2d FACTS 2008 guest : Terry Moore

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Terry Moore began writing and drawing his award-winning comic book series Strangers In Paradise in 1993. Since then he has produced over 100 issues of the larger-than-life saga featuring Francine, Katchoo, and the amazing cast of friends and lovers in their lives. Strangers In Paradise is published under Moore's own imprint, Abstract Studio, and is one of the most successful independently published books in the comics industry.

At this moment Strangers In Paradise has ended his long tenure and Terry Moore is very busy with his new epic, called ECHO.

He is also on Marvel's Runaways (taking over from Joss Whedon) and taking over Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane series starting with a new issue #1!!!

Little info: Last edition of F.A.C.T.S. 2007 had the French publisher brought in the French translations of Strangers In Paradise along with American artist Owen.

This year you have the chance to meet this writer/artist and get acquinted with his new series at Marvel and his own ECHO ofcourse.

My personal favorit of his work is this one:

www.boomvavavoom.com/ebas_darkvamp.html






Visit the Strangers in Paradise website : www.strangersinparadise.com
Visit the Wikipedia page of Terry Moore : en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terry_Moore

[grafunkel]

Note: that artwork isn't by Terry Moore, of course. ;D

I saw some previews of Echo, and it looks very interesting: intrigue and mistery, well-rounded characters, good art.

(and I don't mean "well-rounded" in THAT way, Boom. ;D You and your dirty mind.)

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grafunkel said:

Note: that artwork isn't by Terry Moore, of course. ;D

no...he was the writer and the amazingly talented Ebas was the artist. terry DID produce a variant

(and I don't mean "well-rounded" in THAT way, Boom

you know me sooooo wel

[grievous444]

Can't wait to meet him. i will ask that he draw VAMPIRELLA for me.

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I think I am gonna stick with my "theme"

[Mr. Facts]

That is the mummy theme, right?

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got that right the first time, man!! the HOT mummy theme, that is

[grievous444]

boomboom said:

the HOT mummy theme

Give me the HOT amazon theme.

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Wonder Woman you mean?

Or a regular amazon...a female horserider?

[grievous444]

I was thinking of a regular amazon, butt the Wonder Woman theme isn't bad to.

[e-Mino]

I'll go for my newly started Minotaur theme (as opposed to the old "tallest character ever" theme).

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WONDERCON: SPOTLIGHT ON TERRY MOORE

At WonderCon in San Francisco, writer/illustrator Terry Moore admitted that he felt a little like J.K. Rowling when it came time to end his long-running, creator-owned series, "Strangers in Paradise." For him, the process of letting go of a 14-year project involved a trip to Santa Fe, a fallow period that made him a little scared, taking on mainstream writing chores for Marvel and the launch of a new book.

To resolve the complicated, 90-issue soap opera/thriller story of Francine Peters and Katchoo Choovanski, Moore rented a townhouse in Santa Fe, New Mexico. He said he needed to be physically present in the city where the final scenes of the book are set.

Moore said, "There is some kind of craziness to it, where my characters become too real. I really do like to think that Katchoo and Francine are living in this $4 million house outside Santa Fe, and they're just unbelievably happy. They have these great kids and this routine where, if you went to this certain park or restaurant once a month, you would see them."

After Issue 90 of "Strangers in Paradise," Moore figured he would jump easily into his next assignment. "My plan was that I would open up all the ideas in my filing cabinet and pick one -- and that would be my next series. I'd do something light-hearted for a year and buy some time, then figure out what my real series would be. The problem was, when I got home and starting going through the ideas, I didn't like them."

As the months passed and no great, fresh idea presented itself, Moore worried that he wouldn't be able to find the creative rhythm again. "I felt like if I took a year off from comics, I would be like some super-band that breaks up and takes 15 years off and then expects their audience to still be there – and they're not. You know, like Journey or something."

Because, as he said, "the world moves on, so you've got to keep making comics," Moore persevered and eventually began to develop the narrative that will become "Echo," to be published in March by his company, Abstract Studios.

Cover art to "Echo" #1
Moore said that his interests and outlook have changed a lot since he last looked at those old notes. "I wanted to talk about other things. I wanted to be more satirical about American society. I'm really frustrated with government and social trends – and the laws of physics."

The laws of physics?

Although Moore revealed few plot details about "Echo," it's clear that its main character, down-on-her-luck photographer Julie Martin, quickly encounters something straight out of science fiction. He described the series as "'The Fugitive' meets 'The X-Files' meets 'Strangers in Paradise.'" Online previews of the book mention that Julie becomes "the unwilling host to a symbiote nuclear weapon."

Moore now has the plot well mapped out. "I sat down and outlined 20 issues out, three trades' worth of material, which is something I never did with 'Strangers in Paradise.' I knew what I was doing when I started the first issue."

Moore described the first issue of "Echo" as "a trainwreck," presumably in a good way. "It's all action. At the very end of it, you see the predicament that Julie's in. But then the question is, "Who's Julie?" There's so much to her."

According to Moore, he had the backstory of every character figured out by the time he finished Issue 2. "I have years' worth of stories in my head."

That's good, because the book seems to be off to a healthy start. Orders for Issue 1 of "Echo" outmatched those of anything else previously published by Abstract Studios. The book will be published on a six-week cycle.

Moore said that he was supposed to have 100 preview copies available at WonderCon, but glitches with the special silver foil cover caused production delays at the printer.

In addition to his creator-owned projects, Moore is writing two mainstream, out-of-continuity series for Marvel, "Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane" and "Runaways." Moore's run on the latter will begin after the one by Joss Whedon concludes.

Moore said that he is working on the third script for the Spider-Man book. "This is a dream come true for me, because it has the character set that I grew up with. Gwen Stacey is alive. Everything is possible. They're still in high school."

Cover art to the final issue of "Strangers In Paradise"
Moore joked, "My devious plan is to overturn the Marvel Universe. In my universe, Gwen lives and everybody else dies."

As for "Runaways," Moore was reluctant to say much about it, because not all of Whedon's plans for the characters have played out yet.

In response to a question from the audience, Moore talked about "Motorgirl," an aborted series idea that he contemplated after "Strangers in Paradise," about a "semi-Goth" girl living out in the desert, who plays bass in a bar band, is a great mechanic and dreams of restoring a vintage motorcycle with her best friend, who happens to be a gorilla.

Moore said he was ready to proceed with the idea last summer. He put a picture of Motorgirl on his blog, only to receive an e-mail from artist David Hahn letting him know that there already was a "Motorgirl" comic being developed by Hahn, Paul Guinan and Anina Bennett. Moore backed away from the concept and ultimately found "Echo."

In regard to potential adaptations of his work, Moore said that Steven Sears, producer of "Xena: Warrior Princess," has expressed interest in bringing "Strangers in Paradise" to TV, perhaps for Showtime or HBO. "If he could get it green-lit for a TV series, he'd have my full attention on it. TV is the place for character stories."

Asked whether there might be a deluxe omnibus edition of the entire "Strangers in Paradise" saga, Moore said that the prevailing feeling among retailers seemed to be that it is too soon. "There's a cycle to creative product. I'm lucky to have been able to make a living off of it while it was in production. When it stops, then we have to give it 10 or 20 years for the rest of the world to find it. The fact that you guys were aware of it while it was in production, that's pretty cool. It's like you were able to watch Mozart in concert."

SOURCE: www.comicbookresources.com/news/newsitem.cgi?id=13108

[grafunkel]

Hey, I read that one as well this morning!

I think I'll buy a SIP off him at the con, and give it a try. And I'll definitely get Echo. ... Maybe the silver foil preview edition'll be ready by then?

[boomvavavoom]

it is out this month isn't it?

I pre-ordered it already!

[fab1]

Wow.

Let's just hope he won't have to cancel his appearance. Too much can happen in seven and a half months.

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Terry Moore talks life after ‘Strangers in Paradise’ with his new series

Take it from Terry Moore: 14 years is a long time to obsess over a woman.

But that’s exactly what the Eisner-winning writer and artist did with Strangers in Paradise, his perennially popular feminist anthem that helped put independent comics on the map. Now, less than a year after ending Strangers, his Abstract Studio label is set to unveil Echo, a new original series written and drawn by Moore that he describes pithily as “’The Fugitive’ meets ‘The X-Files.’”

Like his previous work, Echo finds inspiration in a strong female protagonist: Julie Martin, a photographer who witnesses an otherworldly explosion in the California desert. Hunted by a private corporation, Julie goes on the run while exploring new physical abilities garnered in the incident.

“I’m a big fan of junk science,” Moore says of the title’s sci-fi premise. “I’m not a physicist or anything, but I read those books and put together my own whacked-out theories on how it really works. I like to write about that, but I never got the chance in Strangers, so this is really tapping into another side of me.”

Fans of Moore’s earlier work shouldn’t worry he’s suddenly morphed into Asimov: his focus remains firmly on characterization.

“You would like her,” Moore says of the beleaguered Julie. “She’s a nice person. She’s not perfect. She’s made mistakes, run off her husband, but she’s capable of handling a lot more than what’s she’s been doing in her life. This event happens and forces her to fight for herself.”

And like many of his protagonists, Moore’s heroine isn’t alone. “She has an older sister who is helping her a lot in the beginning. Her husband abandons her and she finds no help from him or the friends that they had. But she does find a new ally in a park ranger named Dylan, who also happened to witness the event from far away. When he starts investigating it, his path crosses with Julie’s.”
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For Moore, who abandoned the two dozen ideas that had been brewing in his head prior to the Strangers send-off for something “very now, very today,” it was inevitable that he’d return to the fairer sex. “Doug Sneyd, his stuff ran in Playboy, he had these beautiful watercolor cartoons of women that were just gorgeous,” the artist says of his early influences. “That kind of stuff made an impression on me. It’s why I ended up focusing on female characters.

“I thought about [writing a series with a male protagonist] for about 20 seconds and then blew it off. There’s just so many out there like that. I figure that if I can write good female characters, I need to go to what I know.”

Moore, whose unisex first name often resulted in fans assuming he was female, expresses bemusement that his aptitude for writing women is met with incredulity. “Mary Shelley writing Frankenstein and all that, I don’t think anyone questioned cross-sex writing…or J.K. Rowling writing about a male protagonist.

“If I had written a story about Jack the Ripper, I think I would’ve been just as good with that and people would say, ‘So, you really identify with serial killers?’ No, I’m just trying to be a good writer.”

After stints in TV editing and music, budding artist Moore was inspired by the relatable human travails in a National Lamthingy strip titled One Year Affair and began Strangers in 1993. Despite having what he calls his “best year ever” financially in 2007, he decided it was time to wrap up the story of Francine and Katina “Katchoo” Choovanski, two best friends with a complex relationship. “I was really firing myself from a great job. But writer-wise, I knew I had taken everybody as far as they could go. After that, I know I would have to go into a second generation of characters, or turn it into a satire of itself.”
pad
Moore did neither, ended the series with #90 in June, and almost immediately began work on both Echo and a first-time stint as a writer-for-hire. He’s penning both Runaways and Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane for Marvel. The latter is somewhat ironic, considering Gwen Stacy’s free fall once convinced him to avoid mainstream titles.

“I abandoned mainstream comics when I read [Amazing Spider-Man #121] where Gwen Stacy died,” he laughs of his career trajectory. “That really pissed me off.”

Of his new role as storyteller for established characters, he says, “It’s weird, when I think about it. I realize the responsibility these books have, the readers that may not even know me. But you can’t dwell on that. It passes quickly and then it’s just me and the story again.”

At a time when most artists would be happy to recline and examine their body of work, Moore is juggling multiple projects. “One thing I hadn’t planned on was how much time I spend working on my Marvel books. I thought, ‘I can write a script in a day or two.’ But I’ve spent much more time than that working on my Marvel stuff. I really want it to be good.”

Asked if he has long-term plans for Echo, Moore prefers to leave it up to reader response. “I’ve outlined three storyarcs that are about six issues each, so it’s either a total of 18 issues or three trades, and that just takes us through to what my entire original Echo idea is. Then we’ll see where we stand. If I’m having fun with it and people are enjoying it, I’ll think about going longer or just moving on to a new title.”

And what title could that be? “Supergirl. That’s one I’d really like to get my hands on.”

Like we even had to ask.
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SOURCE: WizarUniverse

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THE ECHO OF TERRY MOORE

After the end of perennial favorite slice of life with a twist series Strangers in Paradise, creator Terry Moore thought long and hard about what he wanted to do for his next independent project. He wanted something different from SiP, but he's not in entirely foreign waters with Echo. Moore's sticking to some familiar territory with his leads in Echo. He has two strong women bonded together and a man caught up in the mix. But those are about all the similarities to Francine, Katchoo and David of SiP. He told THE PULSE, "I want to tell a story about good people that will scare you. I'm going through a mischievous phase." Moore's not reinventing the thriller wheel, he's just having a great time giving it a spin in the pages of Echo.


THE PULSE: Well, with one issue of Echo out there, what kind of comments have you received or read online about your new venture?

TERRY MOORE: The reception has been good. I'm very pleased.


THE PULSE: With Julie Martin you've introduced a very different type of leading lady than we were familiar with from Strangers in Paradise. How did you come up with your recently divorced
photographer, Julie?

MOORE: I just think about the woman I want to work with and build from there. Julie is different from the girls in SiP, but I think they would get along.


THE PULSE: I can see wanting to do something different because you don't want to be pigeon-holed as one type of creator and you were probably tired of living in the world of SiP; but, especially after doing SiP for so long, do you ever have to catch yourself and redo something because, consciously or unconsciously, you're treading ground you've already covered?

MOORE: Probably, but it must happen so early on in an idea I'm not even aware of it.


THE PULSE: Why did you want to set this between Yossemite National Park, CA and Area 51, Nevada? That's quite a stretch of land with a history all its own ....

MOORE: Exactly. It's like the moon out there. The military presence there is like all the other desert life, invisible but deadly. If you have any clue what's really out there you'd never go near the place.

Seemed like a good setting for a scary story.


THE PULSE: This is a high sci-fi type concept: a young woman unwillingly hosting a symbiotic nuclear bomb. How did you ever come up with something like this? It kind of is weird and fascinating, yet incredibly disturbing at the same time ....

MOORE: I want to tell a story about good people that will scare you. I'm going through a mischievous phase.


THE PULSE: How did Annie Trotter's spirit kind of live on in the bomb? Why did you want to add this element to the game?

MOORE: The details of that are coming in the story. I'll be more forthcoming about it in a year or so. But the fact she is there is point of the whole story, hence the title... Echo.

THE PULSE: So is Annie kind of aware that she's bonded to Julie? If so, how do the two kind of co-exist? I mean does Julie think she's just gone crazy, or had a mental breakdown like her sister, Pam, or is she kind of able to quickly accept what's happened?

MOORE: You have to read the story for that.


THE PULSE: Was this purposely done to Julie and Annie? I mean was she made this human bomb type as part of an experiment or was this something gone terribly awry?

MOORE: That's in the story too.

THE PULSE: If this is kind of living nuclear materials, is Julie dying a slow death by being bonded with it?

MOORE: In the story.

THE PULSE: Is Julie the only one who got infused with this symbiotic bomb during the accident or were there others in the area? If so, how will that come into play?

MOORE: In issue 2 we find out the answer to that.


THE PULSE: One hears "symbiotic" and might think of a Venom or Carnage type. How is this sentient symbiote different from those dark creatures?

MOORE: I wrote one of those dark symbiotic stories once for The Darkness. No, this is different, more elemental... and I mean that in a pure physics sense.

THE PULSE: Did you purposely make Julie a photographer so she'd be someone familiar with the lay of the land and someone who has a keen eye? Or was that just an interesting occupation you thought to have her as?

MOORE: It comes into play with how she handles the situation.


THE PULSE: You've told me when I was asking a little about Echo that John Foster, the head of HeNRI's nuclear weapon division, is kind of a modern day da Vinci with his interest in weaponry. How is he different than any of the other mad scientist or driven characters one might meet in different medias? What's his bigger picture?

MOORE: The value is in the details of the man, I think. No one would call da Vinci a stereotype mad scientist, but he could well be the prototype. Mad scientist conveys a cartoon lunatic, whereas da Vinci was unnerving in his pragmatic approach to inventing, building and supplying weapons of mass destruction to the powerful men of his time. That's how he made his living, not off art, off weapons. The more deadly and destructive the better. He thought nothing of it for much of the time. He was brilliant at it. Eventually he found his limits with it, but there's no telling how many thousands of people he killed. Nobody talks about that part, do they? They just look at the pretty art.

My Foster is like that. Wonderful side products coming out of his nuclear research... brilliant man... oh, did you see the body count he's leaving in his wake?

That kind of scientist is very real. America is full of them.


THE PULSE: Who else is involved in this HeNRI? What's their purpose? Are they government sanctioned or kind of operating outside the box?


MOORE: HeNRI is a private contractor working for the Army on Project Phi. The rest is top secret... and revealed in upcoming issues.


THE PULSE: You've explored a lot of realistic evil men and women in the pages of SiP, but how are these operatives from HeNRI different from any that you've really scripted in the past?

MOORE: I will try to write the most realistic people possible, with conflicts about their actions. There is an endless variety to work with so I'm sure I'll have characters you haven't seen before.


THE PULSE: How do you even wrap your head around writing something like this? I mean I know SiP had so many layers going on, but this really seems to be like a story that could go in any possible direction, with so much fertile ground to explore ...

MOORE: It's just like herding a bunch of frogs down a street, trying to keep them going forward to this goal you have in mind. Yes, just like frog herding.


THE PULSE: I kind of asked about most of your leads except the Yosemite Park Ranger, Dillon Murphy. With two women bonded together and a man in the mix, one might make a connection to SiP and think of him as the David of the group. But what is Dillon's role here?

MOORE: He's the David of the group. Just start with that and I'll surprise you repeatedly.


THE PULSE: How are you juggling working on this and your upcoming runs on Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane and The Runaways? How far ahead in Echo would you like to be before an issue of either of those series hits stands?

MOORE: By the time either of the Marvel series hits I'll have my first Echo tpb out!


THE PULSE: What's coming up in your first arc on both those series?

MOORE: For Runaways I can tell you the gang is back in Los Angeles. I can't say anything more until Joss is finished with his run. For SMLMJ, the kids are just starting their Sophomore year in high school and there's trouble, oh God, is there trouble at school.


THE PULSE: What conventions are you definitely heading to this year?

MOORE: Supercon and San Diego are my only other stops in the U.S. this year. The other cons this summer are in Spain, Italy and Belgium.

SOURCE: www.comicon.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=36;t=007111

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TERRY MOORE AT THE BONE & BEYOND EXHIBITION

"The power of the comic is unique. You can't find it in film or in novels or in fine art. The fact that you can marry words and images on a page, and the moment is there for you. If you draw the face and the emotions good enough and you put the words next to it, it works. The reader looks at it, and it hits the same emotional buttons as if they'd seen it on film or read it in a book by a favorite author," he said. "The difference is that it's stuck on a page, and it's not going anywhere. That moment's stuck on a page, and that moment stays there all day or as long as you want it to. If it's a moment that makes you happy, it can make you happy all week, all day, all year -- as long as you want to look at that page. If it's offensive, it's offensive all day. If I draw something ugly that offends you, every time you look at it, it's going to offend you. This is the power of the comic book."

"It's ironic because the highest price ever paid for a painting by a living artist was just paid yesterday," Moore said. "Thirty-three million dollars for a painting by Freud. It's a portrait of a nude woman. It's a picture I can't put on the cover of a comic book. If I put that on a comic, we would have a serious legal problem. But they can put it on CNN.com and sell it for a fortune and everybody just thinks it's art.

"Or I can go in the novel business and write about anything I want," he said. "I can write in detail about what Darcy does or what the Parker girls did. Because Thomas Harris wrote the Hannibal Lecter books in great detail. I can't draw a Hannibal Lecter book because there we are right back to the CBDLF case. There's something that has to happen here. We have the finest talents working in comics, but their hands are shackled behind their back.

"So you guys that are getting a higher education and will end up in influential positions in society in about 10 years and will end up running the country," Moore said, "would you please do something about it?"

read more here:
forum.newsarama.com/showthread.php?t=157453

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Terry Moore Interview (JUN 2008)

westfieldcomics.com/interview/216

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Just so you know… Echo 4 is now available everywhere.

And you need to read it before this one comes out in a couple of weeks… Echo 5!

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Hero Intitiative

they have this idea of taking care of retired comicartists.
www.actorcomicfund.org/

Auctioning 100 Ultimate SPider-Man's last year was awesome.



This year they will have 100 HULK #1 covers to be auctioned off

[boomvavavoom]

[grievous444]

From wich comic is it?

[boomvavavoom]

i wish!!

it was a commission.

Found it on comicartfans.com

[boomvavavoom]

www.newsarama.com/comics/080717-TerryMooreEcho4.html

WAY cool interview about Moore and his creation ECHO