Save A Horse, Ride A Spaceship
By Josh Hechinger
November 7, 2006 - 22:24
In March of 1836, the Mexican general Antonio Lopez de Santa Ana was felled by a single 600 yard shot from the Alamo’s battlements before that fateful battle. And though The Alamo fell, it gave Texas general Sam Houston time to rally his forces and win Texas’ independence as a free and sovereign nation.
The history buffs in the audience are probably scratching their heads in confusion. Never fear, history hasn't rewritten itself on you. This is just the starting point for the alternate history comic Roswell, Texas (http://www.bigheadpress.com/roswell)
And if you're still puzzled, well, sit back and let this interview with series artist Scott Bieser tell you all you need to know.
CCB: Okay, for the folks at home, who are you and what do you do?
Scott Bieser: My name is Scott Bieser and I am a cartoonist and illustrator, currently the principal artist for Roswell, Texas as well as creative director for Big Head Press, which publishes R,T and other stories. My recent cartooning credits include my previous graphic novel with L. Neil Smith, The Probability Broach: The Graphic Novel and A Drug War Carol, which I drew and scripted based on a story by Susan W. Wells.
In recent years I've also illustrated four prose book covers: Lever Action, The Legend of Carl Drega and T he Black Arrow for Mountain Media, and The Lost Gold of San Francisco for 21st Century Publishing.
In the previous century I drew a few comics and painted several dozen covers for Malibu Graphics' various black-and-white books. I co-created The Rovers with Steve Bennett and wrote and drew GAMBIT, my own space-opera from which, apparently, Chris Claremont derived his mutant character of the same name. I'm also responsible, for better or for worse, for the world's first computer-generated pornographic comic book, Cyber-Lust, which Eternity published as a three-issue mini-series. I drew it on my Mac SE.
During the 1990s I was an animator and art director for computer game publisher Interplay Entertainment, Inc. (nee Interplay Productions), working on various Battle Chess titles, various Star Trek franchise titles, weird stuff like Boogerman, cool stuff like M.A.X. and M.A.X.2. For a while I supervised every 2-D artist in the company and so had an indirect hand in every title Interplay published from 1995-1998.
I currently live on the Internet at a node located in Wyoming.
CCB: In a nutshell, what is Roswell, Texas about?
Scott Bieser: Roswell, Texas is a sci-fi western romantic comedy. It's about a Texas from an alternate history, one in which Davy Crockett had killed Santa Ana at the Alamo and himself survived to become a force in Texas politics after the revolution. So Texas never joined the United States and history in North America proceeded quite differently.
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| Captain Audie Murphy of the Texas Rangers debriefs the cast. |
The "romance" part comes in when Lindergh's man, "Wild Bill" Bear, meets the lady who owns the ranch where the saucer crashed -- but I don't want to spoil the story.
R,T presents a somewhat idealized version of Texas, a Texas that more fully embodies its historical values of optimism and mastering one's own destiny, and has largely set aside ethnic antagonisms and kept its government too small and limited to attract the greed-heads and power-pimps who dominate most democracies. It's Texas the way it could have become, and the way it might yet become.
CCB: Who’s the audience for the series? Give us a frame of reference: if people like “blank”, they’ll like Roswell, Texas.
Scott Bieser: If you like alternative history stories, such as the works of Harry Turtledove, or for example, Warren Ellis' Ministry of Space, then R, T will give you some ideas to chew on. If you like westerns generally, and '50s westerns specifically, you'll like R,T, which is written with many tropes from that genre.
I think if you liked Firefly and Serenity, you'll like Roswell, Texas. Just because.
I think one of the more charming things about R,T is the way that famous people from the early 20th Century keep turning up in oddly different sorts of roles. Some villains become heroes. Some heroes become politicians. James Nance Garner runs a private spy agency. A cartoonist is President For Life of the Republic of California. A famous Western character actor runs the airport just outside Roswell. Madame Curie is working for the Emperor of French Mexico. T.E. Lawrence is still alive and well and working with Eliot Ness.
And of course, fans of Neil Smith's prose stories will love this book, which is his first all-new novel-length story published since 2002. Neil has created at least six different alternative "universes," and this one gives some bones to the one that we've known the least about so far. For gun enthusiasts, there are lots of different shootin' irons in this story, and I hope I've properly rendered every one of them.
CCB: What’s Big Head Press’ “thing”? Dark Horse Comics does a lot of horror themed books, Vertigo does general weirdness, and Wildstorm tends toward “widescreen” action. What’s the thrust of Big Head Press’ books?
Scott Bieser: Our thing is "Thoughtful Stories," which means stories that might be of any genre but must have some intelligent things to say and points to make, and make them in an entertaining way. Of course we prefer to find ourselves in agreement with these points. Our outlook is very pro-individualist, or as I once would have said "pro-freedom," before the Bushtalkers corrupted the meaning of that term.
We publish stories promoting the primacy of individual life and value over and usually against collectivist institutions or culture or psycho-spirituality -- but we don't demand adherence to any political or social doctrine more specific than that. And the quality of story and art have to be excellent.
CCB: Outside of your own stuff, of course, what other comics would you point new readers to?
Scott Bieser: It really depends on the person I'm recommending to, there is such variety available now. I recommend Warren Ellis' Transmetropolitan series to those who like science-fiction, and the Hernandez Brothers' Love & Rockets books in their various iterations, to those who like romance/relationships stories, and Carla Speed McNeil's Finder for those who like sci-fi with their romance/relationship stories.
I really liked Joe Sacco's Palestine and Safe Area Gorazde books and recommend those to people all worked up over The International Islamofascist Conspiracy. I also recommend anything written by Alan Moore, in any genre, even the works he's had his name removed from. (grins)
For younger people, I'm not really current enough to make recommendations but I just point them at the Manga aisle and they usually figure out what they like soon enough.