Show Notes
Today we are joined by super star artist Kelley Jones! You cannot think of Batman in the 90's without thinking of Kelley. His Sandman run was inspiration for John. Join us on a special three part episode where Kenric talks to Kelley about everything form art, to universal monsters, to starting his comic collection!
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Kelly Jones Interview Part 1
[00:00:00] Kenric:: all right, guys. Thanks for coming back today on the show. Well, he's a California boy grown, grew up in citrus Heights. He's an ISER and award winner. He's he's. Probably drawn some of the best Batman work you'll probably ever see. And of course he's worked on Sandman with the great Neil Gaiman, as you just heard Kelly Jones.
Thanks for so much for coming on.
Kelley:: It's my pleasure. Thank you guys.
Kenric:: So what have you been up to man? How's how's life treating you?
Kelley:: actually, you know, I know it's for everyone. It's really weird, I guess it is. But you know, for me, it's kinda like, you know, other than you can only go to the grocery store, right.
Kenric:: Right, right.
Kelley:: it's it's, you know, I've been pretty busy. I've had, I had some tight deadlines anyway, so I wouldn't have got out much.
These last few months anyway. So it's, I think it's, I think it's strange. It's strange in that everybody. I, you know, I just look out on my street and everybody's there all the time. It's kinda like [00:01:00] that's bizarre.
Kenric:: Yeah. They're not at work. They're in your front of your house.
Kelley:: yeah, they're there and I'm used to being the only one on the street, you know, so that, that's kind of strange. And yeah, but other than that, you know, I, and it seems like it's kind of starting to get back a little to normal, whatever that is, whatever that was before normal or not, it seems like it's starting to buy its own inertia.
So it's kind of weird cause everything's has seemed so out of control for a while. Right. You know, and it just kind of does its own thing. It's a, it's a strange time. I, I, I don't know how to, how to, you know, it's going to be one that I'll probably know what it's like a year from now, and then you'll go, Oh, okay.
Now I can put it into words because your first thing is to think a walking dead or something, you know, one of those weird, some, some, end of the world thing,
Kenric:: You know, it's weird as this girl goes, Hey, you should read this book called oryx and Crake. And I was like, Oh, okay. [00:02:00] And she's, she's into weird horror movies and everything else. And I was like, yeah, I'll check it out. And I read it. And it's about a guy that creates a drug that basically he, well, he kills everybody in the world and leaves his friend that he kept giving the antidote to.
Telling him, it was for the other thing, but it's really given this, this guy, this antidote. And so he ends up being the only person left in the world, but his friend, but his friend was like a mad scientist that created these sub humans that do things differently that has like their whole sexual awakening of giving birth and stuff is completely different than ours.
It's all non passion. Everything is very, more like a flower. Right. And. Literally a week or two weeks after I finished this book, the pandemic hits and everything shut down. I'm like, what the hell?
Kelley:: it's weird because you know, I've always been a fan of like stuff, like the day of the Triffids and the
Kenric:: Yeah. I love that stuff.
Kelley:: end of the war. [00:03:00] And you always look at it as like, okay, from, from afar or anything, you know, you read the stand or something, but now that everyone's went through this, all those things have a different feel to it.
Yeah. I think those, they probably work better now because you can, you can identify better. With, with the weird news reports. You know, the only thing on the news is that, it's been strange last it's like only the last few days here. You're getting different news
Kenric:: well, how weird is it in October? The Navy? Releases the tapes that show unidentified flying objects that we're taking. And then three months later we're on lockdown.
Kelley:: I know. And they start and they slowly, and, you know, I used to, I used to think I would like it if they would just say, yeah, yeah, yeah, there it is. But now I'm kind of agreeing with them. I don't like them to say, yeah, yeah, there they are. I didn't know. Well now what do we do?
Kenric:: Have you?
Kelley:: I always kind of liked denying it even though, and then that way you could say all they know, but when you see that they release this [00:04:00] stuff and that the people involved in it are so credible and
Kenric:: they're legit, right? It's not your crazy cousin saying.
Kelley:: know, somebody sitting in that thing, you know, it isn't just a little.
Some zipping around there's somebody in it.
Kenric:: yeah, it's weird. It's super, you know, Joe Rogan had on his podcast, w the pilot from the 2004 footage, and he talked about the whole thing, and then talking to the, the, the pilots that did the, the Ghibli, I think they call it the gimbal thing. And he, yeah, it's super weird, man. That was like,
Kelley:: you know, I've always been interested in pilot reports more than anything else. And, and pilot reports, because one they're trained, they know what's going on, but they have so much to lose. So you figure if one says it a hundred didn't, you know, so at this point, you, you, you figure that, that, so [00:05:00] that's so got into their soul.
What is this? This can't be, it changes your paradigm. I mean everyone who says they believe in it. Yeah. I believe in it, or they don't believe in it. But if you really did like these guys, if you really saw something like that, do it's basically flaunt how much more can do than you, how much more advanced that would be something you'd think about all the time.
I think.
Kenric:: Yeah. It's so it's the one that they shot in 2015 too, which is freaky, is the guy said, look out, you're like, he says, look at your essay, which is the guy explains it, but there's a pot of them, like information, not just one that they're capturing on infrared, but there's a whole other ones that they couldn't get
Kelley:: Well, how many, I mean, you guys have to have this as, just as I do you have friends or family? You say they've seen something.
Kenric:: when I was a kid, we did see something we didn't, but to me it looked like more like we saw a very close meteor that was probably burning up in the atmosphere. That's [00:06:00] how I took it, but I was like nine, you know what I mean? And that's how my dad explained it to me, but we definitely saw a giant flash in this guy.
Kelley:: I, and you know, it isn't like I do comics and that's why I think for me, it was on our street. when I was growing up, my dad did construction and he had us, my brother and I load up his stuff. He was talking to a friend of his, on the street. It was early, early, even just sun going down, but it was heavy, very overcast.
Not running, but very overcast and this incredibly bright light just moves up from the South and you're waiting, you know, when you see it, you don't say, Oh, UFO, you just go bright light. You're wait for the sound of the jet. You wait for the sound of the engines and it just never did it. And it, and then it comes up almost to where we are and it's stopped. And every week, no one's saying anything. No, one's saying, look, look at that. Everyone just stops on the, you know, that was out on doing whatever, [00:07:00] go straight up through the clouds like gone.
Kenric:: Yeah, it's fucking so
Kelley:: and all I remember, all I can remember is my father had served in the military and the guy he was talking to was an air force And they both looked at it and everyone looked at everyone's looking at each other, cause it never made a sound. But it got really, really bright. And then it goes straight up through the clouds, no sound, maybe like this little hole going through it it's nuts. And I was a kid, you know, I wasn't that old and I can't remember too much of things going on that I can remember crystal clear and no matter what, if it never happened again, if it was the only one that ever did, that's still the weirdest thing, you know, that's just this week thing.
Kenric:: Yeah. And now you kind of had confirmation that it could be
Kelley:: I had to, you know, my father was, was, had to do, they had to be able to identify things cause he was in the Navy and the guy was the other, the friend on the street was, [00:08:00] a captain in the air force, training people to fly Delta wing fighters then. So they knew, they both said they had no idea what that was and had never seen anything
Kenric:: so crazy. It's so
Kelley:: And at that point, your whole world changes, right? It's like, wow. Okay. That
Kenric:: yeah, a hundred percent.
Kelley:: what they, I don't not care what science says, something that is not from here.
Kenric:: well, I always believed, and I always believe even if we never see it, like in our faces, you know, even though I think that stuff that came out in October is pretty much pretty clear that there's something more here.
Kelley:: pretty slam
Kenric:: Yeah, but I always believe that there's other rates, other beings from other places, maybe not necessarily coming here, but definitely in the expansion of the universe, we can't be the only, only beings out there.
That's ridiculous.
Kelley:: Absolutely. And before, you know, it is true, extraordinary, extraordinary claims need extraordinary proof. That was pretty extraordinary proof
Kenric:: yeah. But do you have Jeff?
[00:09:00] Kelley:: I mean, you're being
Jeff:: let me say a couple.
Kelley:: planes. Your multiple radar hits visual confirmation camera confirmation. I mean, it's everything you asked for.
Jeff:: Well, I would say, I think it was a few months earlier from the video of they published the Pentagon. There actually was a news article and a couple of well-known, websites and magazines that there was evidence of. And they found evidence that there was a patent. That's someone has on a vehicle, some sort of shift vehicle that can move like that through water and in air, in all directions at once.
So come around and come through to my father about going. So the question is, did the pattern come before evidence of the EFS or did the UFO come and now we have this patent for a spacecraft that can do the same damn thing.
Kenric:: that'd
Kelley:: Well, if they do, they're missing out on making a fortune right now. Huh?
Kenric:: right. Cause that would change travel instantly.
Kelley:: they would have to be, they would have to be like a James Bond villain. Right. You know, it's like we have this great
Jeff:: Yeah,
Kenric:: it was bill [00:10:00] Gates all along.
Jeff:: apparently it was apparently it's, it's the military, the military owned that it's connected to that Pat and apparent. That's why I wouldn't have normally be when they wouldn't be made on it would be a government product.
Kelley:: they wish they wish they had that.
Kenric:: right.
Kelley:: No, they wish no one, no, no way it, whatever you saw in that, nobody, nobody will be able to do that for 500 years. Yeah,
Kenric:: It's crazy.
Kelley:: exhaust, no heat. You're moving at will
Kenric:: Well, the guy that was on, on Joe Rogan
Kelley:: miles. You're going 5,000 miles an hour. You can go from 60 feet to 35,000 feet in one sweep of a radar.
Kenric:: yeah, that's nuts. Yeah. Well, the guy on Joe Rogan's podcast can't remember his name and it kind of drives me nuts, but he's a, you know, he was a commander in the air force, a pilot, but he talked about. That, when they, when they think about how they watch, how it [00:11:00] moves and seen it live, they felt like it was more a manipulation of gravity, you know, because air water, nothing seemed to bother it.
It just did what it
Kelley:: No, no. And if you are able to get here from somewhere else,
Kenric:: yeah. You're going to have that.
Kelley:: That, that technology to get you from wherever to here, what they, what we saw was child's play from that, you
Kenric:: Yeah. Yeah,
Kelley:: to be able to do that, to be able to go, I, it, look, it's hard to wrap our heads around just the distance, you know, From here to Pluto or something, you know, just in, in terms of just the solar system, just how big the solar system is.
It's I can't get my head around that. and, and so to say from another star, which I think, look, I'm not judging it by what we do, or our knowledge of physics. It's somebody, you know, give somebody else a hundred thousand years
[00:12:00] Kenric:: Who knows.
Kelley:: what they can
Kenric:: Yeah. I think that's that folding of space and time that Albert Einstein talked about.
Kelley:: Yeah, well, look, it could end. It could be something even more exotic than that.
Kenric:: Yeah.
Kelley:: You know, it could be something that, that doesn't take what we think it would take. Isn't what you'd need to do that we think you need to do. and there's all the old examples, but that's all beside the point. The fact of the matter is we all saw what these things did.
Kenric:: it's incredible.
Kelley:: and you, and you have too many people. Who've seen these things before, who are very, who are extremely credible, have nothing to gain. it's genuinely bizarre and it is what it is. I mean, and I think it affects people of beyond just how bizarre they are, how it affects people personally. I mean, I remember not.
Maybe 15, 20 years ago, an aunt of mine was at Christmas [00:13:00] and this wasn't even the subject something else was being spoken about. And somebody had said about, had mentioned, and there's maybe 25 30 people at this Christmas dinner.
Kenric:: Yeah.
Kelley:: And, and someone just brought up stuff that you're embarrassed by your stuff.
You don't talk about her stuff. You blah, blah, blah. And I have this very elderly aunt who just says, well, I saw a flying saucer once, and she'd never said this, her husband's sitting there and looks at her and she says I was in a bus in 1947 coming down the foothills towards Sacramento. And it was the middle of the day.
And we're all in a bus coming down from the Hills. And this thing just came over the trees, big silver disks, just like they say, just. Came over kind of floated went down the Canyon and off it went didn't knock high speed. Just sort of when its way, but it was big solid thing. [00:14:00] Nobody on the bus said anything. That's what, and that was her thing. Wasn't I saw the UFO it's that we saw this and nobody said anything. And she didn't say anything until at this dinner. And so I just said, so you never told anyone. She goes. It just didn't come up and you think, okay, there's, that's a weird thing now. I mean, I would, I
Kenric:: She that she had to feel like she would be teased or someone would say, Oh, they'll probably think I'm lying. You know what I mean?
Kelley:: Or something, but she didn't see. I mean, she just said it like, yeah. And the strange thing is nobody said anything and I always want know the strange thing was you saw something, Then the rest is the rest, you
Kenric:: This is weird. Does having conversation like this? Get your creative juices going. Okay.
Kelley:: it's one of those things where, [00:15:00] probably what it does is to creative people, which I think is virtually everybody. I think that's just, I think that's in everybody's DNA is to be creative.
Kenric:: Got to find the medium that your creation is in.
Kelley:: Or whatever it is, I mean, but it, but I think people who do it, who, who go maybe to the step I do or something, it affects every part of your life though.
It doesn't mean you draw everything in your, you know, you just, if you build a wall, you build it, like you think, well, how would I make it more than just functional, but interesting. You know what I mean? It's like, you know, it's, it's, they called it not romantic. Like. You know, towards you, you're, you you're romantic towards a girl or something, but romantic in how you see the world, you know, you see things romantically.
And I think that's, that's when you talk about stories like this, people who see the world in that way, it, it, it makes that speculation. You're, you're not instantly frozen by the science of something. You start thinking [00:16:00] about somebody sitting in it.
Kenric:: The wonder men of it all.
Kelley:: Yeah. What, what are they thinking? What, why are, why, what would I say to them?
What would they say to me?
Kenric:: Yeah. I think that, well, do I taste good? I don't know. I don't know.
Jeff:: Yeah.
Kenric:: So, Kelly, I understand that you are a lover of horror movies from way, way back and your parents had a very funny role.
Kelley:: That rule being, you could watch anything you want it. Absolutely at any time you want, if you want to stay up late, you just gotta be, do whatever you gotta do then. But if, you wake them up with a nightmare, if you do, if you do the screaming in the crying and the, I can't sleep, you never get to see it again.
That's it. You're
Kenric:: more horror movies.
Kelley:: No more horror films, no more. Any of that
Kenric:: So what movies just scared you where you almost went and told your parents? I can't
Kelley:: Oh, there. Okay. Well you go back. Too. There's certain ones that just [00:17:00] nailed me and there would be, and sometimes you wouldn't think they would, and now you wouldn't. But when I was a kid, they ran war the world. Okay. It's probably the sound editor of got me because it was so loud of a movie
Kenric:: Right.
Kelley:: and. And there's an end of the world for you. Right. So, and that one just, I thought they were coming, you know, I thought they were coming. there was another one I remember. and it's funny when you go back on some of these things, when you're young, they're terrifying, then as you get older, they're okay.
There was another one called a Navy versus the night monsters.
Kenric:: Oh, I haven't seen that one.
Kelley:: Okay. And, and they're on this little Island and, it's near, I don't know where the hell it is. I just remember this guy comes, you hear this guy saying, yeah, I'll go take care of, and he goes off into the forest and you heard this blood curdling screams and he comes [00:18:00] back and his arms missing and he just falls down.
And there's this, just this bloody stump. And I don't even remember the rest of the movie. I just remember that. That was unbelievably, just, I couldn't believe it. And of course, creature of the black lagoon, I couldn't go swimming anymore.
Kenric:: Oh,
Kelley:: used to, we used to go to the Lake
Kenric:: I was like jaws
Kelley:: thought twice about it. After that I knew he lived in that Lake
Kenric:: you know, what's funny
Kelley:: not convince me otherwise, but those things would wake me up,
Kenric:: I had a very similar childhood. My, my parents wouldn't let me watch anything rated R right. And my, my mother is super religious, like strict religious, too. Right. And, but we in 19, I'm 45. So I'm five years old in 1979, six years old, 1980. I have an older brother who is five years older than me. And we had Showtime and we had cable, but back then [00:19:00] they had a PG key. We had a little box and there's a literal key. You do you know what I'm talking about?
Kelley:: I remember because when you first got cable, you could, you could hit a switch.
Kenric:: Yup. Yup. So my parents would put that key on my dad's, And my brother went up 11 o'clock at night. They went to bed, they were asleep and he, and they always slept with their door open, but the TV was downstairs. So he goes upstairs, grabs the, you know, sneaks. The key goes back downstairs and they had in one night they had Salem's lot.
This is all on Showtime. They had Salem's lot. They had, and it was the, the cut version of the miniseries. So it was just two hours long, said that they had the hand with Michael Kane and yeah, 1930s prank was in 1930 when Frankenstein came out. So we start with Salem's lot. We watched that and that scared the crap.
It's the scene with the kid in the hospital bed and his friend.
Kelley:: scratched on the
Kenric:: Oh, my God, that scared the crap out of me. And my brother's like, I'm putting the [00:20:00] covers over my eyes and he's going, it's safe to watch I turn out. And it's that scene and the scene where I think is it Vincent Price that gets pushed up against the wall of horns,
Kelley:: no, that was, James Mason.
Kenric:: Jason? Yeah, that scene. So when they showed that, I was like, Oh, and when I think back about it now, it's kind of gruesome that, that, that was on TV. Like
Kelley:: Look, I,
Kenric:: it was a huge hit too, right.
Kelley:: I, yeah, I, I once said to my parents after seeing Frankenstein as a little kid, I said, the sun's too bright in my bedroom cause it would face West. And so I, I like Thumbtack one of my blankets up over the window because I was convinced he was going to look in my window
Kenric:: I did that with the Dracula.
Kelley:: tell him, I couldn't tell him at seven years old that cause that would, then it would be, I
Kenric:: You're breaking the rule.
Kelley:: say that. It's what it was. Do remember also, you know, my dad loved this stuff. My dad loved. Outer limits and night gallery and monster [00:21:00] movies. We used to go to the drive ins and see all these things. and so we would go and, and you know, my mom couldn't care less about it. So, but that was, I think mostly that rule came from, if your mother gets upset, it's going to be me who gets him.
Cause I have kids on now. I get what my dad went through. Cause I used to do things to my kids. for fun, you know, that probably wouldn't be smart.
Kenric:: What are you doing? Krampus on December 5th,
Kelley:: they always, they would always get up and wander around and they're little kids, right. They'd want a cookie or something. And my wife would say, well, you know, she talked to him, well, I remember being talked to and I'd wait until their mouth shut.
And then I wait until their door shut and then I'd go get a cookie. so I had this, one of those great Dom posts, Frankenstein masks. And I had this a cake from a Halloween. I kept it from a Halloween party from a million years earlier, Dracula Cape. [00:22:00] And I just stood at the end of the hall. I didn't do anything.
The lights were out. I just stood. I didn't say anything. I waited and I knew they would go down and get a cookie. And I just waited. I just stood there and they opened the door and they don't really notice me. And then they notice me. don't do anything. And all I do is I don't say anything and do anything.
I just walk really fast towards him. They fly into their rooms, slam the doors. anything. I don't say anything. And then I go and I take that stuff off and I go, and then you can make it to where they can hear me. I said, Hey, I think there's something in the hall.
Kenric:: Oh, that is evil, evil genius,
Kelley:: talk about it now that, you know, thankfully they talk about it well, and not to a counselor or a therapist. But, to me that was funny, you know, that was fun to do. and, but my father, you didn't do those kinds of things, but my father was a big lover of [00:23:00] and a big lover of those kinds of movies.
And. He was the one who would help us tweak the fireworks to where they went from safe to not sane. so he never really grew up that way. And, and that's probably why I associate these things with a lot of, a lot of fun, you know, it goes from really scary to really fun. Because he would, I remember him getting up, wants to tell us to turn that damn TV down.
Right. Cause it's, I dunno, 12 o'clock at night and brother and I were watching TV and he came in and, and, and I just said, but them, as on
Kenric:: that's a great
Kelley:: yeah. And he goes, all right. And he goes in and he pops popcorn. He had to work in the morning, pops, pop, and we're watching them until two in the morning.
Kenric:: Oh, that's a great dad. That's a great dad.
Kelley:: Yeah. So he, he dug it, you know, he dug that the right stuff.
Kenric:: Yeah. I love that you have this very, amazing relationship with your, that you had with your parents, but [00:24:00] also with your brother who drove you around to find all these comic books
Kelley:: yes he
Kenric:: and fantastic for number 84, what does that mean to you?
Kelley:: He came home with it from school and I'd never seen comics. I knew like I watch cartoons and stuff, you know, I love it. I was already ready for it because I love Johnny quest and I love those kinds of cartoons. the star Trek, animated series, those kinds of things. I think they did planet of the apes like that.
So I was into that kind of story and he was in, I want to say seventh grade, eighth grade, something like that. And at the end of the year, at the end of the school year, he was just given a stack of the, I guess the teacher used them. Like when you got your work done, read a comic book or something, he came home with them, they just cleaned out his, and he came home with them and you just put them on the, on a table.
And it was like crack, you know, go up to it. And I go, what is this? And there was Marvel's greatest comics and a few others, but I remember the first one [00:25:00] was, will man survive with the Inhumans. And, and Maximus was. Smashed in a table and all the fantastic four were little on it. I understood everything.
I read that thing. I still have that issue. I still have those
Kenric:: I literally, Kelly, you literally got chills because your experience and how you got introduced in comics is a parallel to how I got into comics with my brother who introduced me to X-Men and Spiderman and Batman back in like 1981, 1980. And
Kelley:: And it's amazing. It's amazing because it's electric
Kenric:: Yeah, it was, it was totally electric.
Kelley:: wasn't too much after that. My mom and dad had a friend who had, A cabin in North Lake Tahoe. And there was no cable, no, nothing. I mean, you got one radio station and one television station
Kenric:: If you're lucky.
Kelley:: was, it was snowing like crazy or whatever.
Anyway, he got the use of it and he wanted to maybe entice my mom to maybe do a cabin themselves. [00:26:00] Right. So rather than say, just do it, he wanted to take her, have a good fun time. And then she would be more amenable to going in and building a cabin or something. And when we were there, there was this big chest and the guy who, who owned the place had told my dad, tell your son, he didn't know.
I liked him at all. Tell your son if he wants any of those old comic books, he can take them because they're going to Rob my kid's brain and he didn't want, you know, you had the prejudices of comics. So my dad who didn't mind comic books at all, and I never really got her. I had this handful for my brother.
Never entered my mind to go buy them though. Okay. You know, go to a. Seven. I, it just didn't. I, they were, that was it. And, and in there, they, they had only just been, they could not have been out that long. were all the, all the Marvel stuff, all this DC stuff, it was great. I'm reading the Avengers.
I'm reading fantastic for Spiderman, Superman, all this stuff. And at the end of it was swamp [00:27:00] thing. Number two, and, monster Frankenstein, five. there's rights and employment. I hated those books. I hated them when I read them, I hated them. I hated them. I hated them.
Kenric:: Scared you too much.
Kelley:: and I love CA I love scary stuff, but I didn't think in comics, you know, when you're a kid, they're super heroes and you blah, blah, blah.
And it bothered me. And so I read them and I think Wrightsons, unmined scarred me. this head
Kenric:: he's so good.
Kelley:: a potty. Scarred me and I would stare at that drawing and it really scarred me. So I put them in, I put them down. I, you know, I read all the other books first. I read those last, but about two hours later, it just stayed with my hand to look at it again.
It's like I had to see this again. I had to look at Medusa again and, I read it again and I was, and it's like, I don't know. It, it, that alchemy work and I loved it.
Kenric:: Yeah.
Kelley:: I loved it. And it's the first time. And I got a chance to [00:28:00] tell him when wean this and Bernie, it was the first time I ever went to go look at the credits page and see who did this.
And the names were wonderful wean and writes. And it sounds like guys would make scary
Kenric:: right, right. Bernie Wrightson.
Kelley:: and style was so weird. And so it was ploop, plugs had a big spider that would suck the brains out and Frankenstein had to fight the spider. It was great, but at the time I read it, I will, Oh my God.
You know, nightmare fuel. and then I had told, I had said to, I told that story to both those guys and I said, you know, I went from hating you. And in two hours I, you know, was loved you.
Kenric:: Yeah.
Kelley:: And, and they both loved, in fact, Lynn wean used to make me tell that story to him all the time.
Kenric:: No. That's awesome.
Kelley:: Tell me that again.
Tell me that again, because he loved the fact that it would, you know, I was the exact age at the time that he was aiming it at. And that's what every writer or artist would want to hear. They hate you. [00:29:00] And then they love you, that you did that. It was so out of the, out of the mainstream, out of the, whatever, but it stayed with me longer than the stuff that was in the mainstream.
Even though I loved it,
Kenric:: Right.
Kelley:: I can still go back and read it and, and get swept away. So that's, that was absolute magic. And it's a perfect, you know, there's a blizzard outside.
Kenric:: The whole backdrop is set up for this.
Kelley:: yeah, it's perfect. There's a blizzard. There's no TV or radio really to speak of. There's nothing really. There's just a big fire.
And I just sat and read comics there. And my dad, my dad liked that so much that I was quiet through that, that every time we'd come into town, we'd just go to the seven 11. And whether I was there or not, I could be unloading the car whenever he'd go into town and he'd just get one of everything. And so he'd get me one of whatever they had and that's where I got into Wayne.
Howard's midnight tails. That Charlton book, man. I, [00:30:00] I love that still. One of my all time, favorite books is Wayne Howard's midnight tails with Arachni. I loved that. Loved that book. And so yeah, I mean he came, I remember him coming home with, Barry Windsor Smiths. Conan treasury with red nails in it, this big book.
I'd never seen anything like that. And I just,
Kenric:: God Barry Windsor Smith, his cone and stuff is so flipping good. It's
Kelley:: Still, still feel the best Conan ever.
Kenric:: Oh, right. It's like, you look at some of that work and you're like, it's not even fair. That you're that good?
Kelley:: And it's one of those things where I always kind of identified with him in one way, in that he knew who he was, but he wasn't really allowed to be who he was. Right. So he goes away for a year and then just does what he wants to do the way he always saw inking himself. Not trying to be Jack Kirby or anything.
Kenric:: right.
Kelley:: Oh,
Kenric:: Being the best Barry Windsor Smith. He could be
Kelley:: yeah. Just going to be who he wanted to be [00:31:00] and you take your chances with it. And, and that's kind of happened to me on dead, man. I, I, you know, I had a pretty good career going out. Marvel had me under contract. I was making a living the whole, everything that you want to do. And it was completely unfulfilling, thoroughly, completely unfulfilling.
I was, I was transitioning myself out of comics because I just wasn't enjoying myself. And, at that point, you really that's, that's the place you have to be to make that transition. When I got dead, man, it was like, they saw, they saw how I drew and, and in action comics, weekly, they sorry, drew.
And when they gave me the prestige books, you know, I made the one request I made, which was basically a demand cause I had nothing to lose I wanted to ink it and control the art. and at that point they, you know, they said, yeah, sure, [00:32:00] fine. But Marvel would, you know, Marvel was not so inclined to let me eat myself. So, that, that was a big, that was a big deal to me.
Kenric:: yeah. When, when D C said, sure.
Kelley:: man, if dead man failed, or if they fired me over dead man or dead, man, didn't sell book. I could always say, but this is what I look like. This is what I wanted to
Kenric:: this is me. This is when it ended, but man, you knocked it out of the park and really in my mind is the definitive work for, but for dead man, especially on his look, I mean, you changed everything about it before he just looked like a dude with white face white
Kelley:: Well, look, look, there's, there's a, there's a very difficult thing when you handle certain characters. And that was one of them was, was that it was really deep in the shadows of the tremendous good Neil Adams versions.
Kenric:: right.
Kelley:: And so everyone measured you by that. And even when I did Batman, it was the same thing,
Kenric:: Which isn't really fair, right.
Kelley:: back their mind.
They always think, well, okay, there's Neil and then there's this, that, [00:33:00] or the other thing, you know, but it's Neil. And, so I always said, well, first, you know, I, I know I can't compete with that. So you have to come up with something else. And what what's amazing about art. Is it's it's sadly it isn't about techniques, technical skill, I should say, where you get credit for it.
Whereas you would maybe if you did computers or you're a doctor somewhere yeah. That needs to know your technique in art. It's the idea. And if you can get the idea, you're forgiven the fact that you can't try like new labs
Kenric:: right. It's the emotion that you can convey.
Kelley:: And, and art is created with emotion, right? And it's received with emotion.
It's not there's no, there's nowhere. You can go to learn this to where, whatever learning you have will be accepted by an editor or a reading [00:34:00] public or anybody. It's just, you come in there and can, does that. Like for me, editors would see it and it would, they would be struck by it. And it wasn't because I was a brilliant draftsman.
It would be wow. That, that really, I mean, I remember doing a filling cover for Archie Goodwin on Batman. The first thing I ever did was I think Batman detective six 51 or something, a cover, and it was an inventory cover and, and Archie good one had seen me do dead man. And he called me up and I'd never spoken with him before.
So, and he said, Hey, I'm. wondering if you would want to do just, you know, I want to see how you do, I'll pay you do me a inventory and we may, or we may not use it, but I want to see what you do if you did Batman, just anything you want to do with Batman. I did this one cover. Yeah. She really, really liked it. Yeah. I look at it now and [00:35:00] I go, God, it's kind kinda clunky here and it's kind of clunky there and, you know, but. When he described it, he said, boy, I haven't seen anything like this
Kenric:: I don't know. That looks pretty bad ass Kelly.
Kelley:: you know, it was one of those things where you just, and he asked me, where did that come from? Where did this come from? And I told him, I said, well, I don't know how to, you know, I don't go into it thinking if I were this hero, what would I do? Or blah, blah, blah. Go. I think of it like, well, if she was after me, you know, how would I react? What, what, what, especially with Batman. And he liked that answer. I said, I don't know how to be a hero.
I'm I'm not that. but I do know what would scare me. so I said, I don't really think of him as his musculature or this big physical presence. I see the shape in the dark and I see the shape [00:36:00] staring at me. All it says all it, it doesn't give big, long speeches is just to stop it. And, you know, okay.
Now in Gotham, the crazy people keep doing it. That's why they're crazy. But the regular people, in fact, I did it, I did it. I got to use these ideas. They were ideas I always wanted to do when I was doing it with Doug. And there was just never a place to stick them in. So all the years later, when I did Kings of fear a year or two ago, I said, I want to put in these things.
And one of them was that what I just said there. And the other was that like the bat signal is not a call to him to come and do something, which it is, but the regular people, us, we wouldn't know that. Right. We don't know that it's a warning that he's loose and Batman is the worst of the, whatever the, you know, he's the worst.
Because they have to do a warning. They don't do it for the joker. They don't do it for the Riddler. Clayface any of [00:37:00] the others. They do it for him though. And he's the worst and the best, because he's never in our common asylum. All the others are in our chromosomes. He never gets caught. And when you see him fighting those guys, if you happen to see him fighting those guys, it's over turf. It's not, it's not like he's saving anyone. It's not like he's doing anything good. Because if people thought he was a hero, they're not going to be afraid of him.
Kenric:: Right.
Kelley:: They don't know, they don't know what his motivation is. They don't know who he is. They don't know what he is. They just know this. He did he's terrifying.
So I was able, they, they liked that and they let me put it in there. and that struck a chord. I've been very pleased that Kings of fear did as well as it did. And there they keep reprinting it and whatnot.
Kenric:: that's good stuff. When did you.
Kelley:: was, but it was those weird ideas, you know?
Kenric:: Yeah. Well, when did you really start, doing the, the, the oversized ears? Cause I gotta tell you that's my favorite feature that you do is the back is on the cow. And then you've probably heard that a million times, but.
Kelley:: know I look, [00:38:00] I, I always, I always thought of it not, I don't get too deep in the weeds on it. I just thought again, if this guy was coming down an alley at me or swooping down, or just in my study, And he doesn't come out in the bright light and say hi, and you know, or hit I'm Batman, stop it.
He just is there. And I thought that his silhouette, his, his that's what you would really, you don't want, you're not going to focus on this guy. You're going to run from him or you're going to get the crap kicked out of you, but he's the shape and you don't forget it. And it's demonic and, and anything that makes him more like another hero.
I didn't like. Because I thought he works on the psychology of that, that that's, that's his thing. and I thought he holds himself that way. I never saw him as a crazy guy. I never saw him as that. I saw him as dedicated to what he does, like a brain search, and I'm going to cure that [00:39:00] tumor,
him that way, but he also knew that intimidation.
99% of his work has stopped with regular people over that. That that's my, that was the thing that I wanted to, I remember all these little things like captain, captain kept I put in Kings of here. Cause you never know if you'll ever do a Batman again. So I said, I wanted it to be where there's a gal at the end.
Who, who, cause you have all these stories where they say, why do you do it? Why do I do it? Why do I do it? Well, the reason he does it. Because, you know, joker always gets out and, penguin always gets out. The reason he does is it changes people's lives, regular people. And there was this girl in it and she says, my boyfriend ran with a bad crowd. one night you came into his life and he could not, you told him you told him to stop it. [00:40:00] And turn yourself in and he went and did it. And though he still has nightmares. He changed his life and he now has a, makes a living and he got married and he has a little girl and dah, dah, dah, and it was due to that.
And he, and Batman apologize. I'm sorry about the dream. She goes, don't at all. Apologize for the dreams.
Kenric:: that's awesome.
Kelley:: So that was a little thing. I, in fact, that was a story I always wanted to call a 2% because it was to explain why Gordon would break our fourth amendment. And he's the best guy in Gotham yet here he is working with vigilante, breaking all the rules, putting people in jail.
Kenric:: yeah, yeah.
Kelley:: would he, and, and he would have like, you know, like when. For the IRS, you have the books they show, and then you have the secret books. Well, his secret books were the real arrest reports, the real stuff. And that the [00:41:00] recidivism rate, when Gotham would arrest, you would be like 88% would go back and do it again.
But with man, it was only 2%.
Kenric:: The, yeah, the bosses.
Kelley:: Yeah, those dudes, everyone else said never again.
Kenric:: So,
Kelley:: Because they were more frightened of him than they were of working for the joker,
Kenric:: yeah, that
Kelley:: paint on or whoever.
Kenric:: So Jeff has a, has a question or a
Jeff:: Well, I was actually, I was thinking about the Batman that you drew, and obviously we're talking about as Kendra brought up, like the long years, everything else, I always kind of viewed it as sort of like the perception of him. Like you were seeing how people perceived him, or then you're seeing how he actually is.
Cause he kind of looks like a nightmare or it looks like that, like the dark aspect of how we would imagine Batman would be when we first see him kind of thing.
Kelley:: No exactly. That's exactly it. I can't add anything to it. That's exactly what it was. I, I know that it would scare me, something like that. I'm taking out the trash, I'm a bad guy, but I'm taking out the trash [00:42:00] and I go out there and theory is, you
Jeff:: Well,
Kenric:: Oh shit.
Kelley:: and that would, I would, I wouldn't focus on all the details and the bits and the pieces.
And I know people, I know they do that now. I, I've just never been into all the armor and the bits and the pieces. I've always thought it's the Cape and the cowl and the rest of it. I like the gadgets. I like that he can pull something out of his, you know, I remember, one writer says any catches man bat, and I don't know how any just wrote.
I don't know how he does it. He just catches Batman and it, let me make a little in his utility belt, a man back catcher. Right? That it's only for man back, you know, and he throws this thing, it spreads out a big net. It grabs him and it, you know, does a little parachute and he drops him down. Cause he's figured he's flying when he's doing and doesn't want to kill him.
So it did all these things. And I dig that. I dig those things because every once in a while you want to remind everyone and of course he can do this too. Like if all else fails, he's [00:43:00] got that utility belt.
Jeff:: Now when you were making, the as bad cost and where were you, I'm assuming you were on, when the designers of the appearances you drew the first covers for them? Like, what do you think to yourself? I can, I have to step it up with Batman. Cause you meet Batman, you know, a very scary Batman. Now you've got to step it up even more with Asrael Batman.
Kelley:: Well, a lot of that, I think part of it was, I was looking at, jokey Sada had come up with some designs and I've there's few other people. And they said, we know. That you're not really gonna follow you. We know that. just kind of do something that, you know, blah, blah, blah. And, and at that point, yeah, you just sort of go into it.
And, I knew one thing I would do is I would still retain the Cape as being weird,
Jeff:: yeah.
Kelley:: that would be kind of, you know, cool to have this. This ultra modern thing. And then, then something that was very old school connected to it. I still haven't really seen that done. Usually if [00:44:00] something's modern, it's Uber modern.
Right. And they don't add something kind of old with it, something traditional with it. So I did that and that worked out really, really well. I, you know, when I did it, it was always kind of difficult for me because I'm such a traditionalist with Batman. And I'm so into how I do him, the way I do, because it, it dictates story to me, it dictates how I tell a story.
and I think Batman is so utterly unique that he doesn't need anything more. I know, you know, that's probably makes me in the small, in the minority on that. I just think he works so much better as this mysterious character. I don't want to know his personal life too much. You know, it's, it's interesting.
It's okay. It's okay. As a subplot, but the main thing still is him in, in doing his business.
Kenric:: right him in the night.
Jeff:: Yeah.
Kelley:: really? I
Jeff:: did the leg fin, [00:45:00] where did the light fins, where did that come from? From.
Kelley:: What did work come from?
Jeff:: As a, as on the legs, he had those kind of fins coming out from the, from the legs on AskPat.
Kelley:: I think that was something they had asked for. They said they wanted, some kind of symmetry to it. And, and so at that point, they didn't say put that stuff there, but I just started going okay, well, I'll just, I'll, I'll make things, I'll take certain elements that were like on his arms and I'll put them on his legs.
As well, you know, just anything to make it different, anything to kind of make it, you know, and again, they used to get frustrated with me because whereas I would show him a lot of times I put the Cape all over him, you know, and they wanted to show off the armor and stuff. So, yeah, that was, it was always kind of funny, you know, that I would do that.
but to me, it, it, it was working visually and it was getting a great reaction. So at that point, I go, let's not screw it up. I mean, everybody else is doing this. Let's just keep doing that. You know, if [00:46:00] everyone else is doing whatever they're doing, that's fine. But if we can do our own thing, we're the only place they can get at this.
This is working.
Jeff:: I love the cover to detective comics, six 67 so much. I still want that on my wall. It's such a beautiful uncover. I love the Astro bat costume. I know some people may not, but I absolutely adored at those when the best local Batman. Cause it was absolutely terrifying. It literally took, it looked like a dark night, you know, with the armor and everything attached
Kelley:: Well, that's, that's exactly it. And I would think of it that way, because I would take that and say, well, here he is dressed in armor right here, here he is dressed that way. eh, and if we're going to do it, I wanted it to be as far a field from just the, the, the, what he was wearing before. And I never got, you know, they would always say, well, I never asked the questions of what he wore.
I just knew to me, it was like, how did the colors color it? That's all I cared about. and, and go from there. But when it got to this, I thought, well, then I wanted, I thought of him, like, if he was some [00:47:00] Crusader or something, you know, And not the caped Crusader, but you know, the real kind that puts on armor and you know, that, that, that kind of vengeance guy, that, that guy who is a reckoning.
So, and since, you know, as bats was. The way they were writing was saying, okay, if you really had a guy doing what you, these kinds of awful things you wouldn't want that you want, you want your more ethical, moral Batman. so you could go a little further with it, you know?
Kenric:: You want the ambiguity?
Kelley:: Yeah. Well, I'm big on ambiguity.
Kenric:: yeah. Yeah. What, what does Marshall Rogers mean to your career?
Kelley:: Well, Marshall. When I was, they had just started doing comic book stores in my area, at least. And I remember going there and I wasn't buying, I was buying Marvel and old, old [00:48:00] horror comics and stuff like that. If I bought new stuff, it would be like micro knots and the X man and Avengers, stuff like that.
Or wasn't really buying DC. And a friend of mine said, you've got to read this. This is really good. And it was the first of those. And I didn't, and I don't want to run around, down. I'm not into Batman. And I would, you know, because I would buy one or here or there, I get a, the, you know, Neil Adams, this or that.
But, when the second one of those detectives come on, he says, no, you have to, now I'm going to sit here and you're going to read these. And I read those two issues and knock me out. I mean, I was instantly. A fan of this. And certainly Inglehart story was wonderful, but it was, it was Rogers who had such a different style. And, it was so cinematic. It was, it was like a movie, but better. And [00:49:00] Marshall knew where and when to highlight a panel, he knew how to get you to that panel. He knew how to focus your eye. Now, I didn't know any of that. I just knew I was doing it. And when, anyway, I got to be a tremendously big fan of his, I loved his mr.
Miracles, like crazy. I think that's my favorite. My favorite full page spread of all time is, in mr. Miracle where it's a closeup of dark side.
Kenric:: Oh, that's cool.
Kelley:: Yeah. And all these, all it says is, well, you know, you have mr. Miracle going all through apocalypse to go and try to kill dark side and dark sides waiting for him.
It's not like he could, you know, Darkside knew he was doing it. That was great. But it, all it says is welcome. My son, man, knock me out when I first saw it. So I became a massive Marshall Rogers fan.
Kenric:: I
Kelley:: And, and so a friend of mine, the friend of mine who introduced me to, it said, let's go down. He's going to be, cause he worked at the comic book store.
He says, [00:50:00] Let's go down and he's going to be in San Francisco and let's go meet him. And we go and I, I was drawing, but I didn't bring any art. I was just going, he was there, strangle was there. Kirby was there was it. That was a big deal. And so we go up to see him and man, I was so glad I was telling my friend.
I'm so glad I didn't bring anything because he's just eviscerating people not being mean. He's just basically telling them as it is. These were not good. Pages are good examples of, of comic art. And he was letting him know and he was letting them know what they had to do is basically start over, you know, but he was, he would tell him,
Kenric:: Yeah. That's good though. A lot of people don't do that. They just, they tell you what you think you want to hear.
Kelley:: they don't want to hear it. And if you don't want to hear it, you're never gonna make it. So, so anyway, I was saying to my friend, I am so glad when my friend had brought some of my art. Great. And how I didn't know is he would buy original art and he would buy portfolio stuff. So we had kind of a case for it. So he had taken some of my art and stuck it in there [00:51:00] because he liked what I was doing. And he knew I wasn't really, I wasn't drawing comics really. I was just drawing monsters and weird stuff and, and things like that. And he took it and he sh and he says, Hey, Mr. Rogers, this is my friend, blah, blah, blah.
And I'm like, what is he doing? I'm right here. And then he pulls out this art. says, can you, can you just, if you have a chance, can you just tell us what you
Kenric:: I gotta ask. Did your Adam's Apple just drop into your stomach or what?
Kelley:: I wanted to kill my friend?
Kenric:: Okay.
Kelley:: You know? I'm not pursuing it. I mean, if I was whatever little justice gestation was happening in that, maybe I want to do this. I just saw what he did to these other people. He wasn't mean it was worse. If someone's mean you can lie. I can blow it off. He wasn't mean,
Kenric:: yeah, he's being honest, which scared you
Kelley:: Yeah. Honest. It's worse than me.
Kenric:: especially with some, you don't want to hear.
[00:52:00] Kelley:: he looks at it and he doesn't see anything. He looks at another one. Doesn't say anything. He looks okay. Aye. I'm thinking, Oh man, this is it. I don't know what's gonna happen. And he looks up to me and says, do you have a few minutes? And I go like, and I didn't know when he says, could you come back around the booth and sit for a bit?
And he tells everyone, Hey, you know, I'll, I'll get back to what I was doing. And he spends about 20 or 30 minutes telling me how, what I'm doing. Right. What I need to do.
Kenric:: Oh, my God.
Kelley:: There's something here.
Kenric:: That's amazing.
Kelley:: And that he could see this. And he really liked how I laid blacks down. And I didn't know what he was talking about.
Cause I didn't know any terms. So he, he liked how I textured. He liked how I, I was adding weights to think all this stuff. And I'm nodding not knowing what the hell he's talking about. Cause I don't, I don't know the terms. He drew a little thing, a little, figure sketch for me. On how to, how to construct a human body.
He [00:53:00] gave me a few, she told me where to look. and then he ended it by saying, you know, I think if you pursue this, you can do comics. I think you could do this. I'm pretty sure you could do it. And I think if you ever did you do a really great Batman? I think you would be a great Batman artist and he meant this.
He was very serious
Kenric:: Wow. I can't even imagine.
Kelley:: I can't. And, and what he did was he sat down and he took a page from, from detective or from Batman family, a great page. And he went panel the panel showing me how it's not just thrown there, but why he did it and the decisions he made. And he was trying to tell me, not like how great I am.
Look at me, Kelly, how great it was like here. You gotta think, when you do this, you got to think when you get to that last panel, how did you set up the first panel to get to the last panel? When you're putting a panel together, what do you want the reader to look at? Because you've got to have everything to be there.
I naturally goes to that when you're composing all [00:54:00] the page, what's the main focus of that page. So I'd never thought things like that. I just read comics like everybody else, you know? And it put it, put these things in my head. So I walk out of there. I always regretted. I had not just grabbed that page. Bought it, but you know, it was in those days, 79 80, it was $200, 80, 79. I didn't have that kind of money. I had like enough money to get in and enough money to buy a few things, maybe $30.
Kenric:: right,
Kelley:: And so I always regretted it, but I couldn't foresee that one day I was going to do this much less, get hired, much less do Batman.
Kenric:: right, right.
Kelley:: And so I had told a friend of mine, this, my buddy who went with me, we were shocked. I mean, I remember driving home and I, he was just babbling
Kenric:: old were you?
Kelley:: I was 16, he was 20 or 19, I should say about 19. He was about three years older and he was stunned and he went back and he told [00:55:00] everybody, and they were all stunned because I was just this little kid who would come in and buy, you know, a comic book here or there. they were all big Rogers fans too. At that time, he was, you know, it was John Byrne, George Perez, Mike Golden and Marshall Rogers.
Kenric:: Gee, you just named the rogues gallery of that time.
Kelley:: that was, that was the guys, you know? yeah, they were the buy it sight unseen. so when that happened, that became a big deal. And then it was at the, okay.
So a couple of years later, 82, I get hired by Marvel, have, you know, doing my thing. Eventually I get to where I met D C I'd. I'd never figured I'd be at DC. And, I told a friend of mine that then he, he was very much into art is another guy. And he got into art, collecting and art dealing and art, that whole thing.
And I told him the story on a couple of occasions when I'm telling you, I just said how weird [00:56:00] that is. And I always kicked myself that I, now I didn't, I, it would've been so cool to have that page. Cause how often do you have some kind of art of the actual thing? That was the life changing moment, right?
Here's the page. Here's the thing. Here's where they did it. And I told him that, and just a few years ago, you know, he, he shows up, he, he lives in LA, so he's just driving by coming through. He says, Hey, are you going to be there? And I said, yeah. And so we're sitting in the backyard and he said, Oh, just a minute.
I forgot something. He goes back to his car. He comes back and he damn it. If he pulls this thing out,
Kenric:: Oh, my God. Did you cry?
Kelley:: I,
Kenric:: I think I would have cried.
Kelley:: I was beyond it. There was, it was shock. I mean, literal shock. My wife cried.
Kenric:: That's
Kelley:: she knew that story and I, and he says, and he just slides across because I was about to get my checkbook. Right.
You know? Cause I know that's expensive. He just slides it. Versus this is for [00:57:00] you.
Kenric:: What a friend.
Kelley:: Yeah. And he said, I know what the, I I've heard that story so much. And I knew what it meant. And so he got it and it's, it's, I'm not really a collector of art. I'm a collector of stuff, but art, not so much, but it's, but I have it up on my wall.
Kenric:: Yeah. You know what? So this last Christmas, my buddy, he had a pretty rough upbringing. You know, his, his, both parents died pretty young and they got divorced and all this kind of stuff. But in his bedroom, at his dad's house, he had the original poster that came out for star Wars before the movie came out, which was.
Drawn. Right. And Leah and Luke, they all don't look like, like what they ended up being. And he loved that thing. And he had, and it came in a set with these sheets and he loved it and he was talking about it. And I couldn't find, well, I found the original poster, but the people want like $3,500. I'm like, I just, I know.
[00:58:00] Kelley:: I'm with you on
Kenric:: Yeah. I just couldn't do it. But I found the replica of it. And I tell you Kelly, when I gave him that, that poster. And I waited because we all went over. We had Christmas together because, well, we just did. And when I told his girlfriend, I said that this is what I do. I'm really hoping that he sheds a tear because Keith, this is big burly blue collar guy.
You know what I mean? He drinks all the time. He does not show emotion, you know, unless he's mad. Right. That's the emotion he shows and. He, I, when you opened that thing, he couldn't look away for a full minute. And that's a long time when somebody's staring at
Kelley:: I, I totally get it when it was slid frost, I was in shock
Kenric:: Oh, it was awesome.
Kelley:: was an, and like I said, my wife knew that. And all I said is this is, this is that page. And she just bald.
Kenric:: that's awesome. That's a
Kelley:: And I was stunned. [00:59:00] I look, I hugged the shit out of him,
Kenric:: Give them a hug for me when you see it.
Kelley:: hi. And, and he's like, he he's so funny cause he says, well, I don't want you to think I want anything from you.
This is just for you. And I'm like going, I'm not even thinking like that. Right? He cause he overthinks. I'm just like, this is a direct connection to 16 year old Kelly.
Kenric:: Yeah.
Kelley:: And I'm I, and I told him, I said, you have to understand, yeah, it held this, he put it down, he pointed on it. He swept his hand over. This is, this is it.
Kenric:: yeah. The shaped your career.
Kelley:: it is, I said, it's the thing I said. It's because see, I, I used to, you know, and I'm going to frame this together because there's two things. There was there, there was that swamp thing. Number two, and this something thing.
Number two, made me look to see [01:00:00] who that people did, these things. And I became a fan of Bernie Wrightson at that moment, you know, two hours after the moment I should
Kenric:: Right, right.
Kelley:: and then, and then, this, and it's the only time I met Marshall and, I had an editor at DC who had worked with Marshall.
And I had told him this story now I didn't have the page then, but I told him the story. This is like an Oh six. And I was doing Gotham after midnight for him. And he says, yes, I've worked with Marshall. He says, and I agree with you about Marshall. Cause I had said. Those six issues of detective are the, if you wanted to convince someone, not just a Batman, but of the importance or the, or the credibility of comic book, art of everything.
That's what I would show someone because they're beautifully written, brilliantly drawn and the dramas there. Yeah. All the cliches are there. [01:01:00] And all the stereotypes are there and they're all wonderful. And you immerse and it's why comics are great and eccentric and perfect and movies. Can't get that
Kenric:: Yeah, I love
Kelley:: there.
It's all there. It's why comics are the best.
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