But first, this issue's GUEST CREATORIAL, from co-writer TERRY BEATTY...
"Although my book is intended mainly for the
entertainment of boys and girls, I hope it will not be
shunned by men and women on that account, for part
of my plan has been to pleasantly remind adults of
what they once were themselves, and of how they felt
and thought and talked, and what queer enterprises
they sometimes engaged in."
That's what Samuel L. Clemens, an author of some note (who resided briefly in my hometown of Muscatine, Iowa), said in his preface to THE ADVENTURES OF TOM SAWYER, a book that, by all accounts, more than lived up to its author's expectations. And while my collaborators and I would never attempt to compare ourselves to the one and only Mark Twain, his words express exactly what we have in mind for our series of NEW BLOOD stories.
It has seemed to me that in the past two decades, comics have focussed so much on "growing up" - on pushing the envelope - on being dark and gritty and sophisticated - that something has been lost. I grew up on comics. Learned to read from them. But when I was a kindergarten kid (in 1963, if you must know) the mainstream comics were accessible to a little kid. Stories were self-contained. They were told with techniques that were clear and coherent (you know, like ELFQUEST). But these days? Well...
So when the opportunity was presented to write a series of Elfquest stories for NEW BLOOD, my wife Wendi Lee and my friend Gary Kato happily joined "Team Elfquest." Both Wendi and Gary share my concern about the dearth of quality comics that are at once accessible to younger readers and entertaining to adults. Carl Barks (the Disney ducks) and John Stanley (Marge's LITTLE LULU) spent their careers doing the kind of comics we want to emulate, and though we may not be in their league, the quality of their work is the goal that we are striving for. But exactly what kind of story to tell, we wondered?
I'm a big one for getting back to basics, and since ELFQUEST is a fantasy, I looked to the earliest fantasy stories I'd been told as a child. Fairy tales. The Brothers Grimm. The Arabian Nights. You remember them all - Hansel and Gretel, Jack and the Beanstalk, Aladdin. Great stories, all of them - and if creators as diverse as Walt Disney, Jay Ward and Stephen Sondheim could reshape them to reflect their own vision, then so could we. I just hope that when you read our stories, the music you hear in your head is closer to Sondheim's "Into the Woods" and not the theme from "Fractured Fairy Tales!"
And since we wanted to tell stories that might be a little too fanciful to be "official" ELFQUEST tales, we decided to make them just that - stories, told by the adult elves to a pair of wide-eyed cubs. Maybe the stories really happened, maybe they didn't. Can we trust Skywise (whose name, juggled a bit, sounds a great deal like "wiseguy") not to pull an elf cub's leg, given the opportunity? Fantasies within a fantasy - who is to say which are real?
Call them "Elfquest bedtime stories" or, as I jokingly refer to them, "Li'l Elfquest" (ouch!), you won't see us revealing any deep dark secrets about the Wolfriders and their ilk, no soul searching or bloodletting - just colorful adventures that we hope will excite and surprise you and give you a few smiles - and maybe even a laugh or two along the way. Our greatest hope, though, is that you share these stories with the children in your lives, because they are who our stories are really for.
It occurs to me that ELFQUEST readers may not be familiar with other work by the Lee, Beatty and Kato team, so, along with a shift to the third person, here's a little background - and a few shameless plugs!
Wendi Lee (as W.W. Lee) is the author of the "Jefferson Birch" Old West private eye series from Walker and Co. Her fifth book, OUTLAW'S FORTUNE, was published this year. She has also been busy in the short story market (often in collaboration with her husband), with contributions to numerous anthologies including the "Cat Crimes" series. She has been involved in the comic book business for a number of years, having written for various trade publications, and was (once upon a time) Press Liaison for Deni Loubert's Renegade Press. She and her husband first met at the San Diego Comic Convention in 1983. They were married in 1989. What took them so long?
Gary Kato is one of the best-kept secrets in comics. He not only pencils, inks, letters and colors NEW BLOOD "Bedtime Stories," but contributes lettering and color to other ELFQUEST stories as well. He has drawn numerous comics with writer Ron Fortier, including the original STREET FIGHTER and the remarkable MR. JIGSAW (the latter currently on view in the E-MAN mini-series from Alpha Productions). For ten years he was an assistant and letterer on Max Collins and Terry Beatty's MS. TREE. Amazingly, Kato and Beatty have never met face to face, Gary's hometown of Honolulu not being within driving distance of Muscatine!
Terry Beatty is the co-creator (with Max Collins) of the comic book features WILD DOG and MS. TREE, the latter having the distinction of being the longest- running private eye series in comic book history (twelve years). With Wendi Lee he is co-author of stories for the upcoming paperback anthologies JOURNEYS TO THE TWILIGHT ZONE III, FRANKENSTEIN, CELEBRITY VAMPIRES and SANTA CLUES. He recently inked Joe Staton's pencils for fifteen issues of DC's GUY GARDNER, and is currently drawing JOHNNY DYNAMITE: UNDERWORLD, a four issues mini-series written by Max Collins, to be published by Dark Horse Comics in 1994.
Jeff Smith, who has nothing at all to do with this comic book, is the creator of BONE, a comic so wonderful I just couldn't resist plugging it here.
Okay, enough of that...
One last thing: I know I promised not to compare our work to that of Mark Twain, but looking back at the stories we have written so far, isn't there just a little of Huck and Tom in a couple of cubs named Cutter and Skywise? I like to think so.
* * * * *
And now... it's letter time!
Arrgh. Is this what I have been condemned to? To
be forever known as "that NEW BLOOD basher from
Canada"? What a claim to fame. I do like NEW BLOOD, I
really do. In fact, I loved the new Summer Special.
Honest! I didn't love all the stories, but I didn't dislike a
single one. The cover is fantastic. You really need that
guy Dave DeVries to do more stuff - like a real portfolio
of EQ art so I can hang it all over my wall. "Heal They Elf"
was... well, cute and silly, as to be expected, and "Fur
Flower's Gift" was a wonderfully refreshing change of
style. The art in "Rock-Shaper" was really good except
for the odd panel, like that one where Ahdri's arm looks
strangely mutated. But I shouldn't criticize, having a
good deal of difficulty with foreshortening myself. I
loved the Lethargic Ladhands story. it was absolutely
hilarious, and I loved the style of drawing and the
colors. As I've probably mentioned before, I have
absolutely no qualms about different styles of ELFQUEST
art. It's those who try to draw like Wendy and can't that
bug me. "The Passage" was fantastic! I can say with
total honesty that that is the absolute best art I've ever
seen in NEW BLOOD. I think you should get those guys
working on Hidden Years. And of course, "How Not To
Write Elfquest: New Blood!" Not much more that
needs saying about that one, except that maybe I'll
switch my idol from Wendy to Deni. Just kidding!
Loooove the hip-hop ears! You guys should dress up
like that for Halloween!
Anyway, that's about all I want to say, except for one thing - I don't hate NEW BLOOD!
Maral Agnerian
<<street address removed from archive>>
Aw, come on, you can tell us... what do you really think? Hee hee...
Yes! I've been waiting for this one! I hope that
Bill Neville doesn't have all of this silliness out of his
system, because I get the impression from the letters
pages that a lot of loyal ELFQUEST readers need to
lighten up. Even during my acting classes, no matter
how worked up or melodramatic we get about how we
all must perform or risk being an incomplete person,
we're forced to make fun at ourselves just to keep it all
in perspective. In effect, that's what NEW BLOOD is all
about, right? Anyone demanding ultra-strict continuity
and consistency in details (in NEW BLOOD, at least)
should be tied down and forced to read issue number
eight a few hundred times. Sure, we're passionate
about the elves but it's just a comic book.
Good stuff, Bill. Especially the Liefeld elves. Priceless!
Michael Brady
<<street address removed from archive>>
Oh how grandly this title began. We faithful
readers were promised some interesting interpretations
of the familiar ELFQUEST settings and characters. The
EQ stories in the series would not necessarily be what
Richard and Wendy would do, but they would be
interesting and entertaining. The first few issues
certainly lived up to that promise. John Byrne, Barry
Blair, Taggert and DeVries, Lea Hernandez, and others
gave us some different slants on the inhabitants of
Abode. These early issues were confirmation that the
concept of the Worldpool was a viable one. ELFQUEST
was truly moving in a new direction.
The past several issues have failed to live up to this promise. The Vickie Murphy story was good, as is the present series of "Bedtime" stories, but they lack the creativeness of the earlier issues. There are essentially the types of stories that Richard and Wendy would do. Those two are great, but I thought the point of this series was to open EQ up to other artistic interpretations. "It ain't Wendy and Richard" should be the guiding philosophy of this series. Instead, I'm seeing "Let's be as much like Wendy and Richard as we can." This is unfair to everyone.
Hugo Award winning S/F author and fellow Peorian Phillip Jose Farmer did something very similar to what you were doing with NEW BLOOD. He gathered a bunch of writers together, gave them the rules of one of his fictional worlds, and told them to go crazy. The resulting collection of short stories, Tales of Riverworld, contains some exceptionally brilliant interpretations of Riverworld. Many of the stories in the collection simply could not have been told by Farmer, but they enhanced, rather than demeaned, his creation. This is the type of attitude I would like to see more of in NEW BLOOD. Give your creators the rules of your world, and let them go crazy within the boundaries you set. Challenge them to tell good stories, but also let them explore their own creative interpretations of EQ. No one can tell EQ stories like Wendy and Richard and no one could ever hope to replace them. However, I'd really like to see what some of your creators can do when unleashed.
Be bold, have vision. Get back to the original conception of this title. Remember, if it ain't broke, don't fix it. Thanks for listening.
Conrad L. Stinnett III
<<street address removed from archive>>
The Flying Wallendas had it easy. All they had to do was keep half a dozen people and assorted furniture balanced on this teeny-tiny little wire. We're attempting to open up a mansion of many rooms, slowly, carefully, one month, one issue, one story at a time, and to make sure that what we do (and by "we" I certainly include every single person who contributes to the ELFQUEST storytelling universe) remains faithful both to a spirit of exploration and to those very rules you mention.
Some creators take the tack that what they do can only be done by them, and by no one else. That's their prerogative. ELFQUEST, we've discovered, by its very nature, must be shared. It's a world full of stories that want out. It's a multi-faceted idea, with a past and a future, that's as intriguing and "explorable" as the world we story-reading humans inhabit.
Your point is well taken. Even as the NEW BLOOD title evolves to accommodate a new-old cast of characters setting out on their own series-long quest, we're looking to keep the "Worldpool" concept viable as well. We agree; it would be a shame to lose the "possible impossibles." On the other hand, we've discovered that readers do love long stories that "feel" like grand adventure. We aim to please.
NEW BLOOD #8 was just priceless. I like Nimoy
Squirt. It was fun to see Winnowill the Jessica Rabbit
lookalike.
Pam, Bill and Tara, the Trinket story was great. I loved Ember falling flat after having teased Trinket so.
*Cough* The "ElfForce NewBlood" illustration caused the same reaction this style always gets from me. It made my teeth hurt. I really hate that style of art.
J. Sylvan
<<street address removed from archive>>
Now, before anyone gets the wrong idea... Rob Liefeld and the Image guys have tapped into some wild and bizarre current with what they're doing; it makes the times we live in interesting, as the saying goes. We think that Bill Neville's "ho-image" is hilarious, not because we hate either Rob Liefeld or his art, but because it's such a bang-on parody. Hey, he did us a favor once without knowing it; we should hate him??
And on that note, see you in 30!