o many Angel fans, Tennessee-based artist Eric Powell is best known for his dark and noir-ish take on the brooding vampire with a soul in the pages of Dark Horse Comics' first Angel series. Despite all the fun he had drawing Joss Whedon's creations and making them his own, his greatest passion is to draw large, hulking characters like his own creation, The Goon. CoA delves into the artist's life, including his love of the comics medium; how he broke into it; characters he'd like to draw; and the blood, sweat, and tears he endured finding his beloved creation a publisher. From getting David Boreanaz's likeness down and drawing a demonically enraged sandwich to wondering if he had an Ed Wood complex, the artist talks candidly about the ups and downs he has faced in the comics industry.
LOVE AFFAIR
Angel ~ The First Series
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"I've always loved to draw. Everytime I drew something, there was a story to go along with it," Powell says, speaking in an easy-going, soft-spoken tone with a slight hint of a Southern drawl, something that certainly belies his amazing, if not bizarre, sense of humor that fuels his current project, The Goon. Powell's love of comic books goes back to when he was kid; he remembers reading Spider-man and the Hulk, two of Marvel's flagship characters. Although he has vague recollections of the actual stories, he recalls being inspired enough to pick up a pencil and draw on anything he could get his hands on. He cites Jack Kirby (Marvel co-founder who co-created the X-Men, Fantastic Four, Thor, Hulk, et al), Wally Wood (an EC Comics science-fiction and horror artist from the 1950s and illustrator of Mad Magazine), Will Eisner (a pioneering artist in comics for more than 60 years and creator of The Spirit), and Jack Davis (also an EC Comics artist from the 1950s, who has also drawn covers for Time magazine) as the greatest influences on his work. Today, the artist still reads comics and never misses Hellboy his favorite comic, written and drawn by Mike Mignola. "I never miss it," he says. "I love every issue."
His favorite writer in the comics medium--and another influence on his work--is the award-winning Alan Moore. Moore is best known for his work on DC's Swamp Thing (another one of the artist's favorite comics); 1986's landmark Watchmen series, which takes a deconstructionist view on the super hero genre; and 1988's Batman: The Killing Joke, which he calls one of his favorite stories, if not his favorite. Batman: The Killing Joke, which is the basis of the upcoming WB TV series Birds of Prey, isn't your typical Batman vs. Joker story. In it, Bats wants to talk with him about why their relationship is so adversarial before they kill each other. However, the Joker escapes from prison and goes on a crime spree, which is interspersed with segmented flashbacks of his origin. Pulling out all the stops, he shoots and paralyzes Batgirl. Powell says, "I remember being completely impressed with the comic when it came out. It was a very powerful story."
BREAKING IN
It is very difficult to break into the comics medium. Many artists can attest to it. And Powell is no exception. "It's very hard," he states bluntly, not mincing any words. His advice to aspiring comic artists is equally blunt: "If you don't want to dedicate massive amounts of your life to this profession, then it's not for you." While sending samples of his artwork to Marvel and DC without any luck, Powell collaborated with a local comic creator in Tennessee who was self-publishing a comic called Best Cellars. The book had a small print run. It wasn't even distributed; it was only sold locally and at comic conventions. At that point, he learned of a guest appearance by legendary horror artist Bernie Wrightson at a local bookstore. Also present was Tom Sniegoski, a future chronicler of the Dark Avenger in both comics and novels. Sniegoski ended up looking at Powell's artwork, which impressed him. From there, he shipped Powell's name around and they ended up working together on Razor: Uncut, Powell's first paying job in the comics industry. Powell did plenty of independent work from there, drawing for Caliber, Chaos, and Antartic Press. He then did three issues of The Goon for Avatar and then decided to shop it around, eventually showing it to Buffy and Angel editor Scott Allie at the Chicago Comic Convention. He said Allie liked what he saw and told Powell he'd see what he could do in getting The Goon published by Dark Horse.
In the meantime, however, Allie offered him some work on what was then Dark Horse's new Angel comic series, written by Christopher Golden, whom he met through Sniegoski. Filling in for regular artist Christian Zanier, Powell's first issue of Angel was No. 4, which he drew in a dark, moody style. The story centered around Angel trying to stop an abusive and deranged husband, claiming his wife was replaced by dark faeries, who answered her summons and plan to dispense their brutal form of justice. As much as he enjoyed drawing the Dark Avenger, he confesses he ran into some trouble capturing the likenesses of the actors. "I had a hard time initially. I never got the likenesses right as hard as I tried. I got Glenn Quinn's (Doyle) and Charisma Carpenter's (Cordelia Chase) likenesses down pretty well. However, David Boreanaz's (Angel) was something I couldn't quite capture." Ironically, even though drawing Angel presented him with a challenge, Powell admits it was his favorite character to draw, describing the heroic vampire as moody. "That's the only way to put it. It's like he's looking at you from under his brow. That's cool. I got the chance to let loose on him a bit and made him very dark. I drew other characters in a brighter context."
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"It's like he's looking at you from under his brow. That's cool. I got the chance to let loose on him a bit and made him very dark."
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Issues No. 8-9 centered around a monster killing people in the sewers. Det. Kate Lockley so desperately wants to believe it's Angel. Meanwhile, Angel tracks a monster down named Abner whom he believes is the killer, but in the end learns otherwise almost too late. Abner, a simple-minded, backwards-speaking demon with a gentle heart, is a towering creature, something which drawing is Powell's stock-in-trade. However, Abner was created by Golden and Sniegoski, while cover artist Jeff Matsuda designed his look visually as seen on the cover of No. 8. "I wish I had a hand in designing Abner, a big hand. He would've been a lot different if I designed him myself. I wanted to stick to Jeff's (Matsuda) design but made it my own as much as I could," Powell says. "I thought it would be really cool for him to use all of his appendages and strangle Angel with his foot (on the cover to No. 9)."
Powell expresses his surprise when he learns Abner was used again in a cameo in the "Past Lives" crossover between Buffy and Angel, which was the series' final multi-part story arc. "It would've been a good idea in the Angel comics to have Abner as a recurring character because the show couldn't afford to create a big monster," said Powell. "In comics, you can get away with creating a supporting character that has nothing to do with the regular TV show." In addition to his Angel work, Powell drew the Giles one-shot, which chronicles a tale of the Watcher's past almost two decades before he comes to Sunnydale and trains Buffy. He calls this assignment one of his favorite Buffy/Angel projects. "I drew the Giles one-shot, which was a Holmes/Lovecraft thing. I really enjoyed doing it. It was a lot of fun," he says. He served as background artist on Willow & Tara: Wanna-Blessed-Be (written by Golden and Tara herself, Amber Benson), along side of artist Terry Moore (acclaimed creator of Strangers in Paradise). However, he had no contact with Benson during the process of creating the book. "When you're an inker, you're a step away from the story or its content; you have no say in it. You're just there to embellish the (pencil) artist's work," Powell explains. "The most contact I had (on this project) was with Scott (Allie)."
The Cordelia One-shot, Demons in the bedroom
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Powell was originally asked to tighten Moore's pencils and fill in the background, but Moore did so much work on the book, which didn't allow Powell to do too much; there were only a few background scenes for Powell to complete. "On this project, I'd get a note from Terry (Moore) indicating where I should draw a tree, so I would put in a tree. If he needed a door, I put in a door," Powell recalls. "He put more work into this than he had to. I had a lot of fun doing it, anyway." His recent work on anything 'Angelic' was a 3-page sequence in the Reunion special (penned by Jane Espenson, Buffy writer and co-executive producer), featuring a demonic bunny in a story depicting different perspectives of the Scooby Gang regarding Buffy and Angel's off-screen meeting after she was resurrected and he went to meet her between the episodes, "Carpe Noctem" and "Fredless." In the case of the demonic bunny, it was rabbit-phobic Anya's point of view.
If there is any connection between his Goon and Angel work, it's the final issue of the first series, No. 17 (a.k.a. the Cordelia special), which takes place after the 1st season of Angel before Cordy meets Gunn. The story could be described as a Home Alone story where Cordy (with a little help from her roommate Phantom Dennis) foiled a bumbling burglar of the demon variety, who's after a heart Angel gave his girl Friday for safe keeping (she stashed it in her underwear drawer, a place the demon sarcastically called an 'original hiding place'). There's no Angel. There's no Wesley. There's only Cordy, armed with her hair dryer, among other home appliances, and her salty tongue. There's also plenty of comedic elements in it, something of which The Goon has aplenty. "I had a good time on that project. Everyone involved (Golden, Sniegoski) had a blast," he remembers with a laugh. Just wait 'til you see what Cordy uses to blindfold the demon at the end!
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