There's been some crazy things going on at Dark Horse. With the FIRE AND STONE event, we've been seeing the big movie characters come together. We've also had a bunch of interviews with the writers interviewing each other. So far we've seen Kelly Sue Deconnick interview Paul Tobin on PROMETHEUS: FIRE AND STONE and Paul Tobin interview Chris Roberson on ALIENS: FIRES AND STONE. Yesterday we had Chris Roberson interview Chris Sebela about ALIENS VS. PREDATOR: FIRE AND STONE, drawn by Ariel Olivetti. Now it's time for Chris Sebela to talk to Joshua Williamson about some Prometheus vs. Aliens vs. Predator action in PREDATOR: FIRE AND STONE.
CHRIS SEBELA: One of my favorite parts of your book is how you lock Galgo and Ahab together with those laser leash handcuffs. If you had to get laser leashed to anyone else in the Fire & Stone writer's room, who would it be and why?
JOSHUA WILLIAMSON: You, bro! Of course it would be YOU!
Then we could just hang out and talk about horror movies all day. And then I’d slowly drive you crazy. I say slowly but I imagine it would take all of an hour. Then you’d probably chew your own arm off and we’d be free. Problem solved!
CS: At no point working together to break down the stories for Fire & Stone did you ever seem the slightest bit intimidated about writing Predator. Are you just that annoyingly confident or did you have any fear going into working on something this nerdishly important?
JW: I was terrified. Every second of every meeting. Not just because of Predator but because of being in a room where my ideas would be analyzed by other writers. I was super intimidated by the room. And when I’m nervous I talk more… so that might explain that. Which is where I think Galgo got that habit.
But with writing Predator… it didn’t really sink in that I was doing that until I was writing issue two. Issue one was a bit more of an action issue with Galgo being an asshole that segued into the Predator hunting and killing… which is the easy part. It was “What the hell do I do now?!” stage after the hunting stopped… that I was like “oh shit… now the Predator and Galgo have to do stuff?!”
Writing scenes with the Predator hunting and killing is fun… but then I need an actual story, and that freaked me out a bit. But because of the room I had people to chat the story out with and it all fell into place.
CS: Maybe this isn't so much a question as it is a challenge, but my favorite little detail of sci-fi is when they flat-out just make up some futuristic swear words. My challenge: Make up 5 futuristic swear words.
JW: This took me a bit to come up with some stuff but here we go:
- Babadook
- Blue Turtle shell
- Ra-Ra
- Sony
- Rocky
You can imagine which of those are positive swears and which are negative.
CS: I know you're a horror geek like me, but do you ever get freaked out by bombarding yourself with the array of visually and psychically horrifying material you're researching or just creating in your head? Do you ever freak yourself out when you're writing? Do you ever write something so awesome you literally high-five yourself?
JW: One night after one of the bigger writer’s room meetings I had nightmares about Predator’s chasing me. No joke. It was all fragments of images but still… the Predators were out to get me.
Sometimes when writing horror stuff and doing research I freak myself out a bit. I’ve seen a few messed up things in books or documentaries that I know I can never unsee. But I think that adds to the tone of the book. I put that feeling into the writing.
If I can make myself or the artist twitch a bit at the ideas we are trying to put to paper, then I’m on the right path. I mean… really, if I can’t scare myself, then what am I doing here?
And yeah… I’ll write something rad and stand up, give myself a high five… take a victory lap and then get back to work.
CS: One of the best parts for me of writing for the predators was getting to use their arsenal of weapons. Which is your favorite Predator weapon and why?
JW: That spinning blade thing… the “Smart disc” which I didn’t get to use much.
It just looks rad. I like that it can be used as a throwing device and as a hand held weapon. It was designed by Stan Winston for Predator 2, and kicks ass in that movie.
Ahab’s was lost in space in Predator Fire and Stone #1… but if I ever go to write Ahab again I’d give him a new one to play with.
Check out some preview pages below. PREDATOR: FIRE AND STONE #4 is on sale January 28. Be sure to come back Monday to check out our final installment with Josh talking to Kelly Sue about PROMETHEUS: FIRE AND STONE - OMEGA and an exclusive look at that issue.
