With HeroesCon ’11 just around the corner we’re happy to continue to shine a spotlight on several of the creators who will be appearing.  Today we’re featuring an interview with John Arcudi, a veteran writer who has worked on everything from Superman (in Wednesday Comics) and Doom Patrol, to Gen13 and the cult favorite Major Bummer.  He’s also been a mainstay at Dark Horse Comics for years working on titles like The Mask, Aliens, Predator, RoboCop, and for the past several years as the co-writer of the popular Hellboy spinoffs B.P.R.D. and Witchfinder. Make sure to stop by and say hello to John and welcome him to his first ever HeroesCon appearance!

Seth Peagler (SP):  John, we’ve been fortunate to have several of your Dark Horse cohorts appear at HeroesCon over the years, so it’s nice to have you be in Charlotte with us this year.  Many of our attendees probably know you best from your work on B.P.R.D., but you’ve written everything from mainstream superhero titles to original graphic novels like A God Somewhere.  I’m curious how your writing approach differs between superhero books and titles of other genres.  Is there a difference at all, or do you structure your writing the same way regardless of the genre?

John Arcudi (JA): Thanks for having me, and I sure hope many attendees know me.  We’ll see.  As for my writingapproach, that’s an interesting question.  I’m always trying to tell the best stories I can, but there’s no getting around that I look at different work in different lights.  The way I write superheroes, for the most part, is pretty badly.  Never really got the feel for them, hence the creation of Major Bummer, my and Doug Mahnke’s super-satire.  It was more personal so I felt I could pour a lot more stuff into it.  Same thing for A god Somewhere.  In both cases, there’s no existing continuity to adhere to.  They’re my characters and my stories, and I’m more confident that I actually know what I’m doing.

(SP): Particularly with writers I’m always curious about their educational background.  Did you study English and screenwriting?  Was comics writing something you naturally found yourself working toward?

(JA): English major, but was never working towards writing comics.  Never.  It was a kind of accident, actually, but as soon as I started it turned out I worked well in the medium, so it’s lucky I ended up doing this instead of being a mechanic.

(SP): OnB.P.R.D. you’re working with one of our industry’s giants Mike Mignola to develop and flesh out his universe, but you’re still able to bring your own ideas and elements to it.  What’s the creative process like between you and Mignola?  Are plots collaboratively developed with you handling the scripting duties?

(JA): B.P.R.D. is a strange animal.  Mike and I do sometimes collaborate on plots, and sometimes we don’t.  It just depends on what the mini-series is about — but as for the large, over-arcing plot — which is to say, where the series is heading, yes, we did and do collaborate on that.   I’m also very fortunate that for being as big a name as Mike is, he still lets me do what I do, lets me run with an idea, and takes my ideas seriously.  He seems to trust me, which is another reason the B.P.R.D. books work so well, or at least why I’m happy working on them, which one would hope translates to good reading.

(SP): Earlier this year longtime B.P.R.D. artist (and HeroesCon regular) Guy Davis announced he was departing the book.  After working on this title for so long with Guy, I’d imagine the two of you and Mike had developed a kind of instinctive working relationship with each other.  How have you and Mignola handled the transition over to new artist Tyler Crook?  Are you finding elements in his style that are informing your storytelling or that might influence future storylines?

(JA): Sure, it’s been weird, and I do already miss Guy.  He’s so talented, but he’s also a sweetheart, and you’re right; we all got into a groove with him.  That said, Tyler is really an incredible artist.  There’s going to be an adjustment period, obviously, but once we all get used to each other, Tyler’s going to do a great job.  He’s already finished one issue and it’s beautiful.  If he can handle all of our idiosyncrasies, then he’ll kick ass.  And I expect that I will play to his strengths, so sure, my stories — or how I tell them —  will turn out to be a little different.

(SP): Having been a mainstay at Dark Horse for years, I’m curious as to whether or not you’ll be bringing some of your popular characters like The Mask back in the new Dark Horse Presents title?

(JA): Right now we’re negotiating to get an old character back in DHP, but I can’t say much more about it than that.

(SP): I mentioned your original graphic novel A god Somewhere, are there any other creator owned books that you’re developing at the moment?

(JA): I’m working on a Graphic novel involving that self-same character that I can’t talk about (regrettably).  I also have a large OGN I’m developing and am just looking for a publisher.  It’ll be more along the lines of A god Somewhere.  Got a lot of hopes for that one.  Also, while it’s not a new book, Major Bummer is creator owned in every sense of the word and Dark Horse will be publishing the complete collection of that series in October of this year with some extras from both me and Doug Mahnke tossed in.

(SP): Thanks to John Arcudi for taking the time to talk with me.  Make sure to stop by and welcome him to HeroesCon this summer.  Stay tuned to the Heroes blog for HeroesCon news and guest spotlights, and remember, we still have tickets available, so pick them up while you can!

The Heroes blog is usually a place where we share good news with you guys but today’s news is a bit of a downer. With a guest list as big as our 2011 one, there are bound to be some cancellations. Unfortunately Mike Mignola and Mike Perkins will be unable to attend HeroesCon 2011. We will miss both of these guys but they have already promised to join us for HeroesCon 2012. Look for those 2012 dates to be announced right here very soon! We’ll start a list of these and any future cancellations on our Guest List page, at the bottom of the Recent Additions area at the right of the list. We have several exciting guest announcements yet to come, so stay tuned to our blog for all the big news!

We’d also like to mention HeroesCon 2011 tickets are now available through our site here. As always, you can also purchase tickets at the store or via telephone at 704-375-7462. This year is shaping up to be one of our best shows ever and we hope you will be able to join us!

I can’t catch my breath! The guest list updates keep coming…

Nick Cardy is not only a veteran of comics, he’s also a veteran of World War II! Nick drove a tank in the war and was awarded two Purple Hearts. Last year Nick missed his first HeroesCon since 1987. We are very happy to welcome our friend back this year! Nick has drawn covers or interiors for pretty much every DC comic published from the 50’s to the 70’s. He is well known for designing Wonder Girl’s more mature costume (Back off tigers!), designing  Mera and Ocean Master, and drawing the classic Western Bat Lash.

Karl Kesel was one of the most successful artists to come out of DC Comics’ New Talent Program. He built a reputation as an inker of note on Superman, and Suicide Squad before he moved on to writing such titles as Fantastic Four, Daredevil and The Human Torch for Marvel and Batman/Superman: World’s Finest and Harley Quinn for DC. He also collects rayguns and pre-hero Marvel monster comics. Karl’s appearance is sponsored by The Hero Initiative.

James Silvani is a Hawaii based illustrator with a long and surprisingly scandal-free career in the comics and licensing fields. He has provided art for The Muppets, TMNT, Transformers, Star Wars, Looney Tunes and Animaniacs. Currently he is continuing his work on the successful reintroduction of Disney’s Darkwing Duck.

Roy Thomas will be appearing at HeroesCon on Saturday only! Fun fact: Roy was Stan Lee’s first successor as editor-in-chief of Marvel Comics. Make sure you get a chance to meet this legendary writer of titles such as Conan the Barbarian, Uncanny X-Men, Avengers, Fantastic Four, Thor, and many more!

Herb Trimpe has worked on dozens of titles for Marvel Comics including The Incredible Hulk, Fantastic Four, Iron Man, Shogun Warriors, Godzilla and more. Of course he also illustrated that awesome 1st appearance of Wolverine on the Hulk #181 cover over there on the left!

Also included in this guest list update is Silver-Ager Paty Cockrum, who was a regular in the Marvel bullpen and co-creator of The Cat.

Clayton Henry began his professional career 13 years ago with The Nine Rings of Wu-Tang followed by Area 52 for Image Comics. He has gone on to pencil several titles at Marvel and DC including Exiles, Uncanny X-men, Incredible Hercules, Adventure Comics, Marvel Adventures, and Spider-Girl. Clayton’s pristine ink-like pencil line has created a high demand for his cover work as well!

Peter Krause has been drawing comics for over twenty years, including a number of projects for DC Comics, Star Trek:TNG, Metropolis S.C.U. and Power of Shazam! He is currently finishing up a run on the Eisner and Harvey nominated Irredeemable for BOOM! Studios.  Peter also draws storyboards, and is currently working on an upcoming feature film.

Amy Mebberson is a comic artist and former animation artist with the Walt Disney Company and LAIKA Studios. She has worked on many Pixar and Muppet Show titles and now draws licensed all-ages comics for APE entertainment. She also produced the webcomics As If! and Thorn and now maintains the blog Fun Size. She will also be the artist on IDW’s new Dorothy of Oz comic series. Born in Sydney, Amy now lives in Portland with a lot of breweries and far too little sunlight.

Scott Wegener is the artist and co-creator of the Eisner Award nominated book Atomic Robo and he recently completed the mini-series, Avengers: Earth’s Mightiest Heroes for Marvel Comics.

Jim Zubkavich is a Project Manager at the UDON studio (best known for their artwork on Capcom’s legendary Street Fighter franchise), the creator of the hot new action-comedy series Skullkickers at Image Comics and an art professor teaching Animation-related courses at Seneca College in Toronto, Canada.

Also added today:

Charlie Kirchoff colorist of Doctor Who, Magus, Clive Barker’s Hellraiser

Mike Leib author of Tag Cursed, Savage Tales, Marvel Romance Redux, What Were They Thinking

Tim Vigil Faust, EO, Webwitch, Frank Frazetta’s Dark Kingdom

Matt Webb colorist of Flesh and Blood, Next Men, Hawkman, Star Trek

Our pals from Studio Revolver have made it official! They will all be here for HeroesCon 2011! A few of these folks were already on our guest list but now the rest of the gang has confirmed. Jason Pearson ( Body Bags, Astonishing X-Men ),
Dexter Vines ( Ultimate Thor, Old Man Logan, Civil War ), Tom Feister ( G.I. Joe Origins, Ex Machina, Avengers: The Initiative ), Tariq Hassan ( White Wolf Publishing, Wizards of The Coast, Upper Deck ), Casey Edwards ( Super Secret Robot Club, The-Gutters.com, Jingle Belle ), Stephanie Gladden ( Paul Dini’s Jingle Belle, Ren & Stimpy, Cartoon Network ), Kevin Stokes ( NHL: The Guardian Project, The-Gutters.com ),  and Bernard Shepard ( Hulk, True Blood, Super Secret Robot Club ) will all be parked at the Studio Revolver booth and ready to shake your hand, sign your comics, and they might do sketches for your entire family if you ask nicely. So stop by and meet these guys. They work on a huge range of projects and they will be happy to tell you all about them!

Bonus! Former Studio Revolver member John Tyler Christopher is also attending the show this year!  John has been doing some great covers for Top Cow lately on titles like Artifacts, Witchblade, and Twilight Guardian. He recently moved to the Midwest and we are happy he is making the trip to visit us this June. Check out this teaser image from Marvel’s upcoming Hell On Wheels!

We are happy to announce we will be hosting the Inkwell Awards at HeroesCon 2011! The Inkwell Awards honor inking excellence in comics and help raise awareness of the role inkers play in creating comics. The 2011 awards ballot is live. Help us spread the word and let your friends know the ballot is open and ready for your votes! Vote here, then come out and see if your favorite inker wins at HeroesCon 2011!

Geof Darrow blew minds when he teamed with Frank Miller to create the monument to dizzying detail Hard Boiled. My eyeballs are still recovering! Geof teamed with Frank again to create Big Guy and Rusty the Boy Robot, another oversized comic adventure which was later turned into an animated television series.  He was head conceptual artist on the Wachowski Brothers I trilogy and has worked on various other film projects with directors Ridley Scott, J.J. Abrams, and Mc G. His latest comic, The Shaolin Cowboy, was created, written, and drawn by him and published by the Wachowski Brothers‘ Burlyman Entertainment which is being made into an animated film written and co-directed by Geof!

Indie Island anchorman J. Chris Campbell will be holding it down again at  HeroesCon 2011. Besides being the creator of the funny book Zig Zag and illustrator of the comic Recalcitrant Jones and the Dead Beats. He is the publisher of Wide Awake Press which has published over 50 mini-comics, 20 of which were authored by him including It’s the Attic Bugs.

HeroesCon 1st-timer Becky Cloonan is an award-winning cartoonist and illustrator who started self-publishing mini comics in 1999. Since then she has worked for publishers like Vertigo, Dark Horse and Marvel, with editions of her work in print in several different languages. Becky is currently working with Gerard Way on a new series from Dark Horse called True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys, and still tries to self-publish one comic every year. I’m pretty sure she designed that bad ass spider that is all over everything in the latest My Chemical Romance videos, too.  Make sure to check with her when you welcome her to her first HeroesCon!

Dave Crosland (aka King Gum) is an illustrator who specializes in stylized art that is a harmonious collision of traditional aesthetics and modern, urban sensibilities.  Crosland’s notable works include Yo Gabba Gabba! Comic Book Time and Scarface: Scarred For Life, art for the pop band Gym Class Heroes‘ gold album “As Cruel As School Children”, and in-game illustrations for the Kick-Ass video game for Sony’s PS3.

Jen Van Meter has been writing comics since 1998.  Best known for her Hopeless Savages stories from Oni Press, she has also written short stories, single issues and mini-series for Marvel, DC, Dynamite and Dark Horse.  She lives in Portland, Oregon with her husband, writer Greg Rucka, and their children.  Currently, Jen is working on a new volume of Hopeless Savages material intended for a 2012 release.

That’s not all; Chris DiBari, Gary Friedrich, Matteo Scalera, Charles Soule have also been added to the HeroesCon 2011 guest list today!

Stand clear! BIG  HeroesCon 2011 guest list update coming through!

Click to see in all of it's Asgardian glory!

Frank Cho rose to popularity with his syndicated newspaper strip Liberty Meadows. Tired of dealing with the stuffy attitudes of the syndicate, Frank took his creation to Image comics where he enjoyed continiued success (of course). Lately Frank has been  illustrating lots of the characters he grew up enjoying for Marvel Comics, including Shanna the She-Devil, Hulk, Mighty Avengers, and most recently, the popular New Ultimates.

Darwyn Cooke first tickled our eyeballs with his fantastic opening sequence for the Batman Beyond animated TV series. His first comic work, Batman: Ego showed that Darwyn was an artist with an innate talent for storytelling. His amazing covers for numerous titles has also shown he has a classic design sense.  The instant classic DC: the New Frontier and his Parker adaptations have solidified Darwyn’s reputation as a master comic creator.

We are happy to welcome our friend Joe Jusko back to HeroesCon this year. Joe’s lush paintings have graced the covers of countless comics books and magazines. Joe’s renditions of Vampirella have made him a favorite of fans of the character. His work has been on our shelves lately on the covers of Wolverine/Hercules from Marvel Comics.

We are very excited to welcome Ryan Sook to his very first Heroes Convention! Ryan was one of the first artists that Mike Mignola trusted with his creation Hellboy. Ryan has since gone on to show his versatility with a very memorable Batman: Black and White story, striking work on X-Factor, Friday the 13th, and The Spectre to name just a few, and his great Kamandi story in the enormous Wednesday Comics from DC.

Billy Tucci is the founder of Crusade Comics where he publishes his creator-owned comic Shi. Billy also wrote and drew the acclaimed Sgt. Rock: The Lost Batallion which featured the retelling of the astounding “last stand” by a small number of trapped US Infantrymen of the 36th Division and their rescue by the American-born Japanese soldiers of the highly decorated 442nd Regimental Combat Team.

But that’s not all!  Buzz, Jamie Cosley, Rob Hunter, Eric Layton, and Tommy Smith have also been added to our guest list today! Whew!

Let’s round out the week by adding more names to the  HeroesCon 2011 guest list which is already bursting at the seams!

We are very excited to announce that DC Comics superstar Shane Davis will be a guest at HeroesCon this year! When DC has an epic superhero adventure that needs drawing, Shane is one of their go-to guys. You’ve seen his detailed and action-packed work on Superman: Earth One, Batman: Bruce Wayne: The Road Home, Superman/ Batman: The Search for Kryptonite, and Final Crisis: Rage of the Red Lanterns, not to mention all the cover work he has been getting lately!

We’re also happy to welcome back the guys from Creaturebox, Greg Baldwin and Dave Guertin. You’ve seen their awesome work on the covers of the Ratchet & Clank series from DC/Wildstorm. Their love of cartoons, robots, aliens, and creatures of all shapes and sizes and their ability to render them with imagination and believability has put them in demand in the comic and video game industries.

HeroesCon without Nat Jones would be like Christmas without presents! We’re happy to welcome Nat back this year. You’ve seen Nat’s remarkable work on Frank Frazetta’s Death Dealer. Recently he teamed up with Steve Niles to illustrate Wulf for Atlas Comics. He always paints awesome pieces for our Anuual Art Auction, so don’t miss it!

Inker Mark Morales’ super clean inks have graced the pages of Avengers: Children’s Crusade, The Mighty Thor, Siege, and Secret Invasion. Stop by his table and say, “Hey!”

We have some good stuff for you guys! Not only do we have a great guest list update, but the initial Artist’s Alley/ Small Press listing has also been added to the site. Let’s get down to the nitty-gritty!

Writer Paul Benjamin has a list of credits far too long to list here. Muppet King Arthur, Amazing Spider-Man, and World of Warcraft: Shaman are just a few.

We’re very happy to have Danielle Corsetto back this year. Her popular webcomic Girls With Slingshots is a perennial favorite! Look for the giant cactus with a moustache, she won’t be far.

Nick Derington can do many things, from storyboarding animation to writing and drawing comics, and he does them all very well. You’ve seen Nick’s work in the film adaptation of Philip K. Dick’s A Scanner Darkly (Nick was the Lead Animator), Erin Esurance ads, Popgun Vol. 1 and the Escapist to name a few.

Michael Dooney is the creator of Gizmo, a great comic from the black and white boom of the 80’s. Dooney has also worked on Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and tons of toy designs.

Ian Flynn is the writer and guiding creative force behind the comic versions of Sonic the Hedgehog and the upcoming Mega Man books from Archie Comics. Ian will also be at the store for Free Comic Book Day on May 7th if you can’t wait until June!

Carla “Speed” McNeil is known for her long-running Finder series. She has recently taken her creation to Dark Horse Comics and I’m sure this amazing series that Scott McCloud called, “the best comic you’ve never read” will find the audience it deserves!

Declan Shalvey is making his second trip to HeroesCon this year and he has been keeping busy since his last visit! You know Declan’s art from the pages of 28 Days Later, Thunderbolts, and Captain America and Crossbones.

We’d also like to welcome back Micah Harris & Loston Wallace, co-creators of the new, hot-off-the-presses Lorna: Relic Wrangler.

Take a look at some of the talented folks setting up in our Artist’s Alley! Table assignments will be up before too long. If you purchased a table (not a booth) and you don’t see your name on that list please feel free to contact  me. Also, email me if you see any errors (mispelled name, broken/bad links, etc). I will take the blame if I made the mistakes but some of you need to work on your penmanship (you know who you are!)

As we mentioned in a previous blog post Small Press tables at HeroesCon 2011 are sold out. We will be taking a limited number of waiting list slots in case anyone needs to cancel or more space becomes available. Thanks!