For extra background read previous interviews done by Ninth Art
Slush Factory and
Jose Carlos Neves

You’ve never actually met Alan in the flesh but you do have phone conversations with him about Promethea. How much pre-planning went in to the construction of Promethea?

Not a whole lot actually. I read the premise and thought about it a while before I sat down to do character designs. My wife and I sort of had a brainstroming session while I sketched Promethea’s design and then there she was. The other thing is that Alan asked me questions about the sort of interests I have, things I would like to draw. He likes to try to write to his artist’s tastes and personality.

How long between Alan pitching the original idea to you and the publication of Issue #1?

I don’t really remember how long it was from when we started the first issue. It had to be a good stretch of time because I remember I hadn’t even started Son of Superman and I had to finish that before I got started on Promethea. From what I remember I had to work on both projects at the same time for a while.

Do you think Alan had a basic plan for all 32 issues at the start in his head or was he making it up as he went along?

Alan had a very very vague plan but generally he has been writing this project a few pages at a time. Quite often I would have a few pages of script in hand and would call him to ask what happens on the next set of pages and he would say to me “Honestly, I’m not quite sure Jim, I haven’t written it yet so I don’t know.” Its amazing to think about it being written in that way because it certainly doesn’t feel like it was written spur of the moment. Its all very cohesive. Also we would have a talk at the beginning of each issue so we knew what direction we were probably going to go in so I can figure out what I’ll need to do with the art, but many times Alan deviates. Alan seems like he wants the story to almost write itself and doesn’t want to feel pressured to fit into any sort of structured outline. The qabala quest was probably the story that had the most forethought put into it, leading us into the final story arc.

Is Promethea the hardest and/or most rewarding title you’ve ever worked on. After 5 years and 32 issues Have you ever done something of this magnitude before?

Promethea has become a huge part of my life. It’s amazing to think about where I was when I started this thing and where I am now. It’s affected my career surely but also strengthened me as an artist. Even my personal life is very different. It’s hard to wrap my brain around all the changes and growth that have happened because of or at least during the time I’ve been working on this project. So I guess to answer your question more directily, Promethea has been the hardest, most rewarding and largest magnitude project I’ve worked on yet..........

Do you think you’ll ever go to England and visit Alan to meet him face to face?

Absolutely! We are planning a trip to Europe in the next few years and wouldn’t miss the opportunity to meet him. When we go I want to make sure we have time to really soak it all in, to really enjoy the trip. Not looking forward to flying at all though, I have enough trouble getting on an airplane just making a short trip somewhere. I try to avoid it as much as possible. So flying to England all the way from here in California makes me extremely nervous just thinking about it. Very long on the flying part of it but beyond that I’m sure the trip will be fantastic!

Which of your previous work do you think Alan was most impressed by when he chose you to help create Promethea with him?

I believe it was Chase that made him decide on me for Promethea.

Covers Source

I'm assuming what appealed to him was that Chase was a female character done realisticly. I think he saw some of the page layouts I did for that and thought he could work that into the type of story he wanted to tell. But to be honest I’m just speculating here. I’ve never really had the courage to ask him “why me?” It’s just never felt right to me to do that. And at this point it would probably sound like I was fishing for compliments.

Alan is well known for bringing out the best in the artists he works with. What do you think are your major strengths as an artist and how much of the artwork has been yours? Eg. Script saying something like this is what I would like to see in this panel but if you can think of something better go ahead

I feel a little weird saying what my strengths are, there are things I hope I’m good at?! Hopefully I’m not too off base in saying I draw a realistic figure, I have some storytelling skills and at least an interesting design sense. I believe maybe I have a unique perspective in the last 2 categories. I like to do border designs and unconventional layouts which Alan very quickly noticed and incorporated into the scripts. As far as examples of script change they are mostly little story telling tweaks. Mostly it’s very small things like a change in perspective in a panel or I rearrange a panel to bring more emphasis on the emotion on someone’s face, etc. The page I just did for issue 31 pg 23 I did something like that. Alan called for the camera on this page to progress backwards but what was happening was a very momentous and emotional scene and the intensity would be lost by pulling the camera away, so I pushed the shot in very tightly. There has been times where I’ve changed the entire layout but that’s extremely rare.
Another change I did that I remember is the character design for Uvula Cascade. Alan described (in great detail of course) a stereotypical porn star with enormous fake breasts and over the top street walker clothing and make up. I changed her look to reflect a more realistic protrayal of a porn star today, at least the ones I care to look at anyway.
Also I’m the one responsible for all stylistic jumping around for the 10 issue quest story arc. When Alan approached me with the quest concept for that part of the series I thought here is my opportunity to really push the boundaries of the visuals beyond what we had already done up to that point. It was absolutely the right thing to do for that arc. It really allowed for the art to convey a lot of what Alan wanted the individual “worlds” to feel like. We would discuss a couple of issues at a time. I would suggest an artistic look or artist I wished to go for according to what he wished write about. So for example I would say Van Gogh and other impressionist painting styles might be appropriate for Chesed and he would write his script with that in mind. That was pretty much what was done with that entire arc. And we continued that to some degree in the issues that followed as well but more inter-mixed into the regular comics style that we had already established.

Did you know Alan only by reputation beforehand or did you both have mutual friends in common?

It’s a little hard to not know Alan’s reputation in this business but no, I didn’t know Alan personally before Promethea. I had a few friends that did. But I’m so grateful to call him my friend now. He is one of the most graciously kind persons I have ever met.

What other projects did you work on while you were doing Promethea between 1999-2004?

Well this could take a while....I did a bunch of different runs of covers over at Marvel ( Inhumans, Gambit/Bishop, Wolverine, The Crew, Weapon X, Hulk, Deadpool) One of the Wolverine covers got turned into a T-shirt which was cool. I did some Hellboy and Star Wars stuff at Dark Horse. The Hellboy thing was a blast because I got to paint and co-write that story.

I did a story with the amazing Jodorowsky for Humanoids’ relaunched metal hurlant, pre DC merger (vampire comedy, gotta love that). I did numerous things here and there for DC which I can’t really remember much of except Nightwing covers and a black and white painted Superman page, oh, and I co-wrote some Chase stuff for Secret files and got to draw one of them (the joker’s last laugh tie in, it came out rather well). oh yeah and some very disappointing teen titans covers. I did a wrap-around Astra cover for C.P.M. Manga which came out really nice. A couple of Alan tribute books. Anyway this could go on forever, let’s just say I’ve done a lot of other stuff. A couple things are coming out soon such as an Adam Strange story I did for the Julius Schwartz tribute books and some Warlock covers for Marvel. I got to redesign Warlock for the new series, hopefully it will go over well. And some JSA covers

Inhumans

Wolverine

If there ever was a movie version of Promethea made who would you choose as actors, director, soundtrack, writer, etc?

Good question, I love this kind of stuff! At one time I thought it would be easy to cast a Promethea film but I now feel differently. At this point I think that I would have to see a bunch of different possibilities and go with a gut instinct reaction as I saw my choices in front of me. Maybe Natalie Portman as Sophie? She looks quite a bit like her and she definitely has the talent to play her properly.

If you’ve seen any of her lesser known roles you know what I mean. Which brings me to the idea of a director...Luc Besson. He always has an unsual perspective or Enki Bilal, have you seen some of the available footage for his film of The Immortal? Absolutely breath taking. Honestly though, for it really to be done properly and to have most of the elements of the comic’s more sophisticated themes, it would need to be a large mini-series for HBO or something like that. Now about the music...I feel it really should be a whole concoction of stuff ranging from classical to dark and moody rock. Definitely psychedelic, mysterious and mystical sounding. I would probably pick more obscure and lesser known pieces of music plus some newly created orchestral pieces as well. I could probably come up with a lot of different musical artists to list that would be appropriate. Fields of the Nephilim or Nefilim or Nephilim as they are also known as. They would be a must have music requirement for any proper Promethea film. Their music has the perfect elements of mysticism, rock and psychedelia atmospheres that I would hope to invoke.

Whenever I look at the descent back to Malkuth in #23 I keep hearing in my minds ear the end of the Beatles A Day in the Life with the final piano chord crashing as Promethea returns into Sophie's body. What music would you put in a film version of that scene?

I think you are right on the mark with that choice for that scene. Especially because it is very fast and sudden feeling with lots of epic drama thrown in at the same time. An amazing piece of music.

Do you listen to music while you draw or do you prefer to work in silence?

Yeah, I do listen to a lot of music when I work. But I don't limit myself to what kind. Just whatever I grab quick from my large collection or whatever new stuff I haven' listened to yet.

Is there any chance that Alan’s Promethea scripts could one day be published a la Absolute Edition of League of Extraordinary Gentlemen?

Anything is possible, it would be a shame if they didn’t.

In the meantime do you have just a small sample of some script pages you could share with us. My favorites would be pages 1-3 of issue #23 "Something from nothing". Any chance you’ll let 4colorheroes put up a small amount of Alans script when they interview you?

A: I can attach something. I don’t have the script for 23 anymore unfortunately. I don’t know anything about an interview with 4colorheroes.

Do you think Promethea is the sort of work that will receive greater appreciation once it is all collected into 5 Books as opposed the #32 issues that are published over 5 years or so?

Yeah, I should hope so!! I think it’s one of those stories that will be better appreciated as a whole, not to knock the value of each individual chapter. I think a lot of Alan’s stories are that way, they have meaningful chapters but there is always a bigger idea to be conveyed by the whole. I hope I don’t sound arrogant but I think Promethea took many previously known conventional comic book ideas and twisted them into something new. Even though Promethea relied on those conventions, when looked at as a whole body of work we did things that really hadn’t been done before. I don’t think people will realize how different this series was until some time later.
Watchmen is a good example of this thinking because when Watchmen was coming out the individual issues did sell OK but wasn’t nearly as appreciated until it was collected. And before anyone jumps on me I’m not comparing Watchmen and Promethea!

Are there any artists whom you haven’t managed to use as an inspiration for a Promethea cover that you would have liked to use? Who are your favorite artists?

Well Rembrandt’s religious iconography comes to mind and I would have liked to do something honoring Jackson Pollock if I could of had it make sense. We didn’t really have a master plan for the covers we just picked different artists or different art styles or mediums we liked that had a look that helped represent the issue often only a month or so before I did them. I’m afraid that it would be too time consuming to list my favorite artists. I’m a big art junkie. Here’s an after thought...it would have been nice to do something that would be a tribute to Al Williamson. Another idea I had considered at one point was doing a cover that looked like the old Dan Dare comic strips from Eagle even trying to duplicate the hand washed color that they had but I couldn’t find a place to do it.

I can see Blade Runner and Gilliam’s Adventures of Baron Munchaussen as some of the inspiration behind some of your illustrations for Promethea. Are there any other movies or comic books that have provided the source for your work on Promethea? Which comic book artists and film directors do you admire?

That’s interesting that you picked up on those film influences in my work. You are the first to notice that or at least to say so. On a different level I’m influenced by the Coen brothers films also. They are probably some of the best film makers in history. I’m also influenced by old sci-fi films from the 50s and 60s. As a matter of fact, probably my favorite film of all time is The Day The Earth Stood Still. In my humble opinion, it is probably one most important films ever made from that time period because of it’s message and ideals. What it has to say can still be relevant today and it was presented with such class. I’m influenced by Hitchcock and David Lynch and in some ways Hong Kong cinema as well. Another film I find that influenced me was Luc Besson’s The Fifth Element. A very visually interesting film which is obviously influenced by European science fiction comics and graphic novels. That's probalby why I like looking at it so much since I love those types of comics as well.
I love anything by Jodorowsky, Moebius, Serpieri, Bilal, Manara, Schuiten, Bess, and many more. Some of my American comics influences are Williamson, Toth, Russell, the Hernandez brothers, Seth (Palookaville), Charles Burns, Chaykin and many more.
This may surprise some people, because of the way my stuff looks, but I’m also influenced by manga artists as well. Such as Ryoichi Ikegami, Junji Ito, Osamu Tezuka, Kosuke Fujishima, anime director Hayao Miyazaki, and again, many more.

Are there any other comic books out there that you think are similar to Promethea in any way? Here’s my list

I’m not sure if this is really similar to Promethea other than it really can immerse you into another world thoroughly and has an amazing sense of wonder and scope but I really love Rod Espinosa’s Neotopia from Antarctic Press. Also I would think that Rex Mundi from Image would be appropriate due to it’s subject matter. It touches on similar themes and and is done with intellignece and excellent attention to detail. Also Jeromy Cox does the color work for it as well.
Another appropriate book or set of books rather is White Lama by Jodorowsky and Bess done for humanoids. It is a spectacular 6 volume graphic novel series. I highly recommend it. I believe it will be repackaged into a slightly different format and re-presented to come out later this year by the new DC/humanoids partnership. Definitely worthwhile reading.

Eric Shanower told me that:
I'm working on a second Little Margie story that Steve Moore has written. Alan Moore plotted it. It's somewhat longer than the first Little Margie story, and is supposed to be at the end of the strip's run.
Do you know anything more about this?

You know as much as I do but I can’t wait to see it. I’m sure it will be just as great as the first one. I really love what Eric did with it so the new one will be fantastic.

Also do you think Issue #32 will be longer than the standard 24 pgs?

Guaranteed.
Issue 32 will be 32 pages long and, if production works out, will also be a stapled printed comic-read sort of like a comic-but also be an unfolding double sided poster and a limited double sided poster with some sort of special printing involved in its production. Todd [Klein] and I are working on issue 32 right now. We are both designing on this one with me handling the art chores. I'm not what the schedule will be for it due to the different formats. Hopefully it will be available in all of its various formats at the same time. Be prepared for a very unusual reading experience thats for sure.
The format decided on for issue 32 is strictly to do something fun and puzzle like which will make more sense when you see it. It will definitely be unlike anything else done before. From what I have recently found out, the special limited edition poster version will most likely be available after the stapled comic version and the company is still not sure if they will be able do the folded poster version. If they can it will probably be offered at the same time as the stapled version. So there should be 2 to 3 versions coming and possibly multiple solicitations for them.

What are some of your own favorite images that you've done for Promethea?

About my favorite images from the series so far I tend to pick out unsusual ones sometimes. These usually end up in my own private collection of work that I've done and are not to be sold to collectors anytime soon. I tend to choose the pages I keep for a variety of reasons. Sometimes it's for only a particular panel or sometimes it's the overall feeling I get about the page. or if I'm particularly happy about a certain aspect of the drawing quality itself.
I'm also quite proud of the covers we have done. not to sound arrogant, which I'm sure this will, but I think we have done some of the most remarkable covers for a comic series that I've seen. Especially in the way they are all so radically different from each other and yet still different from whatever is sitting next to it on the shelf. I'm really proud of that. On my next project I'm going to attempt to do the same thing but in whole story arcs instead of individual issues. Hopefully that will work out just as nice as promethea did in that regard.
List, in no particular order...
all of the rough character designs
Issue 1 page 2
Issue 1 page 27
Issue 2 page 24
Issue 3 page 24
Issue 4 page 1
Issue 5 pages 18 and 19
Issue 6 page 1
Issue 7 page13 page 21
Issue 8 page 24
Issue 9 page 24
I don't have anything for issue 10. It was entirely sold to a collector so I would have to say my favorite images are the 2 pages that the panels actually form a winding snake and then the 2 orgasm pages that is a rip of one of the Jimi Hendrix album covers.
Issue 11 page 11
Issue 12 the cover
The cover art to volume one hardcover edition
Issue 13 pages 4 and 5
Issue 14 pages 20 and 21
All of issue 15 was sold to a collector so I would have to say favorites are the infinity loop and the first appearance of Mercury
All of the design art for the statue and action figures

Issue 16 pages 16 and 17
Issue 17 pages 14 and 15
Issue 18 page 24
Issue 19 pages 14 and 15 Poseiden
Issue 20 pages 14 and 15 this is when the relief comes
Issue 21 pages 12 and 13 city of pyramids
Issue 22 the real pages 14 and 15 which are inside
Volume 4 collected edition
Issue 23 pages 12 and 13
Issue 24 pages 14 and 15
Issue 25 pages 6 and 7
Issue 26 page 12
Issue 27 page 1
Issue 28 cover
Issue 28 pages 14 and 15
Issue 29 the cover
Not really a Promethea part but I kept the art to the cover portrait of Alan I did for Comic Book Artist magazine

and the art for the 2 page sequential pop art tribute that I did for the Extraordinary Works of Alan Moore book
I haven't decided what I'm keeping from the remaining issues yet. I probably will end up keeping all of issue 32 for awhile at least.

What was it like to win the 2002 Squiddy for Best Comics Penciller in 2002?

Well its always an honor to win an award and to know what you do is appreciated in a major way like that.

Do you actually get anything? Statue or paper or email saying you've won?

The funny thing about that is that I would never have known if it hadn’t been for my editor Scott Dunbier calling and telling me. So in other words, no I didn’t receive anything.

Once Promethea finishes JH Williams will be illustrating Warren Ellis’ Desolation Jones

I'm really looking forward to this project and working with Warren. I feel it has the potential to be just as captivating as Promethea but in drastically different ways. I think it's a good thing that it will be different than Promethea otherwise what's the point of doing it. Got to keep things moving in new and exciting directions or you could become stale, you know.

At the Promethea Message Board JH Williams always uses

That little phrase can be found sometimes near the run out groove on "Sisters of Mercy" records. Another one of my all time favorite bands. Very interesting phrase I think.