DF Interview: Sean Phillips renders a ‘hero’ with a new twist in the ‘Reckless’ OGN

By Byron Brewer

Sex, drugs and murder in 1980s Los Angeles, and the best new twist on paperback pulp heroes since the Punisher or Jack Reacher.

Meet Ethan Reckless: Your trouble is his business, for the right price. But when a fugitive from his radical student days reaches out for help, Ethan must face the only thing he fears…his own past.

Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips, the modern masters of crime noir, bring us the last thing anyone expected from them—a good guy. A bold new series of original graphic novels, with three books releasing over the next year, each a full-length story that stands on its own. DF wanted to hop on for the ride, so we sat down with artist Sean Phillips.

Dynamic Forces: Sean, your graphic novel Pulp with writer Ed Brubaker is already a megahit and a second OGN, Cruel Summer, is now in stores. With the clock ticking – we are all waiting on that chime! – to 2021, how is it Ed and you decided to put out a THIRD OGN, Reckless, before year’s end, and right in the face of the pandemic?

Sean Phillips: Cruel Summer was finished last year, and Pulp was finished in March this year. Ed and I were going to get straight into a new ongoing monthly comic when lockdown hit. All comic shops, Diamond and Image shut down so that put paid to those plans. That project had quite a heavy subject matter, and we felt the time was right to do something a bit more light-hearted. For us anyway! We just didn’t think launching a new monthly comic in these uncertain times was the way to go. Maybe we’ll come back to that project some other time. For the first few weeks of lockdown, Ed and I did an original Parker story for the next Martini Edition of Darwyn Cooke’s Parker adaptations, and then I did a few private commissions until we decided what to do next. We both really liked the format of a hardcover OGN that we’d used for Pulp and Bad Weekend and My Heroes Have Always Been Junkies and decided the time was right to do another one. With an OGN, we could just stockpile pages until comic publishing started up again, and be ready to put out a new book. So off we went. After a couple of months’ delay, Pulp was published and sold really well, much better than any book we’d done before. That made us think maybe we could make a series of Reckless books. I usually draw about 250 pages a year, and without having to stop and paint a cover every month, drawing an OGN is even quicker. Ed had a million ideas for Reckless stories, so we decided to just go for it and get out as many books as we could in a year.

DF: This isn’t just one graphic novel but a trilogy of them that will all see publication within a year, if arrow meets target, of Reckless’ on-sale. How will this be carried out? Is it a continuing saga with continuity? Or three books with similar theme but no threads at all? Or something else?

Sean Phillips: Each volume is self-contained, and can be read by itself, just like our Criminal books, but they each build on each other to a more satisfying whole. Just like a Jack Reacher novel or episodes of Columbo.

DF: Tell us a little about the world Ed and you are building here.

Sean Phillips: It’s set in a sun-bleached 1980s California, before mobile phones and the internet.

DF: Introduce us please to Ethan Reckless.

Sean Phillips: Ethan Reckless is a former Sixties radical, with the scars to prove it. He’s one part repo man, one part private eye, and one part wrecking ball. But when a fugitive from his Weather Underground days reaches out for help, Ethan will have to face the only thing he really fears anymore: his past.

DF: And the OGN’s storyline?

Sean Phillips: Someone from Ethan’s past needs his help.

DF: What were the more enjoyable and/or challenging aspects of handling the art in Reckless?

Sean Phillips: It’s always fun starting a new project, designing new characters and locations. With Reckless, I’m continuing the three-tier layout I do with all the books I do with Ed. This time the pages bleed occasionally too. They never do in Criminal. This time I’m drawing a lot more scenes set in sunny daylight, so I’m relying on my son Jake to do a lot of that in his colors. He’s definitely got that hazy, sun-bleached feel down pat in Reckless. Drawing-wise, I’m aiming for more looseness in the inks, while still putting in all the detail a panel needs. Working well so far, I think. The challenge with all the comics I draw set in the U.S., is picture research. I’m in the UK so I need to research everything I need to draw. It’s all alien to me.

DF: Talk a little about this years-long collaboration you’ve enjoyed – with much success – with Ed Brubaker.

Sean Phillips: He’s been very lucky to have me! We’ve both been lucky that enough people read our books to allow us to continue. We both had a lot of fun in the past working on other people’s characters but nothing beats owning your own work. With Image with have total control of everything from story to schedule to format. We only have to make each other happy, I like his stories and he likes my art, so it’s the best it can be. It would be very weird to give up any of that to go back to Marvel or DC or whoever. Sometimes I miss drawing company characters, but doing the occasional cover or commission scratches that itch. Ed has his movie and TV work for if he ever gets fed up doing comics with me. Hopefully that won’t happen, and we’ll carry on working together until we’re too old to do it anymore.

DF: Sean, tell us what might be coming up for you in the way of projects … including two more graphic novels in this trilogy.

Sean Phillips: Nothing else planned apart from more Reckless books. At the moment I’m halfway through volume two, so still hundreds of pages to go until I can draw anything else.

Dynamic Forces would like to thank Sean Phillips for taking time out of his busy schedule to answer our questions. The Reckless OGN from Image Comics is in stores now! Its second volume, Friend of the Devil, is scheduled to be released in May. A third volume is planned.

For more news and up-to-date announcements, join us here at Dynamic Forces, www.dynamicforces.com/htmlfiles/, “LIKE” us on Facebook, www.facebook.com/dynamicforcesinc, and follow us on Twitter, www.twitter.com/dynamicforces.

THE ART OF SEAN PHILLIPS HC - SIGNED BY SEAN PHILLIPS AND EDDIE ROBSON

THE ART OF SEAN PHILLIPS HC

HEART OF THE BEAST HC 20TH ANNIVERSARY EDITION - SIGNED AND REMARKED BY SEAN PHILLIPS, JUDITH DUPRE, AND DEAN MOTTER

THE COMPLETE RAISE THE DEAD TRADE PAPERBACK

UNCANNY COLLECTORS' SET TRADING CARDS - SIGNED BY ANDY DIGGLE

UNCANNY COLLECTORS' SET TRADING CARDS

ARMY OF DARKNESS #13: THE DEATH OF ASHLEY J. WILLIAMS

2. 04/22/2024 - PETER MILLIGAN

3. 04/18/2024 - RICH DOUEK

4. 04/15/2024 - TONY FLEECS

5. 04/11/2024 - JOE CASEY

Show All