ALLAN LISKA & WEYODI OLDBEAR revive THE PRESS GUARDIAN and THE CLOCK for the Public

The Press Guardian and The Clock have made a timely reappearance, brought back to print through Green Archer Comics, campaigning on Kickstarter through April 30th!

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COMIC BOOK YETI: Allan and Weyodi, thanks for stepping into the Yeti Cave today. How are you both doing back Stateside?

ALLAN LISKA: I deal with it the way I’ve always done, by writing about it. There are a lot of amazing creators in the comic book industry who are, rightfully, worried right now. Then there is the practical side of trying to run a business when you never know how the cost of things is going to change. The comics industry has always been challenging, and it feels more so than ever. 

WEYODI OLDBEAR: I see you’ve chosen to forego the easy questions, lol. As a Tribal citizen, I see a lot of programs aimed at alleviating suffering and ending disparity being gutted, so I’m taking turns writing about it, going to protests, and bugging my senators. So I’m, you know, turning into a self-parody. That’s what I’m up to these days.

CBY: Yeah, taking these challenges head-on, vocally, with a sense of both self-awareness and humor is the healthiest approach I can think of at the moment. So you’ve got a double-feature Kickstarter campaign for The Press Guardian #3 and The Clock #1. How did you two initially meet and decide to work together? 

AL: When I came up with the idea of an updated Clock, I knew I wanted Dale to draw her. But, I also knew neither one of us could write from the perspective of a Native American woman. Dale recommended Weyodi. I read some of her work and knew she was the perfect fit. 

WO: My friend, comic artist Dale Ray DeForest, approached me and told me about this great guy who had a job that was right up my alley. As a bonus, I would get to work with Dale. As it turns out, Dale wasn’t pulling my leg; Allan is great to work with.

CBY: A resounding endorsement of Dale's talent and judgement, it seems! Can you tell us a bit about Green Archer Comics? It looks like the titles are steeped largely in Golden Age inspiration, and these two titles are resuscitated from the Public Domain. How did you both decide on which superheroes to bring back into publication, and what role did Green Archer have in the development process? 

AL: Our tagline is “reviving legends” for a reason. We want to reintroduce or introduce the world to these characters that have been forgotten by time. But this isn’t a free-for-all. They have to be characters that inspire us, that we love, or that give us a chance to tell interesting stories. Our first comic, Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar, was based on a 1940s radio show. Johnny Dollar was an insurance investigator, and he was just an everyman. He wasn’t the smartest guy in the room and didn’t have the police or FBI backing him up. He was just a guy doing his job in a very competent way, and that’s what we loved about him. It’s the same for The Clock, The Press Guardian, The Green Archer, and the other characters we are working with. The name itself comes from a forgotten Edgar Wallace book by the same name. The book was a bestseller at the time, but it's been largely forgotten. It even inspired a 1940 movie serial, which has also been largely forgotten. We want to bring the story back for people, let them know about this amazing character and what it means [side note: The Green Archer serial was a partial inspiration for The Green Arrow, who made his debut in 1941].

WO: The character was already chosen when I came on board, but I love the Golden Age comics. That was one of many factors in my decision to sign on to write The Clock. We could use a dose of Golden Age idealism right about now. To add to that, I instantly had an inspiration for her new backstory and the source of The Clock’s powers as soon as I heard Allan wanted to bring back The Clock.

CBY: So, as you’ve also decided to reimagine the identities of both The Press Guardian and The Clock, you've noted the need for new backstories that retain the tenor of early comics. (I did the same when looking to revisit Black Wings for the Golden Domain zine that recently dropped.) What are you doing differently this time? Also, what do you both see as the leeway allowed and limits imposed in adapting pre-existing characters with existing lore, canon, and fan expectations? 

AL: Earlier this year, we did a comic called The Press Guardian & The Clock: 1942 that revisited the original characters, and we stayed as true as we could to the original comics. But these are modern retellings of these heroes, and they need a modern spin. Think about how many times Othello has been re-told or re-imagined, I am guessing people are reading this who have seen a re-imagining of Othello and not realized it. Should I be comparing 1940s pulp comics to Shakespeare? Maybe not, but if the stories are timeless, then they can be retold. The Clock was a vigilante in the original, and our Clock is a vigilante, just one who takes on hackers. There is a scene toward the end of issue one where we see an original Clock action figure on Tani’s shelf; she has been inspired by the stories of the original Clock. As with Othello, the important thing in any retelling is maintaining the spirit of the original character. 

WO: Writing The Clock as a Comanche woman, who is connected to her culture but whose powers are in no way related to being Native, is incredibly liberating. In some ways, the character is different from the original Clock; she’s a Comanche woman, for example, but at the same time, I’ve tried to reference the original throughout. Like the original, she’s committed to righting wrongs. Comics are, in some ways, modern folklore. If you look at something like the Arthurian stories, they often seem to reboot characters or contradict each other. When a comic is resurrected or rebooted, something very similar happens. New and different stories don’t take anything away from the old stories; they just expand our ways of imagining the characters and what they might mean.

CBY: True, characters have been getting rebooted or inserted into new scenarios for millennia, so it's a worthwhile tradition to explore. This issue of The Press Guardian features art by Tiff Kath and Sino To, and covers from Rob Jones, Liana Kangas, Marguerite Savage, Rebecca Ann, and Sarah Webb, with letters by Saida Temofonte. The Clock #1 debuts with art and main cover by Dale DeForest, colors by Liezl Buenaventura, and letters by Saida, as well as a variant cover by Frankie Morin. Can you tell us what has gone into assembling this crew of creative talent behind both books?

AL: Honestly, the nice thing about running a comic book company is that I can reach out to artists I love and try to convince them to work with a small publisher to help tell interesting stories. I am surprised that just asking has been enough most of the time. The other thing that has been important for me to remember is that we’re making comics, and this is supposed to be fun. Which means I need to be flexible on delivery dates and understand when people fall behind. Schedules can always be adjusted. 

WO: I’m just a little bit stunned at the quality of the team Allan has assembled. Every time new images show up, I’m bowled over. 

CBY: I've seen some really engaging imagery tied to these titles, so I'm keen to see the full issues when they drop. Now that you’ve spoken a bit about the others involved in the creative team, can you tell our readers a bit about your creative journeys? What creative work is foundational to your approach to comics? How did you both get involved in creating in the medium initially?

AL: I’ve read comics my entire life. I’ve been a Green Arrow fan since I was five, and I was reading the Denny O’Neil Green Lantern / Green Arrow run at a much, much, much earlier age than I should have. But the journey toward starting a comic book company began in 2023. I was talking to a friend about how much we loved the (previously mentioned) Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar radio show and how we both listened to it all the time on planes and while working. We were speculating that it would be cool to update him and turn him into a comic book. I thought it would be an easy (ha!) thing to do. It turns out making a comic book is hard. But, I put the book together, ran a Kickstarter, and we raised enough not only to cover the first book, but parts of the next two. Green Archer comics was born!

WO: The Clock is a case of coming full circle for me. I’ve been writing most of my life in various genres, and while I’ve been a comic book fan since the 1970s, I had never considered writing comics. Then one day, I walked into Big Adventure comic book shop in Santa Fe and saw the cover of Rez Luv, by Dale Ray DeForest. It was an electric moment. I never had the feeling that something had been written for me the way I felt Rez Luv was written for me. It was like being struck by lightning. I immediately went home and wrote a graphic novel. Then I wrote a short werewolf comic. Now I can’t stop.

CBY: I hope you're able to continue channeling the momentum you've built in creative, fruitful directions. On other work in your orbit, Allan, you've mentioned your involvement in another IP resurrection; Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar, and the original Cryptid Hacker Force is the sort of title the Yeti crew is always open to hearing more about. Weyodi, I know you’re prose includes explorations of indigenous futurism, so what can you tell us about your other written work?

AL: Cryptid Hacker Force came about because of a slow day at a comic book convention. When I do these conventions with my brother, Benn (another brilliant writer), we always bounce ideas off each other. In this case, we were joking about how much Bigfoot love there was at this particular con, and we started speculating about what Bigfoot’s hacking power would be. The answer was obvious: to blur pictures of other cryptids. One thing led to another, and we had the Cryptid Hacker Force: a group of cryptid hackers whose job is to cover up cryptid sightings. We set the comic in Scotland because, of course, the biggest cryptid camera mug in the world is The Loch Ness Monster. Plus, we both love Scotland, and we hope we sell enough copies to justify a company-paid trip back to Scotland…for research.  

WO: I’ve had a few different things going on recently. My Indigenous Futurist novel, As Many Ships As Stars, which in many ways is a throwback to Golden Age science fiction and at the same time is a retelling of Comanche oral history, was released in October of 2024. Later in 2025, my three-book, Indigenous Futurist Hope! Punk dystopian series is going to be released by Greasy Grass Press. The books are The Root and The Seed, The Burning Lie, and The Bees Made Honey in The Rich Man’s Skull. As we speak, I’m at work on more on more issues of The Clock.

CBY: Friend and colleague of the Comic Book Yeti, Melissa Meszaros, brought this campaign to us, and it was the first I’d heard of Green Archer comics. When working amidst the landscape of the independent comic industry, what have you found most effective in gaining a foothold with new readers and building your audience?

AL: Even though a lot of creators don’t like them, comic book conventions. They are a challenge because I am not a natural salesperson, but getting to tell people about our comics on one works best. Kickstarter, despite its increased popularity, is still a surprisingly good platform for finding and keeping new fans. 

WO: My tactics are simple; I try to come up with a story that interests me, then I try to write it as well as I possibly can.

CBY: Working with public domain characters at the moment, you’re getting experience adapting and working with narrative worlds beyond your creation. Are there any ongoing, actively developed intellectual properties you’d both ideally like to contribute to, if the opportunity arose? To that end, as you’re both working in collaborative roles with other creatives, who across the comic book industry that you admire would you like to work with, if opportune?

AL: I would love the chance to work on a Flash Gordon (hi, Mad Cave) or Green Arrow (hi, DC) comic. They are both incredible characters with 80+ years of lore to draw on, and they are interesting to me because they are just people who work hard to succeed. No super powers, just the desire to protect people. The one cover artist whose schedule I have not been able to get on yet is Annie Wu, her work is stellar. 

WO: Too many to name, really, too many IPs, too many artists, but Maria Wolf. She’s probably at the top of the list of artists I’d like to work with someday. 

CBY: Related to the premise of both comics, freedom of information and security of individuals from exploitation and harm both arise as overarching themes. You’re both also data security professionals. What do our readers need to know about the shifting landscape around digital architecture, security systems, and the legislative environment in which we are all operating as individuals?

AL: It’s funny, I’m doing this interview from the RSA Conference in San Francisco, one of the largest security conferences in the world. Tens of thousands of people are here this week trying to answer that question. What we do know is that the threat has shifted; bad guys don’t have to hack into your system anymore; they are invited in. They don’t have to steal your banking information, you give it to them. Whether it is a WhatsApp “investing club,” a “mistaken” text, or a phone call from your grandchild saying she needs help. The bad guys have gotten so much better at social engineering that you often don’t know you’ve gotten hacked. I was in a grocery store last month, and an elderly gentleman was trying to purchase over $1,000 worth of gift cards. The cashier asked why, and when he explained that it was to pay the IRS, she warned him that it was a scam, but he didn’t want to believe her. She finally pulled out her phone and showed him on the IRS website. But, he didn’t want to believe that he had been taken in like that, none of us thinks we‘d fall for scams, which makes us all susceptible. While I’m glad that the cashier was so alert, I also think it's a shame that we have to rely on the Spidey-Sense of someone making $20 an hour to keep people safe — we need to figure out how to do better as a society. 

WO: Not me, I’m just a schmoe. I get all my information from Allan, and I’m not at all shy about emailing him when I hear of some troubling new development. Poor Allan.

CBY: We always close by offering creatives the opportunity to share some inspirations unrelated to the work they come to discuss. What other comics, literature, film, music, art, etc., should our readers give some attention to once they give The Press Guardian and The Clock a read?

AL: I just re-read George Takei’s They Called Us Enemy and Alan Moore’s V for Vendetta, and I’ve been thinking a lot about The Great Dictator and Casablanca. But, life shouldn’t be all heavy, I also recommend Grant Lankard’s League of Cryptids and Kelly Thompson’s Birds of Prey run has been incredible, I’ve also really enjoyed the new Question series, All Along the Watchtower and Zatanna’s Bring Down the House as well as the first couple of issues of her new run.

WO: I just saw Sinners, it was incredible. I’ve been on a kick watching classic anti-fascist anti-demagogue themed movies lately; Keeper of the Flame, A Face in the Crowd, The Black Hand, and of course, Citizen Kane. These old black and white movies with their dramatic lighting and often exquisite composition and pacing, are a real inspiration for me when writing comics. Needless to say, I take great pleasure in them, too. The themes don’t hurt either.

CBY: Allan, Weyodi, it was a pleasure to have you in the Yeti Cave today. If you’ve got any portfolio, publication, or social media links you’d like to share that weren’t included above, now is the time!

AL: You can find us at www.greenarcher.io, on Instagram and YouTube at @GreenArcherComics, and BlueSky at @greenarcher.io

WO: Links to most of my work can be found at weyodi.com. There’s a free short story there, too.