Wed 1 Aug '12
Comic Book Day: Michael Avon Oeming's "The Victories" is a Real Winner
Sometimes life as a superhero isn't so super.
Many of us walk around each day, slowly bottling our anxieties and insecurities until they reach a boiling point. It can be helpful to talk these things out, but sometimes talking isn't enough. For Michael Avon Oeming, therapy was only one part of the puzzle in his path to healing. He realized that his art had always been fueled by traumatic experience, which set off another light bulb: what about a superhero story in which the hero's powers come from a deep-rooted place of pain? What about a hero that has to deal with the same stresses, neuroses and anxieties that we do? Enter the world of The Victories, Oeming's powerhouse of a title, which is being published by Dark Horse. We caught up with Oeming to pick his brain about his dark take on superheroism, what inspired the project and why superheroes provide such an incredible canvas for storytelling. Also, check out the Nerdist Channel exclusive trailer for The Victories.
Nerdist News: These are not necessarily the superheroes we're used to seeing. You seem to make a conscious point of showing their fallibility. What influenced your decision to show heroes in this light?
Michael Avon Oeming: When I think of superheroes, I often think of their motivations for doing what they do, and what kind of personality it takes to set themselves up in society as some sort of police, working outside of the justice system. That immediately takes me into some pretty quirky head space. It seems like you'd have to either be an egomaniac or someone with something to prove. I also came up with this idea during some heavy therapy I was going through, if you compound those two things, you get the Victories.
NN: You mentioned this project was a product of time you spent in therapy. What can you tell us about that and how it contributed to The Victories?
MO: I wanted to express what anxiety was like, what a panic attack felt like. How could that be translated in the art and subtext of a story? My artistic drive was fueled by trauma. I thought what an amazing origin that would be for a superhero. What if the very thing that gave him his power and identity was also the very source of his greatest pain?
Be sure to read our full interview on Nerdist.com to find out all about The Victories and see some exclusive artwork and a Nerdist exclusive trailer for the series. |
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