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Go get it here. Also came up with a transcript real quick. Again, English? Not my first language, so please excuse any typos (and help me with that one miss, maybe?)
Spoiler:
Brian Lynch: Hey everyone, this is Brian Lynch, I'm the co-plotter and scripter of Angel: After the Fall and the upcoming Spike: After the Fall, and I'm the writer and creator of Everybody's Dead. All of those are from IDW, and you should pick them all up. This is all pretty great. I've read them all, and I'm really unbiased when I say that they're wonderful.
A few weeks ago I asked anyone who reads my blog to pose any questions they may have about anything that I'm working on, or about, you know, what I'm doing, or what I'm wearing. In case anyone wants to know what I'm wearing now that I've put that out there, it's, like, an orange Izod and a hat and shorts. I don't usually wear Izods, per se, but I'm doing laundry, so my hayless (?) clothes are unavailable. Okay, I'm gonna answer the first couple of questions that people asked me -- they asked me, I think, 43 in total, but I'm gonna try and knock out, like, five, just to get it started. Is that okay with everyone? I hope so. Okay, let's go, let's start.
Jesse said, so, I've introduced Kate again -- she actually said "so you've introduced Kate", I turned it about myself. Jesse thinks she should get a spin-off now that Kate's back in rotation in the Angel world. Jesse says, "Since she left Angel I've wondered what she'd been up to, and after seeing her in this issue, I want to know about her battles and such over past several years. Are you interested?" I think that's a great idea, and when I finished writing this story for Kate, I actually said, you know, if we did a spin-off from Angel: After the Fall, it would be really cool to do a Kate mini-series. And then when IDW asked me if I had any ideas fora mini-series, it was either going to be one involving Kate, or the Spike: After the Fall. We went with Spike, because it's more in line with the Angel story, and we can make the two series kind of link up, whereas the Kate one would be off on her own thing, and I thought, you know, there should be a big coherent story altogether, cohesive. But yeah, I think a Kate story would be great -- I don't know if I'm gonna write it, but I think someone should, you know, put her front and center in her own series, 'cause she's really fun to write, and I think she's a fun character, and I think she has a fanbase. People were really excited when it was revealed that she came back, so that was cool. Thank you, Jesse.
Next question's from Sarah, and she starts "Hi, Brian!" and I say "Hi, Sarah!" and Sarah says "I had a question about writing Spike: After the Fall. Were there any stories that you wanted to do in Spike: AtF that you couldn't because of what you had set up in Angel? Or the other way around?" Actually, no, they kind of complement each other really well. You don't need to read either one, per se -- you don't need to read the other one to get the point of both series, but it certainly does help, and it certainly paints a huge picture. Actually, it didn't restrict me in any way, in fact, they let me go into more detail and do certain revelations in Spike's series that will make the Angel series all the more layered and richer. So, no, it actually really helped, that's why we went with Spike, as opposed to some of the other mini-series, like the Kate one. So, thank you, Sarah.
Next question's from Brian B. He asked "How do you keep your sideburns so trimmed?" He actually said "so trimed", I'm assuming he meant "trimmed", and the truth is, Brian B, you've not seen me lately, because I do not keep them trimmed. Or trimed, even. They're way too wacky right now, they're really thick. But thank you. Then he asks "Okay, now for something less important. I'm very excited about Spike: AtF. I'm wondering, though, in this hell will any of the gang find, for lack of a better word" -- um, I don't understand. Brian, I think you're so excited about Spike that your question is really weird. They want to know if there's any kind of love. Oh, he wants to know if there's any quote-unquote "love" between the characters. I'm not gonna reveal that. That's a spoiler, and, you know, you don't wanna have that revealed in a blog, one way or the other. You wanna read it, you wanna see it. Although you did point out that the Spike: After the Fall Issue 3 has a cover where there's some hankypanky going on, and that's totally true. There is something on that cover. Okay, thanks, Brian.
Next question's from Rowanda380. She says how nice it was to see Kate, and "it was nice to see a woman have a spotlight in the plot who wasn't weak, sick or attached to some man. Seriously, the storyline in general is missing the strong female influence." I disagree; Illyria certainly relies on Spike for some things, and obviously Wesley had an effect on her, but she definitely is kind of her own person at this point -- I mean, she's not even a person, but you know what I mean. I think Gwen and Nina both work with Connor, but, you know, I think they've got their own thing going on. Also, I don't know... I think the leads in the book are, of course, Angel and Wesley and Connor and Spike, but I mean, Illyria, ever since she's been in there, has had such an impact on the series, I don't know... I think she's got a strong influence. So, I'm sorry if this series doesn't have what you're looking for in terms of that, but I'm doing my best. And Brian B. likes it. And he likes my sideburns.
Next comment was deleted. I wonder what that person said. Probably something really -- it was probably, like, a compliment about how great the female characters are in Angel: After the Fall. It would have complented what I was trying to say before. Oh well.
All right, next question, Chris G. "Yo, Lynch. Nice 'chops." The sideburns... very popular with the blog audience, I had no idea. First question they asked, "Is there a glitch in Hell's matrix because Spike and Angel both have souls? And since L.A. is in Hell, the demons rule and the dead are rising again. Does this mean there's possibility of guys like The Beast to pop up?" It's a possibility for anything to happen in the book. We didn't say exactly where they are or what's going on, but anything can happen at any point, as we prove, hopefully, each issue that keeps surprising people. And Chris G. asks "Is Betta George being held down by a big web?" Yeah, Betta George is being held by something that's dampening his power, so he can't be unleashed, basically. 'Cause Gunn -- I mean, I guess Gunn knows his potential, and we're going into that a little more as the series goes on. You saw what happened, hopefully, in the last First Night issue that was released; Betta George did get away from the thing that's keeping him down, he was able to kind of manipulate one of the vampires. So, that was kind of cool. Thank you, Chris G. Oh, and then he says, "Keep it up, this book is the greatest", which is so nice. Thank you Chris, it's nice of you.
Last question I'm gonna do and then I'm gonna put this right up. It's Charlie Manson -- crazy that this is what Charles Manson is doing with his time, but he says "How close is Joss to the production of this fantastic series?" Joss laid the groundwork with me, a very specific outline, and now I'm carrying it out. That's pretty much what he's doing. So he did the heavy-lifting in the beginning, and now I'm the... now I'm the spokesman, now I'm the mouthpiece, does that make sense? Then Charlie Manson said, "If and when Angel becomes a vampire again, is he going to have a soul? And a tattoo?" I can't answer either one of those, 'cause they're all, I mean, that's all part of the book. The tattoo thing is going to be answered in the next couple of issues, it's a throwaway thing, but I think it's kind of a cool aside. Then Charlie Manson -- who is a huge fan of Angel and Spike, I had no idea. In addition to the plethora of awful things Charlie Manson does, he's also a very dedicated Whedon fan, which is crazy. Charlie Manson says "I am so glad Spike is getting his own book, because there was definitely not enough of him in Angel, but can one of the two of them at least mention Buffy?" Okay, that is absolutely no problem, they will do that. Then... mumblemumblemumble, "I hate that no-one from this or Buffy: Season 8 has even thought of each other." I'm sure they've thought of each other, Charlie Manson, but with all the stuff going on in the Angel series, it would be weird if Angel's like "I just challenged all these lords... I have no power left... I'm not a vampire... also, I wonder what Buffy's wearing right now." Like, he's clearly thinking about her, just like I'm sure Cordelia is on his mind, and we go into that as the series goes on, but at the same time, he'll be in an awkward stop in where the story's going if he just stopped and thought about something that wasn't pertinent at that moment. And Buffy is thinking about Angel, and Spike -- she had a dream about them earlier in the book, in her own book. And then Charlie Manson says "This book is amazing amazing amazing." Thank you! And then he asks how the series is gonna end, or details about -- Charlie Manson, as much as I fear you for what you have done, I can't reveal anything about the end of the book, although it's mapped out and it's pretty awesome, and I think you guys will... I think it's... yeah, I think it's epic, so. Thank you, Charlie Manson.
I'm not gonna end with a Charlie Manson question, because that's just a rule of podcasts, is you never stop with a question from a mass murderer. So Nolan says -- and I don't know Nolan, I don't know if you've killed anyone. If you've killed more than one or two people, then you also are a mass murderer, but if you've killed one or less, I can end on your question. So I'm gonna assume you are not a murderer, and then I'm gonna click on the link to your blog and see if you have blogged about possibly killing anyone, in which case I have to go back and answer another question. Nolan says, "Did you know how hard it is to find a copy of Big Helium Dog in my town?" Anyone that's confused as to what that means, Big Helium Dog is a movie I directed a while ago -- I wrote and directed -- and it's not on video or DVD, so I'd assume it's insanely hard, and if you found one, that's great, and tell me where, so I could go get a copy. Next question from Nolan: "Also, you said your writing in the Connor/Kate story is your best Whedon writing so far. I won't argue with that, but is there any one particular part that you are especially proud of?" I just really liked the fact -- I thought in a limited amount of time, we were able to play with the fact that Connor was so confused about who should be influencing him and who is his father, and in the course of a couple of pages, I was pretty proud of the fact that we had Angel encourage and kind of inspire him to go in the right direction, without Connor even knowing it. I thought that was really cool, I thought in a limited amount of time, we told Connor's story pretty great, and we let readers know why this character has gone through this big change. So I was pretty proud of that. And also I was proud of bringing Kate back.
But I will say that, since then, I've written stuff that I think is as good as that -- better, hopefully. I think the Spike series is just so dark and so fun and the revelations are so cool that I think that's coming along really well, and I think the stuff we have planned for the rest of Angel is just, it's just great. Like, if the rest, the earliest stuff was fun... And I hope everyone got a charge out of seeing their favourite characters back, but now they're back, and, you know, we're starting to just mix and match everybody and they're all interacting and it's building to something so big, and I just, I can't wait to see people's reactions. And I can't wait to write the specific dialogue that goes with certain things.
I think people are gonna -- if, in fact, a comic can make you, like, excited and cheer, then I would think that we have a lot of moments like that coming up. And I would think -- I mean, it's happened to me, that there are moments in comic books that I just, I find myself getting really upset. And the last thing that did that to me was Pride of Baghdad, which is Brian K. Vaughn's graphic novel. I figured the hardest name and I apologize, but that made me so emotional, just that one and We3 by Grant Morrison and Quietly. I think there's stuff coming up in Angel, especially if you love these characters, you just... I'm emotionally attached to them, and I can't wait to write certain things and I can't wait to see or to hear people's reactions. I think dark times are coming and crowd-pleasing times are coming and it's just, I don't know, I think it's big. Act 2 and this one, Act 3, kind of together -- right now I'm working on Act 3 -- it's all homerun stuff, hopefully. So I just rambled, I swear I wasn't trying to (line???) the comic, I'm just excited about it.
I think that's it for now, I'm going to continue with Noel's question next time, but I just wanted to get some questions up so you guys knew I didn't forget about you. I hope you guys got the Angel: After the Fall Issue 1 Director's Cut that came out today. I think it's great, it's the entire script and my notes and the series looks great... the colours, like, pop more than they did in the first printing of the Angel Issue 1 and we changed some colouring stuff to make it work... the cover is amazing... I don't know, I hope you guys pick it up. And Everybody's Dead is coming out in a couple of weeks. We have two Angels coming out next in the same month, and I think there's some cool stuff in that, but hopefully some of the questions will be about that stuff, so I don't have to talk about it now.
Thank you, guys! If you made it this far, I really appreciate it. I hope I wasn't too boring and I'll be back in a little bit, and we'll talk more. Okay? Bye.
A few weeks ago I asked anyone who reads my blog to pose any questions they may have about anything that I'm working on, or about, you know, what I'm doing, or what I'm wearing. In case anyone wants to know what I'm wearing now that I've put that out there, it's, like, an orange Izod and a hat and shorts. I don't usually wear Izods, per se, but I'm doing laundry, so my hayless (?) clothes are unavailable. Okay, I'm gonna answer the first couple of questions that people asked me -- they asked me, I think, 43 in total, but I'm gonna try and knock out, like, five, just to get it started. Is that okay with everyone? I hope so. Okay, let's go, let's start.
Jesse said, so, I've introduced Kate again -- she actually said "so you've introduced Kate", I turned it about myself. Jesse thinks she should get a spin-off now that Kate's back in rotation in the Angel world. Jesse says, "Since she left Angel I've wondered what she'd been up to, and after seeing her in this issue, I want to know about her battles and such over past several years. Are you interested?" I think that's a great idea, and when I finished writing this story for Kate, I actually said, you know, if we did a spin-off from Angel: After the Fall, it would be really cool to do a Kate mini-series. And then when IDW asked me if I had any ideas fora mini-series, it was either going to be one involving Kate, or the Spike: After the Fall. We went with Spike, because it's more in line with the Angel story, and we can make the two series kind of link up, whereas the Kate one would be off on her own thing, and I thought, you know, there should be a big coherent story altogether, cohesive. But yeah, I think a Kate story would be great -- I don't know if I'm gonna write it, but I think someone should, you know, put her front and center in her own series, 'cause she's really fun to write, and I think she's a fun character, and I think she has a fanbase. People were really excited when it was revealed that she came back, so that was cool. Thank you, Jesse.
Next question's from Sarah, and she starts "Hi, Brian!" and I say "Hi, Sarah!" and Sarah says "I had a question about writing Spike: After the Fall. Were there any stories that you wanted to do in Spike: AtF that you couldn't because of what you had set up in Angel? Or the other way around?" Actually, no, they kind of complement each other really well. You don't need to read either one, per se -- you don't need to read the other one to get the point of both series, but it certainly does help, and it certainly paints a huge picture. Actually, it didn't restrict me in any way, in fact, they let me go into more detail and do certain revelations in Spike's series that will make the Angel series all the more layered and richer. So, no, it actually really helped, that's why we went with Spike, as opposed to some of the other mini-series, like the Kate one. So, thank you, Sarah.
Next question's from Brian B. He asked "How do you keep your sideburns so trimmed?" He actually said "so trimed", I'm assuming he meant "trimmed", and the truth is, Brian B, you've not seen me lately, because I do not keep them trimmed. Or trimed, even. They're way too wacky right now, they're really thick. But thank you. Then he asks "Okay, now for something less important. I'm very excited about Spike: AtF. I'm wondering, though, in this hell will any of the gang find, for lack of a better word" -- um, I don't understand. Brian, I think you're so excited about Spike that your question is really weird. They want to know if there's any kind of love. Oh, he wants to know if there's any quote-unquote "love" between the characters. I'm not gonna reveal that. That's a spoiler, and, you know, you don't wanna have that revealed in a blog, one way or the other. You wanna read it, you wanna see it. Although you did point out that the Spike: After the Fall Issue 3 has a cover where there's some hankypanky going on, and that's totally true. There is something on that cover. Okay, thanks, Brian.
Next question's from Rowanda380. She says how nice it was to see Kate, and "it was nice to see a woman have a spotlight in the plot who wasn't weak, sick or attached to some man. Seriously, the storyline in general is missing the strong female influence." I disagree; Illyria certainly relies on Spike for some things, and obviously Wesley had an effect on her, but she definitely is kind of her own person at this point -- I mean, she's not even a person, but you know what I mean. I think Gwen and Nina both work with Connor, but, you know, I think they've got their own thing going on. Also, I don't know... I think the leads in the book are, of course, Angel and Wesley and Connor and Spike, but I mean, Illyria, ever since she's been in there, has had such an impact on the series, I don't know... I think she's got a strong influence. So, I'm sorry if this series doesn't have what you're looking for in terms of that, but I'm doing my best. And Brian B. likes it. And he likes my sideburns.
Next comment was deleted. I wonder what that person said. Probably something really -- it was probably, like, a compliment about how great the female characters are in Angel: After the Fall. It would have complented what I was trying to say before. Oh well.
All right, next question, Chris G. "Yo, Lynch. Nice 'chops." The sideburns... very popular with the blog audience, I had no idea. First question they asked, "Is there a glitch in Hell's matrix because Spike and Angel both have souls? And since L.A. is in Hell, the demons rule and the dead are rising again. Does this mean there's possibility of guys like The Beast to pop up?" It's a possibility for anything to happen in the book. We didn't say exactly where they are or what's going on, but anything can happen at any point, as we prove, hopefully, each issue that keeps surprising people. And Chris G. asks "Is Betta George being held down by a big web?" Yeah, Betta George is being held by something that's dampening his power, so he can't be unleashed, basically. 'Cause Gunn -- I mean, I guess Gunn knows his potential, and we're going into that a little more as the series goes on. You saw what happened, hopefully, in the last First Night issue that was released; Betta George did get away from the thing that's keeping him down, he was able to kind of manipulate one of the vampires. So, that was kind of cool. Thank you, Chris G. Oh, and then he says, "Keep it up, this book is the greatest", which is so nice. Thank you Chris, it's nice of you.
Last question I'm gonna do and then I'm gonna put this right up. It's Charlie Manson -- crazy that this is what Charles Manson is doing with his time, but he says "How close is Joss to the production of this fantastic series?" Joss laid the groundwork with me, a very specific outline, and now I'm carrying it out. That's pretty much what he's doing. So he did the heavy-lifting in the beginning, and now I'm the... now I'm the spokesman, now I'm the mouthpiece, does that make sense? Then Charlie Manson said, "If and when Angel becomes a vampire again, is he going to have a soul? And a tattoo?" I can't answer either one of those, 'cause they're all, I mean, that's all part of the book. The tattoo thing is going to be answered in the next couple of issues, it's a throwaway thing, but I think it's kind of a cool aside. Then Charlie Manson -- who is a huge fan of Angel and Spike, I had no idea. In addition to the plethora of awful things Charlie Manson does, he's also a very dedicated Whedon fan, which is crazy. Charlie Manson says "I am so glad Spike is getting his own book, because there was definitely not enough of him in Angel, but can one of the two of them at least mention Buffy?" Okay, that is absolutely no problem, they will do that. Then... mumblemumblemumble, "I hate that no-one from this or Buffy: Season 8 has even thought of each other." I'm sure they've thought of each other, Charlie Manson, but with all the stuff going on in the Angel series, it would be weird if Angel's like "I just challenged all these lords... I have no power left... I'm not a vampire... also, I wonder what Buffy's wearing right now." Like, he's clearly thinking about her, just like I'm sure Cordelia is on his mind, and we go into that as the series goes on, but at the same time, he'll be in an awkward stop in where the story's going if he just stopped and thought about something that wasn't pertinent at that moment. And Buffy is thinking about Angel, and Spike -- she had a dream about them earlier in the book, in her own book. And then Charlie Manson says "This book is amazing amazing amazing." Thank you! And then he asks how the series is gonna end, or details about -- Charlie Manson, as much as I fear you for what you have done, I can't reveal anything about the end of the book, although it's mapped out and it's pretty awesome, and I think you guys will... I think it's... yeah, I think it's epic, so. Thank you, Charlie Manson.
I'm not gonna end with a Charlie Manson question, because that's just a rule of podcasts, is you never stop with a question from a mass murderer. So Nolan says -- and I don't know Nolan, I don't know if you've killed anyone. If you've killed more than one or two people, then you also are a mass murderer, but if you've killed one or less, I can end on your question. So I'm gonna assume you are not a murderer, and then I'm gonna click on the link to your blog and see if you have blogged about possibly killing anyone, in which case I have to go back and answer another question. Nolan says, "Did you know how hard it is to find a copy of Big Helium Dog in my town?" Anyone that's confused as to what that means, Big Helium Dog is a movie I directed a while ago -- I wrote and directed -- and it's not on video or DVD, so I'd assume it's insanely hard, and if you found one, that's great, and tell me where, so I could go get a copy. Next question from Nolan: "Also, you said your writing in the Connor/Kate story is your best Whedon writing so far. I won't argue with that, but is there any one particular part that you are especially proud of?" I just really liked the fact -- I thought in a limited amount of time, we were able to play with the fact that Connor was so confused about who should be influencing him and who is his father, and in the course of a couple of pages, I was pretty proud of the fact that we had Angel encourage and kind of inspire him to go in the right direction, without Connor even knowing it. I thought that was really cool, I thought in a limited amount of time, we told Connor's story pretty great, and we let readers know why this character has gone through this big change. So I was pretty proud of that. And also I was proud of bringing Kate back.
But I will say that, since then, I've written stuff that I think is as good as that -- better, hopefully. I think the Spike series is just so dark and so fun and the revelations are so cool that I think that's coming along really well, and I think the stuff we have planned for the rest of Angel is just, it's just great. Like, if the rest, the earliest stuff was fun... And I hope everyone got a charge out of seeing their favourite characters back, but now they're back, and, you know, we're starting to just mix and match everybody and they're all interacting and it's building to something so big, and I just, I can't wait to see people's reactions. And I can't wait to write the specific dialogue that goes with certain things.
I think people are gonna -- if, in fact, a comic can make you, like, excited and cheer, then I would think that we have a lot of moments like that coming up. And I would think -- I mean, it's happened to me, that there are moments in comic books that I just, I find myself getting really upset. And the last thing that did that to me was Pride of Baghdad, which is Brian K. Vaughn's graphic novel. I figured the hardest name and I apologize, but that made me so emotional, just that one and We3 by Grant Morrison and Quietly. I think there's stuff coming up in Angel, especially if you love these characters, you just... I'm emotionally attached to them, and I can't wait to write certain things and I can't wait to see or to hear people's reactions. I think dark times are coming and crowd-pleasing times are coming and it's just, I don't know, I think it's big. Act 2 and this one, Act 3, kind of together -- right now I'm working on Act 3 -- it's all homerun stuff, hopefully. So I just rambled, I swear I wasn't trying to (line???) the comic, I'm just excited about it.
I think that's it for now, I'm going to continue with Noel's question next time, but I just wanted to get some questions up so you guys knew I didn't forget about you. I hope you guys got the Angel: After the Fall Issue 1 Director's Cut that came out today. I think it's great, it's the entire script and my notes and the series looks great... the colours, like, pop more than they did in the first printing of the Angel Issue 1 and we changed some colouring stuff to make it work... the cover is amazing... I don't know, I hope you guys pick it up. And Everybody's Dead is coming out in a couple of weeks. We have two Angels coming out next in the same month, and I think there's some cool stuff in that, but hopefully some of the questions will be about that stuff, so I don't have to talk about it now.
Thank you, guys! If you made it this far, I really appreciate it. I hope I wasn't too boring and I'll be back in a little bit, and we'll talk more. Okay? Bye.
There were quite a few people asking for it on Brian's blog (at least indirectly), so I thought I'd go ahead and do it myself. You know how I am about interviews, anyway.
. After all, he has Amy Acker playing another character in Dollhouse so he might feel free to kill Illyria/Fred off 
.
... love reading your reviews to by the way, one of the first places I go to after a new issue of Btvs or Ats comes out 
Great stuff you should be proud!
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