Project and content management for Contemporary Authors volumes
WORK TITLE: Mae, Volume 1
WORK NOTES:
PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE:
WEBSITE: http://geneha.com/
CITY: Berwyn
STATE: IL
COUNTRY:
NATIONALITY:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gene_Ha
RESEARCHER NOTES:
PERSONAL
Born in Chicago IL; married; wife’s name Lisa.
EDUCATION:College for Creative Studies, graduated.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Writer and illustrator.
AWARDS:Russ Manning Most Award, 1994; Eisner Awards, 2000, 2001, 2006, 2008.
WRITINGS
Contributor to Superman—Action Comics, Vol. 1: Superman and the Men of Steel, DC Comics (New York, NY), 2012; Flashpoint: The World of Flashpoint Featuring Superman, DC Comics (New York, NY), 2012; The Shade, DC Comics (New York, NY), 2013; Sensation Comics Featuring Wonder Woman, Vol. 1, DC Comics (New York, NY), 2015; Fables: The Deluxe Edition, Book Thirteen, DC Comics (Burbank, CA), 2016. Contributor to numerous comic books.
SIDELIGHTS
Gene Ha is a writer and illustrator working in the comics genre. He holds a degree from the College for Creative Studies. Ha went on to become an artist and illustrator for various DC Comics books and publications, including the “Top 10” series, on which he collaborated with writer Alan Moore.
In 2017, Ha released Mae, Vol. 1, his first graphic novel. In an interview with a contributor to the Comics Alliance website, Ha explained: “It’s about two very different sisters from small town Indiana. The older sister, Abbie, discovered a doorway to another world at the age of thirteen. For the last seven or eight years she’s been living there and having great adventures. She’s defeated horrible monsters and power-mad scientists and evil nobles. By the age of eighteen she was a beloved hero. But by the time she turned twenty-one it all comes apart and she decides to return to Indiana.” Ha continued: “The younger sister, Mae, has had no idea what happened to Abbie all this time. She’s taken over the family business, finished high school and cares for their ailing father. Then she gets a late night call from the sheriff’s office. They’ve found Abbie, she’s drunk and Mae needs to pick her up. Abbie’s tales are hard to believe, until the monsters start showing up too.” Ha told Teresa Jusino, writer on the Mary Sue website: “My biggest inspiration was Kyle Baker’s Why I Hate Saturn. It’s a character study of two sisters. … Saturn showed me that you don’t need fights and action scenes to have great character conflicts. They can even be friends and sisters. And I learned that you can write heroes that don’t look like standard comics protagonists or like yourself”
Jason Sacks, contributor to the Comics Bulletin website, suggested: “Mae, Vol. 1 is a promising first issue. Much of its promise comes from the fact that it’s a slow burn and this story can head in most any possible direction. But much of its promise also comes from the fact that Gene Ha’s art is wonderful and he does a terrific job of building character and world.” Writing on the Monkeys Fighting Robots website, Anthony Wendel commented: “This is the start of a great indie book series which makes you want to check out the next chapter as soon as it is done. The only individuals who won’t find this book entertaining are those who are looking for a light read.” “The strength of this story is Ha’s … always inventive artwork,” asserted a Publishers Weekly reviewer.
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Publishers Weekly, February 13, 2017, review of Mae, Vol. 1, p. 59.
ONLINE
Comics Alliance, http://comicsalliance.com/ (May 12, 2015), Janelle Asselin, author interview.
Comics Bulletin, http://comicsbulletin.com/ (April 25, 2016), Jason Sacks, review of Mae, Vol. 1.
Gene Ha Website, http://geneha.com (October 20, 2017).
Mary Sue, http://themarysue.com/ (April 18, 2016), Teresa Jusino, author interview.
Monkeys Fighting Robots, https://www.monkeysfightingrobots.com/ (January 20, 2017), Anthony Wendel, review of Mae, Vol. 1.
Gene Ha
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Gene Ha
6.8.08GeneHaByLuigiNovi.jpg
Gene Ha at the 2008
Big Apple Comic Convention
Born Chicago
Nationality American
Area(s) Writer, Penciller, Inker
Notable works
The Adventures of Cyclops and Phoenix
Top Ten
Awards 1994 Russ Manning Most Award
Four Eisner Awards
Gene Ha is an American comics artist and writer best known for his work on books such as Top 10 and Top 10: The Forty-Niners, with Alan Moore and Zander Cannon, for America's Best Comics, the Batman graphic novel Fortunate Son, with Gerard Jones, and The Adventures of Cyclops and Phoenix, among others. He has also drawn Global Frequency and has drawn covers for Wizard and Marvel Comics.
He was awarded the 1994 Russ Manning Most Promising Newcomer Award, and won four Eisner Awards, in 2000, 2001, 2006, and 2008.
Contents [hide]
1 Early life
2 Career
3 Techniques and materials
4 Personal life
5 Awards and nominations
5.1 Awards
5.2 Nominations
6 Bibliography
6.1 Dark Horse Comics
6.2 DC Comics
6.2.1 America's Best Comics
6.2.2 Vertigo
6.2.3 WildStorm
6.3 Malibu Comics
6.4 Marvel Comics
7 References
8 External links
Early life[edit]
Gene Ha was born in Chicago and raised in South Bend, Indiana. According to Ha, his parents were well-educated Korean immigrants whose aspiration was that their three sons would obtain prestigious degrees and enter corresponding careers. Gene was the most introverted of his brothers, a "geek" who sought out escapist fantasy particularly through comic books. Whilst his siblings displayed impressive artistic talent, they lacked the patience to sit for hours on end applying themselves to illustration. Ha notes parallels between his generation of Asian-American comics artists and the generation of Jewish creators from the 1930s, both of whom were children of immigrants struggling to fit into America.[1]
Ha cites as his influences numerous creators from the 1980s, such as John Byrne, Frank Miller, Bill Sienkiewicz, Walter Simonson, Alan Moore and most importantly Matt Wagner, whose Mage series Ha says is still "epic" to him, and its main characters "personal archetypes".[1]
Ha took few classes in art, as he was only interested in drawing as a means of creating comics, and South Bend offered little in the way of education in realistic drawing. He began to truly understand graphic arts when working on his high school newspaper, The Clay Colonial, winning the Most Valuable Staffer Award, which was unusual for an artist. After high school, Ha attended the College for Creative Studies. In his last semester he sent drawing samples to Marvel and DC. Although he received a harshly critical response from Marvel, DC was interested and sent him a sample script.[1]
Career[edit]
Ha's first published comics work was in Green Lantern vol. 3 #36 (Feb. 1993), whose story, "The Ghost of Christmas Light", was written by Gerard Jones.[2][3] He would draw a number of comics for DC and Malibu Comics, and did work for Marvel as well, illustrating the 1994 miniseries The Adventures of Cyclops and Phoenix, which documented the childhood of the character Cable. He would draw that miniseries' sequel as well, Askani'son.
Ha was one of the artists on the Shade limited series which spun off from the Starman series.[4] He would subsequently illustrate a number of different properties for various publishers, including Aliens: Havoc, Superman, JLA Annual, which included interiors and cover work. In 1999, he began illustrating Top Ten, one of the series of Alan Moore's America's Best Comics imprint for Wildstorm. He would draw that series' twelve issues which ran until late 2001. Moore and Ha collaborated on the Top 10: The Forty-Niners graphic novel prequel published in 2005.[5]
In 2002 Ha wrote "The Stronghold", an Iron Fist story that appeared in Marvel Knights Double Shot #4, which represented his first published comics writing.[3]
In 2006, Ha was set to serve as artist on the first four issues of a relaunch of Wildstorm's The Authority, with writer Grant Morrison. Ha drew two issues, but the project stalled after the second issue, as DC needed Morrison to concentrate his efforts on Batman rather than on Wildstorm projects.[6]
In a December 2013 interview, Ha announced a sabbatical from work-for-hire comics and expressed his desire to focus on creator-owned projects.[7]
In June 2015, it was announced that Dark Horse Comics had selected for publication Ha's creator-owned series Mae, which Ha funded through the crowdfunding website Kickstarter. The Mae fundraising campaign, which was for a 68-page Mae graphic novel written and illustrated by Ha, launched on April 24, reaching its $22,000 goal in 36 hours, and concluding with a total of $75,643. The book, however, will be published as an ongoing series rather than as a graphic novel. A portal fiction story, it depicts sisters Abbie and Mae, recently reunited following Abbie's disappearance eight years earlier into a fantasy world of monsters, who have followed her back to her world in pursuit of her.[3][8] The series holds a 7.8 out of 10 rating at the review aggregator website Comic Book Round Up, based on 35 reviews.[9]
Techniques and materials[edit]
The variant cover for Justice League of America #11 (Sept. 2007) by Ha
Once Ha obtains a script, he makes "tiny" thumbnail sketches of each page, and then makes layout sketches on reduced copies of comic art board, two per page. It is at this stage that he works out the light/dark balance of the page. Though he says about 90% of his artwork are done without photo reference, he will sometimes photograph his friends posing as the central characters, or use a full length mirror to draw himself. He renders minor characters from his imagination. Irrespective of how much sunlight he has on a given day, he prefers to use a 500W incandescent photo lamp, though he believes a 500W halogen lamp is also adequate. He prefers to use a lead holder with H lead for sketching, and 2B lead for shading, which he sharpens with a rotary lead pointer, believing that such leads can be sharpened better than a traditional pencil. He blows up a scan of each page layout to 8.5" x 11", and draws "tight" pencils on top of these, which are then scanned and printed on 11" x 17" inkjet paper in faint blue line. He prefers Xerox paper because he feels that the surface of marker paper tends to get smudgy or oily. When modifying art in his computer, he uses Photoshop.[1]
To effect his current ink wash style of shading and inking, he uses a variety of warm grey Copic markers with wide and brush tips, in particular a 9W Copic Sketch brush marker. For outlines and precise shading effects he will use a variety of pencils, most notably a 2B pencil, and for highlights and corrections, he will use white chalk pencils and white gouache paint. He also uses Staedtler Mars technical pens.[1]
When doing digitally painted covers, he also uses a Winsor & Newton Series 7 Size 1 brush, Badger Air Opaque airbrush paint, water-soluble ink wash and Strathmore Windmill vellum 100 lb. Bristol board. He cleans his brushes with Masters Brush Cleaner, to which he adds water for a gel consistency.[1]
Personal life[edit]
Ha and his wife Lisa live in Berwyn, Illinois.[6]
Awards and nominations[edit]
Awards[edit]
1994 Russ Manning Most Promising Newcomer Award[10]
2000 Eisner Award for Best New Series (for Top Ten, with Alan Moore and Zander Cannon, Wildstorm/ABC)[11]
2001 Eisner Award for Best Continuing Series (for Top Ten, with Alan Moore and Zander Cannon, Wildstorm/ABC)[11]
2006 Eisner Award for Best New Graphic Album (for Top 10: The Forty-Niners, by Alan Moore, Gene Ha, Zander Cannon (ABC))[12]
2008 Eisner Award for Best Single Issue (for Justice League of America #11: "Walls", by Brad Meltzer and Gene Ha (DC))[11]
Nominations[edit]
1999 Eisner Award for Best Penciller/Inker or Penciller/Inker Team (for Starman #46)[13]
2006 Eisner Award for Best Penciller/Inker (for Top 10: The Forty-Niners)[12]
Bibliography[edit]
Dark Horse Comics[edit]
Mae #1–4 (2016)
Oktane #1–4 (1995)
The Real Adventures of Jonny Quest #8 (1997)
DC Comics[edit]
Action Comics vol. 2 #3, 9 (2012)
Batman: Fortunate Son HC (1999)
Batman: Gotham Knights #13 (Batman Black and White) (2001)
Blackest Night: Tales of the Corps #2 (2009)
Celebrate the Century [Super Heroes Stamp Album] #2–3 (1998)
DC Universe: Trinity #1 (1993)
Flashpoint: Project Superman #1–3 (2011)
Green Lantern vol. 3 #36, 44–45 (1993)
Green Lantern Corps Quarterly #8 (1994)
JLA Annual #1 (1997)
Justice League vol. 2 #7, 20 (2012–2013)
Justice League of America vol. 2 #0, 11 (2006–2007)
Phantom Stranger vol. 3 #6–7 (2013)
Shade #1 (1997)
Shade vol. 2 #12 (2012)
Showcase '95 #11 (1995)
Starman #46, Annual #2 (1997–1998)
Superman vol. 2 #200 (2004)
Superman/Batman #75 (2010)
America's Best Comics[edit]
ABC: A-Z, Top 10 and Teams #1 (2006)
Top 10 #1–12 (1999–2001)
Top 10 Season Two #1–4 (2008–2009)
Top 10: The Forty-Niners HC (2005)
Vertigo[edit]
Fables #52, 122–123 (2006–2013)
Fairest in All the Land HC (2014)
House of Mystery vol. 2 #35 (2011)
WildStorm[edit]
The Authority vol. 3 #1–2 (2006–2007)
Global Frequency #12 (2004)
Malibu Comics[edit]
Night Man #2–3 (1993)
Marvel Comics[edit]
The Adventures of Cyclops and Phoenix #1–4 (1994)
Askani'son #1–4 (1996)
Marvel Knights: Double Shot #4 (2002)
Shadows & Light #1 (1998)
X-Men Annual #3 (1994)
Young Avengers Special #1 (2006)
Gene Ha is the writer and artist of Mae. He's also the artist on comics such as Top 10, Fables, Justice League, Cyclops & Phoenix, and Oktane. His work has earned 4 Eisners, the highest award in the US comics industry.
He lives outside Chicago in Berwyn, IL with his wife Lisa and their rescue dog Fina and would eat through an IV tube while he
drew if it was practical.
Materials
I'm often asked what materials I use. My advice here is, "Do as I say, not as I do!" I do 1" tall loose roughs, scan it onto my Mac, print a 10" blueline, draw a tight pencil, scan, print a 15" blueline on acid free animation bond paper, then ink with 2B pencil and Copics. One more scan, hire a flatter, then I color the drawing in Photoshop. This works OK for me, but artists who work digitally on every stage can work twice as fast. Check out Freddie E Williams II's The DC Comics Guide to Digitally Drawing Comics.
Learning to Make Comics
There are many paths to learning how to draw and paint. For beginners the most useful resource is Mark Crilley. Check out his YouTube education videos, where he can introduce you to many basic concepts in drawing. He focuses on manga, but the principles apply to superhero comics too. His fundamentals are sound. If you enjoy these, get his book Mastering Manga. His comics are pretty awesome too!
Some other great books are Scott McCloud's Understanding Comics, Drawing Words Writing Pictures by Jessica Abel and Matt Madden, and How To Draw Comics The Marvel Way by Stan Lee and John Buscema.
I graduated from the Center For Creative Studies, now called the College For Creative Studies. That was over 20 years ago. Again, "do as I say and not as I do." Don't just apply to CCS because I went there. If you're looking for an art school, check out work from their recent graduates. If they're making work like you want to make then add them to your options. Contact some recent graduates. Ask many many questions.
Breaking in to the Comics Biz
Finally my advice on breaking into comics. It's not even possible to break into comics the way I did. I sent photocopy samples to Marvel and DC. Neither company accepts mailed samples any more. In the modern day, start drawing and posting your work online. Don't worry if your early work isn't 'good enough' yet, people will be excited to see you get better. Meet other artists on sites like Deviant Art and Instagram. Go all out promoting your work on sites like Tumblr. Start a web comic. Self publish if you think you have enough fans. The best way to get work from Marvel and DC is your own published comics. Hopefully you'll do so well you'll never need them.
Breaking and Entering into Art and Comics
I figure if you're reading this bio, you're either interested in how I got a job in comics or how to keep your kids from becoming comic book artists. Good luck either way. Anyhow, I'll try to explain how I ended up working twelve hours a day sitting alone in a small room with only my dog Fina to talk to.
I was born in Chicago, but raised in South Bend, Indiana. The home of Notre Dame University. My parents were well-educated Korean immigrants who hoped their three sons would get prestigious degrees and move on to prestigious jobs. Didn't happen...
I was the most introverted of the three Ha brothers. Being both a geek and a first generation Korean-American made me seek out escapist fantasy, especially comic books. While my brothers were both more artistically talented than me, neither of them had the patience to sit for hours on end working on one drawing. Or maybe they just had better things to do. I was the only brother not to play high school football.
I think there are a lot of parallels between my generation of Asian-American comic book artists and the generation of Jewish artists and writers who created superheroes in the 1930's. Mystery men with super powers, secret identities, and absurdly Anglo names seemed to have attracted both generations. We were all the children of immigrants struggling to fit into America, and the fantasies of 1930's Jewish geeks still held appeal to 1980's Korean geeks.
All of the typical comics names from the 80's were influences on me: Byrne, Miller, Sienkiewicz, Simonson, Moore, etc. But the most important was Matt Wagner. Mage is still a magical series to me, and the stubborn Kevin Matchstick and Sean the ghost are personal archetypes to this day. My dream is to make a series that will be as powerful to you (and myself) as that book was to me.
Art appealed to me, not in and of itself, but as a way of creating comic books. South Bend public schools offered few classes in realistic drawing, so I took few elective classes in art. I mostly drew in other classes and after school. I was quite good at taking notes, then caricaturing the teachers before they moved on to a new idea.
My high school's newspaper, the Clay Colonial, was where I really began to understand the graphic arts. I won the Most Valuable Staffer award, an unusual honor for the staff artist. I don't know where my high school and college degrees are, but I know where that plaque is.
The most important thing one must do before learning is figure out what you don't know. When it came time to go to college, I had no proper portfolio and couldn't get into any self respecting school. Which is how I ended up at the Center for Creative Studies (now the "College for Creative Studies"). In my first two years, I learned how little I knew. The last two years I tried to learn it. Art school can be incredibly useful, but the degree itself is meaningless. My art was still a mess when I graduated. I've met kids stuck on farms their whole lives who can draw better than I did then, and I've met art school grads whom I wouldn't want working on the Clay Colonial. In Minneapolis I shared a studio with two artists who held day jobs and hadn't been to art school. They were incredibly dedicated and were better artists than I was when I graduated.
In my last semester at CCS, I sent out drawing samples to Marvel, and a week later to DC as an afterthought. Marvel sent an unintentionally vicious letter criticizing my perspective, anatomy, and technique, everything except my storytelling. In retrospect, they were mostly right about everything but the storytelling. Still, they were needlessly harsh.
DC was interested. They sent me a sample script, liked the results, and I've had regular gigs ever since.
I currently live in Berwyn, IL with my wife Lisa. She fills me with joy, and keeps me from going crazy. Our rescue dog Fina gives us both sunshine
and fuzz.
QUOTED: "My biggest inspiration was Kyle Baker’s Why I Hate Saturn. It’s a character study of two sisters. ... Saturn showed me that you don’t need fights and action scenes to have great character conflicts. They can even be friends and sisters. And I learned that you can write heroes that don’t look like standard comics protagonists or like yourself"
gene ha
In a comics community that’s increasingly hungry for nuanced female protagonists and female-centric stories, Dark Horse Comics is providing just what they’re craving with an awesome new title by Eisner Award-winning creator, Gene Ha.
The series is called Mae, and it tells the story of the Fortell Sisters: the titular Mae, and her frequently absent older sister, Abbie. Abbie ran away when Mae was eleven, leaving Mae alone to take care of her ailing father. Now that Mae’s in college, she discovers exactly where her sister disappeared to all those years ago, and it changes her life forever.
Gene Ha is both the writer and artist on Mae, and in an email interview he talked to me about the importance of female characters, all-ages comics, and how a new, young, diverse readership is forcing the industry to change the face of comics.
Teresa Jusino (TMS): Where did the idea for Mae come from? How did this story develop?
Gene Ha: My biggest inspiration was Kyle Baker’s Why I Hate Saturn. It’s a character study of two sisters. Anne is a drunk and disorderly columnist. Laura is squared away, but also believes she spent the last few years as the Queen of the Leather Astro-Girls of Saturn. They argue and mock each other, a lot. Baker’s book opened my eyes in so many ways. I loved Laura’s perhaps delusional back story. Saturn showed me that you don’t need fights and action scenes to have great character conflicts. They can even be friends and sisters. And I learned that you can write heroes that don’t look like standard comics protagonists or like yourself (Kyle Baker is African-American). If you’re willing to learn and ask questions you can discover just how different other folks’ lives are, and write about them honestly.
I began doodling two sisters, one a space girl and the other a mechanic. Over time they began changing. Abbie lost the helmet and began wearing a colonial era jacket. Mae switched from overalls and got her signature Tom Baker Doctor Who scarf. Once I figured out why they dressed that way I finally had the story that became Mae.
TMS: Abbie seems to be the kick-ass one, but the series is called Mae. What can we expect from Mae as a character as the story goes on?
Ha: This is the story of how Mae becomes her own hero. Her sister Abbie ran away when she was 11, and Mae soon had to care for her ailing father and manage the computer shop. She had to grow up fast.
Her sister’s return and father’s disappearance means Mae has lost her old life, but it’s also her first chance to define what she wants to do with her life. She can’t be a fighting machine like Abbie, but because Mae is brave and smart she can solve problems that Abbie can’t fix.
Cimrterén, the other world, is a mess in part because Abbie always wants to solve problems with her fists. Mae will become the greater hero because she doesn’t shoot first and ask questions later. Mae’s going to learn the limits of Abbie’s style of heroism, and that will help Mae figure out what kind of hero she wants to become.
MAE #1 PG 01 copy
TMS: This is a creator-owned book where you’re on both writing and art duty? Did you do colors, inks, and lettering as well? Do you feel a greater sense of freedom doing a book entirely yourself? Is there a part of you that misses the collaborative nature of working with another writer/artist/etc on a book? Why is this story one that you had to be completely involved with?
Ha: I love drawing the scripts of great writers! The problem is, I have a very distinct vision of who Mae and Abbie are and you can’t get great scripts from a writer if you limit them to someone else’s vision. I had to write this myself.
The setting and back story are very complex. Like HBO’s The Wire, every piece matters. The Fortell sisters have naturally purple hair and orange eyes. The first explorers of the other world were Czech and that affected how they governed the world and why they kept it secret. There’s a reason for everything. It’s a huge history and I can’t hand it off to another writer. My freedom would become their shackles.
I have given small parts of the world to other writers. There’s a short prequel story from Mae’s high school days written by Danny Busiek. As a modern young geek girl Danny understands that corner of my world far better than I do. It was exciting to learn about Mae’s history from Danny!
My Top 10 layout artist, Zander Cannon, is lettering and I had color assistance from Rose McClain. Other than that, the first 2 issues were all me. In the US comics industry we call the inked page the “finished” art, but my vision for the art isn’t just black and white. So I had to color the first story myself.
To keep the book on schedule, with Mae #3 I handed off coloring duties to Wes “Wesflo” Hartman. I’m happy I’ve established the look well enough so that I can hand it off to such a brilliant colorist.
TMS: Why Dark Horse? What was it about Mae and Dark Horse that made them a perfect fit?
Ha: I’ve never been loyal to companies, I’m only loyal to people. Their top management made sure I trusted them as individuals to give me my creative freedom. And they put it in writing too.
My editor Daniel Chabon is a great partner in my labors. He understands that I’m telling the story of Mae my way, but Daniel’s never afraid to point out possible problems that I’ve missed. You want everything fixed before the story hits print. You can’t fix it afterward!
MAE #1 PG 02 copy
TMS: This is an all-ages book, which I love. Recently, I spoke with the creators of Alabaster Shadows about doing all-ages comics and why they’re important, and they mentioned that the resurgence of all-ages comics is, in part, to do with the fact that indie publishers are having more of a Moment right now, allowing for more inclusivity and a wider variety of movements and styles. Why is creating an all-ages comic important to you, and why do you think all-ages or youth-focused titles like Lumberjanes, and even Ms Marvel, are succeeding right now?
Ha: For most of my career comics has been on the brink of disaster. Comic shops kept closing, sales shrank, and we marketed to the same aging shrinking readership. I’ve long argued that we need to welcome new readers if we’re going to survive. That’s why I do free con sketches for kids and support public library events.
The comics hobby is growing again, but I don’t credit me or indie publishers or established comic companies. Comics is growing because young readers are forming online communities and creating their own content. Fanfiction and fan art is where they train, and some of them create new work and support it. Nimona, XKCD and Homestuck have huge and passionate followings, but they would have disappeared without a trace as comic shop titles.
We’re also seeing new venues for selling print comics. Scholastic sells comics to young readers through school book fairs. They don’t depend on Diamond so we don’t see them on the “Top 300” charts, but books like Amulet and Smile are bigger than anything from Marvel, DC or Image.
The reason we’re seeing more diversity in gender, age and race in comics is because these young readers are more diverse. DC and Marvel are just a small bit of comicdom and they’ve decided to open the gates and grow, instead of gatekeeping and dying.
MAE #1 PG 03 copy
TMS: In addition to all-ages comics being more popular these days, the all-ages books seem to be gearing more female-friendly. Mae features primarily female characters, and they are all amazing – and casually geeky, which I adore! Was it a conscious choice to speak more directly to a young, primarily female audience? What do you think that young boys and men can get out of reading the stories of wonderful female heroes?
Ha: I want to write about Mae and Abbie because I think they’re interesting and fun. And I love letting geeky girls see that they can be the heroes of their own stories. The question becomes whether people beyond me and the geek girls will be interested.
I really wasn’t sure when I started, but every year it becomes clearer that readers are growing braver and more curious. Stories like Paper Girls and Lumberjanes and the movie Frozen are popular with girls and boys. Readers love a good story even if the hero doesn’t look like them.
And part of making a good story is looking for new things to say, and new ways of saying it. Two years late I just started reading G. Willow Wilson’s Ms Marvel. You can see a lot of Spider-Man in the story, a teenage dork who uses superpowers to expand her horizons and discover herself. But by using a very different hero Wilson has made the tale fresh. The expectations on young Kamala are different, so she has to find different solutions. She wants to be a good Muslim but she doesn’t blindly accept how others tell her to be devout. She sticks up for herself and makes her own interpretation. As a girl she faces pressures to be virginal and to be sexy, and she has to struggle to a spot where she’s neither Captain Marvel nor her mom, but someone new.
This is far more compelling than a straight retelling of Peter Parker’s story, for readers of either sex. It’s an important lesson for guys like me that sometimes the story is better if it doesn’t look like us.
The Final Order Cut-Off for Mae is Monday, April 25th, so if you wanna snag Mae #1, make sure you order a copy at your local comic shop! I’ll be reviewing the title closer to its release, but spoiler alert: this is one you’re gonna want on your pull!
(headshot courtesy of Gene Ha, Mae images courtesy of Dark Horse Comics)
QUOTED: "It’s about two very different sisters from small town Indiana. The older sister, Abbie, discovered a doorway to another world at the age of 13. For the last 7 or 8 years she’s been living there and having great adventures. She’s defeated horrible monsters and power-mad scientists and evil nobles. By the age of 18 she was a beloved hero. But by the time she turned 21 it all comes apart and she decides to return to Indiana."
"The younger sister, Mae, has had no idea what happened to Abbie all this time. She’s taken over the family business, finished high school and cares for their ailing father. Then she gets a late night call from the sheriff’s office. They’ve found Abbie, she’s drunk and Mae needs to pick her up. Abbie’s tales are hard to believe, until the monsters start showing up too."
Last week, ComicsAlliance showed you an exclusive preview of Gene Ha's graphic novel Mae, which he's currently running a Kickstarter for. The project is funded twice over with three weeks left in its campaign, but Ha still has more stretch goals and incentives planned. We've spoken with him about genesis of the project, his careful planning for the Kickstarter, what it's like taking on new roles as a creator, and why he thinks broadening comics' readership is important.
ComicsAlliance: How long has Mae been in the works?
Gene Ha: It only became my main project in late 2014, but it’s been building for most of my career. My eyes were opened up to the possibilities of female heroes when I read Kyle Baker’s Why I Hate Saturn around 1995. I only grew up with brothers, and the dynamic between the two sisters really blew me away. Even if gender isn’t the explicit theme, it lets you tell a different story if you have female leads.
The setup of a returning sister who claims she’s been off on a fantasy world is a direct swipe from Kyle Baker, though we use it in very different ways. Saturn is Kyle’s Snuffleupagus, it never shows up in the story. We are definitely going to see Abbie’s fantasy world.
The big delay was learning how to write. My only previous published story was a 12 page Iron Fist story in 2002. Stuart Moore had to guide me through four or five drafts, and it really taught me how much I had to learn.
Iron Fist story written and drawn by Ha
CA: What made you decide to do a Kickstarter campaign?
GH: Rocket Girl! Amy Reeder and Brandon Montclare’s Kickstarter in the spring of 2013 was the game changer. I love everything about the project, from how they ran their campaign to the art and the story. I especially love how they built a community around Rocket Girl. People tend to think of Kickstarter as mainly a financial website, but it’s really a community. If creators can prove they’re serious and prepared, people give both their money and their friendship.
I didn’t know if I could do it, but I began talking to experienced KS vets like Jimmy Palmiotti and Ryan Browne. They’re great at Kickstarter because they’re both so sharing and big hearted, and that came through in their mentoring of me. They both thought Mae and I were a perfect fit for Kickstarter. It’s been a lot of work and learning, but they were right. I love the Kickstarter comics community!
CA: You’re a well-known and well-respected artist. Did you ever try to or think about pitching this project to a publisher?
GH: I explored similar projects with writers I love. Then the project would implode. Around 2005 Zander Cannon and I began working on a cross worlds tale for Humanoïds USA. Then they shuttered their US office. In 2009, Bill Willingham and I began work on Back Roads for IDW before scheduling conflicts torpedoed that. I don’t believe in dictated destiny, but it sure felt like the universe was telling me to take Mae more seriously.
Art from Back Roads, written by Bill Willingham
CA: You have all the work completed on the project already. Why was that a priority for you?
GH: One of the biggest issues with Kickstarter is proving that you’ll actually deliver. Backers have been burned before, repeatedly. Ryan Browne really drilled this into my head. He only launched his Kickstarter after his book was a finished printer ready file. He became my main Kickstarter role model, and I lived off of my savings while I finished the book.
CA: What is Mae about?
GH: It’s about two very different sisters from small town Indiana. The older sister, Abbie, discovered a doorway to another world at the age of 13. For the last 7 or 8 years she’s been living there and having great adventures. She’s defeated horrible monsters and power-mad scientists and evil nobles. By the age of 18 she was a beloved hero. But by the time she turned 21 it all comes apart and she decides to return to Indiana.
The younger sister, Mae, has had no idea what happened to Abbie all this time. She’s taken over the family business, finished high school and cares for their ailing father. Then she gets a late night call from the sheriff’s office. They’ve found Abbie, she’s drunk and Mae needs to pick her up. Abbie’s tales are hard to believe, until the monsters start showing up too.
The sisters have both missed out on having normal childhoods. Abbie never had to grow up, and Mae had to grow up too soon. I’m excited to explore my geeky love of fantastic worlds, but at it’s heart Mae is about the relationship between the two sisters.
CA: What inspired you to create this story?
GH: There’s so many inspirations! Beyond Why I Hate Saturn, there are also tales like the Oz books, John Carter, the Avatar cartoon series, and especially Pixar movies.
Why I Hate Saturn art framed on Ha's wall
There are also non-fiction inspirations. When I first heard of the Bechdel Test, I realized that Mae would pass that test. It’s not that every movie or comic book needs to be Bechdel Test approved, but there are far too few. I could be part of making the comics industry a little bit better, a little more welcoming.
By doing things like making free sketches for kids, I’ve always tried to invite in new readers. But my books have been mainly aimed at guys about my age. Mae is my chance to make a book that openly invites in new readers to read comics. Along with old male comics nerds like me, of course.
CA: You’ve done nearly everything on this project, including writing, drawing, and coloring. Was it a challenge for you to take on all of these roles?
GH: I have not done lettering, Zander Cannon did that. I know my limits. Besides graphic design by Anette Nam and my color prep by Rose McClain, I’ve done the rest.
It’s a huge challenge, and I’ve gone in knowing that I have a lot to learn. I ran rough drafts of the story past professional friends to get feedback. Tim Seeley has been especially helpful both with specific changes and with broad advice. He says you just have to dive in and start creating, you don’t need to plan everything out. You’ll be just as creative tomorrow and even more skilled.
This coincides with what I learned from working with Alan Moore on Top 10. He’ll knowingly create story hooks that he can use later, but otherwise he plans as little as he can for future issues. If it’s a tightly plotted time travel story then he’ll plan everything. For a book like Top 10 he planned very little except who the murderer of Boots and Saddle was and how she’d get caught.
CA: Did you do anything different artistically when approaching Mae compared with how you approach your other work?
GH: Definitely. This is the first long form story where I have complete control of color. That means I’m going to draw differently because I know the coloring will complete the art. Normally I like to use bold black areas. After a few pages of Mae I realized that I needed to leave that out: it was limiting how I lit and colored a scene. The original ink drawings for most of the book are mostly clean linework.
Beyond that, I’ve definitely taken a strong Pixar influence. The Incredibles really blew me away around the time I began seriously exploring doing a book like Mae. And that’s led me back to works that have influenced Brad Bird, like Rankin/Bass Christmas specials and their animated Hobbit.
CA: You say this on the Kickstarter page: "Mae is the start of a new and different phenomena. It’s a lavishly produced adventure tale with two strong female leads, made for a wide audience: young adult as well as older readers of both genders. We know that there are many readers out there who can appreciate story and art without needing grim, gritty violence, and sex. Let’s prove to the world that there’s room for original creations like Mae. The Comic Book medium is big enough for all of our dreams and stories.” As you know, this is something that I am passionate about as well. Why is this important to you?
GH: I’m doing this because our industry will die without them. There are still people out there trading baseball cards, but it’s a dying hobby. Until recently I was afraid that US comic books would go the same way. I came in during the end of the Image boom, and I watched the industry shrink year after year. Marvel went bankrupt, thousands of local comics shops closed, and sales sank as we used ever more desperate crossover events and cover gimmicks to juice the numbers. I don’t want to sell 25 books that get dumped straight to the quarter bin just to get one variant cover copy.
This has turned around in the last few years, in a way that’s hidden from the Diamond monthly reports. On Comixology Ms Marvel is one of Marvel’s top sellers. It’s not only beating Captain Marvel, it’s beating Iron Man. Books like Bone and Smile have generated gigantic sales outside direct sales comics channels. You wouldn’t know this from online comic geek discussions, but Raina Telgemeier has become more important to comics than Jim Lee. The readers are out there if we’re willing to make books for them. I feel blessed to live in this age of comics.
QUOTED: "The strength of this story is Ha's ... always inventive artwork."
Mae, Vol. 1
Publishers Weekly. 264.7 (Feb. 13, 2017): p59.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2017 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
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Mae, Vol. 1
Gene Ha and Paulina Ganucheau. Dark Horse, $ 17.99 trade paper (136p) ISBN 978-1-50670146-2
When Abbie Fortell was a young girl, she discovered a gateway to a another world populated by anthropomorphic animals, monsters, and other fantastic elements, and abandoned her earthly family in favor of swashbuckling adventure as the hero Ahni. Her younger sister, Mae, has been unaware of Abbie's fate, but when Abbie turns 21 and returns home, followed by creatures from the other world, Mae is dragged into the fantastical conflict herself, and gets to experience what her older sister already went through. The strength of this story is Ha's (Top Ten) always inventive artwork, though this time much of the heavy lifting is left to the colorists, whose tones fill in many of the details. The story itself is a fairly conventional portal fantasy, but future volumes should expand on the world. (Feb.)
QUOTED: "This is the start of a great indie book series which makes you want to check out the next chapter as soon as it is done. The only individuals who won’t find this book entertaining are those who are looking for a light read."
Review: ‘Mae’ Vol. 1: A Wonderful Start Of A Long Journey
By Anthony Wendel - January 20, 201778 0
REVIEW OVERVIEW
Writing7
Artwork7
SUMMARY
A magical world of adventure has begun as this book delivers some great comedy and art.
7
OVERALL SCORE
When she was just a girl, Abbie discovered a portal to a fantasy world and has since had great adventures there: defeating horrible monsters, power-mad scientists, and evil nobles. But when she turned twenty-one it all came apart and she decided to return home. Her sister, Mae, had no idea what happened to Abbie all this time, and Abbie’s tales are too hard to believe—that is, until the monsters and other terrible creatures start to cross over to our world . . . Collects issues #1–#6.
WRITING
Ready to go on an adventure? If not, then you should probably stay far away from this comic, because this series is nothing but a fantastic ride into another world. A series full of legends, magic, and super science which is the beginning of something big. From the moment in the first issue when Mae reunites with her sister Abbie, Mae’s world is turned upside down. The poor woman has little time to adjust to anything before she finds herself having to take drastic steps to keep her family safe from bizarre and dangerous opponents.
Writer Gene Ha shows a lot of geek love through the course of the book. There are plenty of nerdy references to behold. Each issue features a member of the cast quoting a cult classic movie or TV series. This is especially true in the back up stories where many items are spun into the background of each panel. It helps to sell the comedy of the book without it getting old or feeling forced.
Mae
ARTWORK
Gene Ha also provides art for the series with help on the colors from Rose McClain and Wesley Heartman. Ha draws some odd facial expressions at times but this is really the only complaint against the entire series. There is a wonderful mixture of different fantasy realms and styles on display from Star Trek to Gurren Lagann and other anime series.
There is a notable shift in art in chapter six when Paulina Gancheau takes over the art and with Kendall Goode on colors. The style isn’t bad, and does help to show a different side of the characters. It’s just noticeable when you get to the last chapter of the book and it turns out to be such a shift.
CONCLUSION
This is the start of a great indie book series which makes you want to check out the next chapter as soon as it is done. The only individuals who won’t find this book entertaining are those who are looking for a light read. This series is gearing up to take the reader on a very long adventure with a lot of dynamic characters. The pace and plot may move fast so hurry and pick up this first volume.
QUOTED: "Mae #1 is a promising first issue. Much of its promise comes from the fact that it’s a slow burn and this story can head in most any possible direction. But much of its promise also comes from the fact that Gene Ha’s art is wonderful and he does a terrific job of building character and world."
Jason Sacks
Mae is a small town girl, living on a farm in a quiet section of Indiana. The rural life is fine for her if a bit limiting, but the small town doesn’t keep away big city concerns. Her family has a hole at its center and that hole comes from Mae’s sister. When she was young, Mae’s sister Abbie kept running away from home, disappearing to a place that she never explained. Within a few years it seemed that Abbie had disappeared forever and the family lost touch with the child for seven long years.
Until one day Abbie reappeared in the small town. She was grown up, of course, but not in the sort of way you might expect. She appeared confident and beautiful, centered in herself and with secrets very different from those that most runaways experience. As we start to learn in the new Dark Horse comic Mae, Abbie has been far, far away – in another land like Narnia or Oz.
That’s the concept behind this new Gene Ha series and that concept seems intriguing and clever. The problem with reviewing a first issue like this one is that it embodies one of those old truisms that we comic book reviewers live by: reviewing a first issue of a comic is a lot like reviewing the first fifteen minutes of a movie or the first fifty pages of a novel.
In this case that comparison is completely appropriate, because it’s just like reviewing the first fifteen minutes of the first Harry Potter movie. You know what I mean. I’m thinking about all the scenes where Harry’s adoptive family treats him terrible before Harry discovers this whole secret world that’s just beyond this one. Mae #1 concentrates on the prosaic aspects of young Mae’s personal life in order to set up events that will follow later on in this series.
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That makes sense and is a smart way of delivering the story. I’m sure it will read well in TPB form and probably sell a kajillion copies because this sort of story often works really well. But as a standalone first issue that I was asked to review, it’s impossible to read on its own without wondering where the story will lead or how these characters will change.
For what it is, this issue is quite wonderful. Writer/artist Gene Ha is doing his first longform comic in which he’s both writing and drawing the story. He delivers a tale full of fully-fledged lead characters, understandable small-town frustration and some cleverly drawn creatures from “over there.” Mae is at the center of this story but she’s stuck in place while her best friend and her sister are both in motion. Mae’s friend Dahlia is off at Purdue University having weird adventures (and becoming a fashion plate) while Mae is stuck in her town helping her dad with his business and accepting her limited lot in life.
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But Mae is also a fun character. With her references to Doctor Who and her smiling attitude, this is a woman who clearly is making the best of what life has thrown at her, a quality that will no doubt help her as she slides deeper into strange adventures. After all, if her name’s on the title, Mae has to be our protagonist.
Mae #1 is a promising first issue. Much of its promise comes from the fact that it’s a slow burn and this story can head in most any possible direction. But much of its promise also comes from the fact that Gene Ha’s art is wonderful and he does a terrific job of building character and world. This isn’t quite essential reading yet, but the setting and characters pay off, Mae has the potential to become the next Saga.