Well, I pondered how to capture a description for the title of this
interview. “Ask Cartoonists E. T. and Elizabeth Bryan”? After all, they have created the comic Gremlin Trouble (reviewed here on SciScoop!), and are hard at work on their next project (about which they are revealing just enough to tease their fans mercilessly!). “Ask Comic Book Publishers E. T. and Elizabeth Bryan”? After all, they have created their own publishing company, Anti-Ballistic Pixelations, which has had a regular presence at the annual San Diego
Comic-Con. “Ask Engineering Geeks E. T. and Elizabeth Bryan”? After all, they both work as engineers, and E. T. has even drawn a comic about one of the projects he’s worked on — a delightful cartoon History
of GPS! In the end, I went with the most unique appelation of all — and I think everyone can agree that it fits.
E. T. and Liz have kindly agreed to be interviewed here at SciScoop. Remember, YOU ask the questions! Submit your questions all week as comments on this story, and rate the questions of others, and at the end of Friday, Feburary 11 the top-rated questions will be passed on to the Bryans.
12 Responses to Ask Gremlin Experts E. T. and Elizabeth Bryan
apsmith
February 4th, 2005 at 7:19 pm
I’ve only read a little bit – fascinating story-line in Gremlin Trouble. But the one thing that struck me – I’m wondering if the Morlocks and Eloi of H.G. Wells’ “Time Machine” were an inspiration for the gremlin/human split? A lot of technical folk I know kind of see that split already happening – how much of your future do you think might actually happen in reality?
Sweetwind
February 6th, 2005 at 5:04 pm
The teaser
preview on your website of the next project tells me way too little! AAAARRRGH! More details! Will it take
place in “the Gremlin Trouble universe” or is it entirely new? When can we expect it to premier? Is it being conceived with a beginning, middle and end like GT, or will it be open-ended?
Sweetwind
February 6th, 2005 at 5:07 pm
I can see where some of the character’s names come from: Princes
Hexadecimal, Octal, and Binary form a logical sequence, and it’s funny
too :-) The technolutionaries’ seem to be named after great physicists
(Dr. Pi Yukawa after Hideki Yukawa who
discovered the pi meson, for example). Was there any particular
inspiration for the names of Del Delage and the evil sorceress
Jenif-fra? What about the “Brandy” in Dr. Brandy Schwarzchild?
Sweetwind
February 6th, 2005 at 5:09 pm
In Gremlin Trouble, the term “Fay-Tuing” is used by the
extraterrestrials to refer to fairies. Is this an actual word from
somewhere?
Sweetwind
February 6th, 2005 at 5:10 pm
I noticed, especially in Volume I, that some of the dialog in balloons
as well as some of the narrative is typeset (or maybe the word is
machine-printed?) rather than hand-lettered. I noticed because it’s my
pet peeve (I’m of the belief that all comics should be hand lettered, or
printed in a font that resembles hand lettering!), but it didn’t bother
me in this case because it was used judiciously :-) But I couldn’t quite
figure out how you decided when to use hand lettering and when not. Did
you follow some sort of rule?
Sweetwind
February 6th, 2005 at 5:29 pm
An internet search on Anti-Ballistic Pixelations tells me you also published Saiko & Lavender by Michael Vega and Diana X. Sprinkle. Have you published any other titles or cartoonists, and would you publish other titles in the future?
Sweetwind
February 7th, 2005 at 6:51 pm
As a married couple publishing their own comic, you are walking on a path blazed by such couples as the Sims (no, not THOSE Sims) and the Pinis (no, not THOSE… ooopsie, Google’s “I’m Feeling Lucky” hit for “pinis” is being blocked by my workplace as “inappropriate content”…) Anyway, can you tell us some about working on the comic as a couple, and how the creative and business bits sync (or fail to sync)? Does the division of labor described in the Insider Reports article still hold? (”Thomas draws. Stories are developed as a team. Publishing, marketing, and distribution are Elizabeth’s jobs.”)
apsmith
February 8th, 2005 at 11:00 am
So I was expecting it to explain how GPS actually works! I guess it was billed as a ‘history’… I bet it was the “plush” dolls that doomed it with IONS. Anyway, have you thought of adding a few pages of explanation for a broader audience? I bet it could sell via Scholastic or some other education-oriented company!
Sweetwind
February 10th, 2005 at 5:55 pm
How much of your writing on gremlore is “real” and how much did you personally make up? Google found me a reference [PDF] to Percy Prune as being “created
in 1941 to show airmen and women how to use
equipment safely. Prune never got anything right and was always wrapped in bandages.” Is his gremlin association traditional? Are you the first to document his son’s exploits?
Sweetwind
February 10th, 2005 at 6:29 pm
My son’s 2nd grade class is doing a unit on Roald Dahl so I wondered if you had read his book on Gremlins? I hadn’t, but oh my goodness, here’s an on-line copy! [pause while Sweetwind reads for half an hour. Funny, the text says gremlin Gus has a brown face, but in the illustrations he's definitely green!] This looks like it could have been an influence! What fairy stories inspired you the most when working on Gremlin Trouble, and was this one of them?
apsmith
February 11th, 2005 at 2:51 pm
I’ve read a couple of Dahl books, but my son was just reading Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator – hilarious, but also it seemed rather timely, given the talk about space hotels in the next few years. Let’s hope we don’t run into any Vermicious Knids the first time we drop in for a visit…
Sweetwind
February 11th, 2005 at 4:50 pm
As long as there aren’t any of THESE kind!