Over the years, IDW Publishing has had great success with the licensing of comics Joss Whedon-TV vampire Angel. Two of its most popular series Angel, “Spike: Shadow Puppets” and “Angel: After the fall,” are a direct follow-up to “Angel” episode “Smile Time” and “Not fade away”, respectively. Therefore, it should not be a surprise that IDW commission Scott Tipton (Angel: Auld Lang Syne “) to write the comic book adaptations of two episodes. CBR News sat down with Tipton and “Angel: Not fade away” artist Stephen Mooney to talk about the translation of the episodes of the fan-favorite TV series for the comics.
Both events in question took place in the “Angel of the fifth and final season. Originally written by Ben Edlund ( “The Tick”), “Smile Time” has a “Sesame Street”-like children on television also called “Time smile.” Its creator, we learn, a deal with a demon to ensure success of the show, and thereafter, the puppet stars were replaced by demons intent on draining the life force “Time of the smile” Fanbad youth. When Angel and his cohorts tried to close the production in the soul-sucking series, the demons Angel transformed itself – to quote Spike – “a wee little puppet man”, leaving Angel to recover its inhumanity and defeat the demons plush.
“Spike: Shadow Puppets,” written by “Angel: After the fall” scribe Brian Lynch, a chronic battle between the other vampire with a soul, Spike, and “Time of the smile” Japanese subsidiary, which was transformed into Spike a puppet as well.
“Not fade away” was co-written by Jeffrey Bell and “Angel” creator Joss Whedon, and was the final episode of “Angel’s” final season. Angel and the company had agreed to take over the LA branch of Wolfram and Hart, a law firm and bad for a long time foil for our intrepid heroes. The real power behind Wolfram and Hart was a group of old demons now referred to as the Senior Partners. Living in hell a dimension far beyond our mortal plane, the Senior Associate was based on his land, the agents to exercise their will on our planet, in particular, the Circle of the Black Thorn, a secret cabal of some of the most influential figures, human and demons alike.
Angel was able to trick him admission to its membership in the Circle of the Black Thorn, and armed with the knowledge of the Black Thorn’s inner circle, he and his allies instigated a night of long knives against its members. Considered by most to be a suicide mission, and almost certainly a futile, Angel and company succeeded in killing each and every member of the Circle of the Black Thorn, but not before sustaining some victims of their own : Wesley Wyndam-Pryce had died and Charles Gunn had suffered fatal injuries. A fading Gunn met with Angel, Spike and Illyria at the meeting point in an alley in Los Angeles, where the full weight of the Senior Partners’ wrath was bearing down on them in the form of an almost endless army of thirst blood demons.
The television series that ended with our heroes unflinchingly other cargo headed to certain death.
It’s really about the strength of Brian Lynch from the first incursion into the Angel-verse, “Spike: Asylum,” which Whedon hand-picked the writer to pen the sequel to “not fade away,” “Angel: After the fall, “He describes the adventures of our heroes survive in a Los Angeles now mired in hell.
A sticky issue among fans of Whedon is the issue that Angel stories are canon and which are not. When it comes to IDW Angel comics, said Tipton is his understanding that the Whedon co-dash “after the fall” is actually the canon. “I would say that my stories in ’Auld Lang Syne” are canon, because I wrote it, “said Tipton CBR, only half-joking.” Do not go against everything that Episodes or has been in the comic until the date. ”
Stephen Mooney, a hard fan of “Angel” television series, and always refers to the alternates of the Tipton “Auld Lang Syne” according to the Tipton-written books do not violate any established continuity. “It is well structured that way, there were no red flags coming,” said Mooney.
Tipton, who also writes ** ** Star Trek comics from IDW, he admitted that it was a big fan of the series Angel, both to himself, continuity and understands that-obsessed fans are coming from. “I love these characters, and I love these universes, so you need to understand that kind of truth,” Is it appropriate, where it fits, do you have? “That said, Tipton’s own personal philosophy on the issue, either by licensing or original properties, is that if you do not like a story that did not happen.
“That is my attitude to a lot of comics,” Mooney quipped.
“Exactly,” according Tipton. “If you ask me, the Blue Beetle’s alive and well.”
Tipton said his approach to the adaptation of “Angel” episodes varies with the particular project. “For ’Smile Time,” because it is one of the more amusing, cheerful story, I felt I had more room to add some things there, so there are a couple of new scenes in’ Smile Time ’adaptation, “explains Tipton . “I think for ’Smile Time,” part of the idea was to write a piece for the company “Shadow Puppets”, because it was so popular. And we are looking for new forms of public service that Angel has been growing in the comics now “.
Tipton said he and IDW Editor in Chief Chris Ryall old-school comics with kids fond memories for projects like Marvel six-issue “Star Wars”, adaptation, and believes that the affinity that also launched the “Angel” adaptations .
Artist David Messina penciling IDW is the “smile time” adaptation, and Tipton was full of praise for his collaborator. “Messina is doing a great job getting a lot of expression of the puppet, which is fun. In general, his style is more illuminating, so he really do something more cartoony is a lot of fun for me.”
While Tipton felt that there was room to add scenes from “Smile Time” and Mooney both treaties “Not fade away” with a little more reverence. “With ’Not fade away”, that is, as so many of the historical episode, and every scene in this episode is powerful for some people, because it’s the last time we see that many of the characters, “said Tipton.
In case both Tipton and Mooney took creative license was to determine which times of the episode to focus on. “I’m trying not to add new things, but kind of zoom in times of,” Tipton said. Moments like the death of Wesley, who found Tipton particularly tragic. “That script Whedon and Bell is just a Heartbreaker, so the challenge is to find a new way to translate without taking away anything from it.”
Outside his alternate cover of “Auld Lang Syne”, the “Not fade away” adaptation Mooney was the first opportunity to work with Tipton. The artist said his approach to the adaptation of “Not fade away” differs markedly from that of breaking a comic original. Mooney first inclination was to run wild at heart, pointing out what is happening outside a window or in a drawer behind the counter of Angel, while the events of the episode unfolded, but he prevailed in Tipton, ultimately convincing Mooney that in a lot of cases, is “almost a crime” to deviate from the way material was presented in the actual episode.
That said, Mooney realized adaptation was always going to be your own animal, so I tried not to see the episode too many times in advance. “Half the time you try to think from a different angle, like maybe I can get over the shoulder of the character whose face we have seen in the episode, so we are turning around 180 and see from the point of view But 50% of the time I’m going to shoot from the episode, “said Mooney.
In the case of an adjustment as “Not fade away”, which has five television stations leading to it, the creators are forced to assume that readers are not coming into the series blind. “Normally I get in my way of doing something I do, someone who knows nothing about the character that can read and enjoy, but that kind of a lost cause with this,” Tipton admitted. “What I did was done, I added a” Previously on “Angel’’ ’page at least, to get things set up from where they were in this season. I’m assuming that everyone knows the episode as the palm of your hand. ”
One of the most difficult to adapt “Not fade away” was fighting episode of frequent cuts. “Angel is something and boom, this is a flashback,” said Tipton. “There are four stories in progress, and each of them get like 90 seconds at one point in the episode, and I’m like, ’That’s a page and a half, what shall I do?”
Mooney said there were so many switches scene that she felt at times as he was changing scenes of each page. “It’s very consistent, not a mish-mix of things,” said Mooney. “But it’s definitely bam, bam, bam, which makes the satisfaction in my opinion, it’ll feel like there’s a lot there.”
The “Smile Time” and “Not fade away” the adjustments are the only projects Angel Tipton horizon, but he hopes to get another chance to play in the Angel-verse in the not too distant future. “Lynch has been doing this fantastic job with ’After the fall,” it is difficult to say,’ out of there, they give me work, ’ “lamented Tipton.
However, Tipton had a chance to put his stamp on the Lynch “after the fall.” At Comic-Con over the previous year, Lynch invited the veterans’ Angel ’writer to help one of the “After the fall’ histories. The first issue of “after the fall” did not pick up exactly where “not fade away” left: Lynch dropped us into the new status quo of Hell-exiled Los Angeles. However, fans were made for private immediately after that fateful battle in the alley in a story called “First Night”, where Lynch and co-Tipton invited to the script of “First Night” story, Tipton jumped on the opportunity.
“The fact that he invited me to play in the sense that I was really happy with it,” Tipton said. “When we talked about it at Comic-Con, I had not realized how important that the story was going to be for its entire thing.”
Mooney has just completed a season in “After the fall” in the filling of regular Franco Urru artist. Mooney was last edition was the # 14, and the artist admitted that once he returned Urru that no longer had access to scripts for the rest of the story arc.
“You’re stuck in the audience now!” Tipton exclaimed with a laugh.
“I am totally to the left of the loop now, I do not even talk to Lynch already,” Mooney said with mock bitterness. But in all seriousness, Mooney acknowledged that he had been a big fan of Lynch’s work on “After the fall.” And it was Mooney as well as complementary about Urru’s contribution to the project. “I absolutely love [the Urru] things. There are people on message boards talking about me taking advantage of issues that should be drawing, and I’m like, ’You’re right!”
After working on projects for so long for Angel, Mooney is becoming an old representing about Joss Whedon’s characters from the comics page. “I’m getting to the point where they can get quite easily from the top of my head, which is nice, took me a long time to come.” Mooney’s lost count of the number of fans who have asked him to draw sketches in Spike comics conventions. And as much as Mooney enjoys the “Angel” adjustments, which really is the hope of getting the opportunity to work on more original stories Angel.
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