Review Fix Exclusive: Brendan McCarthy Talks ‘Dream Gang’

Review Fix chats with writer Brendan McCarthy, who discusses his graphic novel “Dream Gang,” from Dark Horse Comics. Breaking down the inspiration for the tale and his goals for the project, McCarthy, known for his work on the Spider-man series, as well as The Saucer of Zilk, he was also the co-writer for the recent oil, “Mad Max Fury Road.”

Review Fix: What was the process like to go from a short in Dark Horse presents to a full trade?

Brendan McCarthy: Dream Gang was serialised in Dark Horse Presents in eight-page installments over a year, making up nearly 100 pages.

Of course, we’ve added over 20 pages of ‘extras’ on the making of the graphic novel, mainly tracking the design process.

It’s a story I’ve had brewing for over 30 years and I got to the point where I figured it was finally ready to go.

The story is meant to be read in one sitting. It takes nearly a few hours, about the same length as your average movie.

Review Fix: What were the challenges along the way?

McCarthy: The main thing I had to bear in mind was that at the end of every eight-page episode, I needed a climax that would entice the reader back to want to read the next one. But also, I had to bear in mind the flow of the story when it was collected so that there weren’t dramatic ‘hiccups’ in the overall reading experience. Sometimes in TV shows, you get commercial break climaxes that seem intrusive when the show is edited into one long format, which I wanted to avoid.

Review Fix: What did you read as a kid? How did it influence this book?

McCarthy: I grew up in a golden age of comics, the sixties. When I was a kid, you had the classic runs of Lee and Kirby’s Fantastic Fours, Ditko’s Spider-Man and Dr. Strange, and Infantino and Gil Kane’s beautiful work over at DC Comics. I think you absorb so much of this wonderful stuff at a very impressionable age that it kind of ‘makes your bones’ as a comics storyteller.

Steranko and Neal Adams and then later Berni Wrightson, Mike Kaluta and Barry Windsor-Smith were very impactful too. There were some fallow years after that until the European Comics started to be seen in English translations. So, Moebius, Liberatore and Pratt paved the way for my own ‘hot streak’ in the eighties, as part of the ‘British Invasion’ in comics, as well as the terrific work by Frank Miller, Alan Moore, Los Bros Hernandez, Dave Stevens, etc. I feel very lucky to have lived through so many eras in such a vibrant medium, for which I did my small bit to help bring of age, alongside my fellow creators Peter Milligan and the late Brett Ewins.

Review Fix: What was it like to work with Len O’Grady?

McCarthy: Len is a talented colorist who I had worked with before on the much-admired Zaucer of Zilk, which I wrote with Al Ewing. I was stuck on a few deadlines and Len helped out on about 10 pages of color on the book. The great thing about Len is that you can trust him to deliver when he says he will. I ‘remixed’ some of his colors so that they fitted into the book’s overall look. It’s pretty hard to spot the joins!

Review Fix: What inspired the art?

McCarthy: A whole lifetime of looking at other comic artists but as importantly, a lot of the visual culture we all imbibe in this era. I look at pop videos and magazines a lot, as I try and steer away from replicating film cliches in my comics. I’m all for TV shows or films being adapted from my work, but I don’t think it’s my job to just offer a complete ‘film pitch’ story to Hollywood. A good director will know how to extract a more cinematic story treatment from the material.

The animated 60s Beatles film ‘Yellow Submarine’ remains a huge influence that is hard to shake off. To this day, its visual magic still astonishes me. And it was made in just over a year! In the film, there is a combination of the drawn with the ‘treated’ photographic, especially in backgrounds. That influenced the different ‘look’ and color schemes of the Dream Gang comic for sure.

If there is an imaginary soundtrack to the graphic novel, it would have to be Love’s 1960s Forever Changes album, which forms a crucial part of the story.

Review Fix: Who’s your favorite supporting character in the trade and why?

McCarthy: It’s hard to say. I liked the character of Raymonde, who provides a lot of sarcastic humor. Slumba, the punk-rock pit bull is an important character as is, later on in the second half, The Nut. I think the female characters Sheriff Chumhartley and Luna will form the basis of the next Dream Gang story. But that’s a ways off — I haven’t figured it all out yet!
I liked the idea of a villain who is a kind of ‘programmed psychopath’ and isn’t meant to be rounded off with any ‘back story’ etc. I was looking for a relentless greed-machine to satirize the manic ethos of Wall Street’s fascist-like corporatism.

Review Fix: Reading through this, I am immediately taken back to my younger years, watching “Heavy Metal.” Any thoughts on turning this into a film, or even a video game in the future?

McCarthy: Yes, of course, I can see Dream Gang as a CGI-animated ‘Netflix’ type of animated TV series. A serious, good quality sci-fi show, not aimed at very young kids — to try and get the Dr. Who and Star Trek audience. I’ve done quite a bit of animation in my time.

As a movie, it would lie somewhere between Inception and Avatar. I’d use live action in the Reality sequences, and CGI animated mo-cap in the dream worlds. I’ve spent as much time in film and TV in Hollywood as comics, and have built up considerable skills so as to be able to pull this off.

Review Fix: How do you want Dream Gang to ultimately be remembered?

McCarthy: As something original, with a driving storyline and emotional heart, with some memorable characters. I think I’ve successfully established the basis of a coherent ‘universe’ that can be explored for a long time to come.

Review Fix: What’s next?

McCarthy: I need to see how Dream Gang sells, quite frankly. If it makes sense for me and Dark Horse, we may go into a sequel pretty soon. Otherwise, I have some other great new projects already designed, with the story treatments completed… So stay tuned.