Five Questions with Nailbiter’s Joshua Williamson

Joshua Williamson is a rising star in comics and has done a variety of work in different genres ranging from revivals of Golden Age superheroes like Dark Horse’s Captain Midnight to his horror/paranormal investigation book Ghosted for Image Comics. Williamson’s most recent comic is Nailbiter with artist Mike Henderson, whom he previously collaborated on crime/superhero book Masks and Mobsters. Nailbiter is about the city of Buckaroo, Oregon where sixteen serial killers have come from. An FBI investigator is looking to see why the town has produced so many killers. It’s a bloody, suspense-filled comic that sold out its first printing, and Batman and American Vampire writer Scott Snyder praised it, saying, “If Josh died I wish he’d leave Nailbiter to me in his will so I could say it was my idea.”

1. The advertisement for Nailbiter #1 has some interesting facts in regards to serial killers. What is it about American culture that you feel makes serial killers so prevalent in such a civilized society?

Because it’s a glimpse into the darkness of life. That sound a bit pretentious but it’s true. It’s an aspect of horror that is more real than monsters or ghost stories. They could be anyone. Everyone has thought of killing someone at some point. Most people probably don’t do it out of a fear of being caught, really. Not all, but more than you’d expect. And so with serial killers… they did it. They went the extra steps, and had it planned. It’s one of my favorite lines from Psycho. “We all go a little mad sometimes.” And with that people want to see the madness.

2. How did the idea for Nailbiter come about, and what kind of research did you do before writing the book?

The idea was developing for years and ended up being an amalgam a few ideas I had to do a dark thriller comic. I knew I wanted to do a book about a small town. But also something with serial killers. I didn’t want to do the cheesy… “serial killer resort” sort of thing. I knew I wanted something that could lend itself to a mystery that was grounded in reality. That all added up when I had the very simple idea of “What if a bunch of serial killers were from the same town?”

As for research. LOTS. Lots of depressing reading. Watched as many documentaries as I could. And then when that was all over I read some more. Then I talked with some experts in criminal behavior. It was a interesting time. Real serial killers are much more mundane and ugly. It’s rough.

3. The book takes place in Buckaroo, Oregon a fictional town in the state where you reside. What was it about Oregon that just ‘screamed’ serial killer to you?

Well… like you said… I live here. I used to live in a small town outside Portland and I’d ride my bike around and see all these open fields with creepy houses. And y’know all the rain and dreary weather has been known to drive a few people nuts.

4. When creating the origins of the Buckaroo 16, was there ever a moment when you thought that maybe you had gone a little too far? Was there ever a moment when your imagination frightened yourself?

Not so much. I tried to think of it a bit more like creating a Batman’s rogue gallery. That was the path we took. As I said before… I think serial killers are a bit of a power fantasy. As sick as that sounds. There were certain aspects of serial killers that we agreed to avoid from the very beginning. Some ground rules and boundaries that we placed so after that we were able to cut loose, and create. For me it was more the execution of the story that scared me. The tricks were done with the comics medium.

5. A lot of people don’t realize how exhausting writing can actually be. How do you juggle the different projects you’ve been working on?

Schedule. I keep a pretty tight laid out schedule and I’m honest with my editors about it. I try to do a lot of notebook work before I ever touch the computer. And I take time off to recharge. Weekends, evenings, etc. I have to walk way for a bit. BUT my head is still going. And I’ve noticed that my best ideas came when I was NOT working, but doing other things in life. I can’t say how many times I’ve had ideas for dialogue while doing the dishes.

But yeah. Schedule I treat it like a job, because it is. A job that I love and want to keep. Haha.

Bonus Question: Later in July you have Robocop, set in 1986 during the original movie timeline. As a personal fan of the original film, what can fans expect? How close is the tone going to be to the original film’s hard R rating?

Having that same Hard R was important to me. It was one of the conditions of me writing the book, but even then after I turned in the first draft of the first issue I was worried that they wouldn’t be able to stick to that… But they did! It’s been awesome. You can expect Robocop fucking shit up, stopping crime, some cool plots with Officer Lewis, and lots of violence and action.

Nailbiter #2 is coming out on Wednesday June 3, 2014 from Image Comics. You can find Joshua Williamson at his website and follow him on Twitter.