An interview with Devin Grayson

A Shameless web exclusive

By Shane Dingman

Continued from page 14

Where did the ideas for USER and Relative Heroes come from? Are you interested in revisiting gay/bisexual themes in future projects?

Three totally different questions. Neither USER nor Relative Heroes were conceived as “gay” stories. But since they’re both creator-developed and populated with characters of my own design, obviously I’m going to reflect that part of reality.

The gay theme in Relative Heroes is pretty beside the point. There’re five teens, and the leader, Joel, happens to be gay. If we had had a chance to continue with the story, he was supposed to eventually fall in love and form a relationship with Rive, who was going to start traveling with the rest of the family in the Winnebago in the official capacity of Joel’s boyfriend and the unofficial capacity of team chef. But as it was, there were maybe three pages in six twenty-two page issues that even alluded to it. The idea for that story, though, came from editor Jordan Gorfinkel asking me to develop a new series, a superhero team, for the DCU. I kind of panicked and thought to myself how easy I’d find an assignment like that if they weren’t supposed to be super-powered, but that the superhero part of it was really presenting a problem for me (because, basically, I don’t like working with that much allegory — I think we’re pretty damn fascinating and complex and worthy of stories just the way we are). And then the idea came to me that if their powers were my problem, their powers could be their problem — walk straight up to the allegory and look it in the eye. The main themes of the story are adolescent growing pains (some of the struggles of which are demonstrated through the very nature of their powers) and grief. But did I love writing the gay cruise scene? Did I run around and proudly show it to all my friends after it was drawn? Do I still have a copy of the black and white for that page in an old binder on my desk? Hell, yeah.

USER was a pitch I made to Vertigo, based on the closest thing to a real life experience I’ve ever written about. I just wanted to try something more personal, and, terrifyingly for me, I think it’s one of the best things I’ve done (I say terrifying because the implication there is clearly that being more revealing and personal works). The story is more an exploration of gender than sexual preference, but of course, all of that is tied up together and so does play out over the course of the series.

USER was nominated for a GLAAD Media Award, and that meant more to me than anything else I’ve ever been up for. I definitely do look forward to doing more GLBT-themed work in the future, both as a way, politically, to stay active in and supportive of that community, and also, artistically, as a means of continuing to explore diverse and inspiring characters.

You’ve mentioned a rejected suitor spread lies about you “having slept your way to the top” after you had published two comics... as painful as it might be to discuss that, you’re method of dealing with such a sexist attack might be invaluable advice for other young creators facing similar slurs. So, how did it happen and what did you do?

It’s not painful to talk about it, it’s just frustrating, because there wasn’t anything I could do. How it happened was that I was no longer in touch with him, I got a little bit of public notice and the guy got online and started saying mean things. It’s that easy to malign someone. His allegation was, primarily, that I must have given head to a Bat-Office editor to get my first Bat-book assignments, so I did go online once early on to point out that they were in New York and I was in California, and although I had yet to meet them, I highly doubted they were so endowed that we could manage such a trick trans-continentally. But even I know that it’s not as much fun to have someone prove a rumor false as it is to have someone insinuate one, and I’m sure that there are people who believe his story to this day. They are not likely to be people, though, that have taken my work very seriously to begin with, so although it does hurt to have mistruths spread about you, I guess ultimately it doesn’t really matter. I know how I got my work, the editors know how I got my work, it’s seven or eight years later and I’m still being given assignments regularly and that guy who started that rumor is now married in Ohio and is hopefully happy and busy and has better things to do with his time. So as much as it will always be pretty profoundly not okay, it is also, basically, okay. Life goes on. And, too, this is something successful women go through in every industry I can think of, which is part of what makes it so frustrating. Why do people even entertain it anymore? It’s such a dumb, easy, self-revelatory put-down. No one likes having lies told about the, but almost everyone has experienced it.

As for other young creators — the male ones won’t have that problem, and the female ones will already be familiar with it from other parts of their life (though obviously, the more public attention you get, the more virulent and persistent the rumors). My advice to all professionals is to not take the message boards too seriously — personally, I don’t read them at all (someone once said in a column that anyone who said that was lying, but obviously he’s never been attacked about his dating history, sexual proclivities, body or basic right to be in the industry...believe me, the boards hold no allure for me). Beyond that, there’s really not a thing you can do. I spent the first year and half trying to fight back and do damage-control and it was making me crazy and impacting my work and getting me nowhere, so finally I just decided to be a good person and a dependable writer instead of trying to prove that I was either. I stopped reading comic message boards and now the only time I hear anything about what’s going on in them is when a well-meaning fan writes me an email to tell me that they totally don’t agree with what’s being said on them and he or she hopes I know that not everyone believes it. And then I write them back and say “thanks, I really appreciate your support, but please don’t worry about it — it doesn’t hurt my feelings if I don’t know about it, and I won’t know about it if you don’t tell me.”

Does that experience play into your dislike of message boards, which I understand are pretty much the lifeblood of serious comic fanatics?

Of course! That and many others like it. The final straw for me was when someone got fed up with my unwillingness to fight to defend myself online and started posting as me. I’m sure she meant well, but my god — that was horrific. I had her account traced and wrote her an email demanding that she stop and she really didn’t see why she should, she thought she was doing me a favor. So from that point on I announced that I would never read nor post on a comic-related board (just to clarify that if you do see a post on one under my name, it ain’t me) and I’ve kept to that and been much, much happier for it.

And I don’t think it’s true that message boards are the lifeblood of serious comic fans, I think they’re the lifeblood of serious posting fans. Compare any sales chart to what’s being said on the boards and you’ll immediately see how misrepresentative they are. I love the idea of Internet communities and think it could be very valuable for fans to have places where they can share ideas and reading lists and such, and I also know that eighty percent of the people who post are really nice, reasonable, bright people. But that other twenty percent makes it not worth it for me, personally, to be there, so I stick to Gaming forums and Political boards where at least the vitriol is not aimed at me. ;-)

Who do you see as your constituency? Those fanatics, or the regular reader who picks up stuff from the newsstand, not the specialty store?

We don’t have comics that are sold on the newsstands much anymore, which is a shame. They are not something the casual reader is likely to just run into in the course of day-to-day life. You pretty much have to seek them out. Direct Marketing saved the industry in the early seventies, but now it’s something we seem to be rethinking. It would be great if we could figure out some way to support the specialty stores and also have more comics available to the general public in grocery lines and magazine racks and such.

I don’t really think in terms of a constituency, I just write the best stories I can, one at a time. Ideally, you want enough character development to keep the long-term readers happy and enough clarity to keep things accessible for the casual reader. Because I came to comics so late in life, I do really love the idea of getting people who are unfamiliar with the medium excited about it, but it’s also really satisfying to give the loyal, long-term readers something they can sink their teeth into.