HORSING AROUND
Interview With Peet Janes

Interview by Steve Almond

Behind the pages of Dark Horse's Star Wars comics, Editor Peet Janes sheds light on the process
...and talks about familiar faces returning and the prequel adaptation.

Peet Janes, Editor
Dark Horse Comics (http://www.dhorse.com)

As you can imagine, there are countless things going on behind the scenes of bringing fans their regular fix of Star Wars: whether it be toys, books, games or multiple times per month in comic book form. Peet Janes is an editor at Dark Horse Comics who's worked on such Star Wars titles as Shadows of the Empire, The Last Command and the much-acclaimed X-Wing series. 

To top it off, he's also penned the first in a series of Handbooks that take a closer look at the Star Wars universe Dark Horse has expanded upon: the fabulous X-Wing Handbook. Mr. Janes recently took time from his very busy schedule as head editor of Star Wars titles to answer some of our questions. If you've ever wondered just how much thought goes into the assembly of a comic series, how the editor puts it all together and what we can expect in the near future for Star Wars fans, read on!

ES: I find that with comic books, most people only recognize the author and primary artists. What are the duties of the editor and what other tasks are involved in being the head-editor for the entire SW line?

PJ: The editor wears numerous hats, and is present from when the germ of the idea for a project is first conceived to when the creators are signing copies at a convention table.

During the course of a project, the editor is a diplomat between the creators and the licensor, as well as between the creators themselves. It's the responsibility of the editor to make informed decisions regarding creator selection: will these creators work well together? Is this inker's style appropriate to this penciller? Is the chosen creative team one that will push the boundaries of this comic, or drive readers away, or attract new readers?

With licensed projects like Star Wars, very often the idea for a series is coming from either the licensor (Lucasfilm) or it's something that we brew up here in the office. Since Lucasfilm does not allow creators to work on a SW project until they are contracted, we can't really solicit creators for manuscripts (nor can creators blindly submit to DH) unless they're somebody we'd be nuts to turn down. Thus, the story ideas begin here, and then we build a creative team, and supply them with copious reference. The editor then leaves off the creative stuff to the creators, although a good editor spends time working through ideas with them.  For example, I borrow from the techniques of a predecessor, former SW chief Ryder Windham, and frequently supply thumbnails for cover artists.

During the creative process (typically about nine months per issue), the editor acts as go-between between the creators and the licensor, makes sure that everything's spelled correctly and that the artwork is clear and covers everything it needs to. The editor manages an in-house team assigned to the book's design, coloring, and separations, and occasionally gets called upon by marketing to assist in promotion. Then the book comes out, and the editor makes sure everyone gets his/her comp copies, tags any problems for correction in the later collected edition, and moves along to the next project.

As the chief of the SW line, I coordinate among the various projects to insure that we're making the best use of the various eras where we have stories going on. It falls to me to keep abreast of all the new developments in SW, including the work of other licensees, and I plan the schedule out several years, looking for opportunities for coordinated launches with other licensees, promotional opportunities, and trying to grok what the readers want.

ES: Have there ever been proposals, by yourself or others, that you looked forward to working on only to have LFL pass on them?

PJ: Sure. Stackpole's Specter of Thrawn comes immediately to mind, and there are many more X- Wing stories that we're not going to be able to tell right now . . . Sometimes LFL passes on them, sometimes publisher Mike Richardson passes on them, sometimes I do. The time may not be right, or we have other publishing obligations, or they may not be any spot open on the schedule.

ES: Could you outline the process involve in getting a SW comic to that shelves, being as detailed as possible? (Where the story idea comes from, how the creative team is picked, liaison with LFL, etc, etc.)

PJ: As stated above, the ideas mostly come from Lucasfilm, or from DH itself. Sometimes it's a very general idea: "Let's do another Boba Fett project--call Cam Kennedy and John Wagner." Other times it's very detailed: "Vader's Quest will deal with that tragic moment when Vader discovers that a punkass farmboy pilot is his son, and signals his fall."

Creators are chosen mostly based on track record, although just because somebody has written a million superhero titles doesn't mean he'll be a good SW writer. Enthusiasm for the material is essential. Otherwise, we play to people's strengths.

For example, Darko Macan being chosen to script Vader's Quest. Darko shone so brightly when he wrote "The Phantom Affair" for X-Wing, that we thought his combination of heartfelt drama, action, and humor --in addition to being true to the original SW formula-- would be perfect for a tragedy like VQ. At the same time, John Wagner, whose scripts tend more toward the guffaw/mayhem variety, is a perfect writer for characters like Big Gizz and Spiker, Jabba's swoop scum from Shadows of the Empire/The Jabba Tape.

The art selection must also be inspired. Using the same examples above, Dave Gibbons is a great choice for VQ; his style is clean and evocative, perfect for a tragedy (see his Watchmen issue featuring the Comedian's funeral). And then there's Kilian Plunkett for The Jabba Tape; manic, scratchy line detail, elastic, cartoonish features that also--somehow--remain realistic, and general chaos.

The creative process takes up to nine months, and basically involves the shuttling of script and art pages between the creators. Lucasfilm has approval over each "malleable" stage of production; the outline, script, pencils, and lettered inks, as well as cover sketch, logo design, and letters columns all must be approved by Lucas Licensing, and the inestimable Allan Kausch.

ES: There is definitely a certain "feel" to Star Wars that was established in the films. Since the comics are a visual representation of that universe, fans have expectations when it comes to how technology and the movie characters appear. Do you ever insure that artists can accomplish reasonable technical aspects and actor-likenesses before signing them for a series?

PJ: This concern is secondary only to whether the artist has the ability to render comics pages with some degree of composition, or, to put it more clearly, can the guy draw a comics page that does everything a comics page needs to do?

A difficulty involved in art selection is that we are constantly prodded to bring new creators into the mix. While I'd be perfectly happy signing John Nadeau to every X-Wing arc, the facts remain that A) It is nearly impossible for a penciller to do 12 issues a year, and B) Who would want to? Many creators want to spread themselves around, make their catalogue of work diverse in order to score choice projects in the future. Others have significant lives outside of comics and choose to only work on the occasional project. Still others wish they could do 12 issues a year, but their personal style won't allow it.

But, I think the main thrust of your question is about the quality of the work, not the frequency. Yes, all creators must go through Lucasfilm approval, and often need to be approved by publisher Mike Richardson as well. Sometimes we get burned by creators whose samples tell us that they are capable, but in fact they had six months to work on the four pages of samples, and their work is going to look quite different when they have five weeks to pencil an entire issue. When this happens, we need to do a balancing act: should I disrupt the series by reassigning the art chores? Even if the artist is turning in work with problems, is he on-schedule? Can we attempt to fix it? There's no easy solution, particularly if a project in on the edge of jeopardizing the schedule. We do, however, know better the next time.

ES: Do you keep current with the SW novels? How are they taken into account when developing a new series? Have you been in contact with Del Rey to discuss their plans?

PJ: Yes, although I will admit that there are several novels I have yet to read, and others that I read so long ago that I barely remember them. Generally, if a novel falls in a period that we will be exploring, I'll read whatever prose I can find on the period. It's obvious that the readers want comprehensive continuity, so it behooves us to take care when we start something new. The edgy part is where something is considered "canon" or not, and by whom.

Allan Kausch at Lucas Licensing is basically paid to make sure continuity is clean, but we can save a lot of time and energy if we get it right in the first place. The novels are taken into account as being maps to the areas where our comics might want to explore. With a straight-up adaptation, we're using the novel directly.

With a cross- promotional opportunity like Shadows of the Empire, we're assigned a portion of the story to tell, and then we actually coordinate with the other licensees to produce a coherent story. Otherwise, the novels are treated as historical treatises, and used as reference. Dark Horse and Del Rey have been working closely on several cross-promotional projects, but it's too early to say what's going to happen. I can, however, say that Del Rey and Dark Horse have one thing in common that will do wonders for coordination of our efforts: Michael Stackpole.

ES: I know you've only had editing duties with "The Thrawn Trilogy" adaptation with the last few issues, but perhaps you can still field this one. I've heard that Timothy Zahn wasn't contacted regarding the adaptations of his novels. I realize with the licensing setup, his approval or input isn't required, but wouldn't it be logical to include him, at least in a consulting position?

PJ: I seem to recall a complicated story back when we first began the Heir to the Empire (HTTE) adaptation, but I don't know the details. It may have been as simple as not knowing how to get in touch with him.

I know that some folks might have preferred to not establish contact with the original author at all, but as soon as I was working with his ideas, I was in touch with him with questions. I had already been working with Michael Stackpole on X-Wing, and had previously cured my nervousness around famous authors by working with Joe R. Lansdale on Tarzan: The Lost Adventure, and later, Alan Dean Foster on the Splinter of the Mind's Eye adaptation (then there was the time that Harlan Ellison came to my office to ask for an out-of-print manga I had . . .).

I was still a bit in awe when I started to be in contact with Tim; after all, it was HTTE which launched the modern SW renaissance, and besides that, I thought it was a great novel, SW or not. Once we broke the ice, his consulting became priceless, and eventually we wound up building the "Mara Jade" series. Dark Horse may have made a mistake at first, but I hope it's long since been rectified.

ES: Why isn't there more cross promotion between the novels and comics? I'm sure many people would have avoided confusion (and subsequent annoying of RASSM members) if there had been an ad for Dark Empire when the "Jedi Academy Trilogy" came out.

PJ: There are so many factors involved, and so many different creative minds working simultaneously, that I'm surprised there aren't more conflicts and more opportunities falling between the cracks. Suffice to say that most folks working on the various SW licenses have the best intentions in mind. It's also important to remember that in a lot of ways, we're building this sort of cross-promotional behavior as we go along (Shadows of the Empire, for example, was in many ways an examination to see how various licensees would cooperate to promote a single agenda.).

ES: Did you feel SOTE was a success on the promotional co-ordination front and do you think the licensees will be able to work better together on the juggernaut that will be Episode I merchandising?

PJ: Our promotional partnerships were very successful, including the slim comics packaged with double figure sets (Kenner), minicomics packaged with model kits (Ertl), and cross- promotional deals with Bantam, West End Games, the "soundtrack" publishers (Varese Sarabande), and the videogame publishers (LucasArts).  I recall coordinating reference materials with the Hildebrandts as they painted the card set, and expanding my comp lists to include the dozens of other licensees.

Could it have been done better? Of course--one must always strive to do things better. Did we licensees make maximum use of our resources at the time? Close enough. It is worth noting that the targets of such merchandising, the fans, have become considerably more savvy since the olden days of '77, and that level of intelligence needs to be catered to.

Will we be even more coordinated for the Episode I release? Absolutely. The material demands it, as do the fans. Lucasfilm organizes license summits where licensees meet and plant the seeds of future cross-promotion. They're damned fun meetings, too, because hey, we're all working on Star Wars! 

ES: Speaking of promotion, I notice there isn't a Star Wars section on the Dark Horse website. Any plans for one? It would be a good opportunity for interviews w/ authors, artists, etc. Maybe even some special online SW Handbooks.

PJ: At this point, we feel it's in DH's best interest not to separate SW any more from the general publishing schedule than it already is. There will always be coverage of SW titles mixed in with everything else. Contrary to many SW comics fans' beliefs, Dark Horse publishes a lot of other stuff.

ES: Has Dark Horse ever considered advertising on prominent Star Wars websites? Does LFL give you guidelines on dealing with people on the net (ie, was there a problem in mentioning a particular website in a recent "Cut the Chatter")?

PJ: I can't speak for Lucasfilm, but it seems to me that fan promotion certainly doesn't hurt, and very often helps. I would imagine LFL might draw the line if somebody cooked up a paid- members SW website, but a site like TheForce.net contains lots of reader-generated material, plugs for various projects, and commentary/criticism. I only see benefits from that: wider exposure, more specific requests, stuff like that.

As far as the mention of TheForce.net, I merely included it in my letters column and sent it off to LFL for the usual approval process. If they had had a problem with it, they probably would have asked that I remove it. DH does links with other sites, but I haven't heard anything about buying advertising online.

ES: I was looking forward to The Specter of Thrawn. Can you give any details as to why the series was cancelled?

PJ: Ill-conceived from the beginning. Unlike Shadows of the Empire, which had custom-fit slots for various licensees to tell their chunks of the story, Tim Zahn had not known of any plan to place a comics arc between his novel duet, and so not much story was left to tell (curse that Zahn guy for being so comprehensive!).

Mike Stackpole gave it the old college try, and actually came up with a truly involving story line that is a fascinating historical study of the galactic civil war, but it wasn't going to work. Fortunately, quick thinking brought Mara Jade to the fore. Perhaps we'll someday see Stackpole's work in another form--it was definitely too good to trashfile.

ES: The forthcoming "Jedi Academy" series will be the latest into the Timeline Dark Horse has ventured. Is there any specific reason why later stories haven't been developed (besides the ill- fated Specter of Thrawn)?

PJ: Yep: we just haven't gotten around to it. It does seem like a logical direction to go for stories, doesn't it? Also, I think that there's a lot more calculated thinking going into the development of projects nowadays. As complex as the SW universe has become, it now requires a finer degree of navigation.

ES: I understand that prequel information is not something you're allowed to speak about, but the case is the same for novels: will we see stories of the classic characters be phased out once prequel-mania hits?

PJ: Personally, I think we'd be fools to disregard the work of the last twenty years. If I have anything to say about it, we will be giving equal time to every SW era. Unquestionably though, the new films are going to command a lion's share of exposure for a time.

ES: Do you think there are limitations on the stories that can be told of the movie heroes? Besides the Dark Empire saga and Shadows of the Empire, only SOTE: Evolution featured the key players together (and even that was a limited role).

PJ: Yes, and that's why we've limited the stories involving the magnificent seven. It would be easy to feature a new-doomsday-weapon-o-the-week in each series, but it wouldn't be true to SW. That's why we've often chosen to explore the lives of other characters. And that's why, generally, series involving those main characters must be thought out and carefully planned. They're icons, not to be handled lightly, nor are the minutiae of their day-to-day lives to be exposed.

ES: Here's another that might be off limits: has there been any discussions on how titles will be released in the future. Many fans find it limiting when stories are published that take place 25 years in the future before ones that occur only 10-15 years later. A case in point is Crimson Empire. Over 30 titles have been published that take place at a later time. Can anything important ever really happen when there are no mentions of it later in the story line? This could be avoided if titles were published in a more chronological order.

PJ: An excellent point, but chronological order is not really an option. What we should be doing more of is the sort of coordination that goes on between Mike Stackpole and Tim Zahn. Characters like Baron Fel, Leonia Tavira, and others that turn up in several spots of the timeline, penned by different authors, have great potential for uniting disparate portions of the timeline. And let me ask you this: are fans asking the same question of George Lucas himself? George started his epic in the middle, a classic literary technique for wholeheartedly thrusting the reader into a story from the get-go. Now, he's going back in time decades, to tell the backstory behind the story that we all grew to love. Can anything truly important happen in Episodes 1-3? I would say yes.

ES: Touché. :-)   Do you worry though that events in the new movies will greatly contradict events in spin-off works, or do you picture Allan Kausch leaning over George's shoulder as he's writing and pointing out minor things that could keep the whole thing consistent? Just the minor change in the Special Edition of Jabba's appearance rendered the "Jabba the Hutt" comics visually incorrect. The Greedo/Han scene certainly changed a lot in the various retellings of that scene in Tales from the Mos Eisley Cantina. They're all within Lucas' right because it's his creation, but they do impact the work of people who are essentially working with his permission.

PJ: It's not something we can really worry about, so we don't. Lots of people have been working on lots of SW extrapolations for the last twenty years, in good faith. There were never any promises from George Lucas or Lucasfilm regarding the acceptance of their work into some wider canon.

The examples you cite above, then, become merely shots across the bow: a warning that perhaps some folks are taking this far too seriously, and may have forgotten that fun and excitement was what fueled the SW phenomenon in the first place.

ES: We know that Terry Brooks will pen the novelization of Episode I and we've heard that the comic adaptation will be four issues with art done by Igor Kordey. Can you release the name of the scripter? Also, Brooks has apparently been given a lot of leeway to explore areas not covered in the film. Have the comics team been given the same freedom and have they been in touch with Mr. Brooks to make sure the adaptations mesh? 

PJ: Igor Kordey is old and incorrect information. The artwork on the Episode I adaptation is by Rodolfo Damaggio (pencils) and Al Williamson (inks). The script is by Henry Gilroy. Damaggio has contributed to the X-Wing Handbook, as well as worked on Batman/Predator III, plus some other Batman titles. His illustrations in the Handbook include Isard, Cartariun, and Loka Hask. I'm afraid that's all I can say right now, (because) the movie's going to be better if you don't know! Think about how much you knew when SW:ANH came out, and how much of a surprise it was, and then try to recapture that. You won't be sorry! 

(Steve Almond is a regular Star Wars Lit junkie)

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