Every month, Dark Horse Comics gives readers a behind-the-scenes look at the making of a comic or book. These articles can include the inspiration behind a specific title, what it's like to work in the comics industry, or some other special feature on the highlighted title of the month! In this month's Horsepower, Patton Oswalt gives readers a rundown on all the fantastic creators working on From the World of Minor Threats: Welcome to Twilight:
You wanna say something so profound, always, about a creative work you’re setting loose into the world. You wanna say memorable words about the creative process and the ups and downs of writing and the reading and re-reading experience. In the world of comics, you also want to talk about the happy-jolt moments when the artwork comes in, and you see visualized what you only tap tap tapped out on a keyboard. That’s a rush that never gets old.
But with Welcome to Twilight there’s a deeper thrill, and that’s the thrill of seeing our world – in this case, the world of Minor Threats that I and Jordan Blum and Scott Hepburn created – in the hands of creators and visionaries that we’ve only ever been fans of. And you see these people, these creators, who had such an effect on what we do creatively, start to play with and warp and twist and deepen a world whose foundations we’ve already dug into. And they find levels and side roads and impossible dimensions that we never suspected were there. But, once they’re revealed? You can’t believe you didn’t see them in the first place. And it keeps hitting us, every day like it’s the first time, that now you’re collaborating with your heroes.
Matt Fraction created one of the most tragic never-was superheroes and got Mike Allred to illustrate it. I don’t know what else to say about that story except, “Wait until you read it.” You will learn to fear a man with a face for a face. It’ll make sense, I promise. Brian Michael Bendis, with Soo Lee’s art leaping off the page, has opened up a new (and dangerous) dimension in Twilight City. I still remember how I thought, “Oh, Frankie isn’t going to like this…” when I read his script and I was so happy because it meant a character I’d created had gotten out of my control.
Gail Simone checks in with the loveable and hapless Crab Louie for a tale of fandom and friendship with beautiful art by Gene Ha.
And we end on Gerry Duggan, who takes us into the tense, nervy world of The Cleaner, with Mark Torres doing the kind of art that would have made him a king during the era of pulp paperbacks.
In case you haven’t caught on, this entire column is just one long brag. I can’t believe we got these geniuses to play in our world and I’m as excited to read all of it as you are.
The city of Los Angeles is burning around me as I write this but all of this is a tiny glimmer of hope in the sad inferno of a planet we live on. Yay, comics!
—Patton Oswalt
From the World of Minor Threats: Welcome to Twilight #1, written by Matt Fraction, Patton Oswalt, and Jordan Blum, illustrated by Mike Allred, colored by Laura Allred, and lettered by Nate Piekos, will be on sale March 12!
Find Horsepower on the last page of all Dark Horse single issue or here on our Newsfeed.
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