Who's Who In The CBU Update 2009

Who are... Park and Barb?

Barbara Lien-Cooper and Park Cooper, are the owners of Wicker Man Studios and of Gun Street Girl, its flagship project created by Barbara and artist Ryan Howe. Barbara has written for many websites, and served a one-year stint as Managing Editor of the multiple-Eisner-award-winning print magazine Comic Book Artist. Park is the Editor-in-Chief of indie comics company Septagon Studios, and of Comics Bulletin's sister-website MangaLife. Together, they also co-wrote the graphic novel Half Dead, published by Dabel Brothers Productions and Marvel Comics, and later picked up again by Desperado Publishing, and the New Media project The Hidden for manga publisher Tokyopop. They both also adapt manga and edit manga and comics for various companies.

Interview: Queenie Chan

By Park Cooper

Australian resident Queenie Chan is a manga-ka, or manga creator, whose works appear online at the website www.wirepop.com. She is also currently drawing her own series, THE DREAMING, for TokyoPop, to begin in 2006. My wife and I read her horror manga story, BLOCK 6, at Wirepop, and we delightedly compared notes on webcomics. Still, we felt we just had to get to know her better... and what better way for new friends to get acquainted than through an interview?




Park Cooper: So right now I'll try to ask you some general questions...

Queenie Chan: Okay, here we go.

PC: What were you doing when I showed up today? Drawing, I suppose?

QC: Surfing the net. SUPPOSED to be working... but it's a SATURDAY!!

PC: Barb and I have been reading library manga all day.

QC: I wish my libraries had manga.

PC: Lots of FRUITS BASKET. FRUITS BASKET is a mildly big deal here now.

QC: I realise. Not really a fan though I would read anything on my lap.

PC: We rented the first volume from a local store again because we missed hearing the voice work… and the music. Anyway... let's talk manga. We know a lot about the ins and outs of the Western Comics Industry... [shakes fist angrily at W.C.I.]

QC: Hee hee. I don't, but I'm learning...

PC: Barb enjoys a good gothic shojo. She gets off on BRIDE OF DEIMOS even though it's soooooooo old school. She just can't help herself somehow.

QC: Hmmm, I was somewhat turned off by the art, but I can see the attraction.

PC: It's a slightly guilty pleasure.

QC: I think the most important thing for horror is atmosphere too. It's what makes something memorable.

PC: Yes. Too old school. But she has trouble finding manga that scare the hell out of one using mostly atmosphere.

QC: People are somewhat desensitised to violent imagery these days, so there's only so much you can do in terms of gore.

PC: Barb was interested in UZUMAKI but felt he pushed it too far. And GYO was very much not to her taste.

QC: Junji Ito always pushes things too far. I think that quality's a staple of most Japanese horror manga.

PC: Ah well.

QC: And GYO was... more funny than scary. Killer walking fish! gasagasagasagasaGASA... CHOMP!! *augh~*

PC: Barb didn't laugh much, she just felt it was a little icky. Ew, stinky fish... not very scary. Anyway, what are your influences? I can't wait to ask any longer.

QC: Right-o. My influences! I have a lot of influences, mostly manga, though the one person that has influenced me more than others would be Osamu Tezuka. It's not so much his art, but his attitude towards manga that I admire. He wasn't the first manga-artist I got attached to, but when I stumbled on more of this work, I was amazed by the variety of stuff that he did, unlike most currently working Japanese manga-ka. Most manga-artists tend to stay within one genre and one demographic, but Tezuka just rocketed from one genre and one demographic to another, like he didn't care, and he probably didn't. I suppose that's why I myself try so many different genres and styles because in a way I'm trying to imitate him. And amazingly enough, another one I was really influenced by was... Calvin and Hobbes.

PC: That wouldn't seem so surprising except you're a scary writer person doing scary works.

QC: Oi? I have a lot of other manga on my site at http://www.queeniechan.com/ Let's see... I have 9 short stories and 4 longer ones on the site (some dead, but can't be helped). It's the short stories where I have the most fun experimenting. Though I've only found a style I'm comfortable with recently. Hmmm... writing manga isn't much different from writing western comics, because ultimately it's the story pacing that makes the difference. Usually that will be up to the artist.

PC: Anyway to answer an earlier (implied) question of yours, no, getting in the 5th time is not normal in Western Comics. What's normal is never getting in.

QC: Hahaha! Okay, not really funny. Because they only want superheroes?

PC: Oh, that's part of it. Sometimes sexism is a problem...

QC: At TokyoPop, over half of the creators are girls. ... And after TokyoPop, I thought things were making progress in the so-called "western comics industry."

PC: And economics... Smaller publishers care less about girlness and superheroes, but they're also usually scared of taking a chance on anything new and losing any money. Some people in the WCI feel it's going to destroy them because it's stealing all their readers.

QC: Because manga has more readers than the WCI?

PC: Yes.

QC: Hmm... sounds like a train hurtling over a cliff.

PC: And YOUNGER readers. Getting them to actually buy the comics is hard. Toys and clothes, yes, but not the actual comics.

QC: True. Manga is getting all the younger readers.

PC: Manga is cheaper, gives more for its dollar, has more variety, has better characterization. It's WRITTEN better. There's a lot of death-of-comics talk going around for years in the WCI, but now even the people who were just paying it lip service are wondering.

QC: Oh! I read "Western Comics". Not superheroes, but Sandman, Sin City... luv it. But these are more "indy" works, I suppose.

PC: I must be SO turning you off of any thoughts you had about Western Comics. I don't mean to... but our experience has been quite bad until recently.

QC: I see. Perhaps it's better to opt out of it altogether. Western comics, I mean. The industry will only get more paranoid as it sinks further.

PC: What we really liked about your comic Block 6 when we read it was it had that 'What the hell! That's just kinda wrong! That's not the rules of reality!" thing that goes on... my stories are all more linear...

QC: Is that what people think when they read "Block 6"?

PC: 'Wrong' as in... the brain rebels against the unearthly nature of the strangeness. Not that you're breaking the rules of good fiction... far from it.

QC: Well, Block 6 was intentional in the way it didn't follow a linear storyline, but rather a circular one.

PC: So have you read any other western comics besides Sin City and Sandman? Sin City for you surprises me... you seem like such a gentle soul…

QC: This gentle soul likes action adventure stories, LOVES Sergio Leone's spaghetti Westerns and Clint Eastwood, and enjoys DragonBall Z (the manga). So naturally, I'd like Sin City. Hmm, I like Derek Kirk Kim's work a lot. Loves his colours, yay!

PC: And Gun Street Girl…

QC: Yeah, hehe.

PC: So to get back to some of the interviewing-you stuff for a moment-- how did you decide to join Wirepop? How did that happen? Why Wirepop? Why a pay site? Why the web at all?

PC: How did you decide to be a manga artist, for that matter?

QC: Well, that's an interesting story. I never drew much growing up, and actually has a degree in information systems. However, I graduated at the valley of the dot com bust in 2002, and so couldn't find a job. In 1997 I started drawing manga in my first year of university because I was so bored, and by early 2003, because I was still out of a job, I began contemplating manga as a serious occupation. Back then, TP was barely looking for original pitches, so I sent "A Chinese Ghost Story" in (that's on my site), and they responded favourably. Round at about the same time, I was contacted by Wirepop, who had seen some of the manga I posed on my site. They're mostly manga I drew in university, and since it was a hobby back then, I posted it online. When the folks at Wirepop saw it, they asked me to join them at a pay-site, so I came up with "Block 6" as an ongoing story and joined them at the beginning of 2004. After that, I landed my current gig "The Dreaming" with TokyoPop, so I've been out of touch with the web for a while. However, I don't intend to lose touch, because I believe the Internet is the way of the future. My ultimate goal is to draw stories for people to read anyway, so I prefer the medium where I can reach out to as many people as possible regardless of geographical boundaries. And the Internet embodies that.

PC: YUP.

QC: I must say I ended up a manga artist because that's what I grew up reading and was influenced by. It wasn't until 2004 that I started reading Western comics!

PC: You probably enjoyed SANDMAN... read the whole thing yet?

QC: Nope. Currently collecting it!

PC: How far are you?

QC: Western comics is expensive in Australia. Only got 3 volumes so far. Nothing under $20, unlike manga.

PC: Mmm... So that gives you some good stuff... Volume 1, where he's quickly getting his bearings... Volume 3 is Season of Mists, is that right?

QC: Yep. And Dream Country.

PC: Eh? Wait. You have the first one, and Season, and Dream Country? Is that right? Well I thought you were going in order, but in my personal opinion, those choices are even better. Barb and mine's first exposure to a comics script was what was in the back of Dream Country.

QC: I believe so. Wait, I don't think I have the first one, I have Neverending Dreams, I think. Either way, it's NOT a part of the original series,. #1 wasn't in stock.

PC: Oh really, that's the newest one. Not at all a good exposure to his work.

QC: True. I realised that when I read it. Shoulda stuck with the original bunch.

PC: But if you've got Dream Country and Season of Mists, then you've got the idea.

QC: Yup.

PC: I know you don't have anything to compare it to, but what's the Australian manga experience like?

QC: It's like an off-shoot of the American one, I suppose. People seem to be more open minded towards manga, because the so-called "Western comics" scene in Oz is flooded by American comics anyway.

PC: And of course you also aren't very far at all into the world of the WCI, so you aren't aware of how horrified the WCI and all the specialized comics stores are about manga...

QC: Well, the comic stores here aren't all that horrified. They stock both, though the last time I've been in a comic book store was probably 1995.

PC: The best store in Dallas no longer stocks both. They've gotten rid of all manga unless you count Teen Titans.

QC: Either way, local artists are struggling. Before they struggled against American comics, now they struggle against manga. What's new?

PC: And the occasional attempts Vertigo makes at manga with the character of Death.

QC: Oh, the backlash seems a bit over-the-top. In America, I mean.

PC: It is. But... in America, almost everything is over the top.

QC: I... can't stand the manga-ised Death, or the entire Endless. I prefer Gaiman's artists much, MUCH more.

PC: Eh? can't stand "the entire Endless"?

QC: I can't stand the manga-ised Sandman in general, I mean. The manga-ised Death and friends.

PC: Ah.

QC: Sandman CAN be done in manga format, but why do it when the original works so well?

PC: Because the original is over and everyone wants manga, he said cynically.

QC: Especially Death - she is everybody (and mine's) favourite character.

PC: Sandman was done for an older audience. While manga can be just as serious and affecting as manga, I'm certain that someone at DC said "Oh, manga is all about being cute for little girls who can't stand violence or anything like that"... they don't UNDERSTAND manga at all.

QC: Eh? He's joking, right? Neil Gaiman? Sandman is classic, man! People still buy it, it doesn't need to be reinvented.

PC: No, I said that, hypothetically. Sandman is over, but if the fans will buy more, they'll sell them whatever they can think of that might sell.

QC: That's true. Misconceptions has a lot to do with it. I was writing about the misconceptions associated with the word "manga" on my livejournal: http://www.livejournal.com/~queeniechan/

QC: There's so much manga that never make it into English. The very best of them included. And truth is, cute girls only constitute a small percentage of total manga output in Japan.

PC: Yeah, we've just been hearing about things like GANTZ and stuff.

PC: Hellsing wasn't EXACTLY for us, but at least it had EDGE.

QC: I was thinking economic textbooks manga, but you get the idea. Salaryman manga, 4-panel gag manga, cooking manga, educational manga, history manga... actually, just about anything that can exist has been made into manga. And enough porn to bury a small country. Porn aimed both at men AND women. So there's double the amount of it - it's like the book market in other countries.

PC: Yeah! Well that used to be everyone's first idea of manga... hentai.

QC: Uh-huh. But I think that's an image that was first fostered by anime.

PC: Then the anime and cartoons got popular, and then Pokemon came, and then the Pokemon and Dragon Ball kids got just a LITTLE older, and then it exploded.

QC: The first trickle of anime tended to be adult porn.

PC: Right… but no more.

QC: Thank god. A lot of the current manga boom is fuelled by anime watching. So it's all interrelated. Hopefully the stereotypes people in the West have of anime and manga will move beyond the current perception - and see that it is a medium like novels, movies and television.

ML: So, any closing thoughts?

QC: The Manga Market has expanded quite rapidly in America and beyond for the past few years, especially with the next generation of non-Japanese manga artists. It's good to see companies like TokyoPop willing to take risks and nurture these artists, and it seems that there is a market out there for the stories being told too. I think overall it can only do good for everyone involved - not only does it add diversity to the concept of manga in the first place, but it can also help break down the existing stereotypes people have of "comics", especially Western ones. Hopefully manga can be a worldwide entertainment phenomenon, much like movies, within the next 2 or 3 decades. I have a lot of hope for the future. :)








http://www.queeniechan.com/

http://www.wickermanstudios.com