Spooks Light and Dark

Jeremy Whitley

By Sheena McNeil
October 1, 2018

We always love Jeremy Whitley's comics and chatting with him about them. This month he's got several new titles and chapters being released, so we tried to highlight the assortment. There's something for everyone -- probably multiple somethings.

Sequential Tart: You have a lot of irons in the fire right now, which is great! How do you balance what gets priority at any given month, as well as prioritizing your own series versus others?

Jeremy Whitley: Honestly, at least for me, it's easier than you might think. I am well ahead on both of my currently running creator-owned series (we're talking in the vicinity of a year ahead), so those rarely become issues for me.

Even still, I have several freelance gigs, which I am juggling at any given time. Basically, the way I've been keeping up this summer is starting with the book with the tightest deadline, writing it, then switching to another project while I wait on approval from editorial / licensors. Approvals can take between a couple of days and a week, so I always just work on the next comic with a deadline that I am cleared to continue. Sometimes that means jumping from writing an epic fight scene to a goofy interaction in My Little Pony, but it keeps me on my toes.

ST: This also means it's going on a year since the last update on Adrienne (Princeless) and company. I'm REALLY looking forward to more. What is the most challenging part of running a story over such a big slice of time? Keeping the characters / story true? Keeping the readers engaged?

JW: I think keeping the readers engaged is one of the tougher objectives. I like that we're now at a point where a new reader can pick up the first volume, and when they read it they have five more to keep them busy. Each time we put out new issues it makes our back catalogue a little bigger.

Often the challenge for me is just being patient. I write fast and, as I said before, well ahead. There are certainly moments where I finish a script and realize that I'm not going to see that cool thing I wrote for another year and a half, but I have to keep in mind that it takes time to draw the kind of quality comics I want to put my name on, so I learn to be calm ... or at least to start working on another project.

ST: What are you most excited about with this new chapter of Princeless?

JW: We finally have a moment I've been waiting for since volume 1. Adrienne is coming face to face with the Black Knight in this chapter, and I think the whole thing came together beautifully. This volume is definitely one of those occasions where I saw something on paper that I've had planned out in some form for six or seven years, and it brought tears to my eyes. There are going to be a few of those moments in the next year or two of Princeless.

ST: I love that Raven's crew is getting a Halloween ComicFest issue! How long has this spooky story been rattling around in your brain trying to see where it fits? How did you land at making it for Halloween ComicFest?

JW: I'd been wanting to do some different types of stories with Raven and her crew, and this was a perfect occasion to pull that off. I didn't have the details of this one locked down until I started writing it, but it actually fits very nicely between the end of year 2 and the beginning of year 3. It's going to interact very closely with the next year or two of stories. It was a very neat opportunity to introduce new readers to the series and really get the hooks in them for what we want to do in the next year.

ST: What is the most challenging part of making an issue that can be enjoyed stand-alone for new readers?

JW: Room. I tend to have characters that talk a lot and like to tell stories that go on for years. The hardest part of my career has been learning how to get in and out of a story in 8 pages. That's really challenging. Making it something enjoyable is even harder.

ST: What options will there be for fans to get this story if they miss it or their store doesn't do Halloween ComicFest?

JW: We plan to include the story in the first collection of year 3, where it would fit in the overall continuity. Plus, I'm sure Action Lab will make it available digitally. It's an introduction; we want as many people to read it as possible.

ST: Reboots of fan-favorites from the 80s often get a love-it / hate-it reaction. What are you doing with Rainbow Brite that should appeal to the original fans and nostalgic readers?

JW: I think we've looked closely at revivals that we loved, like Jem and the Holograms. We want to keep the things that made the original special and bring a sort of modern eye to it. Having talked to a lot of big Rainbow Brite fans in the last few months, I've realized that this was a series with a lot of really devoted fans, but not a lot of text. There's about a dozen episodes of the show and the movie ... and of course a few attempted reboots. I think we have an opportunity to take an idea that captivated kids' minds and give it a treatment where we really get to flesh it out and build some lore. World building has always been one of my favorite parts of writing anyway, so this seemed like a great opportunity to really build Rainbow Brite into something still recognizable, but bigger than ever.

ST: How are you balancing that with appealing to the modern, new, young audience?

JW: Well, honestly I don't think there's a huge difference between those things in this case. The adult audience that wants this book largely wants it because they remember it from when they were kids. They want to see these characters and this world again. I can't help but modernize it from the original because that show was so uniquely an "80s kids' cartoon", complete with regular introductions of new elements and characters that could be sold as toys. We don't have toys to sell, so we're free to really focus on characters and story, a luxury the original never had.

ST: What about Rainbow Bright appeals to you as a character and / or world that made you want to work on this title?

JW: I love that Rainbow Brite is, in many ways, a blueprint for a lot of things that came after. She's a magical girl in a world before that was an entire genre of character. [Editor's note: Perhaps in the West, though Magical Girls have existed as a genre of character in Japan since Princess Knight was released in 1953, and the US sitcom Bewitched (1964) is considered a progenitor of the genre in general.] She's a hero who represents traditionally feminine values as heroic: empathy, honesty, caring -- values that I feel like we're only now rediscovering in characters like Moana. These are values that I feel like are much more aspirational than the usual "good at punching" that headlines a lot of heroes' resumes.

ST: My Little Pony: Nightmare Knights #1 has me super excited! I'm a Luna fan and a villains fan, so a team-up sounds amazing. How did this story come to be?

JW: It's actually a super weird origin. I had originally just pitched a story where I would get to play with characters I liked and get to have fun. Between the characters who were in the movie and never crossed over to the TV show, and the Pillars of Equestria, who played such a large part in the previous season and then didn't continue to pop up, I thought I could make a team of compelling characters who would be essentially autonomous from the rest of the MLP world.

Hasbro wasn't especially sold on this. They wanted a team with more characters who had what they considered a large following, characters I'd avoided especially because I wasn't sure how they would be used in the show. So my editor and I talked it over and decided to keep the characters I really wanted to write from the movie (Tempest and Capper) and make the team out of some of the other bad guys we love. And who's better to lead such a team than the original bad guy of the series, Nightmare Moon herself. Once we knew we were going with a villain team, Trixie and Stygian were obvious choices. We thought about bringing in Discord, but considering the nature of our bad guy, he didn't quite fit. I think this team came out really great. I've already written the whole mini, so I hope people like it.

ST: Which former villain were you most looking forward to writing and why?

JW: Well, I had just written a two-part Tempest story for the Friendship is Magic series, so I was looking forward to pulling her back in. I always look forward to writing The Great and Powerful Trixie, but I think Capper was the character I was most looking forward to. I was excited to get to play with a true rogue in the MLP world. I love a good rogue.

ST: What is your favorite part about writing My Little Pony stories?

JW: My favorite part with these stories is getting to play in the gaps of other stories. Finding the story that you can tell and not mess up the general continuity of the series is difficult sometimes, but finding one that fits perfectly in the gaps and enhances everything else around it is a really fun thing to do.

ST: All of these we've discussed are due out in October. After the push for these and their follow-up issues, what's next on your creative horizon?

JW: Well, Princeless Vol. 8 is actually already drawn and waiting for early 2019. I'm super excited for that. I'm hoping Unstoppable Wasp has a much longer run this time, because I have a ton of stories with Nadia I want to tell. I also have a few unannounced projects that will be coming in 2019 that I'm super excited about. I promise, there's lots of cool stuff coming!