I have a little secret I’m not proud of: With the amount of Kickstarter projects I back, when they arrive, they tend to pile up. I have an entire pile of unread Kickstarter graphic novels and single issues that I always say I’m going to get to next week, and next week always becomes the week after, etc., etc., ad infinitum.
But a couple weeks back, I finished my weekly books early enough that I had some time, and I grabbed a couple books off that pile and read them. And one of those books was the print collection of a fantasy/comedy webcomic, “Monster Lands.”
I don’t even remember how I stumbled across this Kickstarter, but I’m glad I did. It has a wide and diverse cast, some big fantasy action, and it is genuinely funny. When I finished the book, I was thinking, “OK, when I have some time (HA!), I’m going to have to actually catch up on the webcomic, because I want to know what happens next.”
But the vagaries of fate are with me sometimes, because a week after I finished reading volume one, I get an email saying a creator you have backed before has a new project, and wouldn’t you know it, it’s “Monster Lands” Vol. 2! So I immediately backed it, and reached out to creator James Nelson to ask him to talk about “Monster Lands.”
Matt: What is the elevator pitch for “Monsters Lands”?
James: “Monster Lands” is a comedic fantasy story that covers a wide cast of characters that seem like they’d be at home in an ’80s animated show, but with more aged-up humor and violence. The overarching theme of the story is about breaking cycles — a lot of the characters in the story are unwilling or afraid to step out of the roles they’ve carved out for themselves, regardless of how much it’s actually helping them.
Matt: Did you do anything different with the pages that would become volume 2 of the book as a webcomic, knowing eventually it would appear in print? Or had that been a consideration from the beginning?
James: I’ve started doing my pages completely digitally just to make things faster so I can have some more free time and to plan ahead. I turned my hand-lettering into a font to save lots of time as well. This makes it much easier to go back and edit older pages for this book. I’ve begun to try to make my panels bigger and less wordy now that I have an idea of the size of these books.
Matt: You have a diverse cast, with lots of inclusivity, not just in race, gender and sexuality, but body type, which gets forgotten a lot. For example, Othera, one of the main characters, is a female warrior who is built like a bodybuilder, not like a stereotypical chainmail bikini babe. When you developed your cast, what considerations did you have for diversity in the cast?
James: My general idea when designing characters is that they should look different just by looking at their silhouettes. I also wanted this to be a fantasy world where a lot of different people could see themselves inhabiting it and going on adventures. It’s got talking doors and dragons, everyone likes those!
Matt: Humor plays a huge role in “Monster Lands.” Even most of your major villains have comedic moments. How do you balance humor with action to keep the stakes high?
James: You need to know when is the right time to use humor. Usually when the villains are winning or a character is at their lowest point, using humor can undercut the intended tone, so you need to reel it in at those parts of the story. When things start seeming better, then you can crack some jokes to let the audience know that everything is gonna be OK. Basically you don’t want the reader to feel one emotion 100% of the time, or it won’t have any impact. Quiet moments need loud moments, funny moments need serious moments, so on and so forth.
Matt: What are some of your favorite fantasy stories?
James: “A Song of Ice and Fire” is one, for sure, just waiting on the latest book! The characters and political schemes are so thrilling to read about, and I like to theorize about what may happen. I also really enjoy “Avatar: The Last Airbender,” a classic show with a really well thought-out world. When it comes to webcomics, I’ve been reading “Verse,” which is quite beautiful, so I’d recommend giving that a go. I recently finished the anime “Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood,” and I really liked that one as well. All the characters are top-notch in that series.
Matt: What did you learn from Kickstarting volume one that you’ll use with the new volume?
James: I learned how to ship packages faster, which will certainly help this time around. I also learned that frequent updates and communication is important for keeping everyone in the loop. Finishing the first Kickstarter gave me the confidence to continue the story as it showed me people were invested in it.
You can follow James and “Monster Lands” on Twitter @James_L_Nelson, read “Monster Lands” at monster-lands.com and back “Monster Lands” Vol. 2 on Kickstarter.
Matt Lazorwitz read his first comic at the age of five. It was Who's Who in the DC Universe #2, featuring characters whose names begin with B, which explains so much about his Batman obsession. He writes about comics he loves, and co-hosts the creator interview podcast WMQ&A with Dan Grote.
