shelf.
[00:26:54] Speaker B: And have your I'm going to try not to cry, but we'll see what happens. I just think you've been something you've been in love with for so long, whether that genre comic book or just even that. I mean, like you were talking about just memories of walking into a comic book shop.
I would go in and just sometimes look at the toys.
It feels like a safe haven in many ways and it's such a place with so much creative juices flowing, I feel, because it's artists and writers.
So to go in there and then have something with your name on it is crazy.
[00:27:34] Speaker C: It's wild.
[00:27:35] Speaker B: It's crazy.
[00:27:35] Speaker C: It's wild.
[00:27:36] Speaker A: Can only imagine. It's funny. I'm having this small experience version of it where Mad Cave Studios put out a Legacy of Violence volume Two, which is from Colin Bunn and Andrea Moody, and they randomly didn't even tell me, but they put my pull quote on the back of the book for my review of it. And I'm like reading their advanced copy on PDF on my iPad in the middle of the night and I get sending my LCS owner like a picture. I'm like, holy smokes, I had no idea. So now I'm like, I'm going to go turn every single one of those copies around, flip it around.
[00:28:10] Speaker C: I mean, no pressure, Justin, but we're just saying the better the pull quote, the more likelihood there is of landing on the back of a trade at some.
[00:28:19] Speaker A: Well, it's funny because I have who was it? Image had written out reached out about one about if you had any and then distillery the new publisher out there, they reached out putting a quote on their website, but they reached out like they actually asked, which is fine, I don't like whatever, but it was just kind of funny. I'm like, I just happened. To stumble upon it. And I looked at Volume One, and in the spot where I am is where CBR was last issue one or Volume one. So I was like, I replaced CBR. I'm happy with no big deal, but it was kind of funny.
My day job is a creative director for a brewery, and I do the graphic design and stuff for labels and beer. So I had the same experience when I walked into a store the first time and saw my can of beer on the shelf. And my artwork was out there, so it was cool. So I can understand it's a fun experience. And I tried not to cry, Leah, I'll tell you that. Right. So it is a fun experience.
[00:29:11] Speaker C: Is it nationally distributed?
[00:29:13] Speaker A: It is not. It's mostly in the Northeast, but there might be some in New York.
[00:29:20] Speaker C: We're in Connecticut next week.
[00:29:21] Speaker A: Not in Connecticut, but it should be somewhat in New York, depending on where you are in the city and where we have it's called Orano Brewing Company.
Our beer that would be down there is Tubular. It's like tubular. That's our beer that you see. It looks like a can from the Saved by the Bell, is what the can looks like.
[00:29:40] Speaker C: I love that.
[00:29:41] Speaker A: But, yeah, it's a fun experience seeing that out there. But now you guys have written this short story together. Is this something you want to do again? Maybe a longer format? Or is this something that was like a one and done thing? You guys don't like each other anymore?
[00:29:53] Speaker B: We're done. It's over.
[00:29:55] Speaker C: I mean, we waited all these years to finally see and it was just a nightmare.
[00:30:01] Speaker A: You'll see how sales do, right? You'll get the sales number, we'll see.
[00:30:05] Speaker C: How rich we get off of writing a one shot comic and that will determine everything.
[00:30:12] Speaker B: Yeah, we can't beat this.
[00:30:14] Speaker C: I have launched a production company this year that's called Good Fiend Films.
We are telling stories that wrestle with ideas that matter to the creators through the lens of genre, which is mostly focusing on horror and science fiction. And because the creating of this went so well, and because we are so close and creatively in line, we have a number of projects that are at different stages of manifestation. So if you guys love what you see with Horror House, when you're reading through the Headless Horseman and you go, oh, man, this one's awesome, just the way good old Justin did. You go, who created that Kilpatrick des Mulchin team? You're like, what else are these guys working on?
There's some stuff in the hopper. It's all genre so far.
[00:31:17] Speaker B: We'll pull out one rom.com just to.
[00:31:20] Speaker A: See how it lands randomly.
Yes, exactly.
[00:31:26] Speaker C: And by period drama. Well, we have one period drama.
[00:31:32] Speaker B: Commentary.
[00:31:34] Speaker C: A lot of good horror ideas going.
And with Good Fiend, one of the things that's wonderful is it's this playground where we can play around with ideas partner up with different people to see who may be the right fit for helping bring things to life. And it's know, I hope, to see Count Crowley come to life in different manifestations. We've got the newest volume of that coming in November. So I'm not sure when this episode of your show is going to drop.
[00:32:09] Speaker A: But for all of your 18th, the day of Headless Horseman, the day that we dropped this great.
[00:32:14] Speaker C: Go pick up Headless Horseman at your LCS. And then make sure to add Count Crowley to your pull list so that you get the new volume, which starts dropping in early November.
[00:32:27] Speaker A: And the trades for the first two volumes trades are available. This should be available so people should be able to grab those.
[00:32:32] Speaker C: They are. And luckily they've been having some places are having a harder time keeping them on the shelves, which makes me very happy that's because that means I get to make more Count Crowley.
[00:32:43] Speaker A: Yes, it's an unbelievable book too. So you grab that. But yeah, I talked last episode with Ethan Sachs who wrote a book called The Haunted Girl, but he also rates bounty hunters for Star Wars and stuff like that, but was also dropped. The episode is going to drop the same day that the comic was like what you need to do is you're listening to this in the morning on the way to work. You need to call your local comic book shop on the way to work and say, can you save me a copy of the Headless Horseman Annual so I can get that when I get out of work? Or whatever. You need to do that. And then also while you're out there, grab your Count Crowley and stuff like that too. Yeah, right. And all your different pop vinyls out there that are of you.
[00:33:19] Speaker C: That's right.
It's really fun because we've been on strike as actors and writers from the film and television industry for quite a while now.
We've been writing and developing our ideas in the comic space and just thinking of our general ideas of stories that we just want to tell that are important to us. But also working in licensing has been really fun for me with Count Crowley and I hope with other stories and characters that I create because getting to work with Immortal Masks who are doing now masks of the Count Crowley characters has been a dream.
Talking to some other potential collaborators on some really cool things, ancillary products and ways that you can continue the story outside of just the pages of the comic book, that's really exciting to me. I want a Saturday morning cartoon of something we make. Now that you're saying that, is it.
[00:34:17] Speaker A: Any Saturday morning anymore or is it just a Saturday morning? You can only watch Saturday morning, but.
[00:34:22] Speaker C: I will say my kids wake up at 659 on Saturday mornings. Now they're not on a timed viewing schedule anymore, which is wild. It's not like, oh, Thundar is going to be on at 08:00. A.m. But Gargoyles Gargoyles was so good. Man, I love comic book.
[00:34:38] Speaker A: Comic books.
[00:34:38] Speaker C: Great.
[00:34:39] Speaker A: It's written by Greg Wiseman, too. Same guy who created Carquills. Awesome.
[00:34:43] Speaker C: I've got some, but they go down on Saturday mornings, and they're sitting on that couch waiting for some Cap and Crunch. I got to go get some monster cereal. I can't find it. My target hasn't been carrying chocolate or Frankenberry or Fruit Brute. Yeah, it's killing me.
[00:34:59] Speaker A: Interesting. My son just likes to watch YouTube videos of people driving Matchbox cars into pools. Yeah, he's two years old. He's just like he calls it Cars and Pool. He says he wants to watch that. It's literally just guys taking the cars from the movie cars and running it down a slide into a pool for, like an hour. And he's fascinated with it.
[00:35:18] Speaker C: The Unboxing. When my son was like two, two and a half, he was watching the unboxing videos a lot. Just like, people opening weird.
[00:35:26] Speaker A: I don't know why I'm doing this or I just should do that. I'm sure that was people making pretty good money just watching these kids, which doesn't make any sense to me because their demographic is two year olds that don't buy anything. So I don't know why they're making money off this advertising when the person who's watching it is likely not going to buy the ads.
[00:35:41] Speaker C: But yeah, here's my hope for you, Justin. My hope for you with capes and tights is that you get the trophy, the YouTube trophy.
[00:35:51] Speaker B: Oh, he just learned about this. The plaque. It's a plaque.
[00:35:53] Speaker C: It's a plaque.
[00:35:54] Speaker A: It's a plaque.
[00:35:55] Speaker C: Leah hit it this weekend.
[00:35:57] Speaker A: What?
Yeah. Do you get it in the mail at some point, or do you like.
[00:36:03] Speaker B: Well, they have to send you an email, and it will take a while because they have to like, even after you hit a certain number of subscribers, they have to see it on their end, and they got a lot of people. And then I think you can apply and then you get it in the mail.
[00:36:20] Speaker A: Do you have to pay for it?
[00:36:22] Speaker B: What?
[00:36:22] Speaker A: Do you have to pay for the trophy?
[00:36:24] Speaker B: I think you pay for the shipping.
[00:36:26] Speaker C: Considering how much you've made them with, like, over 100,000 subscribers or whatever, and then all the millions of views. But you're still going to pay.
[00:36:34] Speaker B: But I also am not monetized, so I haven't made any.
[00:36:36] Speaker C: You've made nothing.
[00:36:37] Speaker B: I just get the plaque.
But I like that I'm a sucker for a medal, a trophy, anything that's like a Halloween costume contest. I get mad if I don't win them. So someone, I think, just needs to have a trophy on reserve just to hand me so I don't have a fit.
[00:36:52] Speaker A: It just says you won a trophy. It's all yeah, look, I've got a.
[00:36:57] Speaker C: Whole little shelf up there. Of mine. I love trophies.
[00:37:00] Speaker B: I'll just take one of those, don't you? That's how it works, right?
[00:37:04] Speaker A: No, you just take it. Possession is nine tenths of the law, so there you go.
[00:37:08] Speaker C: Stolen valor over here.
[00:37:10] Speaker A: I know you're on strike, david with the SAG, right?
[00:37:14] Speaker C: Yes.
[00:37:14] Speaker A: Still on strike there. Writers obviously have a tentative agreement, whatever's going on. Can you talk about your project that you had with the word late in it or no?
[00:37:24] Speaker B: Late night with the devil.
[00:37:26] Speaker C: Oh, yes. Late Night with the Devil is absolutely.
[00:37:28] Speaker A: Open for I thought so, but I just didn't know I wanted to know. Am I going to be able to see it at some point here?
[00:37:35] Speaker C: It's non studio and you will be able to see it next year. Right now it's doing a film festival tour. So we will be playing, I think, the Philadelphia Film Festival soon. Definitely. Chicago International Film Festival. I will be attending the screening of the Chicago International Film Festival. I believe that's on October the 15th, Sunday in Chicago, which is rad because that's where we hail from. So it'll be cool to go back there and celebrate this movie that I love so much, which is set one night.
It's the late 70s late night TV talk show and we're one episode of Night Owls, which was a 90 minutes late night talk show. And the host, Jack Delroy, who I'm playing, was just far, far second place to Johnny Carson. And the ratings in fact, the show is like on the verge of getting the axe probably any day because the ratings keep dropping. And so on Halloween night, jack decides to try and push the boundaries of good taste, ethics, et cetera, for entertainment's sake and trying to get the viewership up.
And it works. It's a happy ending story. I want you guys to all watch this. It's like a good old rom.com where a hero who decides to make questionable choices about ethical decisions in a place where horror is real totally comes out looking great.
[00:39:07] Speaker B: Don't believe him.
[00:39:09] Speaker C: I'm so proud of this movie, man.
[00:39:11] Speaker A: It sounds like it.
[00:39:11] Speaker C: Yeah, kevin Smith screened it recently. We had a couple of friends to watch it and he said such a great compliment. He was like it's like Rosemary's Baby meets network. And I was thrilled. I sent that to the guys who wrote and directed it, colin and Cameron Karen's, and they were over the moon. It's really fun. I'm very proud of it. And Stephen King, speaking of your neighbor, he got to screen it and he tweeted something very nice, which I should frame. I should get that, like, crocheted or embroidered in like a thing. Yeah, and send that to the boys. They would probably love that.
[00:39:49] Speaker A: You should tell them to say the same thing on another platform so that it does live forever, unlike the likelihood. Well, here's the thing.
[00:39:57] Speaker C: We screen grabbed that shit, man.
[00:39:59] Speaker A: We got it forever.
That's pretty funny. I mean, Kevin Smith and Mark Bernardin. Mark's actually been on the podcast. They were like, hailing this kevin Smith was saying was one of his favorite things. I'm like, oh, my gosh, now I got to see this movie and now we can't see it for a year.
[00:40:15] Speaker C: And Mark's comic writing is so good, man. I love and Kevin does a lot of really cool stuff with comics, too. Obviously, he's gotten to play with his own IPS, but he's done a lot of cool stuff with DC.
I love it, I love it, I love it, I love it.
[00:40:30] Speaker A: His comics are at Dark Horse, too, so that makes sense. Both of them actually have comics at Dark Horse. Kevin's awesome. So is Mark. Mark was great. Mark was mark was like, recovering from COVID when he came on the podcast. You're going to be okay. He's like, I got it. Let's do that.
I'm so glad that you two took time out of your day to talk here at the podcast about Headless Horsemen. It's coming October 18 to your local comic shop as well as Count Crowley. There's two volumes already out, one coming in November, all kinds of cool stuff. Looking forward to future stuff, right?
[00:41:06] Speaker C: And if you don't mind yeah, I'd love to come back too and talk about I've got a series with Image. Tod McFarlane is helping shape a new book that I created called Knights versus Samurai. And Federico Mele Fede, as I call him, is just to me, like Lucas Kettner, one of these artists that is about to just explode with such a unique voice as an artist and has such a specific style. And we're deep into production on that book right now and it's so rad. I can't wait for you guys to see. So lots to come. And all of the collaborations of Des Mulch and Kilpatrick Patrick is what they're calling us.
[00:41:47] Speaker A: And I'm hoping you can get back to work acting, too, at some point here. Pretty soon.
[00:41:51] Speaker C: Yeah, I think we're like close. Inches away.
[00:41:55] Speaker A: We're very close. I can imagine. I'm looking forward to it. Selfishly, all of us viewers at home are like, let's go. Yeah, but we're all like, in the same sense. A lot of us agree with everything that you guys have stood for and done and fought for in the selfishly. We're like, okay, at some point we need new stuff. I can't watch Reruns over and over.
[00:42:12] Speaker C: I think the powers that be have felt the pressure and I think they know the fans out there are angry, and I'm glad that it feels like they're finally listening and they could have done all this day one, but they.
[00:42:27] Speaker B: Like the drama they do.
[00:42:28] Speaker C: They certainly like the drama.
[00:42:30] Speaker A: I just never got it because I feel like none of it ever makes them painted in the good light. I don't understand.
[00:42:37] Speaker C: When they were doing those publicity quotes from that billionaires retreat that was up in Northern California. Everyone was like, you're so out of touch. It's bizarre. It's wild.
[00:42:48] Speaker A: We had a local business here who has a restaurant in the area. He has a place. He lives in another country. He does so well that was posting on Facebook about something about stores fronts being open during the pandemic, something. But it had it geotagged of him in the other country, like on like it was something to talk about people not getting paid or whatever it was or unemployment or whatever. I'm like, Dude, that's so out of touch.
You need to turn your geotagging off so that people don't know people right now. And you're on the beach sipping my ties and you're talking about people not going to be able to work or something like that. I'm like, Come on, people, stay in touch here.
[00:43:27] Speaker C: He needs more my ties. Justin. He needs more my ties. He needs more aruga.
[00:43:35] Speaker A: Like I said, I loved it. Tyler did a great job on the book. I think it's the partnership. I mean, I would love to see a book between the two of you and Tyler. That would be a dream come true, in my my opinion. And I would love for it to be a Dark Horse because those Dark Horse people know what they're doing over there as well. So yeah, grab Headless Horseman annual number one at your local comic book shop out today, actually, technically, because that's when this episode drops, as well as Count Crowley and all that stuff. And you have a website, Leah?
[00:44:02] Speaker B: Yeah, it's my name. Yeah, it's a cute website, actually.
[00:44:08] Speaker A: You should check it out.
I made it perused. It was pretty funny, right? I like your reviews. What people say about you is like, your nephew and your mom. It's great. Yeah, people should read those quotes.
[00:44:19] Speaker B: I have testimonials, too.
[00:44:24] Speaker A: Poll quotes from your mom. It sounds like a joke, actually. I got pull quotes from your mom. No, grab that. And then I said, sell out of Count Crowley so that David can make more of these as well as the Headless Horsemen. So people at Dark Horse are like, oh, these two should make another comic together. That'd be great. But I really appreciate you two taking out your time of your day talking here at the podcast.
[00:44:47] Speaker C: Thanks, man. That was awesome.
[00:44:48] Speaker A: Some point, you guys come back on.
[00:44:50] Speaker B: Love it.
[00:44:50] Speaker C: Got it?
[00:44:51] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:44:51] Speaker C: All right, man. Happy Halloween.
[00:44:53] Speaker A: Thank you.
