Andrés Vera Martínez
Comics A.M. | Rick Perry at odds with newspaper over cartoon
Editorial cartoons | Michael Cavna interviews Sacramento Bee editorial cartoonist Jack Ohman about Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s demand that the newspaper apologize for an April 25 cartoon in which the politician is depicted boasting that “Business is booming in Texas!” beneath a banner that reads, “Low Tax! Low Regs!,” juxtaposed with an image of the deadly fertilizer-plant explosion in West, Texas. “It was with extreme disgust and disappointment I viewed your recent cartoon,” Perry wrote in a letter to the editor. “While I will always welcome healthy policy debate, I won’t stand for someone mocking the tragic deaths of my fellow Texans and our fellow Americans.” Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst has reportedly called for Ohman to be fired.
Vito Delsante and Andrés Vera Martínez talk about pitching Fist of Dracula
Before being printed, purchased by fans and read, comics and graphic novels start off as ideas that eventually become pitches that creators try and sell to publishers. Or, as Vito Delsante, writer of FCHS, puts it, “That’s the hard part.”
Delsante and artist Andrés Vera Martínez are currently collaborating on one such pitch, for a book called Fist of Dracula that shows us what the famed vampire was up to in the 1930s. Although the book doesn’t have a home yet, they agreed to talk to me about the creative and pitching processes, as well as share some pages from the books.
JK: How did the two of you meet?
Vito: Purely by chance. I had written a kids graphic novel for Simon and Schuster (Before They Were Famous: Babe Ruth) and the artist couldn’t come through, so they (S&S) hunted down a new artist, and that artist was Andrés.
Andrés: That’s about right.
Vito: Even after that, we didn’t actually meet until Andrés was done with the book. I like to work with people I know, if only so I can see the art process, but I had to let this one go until the end. I think we kept missing each other, too…like, we’d try to meet each other at Jim Hanley’s or elsewhere, and we’d be off by a few minutes.