Of Myths and Resurrections

Budjette Tan and Ian Sta. Maria on Trese, Skyworld and the revival of the PH comic book industry

Truth be told, I am no comic book fanatic (not in the fangirl sense, anyway).

I did spend a considerable part of my youth reading Archie, Funny Komiks, Pugad Baboy and the comics section of just about every broadsheet; I also have Neil Gaiman’s The Sandman and Neverwhere, a couple of Ranma 1/2’s and some Pugad Baboys sitting on my bookshelf.

However, years spent mingling with comic book aficionados in the UP College of Fine Arts has made it unavoidable to imbibe the culture.

In retrospect, conversations among these graphic novel enthusiasts would’ve made Sheldon Cooper look like an amateur.

And apart from this immersion, I was also taking classes with (who would turn out to be) masters of comic illustration: Elmer Damaso (Culture Crash Comics), Leinil Yu (Marvel Comics) and Ian Sta. Maria (Alamat Comics), to name a few.

Perhaps it’s my fascination for comic art that has somewhat made me an honorary member of the club.

For the life of me, I can never quite illustrate as effortlessly and as impeccably, as these guys could.

Komikspeak

I was introduced to the inner workings of Budjette Tan and Ian Sta. Maria’s minds during my formative years in advertising.

Budjette was a senior copywriter at the time, while Ian and I were junior art directors in Harrison Communications.

Currently, Budjette is Deputy Executive Creative Director of MRM (McCann Worldgroup’s digital division), while Ian is now a creative director in BBDO-Guerrero.

Both are into comic books at a fanboy level, and even though I never really had a téte-a-téte on the topic with them, it was part and parcel of the usual buzz in the workplace — the sort of geekspeak you encounter on a day-to-day.

More than a decade later, I’ve managed to stay in touch with these well-respected komikeros. They are now successful comic book creators themselves — Budjette writes for the Trese series (co-created with and illustrated by Kajo Baldisimo), while Ian illustrates for Skyworld (which he co-created with Mervin Ignacio).  Both Trese and Skyworld are in National Bookstore’s Bestsellers list.

Recently, Trese 4: Last Seen After Midnight was awarded Best Graphic Literature for 2011 in the annual National Book Awards in the Philippines.

Prior to this recognition, Trese 3: Mass Murders also won the same award in 2010.

Gerry Alanguilan, renowned comic book artist and award-winning creator of Elmer had this to say about Trese: “Trese continues to impress and surprise, daring to go where no Filipino comic book dare to go.”

After Trese 4 emerged in National Bookstore’s Bestsellers list, Budjette received an email from Neil Gaiman:  “So ridiculously proud of you! When I came out all those years ago for the first time, that was what I wanted to see happen… I feel like you and all the smart Filipino writers and artists out there are doing something really brave and powerful, making a whole new wave of Filipino art and story. Well done!”

Trese and Skyworld

Via an email interview, I asked Budjette and Ian to explain the ideas behind Trese and Skyworld. Both are from Alamat Comics (where Budjette is founding editor.)

“Trese is an urban fantasy that takes all the monsters and creatures from Philippine myth and folklore and sets them in the modern-city of Manila. So, you’ve got a gang of manananggal running a kidnapping ring in Quiapo; you’ve got tikbalang drag-racing down C-5, and aswang are the most notorious hitmen in the city. When crime takes a turn for the weird, the police call Alexandra Trese. She’s uses magic to solve crimes committed by these supernatural creatures,” Budjette responded.

“Skyworld reveals to us the secret history of the Philippines and shows us how tikbalang and engkanto helped Lapu-Lapu defend Mactan and how Jose Rizal and Andres Bonifacio teamed-up to fight the Queen of Aswang. In that backdrop, we follow Makabo, the Prince of Tikbalang, as he spends over 500 years hunting down the Queen of Aswang. The story also focuses on Andoy, a street urchin who turns out to be part of the Maharlika bloodline that dates back to the time of Lapu-Lapu,” he further elaborated.

In a nutshell, Ian described Trese as the local version of the X-Files. “Skyworld is kind of a mix between all the action adventure films that I loved,” he quipped.

Thought balloons

Asian Journal (AJ): When did you start taking an interest in creating comic books? What/who were your influences/source of inspiration?

Budjette Tan (BT): When I was a kid, my parents would just bring home comic books once in a while. So, there were always comic books lying around the house.

It was in grade school when I met other comic book collectors. We’d sketch out costume designs and make secret origins for our own heroes. Those were the beginning of wanting to write comic book stories. Back in the 80s, I was a big X-Men fan and Chris Claremont fan. I loved the work of John Byrne and George Perez and Marv Wolfman. It was in the 80s when I discovered Frank Miller’s Daredevil, Elektra, and Ronin. Which made me pick up his Dark Knight Returns. Of course, Alan Moore’s Watchmen was the big eye-opener for me, on what can be done with the comic book medium. In college, that’s when I discovered the works of Neil Gaiman and Grant Morrison. In the late 90s, that’s when I became a fan of the works of Warren Ellis. These are the guys that heavily influenced my comic book writing. And I just have to mention that it was in the 90s, when we discovered that Whilce Portacio was Pinoy. To know that a Pinoy was drawing the X-Men was a big source of inspiration for us, made us realize that it is possible to get into Marvel Comics.

Ian Sta. Maria (ISM): Grade school. A Batman comic book with the art of Norm Breyfogle made me want to draw comics.

AJ: When you write/illustrate comic books, do you come from an entirely different place, or would you say that working in advertising influences the kind of ideation/work that you do?

BT: I think that my work in the ad agency has made me a better storyteller. Writing a 30-second TV commercial is like writing a 4-page comic book story.

It made me learn to tell a story better, without the fluff, to keep to the narration, but still be able to give it heart. When given an Advertising Brief, the challenge is always, how to sell this old product in a new and exciting way. That’s how I approach a comic book story. “I want to write about a story featuring star-crossed lovers. How do I make this new and interesting? Maybe I’ll make them vampires and werewolves!”

ISM: Working with advertising helps with comics and vice versa. But more often than not it’s comics that work as a stress reliever.

AJ:  How do you go about the process of creating new stories and conceptualizing illustrations for Trese and Skyworld?

BT: I usually take what is a common known story/urban legend/folklore and see what would happen I make Trese try to solve that mystery. So, it’s taking those old tales and [seeing] how they’d fit in a modern setting.

For example, the old folktales say, if you can find a tikbalang, wrestle it to the ground and get a hair from its mane, you can tame it and command it. But in a modern setting, instead of wrestling the tikbalang in the forest, I set the story along C-5, where you have to defeat the tikbalang in a drag race.

ISM: Tsamba ang Skyworld eh...Originally I just wanted to draw a tikbalang with a sword. Mervin Ignacio and I just threw plotlines around during our inuman sessions. Also, we wanted to showcase the very rich mythology that we have as Filipinos. We just thought everyone was doing too much spandex and superhero-types. So we went the other route, [taking] magic and mythology.

AJ: Any entirely new projects brewing?

BT: Trese Book 6!

ISM: [I’m] now in the middle of finishing two other titles with Russell Molina and David Hontiveros. Plus planning for a Skyworld sequel has started.

AJ: Would you say that social media plays a crucial role in your work? If so, how does it play an important role?

BT: It the best and cheapest way of reaching thousands of readers.

ISM: Social media helps spread the word. It helped A LOT! We had friends of friends of friends sharing our posts! So lakas tsamba!

AJ:  What can you say about prominent Filipino comic book artists in the mainstream? How do they inspire you to create your own?

BT: Every time I hear about a Pinoy who’s doing work for Marvel or DC or any other foreign company, it inspires me to keep doing what I’m doing, and hope that my works will someday reach an international audience.

ISM: I’m always proud to see other Filipino artists or writers, who work with big names like Marvel and DC, get international acclaim,. At the end of the day, that is the dream — to make a living out of a hobby.

AJ: Who are your favorite Pinoy and non-Pinoy comic book writers and artists in the mainstream and why?

BT:  Here’s the reason why they’re my favorites: they are great at their craft. They are great artist, writers, storytellers. They surprise me and blow me away with the visuals they make, and the stories they tell. That’s why I like them and look up to them.[My favorite Pinoy comic book writers and artists include] Gerry Alanguilan, David Hontiveros, Manix Abrera, Mervin Ignacio, Ian Sta. Maria, Paolo Fabregas, Kajo Baldisimo and Carlo Vergara. [Non-Pinoy faves include] Neil Gaiman, Warren Ellis, Scott Snyder, Grant Morrison and Alan Moore.

ISM: Mine’s all Pinoy: Leinil Yu, Gerry Alanguilan and of course, Whilce Portacio. They really made an impact in the mainstream! Talagang sumikat sila!

AJ: Any plans of breaking into the mainstream in the future?

BT: That’s what I’ve been trying to do for the past 20 years. Maybe 2013 will be the year!

ISM: Will see… but in the meantime the local scene is not bad at all.

AJ: How would you describe the comic industry in the Philippines now, compared to what it was in the past?

BT: We had a golden age of komiks back in the 50s and 60s, and maybe all the way up the 70s. Back then, komiks sold in the hundred of thousands, out selling newspapers. Back then komiks stories were the basis of the next Pinoy movie or TV series.  Komiks started to lose readership in the 90s and were almost gone in the 2000s. It was in the 90s when a new generation of comic book creators started to come out. This generation grew up reading Marvel Comics and Funny Komiks. In the 2000s, a generation of comic book creators emerged and they were influenced by manga and anime. It was this new generation that started to release self-published comics and to organize events like Komikon. Today, we have an active and supportive comic book community. We have publishers like Visprint, National Bookstore, Summit Media, Precious Pages and Psicom, who are publishing graphic novels. This is what is needed to make the Filipino comic book industry boom once more. Right now, a “best-selling” graphic novel like Skyworld would be selling in the thousands. So, if we keep this going, I hope that our local comics will start selling in the tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands. Add to this the option of digital distribution, then the opportunity for local work to be read by an international audience, by millions of people, is even more possible.

ISM: BIG CHANGE! Social media helped a whole damn lot. Because of exposure [to] the internet, more and more younger people are creating local comic books and supporting them. The industry grew from little exhibits in Galleria Ortigas or UP Fine Arts in Diliman, to giant conventions at the Bayanihan Center, SM Mall of Asia and Megamall. Now, it’s easier to spread the word around and get people and publishers interested.

AJ: For Ian: Nowadays, technology plays a crucial role in creating visually-arresting comic book illustrations. How do you combine old school techniques with new technology in making your illustrations? 

ISM: Well, I think technology is really just a tool. Nothing beats the basics, but in terms of tight deadlines and turnarounds, Adobe Tools come in really handy. But they are JUST tools. Anyone with the right skill can create visually stunning images, using anything from [crayons], to paint, to Photoshop. Learning the basics is the best. I always sketch straight [to] my computer. It saves on scanning and paper, and I just got used to it since I bring my laptop anywhere. So I guess that’s where traditional meets hi-tech. It’s the artist presenting his work, using these new tools.  So whatever I learned from Fine Arts and Whilce Portacio in drawing traditionally, I put to good use using a pen tab, instead of paper.

AJ: For Budjette: Would you say that writing for comic books has evolved in leaps and bounds for the past ten years? If yes, how so?

BT: Writing a comic book is no different from writing a script for a TVC or an RC. The basics of it are the same. The limitations are the same. So, the basic storytelling structure is the same. 99.99 percent of the comic books out there still tell a story the same way. You divide the page with boxes (called “panels”). Each panel shows a scene, an action and the next panel will show you what happens next. And this keeps on repeating until you are able to tell a whole story. There is the 1 percent that uses this structure in a more creative manner.

For example, Alan Moore wrote a story about people living in an apartment building. Each comic book page was divided into four horizontal panels. Each panel showed what was happening on that particular floor of the building. Each panel was happening in a different decade. So, the top floor was happening in the 1950s. The next floor was set in the 1960s. The third floor was set in the 1970s. And the fourth floor was in the 1980s. So, if he showed a baby in the window on the top floor. On the ground floor, you’d see the baby already in his 30s.

Like I said, the comic book is still told using panels and pages. The experimental use of panels and pages dates back as far as the 1950s. But most writers still opt to just tell their story in a linear manner.

I guess writing for comic book will change, the more we start to play around with telling stories through digital comics. Reading a comic book on an iPad allows the writer to play “movie director,” — meaning, he can play around with the flow of the story. For example, when you read a typical comic book, you open a page and immediately see the pictures and the words.

Mark Waid started to experiment with that and since the story is being told on an iPad, the next page/next scene will only come out when you click or tap the iPad. So, here is what Waid did: when you read the story, you first see the image/opening scene. When you tap the screen, it will zoom into one of the characters. When you tap again, that’s when the words come out and you finally read what the character is saying. But, it’s still being told using panels and pages.

It still means, a writer starts with a pen and paper and he’ll start by writing down:

PAGE 1, Panel 1

It was a dark and stormy night. We see our hero arrive to save the day.

Alive and kicking

After waning in the early 90’s, the comic book industry in the Philippines is back with a vengeance.

In his Inquirer.net article, “Who says Pinoy ‘komiks’ are dead?” Gerry Alanguilan says it was through the perseverance and ingenuity of young comic book fans that the industry managed to survive and thrive once more.

“Without any venues to showcase their work, talented young comic book fans started creating their own comic books. They photocopied the page, stapled them together, and sold the comics themselves. Some even went further by actually going to the printing press and have multiple copies printed.”

“Where did they get the money? Most likely some of them had jobs, some of them probably saved up for it, and some probably borrowed money from their parents. Whatever the case, what resulted was the birth of a unique Filipino independent comics industry driven by young people who created, distributed and sold their own comic books,” Gerry wrote.

The Philippines now has its own version of the Comic-Con: The Pinoy “Komikon,” which is held bi-annually — during the summer and at the end of the year.

“That the growth of Komikon and that of the independent comics industry go hand in hand is worth considering. Most of these creators create, sell and distribute their own comics. With no huge distribution arm at their disposal, they sell their comics at every place they are capable of reaching.”

“They can sell at the various comic book stores across Manila, including Comic Odyssey, which has always been supportive of local comics, and of course, they take full advantage of the local comic book conventions, wherever and whenever they are held,” Gerry further wrote.

With guys like Gerry, Budjette, Kajo, Ian and Mervin watching over the panels, pages and speech balloons, comic book enthusiasts can sleep soundly at night.

Don’t let the tikbalangs and aswangs bite. (AJPress)