Intergalactic Church of the Almighty Rod
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4/28/2006 3:57:44 PM
Interview with Tedd Walley, founder of Voodoo Maverick Publishing and creator of
Tedd Walley, founder of New Orleans based indie comic company Voodoo Maverick Publishing combines action, humor, philosophical debate, and biting social commentary into one of the best comic series in my recent memory. His mouthpiece (and what a mouth she has) is Mathilda, first child of Lucifer and leader of Hells armies. The question of her existence leads to her selling her soul to God and defecting to the side of good, much to the chagrin of her family. Lucifer places a bounty on her head and her siblings, along with other denizens of Hell, flood our world to collect. Her best friend is her guardian angel, Baker. A rumpled, cigarette smoking fallen angel with a penchant for boozing and nudie bars, he does the best he can to guide the stubborn Mathilda who is now stuck in the form of an eight year old child. Demons, bullies, math tests...and you think your life is tough?
Currently Tedd is working on the fourth book in the Mathilda series as well as balancing several jobs to support the book. He was kind enough to take time from his extremely busy schedule to answer some questions for me. The following interview was compiled from recent e-mail correspondence.
Rev: Where did the story come from and how do you convert it into the comic? I know the basic concept of visual story telling but where do the plots come from and how do you figure out just what goes into an issue?
Tedd: The story came from my own wee head. Since I like to wax philosophical and psychological so much (and theological for that matter) the thought came to my mind while attending a Jesuit university here in NOLA back in 1994. The question popped into my head during a philosophy class I was taking. "If God is a benevolent God...a kind and forgiving God as we're told to believe, would he forgive the sins of the most evil being IF that being were TRULY repentant?" Of course no one knows for sure, but it is pretty frustrating. Thus, I began a personal quest to find in my mind a truly evil being, and thus created Mathilda. I decided against pre-existing figures of lore and history since I couldn't see in their head to know for certain anything of motivation and such. With Mathilda, I could determine all that, as well as decide for certain if she was TRULY repentant, which is key to the story.
The plot comes from the same confounding place in my head. When I decided to do a comic myself, Mathilda, or anything really, I first put together an outline of the story Im trying to tell. Much like a term paper. This allows me some structure so I know where the story is supposed to go, but some flexibility to tell it how I want to tell it. Thus, Mathilda has an ending, but I couldn't say how many issues it will take to get there. It gets there when it gets there and it may not end in a round number. But all my stories have beginnings, middles and ends mainly because I have other stories I want to tell with other characters.
Rev: Do you ever base character designs on people you know?
Tedd: I purposely try to avoid basing any character on anyone I know other than myself. This comes from strong advice from my lawyer.
Rev: Are you a fan of Manga and if so how does it affect your style?
Tedd: I am a fan of Manga but don't read it per se. In fact, since I started doing comics myself I don't read much of any if at all. Mainly to keep from being even subconsciously influenced, also because I don't have time. I wind up reading something when a friend literally puts it in my hand and says "Dude. You gotta' read this." or some such phrasing.
Rev: How much of the mythology behind Mathilda comes from the dark places in your mind and how much is based in the mythology of the "real world"?
Tedd: The mythology of Mathilda is 50/50 right now. The reason being that the 'real world' mythology is pretty convoluted and contradictory and that's mainly because everything is based off of hearsay becau
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