Reprinted by permission from the May 2001 issue of
|
"a Web Zine about the comics industry, published by an eclectic band of women ... dedicated to providing exclusive interviews, in-depth articles and news, while working toward raising the awareness of women's influence in the comics industry and other realms." |
ElfQuestions - part 1
an interview with Wendy and Richard Pini
by Dani Fletcher
Elfquest has been a classic of the comic scene for
decades, and it's responsible for introducing more than
one fan to the medium of comics. The story of Cutter,
Leetah, Skywise and their people has all the elements to
make it an enduring story. Heavily influenced by manga
and anime style, with a healthy dose of North American
sensibility thrown in for good measure, Elfquest's
hybridity and adult storyline gives it a broad appeal
that has led to a global fandom. This month, Sequential
Tart presents the first of a two-part interview with
Wendy and Richard Pini, discussing past projects and
future hopes for the Wolfriders and their creators.
Sequential Tart: When did you discover comic
books? What did you like about the medium?
Wendy Pini: Comics have always been part of my life in
one form or another, just as the ability to create in
different mediums always has. As a very little girl, I
used to love reading Casper and Wendy the Good Little
Witch and practice drawing the characters. In grade
school I graduated to Superboy and went on to collect
certain Marvel comics in high school.
Was I an avid comics fan for comics' sake? No. To me,
they were movies on paper - my imagination filled in the
movement that was missing. My real childhood passion was
for animation, from Disney to Hanna Barbera to Warner
Bros. I thought nothing could top them. Then, at age
ten, I discovered anime in the form of Tezuka Sensei's
Astro Boy, Kimba the White Lion, Marine Boy and Speed
Racer and full-length features like Magic Boy and The
Littlest Warrior taught me a new way to think of
animation as a medium for darkly dramatic, emotionally
powerful storytelling. That changed my attitude toward
comics as well. The comics I drew to entertain myself
were manga-flavored from the get-go.
Richard Pini: I have a memory, from age 8 or so, of
being laid low with a cold or some such, and being
confined to home (which, given that my 3rd grade
experience wasn't so far different from what's shown on
South Park, wasn't necessarily a bad thing). That
weekend various aunts and uncles came over to visit, and
they brought me an armload of comics - mostly DC titles,
with a couple of the old 80-page Giants thrown in for
good measure. I enjoyed reading them, but they didn't
"stick" with me just yet.
Some years later - I must have been 14 or so - I was
enduring my weekly dose of torture, a.k.a. accordion
lessons. Across the street from the studio where I took
lessons was an old-fashioned drug-store, with a soda
fountain and magazine rack and wooden floors and all the
rest. And from that magazine rack they sold comics, and
I happened to pick up an issue of Superman and Batman
titles did. But Marvel Comics was doing something very
different and daring, though at the time I didn't know
what it was. (It would still be a few years before the
media got on the bandwagon, extolling Marvel's
innovations in storytelling.)
The end result was that I was hooked. That issue's story
fed into the next issue, and the next, and the next. I
wasn't reading comics; I was reading a kind of novel of
great (seeming) depth and breadth, and it was
exhilarating.
ST: What comics were your favorites and how did those
comics affect your own creative processes?
WP: I adored Stan Lee and Jack Kirby's work on The
Fantastic Four and Thor. Such powerful, mythic writing
and art! Later, I was awed by John Buscema's
over-the-top sensuality of line and read anything he
drew. My favorite characters were Marvel's Avengers and
especially The Inhumans who resembled, in so many ways,
the elfin beings of my own mythology. From masters like
Jack Kirby, Alex Toth and Doug Wildey I learned how to
give a character heft and masculine solidity - you can
see that in my trolls and male elves today.
Then, in my teens, a good friend gave me a bunch of big,
fat, pink n' pretty girls' romance manga. I went nuts
with the huge, sparkly eye influence. Combine graceful,
Japanese-type detail with Kirby-type exaggerated macho
linework and you've pretty much got the evolution of my
comic art style. Weird, huh?
RP: I was a total Marvelite at that age; I fit all the
stereotypes. It's just that the so-called "Marvel
method" of doing comic book stories allowed (again,
though I didn't know it at the time) for much more story
and character development than did the very linear
method other comics companies used. I discovered that
characters could behave in very human (read: very
idiosyncratic and smart-alecky) ways, and that shaped
how I approach writing.
ST: When did you discover manga and what did you like
the best about the Japanese style of comic books?
WP: What did I like best? I loved the tension created
when what looked like sugary cuteness came up against
horrible, brute violence. It was such an extreme
dynamic. Nothing was safe. Cuteness didn't mean a
character would survive. And the violence was portrayed
so honestly and unsparingly. As a young, western woman
with a decidedly Yang streak, reared on Disney, I felt
utterly liberated by it all.
I also loved the sense of "otherness" achieved by manga
artists. Their heroes, heroines, and, frequently, their
villains have an idealized, mask-like, androgynous
beauty - much like elves. Almost all manga artists, men
and women, have a strong feminine sensibility in their
work. It shows up in their eloquent use of line.
Entertainment laced with sexual ambiguity goes way, way
back in oriental culture. I still find it mysterious and
compelling.
RP: I think Wendy was lucky in this respect that she
grew up on the West Coast, where there was even a chance
to find the rare manga comic book. They were unheard of
on the East Coast, where I grew up, in the late 1960s
and early 1970s. If it hadn't been for Wendy's
introducing them to me, I probably wouldn't have known
about them at all until much later.
ST: Which manga were your favorites and how did those
compare to your other comic book experiences?
WP: Well, I've never had what you could call a
collector's mentality. Something intrigues me and I just
absorb it - don't generally go after repeated fixes of
the same thing. But Kamui Gai Den was a favorite. Also
Candy Candy and random romance mangas whose titles I
didn't know. Except for the generosity of fellow fans
and collectors like Fred Patten, I could find few manga
back in the late '60s/early '70s - not like lucky
Americans, today, who have ready access to so many
series translated into English.
Often, I'd discover a manga series from viewing anime
based on that material. After seeing Lupin the 3rd, especially
Cagliostro, I sought out and very much enjoyed Monkey
Punch's work (now there's a guy with real, personal
style!). In the '80s, after Elfquest was well
established, I discovered a rather obscure series called
Locke the Superman whose philosophical depth really
excited me. That one I did collect, for a time, along
with the movies based on it.
Not knowing the language, "reading" manga meant figuring
out the story from the pictures. It's a testament to the
expressiveness of Japanese comic art that so much is so
readily understandable. American comics used to be more
like that in the '60s and '70s. Nowadays, for the most
part, you can't just look at a page and get the gist of
a plot anymore. I miss that old-fashioned kind of clean
storytelling.
ST: When you were contemplating creating your own
series, did you know from the beginning that manga or
the manga style was going to play a role? What made that
artistic style so appealing at that point in time? Were
there any other American comics being done in that form?
WP: Since Elfquest was one of the very first independent
comics, and a heroic fantasy comic to boot, which was
nigh unheard of at the time, we had few, if any, role
models and were forced to create our own niche in the
marketplace. While I did not consciously plan it that
way, the manga and anime influences in my drawing style
naturally complemented a high fantasy theme.
Fantasy is organic, born of the inner life of Man and
Woman. In illustration, fantastic subjects are often
rendered in the graceful curves of the art nouveau
style, which I've always emulated. The art nouveau
movement, of course, grew out of turn-of-the-century
European artists' discovery of Japanese wood block
prints and other orientalia. That's why Elfquest looks
somewhat Japanese (though it's regarded as a European
style graphic novel series overseas). My use of multiple
silent panels and "animations" allowing facial
expression and body language to carry the story,
combined with a big-eyed, diminutive, androgynous cast
of characters obviously reflects the influence of manga
techniques.
ST: Richard, the magical world of elves searching for
their origins seems a long way from High School
Astronomy. How did you go from teacher to comic book
creator?
RP: Oh, it was a convoluted path! I'd already discovered
comics, and still loved what the best writers and
artists were doing. I was always a geek for science, and
also for science fiction (and fantasy, though to a
lesser extent). My first real job out of college was
writing and producing shows for the Hayden Planetarium
at the Boston Museum of Science. From there I went into
teaching, and it was while I was doing that that Wendy
sat me down one day in 1977 and said, in essence, "I
have a story, it wants telling, what do you think?" And
then she proceeded to outline the beginnings of
Elfquest.
I don't see myself so much as "creator" as a bit of
"co-creator" or more accurately, "facilitator." I think
that's my role in the world, generally. Wendy wanted to
tell this grand story of elves on a quest, and really
wanted to do it via an animated film . . . but of course
that was out of the question for a couple of
twenty-somethings like us. Writing it out as a prose
novel would strip it of all the beautiful imagery that
Wendy was and is capable of. Will Eisner would define
comic books years later as the perfect blend of words
and movies, so that's the format we settled upon.
Then it fell to me to do the homework and learn
everything there was to learn about printing and
publishing and distribution . . . and in 1977 and 1978
there wasn't a whole lot of established knowledge out
there! We made mistakes; we made all the known ones and
invented a few new ones. But we kept at it, and I
discovered that I really enjoyed being a creative
facilitator.
ST: What were some of the early influences on your art
and writing style?
WP: In addition to those already mentioned, I must also
credit great, romantic illustrators such as Maxfield
Parrish, Alphonse Mucha, Aubrey Beardsley and Howard
Pyle. While my writing of Elfquest scripts often goes
ignored in favor of my art, being well brushed-up on
Shakespeare, and on heroic myths and legends in general,
hasn't hurt either.
RP: As far as writing goes, I'd say the biggest
"contemporary" influences have been Keith Laumer (a
science fiction writer) and Robert B. Parker (author of
the Spenser detective novels). Both writers have a
punchy, almost tongue-in-cheek style that I like a lot.
Aside from that, I just love using the language; I don't
know where I got that.
|
ST: When did you begin working on Elfquest and what was
the work process like?
WP: Early in 1977, when heroic fantasies such as Lord of
the Rings and Star Wars exploded in popularity,
pervading all media, I told Richard my idea for
Elfquest. He gravitated to it immediately. For a while
we debated how best to get the story out to the public.
Should it be presented as a prose novel? A movie script?
Finally we settled on a magazine-size comic book format;
the combined strength of words and pictures was
necessary to realize the project's full potential.
My experience in the comics medium was limited to fan
art and the scripting of one issue of Marvel's Red
Sonja. Richard was a selective comics collector and
bibliophile who knew, at the time, very little about
self-publishing. We had to learn our craft as we went,
but it was always the telling of the story that drove
us. No mistakes we made (and there were many) could
throw us completely off track. This was our child, after
all. We were obsessed with raising it right.
|
|
RP: I've mentioned earlier how things got started, and
Wendy has added here. We really didn't know much of
anything about the process of going from idea to
finished magazine, so we simply set about learning. It's
no great secret. For example, we knew we'd have to get
the things printed somehow, somewhere. So I went to the
Yellow Pages, looked up every printer within about an
hour's drive, and took a sample comic to them and asked
"Can you do this? How much will it cost?" That's how I
began my education in that area.
In terms of working together on the actual story and
art, the inspiration has always been Wendy's, or at
least 98% of it. I'm a much better editor and helper
than I am a creator, but when it came time to flesh out
each issue's plot, we'd have some rollicking story
sessions - usually over pizza-and these would give us
the chance to see what the other was doing from a
different angle.
|
ST: Before publishing Elfquest as an independent comic,
had you tried to propose the series to Marvel or DC?
WP: Yes. But both companies thought the property too
peculiar to be commercially viable. So it was something
of an ironic triumph when Marvel undertook to reprint
the existing series through its Epic line in the early
'80s.
ST: How hard was it to publish the series independently?
RP: Oy. As Wendy mentions above, we'd tried taking
Elfquest to both Marvel and DC, and also to the two
best-known alternative publishers extant at the time,
Bud Plant and Star*Reach. No one wanted it, because it
was just too quirky for them. But in the beginning, we
still didn't want to have to publish it ourselves; we
just wanted to produce the story and art and have
someone else pay us for it. We did find one interested
publisher who had already put out an eclectic line of
comics, and we signed on with him.
However, the experience that eventually culminated in
Elfquest's maiden appearance - Fantasy Quarterly #1 -
was quite a bit less than satisfying. It took us some
months to recover from that, and it was only then that
we decided that the old adage is true: If you want
something done well, do it yourself.
|
|
ST: What were the advantages to a mix of sci-fi and
fantasy as the setting? At that point in time, were
there a lot of sci-fi comics out there?
WP: As I recall, once I got into the process of
co-plotting, scripting, penciling, inking and lettering
Elfquest - and meeting those brutal deadlines - my
interest in reading comics waned drastically. I guess
it's natural not to want to occupy your leisure time
with the very thing you make your living at. So I can't
say I was aware of many sci-fi comics beyond the Star
Wars franchise, nor were they a major influence.
Of course, the superhero comics I grew up with always
had sci-fi elements...Reed Richards' gadgets, Superman's
adventures in outer space, etc. But the blend of science
fiction and fantasy you find in Elfquest is basically a
reflection of Richard's and my personalities.
Richard's approach is more logical, more scientific - he
likes to know the why of things and requires sound
reasons for fantastic events. I tend to take a more
spiritual, intuitive approach, placing emphasis on the
heart rather than the head. The advantage is: the
fantasy world we've created is consistent and believable
because it holds to certain boundaries: no dragons, no
unicorns, no deus ex machina magical manifestations to
try the readers' credibility.
ST: Were you at all influenced by the various TV sci-fi
shows that were predominant during the late '70s and
early '80s?
WP: [laughs] You have to go back much further than that.
The original Star Trek series, with its optimistic,
egalitarian world view and its tight-knit family of main
characters, along with the original, deeply moralistic
Outer Limits were instrumental in forming my sense of
what makes a good story. By the early '80s Elfquest had
come so well into its own that we were actually pretty
fanatic about protecting it from outside influences.
Other comics companies, both mainstream and independent,
suggested crossover collaborations which we generally
(and, I hope, politely) refused. Elfquest was a thing
unto itself and we wanted to keep it pure.
ST: When I think of elves I see Keebler cookies or those
cute little guys and gals that help Santa each year, yet
you took the concept and the preconceived notion that
almost everyone has of elves and turned it upside down
with these awesome warriors and clansmen. What inspired
you to utilize elves in this fashion, and what was the
initial reaction to this series like?
WP: We're down to the nitty gritty, eh? Well, I guess
I'll have to go out on a limb, here, and say I believe
in elves - and in all sorts of inhabitants of other
dimensions who dwell right next to us, though we seldom
get to see them. To me, elves are somewhere between
humans and angels. They are nature spirits, devas if you
like, possessed of an innate sense of all life's
sacredness. Their manipulation of certain energies (some
would call it magic) stays within the realm of nature's
laws. Morally, they don't follow the same rules we do;
they're pan-sexual, not hung-up on taboos. However,
being clear about who they are and what their
responsibility is to the universe, they make every
effort to do no harm.
That said, it occurred to me that it would be really
fascinating to wrench these ethereal beings out of a
particular comfort zone they'd prepared for themselves
and into a harsh, completely unfamiliar environment to
which they must adapt. Elfquest's elves come in
different sizes and shapes. The dwarfish ones, hardened
warriors like the Wolfriders, evolved compact, muscular
bodies in order to survive. That's the scientific
explanation. The artistic one is that I simply get a
kick out of the way these buff little hunks and babes
look. They're adorable, but I wouldn't want one mad at
me, would you?
Ultimately, Elfquest does follow the manga dynamic of
thrusting the petite and apparently vulnerable up
against horrific odds. Richard and I like to joke that
our formula for coming up with a story line is to think
of the worst possible thing that could happen to a
character, or group of characters, and just let 'em have
it.
RP: Another element to the answer is that elves are
creatures that human readers (as far as we know, the
only audience - so far - for Elfquest) can identify
with, because they are mostly humanoid . . . and yet,
they are alien enough so that readers don't feel they're
reading a simple human tale. Reader identification is
very important to the acceptance of any story, and that
the Elfquest elves are human in general form, as well as
appealing aesthetically and sensually, gives readers
easy access to that identification. From the beginning,
we've gotten feedback that's just about unanimous about
how beautiful readers perceive the elves to be, and how
much they - the readers - would like to be elves or be
like the elves.
|
ST: What was the Indy scene like back when Elfquest
began?
RP: It was almost non-existent. Underground
comics had been around since about the middle
1960s, and fanzines had been published since around the
same time, but there was no "alternative" or
"independent" publishing until about 1974, when Bud
Plant began to put out Jack Katz's First Kingdom and
Mike Friedrich began Star*Reach comics. These two were
about it until late 1977 and early 1978 when Cerebus and
Elfquest appeared.
The point is that back then, the market was wide open;
there was almost no competition. Trying to start up
Elfquest today, we'd have a harder row to hoe, that's
for certain. But back then, we were able to take the
infant direct distribution market by storm.
ST: How do you think that Elfquest helped change the way
independent comics are viewed?
WP: Before independent comics, there were the
"undergrounds" - brilliantly entertaining, totally
subversive stuff thumbing its collective nose at the
mainstream comics code. Then, in the mid 70s, Elfquest,
Cerebus, First Kingdom and a few other rogue black and
whites hit the stands. That was the beginning of the
independent comics movement.
The establishment didn't know what to make of us. Our
material was neither taboo nor conventional, neither
mainstream nor underground. It fit no known mould. But
it was clearly wildly popular. So a new term, "ground
level," was coined. Elfquest went on to make a bit more
history as the first "graphic novel series" (another
newly minted term) to be published in America and sold
in big chain book stores. Before then, popular comics
collected and bound in hardcover, color volumes could
only be found overseas.
|
|
It must be admitted that Elfquest is something of a
comics industry wallflower, having received only a
handful of awards over the years, none major. Most of
its recognition has come from the Sci-Fi/Fantasy
community, literary groups, libraries and such. It took
the Overstreet Price Guide several years to even
acknowledge our existence, whereas Cerebus and other b/w
independents were regularly listed. As in their own
story line, the elves have had to face prejudice in the
real world marketplace. In a superhero-saturated,
male-dominated industry, a pretty fantasy comic written
and drawn by a woman was highly suspect. Cute isn't
cool. To some non-mangawise critics, Elfquest has looked
and always will look too precious to be taken seriously.
But retailers, distributors and creators all agree that
Elfquest's one, major influence, still unequaled by any
other title, is the large, previously untapped female
audience it brought into comic shops. Richard and I are
thrilled that over half our readership is female. This
is no accident. Women are drawn to story content that
focuses on relationships rather than body counts. I
write and draw what pleases me, so it naturally attracts
women readers.
RP: All I can add to that is that, at the start of the
"Indy" comics market, an issue that was selling one or
two thousand copies was considered to be doing well.
Elfquest started at ten thousand copies, and the
circulation steadily grew. I believe firmly that it was
Elfquest's initial and highly visible success that
inspired other independent publishers to take a shot at
it too.
ST: How has your involvement in the Indy scene changed
over the years?
RP: This is a bit of a tough one . . . I guess for a
long time, perhaps as long as we've been creating and
publishing Elfquest, we haven't particularly felt that
we were part of the Indy (or any other) "scene." For a
long time, when Elfquest was starting out and being
really popular and outselling all other Indy comics by a
factor of ten, we were in the strange position of being
both envied and ignored. Envied, because we were at the
top of the heap, in a place other publishers admitted
they wanted to be; and ignored, because the style and
content of Elfquest wasn't cutting-edge or avant-garde
enough to warrant coverage in the comics press of the
time. We often were given to understand that Elfquest
just wasn't categorizable enough; it was the wrong size,
it was not color, it was written and drawn by a woman
(who didn't draw like a "girl", however), it only came
out three times a year . . . and it was successful! The
early days of Indy publishing were marked by a feeling
of "the Indies against the mainstream", and if one was
successful, somehow that was a betrayal of the struggle.
So we never really felt a part of the "scene" from the
beginning. We simply did our work, told our story the
best we could, and stayed in business without espousing
any particular cause or voice.
ST: In the '80s there were rumors of an animated
Elfquest series in the works. Which of your cast was
going to be included in that and why didn't that series
ever see fruitation?
WP: The short version is that, in the mid '80s, Elfquest
was in development at CBS as a Saturday morning cartoon
show slated to replace the, then, cancelled Dungeons and
Dragons. Zander's Animation Parlor was producing and we
had a great team of writers, Larry DiTillio and Joe
Straczynski of Babylon 5 fame. We structured a new quest
which included most of the elves, trolls and Winnowill.
However, Judy Price, head of children's programming,
didn't really "get" Elfquest and kept bumping it to an
earlier time slot, which meant we had to aim it at
successively younger audiences. Finally, to avoid ending
up as "Elf Muppet Babies," we let the deal fall apart.
Richard and I have turned down an awful lot of money,
over the years, rather than see Elfquest destroyed.
RP: And yet, had we not turned those earlier deals down,
we wouldn't be answering these questions now, because
Elfquest would have been made into a mediocre animated
film - perhaps - and it would be pretty well dead now.
ST: How does that series relate to the rumored one for
Fox? Are there still plans with Fox?
WP: At this time we have no relationship with Fox, but
that could change. The Elfquest movie, which is being
fully financed in Europe, is well into storyboard phase,
a co-production of Project Sceneries and Wolfmill
Entertainment. The screenplay, written by Marv Wolfman,
Craig Miller and myself, was completed last year and is
based on the original quest, Books One through Four.
Most of Elfquest's best-loved characters made it in.
ST: What else can viewers expect?
WP: Many incidents in the script were lifted whole cloth
from the EQ comics. However, they don't necessarily
happen in the order you find them in the series. Also
there is much new material specifically invented for the
screen. The changes were vital and Richard and I are
more than satisfied. We hope the fans will be too. As
Hijiri Yuki, creator of Locke the Superman, so aptly put
it, "Movie is movie and manga is manga."
ST: How hard has it been to animate the Elfquest series?
Were these characters easily adapted to the Silver
Screen? What has been the most difficult?
WP: You'll be pleased to know that our Belgian director,
Patrick Claeys, right off the bat said he felt we should
maintain a Japanese anime quality in the Elfquest movie.
The elves and other characters, having been designed all
along with animation in mind, are easily adapted. At
this point we're still exploring how we want the film to
look. Tests are in progress. Full CGI animation is only
acceptable to us if the cast comes across as warm and
believable. We're actually leaning more toward Disney's
Tarzan as a role model - lush, 3-D backgrounds behind
more traditionally rendered characters.
Fortunately, Richard, I and our partners at Wolfmill are
contractually in a position of influence. Our approval
carries significant weight with the European animation
studios. Normally, in Hollywood, that's not so. To
protect Elfquest's integrity, and ours, we had to take
our time and set this up very carefully.
RP: Actually, we have pretty much complete creative
control over every aspect of the production. This
doesn't mean, for example, that once a storyboard
sequence is done and approved, we can later go in
willy-nilly and change something. But then, why would we
want to? But other than reasonable limitations like
that, we get to give the thumbs-up or thumbs-down on
just about every aspect of the production.
ST: When making an animated movie of Elfquest, whom
would you like to see cast as your leads for this
endeavor?
WP: Well, many famous names have been batted around. We
need a few big ones for publicity's sake. The actors I'd
LIKE to see cast aren't necessarily big names, though.
They just have the right quality. For example, in my
mind, Rayek always sounds like a young George Takei,
minus that weird laugh. Skywise sounds to me like a
Michael J. Fox type. Winnowill could be played by Kim
Novak, Kathleen Turner or perhaps Sharon Stone. And
Cutter? Well, whatever you may think of his acting (I
think he's incredible) Leonardo Di Caprio has the voice
and the looks.
ST: Films are a collaborative effort. How do you create
a film and maintain the distinctive ElfQuest look and
spirit? Did you feel any anxiety over relinquishing some
control?
WP: The issue of control is what has stood in the way,
over two decades, of Elfquest's debut on film. We've
been optioned several times, and there have been many
attempts at screenplay adaptations. Call us crazy, naive
or plain stupid, but Richard and I just kept holding
out, waiting for the right time and the right creative
team to help us produce as faithful a film as possible.
We think that time is now. When the Elfquest animated
feature finally premiers, there'll be purists among our
fan base who will claim we compromised too much, or
worse, sold out. They have no idea what hoops we jumped
through to retain the spirit, if not the letter of the
original quest. Remember, "Movie is movie and manga is
manga."
ST: Why do you think that ElfQuest has had such an
enduring popularity?
WP: Although our characters are not human, they're easy
to identify with and root for. The theme of "different
ones" attempting to survive in a world that constantly
misunderstands them is one everybody can relate to. The
Hero's Journey, as described by Joseph Campbell, is a
timeless, universal myth which speaks to the ideals and
yearnings of one generation to the next. I think, behind
Elfquest's odd, unconventional window dressing, Richard
and I somehow latched onto a classic Hero's Journey that
a good chunk of the world, thankfully, continues to
embrace.
RP: We've said often that the characters of Elfquest -
the elves - are human-seeming enough so that readers can
relate to them easily, yet different-seeming enough so
that reading Elfquest is not the same as reading an
everyday romance or adventure story. In the elves'
faces, you can see and feel what's going on inside their
minds, which would be a bit more difficult to do if the
main characters were iguanas or the like.
ST: What do you like best about it?
WP: That it's a record of Richard's and my growth as
individuals and best friends. The comic book medium is
our Rosetta Stone and the elves are hieroglyphs enabling
us to express all we care about, all we've learned, all
we've suffered and all we celebrate in the language of
fairy tale.
RP: [smiles] What she said.
ST: If someone has never heard about the series--say
they were living in an alternative non-elf
dimension--what would you say to them about the main
cast to get them interested in reading Elfquest?
WP: I'd say don't be fooled by appearances. Don't be put
off by child-like proportions and fanciful trappings. If
you give it a chance and let it transport you, you will
find yourself in the story, because Elfquest is a Self
Quest.
RP: I guess I might ask this hypothetical person, "Have
you ever felt like you just didn't belong?" And I'd bet
the odds would be pretty good that the answer would be
"Yes." And then I'd be able to say something along the
lines of "Well then, this might just be YOUR story. Give
it a shot."
ST: Which character is your favorite?
WP: Cutter speaks for me. He IS me.
RP: Skywise is my avatar in the series. It's funny -
people often ask if we are Cutter (me) and Leetah
(Wendy), and they get the most interesting expressions
when we say that actually we're Cutter (Wendy) and
Skywise (me)!
Read Part Two of Sequential Tart's ElfQuestions here.
