How did you get the job of working on Doom 2099?
Jeff: I was working at Malibu,
doing a book called Lord Pumpkin, and then Marvel bought
Malibu.
This during the days when Image was just starting up and
Image I think gave a shock to all the independents. Before
Image, no one really cared about independents. Then once
Image came, all these independents starting selling. Comic
shops started ordering them and these companies got a boost
from that. So I think Marvel kind of bought Malibu just to
shut it down. But before they did, the editors came in and
picked who they wanted from who was working there. I was one
of the ones that got picked.
Was there a particular editor that picked
you?
Jeff: Yeah, Susan Gaffney, she was
the one. The first thing I did for her was an X-Men. A
spin-off book called Askani X-Men (X-Men: Books of Askani).
Then after that it was straight to Doom I think, I really
can't remember.
Were you aware that Doom 2099 was going to be
cancelled?
Jeff: Absolutely. That was part of
the deal. The way Susan told me was that once they figured
that it was going to be cancelled, the artist didn't want to
stick around. They wanted to go on to other things. So
that's why they needed somebody new on it. I also think maybe why
I got it was because my stuff didn't really fit so much with
the Marvel style. I think since the book was getting cancelled
they thought let's just take a chance.
Of the three issues, do any really stand out
in your memory?
Jeff: Maybe its the last one,
whichever one where I did the cover where he's just standing
there with the sword. That was I think my favorite one. I
think I put most of my effort into that one. There was some
of them that had the cool characters, you know like Dr. Strange.
Because I didn't think I would get to draw any of that stuff
when I got on it. It was cool.
How do you prepare for taking on a character
that's more obscure? Do they give you previous issues to look
at?
Jeff: They did. I remember they
sent me a ton of reference for Doom. I think they might have
sent me the whole run of comics to read. I'm not a quick
reader, so I know I didn't read them all, but I definitely
did look through all the stuff. But one thing too is that I
think my art is kind of quirky. So they didn't really expect
it to look like the guys who had been on it before. But I do
remember doing sketches for the main character, and giving
them to Susan before I did the book. I definitely had to do
a try-out. I guess it was good enough, because they ended up
giving it to me. I did as much research as I could back
then. But it was so much more limited back then, there was
no internet. Or I guess there was an internet, but I wasn't
on it. It was the days of fax machines and all that. So
beyond just the comics and reading those, that's all the
research I could do.
Were there any challenges unique to working
on Doom 2099 as opposed to other comics you have worked on?
Jeff: I think that was the first
time where there was known characters, like the Thing. That
was kind of challenging because even though I went to work at Marvel, I wasn't a
guy who was like waiting to get his big break on Spider-Man
or something. I never really drew Spider-Man or Thing or any
of those kinds of things. So it was kind of weird to sort of
take that on. Then I remember once the first issue came out,
there was sort of a backlash about the way I was drawing
everything. I kind of realized there was this fan-base out
there that sort of expected like a certain thing. And my
characters didn't fit in the way they wanted. But it wasn't
all negative. But that was one thing. Just realizing that
there's people that really care about Dr. Strange and want
him to be a certain way, you know, which I had never thought
of before. And then the other thing was just being on a
monthly book and dealing with the deadlines. It was just
normal Marvel deadlines. That's a lot of work, doing a whole
book in one month. And I hard a hard time adjusting to that.
I also had a real hard time adjusting to the inkers. I just
wasn't use to having people ink my work. I guess none of
those were specific to Doom 2099, but that's kinda what I
was going through at the time.
Were you happy with the inking?
Jeff: Not so much. I mean I
remember at the time I really didn't like it. Now looking back
at it, I think they did the best they could. When I came
into comics, I came in through the side door. I wasn't even
drawing in that Marvel style to be inked. Everything I did
was fully painted and everything. So when suddenly I was
drawing for someone to ink, I just had no clue how to do it.
That was really hard, just trying to figure out how to do
that. So the pages would look the same. Plus I think the
digital coloring thing was just starting. I wasn't use to
that. You sent me some of the pages, and looking over them
and the way they did Dr. Strange and they changed all the
line color and all that. I just wasn't use to seeing stuff
like that. It just looked really weird to me. It's kind of
nice to look back. I do have a kind of fondness for the
pages.
Was there a lot of communication with the
inker?
Jeff: Yeah, there was a lot of
inkers. There was one issue that had five inkers. That was
just because I was getting real behind on the book. But I
think the main inker was supposed to be Vince Russell. He
talked to me a lot on the phone. You know I hate to be a
bastard, but everybody who was inking I never thought they
were doing it right. I really probably was a pain to work
with. I think they did their best, but I can sympathize with
what Vince was going through, trying to work with me. He was
the one I knew the best out of all them.
Was there a lot of communication with the
writers?
Jeff: I didn't have a lot of
contact other than talking through Susan. They were doing
their own thing. I think, I am not sure, you would probably
know better than me, but I thought that they brought back
one of the writers that had left the books to finish it up.
Is that right?
Yes, John Francis Moore, he was the writer
for the first 24 issues. He pretty much started the character,
and yeah, he came back for the last two issues.
Jeff: That's what I remember. I
remember talking to John too, in the beginning. I remember
the scripts changed. The first script I got was Marvel
style. Where they kind of just give you the beats, the
specific action, and then you have to panel it out. Then I
remember John went on with the next two issues and they came
in as full scripts. I remember that first script, and I
think it was Tom De Falco. I remember that because I used to
read Savage Sword of Conan and he wrote some stories back
then. So I immediately knew that name. His scripts were so
loose. I remember there was a fight scene in the first issue
and it was kind of like you get to page 12 or whatever and
they fight and then go to page 18 and there was nothing
there. So I wasn't used to that, but I think it all worked.
I kind of liked doing it that way.
Were you offered work on 2099: World of
Tomorrow?
Jeff: No. No. At that point I went
off to Image to do a book there. I did more Marvel stuff,
but that was the last time I worked for Susan.
I
think the two covers you did are really great, and one of things
I find cool is that on #43 the logo is vertical, not horizontal.
Jeff: Right. I wonder if they did
that because of the deal with the art. That one has kind of
a funny story. There's a panel in the comic where Doom is
stretched out on the wires and the tubes and all that kind
of stuff. But it was just a head-on shot with the arm going
one way and the other arm going out. So I did a sketch of
that and turned it in to Susan and she very timidly kind of
came back to me and said....and she was one that never
wanted me to change anything...but this she was asking me to
change it because Marvel has had trouble when anything look
remotely religious. And it looked kind of like Jesus being
crucified. Even though it had nothing to do with that, she
just didn't want any kind of back lash that might come from
it. So I didn't have a problem with that, and I changed the
angle on it so he's kind of hanging sideways and she was
happy. But I wonder if that's part of the reason they stuck
the logo on the side.
