Dave Baker x Nicole Goux

Teen angst, coming-of-age, collaborative process, and smooching--what else could you expect from this dynamic duo?

Being creative partners through the years has made Dave Baker (Halloween Boy, Mary Tyler MooreHawk, Punk'nheads) and Nicole Goux (Forest Hills Bootleg Society, F*ck Off Squad, Punk'nheads) a well-oiled machine. This episode delves into how Punk'nheads came to be, and how all of their graphic novels take flight.

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:00

I'm Dave Baker.

SPEAKER_00 0:01

And I'm Nicole Goo.

SPEAKER_02 0:02

And this is uh Creator Creator. We're here to talk to each other about our new book.

SPEAKER_00 0:07

Punkinheads.

SPEAKER_02 0:09

Hey. All right. Now we've had our really forced artificial intro. Now we can just have a normal conversation. Nicole, what did you do on this new seminal book titled Pumpkin Heads?

SPEAKER_00 0:22

I did everything 100% of the work with me.

SPEAKER_02 0:25

Yeah, that's honestly pretty punking accurate.

SPEAKER_00 0:28

It is not accurate.

SPEAKER_02 0:29

Nicole, can you tell me what is Pumpkin Heads?

SPEAKER_00 0:31

So Pumpkin Heads is a slice-of-life comic about a group of kids who live in a flop house and play in a punk band, and um they wear jack-o'-lantern masks when they play. But uh it's really more about um kind of the relationships and scene politics of this group of friends and um creative endeavors and how hard it is to make things.

SPEAKER_02 0:59

Yeah, it's a coming-of-age romance comic, but it's also a coming-of-age making things comic.

SPEAKER_00 1:06

Making things comfortable. Yes. It's about making things. Or thinking that you're gonna make one thing and then getting completely derailed and maybe making something entirely different.

SPEAKER_02 1:18

Yeah. Uh it's a complete graphic novel, beginning, middle, and end, published by Top Shelf, a subsidiary of IDW. And um who's the main character of Pumpkin Heads?

SPEAKER_00 1:31

It's really an ensemble cast, to be honest. But our main kind of perspective character is Hannah Lipske, who is um, we start off with her in art school. She gets broken up with by her girlfriend, and her life kind of falls apart, and she drops out of school, moves back to LA, into the flop house of her will they won't they from high school, Jerry. Um, and he is in a pre-existing band called the Pumpkinheads, um, who through various shenanigans lose their uh lead singer. And because Hannah was a fan and knows all the words for the songs, they ask Hannah to step in and um then we go on our kind of little adventure from there.

SPEAKER_02 2:16

Aaron Powell Yeah, it's kind of like what happened with Black Flag, except with way more smooching.

SPEAKER_00 2:21

Aaron Powell So much smooching.

SPEAKER_02 2:22

Yeah, there's a little more smooching.

SPEAKER_00 2:23

Yeah. When you are in a band with a person who you also have had a crush on for 10 years, things might get a little complicated.

SPEAKER_02 2:32

Yeah. What do you think separates this from some of our other works?

SPEAKER_00 2:35

Aaron Powell We've talked about this a lot, that you and I have kind of lived in this um slice-of-life romance comic world for the last couple of books that we've made. And um we've kind of been working towards or developing a point of view and kind of a formalist perspective of what we like to do with comics and the type of stories that we want to tell. And I think, you know, because we made, I think our first one technically is This Is Not a Girl Gang, which is many comics we made, uh, many, many, many years ago.

SPEAKER_02 3:10

700 years ago.

SPEAKER_00 3:12

Um and then we did Fuck Off Squad and Everyone is Tulip and um Forest Sales Bootleg Society. And now we have kind of landed on this one, and I think it is just sort of um many, many years of work building towards a particular perspective that we've been kind of honing over the years.

SPEAKER_02 3:33

Yeah, I would agree with that. What do you think is Yeah, I think I think I would agree with that. I th the other thing I think uh that works in Pumpkinheads' favor is that um you and I have been doing like caption mechanics specifically, and like how that feels to other reader, I think is different than how this feels to the reader. And I think some of the mechanics in this book, um they f we arrived at a more personal place in a less direct method.

SPEAKER_00 4:05

Uh because what do you mean by less direct method?

SPEAKER_02 4:08

Well, you know, um for Forest Hills, you know, we have this caption mechanic where someone will walk into a room and there'll be all these little, you know, mm-hmm wall of captions around them describing like, oh, they love this movie and they have this haircut and they go over here and they're left-handed and whatever. And sometimes I would just say their motivation in those things.

SPEAKER_00 4:29

Yeah. Or the actual like uh Forest Hills has uh pages that are just prose pages that are kind of like a little story, backstory about a character. And we didn't really do that in this one.

SPEAKER_02 4:39

Yeah, and I actually really like writing that way. Uh and you know, our next potential couple projects we've been talking about, maybe have some of those uh elements reintroduced because I've got some new ideas for how to do them. But um I really enjoyed basically building up a stylistic mechanism that we're both very uh comfortable with and really felt like we kind of reached um like, oh, this is working like how I imagined it would work three books ago. And then taking that tool set and throwing it away and being like, okay, you know you can do that. How do you move forward and not use that as a crutch and like you know, not overuse something to the point of parody?

SPEAKER_00 5:23

Trevor Burrus Yeah, there's a difference between like having a stylistic trademark and just repeating yourself over and over again, for sure.

SPEAKER_02 5:31

And I think you know, there are lots of formalist stuff in the book, and I think you specifically reached a new artistic plateau that was very cool to see. Um but it's even more rewarding to me because we arrived at those places without this toolkit of skills and and mechanisms that we've spent years developing and very is a very identifiable piece of what we normally do.

unknown 5:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 5:58

I feel like we climbed Mount Everest with one leg, and that's like really No, no, I mean I you know, I mean I mean being a little dramatic, but like you know what I'm saying of like we had this tool set that is very popular with for people who like our books and it works really well.

SPEAKER_00 6:13

Fairly codified.

SPEAKER_02 6:14

Yeah, and fairly codified. And then we were like, oh, you know what, we know how to do that. Let's try and do this in a different way.

SPEAKER_00 6:19

Aaron Ross Powell Well, I I think the thing is that you and I are both very interested in what we call formalist comics, which is just comics that are interested in the form of comics as a storytelling tool, right? And so when you have um kind of specific tools that you've been using in the past and you sort of throw them out for new tools, um, it gives you kind of you do have to start over a little bit and and obviously not from the beginning, but figure out like, okay, what is the new thing that I'm interested in using or telling, and how does that um benefit the story? How is it essential to the story? Because you don't want to just throw in like, oh, I did this thing because it's a weird idea, it still needs to add to or be kind of specific to the story in some way. Um what do you want to talk about? The ones that we ended up using for this book?

SPEAKER_02 7:17

Sure. Yeah. Yeah. Which is your favorite?

SPEAKER_00 7:20

Well, there's there's like two main ones, um, which this book, even though it is a single long-form story, we we broke it into chapters as if it was serialized single issues. And one of the things that we wanted to do with that is kind of give context or more information at the beginning of every chapter as if you were catching up, right? And so we did this, you came up with this mechanic of that was then, this is now, and it's a nine-panel, no, a six-panel grid, a six-panel grid with um each panel that was then of things in the past, and this is now of things that are happening right before the story of that chapter starts. And I think it's a really kind of nice way to give the context of what we would normally use those caption mechanics for while doing it in like kind of a smaller, more um local localized way. What is that?

SPEAKER_02 8:22

No, I think that makes sense because I think one of the things we're both interested in is density in different ways. And sometimes density is like the number of panels on a page, sometimes density is the number of ideas on a page, um and and finding new and interesting ways to kind of take that Rubik's cube and change the blocks uh and and the the sides and the of the face, uh, you know, and and show the reader either different aspects of character or build stories in a specific way to um have a recurring rhythmic section that is always gonna be there and always gonna kind of like you're gonna loop back to as a grounding element to be like, oh yeah, I know how the chapter's gonna start. It's gonna start with a splash page image that's gonna feel like a 1950s romance comic, and then maybe a couple small panels on the bottom of the page, you turn the page, and then it's this setup of that was then, this is now, and then you go into the story. Um and that allowed us to do some of those hopefully cool or intriguing character development things in a new way.

SPEAKER_00 9:30

I think kind of generally with comics, if you're not doing a super dense Alan Moore comic, it can really be a struggle to, especially for Dave and I are very interested in character, um, get the type of character development, get the type of story uh elements in the amount of pages that we are allowed. And you know, by allowed, I don't mean some publishers telling you you have this many pages, which is often the case with particularly single-issue comics, but less so for a longer form comic and more just the time and energy and space and all of these things that are very limited in comics, because when you write a prose novel, you can put every thought in your character's head, put every element of that's happening, all of these details, but you are actually quite limited into what you can um create because your space is physically limited.

SPEAKER_02 10:23

Yeah, you have one print signature which gets you about 20 pages or whatever.

SPEAKER_00 10:27

Yeah. Um and so it's always, always a struggle to get the amount of story that you want in these books, to get the amount of character development that you want into these books. Um, and this kind of quick little history and backstory and setup um that we developed for this particular book. I think, you know, it's it's different than like, oh, there's a stain on your, you know, favorite t-shirt or this or this, like that type of um context that we we've done in previous books. But I I think personally, I think it works pretty well and it's kind of a fun extra story. We also did um little mini comics at the end of every chapter that, to be honest, maybe don't add that much story-wise to the book, but they're these nice little kind of quiet moments about the characters um in their time away from everybody else in the book because it is mostly an ensemble book. And so we see people together interacting, and um we get a little bit more of this solo time with each of our characters in those um kind of shorts, I guess I'd call them.

SPEAKER_02 11:40

Yeah. I think also because that stuff is the most fun to write. Especially when you don't have to string a whole story together for it. You can just be like, oh yeah, her car got towed.

SPEAKER_00 11:50

Yeah. It's also great to draw because it's three tiny panels and it's almost no drawing.

SPEAKER_02 11:56

Yeah, totally.

SPEAKER_00 11:58

A lot of bang for your buck.

SPEAKER_02 11:59

It feels more important because of the fact that it's not it's like this suspended moment in time and space as opposed to like it's if you had that same moment in the sequential story, you'd just be like, oh, why is this here? This is frustrating. I'm trying to get the plot or I'm trying to, you know, really understand what this pivot point of the choice this character is about to make is. I don't need all these little small asides where this feels almost kind of like a little like tone poem or something.

SPEAKER_00 12:30

Aaron Powell What do you think is the difference? Because we we've in some of our previous books, we've had moments like this that are quiet moments with an individual character that are sort of outside of the main story, or they're part of the story, but they're kind of like separated from the other characters, where, you know, uh when I have a moment like this, I will often leave a lot of kind of um giant gutters, I guess I'll call them, right? So big empty spaces around to kind of expand the amount of time, make it feel more isolated, make it feel more um, I guess, liminal. Um how do you think that a moment like that within a story functions differently than like if it is outside, physically outside of the story, because it's like outside of the actual chapter. It's not even part of the main story.

SPEAKER_02 13:17

Yeah, I mean, I think that d all art is about context, right? And so when it's in the story, there just inherently is context surrounding that moment. And so when you break it outside of the confines of that chapter, immediately it just becomes a different thing. Even if it's the same scene, like it just becomes this other kind of you know, suspended in amber, Jurassic Park DNA strand of like who the character is.

SPEAKER_00 13:42

It really makes you think about how much the like structure of an actual book, the physical book included, kind of can affit affect the way that we are um taking in story and interpreting story. And I think, you know, I teach a uh sequential storytelling class, which sounds like comics, it's not necessarily, but so much of what I talk about is how the kind of physical choices that you're making in terms of storytelling and also the the object itself, you know, and the way you use a page turn or whatever it is can really change the interpretation of a scene like that, um, or just the way that the reader is kind of taking something in.

SPEAKER_02 14:20

And also, like it just feels different when it is in a larger book where there are these, like even if we had nine or ten single issues of Punkin Heads the series, it would just feel different because you would have it would you would be able to splay them all out and be like, oh look, each issue kind of focuses on a different member of the group. And like, yeah, it may build, but like it's a it's an arc that f is made up of disparate things, where in when it's in this single, you know, compiled edition, like it it feels different because it's not disparate, separate ideas. It's it is a single idea.

SPEAKER_00 14:55

Aaron Powell Well, and we did have discussions when we were first developing it of whether we wanted it to be single issues, right? It is sort of built that way. Um Do you want to talk about why we were kind of like focused on this idea of uh sequential story, not sequential storytelling, um serialized storytelling and and Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 15:15

Uh Nicole and I uh are big fans of Star Trek and specifically how Star Trek the original series and Star Trek Next Generation and DS9 kind of built on the same idea of like standalone stories that then slowly build to a larger arc, um, which is different than serialized storytelling now on TV, where it's a single story split up into ten chunks or fifteen chunks or whatever. Um, and I like serialized stories too. Um but there is something about the way that Star Trek had one and done adventures where you could kind of like rapidly woodshed who a character is. You know, in those first couple seasons of TNG, like they just fully don't know who the characters are, and like they're constantly like, maybe this is who Picard is. Picard's really angry, and like he really doesn't like children. And then we're gonna back out and be like, ah, he's too unlikable like that. Picard is a leader who doesn't like his crew. Nope, we're gonna back out of that, but we're gonna keep the leader thing. Picard is a diplomat. He loves archaeology and flutes.

SPEAKER_03 16:32

And loves a flute.

SPEAKER_02 16:36

Loves a flute.

SPEAKER_03 16:37

Actually, loves a flute.

SPEAKER_02 16:41

Um and like you know, you can see them like quickly moving through, is this who he is? No. Is this who he is? No. Is this who he is? Oh, okay, that's who he is. Now, how do we make the best version of that? Oh, he's a diplomat. How do we put him in a situation that's really difficult to solve? How do we, you know, put him in his own version of the Kobayashi Maru? What happens when a diplomat isn't able to bring their own perspective to something because their mind has been wiped? What happens when he endures like post-traumatic stress disorder from being kidnapped and like his bodily autonomy being removed? Can you still have empathy and like be this magnanimous kind of like negotiator of the universe? And you don't get those ideas without going through a bunch of different ideas of who the character is.

SPEAKER_00 17:22

Yeah, I think when you have 24 episodes to explore, both your main characters and your, you know, sub-characters, your B plot characters, like you don't get Data's cat without, you know, with, you know, eight uh episodes of a single story. Yeah. You know, you just never get there because you don't have the time to explore or to play with or to kind of experience these characters in their daily lives outside of whatever the main plot of this the story is. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 17:50

I mean, and some of the better modern day Trek episodes are the ones that are little spotlight episodes or you know, little bottleship episodes or whatever. And so we wanted to kind of learn those lessons and bring some of that idea of like old school network, you know, local affiliate, you know, uh TV shows and like try and make a show that was what we normally do of this kind of like coming of age, struggling to find out who you are, narrative, but then build into that this idea that we're gonna have an arc where the characters are gonna grow and learn over the course of a quote season, but it is gonna be each issue is a like a single episode with a beginning, a middle, and an end, and maybe there's a mini-arc or a character learns something or they make a pivotal choice, but like you could, if you found it in the wild, just read that one story and that would be totally enough and you would get everything from it.

SPEAKER_00 18:41

Yeah, I mean, the the idea I think in initiated from this kind of Star Trek conversation that we've been having for 10 years. Um, but it also comes from, you know, the experience of reading uh monthly comics now, where it's uh I think, you know, for 40 years, however long, uh each story, you know, they've built on each other, but initially they were meant to kind of be read single issue. Like you're supposed to get a full story in each issue because most people don't go to the shop every Wednesday, don't keep up with stuff. And the kind of modern iteration of that, which is very similar to the film industry or TV industry, I guess, um, is that so many of the um series that are coming out are are written for trade. Yeah and they are meant to be read as a whole story, and you have to have every issue to understand what's going on. And if you haven't read the previous issue, you're screwed, you know? And I think we wanted to bring back some of the accessibility, even though we did it in a full book, uh, of the idea of being able to read that single issue and get the full context, both from the story and you know, this sort of like the that was in this is now is our it's our version of previously on, even though it's not something that we've ever seen before in the story.

SPEAKER_02 20:00

It is a previously on, but also it's telling you things that wouldn't be in a previously on. Exactly. It's like showing you this character's deepest, darkest trauma or whatever, and then bringing you into the story where they have to confront something that brings up that emotional pain or whatever.

SPEAKER_00 20:16

It's yeah, quick context.

SPEAKER_02 20:18

Yeah, and also just like we wanted to make a book that you could read and then put down. You know, like I I feel like every one of the books we make has a different goal.

SPEAKER_00 20:28

This one, not so much something You're gonna have to put it down though, because it's just too fucking long.

SPEAKER_02 20:34

Yeah. But like, you know, we I wanted to make a we had made a book that got nominated for an Eisner called Everyone is Tulip, and the main thing everyone said to us was, this was great. I read it in 15 minutes. And that felt really bad. Like, I know I I understand it is a compliment that this is so good and easy to read that I really like I just consumed it in one sitting and it was so easy and I loved it and it went down smooth. Awesome. Also, we spent like two years on that book, and like it, you know.

SPEAKER_00 21:01

Do you think that MTMH is a direct response to that comment? Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 21:06

Yeah, it's not even, I think, like a fully like I was like shakes fist at Sky.

SPEAKER_00 21:12

Even Forest Hills was.

SPEAKER_02 21:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:13

Right? Where it's the one of the reasons that Forest Hills has these big prose sections is because we wanted people to slow down and really kind of take in the story in a more measured way and also give more context and more information for the characters. But like that response of, oh, I loved it, I read it an hour, is like, okay, well, you didn't really read it then.

SPEAKER_03 21:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:35

And it's very nice. I'm glad you liked it. Um, I'm glad that like you were uh enthralled enough to sit there for an hour and read our book. But also when you spend three years making a book and someone reads the entire thing in an hour, it's it's a little bit hard to kind of be like, but did you even look at it?

SPEAKER_03 21:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:55

Like you just I I did the drawings. Did you like them? Or did Did you just read the words?

SPEAKER_02 22:01

And I think that's also just the difference between cartoonists and non-cartoonists.

SPEAKER_00 22:04

Sure.

SPEAKER_02 22:04

Like, you know, we are also on a fundamental level just asking people to consume the medium in a way that they're just not going to. Yeah. And like, that's fine. Like, it's not a big deal, but it does it gets into the nooks and crannies of your brain and it starts making you think, well, how do I solve for that? How do I make a book that requires more of the reader? And you know, f uh all of the work since then in various ways has been trying to shift things and be like, maybe it's this, maybe it's that, maybe it's this.

SPEAKER_00 22:34

I do think there is like a cross-media grappling with this kind of um shortened attention span that we all, myself included, have now of like, how do I either um make something engrossing enough or complicated enough to get someone to actually focus on this for a certain amount of time, or what is becoming more popular, how do I dumb it down so much that they can be on their phone while reading it?

SPEAKER_02 23:01

Second screen viewing as a concept is the most repugnant thing to me.

SPEAKER_00 23:06

I'm so fucking guilty of it.

SPEAKER_02 23:07

But like So am I, sure. But that doesn't, you know what? But don't dumb yeah. You know what stops me from scrolling on my phone? When the the piece of media requires me to look at it and pay attention.

SPEAKER_00 23:17

Yeah, and when I I still haven't watched enough of it, but like I remember when I first put on the um show Primal, which is a silent animated film or TV show, um, where like I'm used to playing games or being on my phone in some way or another while I'm watching stuff or working, which is actually what I do most of the time. Um, and I remember putting it on not knowing that it was a silent show and being like, oh, I'll just put this on in the background, whatever. And I was like on my phone doing something, and I just like lowered my phone and I just was like Gindy Tardakovski. Yeah, where it was like it is so rare that you find something that pulls you in in that way. Yeah. And as a creator, trying to figure out the code of the matrix to be like, what can I do to really make someone pay real attention, not half attention? Or not like skimming attention, which we all have to do because there's so much out there, you know, and there's only so much time and brain space to read something. But like, how do you make something that connects with people and engages people in a way that really makes you slow down?

SPEAKER_02 24:27

Totally. Do you feel like the characters in pumpkin heads have received uh the love and adoration from the public that they deserve because they haven't. They haven't.

SPEAKER_00 24:40

I mean, when you make a slice of life book about punk kids, uh it's not exactly Superman, right? Like you're you're not we're not writing the Batman. Um, so it's never really gonna get the type of Well, I'll not I won't say never. Maybe it will. Maybe it'll blow up huge, and everybody in the world will want a giant pumpkin mask to wear. Um but uh you know, it's you know what you're making when you make an indie comic, but to be real.

SPEAKER_02 25:13

Yeah, I I would agree. But also I do feel like the characters in the book are there's always a gulf. There's always a delta in between like your vision for a project and then what it becomes. And sometimes what it becomes is actually better objectively than what your vision was, but it's just not the vision, so you're like, I'll get them next time.

SPEAKER_00 25:30

That's always hard. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 25:31

Uh but I do feel like the character component of this book really sings, and I think you were a big component of that.

SPEAKER_00 25:37

Aaron Ross Powell What do you think makes it so strong, maybe compared to previous books we've done?

SPEAKER_02 25:43

Well, I think all of our books exceed well on the character front, but I just think sometimes the character work uh the character work is what we get talked up to about the books more frequently than like the plot or you know, even the formalism stuff, which is kind of surprising. But to me, that always is just a the medium is the message, right? Where it's like they almost lose sight of the formalism stuff because they don't have vocabulary to describe it because it is in service of character and therefore the the character is the ultimate destination, which is what the readers connect to. Which is great. That's what you want.

SPEAKER_00 26:17

Aaron Powell Yeah, if you're not a creator, I don't know that you're as cognizant of Yeah, totally.

SPEAKER_02 26:22

But I think in Pumpkinheads, one of the aspects of the book that really succeeds is the fact that everybody gets their moment and everybody gets a spotlight chapter, and also that they're all fucked up in their own ways, you know.

SPEAKER_00 26:36

And you know why everybody gets a spotlight chapter?

SPEAKER_02 26:39

Why, Nicole?

SPEAKER_00 26:40

Because we had to get rid of an entire character to make space.

SPEAKER_02 26:43

Yes, that's true.

SPEAKER_00 26:44

We did a lot of work, probably the most work that we have ever done, kind of quote unquote pre-production-wise, on this book. Um, the way that Dave and I usually write is one of us will come up with a story or the idea of a story, and then we will discuss that for a long time back and forth. Um, and then Dave will go and write it, and then I will read it. We will often script read together live, make a bunch of notes. Dave will go and fix that, um, do some edits, we'll do it again. This time, I this book went through four or five, six drafts. I don't know how many drafts. And uh, one of the things that happened in that process this time is there was we had an entire other character who um, to both of our great sadness, had to go because he was taking up too much kind of real estate, story real estate. And um, we ended up giving his kind of responsibilities to a couple of the other characters and spreading it out because we really wanted to make sure that we had enough time to dive into each of our characters' kind of backstories and motivations. And um, I think again, this is a space issue, a comics space issue where it's like you really can only do so much. Um and whenever I look at a book that has a huge cast of characters and they all kind of have their little thing to do, I'm very impressed because it is a huge challenge to give everybody meaningful stuff to do when you have that many people kind of hanging out. And, you know, for an ensemble book, you want to have a decent amount of people, but you also are limited by the amount of space.

SPEAKER_02 28:29

I mean, even just like when you look at Star Trek again, the original series movies, most of them people don't have stuff to do. It's just Kirk or Picard that is doing stuff usually.

SPEAKER_00 28:38

Aaron Powell And the only reason that all those characters get development in the shows is because there are 24 episodes a season and seven seasons. Yeah. I mean, barring the original series and enterprise.

SPEAKER_02 28:49

Right, right. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 28:51

Which we don't really need more Enterprise, do we?

SPEAKER_02 28:53

No, I don't think so. Um But you know, Trip is cool.

SPEAKER_00 28:58

Um Is he cool?

SPEAKER_02 29:00

I don't know. Hoshi's cool. Hoshi's cool. I like Mayweather.

SPEAKER_00 29:05

Yeah. May Mayweather is fine.

SPEAKER_02 29:07

Yeah, but I'm but going back to it, like you know, that's something that we talked about was like Star Trek VI. We talked about Star Trek VI multiple times because that's the one where they actually give people that aren't Kirk like stuff to do. That big finale where like Kirk has the sniper rifle, Scotty punches the guy, like or whatever. Well, reverse that maybe I can't remember. But they all have they all have their moment and then they all get to stand on the stage together and be like, Yeah, we're the crew of the Enterprise. Like you know, no, not yeah.

SPEAKER_00 29:40

I just don't really like that movie, dude.

SPEAKER_02 29:42

Nicholas Meyer, don't listen to her. It's a great movie.

SPEAKER_00 29:46

Look, I love Star Trek.

SPEAKER_02 29:48

Have you ever read Cl the Shakespeare in the original Klingon?

SPEAKER_00 29:51

I hate I honestly, I would like that movie so much better if he just had done a Klingon accent.

SPEAKER_02 29:58

Like Christopher Plummer doesn't feel like does he have a British accent? Christopher Plummer just doesn't feel like crazy. Totally, I totally agree with that note. He totally doesn't feel like a Klingon.

SPEAKER_00 30:07

It's anyway.

SPEAKER_02 30:08

But the structure of that though, like the structure of look, this is probably the last time these people are all gonna be together. We gotta really try and share the narrative wealth and like, yes, Bill, Kirk's gonna get his 45 moments. Don't worry. But we gotta give Spock a moment and Scotty and Ohura and Chekhov and like we got and Sulu, like everybody's gotta have their thing so that it feels like a well-rounded, you know, ensemble. And like that's one of the things that we worked really hard with for Pumpkinheads, where it would be very easy to make this the story about the lead singer. Yeah. And it's she's the focal point, she's the point of view character, she comes in, she learns about the world, she engages in this thing, falls in love with it, has this journey, and then that's the climax and it's over. But we worked really hard to, you know, kind of build out not only like an interior world of what it's like to be in a band, but also like an interior world for each character so that when they're coming to this other thing, this joint emotional ecosystem that is a band, you understand why they're fucking up or why they're bringing this thing to it or whatever. Yeah. Um Do you have a specific page or sequence that you think was particularly successful?

SPEAKER_00 31:27

I mean, I think we both always say the same page. I'm there's a lot in the book that I'm very proud of. Um and I will say, um, not that I don't like our previous books, but when I look at the pages of this one, I feel very proud of them in comparison to our previous books.

SPEAKER_02 31:46

But I mean I think that's normal for any artist to feel that way. Like I think I think our other books are pretty stellar. Like I think they're pretty great. But I understand why I do. I do, but I understand why an artist looks at their work and goes, hmm, I don't know about that. Yeah. Which is a lot of the same way about the books that I've drawn. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 32:05

But there there is a page um where our quote-unquote main character, Hannah, is um, she is starting to online date and she downloads an app uh called Swiper.

SPEAKER_01 32:18

Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_00 32:18

With no E. And she's trying to um choose both men and women as her um kind of like who she wants to date, and the app won't let her choose both. Uh so she keeps like poking in between or like pushing the button for men and then women and then men and then women, and it won't let her do them both. And she freaks out and she's on a train. Bus? Train. Um she is surrounded by uh judgmental dudes. Um I think that the um panel-by-panel storytelling of that page thing I think it works pretty well. And I like the drawing of her trying to stab at her phone. Yeah, I remember a bunch of hands.

SPEAKER_02 33:09

I remember when you texted me this page and I was like, oh yeah, this is gonna work. This is gonna work.

SPEAKER_00 33:14

Yeah, that was pretty far into the book at that point. Yeah, I mean, I it's not like I thought it wasn't going to work, but there's a difference between like, yeah, we're finding a rhythm, this is cool, we're excited about it, and like well, and there's always a certain amount of learning to draw the book that you're drawing when you're making something, and the first 40 or so pages, you know. Initially, um I would just kind of do some character sketches and then dive into a book. And I have since learned it really helps me to do a bunch of like expression sheets for everybody so that I'm not learning on the page how to draw them. Um it really I think benefits me long term. And I also um, you know, certain projects, you know, um I did a Batgirl book uh in came out in 2020. And because of the structure of how we were making that book, which was um I had to work weekly. I was I had weekly deadlines. Um, and I think we didn't even have the full story written when I started drawing it. Um I had to thumbnail and then pencil and ink kind of in five-page chunks. Um, and I have since switched to thumbnailing the whole book, penciling the whole book, inking the whole book, because I think by the time that you get to the end of penciling, you have learned how to draw the book. So then when you go down and put your final inks, you have a stronger foundation for the characters and the world and what everything needs to look like. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

SPEAKER_02 34:59

Yeah. I mean, I think the end of the book you can really feel in the scenario where you're not doing that, you can always feel like the last like 20 or 30 pages of a book, like where an artist really figures it out.

SPEAKER_00 35:10

Yeah, it clicks in the last like 20 pages, and you're like, shoot, it should have been this the whole time. But you know, you just you have to learn as you're making it.

SPEAKER_02 35:20

Yeah. I think that's part of the reason why the end of Halloween Boy is so protracted.

SPEAKER_00 35:24

Yeah. How many, uh how many pages do you think that script was initially for the last chapter?

SPEAKER_02 35:29

The last chapter was supposed to be a double-size, it was supposed to be four issue series, with the fourth issue being double sized, so it would be 40 pages.

SPEAKER_00 35:38

Uh-huh. And how many did it end up being?

SPEAKER_02 35:39

Aaron Powell It got split into two issues, each of which were 60 pages. Yeah. So I did 120 pages.

SPEAKER_00 35:47

This is also the the difference in when you work when you write for yourself versus when you write for other people or specifically me, is you don't have the ability to do that when it's someone else, and your brain, the way that you put story together when you are not writing for someone else, is just like I'm gonna give myself an outline and then it as I make it, as I draw it, I'm going to turn it into what it needs to be, and it extrapolates and it extrapolates and extrapolates as you need story beats or Yeah, the drawing is is the writing almost.

SPEAKER_02 36:22

Um and I actually really like that process because it's almost like sculpting as opposed to more like laying bricks, like what it is when you and I work together. It's very much like unit of story, unit of story, unit of story, unit of story, unit of story.

SPEAKER_00 36:35

I mean our brains work very differently. As much as we have a lot of overlapping and similar interests and similar goals for the stories that we do tell, I think w our brains are just fundamentally different. Yeah, to a certain degree. I need the reason that we do so many passes of these stories beforehand is I need the structure. I need to know what's happening when, so that all of my acting is correct and all of my planning is correct, and I know what I'm doing, and I have a plan where you're just like the wild west of drawing comics. And I think there's a lot of creators who actually work that way. I am not one of them.

SPEAKER_02 37:11

Yeah, I I don't know. I think I've worked multiple ways, right? Like you like, I've written full scripts for myself, I've written outlines for myself, I've just drawn it, and like each project is a little bit different.

SPEAKER_00 37:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 37:24

It's mostly just kind of like, oh, I don't I just don't want to do whatever the last thing I did was.

SPEAKER_00 37:29

I do like that whenever you tell me that you're working on a new project and you're like, oh yeah, it's gonna be a four-issue miniseries, I'm like, no, it's not. Don't fool yourself. This is gonna be 300 pages. No. No. No, no, no. I know you.

SPEAKER_02 37:48

I mean, this one, like I said, it ended up like that, that is not four issues.

SPEAKER_00 37:53

When you started writing that book, I think you told me it was gonna be a mini.

SPEAKER_02 37:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 37:59

And it is not a mini.

SPEAKER_02 38:00

No.

SPEAKER_00 38:01

Friends, it's not a mini.

SPEAKER_02 38:04

Yeah. And yeah. Yeah, it ended up being, you know, whatever, three, three, probably thirty, forty-page issues, and then uh two sixty-page issues.

SPEAKER_00 38:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 38:17

But the the second arc is smaller issue count. There's just more of them.

SPEAKER_00 38:24

You mean smaller page count? Smaller page count.

SPEAKER_02 38:26

It's just more issues. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 38:29

Do you have a preference of writing for yourself or writing for other people?

SPEAKER_02 38:35

No. Because they kind of scratch different itches, you know. Uh like, you know, cooking a nice meal in is really fun sometimes, and also going out to eat sometimes is really fun. So it just depends on the mood. Um I just don't the only thing I don't like is drawing for other people. Yes. I've just I've just come to that realization. I just don't like working on other people's scripts. It doesn't even matter if the script is great or not.

SPEAKER_03 38:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 38:58

I just anytime someone is like, so could you please draw a guy holding a sword? I would literally never draw a guy holding a sword. I would never do that. Why would you tell me that I have to draw a guy holding a sword? That's that's horrible. Yeah. That's such a bad idea. Yeah. I would never say to do that.

SPEAKER_00 39:15

So do you think that you have issues with control?

SPEAKER_02 39:22

No, I don't think so. No, I don't think so. I think I have more that like um that I have spent a long time developing a skill, and the way my brain works is if I'm not the one choosing how to use that skill, it feels like wasted time. And I know that that's a toxic trait, but like it just is it just I just don't I want to be the one to chart that destiny and have the idea live or die on its own.

SPEAKER_00 39:51

Yeah, it's it's interesting because I have similar things, not so much in the writing sphere, because obviously I've worked with a bunch of writers. I do prefer to have some input on the writing process and you know, the way that we work, I have a lot of input. Um, but you know, when it comes to coloring or lettering, I've worked with some really great colorists, but it is so hard for me to let that go and like give someone else ownership um over the way that the end product is gonna look, you know, where it's like color and even lettering. Lettering is very important. Um they have so much impact on what the world is gonna see at the end of the day, and you're putting your name on that. And so it can be really, really difficult to be like, hey, other person, go ahead.

SPEAKER_02 40:44

Yeah, it'd be and also it'd be different if uh Dave Stewart was just beating down the door to work with me. You know what I mean? Like, but I also don't like when people color it because I feel like they don't quite understand the way that it's supposed to look and how it functions.

SPEAKER_00 40:59

And even if you like don't know exactly like what it should look like, you have an idea of like it should kind of look like this, and then when you get something back that's not that that can be very difficult.

SPEAKER_02 41:09

Yeah, and sometimes it's not bad. Um sometimes it's just that's fine, but that's like that's just not what I'm doing. Yeah, that's just not what I'm doing. But I feel like that's in some ways, that's kind of uh the key to our collaborative process is like we know each other so well at this point that you know what the things are that I'm interested in. I know the things that you're interested in, and then there's like this like center in the middle that's the overlap of the Venn diagram that is like sad girls kissing.

SPEAKER_00 41:42

It's mostly sad girls.

SPEAKER_02 41:43

People sitting in the cars kissing, sad girls in the rain crying. Sure. You know, uh hair blowing in the wind. You missed one. Yeah. People looking out over a sing a city with the lights twinkling, a sense of existential ennui, like all of those things are stylistic tropes that we both are very drawn to. And it ironically, the all of those same ideas are in my work. They're just like couched in a guy holding a fucking flaming sword or whatever.

SPEAKER_00 42:20

There's like a lot of there's a lot of hair blowing in the wind in Halloween boy.

SPEAKER_02 42:24

Anytime he's not wearing that cowl, it's just that mullet, it's fucking out there, baby. Yeah. I mean, like that's the opening to issue too is him like walking out uh across the like front of Hades Island, staring down at the earth from his floating skull cave island in lower orbit, and then just kind of like being sad while his mullet blows in the wind. And like it doesn't look anything like your version of that, but that is a Nicole Goo scene. Like, that is that is a you a scene I would write for you nine times out of a hundred. Or nine times out of ten. Nine times out of a hundred would be.

SPEAKER_00 43:00

Do you so we have worked together a very long time, probably 10, 11 years now. Do you think that that comes from working with me, or is that something that you would have written for yourself anyway? I don't know if you can separate that.

SPEAKER_02 43:13

I don't know. I don't think I would have had I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 43:20

Because I know there there are things that I do because we've worked together for so long, and I know there are things that you do because we've worked together. I don't know if that's one of them.

SPEAKER_02 43:31

I don't know. I that's a good question. I kind of don't I don't think that I would have arrived at that same place, but I also don't think that I wouldn't write something like that.

SPEAKER_01 43:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 43:45

But like look at the version from Action Hospital, right? There is there's multiple scenes like that in Action Hospital, like where Doyle and Joan are like gonna hook up or whatever. And like it's the saddest, yeah, like not cool and glamorous version of that. Where like she has a mattress on the floor and she's like trying to play guitar and it sucks, and like then there's a double page splash that's like a close-up of Doyle's face saying, Aren't you gonna kiss me?

SPEAKER_00 44:10

Like that's how my more default I mean, and that's something that could easily just be in pumpkins.

SPEAKER_02 44:19

Yeah, it could. But it wouldn't, because it would take place on the veranda or on the roof of the building, and they would be looking out over the city of you know, and like it would be the same moment, but there would just be it would be pis the camera would be existentially in a different place because you were drawing it. Maybe like I would never say another on the roof, because I'm like, I don't want to draw those buildings. That sucks. I'm gonna put them inside so I can just draw like a couple movie posters and call it a night. You know? But like I think that yeah, so much of our creative back and forth has shifted and shaped both of what our perspective on those things. Um and also just like, I don't know. It's fun to make stuff with you, you know.

SPEAKER_00 45:03

Thanks. It's fun to make stuff with you.

SPEAKER_02 45:05

You have something else that just came out recently.

SPEAKER_00 45:08

Yes, I do. Um, I wrote Andrew a an issue of Twilight Zone for IDW. Um from the this is the second um arc of the Twilight Zone series, and this is issue number six, came out in April. Um, and it is about a woman who a very sad depressed woman. Funny how that keeps coming up. A sad depressed woman who uh orders a food delivery box, um, and in that box she discovers a root vegetable that is maybe more than it seems.

SPEAKER_01 45:47

Gasp. Gasp.

SPEAKER_00 45:49

Um Yeah, I don't it's toilet zone, so I never I never want to spoil stuff, but I feel like creepy guy. I don't know. I mean, basically, um she plants this little odd-looking uh root and it develops into a little baby root that um ends up being kind of like her lifeline into holding on and gives her something to live for and something to kind of take care of. And she's a metaphor. Could it be a metaphor? Possibly. Actually, I had someone send me a very, very moving message about um their relationship with their mother and being estranged and then reading this comic and reaching out again to their mother and trying to make connection again. And I was like, oh my God, I cannot believe that um it would have that sort of impact on anyone. Um but it it is very, very if you have an experience like that with someone's comic, please reach out to them because it is not very often that we get the sort of feedback of it meaning that much to anyone, and obviously that is the entire goal of is just to tell stories that mean something to someone, and um I'm pretty proud of it.

unknown 47:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 47:13

Yeah, I mean I feel like the interesting thing about this book is you know, you wrote this one for yourself to draw. And it's interesting to me the stylistic stuff that feels like it's pulled from the show and you know, the black and white tone and some of your compositions, and then also some of the aesthetic choices that you're bringing to it that are more formalist, like you have a lot of decompressed time and showing the the progression of time through tons of small panels and um Yeah, I mean I I guess I'm curious like how much of that was organically discovered through the process of writing and how much of that How much of that was like you being like, oh, I this this page needs a little bit more of that Nikki G magic, you know?

SPEAKER_00 47:59

I mean I think I as much as maybe you try and write towards a goal of fitting into the world of Twilight Zone or fitting into the world of, I don't know, whatever superhero you're working on or whatever it is, you can only really write like you write. Um and um writing is a newer skill for me that I've developed and been working on. And so I was very, very appreciative that I sent IDW four or five pitches for this, all of which I hoped were, you know, in the realm of Twilight Zone and felt like Twilight Zone stories. I I went back and watched a bunch of episodes and read some episode descriptions and stuff. And um, this was the one I thought they were the least likely to pick because it was the one that felt most like a story that I would just tell anyway. Um and they picked it, and I was thrilled and I, you know, I really didn't have to kind of push that story in any in any directions that I wouldn't have normally gone. And so I think it is very inherently a story that I would just tell. Um, and you know, like we have a little Twilight Zone twist at the end, of course, but um I think it is a very me story. Um, and it just comes from years and years and years of working with writers and working with you and developing my own voice. And, you know, it's not the first thing I've written. I I wrote an entire graphic novel called Pet Beeves. Um, and I've written some other shorts and and various things, but um Gem in the holograms, also for IDW. Gem in the hologram. That was that I wrote a 10-page Gem in the hologram story in like I want to say 2016, 2017, which was my first job in comics. So thanks, IDW. Um yeah, I mean, I I I many, many years ago I I wrote that. Um and I think I hopefully am a little bit of a better writer than I was then. Um but yeah, I I don't think that I had to, I'm not someone who really is gonna like try and fit the mold too much, you know, when it comes to that, mostly because I can't. I'm just gonna write the story, I'm gonna write. And if I got a bunch of edits or something, of course I would um try and address those and and push things in a direction that fit better for whatever I was working on.

SPEAKER_02 50:28

But yeah, but you have a codified voice and an idea that you're trying to pursue.

SPEAKER_00 50:33

I think so. And I really just try and make the best version of that story that I can. And you know, you and I are so focused on atmosphere and timing and beats and space, and and that is so much of what I think about when I'm kind of developing a story. Um but I also still am like I need an entire script, I need every beat out, and I need to like, you know, plan ahead in a way that um I don't think every cartoonist does, but um, it's something that helps me get the story to the perfect place that I want it to be.

SPEAKER_02 51:05

Aaron Ross Powell Well, I think um the I think the book is pretty impressive, uh especially because I love the Twilight Zone. I think a lot of people have positive feelings of the Twilight Zone, but I don't think it has an identity in comics that like people come to it really.

SPEAKER_00 51:21

No. It's a Twilight Zone is a weird one, actually, because even the show itself, it has an identity of black and white sci-fi. But really it can be anything you want it to be. Yeah. Um you just kind of need mystery and a twist. And I think that that is something that is incredibly freeing about all of these Twilight Zone stories that they've put together, is you can tell whatever story you want, really, as long as it has those kind of two elements. Um and there's a lot of freedom in that. You know, I wrote all these pitches, and I'm like, I can just make these pitches. They're not Twilight Zone. So if I wanted to, they're just stories that I want to tell. And I I think I have not talked to the other writers on the other issues. Um, but I think that they would probably say the same thing of like Twilight Zone is a really fun um property to work on because it's so free. There's no care, there's no characters.

SPEAKER_02 52:17

Yeah, it's just really rotten.

SPEAKER_00 52:20

Remember what happened in issue 75 of, you know, whatever, make sure that you're on track or you don't have to plan ahead because, oh, that character is getting used to used in this other, you know, line and they need to be here or they need to be alive, and they need you can't kill them, whatever. There's no there's very few restrictions actually on what you can do with it. And so um the stuff that is coming out is um basically like indie comics, but with a Twilight Zone name on it, you know.

SPEAKER_02 52:49

Which is really cool.

SPEAKER_00 52:50

It's great.

SPEAKER_02 52:51

Yeah. Uh well, speaking of Twilight Zone and or indie comics that aren't called Twilight Zone, uh where can people find pumpkin heads?

SPEAKER_00 53:00

Anywhere, I think. Bookstores all around, um, probably the IDW website. Um and through us.

SPEAKER_02 53:09

Yeah. Uh where can people find you online, Nick?

SPEAKER_00 53:11

You can find me on Instagram at ngoo, and my website is just Nicole Goo.com, and I have Blue Sky.

SPEAKER_02 53:20

Oh my god, Blue Sky.

SPEAKER_00 53:20

Oh my god, blue sky.

SPEAKER_02 53:22

Oh my god. You can find me at Instagram xdaveBakerX or on my website, heydavebaker.com. Thanks for listening to us talk about the funny pages. Bye, creator creator. Hi. I hope you enjoyed listening as much as I did. If you want to explore more from these creators, go to your local comic shop or go to our website at idwpublishing.com.