by Mike Collins

What is the premise behind Iron and the Maiden?

JR: Iron and the Maiden is a cross between Escape from New York and Beauty and the Beast set in a high tech, alternate universe 1930's.

For a first time comic writer you were able to get some big names in Joe Madureira and Jeff Matsuda to do some design work for you. What did they respectively bring to the book?

JR: I am a first time comic writer, but a seasoned world creator. But in the video game industry we spend weeks or months designing characters before we go into production. I didn't want to give up that thoroughness, so I looked for the best comic people to help me design the game that way. Joe is a superhero, and his superpower is making anything he draws look incredibly cool. It may not help fight crime, but it sure comes in handy when you are trying to bring a character stuck in your head to life. Jeff is also a superhero, and one of his superpowers is seeing beyond single character to an entire cast of characters and how they interact with each other to make a greater whole. Together, they are an unstoppable superforce.

Tell us a little bit about your creative team...

JR: From the start I wanted the books to be incredibly detailed. One of my all time favorites is Hard Boiled, and although there may not be another individual that can channel Geoff Darrow, I wanted to take a stab at it. Francis and Joel made an incredible team splitting foregrounds and backgrounds on the early books, and as Francis became more comfortable with the material, he started doing incredibly detailed pages entirely on his own. The first page of every book is an incredibly detailed scene from The City Iron lives in done by Joel over a period of weeks. Financially, it makes no sense, but this is a labor of love, and I think it's worth every penny. And Danimation was my first choice for color. He is incredible with light, and crazy enough to take on the task of coloring that detail.

Aspen isn't known for creator owned work, this is a first for them right? How did you go about choosing them to publish your book?

JR: I had a very early meeting with Mike and Frank at Aspen courtesy of Joel, who was working there at the time. I think Iron came at a great time for them. And they are just the right sized shop to both give the books the focus they need, and have the reach to get them out there. It made sense for everyone.

In a time of continually late shipping books, how important was it to you to have all four issues finished before soliciting the series?

JR: As a reader, I can't stand late, or worse, discontinued series. And as a first time creator, who also was financing the books, I figured there might be some suspicion that I would lose interest, or otherwise fail to deliver. The best way to solve that is to finish the last book before you put the first book on the shelf. It's the best experience for the reader.

Are you a big comic book fan in general? Who or what are you following?

JR: I'm a binge consumer of entertainment. I don't watch TV for months, and then I do the entire 5 season DVD collection of some show in a week. I don't read books for years, and then I do a series in a month. Ditto games and movies. I hadn't read many comics since my teens, but after leaving Naughty Dog, my video game company, I met Barry Levine who was at Dark Horse at the time. He got me to go in a comic book store and pick up a comic or two. Six feet vertical of books later (no exaggeration) I had caught up with the last few years. My favorites are probably Transmetropolitan and Preacher, but I also loved Batman: Hush and many other series.

You've got some big names contributing alternate covers for the series including Jim Lee, Michael Turner, Joe Mad and Chris Bachalo. How did you go about getting them involved? Anyone you weren't able to fit in this time?

JR: Every connection is a different story. The thing I like about the comic book industry is that every person I called answered the phone and was more than willing to give their opinion, dispense advice, and more often than not willing to contribute in some way. I wish the whole world were so friendly.

Now that you have the first four issues completed, can you look back and talk about the process of writing the book? Was there anything that was more or less difficult than you imagined?

JR: Writing comics is far harder than I originally anticipated. I have an incredible amount of respect for those that do a book a month... or worse, multiple books a month. And it comes with its own set of challenges that are entirely unique to the format, for example surprises can only happen on page turns that make it a task that takes time and practice to get right. I couldn't fit a whole arc in 21/22 pages, so I just broke that rule. The worst moment is when you realize that you want to add a plot point to the beginning of a book, and it pushes a page so all of your reveals are shot. You start over. It's tough!

Do you expect to do more comics work in the future? Anything else coming up on that front?

JR: I had an incredible time doing Iron and the Maiden. If the public likes it, I would love to do more. There is definitely room for continuation of the story. And I have a lot more ideas that want to get out.

Fans of your video games are going to be interested to know if Iron and the Maiden will make their way to next gen systems. Are there any plans for that?

JR: There is nothing concrete with regards to Iron and video games. I've been working on a web-based mashup technology at www.flektor.com for the past year, so I have barely had time to think about it, but I'd love to see Iron become a game. All of the elements are there.

Finally, for anyone not familiar with you or the new book, what would you say to get them to give it a try?

JR: I don't believe that there is any other opportunity to see so many talents collaborate on a series of books as there is on Iron and the Maiden. But Beyond that, the story, setting, and world will be something totally different. Page for page, Iron is packed with a lot of bang for the buck.

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