Category Archives: Opinions

Some Thoughts on Space Shuttles and Sunsets

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Today, I watched with much of my office as the space shuttle Endeavor flew over our building in Burbank. It was an undeniably cool moment. Certainly an exciting one, but there was also a little sadness mixed in there for me.

Not many people know this, but as a young child, I lived for a couple of years in Lompoc, CA. My father found a job in the town, and we moved there with him at the very tail end of the 70s. If you’ve been there, you’ll know that there’s really not much in Lompoc. It’s largely a military town, and my family isn’t a military one, so it was strange that we moved there. But as a very young boy on the brink of the Reagan years, it was about the coolest place on earth.

The reason is that Lompoc is only a few miles away from Vandenberg Air Force Base, which is why it’s a military town. And Vandenberg, for those of you who don’t know, was a huge part of our nation’s then very thriving space program. I remember being woken up by my father on more than one occasion back then to watch various rockets taking off and missiles being launched (which when you’re four years old, is pretty darn cool). I could see them from my bedroom window. From my window! Admittedly, I don’t remember much else from that early in my life, but I remember that.

At such a young age, I had no basis of comparison when it came to things like rocket launches. For all I knew, watching rockets enter space from your bedroom was something that every kid did in the morning, as common as eating breakfast. I didn’t know that this was something that was pretty rare until I got a bit older, and by then we had moved away.

Outside of the various launches, I really only remember one more thing about that time in my life, and it’s largely why I wanted to see the shuttle today. In the seventies, Vandenberg was selected to become the west coast’s launch and landing site for the space shuttle. As far as I can tell, it was never used as such, but at one point while I was living there, they had one of the space shuttles—I’m assuming Columbia, though I can’t say I know for sure—at the base. And at one point, people of the community were invited to come down and see it.

Now, when I say see it, I don’t mean see it from a distance. I mean, go right on up to it and take a look inside, the same way you might look in an old WWII bomber at an air show. The memory’s a bit hazy, but I can recall being held up to get a good peek inside by one of my parents, and I was surprised by how small everything was inside.

Yes, friends, I’ve actually been in the space shuttle, and my reaction was being slightly underwhelmed. I did mention being young and having no perspective, right?

The point is that now I do. I realize that was something fairly rare. Something that by any standard is pretty darn cool. I realize that I was lucky to be there at that point in time, just as I was lucky to be in a place where I could see the Endeavor fly by overhead today. Seeing the space shuttle so up close and personal as a tyke is one of my earliest memories, and while I never harbored serious dreams of becoming an astronaut, I do attribute those early years for my love of science fiction and appreciation and support of our space program.

Soon, it sounds like everyone will have a chance to see the space shuttle the way that I did, and I hope people take advantage of it. But it’ll be a look back in time, not a look forward, which is what it was when I was a child. These things matter when we’re talking about exploration. The point of exploration is to chart new territory. We should always been looking forward when it comes to space.

I realize things change, and privatizing space exploration and travel makes sense. I’m all in favor of it if it’ll get up back up in space. But the space shuttle’s been flying almost as long as I’ve been alive, so seeing it take one last flight is an emotional thing for me. It’s been a very rough flight at time, but it’s always been our link to the stars. It’s been the closest thing we have to an Enterprise or Millenium Falcon, and now it’s gone.

So goodbye, Endeavor, and farewell, space shuttle program! Yes, you didn’t literally fly off into the sunset, but that’s okay. I think when you’ve been to outer space, that’s no longer necessary.

So You Want to be a Manga-ka

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Recently, I was putting together some writing samples for a job application when I came across a blog entry I’d written back when I was still editing manga at Tokyopop. Near the end of my time there, all Tokyopop editors were asked to create and maintain a blog on the company’s newly redesigned website. Considering we were being asked to do this while also overseeing a full slate of books each month, not everyone was the best at the maintaining part. However, I saw it as an opportunity to directly connect with fans and hopefully sell some of them on the new original manga titles I was working on.

I tried to update my editor’s blog at least a few times each month, usually with some thoughts on a series I was editing or some preview pages from one of my original titles. However, once I strayed a bit from that formula and wrote a pretty lengthy entry offering some advice to fledgling comic book and manga creators. That entry, which I called “So You Want to be a Manga-ka,” went on to become the second most viewed page on the website. (I believe the most widely viewed page was a poll about which Naruto character was the cutest.)

There’s no longer a tokyopop.com, and most of the content that I’d written for my old blog has evaporated into the Internet ether. However, I did manage to back up my “So You Want” entry, and figured it couldn’t hurt to repost it here, in case there’s anyone out there who may benefit from reading it. While it was largely written for the manga community and uses a few terms specifically aimed at them (like “manga-ka”), everything in it applies to artists and writers interested in creating Western comic books as well. If I were to write an article like this today, I’d use different terms, but my thoughts and advice on what it takes to create graphic novels would be pretty much the same. Enjoy!

So You Want to be a Manga-ka

There are tons of very good blog entries on this website offering advice and direction to aspiring artists. So many, in fact, that the thought of putting together my own never crossed my mind until recently. Even when it did, I initially brushed it off, simply because I’m not sure what more I really have to say. However, after receiving a message from an artist asking me for a few suggestions, I began rethinking the issue. After all, most of the art advice blog entries that I’ve read are written by other artists. As far as I know, none of my fellow editors have chimed in and blogged about what makes a good manga artist. Perhaps it’s worth hearing the editorial perspective if you’re interested in drawing manga professionally. After all, if your goal is to get published by TOKYOPOP, we’re the people you’re going to have to impress.

There is one caveat, however. Editors are every bit as different as the artists they work with. I’m by no means claiming to speak for every editor out there, or even every editor at TOKYOPOP. All of us look for different things when we evaluate a new artist. However, I do believe there are a few essentials that we can all agree on, and that’s what I’m going to write about here. A lot of aspiring artists say they dream of becoming a manga-ka, but what does that really mean? What does it take for someone to achieve success as a manga or comic book creator? Well, it takes a good many things, and after a little thought and a lot of Mountain Dew, I believe I’ve hit on most of the essentials.

1. You must be dedicated. If you want to be a manga-ka, this one probably seems like a sure thing. I’m sure you believe you’re dedicated to your art and manga. But are you really? Each volume of original manga that we publish boasts a minimum of 160 pages of sequential art, and takes most artists anywhere from nine months to over a year to complete. If your manga series runs for three volumes, that’s nearly 500 pages of art you’ll be responsible for creating, and around three years of your life that you’ll be devoting to your manga. Sure, it’s easy to feel enthusiastic and dedicated about your manga when you’re just getting started, but after two years of drawing the exact same characters and illustrating the story you outlined and conceived ages ago, are you still going to be that dedicated to it? Or are you going to find yourself getting bored and wanting to work on other things? You’d be surprised how many people find themselves falling into the second category. Make sure you don’t.

2. You must be fast. As I just said, each volume of manga consists of at least 160 pages of art. If you can only complete a page a week, then it’s going to take you over three years to finish a single volume. That’s not practical. While there’s no hard and fast minimum number of pages you MUST be able to do each week, if you can’t at least manage to complete one volume’s worth of manga within a year, it’s unlikely that we’ll be able to publish your manga. As a manga-ka, you need to be able to complete solid pages at a relatively quick clip.

3. You must be consistent. This is every bit as important as being fast (and maybe even a little more so). If you’d like to be a manga-ka, consistency is essential, and it’s not as easy as you may think. Do your characters look different in every panel? Do they look like different people when you draw them in profile or from less-common camera angles? Does their height change throughout the series? Do articles of clothing and jewelry you’ve given them disappear and then reappear throughout your manga? Consistency is essential, and while you’ll have an editor to watch your back when it comes to character details, they can’t do your job for you. Your characters and settings have to stay consistent on every page of your manga, whether it’s page 1 or page 387.

4. You must be technically proficient. Yes, there’s a LOT more to art than just technical proficiency. That goes without saying. However, the importance of knowing art fundamentals should also go without saying. When I do portfolio reviews, I find myself pointing out the same three problems over and over again: anatomy, perspective and visual storytelling. If you want to draw comics or manga, you must–I repeat–MUST know the fundamentals of anatomy, perspective and visual storytelling. How you learn these things can vary. Whether you’ve learned them from art school, community college, books or web tutorials really doesn’t matter to me. What DOES matter is that you do know them and know them well. And practicing them is really the only way you’re going to get to know them, my friends. I realize that refining anatomy and perspective in your art is not very fun, but the end result will be greatly worth it. Quite frankly, knowing your fundamentals is what makes the difference between a professional unpublished artist and someone who’s just doing this stuff for kicks when they’re tired of playing video games.

5. You must be dependable. As an editor, I’m have nearly two dozen books that I’m responsible for. I don’t have time to hunt down creators to ask why their pages weren’t turned in on time. Dependability is essential for a manga-ka, and you’d be surprised how often I’ve found it lacking in the artists that I’ve met. As a manga-ka, you’ll be required to work with your editor on creating a schedule that includes deadlines for all of your pages. It’s crucial that you know what pace you can realistically work at when you do this because once that schedule is agreed upon, that’s it. Those are your deadlines. Your publisher is going to expect you to make them. If you don’t, there are people within the company that your editor is going to have to answer to. Those people are not going to accept excuses from your editor, so you’d better believe that your editor isn’t going to accept them from you. Remember, folks, manga publishing is a business. A company’s livelihood depends partially on the book you’re creating for them. It’s easy to lose sight of this when you’re corresponding with one single company representative, but believe me, there’s MUCH more at stake, and missing your deadlines creates much bigger problems than you realize. And for God’s sake, never pull a disappearing act! As your editor, I’m going to expect to be able to pick up the phone and call you during the day if I need to, or to get a response to any email I send you within a day. I get really frustrated when I can’t. It’s the sign of an unprofessional artist.

6. You must be collaborative. This is one that may not apply to all publishers, but it certainly applies to TOKYOPOP. Our books are not created in a vacuum. While the writers and artists are primarily responsible for what you see when you pick up a TOKYOPOP original manga title, they’re not the only people involved. Your editor’s job is to help you tell the best story you’re capable of telling in the time you have to tell it, and for him or her to fulfill that role, you need to listen to them and take what they’re saying to heart. They’re not interested in rewriting your story or “destroying your vision.” They’re interested in making your vision as strong as possible. That also goes for the designer that puts together your cover and even the reps responsible for marketing and selling your book. Everyone involved in working on your book all has the same goal in mind: they want it to be successful, both critically and commercially. While your opinion is extremely important and it’s crucial to “stick to your guns” when the situation truly dictates it, you’d do well to hear what others have to say.

7. You must be patient. A year ago, I probably wouldn’t have included this one, but things have changed over the past year and the reality of the current market necessitates it. As manga has become increasingly more and more popular, the number of hopeful manga-kas has risen, and with this rise in quantity has also come a rise in quality. That means that we’re no longer in a situation where anyone with talent and a great pitch will immediately catch our eye. Further escalating the problem is the increasing amount of global manga available and in development. Editors throughout the manga industry are busier than they’ve ever been, so patience has become quite a virtue among creators. Don’t be surprised if it takes months to hear back on a pitch you submit to a publisher, if you hear back at all. And don’t be surprised if it takes several pitches, or if you’re told to re-pitch an idea in “about a year.” It’s extremely rare for a proposal to get greenlit entirely as is immediately after it’s pitched these days, and I don’t see that changing any time soon.

8. You must be talented and creative. I’ve grouped these two together not because they’re less important than the above traits, but because they’re the two that I feel are already the most widely known. Everyone knows you need talent and creativity to create manga, and you know what? It’s hardly in short supply. Talent and creativity are essential. However, it’s the seven other traits I’ve mentioned here that will allow you to stand out from the rest of the hopeful manga-kas and enter the realm of the professional ones.

Still there? Then you’ve definitely shown you’re interested in creating manga professionally. Now let’s see how serious you are about it. I welcome any comments and questions below from artists, whether they’re published or not. I promise that I’ll do my best to address them. Otherwise, go and create! After all, the first part of making manga is to actually go and do it!

An Unexpected Look at 9/11

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I sometimes wonder if 9/11 was indirectly responsible for my comic book career. It sounds strange and I absolutely mean no disrespect to any of the people who lost loved ones in the tragedy. But it’s hard not to acknowledge the fact that my life may have been completely different if not for 9/11.

At the time of the attack, I was working for a company called JPI Design, which was an entertainment design and architecture firm in Ontario, California. I was their staff writer, responsible for drafting up everything from press releases to trade articles to scripts for the various theme park rides and attractions they developed. It was a very different job to what I’m doing now, but I enjoyed it and found it very creatively fulfilling. Plus, I enjoyed the industry. There was a lot of passion in it, similar to what I’ve found in comics.

JPI Design was a very small company, but their star seemed to be on the rise. They were in the early design stages for several large, international resorts and theme parks, and I was busy in the days leading up to 9/11 working on proposals and written narratives to help sell the projects to investors.

And then the attack happened and everything changed.

It felt like the whole nation spent about a week in shock. No work was done because all of it suddenly seemed insignificant and unimportant. People were grieving and asking questions, and I was no different. When people began picking themselves up and going back to work, everything had changed. Nothing felt the same, but the impact of 9/11 on the industry I was working in was extreme. No one was traveling after the attacks. Security at the airports was intense, but also, the simple fact was that no one was in the mood for riding roller coasters and getting splashed on log rides after we’d just unexpectedly and violently been robbed of thousands of American lives. Theme parks and resorts seemed so frivolous and at odds with the mood of our nation and much of the world. Leisure and entertainment projects were shelved. All of those large developments JPI was working on disappeared and the company was left without a source of income. They managed to hold on for a little while, but they were soon unable to make payroll and went under. In the end, they were yet another victim of 9/11.

Fortunately, I was given the opportunity to freelance edit manga titles at Tokyopop before that happened, and while I loved what I was doing at JPI and hated to leave the company, it was clear where things were headed. Accepting the Tokyopop offer was an easy decision to make.

If you know anything about me, you know what happened next. I really took to editing manga and eventually wound up with a full-time position at Tokyopop, which opened the door to the career I have now. But occasionally, I have to wonder about what would have happened had 9/11 not occurred and those big projects JPI had in the pipeline had all moved forward. I would have had no reason to leave them and may have built up a career scripting shows and attractions instead.

Yes, it’s true that 9/11 changed everything. Our country isn’t the same place it was before 2001. But not every change was far-reaching. Many, if not most, of the changes were on the individual level for millions of Americans. The most direct—the loss of loved ones—were tragic and painful, but strangely enough, some of the less direct changes may have been positive. Certainly, I’m not defending the terrorist act or suggesting that we’re better off as a result. Don’t misunderstand me. It was a tragedy and I think if any of us had the power to undo it, we would. But in an unexpected way, the tragedy eventually brought me to something good. Like everyone else, I picked myself up, rebuilt and I’m better and happier as a result. And if that’s not a sign of resilience, I’m not sure what is.

Things aren’t good out there right now. We’re on the brink of a second recession and the job market is terrible. Millions of people are out of work and wondering how much longer they can stay afloat…if they haven’t already sunk beneath the weight of debt. People have been affected by storms, earthquakes, drought and there are millions of people out there in the world who still hate us and mean us harm… It’s been a tough year. But we’ve survived tougher, and often in the end, we emerge better than we were before. Stronger.

It’s a message from 9/11 that I think is well worth heeding right now.

Surviving San Diego

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I think it was around the time I bumped into a dwarf wearing a clown outfit while leaving a sci-fi lucha bar in the company of a small harem of women that I realized Comic-Con has really changed for me. To be certain, it’s always been a somewhat surreal experience, but this was the first year it seemed to play out like a four-day, Hunter S. Thompson button trip experienced after 48 hours of meditating to episodes of Adventure Time. It was weird, tiring and more than a little confusing. It left me with a scratchy throat and a sense of fatigue that I’ve been trying to sleep off ever since. It was also one of the most exhilarating experiences I’ve had in ages.

I’ve been going to Comic-Con since well before I started working in comics. I first began making the yearly pilgrimage down to San Diego when I was in college. I remember picking up the first few issues of Alan Moore’s League of Extraordinary Gentlemen one of the first years I attended. This year, I picked up its latest installment, Century: 1969. That’s about the only similarity between Comic-Con then and now, however. The first few times I went to Comic-Con, you could still get passes and a hotel room without crashing the internet. Comic-Con was contained entirely in the convention center, and there was no Hall H. All the big movie panels were in Ballroom 20, and you could actually get into them without lining up half of the day. (I actually used to cheat, showing up about 20 minutes before the prior panel had ended and telling the guard that I was there to check out the end of it, which allowed me to bypass the line of people waiting for the next one. Yeah, it’s astonishing that I had the nerve to act like such an entitled bastard, but what’s even more astonishing is that it actually worked.) At night, I hung out with friends and actually went to bed early so we could be up in time to catch the morning panels the next day. There were no mixers or parties and certainly no late night beer binges. Comic-Con was about fandom for me in those days.

And for the longest time, even after I began working within the industry as an editor and writer, I still adhered at least partially to that belief. But the biggest difference about this Comic-Con compared to all of the ones past was that this was the first year I begrudgingly accepted the fact that I’m there to work. I realized that as much as I’d love to take time out to check out the “Sexy Geek” panel or stroll through the Lionsgate booth to snag one of those mockingjay pins, I couldn’t. This is my once a year industry weekend, and as a freelancer in a very competitive industry, I had to make use of it. In fact, if you’ve been wondering why I don’t really have any photos to accompany this write-up, it’s because I almost never even took my camera out. I just didn’t have the time and my focus was elsewhere. I was more interested in taking business cards than snapshots this year, which may make for a more productive freelance schedule in the months ahead, but it also makes for a very visually uninteresting blog post. Sorry about that.

Part of this newfound acceptance meant connecting with as many of my friends in the industry as I could. I never really think of myself as knowing very many editors, writers and artists…until Comic-Con rolls around. Then it becomes clear exactly how many people I know. And what’s worse is that I really do like these people. I wanted to see them, and while I made a valiant effort to hunt all of them down, a few proved elusive. Several of the good folks that I missed have since told me they came by the Archaia booth and I wasn’t there, which I can only imagine means they came by when I was having lunch or drinks with the ones I did find. People live and die by their cell phones at Comic-Con, so I need to get better about giving my cell number to people I want to see at conventions. And then I need to hire someone to answer my cell phone for me. Considering 95% of my time at the show this year was spent meeting with people, signing comics, talking to fans or sleeping—none of which are really good times to pick up the phone—I found myself ignoring phone calls and text messages until I got a break, at which point I’d have something like 48,000 texts that I needed to respond to. I seriously think I might’ve broken Verizon.

I also had two books to promote this year: Fraggle Rock and Strawberry Shortcake. Shortcake was a little weird since for the most part, I was the only Strawberry Shortcake creator the publisher had in the booth, and I look far more like a lowlife in an Ed Brubaker comic than I do a writer of happy, girly things, but the little girls who bought the book didn’t seem to mind even if a few of their fathers were giving me strange looks. Besides, the great thing about Strawberry Shortcake was that we sold as many copies to adult women as to little girls, proving that men aren’t the only ones upset that their parents threw out all of their old toys. The most interesting one was a sparkly looking porn star who offered to trade me her X-rated coloring book for a copy of the issue. (One thing you never want to hear at a Strawberry Shortcake comic book signing is, “Do you like porn?”) I had to refuse the trade, but she was willing to buy the comic and left me the coloring book anyhow, along with a little pack of Disney Princess crayons.

But where things started to get really bent was my rooming situation. This year, I found myself sharing a hotel room with four different women.

Now, anyone who knows me knows that I have quite a few female friends. In fact, at last count my close female friends outnumber my close male ones about two to one. I also have a female roommate and grew up in a household comprised entirely of women for much of my life, so I’m very comfortable around women. But when you’re a man working in the comic book industry and people learn that you’re sharing your hotel room with four attractive young female creators (well, technically one of them was just down for fun and isn’t in the funny book business, but it hardly changes things), you’re going to get some raised eyebrows…and maybe a few slaps on the back and presumptively knowing winks.

Yes, I apparently had a harem this year—a name which the group adopted themselves. Among this small collective were two artists that I’m working with on personal projects of mine, one of whom I had never met in person before. Another was a close friend of mine from the bay area who I once dated and the last was a woman with a Dune tattoo on her back and a full-time job as a bio-mercenary, which may be the most badass sounding career ever created. You throw a little alcohol into the mix and conversations were lively, to say the least.

It also meant that there was a fair amount of emotional drama over the weekend. Hell, there always is when copious amounts of booze is involved, but this weekend seemed like it had been marinated in it. One of my roommates had originally intended on attending the show with her boyfriend of five years, but then needed to make other arrangements when that relationship ended. Another is unhappy in her marriage and uncertain whether she should stick with it. One roommate had a death in her family during Comic-Con weekend. Two members of our group were vegetarians, while one of them kills animals for a living. People were unemployed, uncertain, uneasy and often in various stages of undress. It was like a Tennessee Williams play with Browncoats.

Needless to say, no one was in the mood to stay in at night, least of all me, since everyone knows the real Comic-Con takes place long after the convention hall has closed. However, I also wasn’t content to adhere to my normal practice of rounding up a group for dinner and then immediately making our way to the Hyatt afterwards. Not when there were other options.

Thursday found us at the One Plus Hub mixer before skipping the IDW party (which was loud and had a line to rival Hall H’s) and heading to the Boom! gathering over at the Hilton Bayfront. That was entertaining right up until their happy hour ended and drink prices rose to roughly the equivalent of a down payment on a yacht. On Friday, we were joined for dinner by the lovely Grace Randolph before a few of us headed off to Tr!ckster. I wish I could tell you what Tr!ckster was, but I visited it twice and I still don’t have the faintest idea. It seemed to be an art show and auction combined with a sushi bar that for whatever reason was being held in some sort of wine cellar. And the subject of most of the art was Akira Kurosawa. (That’s true of the night I attended, at least. I’ve been told the art changed each day.) I’d heard that Tr!ckster was the place to be this year, and don’t get me wrong, it was enjoyable and inspiring in its own way, but after spending about an hour wandering around and seeing very few people I knew, I decided I’d be finding something different to do on Saturday night.

That something different was apparently a bar crawl. To be honest, we didn’t start off Saturday night expecting to stumble drunkenly from one side of the Gaslamp to the other. In fact, we started Saturday night off in the pool. The Marriott Marquis has such a wonderful heated pool, and every time I’ve stayed there in the past I’ve always eyed it longingly as I’ve hurried up to my room. This time, a few of us decided to stop and jump in, while the rest stayed up in the room and eyed us longingly. Then it was off to dinner at Maloney’s, which once used to be a pretty decent pub. Unfortunately, it’s now turned into a loud club with an obnoxious wait staff and a smaller menu than I remembered. Dinner turned into drinks and drinks turned into dancing. And dancing turned into all the women in our group getting swarmed by a bunch of bad dancers who were dressed as superheroes. We decided to leave.

Now, leaving a bar when you don’t know where you intend to go is never a good idea, especially when you’re with a group. We knew the plan was to end up at the Hyatt, but none of us were in a hurry to get there too early…so we wandered. We drifted in and out of a few places including the previously mentioned lucha bar and a crowded Irish pub. We had at least one round at each of them, and by the time we finally made it to the Hyatt, we were almost too drunk to take advantage of Archaia’s open tab. But that’s okay. By then, it was well past midnight and the only people who were even close to sober at the Hyatt were the clerks embarrassingly trying to explain their amenities to the late check-ins while what must’ve sounded like a stadium full of drunken football fans were arguing about whether DC’s reboot was a good idea just down the hall. It’s always hard to tell if the headache you have when you leave the Hyatt is from the booze or the noise.

Considering the sort of nights I was having, it’s little wonder I left Comic-Con in something of a daze. I managed to avoid getting sick this year, largely because I spent most of the past few days sleeping. And now that I’ve woken up, I’ve found myself missing my companions and already looking ahead to next year. That’s a first. Usually, Comic-Con kicks my ass and I don’t even want to look at another red lanyard or plastic badge holder until next summer. This year, Comic-Con kicked my ass…and I kinda want more.

I’m not sure what that says about me. Maybe this means it’s time for me to leave this crazy industry. Perhaps I’ve become like a battered spouse who has been abused for so long he thinks he deserves it. Or maybe I’m more like a boxer who realizes the only way to achieve what he’s after is through blood, sweat and pain. Maybe this is my way of saying I’m ready for the next challenge, the next fight. Maybe success lies just ahead.

Either way, it might’ve been brutal at times, but I made it through Comic-Con. And as always, it was a hell of a show.

Forgotten Friday: The Devil’s Backbone

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What I recall about The Devil’s Backbone is how much its release surprised me. This curiously overlooked flick was the third film directed by Guillermo del Toro, and after the disappointing performance of his debut English-language film, Mimic, it found the director returning to his native language of Spanish.

However, that’s only part of the story. At the time The Devil’s Backbone was released, it had been announced that Guillermo del Toro was directing the sequel to Blade and was also attempting to bring the popular comic Hellboy to the big screen. In other words, in geek circles, Guillermo del Toro was about as hot as you can get. He had a stellar reputation for horror and science fiction, and was about to apply it to two beloved comic book franchises. So when this deeply personal, subtitled ghost story hit theaters in the midst of all that, it kind of came as a surprise. It was unheralded, and I’m not sure the fanboys knew what to make of it. Why was del Toro filming low budget movies with unknown actors in foreign languages when he had just hit the big leagues?

Certainly, del Toro has his reasons. And we’re all the better for them as The Devil’s Backbone is one of the best films he’s ever directed. Watching it now, it serves as an excellent companion film to the far more popular and critically acclaimed Pan’s Labyrinth. Both films are set against the backdrop of the Spanish Civil War and are told from the point of view of a child (a boy in The Devil’s Backbone and a girl in Pan’s Labyrinth—a
compelling difference). Both feature themes of innocence lost to the horror and desperation of war and both build their stories around supernatural elements. Therefore, it’s strange that far more people have seen and enjoyed Pan’s Labyrinth than The Devil’s Backbone. It’s possible that Labyrinth’s highly original fantasy elements just caught the public’s attention in a way that Backbone’s more traditional ghosts could not. Certainly, the film wasn’t marketed anywhere near as well as del Toro’s later one. It’s also possible that filmgoers’ appetites for period ghost stories had been sated by The Others, the ghostly Nicole Kidman blockbuster that came out earlier the same year. (A shame, as it’s nowhere near as original, scary or emotionally moving del Toro’s flick.)

Whatever the reason, Pan’s Labyrinth grossed nearly $40,000,000 in its theatrical run, while The Devil’s Backbone couldn’t even muster up a million.

If you haven’t seen the film and you consider yourself a fan of del Toro’s work, you really owe it to yourself to rent it. Especially if you consider Pan’s Labyrinth one of his best films, because as much as I love the imagination and human terror that movie brought to the screen, I think The Devil’s Backbone works far better as a story. Centered around a young boy who is brought to an orphanage after his father is killed in the war, The Devil’s Backbone is a story about coming of age in an environment that demands it as soon as possible, but offers absolutely no reward for doing so. No hope. No family. No future. All the boys at the orphanage really have is each other, and their friendship helps get them through some extremely trying circumstances, while righting a wrong that has been haunting one of the boys his entire life—and literally haunting the orphanage.

It’s not an easy film to sit through at times. Del Toro doesn’t shy away from revealing the horrors of war and the sort of human monsters it can create (who, like with Pan’s Labyrinth, are far scarier than any of the supernatural horrors shown in the film). However, the most uneasy element is simply the tone and atmosphere of the movie. This is an orphanage that could be utterly destroyed in conflict or by the cruel whim of a fascist general at any moment, and the silent, darkened, dead corridors and corners on display throughout the movie serve as a constant reminder of this. But no visual illustrates it better than the sight of a lone, unexploded bomb that sits half-buried in the middle of the orphanage’s courtyard—a frightening weapon of mass destruction that was defused yet left to rust in the midst of playing children because the war effort couldn’t spare the time or effort it would take to haul it away.

The Devil’s Backbone is full of chilling images like this one, though for my money, none are better than the very final one. I won’t ruin it for you, but I will say it’s nothing horrific or terrifying, and certainly nothing supernatural. It’s an image of youth heading into the unknown… Well, at least, it’s unknown for them. It’s a haunting image rather than a hopeful one because we know all too well what most likely awaits for them at the end of their journey.

It’s a final image that stays with you for weeks after you’ve seen it, much like the film as a whole.

You can check out the trailer for The Devil’s Backbone below: