When he’s not overseeing the movie reviews in Entertainment Weekly, where he serves as senior editor, or writing reviews of DVDs, books or television shows, Marc Bernardin is teaming up with his lifelong friend Adam Freeman to write comic books. This summer has seen the release of their first published comic, The Highwaymen from Wildstorm, and this week brings the graphic novel Monster Attack Network from AiT/PlanetLar.

We caught up with Bernardin to find out more about Monster Attack Network and to see what his plans are for next week’s San Diego Comicon. And he has quite a “to do” list.

JK: You’ve attended the San Diego Comicon before, but this will be your first one as a creator, sitting on the other side of the table. What are your expectations, and what do you hope to get out of the con?

MB: My expectations? If I were to get everything I want out of this year’s con, we’d have another book lined up by the time I get on the plane coming home, I’d have met more people than I knew going in, I’d have drank my fill, I’d have spread the word far and wide about The Highwaymen and Monster Attack Network, and I’ll have a kiss from Katee Sackhoff resting on my unwashed cheek. Now, some of those have better chances of happening than others, but that’s the wish list.

JK: Are you going strictly as a creator, or will you be doing anything for your “day gig” at EW as well?

MB: The closer we get to the show, the more I end up agreeing to for the day job. Not that any of it’s onerous, by any means. I’m moderating the Wimmen of Galactica panel on Saturday afternoon, which both thrills me to no end and chills me to the bone, and might help that Starbuck smooch actually happen. EW is co-hosting a big party on Saturday night, and I’ll be there playing the gracious “host.” (Whatever that means, since I neither own the venue nor the magazine. But…free appetizers!) But, yeah, this’ll be a big show for us as creators, getting to see, firsthand, if the people are really digging what we’re putting out there. And seeing if we can convert any of this 4 BTUs worth of “heat” into some new opportunities.

JK: Will Adam Freeman be at the con as well? How did you guys first meet up?

MB: Absolutely. This’ll be his second San Diego; he’s making a somewhat quicker transition from fan to pro than I did, since this’ll be my 4th. How did we first meet up? On the playground on Shubert Elementary School in Baldwin, New York. He was probably playing soccer. I was the new kid, fresh in from the Bronx, trying to show off my new Jordache sneakers, which were the style at the time. We were friendly in elementary school, a little distant in junior high as we gravitated towards different cliques (me: football & basketball & breakdancing, Adam: art & theater & music), and then friendly again in high school, where our circles collided once again. Towards the end of college (different schools, but both quasi-local to Long Island), we decided to try writing together. We collaborated on a couple of screenplays, along with a third friend, but that didn’t last long because three, it turns out, is the anti-magic number for writing teams. Someone always gets outvoted and not because his/her idea was any less valid, he/she just didn’t have the strength of numbers. Adam pursued (and caught) a career in TV, while I got into journalism. But we both knew we still wanted to write, and when the time was right, we decided to make a play for it.

JK: I understand you’ll be hanging out with Larry Young for much of the con at the AiT booth, where you’ll be selling your new graphic novel, Monster Attack Network. How did you and Larry first meet, and how did the project come about? If I’m not mistaken, even though Highwaymen beat it to the stands, this was actually your first comic project, correct?

MB: Larry and I met thanks to the awesome graciousness of Maureen McTigue. She and I worked together at Starlog magazine back in the early 90s, and have been friends ever since. She was an editor at iBooks when I went to my first San Diego in 2003—a fact-finding/people-meeting mission in preparation for starting EW’s comics’ coverage—and she introduced me to everyone she’d ever met. And one of the first people was Larry and Mimi, who were just aces. Every con since, I’ve made the AiT booth one of my first stops—not only do they put out top-notch books, I’ve always found them to be pleasant company, an oasis in the madness of the SDCC floor. When I told Larry I was thinking about putting the journalist hat aside and trying on the writer hat, he said that I should call him. So I did. I pitched him Monster Attack Network over a burger, and he said, “Go write it.” So we did. We finished the first draft in October of 2005. Found an artist by November 2005. We were targeting SDCC 2006 as the debut for MAN. Parted ways with that first artist right after SDCC 2006, as he hadn’t delivered a single page of finished artwork. Larry found Nima that September, and the poor soul worked his ass off to deliver 96 pages of penciled, inked, and toned artwork in time to make SDCC 2007, Which we will, damnit. I’m holding the finished product in my hands as I type, which is why I’m typing so slowly. (And, mind you, Highwaymen was pitched, approved, written, drawn, and released in that interval…but when Jim Lee is doing the approving and DC is cutting the checks, the process tends to speed up.)

JK: In a nutshell, what’s Monster Attack Network about?

MB: Monster Attack Network is about the men and women of the titular agency on the South Pacific island of Lapuatu, which is lousy with giant monsters the way that California is lousy with earthquakes and mudslides and wildfires and bad pizza. M.A.N. is like the Office of Emergency Management crossbred with FEMA: they manage the frequent crises, get the populace to safety, and rebuild when it’s over. It about people trying to live in harmony with an ecosystem that doesn’t want them to live in harmony…and the reckless real estate baron who wants to bring it all crashing down.

JK: So monsters here are more like natural disasters than evil villains up to no good. Do you bring any personal “natural disaster” experience to the book, like surviving a hurricane or staring down a tornado?

MB: I survived an earthquake during my first trip to California, when I was 14 or so. And we were up on the 18th floor of some hotel. Now, I’m sure it was just a tremor, the kind that native Californians use to stir their coffee, but for a city kid from the East Coast, the ground just isn’t supposed to do that. Scared the bejeezus out of my mom. My brother and I just thought it was the coolest thing ever. Oh, and one time, at Boy Scout camp, lightning struck a tree a few feet from where I was standing. There endeth my tales of battle with Mother Nature.

JK: Tell us a little about your inspiration for the story. Godzilla and his pals seem obvious, but after looking at a preview, it looks like all the monsters in the book aren’t the gigantic, fire-breathing kind, but also of the slimy, corporate type…

MB: Toho and Donald Trump. The Godzilla stuff is obvious—as is a whiff of the Damage Control series that Dwayne McDuffie did for Marvel (why that isn’t a movie I’ll never know). I think the first season of The Apprentice was airing as we were developing the story, and we were struck by how Trump was not only willing to deface many a landscape for his towering monstrosities, but how it seemed like he felt it was his God-given right to do so. And who’s gonna tell him no? And what would happen if he fixed his sights on, say, Jamaica? Would there be anything left of the things that make Jamaica uniquely Jamaica?

JK: And were you a fan of the old monster comics as well, like Fin Fang Foom, etc.?

MB: Not especially. We’re definitely aware of them, as we love the Kirby as much as anyone, but we treat our giant city-crushing monsters more like forces of nature than bad guys. They’re not to be fought, per se, but rather endured. There’s a moment in the book where our hero, Nate Klinger, the Operations Manager for MAN, has to save a hospital from a rampaging giant octopus (man, there are some days when even I can’t believe the sentences I get to say) and he’s got to kill it. And you can see that it’s the lastest of last resorts.

JK: What can you tell us about the artist, Nima Sorat?

MB: That he’s so earnest and good-natured and well-meaning that he willingly got himself in over his head to do this book with us. Because, 96 pages is a lot for an artist to do. To do it for no money upfront, just the promise of back-end, is more than a lot: It’s insane. But he’s also insanely talented, so it all comes out in the wash. It’s his first book, too. And, like Adam and I, you can see a little bit of learning on-the-job-ness … but he started at such a high level, what you see is great just getting better.

JK: Last time I spoke with Neil Kleid, he mentioned he was co-writing something called Starstruck with you that would be serialized on the web. Can you give us any more details on it?

MB: I’ll know by next week if the contracts are to everyone’s satisfaction, and then we can start talking in earnest about it. And, you know, producing it. But Starstruck is a Hollywood-centric crime-and-abject-lack-of-punishment story that we’re going to be doing for a very high-profile pop culture website. One that I may or may not already be intimately familiar with. And, again, if the contracts work out, we’ll have an artist on board who will literally cause my voice to raise an octave or two out of sheer joy.

Be sure to visit Marc at the AiT/PlanetLar booth if you’re in San Diego next week … and keep an eye on his cheek.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 17th, 2007 at 8:00 am and is filed under Comic Books, Conventions, Creators, DC Comics, Graphic Novels, Independent, Interviews, News & Views. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.