Jordan Thomas launches QUARANTINE Kickstarter - INTERVIEW
By Jarred A. Luján — Meet Jordan Thomas. Jordan is a rising comics writer who has a new Kickstarter called Quarantine, and it’s live right now. Quarantine is a really interesting project: a wild sci-fi one-shot that spans 40 pages and features a total of 28 different artists.
Recently, I had a chance to catch up with Jordan to talk about the book it. You can check out our chat below, after the link to the campaign. Enjoy!
>>CLICK HERE to check out QUARANTINE on Kickstarter now!<<
Jordan Thomas QUARANTINE Intervew
Jarred Luján: So, what’s Quarantine about?
Jordan Thomas: At the surface level, it’s about a family who have their apartment building zapped into an alternate universe without being given any specific reason and are then kept trapped in their homes by robots and only given weird goo to eat.
Thematically there’s bunch of stuff going on that people can look for in the book. There’s also lots of crazy sci-fi monsters. Like loads of them.
Luján: I imagine the world’s current events are what inspired Quarantine, but could you give us an idea of how you took it to the next level?
Thomas: Well, the main thing I took from current events was people – especially families with children – being locked inside together. There’s no contagion style viruses or anything. I thought that would be a bit much. It’s really just playing with how we’re all being forced to live on top of each other and the kind of issues that generates before taking the metaphor to a whole new level later in the story.
Luján: Why 28 different artists? What inspired that idea?
Thomas: Twitter! I was just sitting around scrolling through Twitter and noticed some wonderful artists I’d always wanted to work with were sending some fun bits of art they’d been doing to keep busy back and forth, and that led me to the not especially giant leap of getting as many artists as I could together to collaborate on a comic during the lockdown. The number doesn’t have any specific significance. I wrote a script which eventually ironed out to 27 pages, and then Darick Robertson is doing the cover – which is mad!
If the script had needed to be longer, there are other artists out there I would have also loved to work with. I had another five or so on my list to go to next if people were too busy. But there’s always next time if this is successful!
However, there are 19 floors in the apartment building, which is obviously a little nod to our current situation, and also a Stephen King reference – Ka is a wheel people.
Quarantine interior page by Gavin Mitchell.
Luján: This has such a special list of big indie up-and-comer artists! There’s a ton of great and talented artists out there, how/why did you pick this particular 28?
Thomas: Well, I had specific artists in mind for certain pages, but for the most part it was people I’d worked with before and love or just artists I’ve been following for a while and wanted to collaborate with. I also wanted a real mix of styles, so I tried to get people with contrasting styles. I only got a few people saying ‘no’, but there are one or two who wanted to do it but were too busy that would have been great. But honestly the team we have is incredible. We have a Slack group where we share everything and every day there’s a new piece of amazing art. It’s like we’ve made a catalogue for editors at the big publishers to flick through and pick the next top artists.
Luján: Can you give us an idea of what it was like balancing that many creative minds into one story?
Thomas: It was fantastic. The absolute best part of the whole thing. The Slack group is so much fun, so creative and inspiring. I’ll sign in there one day and Gary Erskine will be chatting process with some of the other artists, Shaky Kane will be posting stuff – it’s just generally so positive with everyone encouraging each other and helping out. I also think a little natural competitiveness has led to them all delivering their best work – which is great for me and anyone who buys the comic!
Luján: I saw you describe Quarantine as JG Ballard meets HP Lovecraft, and I’d love for you to go into a little bit more detail about why you see that crossover in this book…
Thomas: Sure. The Ballard comparisons are pretty clear. There’s a fair bit of Highrise in there and also his approach of “it’s a bit in the future, stuff is messed up, but we’re not explaining it all to you so just go with it”. The HP Lovecraft angle comes in a bit later. The blob creature is something you’d expect to find in one of his stories – especially a short story called From Beyond which involves scientists looking into an alternate dimension and finding some pretty terrifying stuff there. But there’s all kinds of other influences in there as well. Darick Robertson read the synopsis and described it as being like an episode of Rick & Morty – which I’m happy with.
Luján: You’ve run four successful Kickstarters so far with you and Clark Bint’s series (that I love) Frank at Home on the Farm. Does that give you an edge of confidence running into this one? What have you learned as you’ve developed these comics on the crowdfunding platforms?
Thomas: Yes, when I’m accessing the logical part of my brain, I guess it does! We’ve never failed with a campaign and our most recent one for the final issue was by far the most successful. So, there’s an audience there. Plus all the artists on the book have an audience, so really if five fans of each artist back the campaign we’ll hit our minimum goal. Of course – and I’m sure you can identify with this – there’s always that evil gremlin part of the brain that screams “what if this is the one that’s a horrible failure?!? Think of all the people you’ll have let down” – so fingers crossed that I quieten that voice fairly sharpish.
Luján: Speaking of which, Quarantine feels so different from Frank. Was this the project you had lined up for after that series ended all along, or did the world kind of just drop it on you?
Thomas: 100 percent number two. I had the idea for the multi-artists book, wanted to have a pitch to take to the first group I was contacting, and this was the story that came to mind. It didn’t exist an hour prior to me sending the group DM. However, I find my best stories are the ones that appear almost fully formed, where it all clicks into place very naturally like someone is telling me the story as opposed to thinking it up – the idea for Frank was the same, just had the whole story appear in my head late one night.
I am excited to be doing something tonally different to Frank though. I’m very proud of that book, and although it has some humor in it, it’s pretty dark. Quarantine is more of a fun ride with lots of silliness and jokes. Pretty much every page has something to make you laugh on it. If you just compare the two title designs from the series, and you can see the tonal differences.
Quarantine artwork by Gustaffo Vargas.
Luján: Lastly, what do you think people should expect from Quarantine?
Thomas: I guess like I said in the previous answer – it’s a whole lot of colorful fun. Despite the inspiration coming from what we’re all experiencing currently, it’s not like a news report; the only similarities relate to the lock down aspect of what’s happening, so it’s not going to be like a grim read.
Then of course people just need to prepare for absolutely incredible art. I mean the pages the artists are delivering blow me away every time – it’s obscene how lucky I’ve gotten. I also think it’s a comic you’ll get a lot of value out of. There are lots of small details to go back and check plus you can compare the different artists’ interpretations of the various characters and creatures. Plus we’re filling the back of the book with making of material – designs, roughs, character sketches – it’s a very complete package of stunning material, and the story isn’t too bad either.
Quarantine by writer Jordan Thomas and 28 (28!!) artists is live on Kickstarter now.
Jarred A. Luján makes comics, studies existential philosophy, and listens to hip-hop too loudly. For bad jokes and dog pictures, you can follow him on Twitter.