Independent Jones: Joey Esposito Talks “Footprints”, Bigfoot Wearing Trench Coats

In this week’s installment of Independent Jones, things came together right at the last minute and I couldn’t be happier with the end result. After digging through several indie projects on the horizon, one came to my attention just two nights ago, which is just one day from my weekly column deadline. This came courtesy of comic book creator Joey Esposito’s twitter account. He was spreading the word about his new Kickstarter project Footbprints: Bad Luck Charm. I’m not sure what it was that drew me to this project. Was it the hard-boiled crime aspect? Maybe it was the amazing artwork of Bigfoot in a trench coat smoking a cigarette while wearing a fedora. Yeah. That was probably it.

I was fortunate enough to join Joey for a conversation about his latest book, his love of crime stories, and how helping your competitors might not be the worst thing in the world.

Q: Let’s start with the first thought I had when I clicked on the Kickstarter link: Can you please tell me why Bigfoot is wearing a trench coat?

Ha ha, absolutely! So, at its core, Footprints is a crime noir story. Volume 1 was a straight-up murder mystery that put Bigfoot in the role of a Philip Marlowe or Sam Spade type of private eye. So naturally, he’s got to have the trench coat, fedora, and the constantly lit cigarette.

Q: Wow. That sounds awesome. But I haven’t read the previous installment that seems to be the basis of both stories. How would you pitch this to someone unfamiliar with the story? Where’s the jumping-in point for someone who’s unfamiliar with this world?

Well the cool thing is that on our Kickstarter for Footprints: Bad Luck Charm, any reward level that gives you the book also includes a digital copy of Footprints Vol. 1. So even if you haven’t read Footprints, you’ll still get the original story to read before hand, if you so choose. But if you were just going to come across it on the shelf or at a convention or something, I would pitch it the same way — it’s a noir yarn with Bigfoot as a private detective that has other cryptids as part of his detective agency. And while one of our stories in Bad Luck Charm is set in the past, I think it’s still a fun read even if you’re not totally sure who those characters are. Hopefully you get an idea of their personalities in those 6 pages. But the other story, the one that catches up with the gang in the present day, is very much standalone. It’s a done-in-one mystery story and doesn’t require prior knowledge of the characters, though there will be easter eggs in there for those that do.

Q: I see. So what inspired this merging of the two genres? Would you say that Footprints is a true fusion of the supernatural and hard-boiled crime stories?

Yeah, I would say so. I just love cryptozoology and crime fiction, so way back when we started work on Volume 1 in 2010, we just wanted to mix it all together. It’s worth noting that we play it straight; Bigfoot, Nessy, etc. existing in the world of humans is a known entity; they interact with people and it’s just sort of commonplace for everyone. I think we created a really cool world that can go either way — we can do supernatural/cryptozoological stories or we can do straight-forward crime. That said, we have Bigfoot and such involved so it’d be sort of a waste to just do a by-the-numbers crime tale. But there’s comedy and horror mixed in there as well; it’s really just a mish-mash of everything that I love.

So how long have you had the sequel on the back-burner? When was it originally written?

I wouldn’t call it a straight up sequel. More of an interlude, maybe. We have a larger story in mind for a Volume 2 (and 3, for that matter), but whether or not that happens remains to be seen. But for Bad Luck Charm, I wrote the Vegas story that you see on the Kickstarter page back in 2012, and the second story — about the gang investigating a cryptid called The Lizard Man down in South Carolina — I wrote last year.

This format and particularly this blending of genres almost cries out for a continuing series of stories. Do you have other stories plotted out? Could you see this being a long-running series?

I mean, we’d love to make it an ongoing, but it’s just not financially feasible right now. The way we originally envisioned it was the Hellboy model, really. An ongoing series of mini-series and one-shots that stand alone but ultimately build a larger story. So we do have stories in mind for what would be Volumes 2 and 3 that we’d love to do, as well as a sort of “Origins” series of one-shots that puts the spotlight on each of the cast members, but it kind of all depends on schedule timing and funds at the moment. But we love these characters and talk about them all the time, so I imagine we’ll always come back to them sooner or later.

As far as detective stories go, what are some of your favorites?

I love crime fiction; Lawrence Block’s Scudder books are a favorite, and of course Chandler’s Marlowe books. While there’s plenty of stuff I haven’t read yet, right now I would say my favorite is Block’s Eight Million Ways to Die.  It’s sort of the definitive Scudder book and does a lot with the character that you don’t typically see ongoing stories about the same character do. There’s a huge evolution there, which makes the book that follows so disappointing (When the Sacred Ginmill Closes) because it goes back in time after pushing the character forward so far. But in general I love the idea of challenging the ethical center of the reader through the actions of the characters, and Block does that wonderfully in his books.

What about tales of the supernatural? I know that’s broad. Specifically, the tales involving the monsters you’ve included (or will include, for that matter) in Footprints.

There are a good amount of comics with Bigfoot in them, actually. Proof is the one that people like to point out in reference to Footprints. Which is a good book for sure, but it’s also like saying just because a book stars Sherlock Holmes it’s the same as every other book starring Sherlock Holmes. Bigfoot is that kind of character that can be interpreted and presenting in different ways, and Footprints is unique in its portrayal, I think. But I enjoy the supernatural in general; I’m a big horror fan and I think that’s where that comes from.

How much of them spill over to your work?

Everything you ingest comes into your work in one way or another. For Footprints in particular, it’s definitely most influenced by crime fiction and film noir, but we very purposefully pair the characters and their special powers with noir archetypes that fit their accepted mythology in the real world.

Why have you chosen to crowd-fund this project? The last installment was crowd-funded but since then you’ve done work with publishers like Monkeybrain. Why not try to shop this to them or another publisher?

Even if we weren’t self-publishing, creator-owned comics still cost money to make. Our Monkeybrain book costs us money with every issue. But in general, we shopped Footprints around with Volume 1 and ended up at a small publisher, but we’ve since taken the property back and will be publishing under my own imprint, Soup Dad Comics, which is how I published my OGN Pawn Shop as well. I just like the idea of having total control of the business side of things without anyone in between. It limits some of our options, but at the same time, it means we can work at our own pace and only answer to ourselves. That’s not to say I don’t want to work with publishers, that’s not the case at all, but for something like Footprints that’s such a pet project for us it just makes more sense to do it ourselves.

Do you see crow-funding as a viable option for the future of this industry?

Yeah, definitely. Even just between when we did Footprints Vol. 1 in 2011 to now, the difference is enormous. Kickstarter has been integrated into comics culture as a major player. Three years ago it was still kind of an uncertain entity, but now it’s as much a part of the industry as anything else. And it’s not just indie creators either; DC used IndieGogo quite a few times for their We Can Be Heroes campaign, which was an awesome idea, worked great, and I think shows the viability of crowd-funding beyond just getting projects made.

Out of all of your incentives for donors, one stood out to me the most. For $250 you will edit a donor’s comic book, “from script to final letters until you are both unquestionably satisfied with the product”. That is an extremely interesting choice for a reward. It encourages both interaction with two creators and paying your talents forward. What inspired you to do that?

I actually offered a similar reward during the Pawn Shop campaign and it sold, so I thought I’d offer it up again. And more recently, I finished editing a graphic novel by Mario Candelaria and Karl Slominski called Ashes, and I really enjoyed the process. But I guess I just love making comics and I think it’s important to do it from different perspectives, so helping other people execute their vision is extremely exciting. So hopefully the Kickstarter incentive will get a creator an affordable editor while also getting themselves some swag and simultaneously making someone else’s project happen.

Do you think the industry would be better served if more creators did things like this? Does this happen a lot?

Not everyone likes being an editor, and not all editors like writing or whatever else. But I do think the industry would be better served in general if there was a more unified support system between all of us. While technically I guess we’re all competitors vying for a very limited number of jobs, we’re all artists too, and aritsts should support one another. I’ve been very fortunate in the friends that I’ve made in the industry, everyone has always been very supportive and helpful to me, so I just try to do the same when I can.

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If you’d like to help support Bigfoot and Nessy see the light of day, you can support this Kickstarter project HERE

Mike Sains

Mike Sains is a Staff Writer at Capeless Crusader. When he isn’t writing, he’s podcasting at various places online. When he isn’t podcasting, he’s collecting comic books, FunkoPop! figures, and vinyl records. You can hear him on Geek Girls, Nerd Boys, The Tower of Sour, and The Inverse Delirium, all available on iTunes. Follow him on Twitter @MikeSains.

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