By Zack Quaintance — Today we have a great chat with J. Gonzo about the new collected edition of his lucha libre comic, La Mano Del Destino. This is one good-looking book, with an ostentatious Silver Age aesthetic and a swaggering 1960s Mexico setting. I had a chance to read this book digitally in advance of our talk, and I immediately pre-order it. It’s that good.

Check out my chat with Gonzo about the book below!

INTERVIEW: J. Gonzo talks LA MANO DEL DESTINO

ZACK QUAINTANCE: So, we’re coming up on roughly the 10-year anniversary of the publication of the first La Mano Del Destino comic...how does it feel now to be compiling these comics into a new big book?

J. GONZO: Tremendously gratifying! - Having been a a professional artist for the past three decades, I am prone to procrastination, distraction, and the pitfall of allowing personal projects to be back-burnered into oblivion. Like the auto mechanic whose car runs like crap, it is far to easy for me to neglect work that I am solely responsible for, so to finally chip-away at this for long enough to reach its planned conclusion is a tangible victory and milestone that I still can't quite get my head around. I wake up most days still thinking that I need to get around to working on the series, only to realize that it is actually complete - I have this phantom guilt about the project - I spent a decade feeling that I wasn't working hard enough on it in my scant spare moments, that, now that it's complete, I don't know what to do with the mental bandwidth I had relegated to it for so long. So now I just try to channel that energy into the few projects that I have planned for that character and his world. I do have a few people in my life that have foisted small moments of retrospective appreciation upon me, but they are fleeting and don't quite fit right. Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to fetishize a neuroses as a substitute for discipline here; I'm just trying to capitalize on my newfound volition and bring some of my plans to fruition.

ZACK: The story is such a fantastic intersection of so many great traditions. As the preview says, it’s “Mesoamerican myth, Silver-Age storytelling, and high-flying Lucha Libre”...how did this specific trio of subject matter capture your interest for this story?

J. GONZO: These are three genres that I personal history and much affection for and I knew I wanted the story to be about notions of "identity " versus "destiny" - and, at some point in the development of the story, I realized that Lucha Libre (and specifically, Luchadores) were a perfect distillation of Identity as a construct, and that Silver-Age storytelling was a perfect framework and shorthand for morality plays that could be both appropriated and/or subverted, and that some Meso-Amercan myths (specifically Coatlicue's birthing of Quetzalcoatl and Huitzilopochtli) would be prefect premises of an allegory that narrative could loosely follow - it all synchronized seamlessly for me. Silver-Age comics and Lucha Libre are, at their core ethos, about myth-making every bit as much as any Aztec codex might be. Myth is narrative of confessed artifice that reveal a truth more visceral than any factual or literal account could ever conjure - the point of these stories is that they're stories, but still resonate. I have often said that Comics are like a magic trick - they are more impressive when you know they aren't real, but still you are fooled. Lucha Libre with it's bold pageantry, and Silver-Age comics with their fantastical heroes and settings, and both with their operatic tones, all tell the viewer the same thing: "this is all made up" - which is no different than a magician telling their audience "I am going to do a trick". The expectation isn't for real magic to occur, but to discover the magic of what is really occurring - and all three genres do a similar thing; storytelling free from the burden of realism to convey an undeniable truth.

ZACK: I want to ask specifically about the coloring of these comics, which I absolutely love. It’s like the Silver Age married a vintage Lucha poster, and this is their really cool punk rock kid. How did you decide on the palette you used for the book, and how does it connect with the characters and story?

J. GONZO: In order to maintain the Silver-Age aesthetic, I wanted to employ a limited color palette - the production techniques of the Silver-Age limited how many colors could be used and (combined with the schedule at which these books were produced) the ability to have gradients or soft edges was extremely limited so flat color was the default. That all being said, I also wanted the palette to be so limited that it was indicative of a curated reality - this is a world that is not the real world. I chose my colors to reflect the vibrant hues of my Chicano heritage as a direct response (and in retaliation) to the dusty brown sepia tones that US pop culture is fond of casting Mexico in. I wanted this world to be as bright and alive as the culture that I was portraying. I also wanted the protagonist, La Mano del Destino, to have his own signature colors - so, of the twelve colors that I use for the entire book, three of them are only ever used on him. I selected La Mano del Destino's colors first (to be bold, of the era, and distinctly LatinX) and built the rest of the palette to compliment his - this world is literally built around the main character. I also used solid color to shade and sculpt figures instead of tints or shade to both: keep inline with the production methods of the era, and to add vibrancy through the resulting color illusions created by placing these hues beside each other (this is a technique that I cribbed from old Ben Cooper masks from this era).

ZACK: Can you talk a bit about the setting of the story, both the era and the place? What about Mexico in the 1960s made it the perfect time for this narrative?

J. GONZO: For me, the heyday of the Luchador was the 1960s - El Santo, Mil Mascars, Blue Demon, and the like were kings of the ring and making movies, the subject of comic books, toys, TV - all around cultural icons. Also, the mid 60s were a time of earnest cultural optimism on scale that has never been matched since. I wanted to set the story in a world devoid of cynicism masquerading as coolness where modernity was embraced. Though I never state this overtly, this is a Mexico that was as prosperous as the US after WWII and what that looks like in about 1964 - it is the aspirational version of the country that was portrayed in a lot of Lucha Libre films from that time - a swanky Jet Age Mexico that never really existed, but somehow did. This is also a world where Lucha Libre is THE MOST IMPORTANT thing that happens on that world. Every decision of any importance is decided by Luchador vs Luchador - want to take over a rival company? - ¡Lucharan! , Trying to get a bill turned into law and the opposing political party wants to block it? - ¡Lucharan! - These are rock stars, lawyers, athletes, and politicians all rolled into one. This fictionalized version of Mexico in the swinging 60s was the perfect backdrop for the larger-than-life Luchadores to be fully-integrated into. It was a time so ripe with possibilities that a person walking around in a suit and mask seems totally plausible.

ZACK: I also wanted to ask about the backmatter in this new book. I’ve read a preview copy, and I thought it was really interesting and really substantial. I mean, there are literal blueprints in there. What was the process like for collecting, selecting, and designing the backmatter for this book?

J. GONZO: I feel like backmatter is for people who really want to expand upon their experience of a book; and just putting the script in there (like a lot of creators do) and calling it "backmatter" is just lazy and a huge disservice to the attention of fans who are genuinely interested in a deep-dive into your story - so I just asked myself "what would I want to see in backmatter?". I always have questions about process and approach and I sought to expand upon those in my backmatter. Also, as mentioned in the first question, I have been doing this book for nearly a decade - and, in that time, I have met and conversed with thousands of people about the comic and have seen a lot of trends develop as to what people want to know about the book - so, away from the hectic environment of a convention table, I set out to clearly and methodically answers those questions. I had also created a lot of material that was only for my benefit and reference (like the aforementioned blueprints) that had no place in the comic itself, but I thought might be fun for people to see. As an artist, I always have question about tools and technique when I talk to other creators and they are always forthcoming with their tips and tools so I spelled-put exactly what I do and how I do it in this backmatter. I wanted to created an almost "how-to guide" for my comic. It took me a long time to figure out my method to get the result I wanted, but it's hardly arcane, forbidden knowledge - I want any aspiring artist to have any shortcut that I can give them - "A rising tide.." and all that. I just wanted my backmatter to have a reason for being there beyond inflating a page count or my ego.

ZACK: Finally, if you had a Lucha name, what would it be and why?

J. GONZO: El Gonzito - "Gonzo" is the only name that anyone who actually knows me uses, and "ito" is a diminutive suffix and I am a small person - 5' 6" on a good posture day. Lucha Libre has a long history of "putting over" unlikely champions, so I feel like downplaying my stature would only mean that I would be underestimated. - I would love to hear your answer to this same question!

ZACK: My wife is a native Spanish speaker and she has a few names she uses for me that may fit the bill, including payaso and bebote, which mean clown and big baby, respectively…hmm, I think I’m going to keep workshopping it.

La Mano Del Destino is out May 19th!

Read more great interviews with comics creators!

Zack Quaintance is a tech reporter by day and freelance writer by night/weekend. He Tweets compulsively about storytelling and comics as Comics Bookcase.