Review Fix Exclusive: Dan Watters Talks ‘Tortured Life’

Review Fix chats with “Tortured Life” Writer Dan Watters, who discusses the series, its connection to Neil Gibson’s “Twisted Dark” series as its goals for the future.

To learn more about the series and its current Kickstarter, click here.

Review Fix: How is Tortured Life different from your other work?

Dan Watters: Tortured Life is different from Twisted Dark or Tabatha in that it is an explicitly supernatural horror series as opposed to a more grounded psychological thriller. I think fans of those series will still enjoy it, as it still has the dark but humorous tone that people have come to expect from TPub’s titles. Neil (Gibson), writer of both those books, wrote issue 1, then let me take over for the rest of the run as he liked my ideas of where the story could go. Hopefully this won’t bother fans of his writing too much, as the whole project is still taking place under his ever-watchful editorial eye.

Review Fix: The art is great in the project, how did you decide on a style?

Watters: Caspar Wijngaard was attached to the project from long before I was, but honestly I can’t really imagine working with anyone else on this; I explained some of my more outlandish ideas for the series to him in the pub one night (I imagine rather incoherently!), and the next day he sent me some concept art which utterly blew me away and became a huge part of developing the project into what it is today. Caspar and I have a similar taste in gruesome 80s horror and I think that really comes across in his art for the book.

Review Fix: What do you think is the series’ best quality?

Watters: Other than the art, I’m really excited to bring the Bloodyman to life. Without wanting to give too much away, he’s one of the main villains of the piece; basically the grim reaper in a trench coat, an utterly Sadean figure with absolutely no redeeming qualities, which makes him a hell of a lot of fun to write… hopefully he’s as much fun to read.

Review Fix: How did Twisted Dark help you get to this point?

Watters: Well, there’s no way that this comic would be happening without Twisted Dark. Neil wrote the first volume in 2011, and decided to publish it himself after seeing how poor the deals are for new writers trying to break into the industry; after the book had a great response, he used it as a sort of spring-board to start his own publishing house and help other creators, such as the team on Tortured Life. Twisted Dark is still going strong, with volume 5 coming out next month.

Review Fix: How has the reception to the project been so far?

Watters: The reception to the project has already been fantastic. Just based on issue 1 we’ve had support from both fans and people inside the industry beyond what we ever expected– that issue leaves things very open and all the teaser art we’ve shown for issue 2 seems to be really generating interest, so I’m excited to show people where this story is going to take them next.

Review Fix: How do you want it to be remembered?

Watters: I’d be happy for Tortured Life just to be remembered as a fun, interesting story, as that’s what we’ve set out to create. If it makes anyone think twice before turning out the lights, well that’s just an added bonus.

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About Patrick Hickey Jr. 14230 Articles
Patrick Hickey Jr. is a full-time Assistant Professor of Communication & Performing Arts and Director of the Journalism program at Kingsborough Community College and is the chairman of the City University of New York Journalism Council. He is the Founder and Editor-In-Chief of ReviewFix.com. He's also a former News Editor at NBC Local Integrated Media and National Video Games Writer at Examiner.com where his work was mentioned in National Ad campaigns by Disney, Nintendo and EA Sports. Hickey was also the Editor-In-Chief of two College Newspapers before he received his BA in Journalism from Brooklyn College. Hickey's work has been published in The New York Daily News, The New York Times, Complex, The Hockey Writers, Yahoo!, Broadway World, Examiner, NYSportScene Magazine, ProHockeyNews.com, GothamBaseball.com, The Syracuse Post-Standard, Scout.com and the official sites of the Brooklyn Aces and New York Islanders. His first book, The Minds Behind the Games: Interviews With Cult And Classic Video Game Developers was released in April 2018 and is chock full of interviews with legendary developers. His second book in the series, The Minds Behind Adventures Games, was released in December 2019. His third book, The Minds Behind Sports Games, was released in September 2020. His fourth book, The Minds Behind Shooter Games, was released in March 2021. The Minds Behind Sega Genesis Games and The Minds Behind PlayStation Games were released in 2022 and The Minds Behind PlayStation 2 was published in January 2023. Hickey is also a contracted comic book writer, currently penning his original series, "Condrey," as well as "The Job," "Brooklyn Bleeds" "Dem Gulls" and "KROOM" for Legacy Comix, where he serves as founder, owner and Editor-in-Chief. Hickey Jr. is also a voice actor, having starred in the 2018 indie hit and 2019 Switch, PS4 and Xbox One release, The Padre (also serving as English language Story Editor), from Shotgun With Glitters. The sequel, The Padre: One Shell Straight to Hell was released in February 2021- Hickey also served as a Story Editor and Lead Voiceover performer. He has also done narration and trailers for several other titles including The Kaiju Offensive, Relentless Rex and Roniu’s Tale. Hickey is also the lead voiceover performer on Mega Cat Studios’ upcoming title WrestleQuest, responsible for nearly 90 characters in the game, as well as Skybound's Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood, where he voices both Dracula and Renfield, as well as several other characters. He also stars in Ziggurat Interactive’s World Championship Boxing Manager 2, where he performs the VO of nearly every male character in the game. He also worked on the Atari VCS’s BPM Boy.

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