King of Comic Book Cool: Darick Robertson
Uploaded by WatchTheDaily on 06.05.2012
Transcript:
King of Comic Book Cool: Darick Robertson Script
[music]
>> DARICK ROBERTSON: My name is Darick Robertson and I’m a comic
book artist. I worked on Wolverine, Spider Man, Super Man, the Justice League, just about
everybody. I co-created trans metropolitan along with Warren Ellis. It was about this
futuristic Hunter S Thompson gonzo journalist and a future where there’s so much media
that no one listens anymore. I really love this book because I got to do
a lot of world building, as they call it now, I didn’t know there was a term for it until
after I was doing it, but creating this city was an incredibly fun challenge
The boys is a world where the superheroes aren’t the people you think. Behind the
scenes they’re awful people, and they live in a world where the only hope we have is
the boys. The boys is being developed into a film so I’ve been meeting people, and
finding that those two worlds of visual storytelling it’s a shorter bridge to bring those together
than I realized.
I’m in love with sequential storytelling, and that’s really the heart of what I do.
I mean I’m a self-taught guy, I didn’t go to school for this. It’s just a passion
that I couldn’t let go of .I got obsessed with this as a 10 year old; when I was 12
I said I would draw comics for a living. And I’m the creepy 43-year-old guy who’s doing
that now, and believe it or not I’m married.
I wanted to draw Wolverine more than anything, and so when I finally got hired to draw Wolverine
and, they rebooted the series, it was a big deal for me. Wolverine didn’t look like
the rest, and he smoked cigars, and he had this bad attitude, and he seemed like he should’ve
be this villain but he wasn’t, and he had this really cool other side to him where he
had this samurai mentality, and he was just this bucket of rage which felt like as a teenager,
I think most teenagers feel like a bucket of rage with no ally and I loved this idea
that if I lost my cool these claws would just come out of my hands and I was indestructible.
I like to draw him as this short little stocky guy, because I could see somebody making the
mistake of walking up to him and say get out of my way shorty, and oh, wouldn’t that
be the worst thing to do to Wolverine?
I had people who would pick on me and mock me for drawing comic books and believing I
would go somewhere with comic books, they didn’t see what I was going to become, and
that’s what Wolverine said to me, he was this samurai inside.
I remember being really good at drawing Tweety Bird and Snoopy at a young age. The adults
around me would get very excited and then id be asked to do this for my relatives. “Draw
one for Aunt Jenny.” I had seen a lot of comics but the first one
that jumped out at me and made me go comics will be your life” was flash #272. And they
had shorts of flash moving sequentially, he was running, but it was drawing after drawing,
and I put it together, oh he’s moving so fast you’re seeing after blurs of him. And
that was just awesome to me, I couldn’t understand how I was seeing all this motion
in a still image but I fell in love.
When I w as 9 years old I saw Star Wars for the first time and it completely blew my mind.
I went home like I had just seen the red sea parting, which just started my imagination
on fire, and I already liked to draw but by that point I was already on a path.
When I was 12 in seventh grade I would make little comic books and hand them out to my
friends and they would…I would try to recreate covers and ads and everything, I would try
to make a complete comic book out of typing paper and staples. I had at least three subscribers.
This comic had a strange influence on me when I was a kid. Superman vs. Muhammad Ali, which
at a glance seems stupid but it’s so incredibly well drawn and surprisingly well written goes
to show you that even the silliest concept can work if it’s handled right.
There’s this double page spread of Clark Kent and Lois Lane walking down the street
in this urban neighborhood of metropolis and the detail and perspective on it is so incredible
that it feels like you’re in the picture and that’s something that I remember seeing
at a young age and saying this is what it’s all about.
Well it’s an infinite special effects budget depending n your talent. You could take your
reader from a living room to sitting on the moon in one gutter.
Along with the Star Wars obsession came a love for action figures to the point that
now I have a huge collection for Star Wars stuff, and I build my own custom action figures.
If they don’t make it then I find a way to make it myself. It’s become something
of an obsession for me. My other passion is rock and roll.
[ROCK and ROLLING]
What I love about music and what comics have in common, is that there is such a low filtration
point between creator and audience. Bruce Springsteen can go out with his guitar and
play his song and the moment he hits the chord and starts singing in into that mic you know
it’s Bruce Springsteen.
Comic books are an American art form almost like jazz. And we’re the last to appreciate
it. How’s that?
[music]
>> DARICK ROBERTSON: My name is Darick Robertson and I’m a comic
book artist. I worked on Wolverine, Spider Man, Super Man, the Justice League, just about
everybody. I co-created trans metropolitan along with Warren Ellis. It was about this
futuristic Hunter S Thompson gonzo journalist and a future where there’s so much media
that no one listens anymore. I really love this book because I got to do
a lot of world building, as they call it now, I didn’t know there was a term for it until
after I was doing it, but creating this city was an incredibly fun challenge
The boys is a world where the superheroes aren’t the people you think. Behind the
scenes they’re awful people, and they live in a world where the only hope we have is
the boys. The boys is being developed into a film so I’ve been meeting people, and
finding that those two worlds of visual storytelling it’s a shorter bridge to bring those together
than I realized.
I’m in love with sequential storytelling, and that’s really the heart of what I do.
I mean I’m a self-taught guy, I didn’t go to school for this. It’s just a passion
that I couldn’t let go of .I got obsessed with this as a 10 year old; when I was 12
I said I would draw comics for a living. And I’m the creepy 43-year-old guy who’s doing
that now, and believe it or not I’m married.
I wanted to draw Wolverine more than anything, and so when I finally got hired to draw Wolverine
and, they rebooted the series, it was a big deal for me. Wolverine didn’t look like
the rest, and he smoked cigars, and he had this bad attitude, and he seemed like he should’ve
be this villain but he wasn’t, and he had this really cool other side to him where he
had this samurai mentality, and he was just this bucket of rage which felt like as a teenager,
I think most teenagers feel like a bucket of rage with no ally and I loved this idea
that if I lost my cool these claws would just come out of my hands and I was indestructible.
I like to draw him as this short little stocky guy, because I could see somebody making the
mistake of walking up to him and say get out of my way shorty, and oh, wouldn’t that
be the worst thing to do to Wolverine?
I had people who would pick on me and mock me for drawing comic books and believing I
would go somewhere with comic books, they didn’t see what I was going to become, and
that’s what Wolverine said to me, he was this samurai inside.
I remember being really good at drawing Tweety Bird and Snoopy at a young age. The adults
around me would get very excited and then id be asked to do this for my relatives. “Draw
one for Aunt Jenny.” I had seen a lot of comics but the first one
that jumped out at me and made me go comics will be your life” was flash #272. And they
had shorts of flash moving sequentially, he was running, but it was drawing after drawing,
and I put it together, oh he’s moving so fast you’re seeing after blurs of him. And
that was just awesome to me, I couldn’t understand how I was seeing all this motion
in a still image but I fell in love.
When I w as 9 years old I saw Star Wars for the first time and it completely blew my mind.
I went home like I had just seen the red sea parting, which just started my imagination
on fire, and I already liked to draw but by that point I was already on a path.
When I was 12 in seventh grade I would make little comic books and hand them out to my
friends and they would…I would try to recreate covers and ads and everything, I would try
to make a complete comic book out of typing paper and staples. I had at least three subscribers.
This comic had a strange influence on me when I was a kid. Superman vs. Muhammad Ali, which
at a glance seems stupid but it’s so incredibly well drawn and surprisingly well written goes
to show you that even the silliest concept can work if it’s handled right.
There’s this double page spread of Clark Kent and Lois Lane walking down the street
in this urban neighborhood of metropolis and the detail and perspective on it is so incredible
that it feels like you’re in the picture and that’s something that I remember seeing
at a young age and saying this is what it’s all about.
Well it’s an infinite special effects budget depending n your talent. You could take your
reader from a living room to sitting on the moon in one gutter.
Along with the Star Wars obsession came a love for action figures to the point that
now I have a huge collection for Star Wars stuff, and I build my own custom action figures.
If they don’t make it then I find a way to make it myself. It’s become something
of an obsession for me. My other passion is rock and roll.
[ROCK and ROLLING]
What I love about music and what comics have in common, is that there is such a low filtration
point between creator and audience. Bruce Springsteen can go out with his guitar and
play his song and the moment he hits the chord and starts singing in into that mic you know
it’s Bruce Springsteen.
Comic books are an American art form almost like jazz. And we’re the last to appreciate
it. How’s that?