The Crossovers
Sep. 29th, 2002 03:03 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
yendiNow this is a comic I want to see -- Robert Rodi writing, Ernie Colon inking, and a helluva concept. I'm so there.
Everything below is swiped from newsarama.com:
The Crossovers is a new monthly color series by writer Robert Rodi, best known these days as creator of Vertigo’s Codename Knockout. The new series will be penciled by Mauricet - a Belgian cartoonist whose work on American shores include a few pages in Adventures of Superman #598 and Tellos: Sons & Moons - and inked by industry vet Ernie Colon, who Rodi describes as a “looongtime pro who I'm thrilled to have on board.”
"I'd been looking for a new series - preferably an all-ages concept to balance Codename: Knockout,” explained Rodi, “but I couldn't really get excited about any of the genres that already saturated the market: superheroes, supernatural, sword & sorcery, science-fiction … Then I recalled Astro City, where Kurt Busiek got some extra juice out of all those genres by placing them shoulder-to-shoulder in a single city. And I thought, why I don't be even more reductive..? Set them all in a single nuclear family?
"I started giggling right away, so I knew I was on to something.”
Rodi provided the resulting brief overview of the series’ premise.
"Meet the Crossovers: Carter, an exec at a biotech firm. Calista, his wife, a home hospice worker. Their children, Cristina, 15, and Clifford, 10.
Just your average 21st Century family.
Except … Carter’s secretly the godlike super-hero known as Archetype.
Calista’s the last of a dynasty of vampire slayers.
Cris regularly slips into another dimension where she becomes Eradika, warrior princess.
And Cliff’s a UFO abductee who’s now a key player in an alien invasion of Earth.
None of the Crossovers is aware of the others’ secret lives. But that may soon change, as their separate subplots start spilling into each other, resulting in a wild and woolly genre free-for-all.”
"The book is definitely a satire, but we're playing it largely straight,” Rodi continued. “The humor's going to come from the bizarre juxtaposition of all these well-worn genre conventions; it'll be more situational than slapstick. More Frank Capra than Harvey Kurtzman.”
As to how the writer hooked up with CrossGen and Code 6, Rodi explained the concept was first pitched to Vertigo back when a name familiar to CrossGen readers was Rodi’s Vertigo Editor – Tony Bedard.
"It didn't work out there, but Tony later moved to CrossGen,” he said. “When the Code 6 line was proposed, Tony remembered The Crossovers and brought it up as a potential property. Everyone was jazzed by the idea, so next thing I knew Ian Feller [Code 6’s Director of Business Development] was calling me. One of those rare, happy occasions for a writer when a publisher comes to you instead of the opposite.
"I met with Ian at San Diego this year and everything I heard and learned about Code 6 just blew me away. They've also proven to be real go-getters; the first issue's already coming together, and we're hoping to solicit for very early 2003 - possibly even January.”
Everything below is swiped from newsarama.com:
The Crossovers is a new monthly color series by writer Robert Rodi, best known these days as creator of Vertigo’s Codename Knockout. The new series will be penciled by Mauricet - a Belgian cartoonist whose work on American shores include a few pages in Adventures of Superman #598 and Tellos: Sons & Moons - and inked by industry vet Ernie Colon, who Rodi describes as a “looongtime pro who I'm thrilled to have on board.”
"I'd been looking for a new series - preferably an all-ages concept to balance Codename: Knockout,” explained Rodi, “but I couldn't really get excited about any of the genres that already saturated the market: superheroes, supernatural, sword & sorcery, science-fiction … Then I recalled Astro City, where Kurt Busiek got some extra juice out of all those genres by placing them shoulder-to-shoulder in a single city. And I thought, why I don't be even more reductive..? Set them all in a single nuclear family?
"I started giggling right away, so I knew I was on to something.”
Rodi provided the resulting brief overview of the series’ premise.
"Meet the Crossovers: Carter, an exec at a biotech firm. Calista, his wife, a home hospice worker. Their children, Cristina, 15, and Clifford, 10.
Just your average 21st Century family.
Except … Carter’s secretly the godlike super-hero known as Archetype.
Calista’s the last of a dynasty of vampire slayers.
Cris regularly slips into another dimension where she becomes Eradika, warrior princess.
And Cliff’s a UFO abductee who’s now a key player in an alien invasion of Earth.
None of the Crossovers is aware of the others’ secret lives. But that may soon change, as their separate subplots start spilling into each other, resulting in a wild and woolly genre free-for-all.”
"The book is definitely a satire, but we're playing it largely straight,” Rodi continued. “The humor's going to come from the bizarre juxtaposition of all these well-worn genre conventions; it'll be more situational than slapstick. More Frank Capra than Harvey Kurtzman.”
As to how the writer hooked up with CrossGen and Code 6, Rodi explained the concept was first pitched to Vertigo back when a name familiar to CrossGen readers was Rodi’s Vertigo Editor – Tony Bedard.
"It didn't work out there, but Tony later moved to CrossGen,” he said. “When the Code 6 line was proposed, Tony remembered The Crossovers and brought it up as a potential property. Everyone was jazzed by the idea, so next thing I knew Ian Feller [Code 6’s Director of Business Development] was calling me. One of those rare, happy occasions for a writer when a publisher comes to you instead of the opposite.
"I met with Ian at San Diego this year and everything I heard and learned about Code 6 just blew me away. They've also proven to be real go-getters; the first issue's already coming together, and we're hoping to solicit for very early 2003 - possibly even January.”
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
Wow, that does sound good.
Date: 2002-09-29 12:09 pm (UTC)Re: Wow, that does sound good.
Date: 2002-09-29 12:23 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2002-09-29 12:33 pm (UTC)Ha! I like the way this guy thinks! I may have to have a look at this book... Even though I'm not buying comics at the moment. Something to do with my lack of income.
(no subject)
Date: 2002-09-29 01:26 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2002-09-29 01:28 pm (UTC)