Serious Questions: An Interview with Tony McMillen about his Serious Creatures Graphic Novel
Seeing as the Covid lockdowns have opened up some free time, I thought it would be a good idea to dust off “The Write Stuff” and get back to some good old-fashioned literary citizenry. And to jump-start this dormant vehicle I decided to chat with Tony McMillen about the impending release of his graphic novel, Serious Creatures, which he both wrote and illustrated.
The graphic novel follows the life of Bobby Feckle, a teenage special FX wizard working through the golden era of practical FX: the ‘70s through the ‘90s. There’s still time to head over to his Kickstarter and get yourself a copy of Serious Creatures, which is available in several formats and bundles, one of which includes his other comic series, the early-Nintendo inspired Lumen.
With Halloween right around the corner, and with horror movie viewings increasing steadily as the day approaches, this seemed like an especially apt time to talk to Tony about his upcoming work inspired by many of those same films no doubt screened and re-screened in homes around the world. (You might even notice a few of them finding their way into novel!) In our talk, Tony dives into his creative process, the differing madness between creating prose versus comics, and the music that’s inspired his works. He also gives us a sneak peak at what he’s got in the pipeline—which, spoiler alert, is all very exciting!
1) Between writing novels, writing songs and writing/drawing comics, how do you best decide the right medium for your stories?
I learned the hard way not to try and force a square block into a cylindrical-shaped hole with my first novel Nefarious Twit. It took me 6 years to write and part of that was because in my heart of hearts I wanted it to be a screenplay and not a novel. And the results weren’t really singing. The final results are still mixed to me and that’s one of the reasons why it’s the only thing I’ve published that I might still rewrite entirely and put out in a different form at some point.
From that experiment I learned that you have to figure out what medium is the most exciting, intuitive or compelling way to tell each story and then play to the strengths of that chosen medium completely. Because I think when a creator is fully engaged in exploring a given medium is when you get work that stands above all else.
2) What do you get out of writing and drawing comics that you don't get out of writing novels? And vice versa?
The first thing that comes to mind is immediate feedback!
One of the most wonderful surprises about making comics was finding out how soon I would hear back from readers about what they liked or didn’t like. It makes total sense seeing as a comic takes such less time to read but I guess I never thought about it before. So when I published my first comic and then an hour later received feedback from someone online who bought it digitally and read the whole thing already I was a little flabbergasted.
I was getting used to writing novels over the course of years and then waiting a few weeks if not months for someone to tell me what they thought.
But to dig in a little deeper, both modes of storytelling are very different. I enjoy the act of drawing more than almost anything including the actual writing. While the act of writing might be more hard work, the results usually fill me with a deeper satisfaction than anything else. A completed work, comic or prose, both feel very satisfying and not much else rivals them. Except, of course, when the ideas come. When inspiration strikes and you’re dreaming it all up it’s like falling in love. It’s exciting, all you see are possibilities. Nothing can beat that feeling. It’s the most addictive drug ever concocted.
3) How does your process differ from writing novels to writing graphic novels? How did you acclimate yourself to the medium/process? What was most difficult about this new medium? Were there any aspects of creating comics that surprised you?
What’s the same is I find developing healthy habits (writing or drawing as early after I wake up as possible; writing or drawing every day if I can) is key to getting better and to shaking off any anxiety about filling up a blank page. It’s partly a numbers game, I have less to be precious about because I know I’m going to create something new tomorrow so if today’s work sucked—that’s okay, tomorrow’s might be better. But it’s also mental exercise (and with drawing, physical exercise, too) it’s keeping those parts of yourself active and limber so even if you only create a little one day when the deluge hits, and inspiration or deadlines come cracking down from the sky you can answer that lightning handily.
What’s different with writing prose or doing a piece of journalism is I have only one tool at my disposal: the written word.
But of course it’s an incredible tool and the truth is it’s really more of a switchboard to access an even greater tool: my reader’s imagination.
The reader interprets my words and completes the final part of the spell I’m casting. My words are a map or a set of instructions but it’s up to them follow it to their own meaning.
Which leads back to the similarity of comics and prose, and all storytelling really: when it comes to creating, it’s all problem solving really.
So with comics, I have sequential pictures with words to help make my mental map for the reader. But unlike film, there is still a lot of room for the reader to fill in the blanks of the story. With prose, they have my authorial voice, descriptions and dialogue to help them conjure up the story in their heads, but now with comics I can provide the look to a lot of what they’re seeing. But it’s done with drawings, not motion picture so there’s an abstraction there, there’s symbolism there. In a film you can do that too but usually it’s literal; if you see a guy in a red shirt in a movie he usually looks like how a guy in a red shirt would look in real life. But with the different art styles in comics my guy in a red shirt might look so abstract it barely registers as human. So the reader has to assign the meaning to it. And they have to fill in the story between the panels.
Comics take key moments in time and turn those into panels. Your brain is what finds connections between those moments and turns them into a linear plot. Just like your brain might assign the sound of a voice on a character or detect a theme or subtext.
The challenge of approaching comics as a novelist was knowing what tools from the written word wouldn’t work with comics.
4) Time being a precious commodity for any artist, especially ones who have to balance several mediums--not to mention the addition of a day job and a family—how do you manage to your time?
Short answer I have no social life. I’m glad I went out at night nearly every night in my late 20s because now I am a home body to the max. But luckily I’m old and boring now and mostly prefer it.
The trick for getting work done for me is realizing that there are more hours in your day than you might realize.
Yes, I go to work, I have a wife and a child, I still exercise, I still occasionally hang out with some friends and once in a while get a wild hair up my ass and actually leave the house to do something social-but there’s still usually time every day to get something creative done.
But it comes back to developing healthy creative habits; so instead of winding down at the end of the day and watching 4 hours of tv or spending 5 hours online; cut that in half or if you’re on a roll on a project cut it out completely.
Having become a father in the last year has definitely complicated matters (especially having to take care of the baby while working from home) but I still found time to make five issues of a comic book. Not because I’m a madman but because I approach my day with purpose. And when possible I try to get creative things done earlier in the day so if work or real life demands more attention I at least know I got a little creative stuff done already and I did it when I was at my freshest.
5) Any plans to merge these mediums you work in? Maybe something like an omnibus novel that includes prose, paneled illustrations and/or songs?
That could be really cool to try, I guess I just have to find the right project that all this multi-medium stuff feels organic and not gimmicky. I’ve included illustrations from myself in my prose work and for some of my comics I’ve included some back matter essays; and I’ve recorded rock songs from the fictional bands in one of my novels but I still haven’t gone full on with merging all the different medias into the actual storytelling of a project. Could be awesome if pulled off right.
6) You put together a suggested soundtrack for your heavy-metal cosmic-horror novel, An Augmented Fourth. With Serious Creatures taking place in the ‘70s and ‘80s, I feel like it would be equally ripe for a suggested soundtrack. What songs would you pair with Serious Creatures? And do you have one for Lumen as well?
I love gabbing about music! Serious Creatures begins in 1974 and so right away in the first few pages two of the characters are listening to Dark Side of the Moon on 8 -Track. Our main character Bobby is 14 years old in the scene and sings “And if your head explodes with dark forebodies too!” Instead of, “dark forebodings too!” and his older sister Laney chastises him for it but the term “dark forebodies” becomes the unofficial moniker for some masked creepy figures who appear throughout the story that only Bobby seems able to see.
Which means I gotta include some Floyd on the soundtrack. I think of The Kinks “Celluloid Heroes” as a sort of theme song for the whole story; I even put it in the trailer I made for the first issue. It really hits that bitterly triumphant note that runs throughout the story.
“Visions of Johanna”, Bob Dylan, “Sweet Virginia” by the Stones, “Frankenstein” by Edgar Winter Group, and the first Van Halen album all get mentions in the pages so I think they’d be great.
Lumen is trickier, it’s really inspired by early ‘80s Nintendo games like Metroid and Zelda as well as late ‘70s sci-fi like Alien so I’d do a synth drenched ominous score; like John Carpenter or Tangerine Dream inspired.
7) What else do you have in the pipeline? Either finished products, works in progress or ones you're dreaming of working on in the future? What are you most excited to work on next?
Thanks, I got a lot churning around lately. So, I’ve been sitting on a completed trilogy of novels called The Bleeding Tree Trilogy that I’ve described as reading like Mark Twain’s Dune. The main character is named Mal Leatherberry and she’s a heretic terrorist folksinger fighting a corrupt world church in a primitive future where they burn nonbelievers at the stake. The first book is called Higher Climbs the Fire and the entire series represents—to me—the best prose work I’ve made. Hoping to find a publisher or bite the bullet and put it out myself early next year.
Before that I’m working on an illustrated instructional manual for a video game that never existed entitled Attaboy. It’s going to be unlike any art book you’ve ever seen while still evoking fond memories of Megaman and other early NES artwork.
I’m also providing the interior, chapter break artwork for David James Keaton’s next novel She Was Found in a Guitar Case which is coming out from Perpetual Motion Machine.
And finally, after all that I’ll start on the second and final arc of Serious Creatures called Now Leaving the Golden State; which will complete the saga of Bobby Feckle teenage special FX wizard as he grows up and makes his masterpiece as well as his biggest mistake.
Tony McMillen makes comic books as well as some books without pictures too.
Even though those usually also contain a few pictures.
He can’t help himself.
He’s behind the heavy metal horror novel An Augmented Fourth published by Word Horde, the sci-fi fantasy graphic novel Lumen and now Serious Creatures; his comic book series about a teenage special FX artist working in Hollywood, riding the wave of practical effects that carried the blockbuster movie industry of the ‘70s, ‘80s and ‘90s.
He thinks Alien is a better xenomorph movie but Aliens is a better Ripley movie.
His go to karaoke song is “On the Dark Side” by John Cafferty and the Beaver Brown Band.
He has recently started to add cinnamon to his chocolate milk.