Buffy the Vampire Slayer- Georges Jeanty Interview

The very talented and gracious Mr. Georges Jeanty took time out of his busy schedule, helping to shape the continuing adventures of everyones favourite Vampire Slayer, to answer a few questions:

1. Your start in comics came with the Paradigm series for Calibur but what was it that first piqued your interest in comic book art?

I had a love for art my whole life. I think every young kid grows up wanting to be an artist before some other item of interest takes them away to what they'll become as adults. I always loved to draw. I was fascinated with art. All of it. Art in print, art in murals, art in billboards. Anywhere there was art I really took a liking to. Comics captivated me more than any of it and that's where my heart has been. I always loved the idea that comics, while having cool art for the most part, told stories. And the better artists drew you into the story with this cool art work. It was a phenomenon that I was drawn to at an early age. As a kid, Superheroes were very real to me.

2. Your work for Marvel seemed very much in the X-line but was varied in tone, Bishop: The Last X-Man being a melancholic piece,
while Deadpool is known for it's tongue in cheek humour (more of a precursor to Buffy, tone wise), did you enjoy that diversity within the same universe?

I love doing different books. And yes, Bishop and Deadpool were vastly different comics. Bishop as I remember was more of a story like the Lord of the Rings. It was broad and sweeping and brooding. Bishop was in this strange world and he was effecting change as he went along. While Deadpool was the opposite. Deadpool as I understood it never took himself too seriously and that's how I approached that character. Like he was a guy who was always wise cracking when you were trying to be serious. But underneath that he was a cold blooded killer. He was a hard character to maintain a balance with, that's why I think you had to have Deadpool among people who were worse than him so that you would root for him. If he was at a party with very nice people he would probably come off as that annoying guy at your office party. Those challenges proved most enjoyable when I was drawing those books.

3. Does humour in a book allow for a bit more experimentation on your end?

I think you can get away with a lot more. As just stated, in Deadpool, which I saw as a comedic book he could do anything absurd and you would believe it because that's the nature of his character. I remember one story that had Deadpool against Punisher. Now these guys are virtually the same and the way that I played it was to have Punisher totally serious and Deadpool totally not serious. So Punisher's annoyance in the book comes from a place you understand and not just think this guy has a bug up his butt!
I do that in Buffy as well. Buffy and company are maybe a little more animated some times to get the point across and as a result I try and draw them funnier. It's a constant act of experimentation. It all depends on the situation.

4. You've handled a huge icon in your career, the big blue boy scout Superman, how was that experience? And is there a pressure when dealing with one of the fore fathers of the comic landscape?

I started on Superman feeling just that way, that this was the quintessential iconic character of comic, and as a result I think my first outing with Superman came across a little stiff. I was so busy trying to show the 'Super' that I forgot about the 'Man'. I think every artist once they start out feel they have something to prove and even more so with a character like Superman or Batman. Their attempts end up becoming stereotypes. True, Superman is the archetype but he's still this guy from a little town. Once I started treating him as a 'man' I had a lot more fun with him, and what I mean by that, I was putting expressions on his face, like if he was lifting something heavy he would grimace a little at the weight, stuff like that.

5. How do you approach which projects you take? Must certain key elements be in place to entice you?

My whole career has be one of happy occurrences. I can't say that I had planned my career in comics other than I wanted to have one. I never had that '5 year plan' that people talk about. I just kinda floated from project to project. I was just happy to be getting the work. I've always said in comics that it's not the project you're doing right now that you have to worry about, it's the project you're doing after wards. I have tried and succeeded to some degree, to just keep working. I have been blessed to have a career as long as I have and I'm grateful for that!
I love to draw comics so there is very little in comics that I wouldn't love to do. There are things that I might feel better at then others, but telling a story is always something I look forward to.

6. Your current work on Buffy has gotten you a lot of attention, and you were personally handpicked by the Boss himself Joss Whedon. How did you feel when you were approached?

Like most people, I didn't believe it.
Really. I thought Dark Horse was yanking my chain. What a cruel trick I thought, to get me to draw your book by telling me the guy who for some is a house hold name asked for you personally. But it was true.
I was like on a high that whole day! I'm so glad I took this gig. Buffy has been amazingly good to me! And it opened the door to a show I knew little about and now consider it among my most favourite, and it has allowed me to meet such wonderful fans. People say there's no love like fan love and I so believe that!

7. A show like Buffy has a large and incredibly vocal fanbase and with a new medium to adjust to, a lot of feedback would be directed to the main architect of this version. Was there any trepidation with taking this job on?

I think because I had no idea of the fan base for Buffy at the beginning I wasn't at all intimidated about taking the job, which was good in hindsight. I treated it like a job I was hired to do. I was going to give it my best because that's what you get when you hire me, but I had no idea how much fans were waiting for something like this, like Season 8. I was more jonesing on the idea of tackling the likenesses. I always wanted to do a project that had likenesses but to be honest I always thought I would be drawing Star Wars or Star Trek first. I had a serious need to Draw an X-Files book or a Godzilla one, and Buffy came out of nowhere for me. It was great!
It's like being in school and the prettiest girl taps you on the shoulder at the end of the year and tells you she has a crush on you. You're surprised and taken back, but the more you think of it the more you feel special!

8. Were you a fan before the job? And if so, did you sometimes wish you weren't to be more objective to the subject matter or has it been
beneficial?

I was not a fan before.
I am a fan now.
And I think that has helped improve the overall look of the book. For the first few issues I was still getting to know Buffy, and I look at those issues today thinking if I could do them over they would be better. What becomes beneficial about being a fan is in the details. A lot of the little visual stuff that you see in the book and can point out as something Buffy or Sci-fi related is usually me just sticking in cool things I like. Like one issue had the Doctor from Doctor Who and Rose his then companion, walking the streets of England, I just thought it would be cool to put that in there since that scene took place in London. There is a future issue with Harmony in a Tattoo parlor and she's looking at all the types of tattoos she can get and in there I've put Faith's and Angel's tattoo along with some other things that weren't in the script, I just thought they'd be cool.

9. TV show tie ins or adaptations slavishly adhere to photo reproductions of the actors involved. I find this often sucks the vitality from the art or in the very least restricts the artist. Your illustrations retain the essential feel of the characters while not being precisely Ms. Gellar et al. Was this point heavily discussed?

It was discussed but not heavily. I had a conversation with Joss about just that thing. I said Joss, I'm not really all that great with likenesses are you sure you want me drawing this book? And he told me something that cemented my approach to the characters, He said I'm not as interested in you drawing Buffy to look like Sarah Michelle, I'm more interested in her looking like Buffy.
That did it for me. While some likenesses are more difficult than others, and Kennedy comes to mind right now, I try and get the essence of the character and not the photo accuracy.

10. What characters and creators would interest you for future collaborations?

In the Buffy book? Well, I've been real lucky to have worked with most of the major writers from the TV show and before this season is done, I will have probably drawn most of the Buffy cast such as they are. All of the writers have been great and it always strikes me what a great compliment to the show how they've all come back to write stories for Season 8 because they really love the material! As an artist it has proven to have all sorts of challenges, as a fan it has been incredible to geek out over having talked to Joss Whedon or Jane Espenson or Drew Goddard and all the rest! It really has been incredible.

11 . Why not shamelessly plug the fantastic looking Buffy Sketchbook on sale through your website?! This is your forum! : )

If you insist! Anyone enjoying Season 8 will love the sketch books I've put together which shows you all the behind scenes stuff that went into making Buffy Season 8. Vol 1 is sold out and Vol 2 is available right now. These books are extremely limited, so if you're interested please act fast. Just go over to http://www.kabalounge.com/ and you can order yours!

The Fall (Movie Review)

Most of us were raised on fairytales and myths. They are intrinsically linked to our development. Imaginations can be built and psyches forged by them. To those who dismiss them with a cursory “just kids stories” have long forgotten both their potential positive and negative attributes. They matter.

The movie “The Fall” by innovative director Tarsem Singh, knows they matter and goes to great lengths to describe the importance of verbal storytelling and the lives it can not only salvage but the ones it can shape.

Set in an L.A. hospital in the 1920s the plot centres around a little Mexican girl named Alexandria (Catinca Untaru) who while on the mend from an accident befriends a wounded stuntman named Roy (Lee Pace) in a nearby ward. Their odd relationship is sparked by a tale he begins to tell her about a band of outlandish characters in a storybook setting and their quest to find and kill an evil Governor. The wicked politician, suitably called Odious has in some way wronged each of the protagonists and in his nefarious machinations we get some of the most beautiful images I have ever seen on the screen. The visual design through the film is sumptuous, an MC. Escher inspired labyrinth, golden dunes, barren tropical isles and timeless palaces are all rendered in such opulence I almost feared for my diabetic health, so rich is the texture of the film. But it’s a sugar high I would brave once more to again spy the wonderful costumes and style that the movie is infused with. It is drunk on the visual possibilities of Cinema.

Apparently CGI- free which is refreshing in this day and age where most Directors use it as a crutch, this is made with more practical special effects and an insane adherence to location shooting. One montage of our heroes previous adventures shows them in numerous countries and that meant clocking up serious air miles travelling to a reported 18 countries for the determined filmmaker and cast.

The characters presented within the story are little more than ciphers, the archetypes of various genres mixed together like ingredients in a cauldron but the crucial thing is we still care for them, as symbols of Alexandria’s imagination and her perspective on the world, innocent, naïve, magical. As less than magical events in the real world begin to invade and darken the tale we don’t want to lose the charm of this place any more than Alexandria does and its there the essential and age old tug of war begins between ugly truth and fanciful fiction. Roy has an agenda with the story and is manipulating Alexandria in a way she couldn’t possibly begin to understand. Therein lies the heart of the film. The fairytale is a beautiful construct, an over the top world which allows the actors within to perform in a very knowing, arch and post modern way but as fun as it all is and as beautiful, the soul of the film is in the scenes between Untaru and Pace. Theirs is a natural chemistry, borne of a free flowing improvisational tone. And when the story must lead to its inevitable showdown between reality and fantasy, both actors engage fully with the material, so much so that they make what we know to be a flippant story as powerful as any “truth” another movie might present.

Now many will dislike the film and feel its themes are obscure, even childish but they are the ones missing the point. Cinema, for all its sins began as escapism and a form of mass story telling. Only this time its adding how one world reflects on another. This may be too dark for children (most fairytales are) and too “insubstantial” for some grown ups but as an example of pure, unfiltered visual cinema and or an exploration of an emotional crisis this is a triumph.