[00:00:00] Speaker A: Welcome back to the Capes and Tights podcast right here on capesandtites.com. I'm your host, Justin Soderberg. This episode, we welcome rom V to the podcast to talk his latest comic, Dawn Runner, over at Dark Horse Comics. We also talked a bunch of other things, including some of his other titles that are out there right now. Rare flavors, detective comics, the one hand, six fingers, all that stuff and so much more right here on the podcast. But before you listen to Rom V and I chat, make sure you head over to Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Blue sky and follow us like us do all that stuff over there and subscribe rate, review all that stuff over on Apple, Spotify, and all your major podcasting platforms. Also check us out on YouTube
[email protected] this is episode with Rom V, comic book writer of things like Venom, Detective comics, Carnage, the rare flavors, and upcoming Dawn Runner at Dark Horse Comics. Enjoy, everyone.
Welcome to the podcast. Rom, how are you today?
[00:01:05] Speaker B: Yeah, very good.
Just done with my work for the day, kind of settling into my evening routine. So nice to be chatting with you.
[00:01:14] Speaker A: It's great to hear that, too, because time difference here. I'm on the east coast, in Maine, in the United States, and you're over in the UK, correct? Am I right about.
[00:01:22] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, I'm in London. I used to live on the east coast a while back. I used to live in Philly, and I lived in New York for a couple of years as well. Yeah.
[00:01:31] Speaker A: So you're at the end of your day. I'm in the middle of my day. But you can rub it in. You're in the future, actually. Isn't that the case? You're in the future?
[00:01:39] Speaker B: I think so, yeah. Who knows?
Time is a circle anyway.
[00:01:43] Speaker A: Exactly right. But, yeah, so, I mean, obviously you've been writing comics and doing this for a little while now, but I'm guessing most of our listeners know who Ram V is. But have you been a comic book fan your entire life, or was this something later in your life? What's your comic book origin story? In a sense?
[00:02:00] Speaker B: I was a comic book reader when I started off as a very young kid. I read a lot of the european sort of phantom, mandrake, Flash Gordon stuff, not a lot of the Marvel DC stuff.
And I read a lot of indian comics, a lot of european comics, Tantan and asterisks.
And so, yeah, they were part of my childhood, but I was nowhere near as intense. I never owned a costume or anything of that sort.
And then I stopped reading them for the longest time. My father took away all my comics and went like, you have to start reading proper books now. And then gave me, like, a copy of Steinbeck. And I was depressed for most of my teenage years.
And then somewhere around 1920, I moved to the States and a friend of mine gave me volume one of Sandman. And that kind of rekindled my love and interest in comics.
But that was, I think, the first time I ever thought of, like, I would love to write something like this one day.
I'd been writing since I was a kid. I'd been writing since I was about twelve or 13. I just never put the two things together until about 2013, 2014, when I was a friend of mine. I was already writing at the time. I'd written a few prose stories that had been published, and a friend of mine said, you have a very visually evocative writing style. Have you ever tried writing comics? And my brain just went, yeah, why haven't I tried writing comics?
[00:03:31] Speaker A: And here we are. Right?
[00:03:32] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:03:34] Speaker A: It's funny how I was talking to someone at my local comic book shop here in town, and I was laughing because I mentioned the idea, like, wait, rom's only been writing comic books professionally for like, ten years. And they're like, wait, why? Because it seems like you've been doing this for the name. You're attached to so many prolific comic book titles with detective comics and carnage and venom. Those books, people are like, oh, he must be a seasoned veteran. And I'm like, it's actually, in a sense, no, you're not.
[00:04:03] Speaker B: My first sort of internationally published comic was self published, was Black Mumbai in 2016. And then my first widely published comic was probably Paradiso from Image in 2017.
My first DC work was only in 2019. So, yeah, it's not been very long at all, but it's one of those things when you write for yourself, you write as a hobby.
There's something, I mean, a combination of impostor syndrome and the Dunning Kruger, or at least awareness of the Dunning Kruger effect. You're kind of looking at your own work and go, and one part of you is going, God, that's amazing. You're brilliant. The other part of you is going like, wait, what if I'm the only one who thinks that?
And so it was really lovely those first few years to put work out and then have people react really strongly to it and really viscerally to it.
Yeah. And then I'm at a point now where I'm like, cool. I still crave that. And now people have this expectation, I think a couple of months ago, someone sent me a bunch of reviews of my own comics on a website called, like, League of comic Geeks, I think it's called. And I've got a couple of friends who are members there, so they keep sending me, like, funny comments and shit from that website.
And someone had commented, oh, another rom v book. At this point, it would be a surprise if it was bad.
And I was like, well, that's not the sentiment you want, which is, like, another good book, God damn it.
But I suppose it's nice to have set that expectation now. So also, on some level, I'm like, cool. I want to make something that makes even those people stand up, people who expect the work to be good.
[00:05:59] Speaker A: Now I feel like you just need to have a goal of making a really shitty comic book just to be.
[00:06:03] Speaker B: Like, see, no, you never do that. Go the other way. Make, like, a really amazing comic book.
[00:06:10] Speaker A: Well, I love when you're solicited for Dawn Runner. It says rising star Rom V. And I'm like, well, in a lot of our books, a lot of us who are fans of your work were like, I think you're already there. I don't know if you're rising.
[00:06:22] Speaker B: No. I think this was a remnant of the standard format that dark horse has, because it was funny. We saw, both Evan and I saw this, and Evan's been amazing in animation and graphics for a really long time as well. And we went to dark horse and said, well, I'd like to kind of like to stop rising now and just. I'm happy just to be a star where I am. I don't need to rise anymore.
[00:06:50] Speaker A: Yeah, it's funny because I read it, because I'm like. And that's another reason why I think some people like otherwise. And I think your biggest thing is it's not just the quality, but the books you've been attached. Not just everybody gets to write detective comics or venom. These books are like Catwoman. These books are books that people covet to write and so have your name so quickly on a name like detective comics. I think some people, again, will think, oh, Robinson doing this for generations now.
He's been doing this for a while, and it's like, well, no, if you actually look at his resume, it's not that long.
Do you feel lucky that you've been able to get on a book like detective comics and things like that so quickly? Some people wait years and years and years.
[00:07:32] Speaker B: Yeah, it's a combination of a couple of things. I don't think you can undermine or undervalue the role of luck. Right.
Anyone who's made it to any level of success in their career, you can always find ten others with same amount of talent, same amount of hard work who didn't make it there.
And so, yeah, there's always serendipity and luck, but the analytical mind in me says it applies equally to everyone. So it's not really something you control, so you don't worry about it on the other side. I think it's also because I've been very true to my own voice.
To me, the worst place for me to end up would be to sound like someone who's been doing this for 30 years and doesn't care to sound like, oh, yeah, it's another comic. Who cares who the writer is? Or the voice is so generic that it could be somebody else who wrote some other comic.
I think that's poor writing.
And I've expressed this view to others before where there's this view that, oh, you write commercial art, so you just kind of do your thing and then walk away. And it doesn't matter. It's still art. Even if it's commercial, it's still art. And so it has to be about you in some way. It has to be evocative in some way.
And if you look at truly interesting artists, even on the commercial sphere, they're all people who have a know, I love David Fincher. And you can look at a David Fincher film and go like, that's a David Fincher film. You don't need to hear the dialogue. You don't need to see the entire hour and a half, two frames, and you're like, that's David Fincher on the same, like, I'm not a huge fan of Michael Bay, but I know he's like a hugely successful director as well. But the one commonality is you can look at two frames of a Michael Bay film and go like, yeah, that's a Michael Bay film.
And so having that sort of voice, having that thing that is you is very important. And I feel like part of the reason I've been lucky enough to end up on these books is also because I bring that voice, I bring that sort of unique point of view to these books.
[00:09:57] Speaker A: Do you think that's easier? But it becomes easier to you with the ability to do some creator own stuff at the same time of doing some of these intellectual properties or big two books, like having the ability to do play with whatever you want to play with, but then go into more of a structure that you have to have at least some rules in what you do.
[00:10:16] Speaker B: Yes and no.
I feel like I'm ill equipped to answer that question because I've always done create our own books.
[00:10:24] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:10:25] Speaker B: At all points in time.
Two years before I did anything for DC, I was already putting out creator own books. So the reason I was working at DC is because I was putting out creator own books. And then recently when I signed an exclusive with DC, I said to them, listen, I'm happy to exclusively work for DC as long as on the creator own front I get to do what I want.
And I remember in that discussion saying, it's like breathing air. If you ask me not to do creator own books, it's like asking me not to breathe. And so I don't think there will ever be a time where I'm not doing something that just exists because it tickles me in some way.
I don't do the creator own stuff for the big sales or the huge successes or anything. They're just books that my brain is like, oh, man, it would be awesome if I wrote this.
[00:11:21] Speaker A: And you have a variety of books, too, which is cool. And you've been able to work with a variety of artists and creators and letterers and colorists and things like you mentioned earlier, they all have a rombie stamp on it. They literally do. They have your name on it. But you read it, you're like, this is your book. You can tell this is your book. Even though it might be a different, potentially different genre or you work with some very different artists, too. It's not like you don't look at a book and go, oh, those looks like a rom book. You have to kind of read it and get into it. But you work with an artist that's pretty cool and having that ability to stretch it out and do all these different things. I was just looking at, you have like, what, rare flavors out right now. The one hand, you're doing detective comics. You've got Dawn Runner coming. So you're not like, it's not like you're not busy.
You're pretty busy. Did I hit everything that's out right now? Rare flavors, the one hand detective comics and Dawn Runner coming right now. Is that you're at right now.
[00:12:13] Speaker B: Yes, that's right.
[00:12:14] Speaker A: Okay. And you got multiple of them are creator owned. And they all have different styles.
[00:12:22] Speaker B: Completely different styles, completely different genres. I think rare flavors is weird. Super magic, realist food documentary.
The one hand and the six fingers are a cat and mouse murder mystery, but told in two different books by two different writers.
And then Dawn Runner is mecha Kaiju, big bombast storytelling, but intimate ghost story, body horror, Sci-Fi romance.
[00:12:59] Speaker A: Speaking of asked, we reached out to Dark Horse to talk to you about Dawn Runner because that's coming out here pretty soon.
[00:13:10] Speaker B: Yeah, March 20, I believe.
[00:13:12] Speaker A: March 20, yeah. So that's right around the corner with that five issue miniseries coming out from Dark Horse. And when I reached out to Caitlin, I was like, yeah, when I get these emails back, and then Caitlin passed me on to whoever helped me get to you. It was.
I get these emails saying, new book from Dark Horse, and anything from dark horse. I'm like, okay, I'm going to read what this solicit is. I'm going to read what this book is because dark horse puts up some bangers, but then you see your name attached to it, and I was like, okay, really? Look at this thing going on there. And so I got to read it, and it was fantastic, and I just can't wait. And the other downside to reading a book before it comes out is you have to wait even longer for the second issue. Exactly. So I think that when I go to read it, I was like, okay, I want to read this because it's a secure story. And again, I have this ability. Evans artwork is fantastic in it. I will say I looked at just before we started recording here, I was looking at the COVID to cover a. And I was looking at the lines that are on. There's, like, so many lines of texture on the COVID I'm like, I can't imagine trying to draw that.
[00:14:16] Speaker B: It seems so weird.
He is surprisingly fast for someone who does such deliberate work.
I'm convinced either he's got some kind of predator natural ability, or he's just, like, running himself into the ground and then pretending to be fine when he wakes up the next day.
[00:14:37] Speaker A: It was just kind of funny. I'm like, typically, I'm a graphic artist by day. I do mostly cans for beer art or beer art for cans.
I do a lot of my stuff digitally and stuff like that, and I do some illustrations, but I was just thinking about. I'm, like, trying to draw those lines over and over again, even in sequential parts of it. There's parts in this book where there's your Kaiju monster. All those things are all on multiple panels. And I'm just thinking to myself, it's just setting yourself up to be like, oh, crap, I got to do it again. But I'm sure Evan loves doing it. So it's not.
[00:15:08] Speaker B: Yeah. And the other thing to note is also some of these are not on paper. They're on scratch board. So he's used, like, a blade or a knife to scratch out the black parts. And I'm just, like, insane. That is insane to me.
[00:15:23] Speaker A: Makes you happy. You're a writer, right?
[00:15:25] Speaker B: Yeah.
Also, I've seen people struggle with, like, how do you know what words to put down?
[00:15:32] Speaker A: Yes.
That's why one of the things that we love comic books so much, I think it's because there is this multifaceted thing to it. There's down to the lettering, the coloring, the different covers. There are the stories, the writing, all this stuff. There's multiple facets, I think. I was talking to you mentioned about reading, actually, your dad telling you to read actual novels. And my parents were just happy. I was freaking reading. They're like, you can actually read. Cool. Let's put a comic books in front of you and see what happens. And I've read a lot more novels as an adult than I did when I was younger. And if you don't like someone's writing style or what the story is about, you basically just close the novel up and move on because there's nothing else to it. I could hate your writing and still enjoy a comic book if the artwork is good. The opposite, you could read the story and then go, okay, this artwork is not what I want, but I can still read it and so on. And so you might not like the plot that much, but the scripting is really good, or whatever. There's so many.
[00:16:29] Speaker B: Yeah. Look, I mean, I compare it very much to making music in a like. In my opinion, Trent Reznord could not sing to save his life. But compositionally, his instrumental setups, his sense of music, his sense of pushing sound is so phenomenal that I love nine inch nails. But I think there are plenty of better singers on the planet, and I think reading a comic is very much that sort of experience I don't think you should be looking at.
I don't think most readers go, like, I like the art, but I'm not sure about the writing. I think most readers are just going to look at it and go, I love the story.
I may have felt strongly about the art, not so much about the writing or vice versa, but in the end, your hope is that no one's able to tell where one thing ends and the other begins. So in the end, you're delivering a song to someone who's listening.
[00:17:29] Speaker A: We had this discussion. I have a book club at my local comic book shop where we read a trade paperback every month, and we discuss it and so on. And when you go into, we talk about the art, we talk about so on and so forth. Sometimes people complain. They know me. They put me into a position of not too many words on a page. There's certain writers who have splash pages of text, and then there's these bubbles that cover up most of the art and so on and so forth. In those times, I think that people are trying to write too much of the story if that makes script too much of the story, and not let the art speak for itself sometimes. And so, with Dawn Runner, I think it was great because you and Evan worked so well together. That was like, you could say things, but then I could interpret my own things on the page. I could take that artwork and go, oh, I know what Rom is trying to say, like, those kind of things. And I think that's why you work so well with your artist, in my opinion.
It makes it seem effortlessly.
[00:18:22] Speaker B: Yeah, look, I think stuff like too many words on a page, unless you're doing something egregious, like your artwork is covered by the text.
I actually feel like those kinds of rules are overly simplified, and they exist to maybe explain, on a very superficial level, how to write a good comic. But there are no rules, man. They're all tools, right? Like, words are a tool. The art is a tool. How many panels on a page is a tool? And really, when you're making a comic, it's about learning how to use these tools. So there might be a page where you've got 30 words in every panel, and then followed by a page that's just one panel with no words on them. And it's about learning how to use any of and all of those things. It would be so ridiculous to take a Rule like that and put it in any other medium. It's only in comics that people talk about it this way.
You wouldn't ever go to a filmmaker and be like, oh, you got too many characters in this shot. You should only have six. You got seven characters in this shot. No, that doesn't work.
Yeah, nobody does that. And I feel like we tend to simplify comics too much because we want to give people these mathematical formulas of how to write a good story, but you can do all the calculations you want. Good story is going to be a good story whether it has 100 more words in it or 50 less.
[00:19:49] Speaker A: Speaking in partnerships like this. How did you connect with Evan on this thing?
How did this co creation happen?
[00:19:56] Speaker B: Yeah, it was really funny.
I had reached out. Sorry. I had seen Evan's artwork when he had done a print called Golgotha, which I think was very evangelion inspired. So this huge mech little character standing in front of it, and I had thought to myself, like, oh, man, if I ever do that mecha kaiji story, this is the guy I want to reach out to. This is the guy I would ask to work with me. I went on his website, and he had already done some comic book work as well. So I was like, I'm really excited. Like, this guy is going to be amazing. I'll reach out to him at some point, because I was already busy working on other things. And then separately, a few weeks on, I get an email from Evan out of nowhere. I think it was a DM, not an email. And he dms me, and he goes like, hey, you don't know me, but I read graffiti's wall, which is the book I did with Anandvadakrishnan. And he's like, I can't find too many other people who read it, but I think this is amazing, and I love it, and it's so evocative. It made me feel like I love comics, and I would love to maybe collaborate with you at some point. I was like, man, what are the chances? The exact same guy who I was like, I want to work with him, writes to me a few weeks after. So it was funny like that. But, yeah, I got back to him. We broached the topic with dark horse, and lo and behold, we had a story.
[00:21:30] Speaker A: As much as we don't like social media out there right now, it's so funny. We're thinking back on how many comics probably wouldn't be made if it wasn't for dms. And the ability to just get a hold of someone, the people getting the chance to actually talk to each other via Twitter, DMs, or Instagram. DMS is crazy. Yeah.
[00:21:47] Speaker B: I mean, I think comics on the whole is very much like that.
I think people underestimate the value of how beautiful it is that comics is such a flat structure.
Know, if I could randomly DM J. H. Williams and be like, oh, my God, I'm a huge fan of your work. And J. H. Williams dms me back, like, oh, I've read some of your stuff, too, and it's great. I'm losing my mind here, but I'm trying to be calm on the but because I love his work, and I don't think there are a lot of other creative industries where that kind of flat structure.
[00:22:24] Speaker A: Yeah. And then you get these partnerships and relationships that last forever too. It's like one of those things that you and Evan are going to be friends for a while now and you probably do a projects in the future together just because this one ability to have this and Evan taking the Sean.
[00:22:38] Speaker B: Phillips and Ed Brubaker, those guys.
[00:22:43] Speaker A: You comparing you guys, you and Evan to baker? No, I'm talking about long lasting, wonderful relationships in mean. And they did happen. Obviously, they happened pre social media and the Internet, but not, I think, the number of people and creators I've talked to where it's like, oh, yeah, we just dm'd each other and that's how we, like, I was like, oh, and also working at different places at different times. You're sending emails and messages to each other. Like, he's sending you image illustrations to you and you're looking at them and so on and so forth that the Internet. Yeah.
[00:23:14] Speaker B: And it's such an intensive process as well. Right. Especially when you collab. I don't collaborate in a way where it's like a conveyor belt or I write a script and then somebody else draws it and I don't talk to them. I tend to collaborate very much. Like, okay, let's sit down for a couple of hours and talk about these pages, and let's make some choices one way or the other. And I think when you collaborate like that, you have to be friends. You have to be able, because I have to be able to give unvarnished opinion on stuff. Like, if I don't like something, I have to be able to say it.
At the same point, if the artist wants to come back to me and say, actually, I think I'm going to need a couple more pages here. Or, I think this moment in your story, it doesn't really land because you haven't thought it through. They have to be able to say that.
And I think that takes an extraordinary level of trust and friendship when it comes to creative fields.
[00:24:13] Speaker A: Speaking of that, I mean, the designs of, like, your. Was it Tetsa? Is that what you're calling them?
And then the Iron Kings. Those designs are so cool. Is that something that you and Evan worked together, or did you give him notes and he went with it, or how did those come about?
[00:24:30] Speaker B: I think conceptually, outside of me going, this is how I feel the mech should be. So telling him things like, okay, so dawn Runner should feel like it's a prototype mech, so it should feel new compared to everything else, and it should feel sleek, and it's probably one of the quicker mechs, so less bulky, more agile.
So outside of conceptual notes like that, I wouldn't dream of giving Evan any specifics until he had, like, a, yeah.
[00:25:02] Speaker A: Exactly how it should go.
[00:25:04] Speaker B: What's the point in me telling him, like, the legs need to be like this, blah, blah, blah.
[00:25:08] Speaker A: They're two inches too long. You got to shorten those legs. They're two inches too long.
[00:25:11] Speaker B: Yeah, see? So when he has a first draft, I'll go in and say stuff like that. I'll go in and be like, oh, maybe the head's too big, or, like, I feel like the head needs, like, I don't know, more aerodynamic shape, blah, blah, blah.
But even that is a conversational process. But I would say, like, 80, 90% of the work on those is Evan the Tetsa. Slightly different.
So the Tetsa, actually, their name comes from an aztec word for sort of demigod. Creatures, like ancient monsters, if you will.
And I know what they are, and I don't think most readers know what they are yet, and I don't think you'll truly understand what they are until you get to issue four or five.
And so, because I know behind the veil, I've seen behind the veil, there are some choices that we made on the tetsas and will continue to make on the tetsas. Like, you'll see as the story progresses, you'll see more of them, and you'll see that. Wait, that's not what I expected. That's not how I expected the second or third one to look.
Yeah. So those designs are much more fluid, and we had a few conversations in terms of what they would feel like, what they would be.
[00:26:35] Speaker A: That's awesome. I love the collaborative part of it. Best comics are the ones, like you mentioned, that work together so closely and do things like this and bounce off ideas off of each other towards the end of this issue. Obviously, it wouldn't be a Kaiju style mech style comp if there wasn't epic battles and things like that. Are we going to see a lot more of those as the issues progress, or is this.
[00:26:56] Speaker B: Yeah, I think pretty much every issue has a few of those, and then as we get to issue four and five, I think those become much more dramatic, and we kind of discover the truth behind what these creatures are.
And, yeah, epic things happen to dawn Runner as well, and happen to the characters as well. And I think the challenge of this book is to balance those sort of epic notes with the softer, more intimate character.
You know, hopefully, given the twist at the end of the issue, you kind of starting to see where those are going to come from as well.
[00:27:38] Speaker A: It's funny, too, because we talked about Michael Bay already. Like, Michael Bay movie is explosions and things like that, but they may not have as much heart as some of them have in it and so on and so forth. It's balancing that out. Obviously, all of us want to see fights and battles of these things. It's the same thing. When you go down to a Godzilla movie, it's like, obviously there's going to be these epic battles with Godzilla, but some of them are just that or none of that. And it was like the balancing between the two. You can't have these big giant.
[00:28:03] Speaker B: No, yeah. I mean, when I pitched this to dark horse, I think one of the first things I said was like, I want to combine sort of the big bombast of Pacific Rim, but also with the drama focused human Sci-Fi of something like arrival. So when I mentioned those two things Pacific Rim and arrival put together, I think people really went like, oh, there's something cool and interesting there.
So I think that's very much the aesthetic that we're going for, is there will be big bombast and all of that, but then there will be intelligent, thoughtful, introspective Sci-Fi happening as well.
Yeah. Basically I'm saying is don't worry. There are scenes where mechs get their arms ripped off and their bodies thrown as well, so it's great. Don't worry.
[00:28:51] Speaker A: That's awesome. But I think you got to have heart to it, too. It's one of those things that it can't just have fun. So I'm glad that there's going to be a little bit of mixture of everything in it and your writing style has that you're able to draw from different. I'd say draw but pull from different things.
I'm glad you said arrival and Pacific Rim, but also I'm glad it also wasn't like in the initial synopsis or the solicit. Sometimes people just dumb it down to those things. But the rival thing I didn't think of until you said to them, but civic rim, obviously, I pulled from when I was thinking about it. But yeah, that's a good comparison. I think people will like it. I absolutely loved it. It's hard to say early on in the year when you talk about a comic book and there's so much more to come out to figure out with comics of the year and all that stuff. But I'm like, dude, you're in contention. This is one of those great comics. And I talked about it at my book club, which we bet on last Tuesday, saying, I just read this book and I'm really excited for people to read it, and so on. And I said, it's easy to read. And it sounded so bad because it sounds so, like, I don't know, it was effortlessly to read, if that makes any sense. Not easy to read.
[00:29:57] Speaker B: Yeah. Like I said, for all practical purposes, you should only hear the song, and every song is easy to hear. It's not like you have to make an effort to listen to music. And that's how every comic should feel.
Frankly, regardless of how complex the story or how convoluted my plot is, the one thing I really love is when people go like, oh, I got sucked into it. I didn't realize I had read so much of it until it was done. And I was like, whoa, I finished that really quickly. And then they'll go on to say, but it lingered with me for a week after I couldn't stop thinking. And that's the great bit. So it was complex and nuanced and powerful enough to evoke a response that lingers for a week. But when you're reading it, you should not be seeing the gears or seeing how the thing works or feeling things are out of place or having to engage and do work in a way that feels like work.
[00:30:57] Speaker A: And I mentioned, I think I said I've read comic books before. Someone used terminology that was so above my head that I was like, I had to google it. I'm like, I shouldn't have to pull my phone out to look something up to be like, what is this thing that he's talking about? And I've also done it because a lot of the books I end up having to read digitally because obviously I get the advanced pdfs and I go to click on the screen to see how far in the comic book I am. And sometimes I'm like, oh, only 30% through. This one was more along the lines where I clicked to go to the next page and it wanted me to go to the next comic, and I was like, wait, hold on a second. This is over already. And that's what I think it's the athleticity part of it, and I think that's, that's that we're just exactly even.
[00:31:33] Speaker B: And, and to give your listeners context as well, this is a 32 page first issue. Yeah.
[00:31:41] Speaker A: And that's another big thing is the fact that you crammed a lot into a lot of pages. But also, like I said, I didn't feel that way. And it also makes it easier for me, because I really like the idea of potentially going back on April 24, when issue two comes out, is to go back on the 23rd night and read the issue one again. So I get that back into it and then go into issue two, and if it's effortlessly read, then I can easily do that. There are certain ones where I was laughing, because I do that a lot. And what was the one I was with the last Ronan? Because the last Ronan came out so far apart from each other. I feel like I read issue one, like, a dozen times. By the time we got to the end of it, I'm like, I got to remember what this is about. But having a monthly comic book was a little easier. So March 20 is when issue one comes out. Issue 220, 4 April, and so on and so forth. You actually got two comics coming out the 24 April, because the fifth issue of rare flavors comes out on the 24 April.
[00:32:33] Speaker B: Yes, that's right.
[00:32:34] Speaker A: And then you had one hand come out on February 7 and issue two coming out on the 13th and.
[00:32:43] Speaker B: Six fingers as well. So every six fingers issue comes two weeks after the corresponding one hand issue as well. That's cool. One and one came out two weeks later. Six fingers one. One and two comes out. Then two weeks later, you get six fingers two. That's awesome. Yeah, I'm really happy to see. So both one hand one and six fingers one went to second printings just while they sold out. So really cool to see people pick up on what we're trying to do with the two books, because we didn't really shout out about it before the books came out, because we wanted for people to have the sense of discovery of like, oh, holy shit, that's cool.
[00:33:22] Speaker A: Well, it's because the covers have a similar but different look to them. So when you're looking at it, I'm like. Because I even was like. I saw the issue come out, I was like, wait, hold on a second. Is this connected in a way? What's going on here? And I was even like, that. There's no way these are not, because they definitely look like the same issue comic.
[00:33:38] Speaker B: Also, the titles insinuate they should be connected, right?
Yeah. I just love doing stuff like that. When I said earlier, I don't do my creator own things because I want the big blockbuster hit every time I do them, because I'm fascinated by the idea of telling stories in a way that maybe people haven't thought of telling, I don't know, another book that has done this where you haven't expressly told the readers, like, this is how you're supposed to do it. Instead, you're kind of expecting them to find out, them to piece the clues together, and then you think about how, to me, how cool that is that you're asking the readers to be detectives in a detective story.
[00:34:26] Speaker A: It's awesome. And if people missed out on, in the long run, it's great in the comic book industry getting the trades to come out afterwards, and you have the ability to do them on that.
[00:34:33] Speaker B: Yeah, and we're collecting the trades that way as well. We're going to have issue one. Issue one. Issue two. Issue two.
[00:34:38] Speaker A: Oh, see, there you go. Yeah, Rob, you're a rising star over there. I don't know.
[00:34:45] Speaker B: I rise anymore. My head's going to be through the roof.
[00:34:47] Speaker A: Exactly. And then you also. Detective comics still, too. March 26 is the next issue of Detective comics.
But really, Dawn Runner is one.
The funny thing is, the benefit of doing an independent podcast about comic books is that I only have to bring on the people that I like their work. No one above me has been like, you really got to talk to Rom. He's got a comic book coming out. And I'm like, really? This is like, I get to choose.
And I liked Don Runner so much, I was like, I got to get on and get Ram on here and talk about the comics. So five issue miniseries coming out starting on March 20 from Dark Horse comics. It's epic, it's fun. It's a bunch of different things all in one.
Again, you mentioned arrival meets Pacific Rim, in a sense. Just check it out. Sure.
Thank you.
[00:35:38] Speaker B: I appreciate all the kind words.
[00:35:40] Speaker A: Yeah, absolutely. I'm so excited for people to read it. It's one of those. Obviously, I don't have the same feeling when people read your work as you do, but I'm saying when I read something that I really enjoy, it's really nice to hear someone else read it and be like, how'd you like it? I can't wait to. Now that I'm reading, like, three weeks now, waiting for the 20th, I'm like, going to go to my local comic book shop and be like, oh, you bought that? Read it right now and talk to me about it. Do not leave the shop.
[00:36:05] Speaker B: You're just standing there at the counter, tapping your foot, going like, come on.
[00:36:08] Speaker A: Come on, get through it. No, it's awesome. I'm excited for it. And then I like, the first issue so much too. I was like, okay, I'm already recommending that we do the trade when the trade comes out for our book club because I just wanted them all to read that, and it's different. Like I said, that's another thing. It's like I read a wide variety. Most of it's been horror lately.
[00:36:26] Speaker B: Yeah, I can tell. I'm looking at all the issues behind you.
[00:36:30] Speaker A: It's been fun. And so to be able to read something a little bit different than everything else that I've read, that adds to it as well.
Anytime. I can support dark horse, too. I love dark horse.
[00:36:39] Speaker B: Excellent. Yeah. I'm so glad you enjoyed it.
[00:36:41] Speaker A: Yeah. So I'm really excited for people to read it. So dawn runner, March 20 from Dark Horse comics. Pick up anything that has your name on it. Honestly, if anybody wants to read anything, because I highly recommend it. Big marvel fan over here, so your venom run, carnage run. Great stuff. So check those out, people. But, yeah, I really appreciate you taking the time out to come out here and talk comics and all that stuff. We made it through without my daughter being born.
[00:37:05] Speaker B: But congratulations in advance.
[00:37:07] Speaker A: Thank you. We did it. I recorded with a buddy, my local comic book shop. That's right. Came on.
[00:37:15] Speaker B: We did all the hard work.
[00:37:18] Speaker A: I was joking. That was my wife. I was thinking about it. I was like, I slept in the living. My son isn't sleeping right now, which is great. Perfect timing for my son to not sleep when I'm about to not sleep on a schedule.
And so I was sleeping in the living room. He was sleeping on the couch. I slept on the iron mattress in the living room to make him feel good and so on and so forth. And I was like, oh, so difficult. Look at her face. And she's just like, shut up. I'm like, yeah, I can't say anything's difficult right now.
[00:37:43] Speaker B: Maybe I don't get to complain for a little bit.
[00:37:46] Speaker A: I'm like, no, my wife is way stronger than I am. I'm going to say it right now on the record, women in general are way stronger than I will ever be after I've seen my wife go through two pregnancies. It's definitely one of those things that there's a reason why men aren't the one getting.
[00:38:01] Speaker B: You got to be tough. Yeah, you got to be tough.
[00:38:04] Speaker A: No way. But, yeah, I appreciate you taking the time out of your day to talk to us and so on and so forth. So everybody should pick up anything by Rom B but dawn runner, March 20, pick it up, people grab it. It's well worth it.
Thanks, Rom. Again. Enjoy the rest of your evening. And yeah, keep making great comics.
[00:38:21] Speaker B: Cheers. Thank you so much. Take care.
[00:38:28] Speaker A: One, two.
