Beanworld Sprouts Anew at Dark Horse

This story originally appeared in PW Comics Week on June 10, 2008 Sign up now!

by Wil Moss -- Publishers Weekly, 6/9/2008 5:48:00 PM

Starting in 2009, Dark Horse will collect all 21 previous issues of Tales of the Beanworld in a series of graphic novels and publish a new Beanworldgraphic novel called Remember Here When You Are There! And this fall, Marder will contribute a new Beanworld comic to Dark Horse Presents on MySpace, and by year’s end he’ll create a new full-color comic.

PW Comics Week: So how does it feel to be back creating comics again? Is it like riding a bicycle or has it been a little more formidable than that?

Larry Marder: It’s been just like hopping back on a bicycle after a long time. And, actually, coming back into a graphic novel world, after working in periodicals, it feels like I’m hopping onto a 10-speed, top-of-the-line sport bike after years of being used to riding an antique. Naturally, it took some getting used to, andmy first few efforts were a bit wobbly, but it all came back to me rather quickly. Now, I’m racing along as if there were never any years of inactivity.

PWCW: You’ve said that you stopped doing Beanworld when the impetus for creating it just kind of left you, but then when you recently did a sketch for a friend it came back—obviously, you were pretty busy in the intervening years, but have you been able to figure out any other reasons why you stopped and what happened that made you able to go back to it?

LM: I never stopped thinking about Beanworld. 

I stopped producing Beanworld for publication when my original publisher, Eclipse Comics, ceased doing business only a few months after shipping Beanworld number 21. At that time, I’d just taken the position of executive director at Image Comics, and the demands of that job, in those tumultuous days for the industry, really occupied my attention in such a way that I kept working on Beanworld in my downtime, but didn’t have the ability to create a new home for it. Adding to all that, I commuted between Chicago and Orange County, Calif., so I didn’t have the luxury of working in the same studio every day, which interrupted my progress.

But even though I slowed down, I thought about Beanworld constantly. I spent a lot of time traveling, with lots of downtime in hotels and airports. As Beanworldideas would pop into my head, I’d jot down notes and scribble panel sequences—which is how I still work. I let the pieces fall out and then worry about how they fit together. But without a home base for me or for Beanworld, I just created freely and didn’t worry about figuring out how to place the bits and shards of story into a proper mosaic that made sense to me. Another key event that frustrated my work at the time was what I call “The Death of Old-Fashioned Art Supplies.” As computer-assisted design, illustration and painting became increasingly prevalent, the commercial uses for old-fashioned art supplies disappeared at a rapid rate because architects and advertising agencies no longer had any use for brushes, pen tips, technical pens, ink, markers and adhesive screen tones. So the stores that sold these things began to dwindle and go out of business. Art supplies that were still being manufactured and shipped were nowhere as well made as they had been previously. When I was unable to replace the point of a beloved technical pen, I went into a bit of a tailspin. Sounds funny in hindsight, but I really did. No home base, no publisher and now no art supplies! I knew it was time for me to follow the advice of Marcel Duchamp, one of my great influences, and just go underground.

It wasn’t that conscious a choice, really.I was so busy managing Image Comics, and later McFarlane Toys, that I didn’t have a lot of time to think about it. I still scribbled and jotted, but I spent less and less time at the drawing board. I just collected my bits and pieces.

But then, two years ago,I had the breakthrough. Just from the simple act of doing a drawing for a colleague’s wife, the fragments started rushing together very quickly. I’ve always said that Beanworld tells me what it wants to do, and I trust it. All of a sudden it came rushing back to me. I knew exactly what kind of Beanworld story I needed to tell.

And to enhance that breakthrough, I began to draw digitally, which has been apersonal leap forward. Now I canreplicate every trick and technique I had in my arsenal when I was using the old materials.

Overall, I’ve been very lucky. In middle age, I was able to embark on two completely new careers: first, managing a publishing enterprise at Image, and then a multifaceted media and manufacturing company at McFarlane. And now, in middle age as an artist, I’m able to discover a whole new universe of tools and techniques for documenting my life’s myth. Very few people are lucky enough to have so many new and different challenges over the span of their working life. I’m grateful.

PWCW: Do you see today’s marketplace as a particularly good time to bring Beanworld back, and if so, why? Or was it more a matter of finding yourself with Beanworld stories to tell once again?

LM: Both. Like I said earlier, Beanworld is just rushing out of my pen right now. But I also think that the world is ready for my work now as well.

Back in the late ’80s, reviewers often said Beanworld was 20 years ahead of its time. Looking at what speaks to today’s audiences, I feel those early reviewers were right. My characters and their stories fit more snugly in the modern world reared on Pixar, Cartoon Network and mangathan they did when they were first published in the ’80s.

PWCW: How did you end up at Dark Horse?

LM: I’ve known almost everyone in upper management there for over 20 years. I like Dark Horse’s company culture and admire everything that [publisher] Mike Richardson has been able to build within it. 

Dark Horse has always showed vision in its publishing, media and merchandise programs, and I feel Beanworld is a natural addition to those endeavors. I admire Dark Horse’s ability to reach readers in every market that responds to comics, and its leadership in creating quality merchandise and media, while showing the highest respect for creators in everything it does.

As I devote myself to Beanworld, I know that the team taking the property to market is as important as the work itself. I think Dark Horse has the best team. My editor, Diana Schutz, has been a strong supporter of Beanworld since it was a photocopied fanzine in the early ’80s. Michael Martens and his team have built an amazing book program. And David Scroggy and Anita Nelson do some great work with toys and collectibles. So, after having spent eight years in the toy business at McFarlane, I have some ideas for interesting toylike collectibles that the Dark Horse team and I will collaborate on.

PWCW: What can you tell me about the new Beanworld graphic novel you’re working on, Remember Here When You Are There!?

LM: Just like a real bean plant that pushes upwards, and then spreads its leaves as it reaches for the sky, so does the Beanworld. I’ve always said the Tales of theBeanworldcomic books took place in the springtime. The new graphic novel concludes the springtime stories and opens the doorway to the summer sagas following the theme of upwards and outwards.

All the major characters are in it. The baby beans, the Pod’l’pool Cuties really start to grow up and are a handful for Mr. Spook and Professor Garbanzo. Beanish’s secrets become more public and Dreamishness asks him to write a love song.

PWCW: Is there anything you miss about your old jobs with Image or McFarlane Toys?

LM: I miss the people I worked with for all those years. But my time of managing the work flow of other people’s creativity had definitely run its course. It was high time for me to get back to my own creativity and spend the rest of my working life on the one thing I want to do more than anything else: Beanworld.