Rebellion launches ROXY and finishes FULL-TILT BOOGIE with ALEX DE CAMPI

Best known for 2000 AD and the Judge Dredd Megazine, Rebellion's new romance title, Roxy, launches with a new tale from Alex De Campi on the heels of her recently completed Full-Tilt Boogie. Check out the Kickstarter campaign, now live through August 9th!

---

COMIC BOOK YETI: Alex, thank you for making time to stop by the Yeti Cave! How’s everything going in New York?

ALEX DE CAMPI: Good. Slammed with deadlines.

CBY: I know the feeling! I realize I’ve caught you between the completion of Full Tilt Boogie, Vol. 2 (which ran from 2000 AD Prog 2367-2377), and the launch of Roxy, Rebellion’s new romance title, which will feature your story, The Getaway Girls. Before we dive into both, I know you’ve got an incredibly diverse creative portfolio, and your pursuits range far and wide, so is there anything else you’ve got in the works that you’d like to share with our readers?

ADC: Well, I had two graphic novels out at the end of last year (Erica Henderson and my Parasocial, and my action/black comedy Bad Karma with Ryan Howe and Dee Cunniffe, both from Image) and the (gorgeous! hardback!) trade of my and Cliff “Gears of War” Bleszinski’s Scrapper  just came out a week ago—again, Image.

Other than that I’m working on a middle grade graphic novel with Carla Speed McNeil, a heist book with Tom Fowler, and more stories for 2000AD.

CBY: Thanks for giving our readers more to look forward to seeing once they've picked up Rebellion's latest. So with Vol. 2 of Full Tilt Boogie, you had an artistic team including Eduardo Ocaña returning from Vol. 1 as the artist, joined by Eva De La Cruz (colors), and Annie Parkhouse (lettering) throughout the run. From the conclusion of part 11, we’re left expecting a third volume to tie things off. I know you’ve worked with Eduardo previously on Messiah Complex, but how’d you pull in the others, and is there now an expectation everyone remains in position for Vol. 3?

AD: Ed chose Eva for colours, and her work’s been gorgeous—and Tharg assigns letterers! Annie’s an absolute star, though, she’s lettered some of my favorite stories in 2000AD so it was an honor for her to work on my story. But yes, everyone is in place for our third and final arc, which is all written, and which Ed is drawing at the moment. 

CBY: At first glance, the music-oriented comic title/ship name and intergalactic bounty hunting premise are certainly evocative of Cowboy Bebop, but once I dug into the story, I was also catching some similarities to Asimov’s Foundation and the factions of the intergalactic conflict reminded me a bit of Warhammer 40k. I know in prior interviews you’ve mentioned your fascination with Science Ninja Team Gatchaman and Space Battle Cruiser Yamato, but without more specious inferences from my side, what creative anchor points and references have you drawn upon to situate and distinguish Full Tilt Boogie within the space opera landscape?

AD: I’ve never read Foundation, and know almost nothing about Warhammer except there are space marines. You know, I suppose there was a bit of the idea of Madoka Magica, but deconstructing the idea of the elite teen sentai force. Other than that, and Bebop/Gatchaman/Yamato, I honestly just made it all up. I usually spend so much time painstakingly researching my work it was nice to do something where I was just up on the high wire, inventing stuff. 

CBY: For those who haven’t caught up on Full Tilt Boogie Vol. 1 or 2 thus far, the first volume is collected and available in the 2000 AD online shop. I found the material thus far to hint at a much deeper worldbuilding exercise that could certainly stretch beyond a third volume. Have other tales have occurred to you in the world of Full Tilt Boogie that you might like to expand upon, and how has your process grown beyond the outline you’d mentioned in previous interviews that you laid out at the start of the project? 

AD: Definitely. It’s a big universe, and I could keep doing Full Tilt Boogie stories and side-stories forever. Even the main story has grown way beyond the original outline, in weird and wonderful ways. It’s been a fun balance of “ooh, what if we do this” with really solid, complex character arcs. 

CBY: I know you’ve mentioned enjoying the trust in your ability as a writer expressed by the Rebellion editorial and publishing team, free from biases encountered with others in the creative industry, which is still heavily dominated by white males (and I can say, as one, a self-awareness around positional privilege is something many of my demographic still struggle with). With various avenues for creative outlet across your professional career, what contributes to how you prioritize comics amongst your projects in how you select or pursue professional work?

AD: Look, I just make books. They take a long time, and they’re a lot of work, so each one is a big commitment. I don’t have the patience to arse around pitching publishers, and the number of publishers who can 1) effectively market adult genre work and 2) have fair contracts is vanishingly small, anyhow. 

So when I develop a story I am passionate enough about that I want to engage in the massive, exhausting, multi-year exercise of making a graphic novel, I do it. Then I ask Image if they’ll publish it.  

That’s really all there is to it. I don’t wait around for anyone to give me permission, I just make the book and then it finds its way onto the shelves, somehow. I’ve usually got a couple books on the go at any given time. I finish the script, hand it off to my artistic collaborator(s), it comes back eventually, I letter it, we publish it, I start a new book. 

And I do stuff for 2000 AD/Rebellion because the editors there are really great, and also (importantly!) they email me. I don’t really have to pitch them. Plus, I love the short episode lengths—it’s nice to be challenged to create effective 5-6 page episodes.

CBY: I'm sure it makes the fiction writing easier when it's not disrupted by publisher pitches, and it's good to know Rebellion keeps you in mind for projects like these. Let’s turn to The Getaway Girls - Rebellion revealed it’s about a new model at a talent agency getting involved with a group of women moonlighting in roles beyond the runway. What can you tell us about how Rebellion brought you on for Roxy and the origins of The Getaway Girls? 

AD: I mean, they emailed me. I’ve done plenty of romance work in the past (Twisted Romance, The Scottish Boy, Heartbreak Incorporated, etc) and the editor also knew I liked fashion, so they sent me an old serial with four British models having adventures (and all pining after their handsome manager). I had a great time updating it, turned it into a heist story (also with smooching), and brought Erica Henderson along for the ride. But the one retro thing I did leave in was using lots of thought bubbles, which felt deliciously decadent. 

CBY: Ah, yes - narrative exposition doesn't get the real estate on the page it did in earlier eras. It sounds like your previous work on The Backups from Macmillan’s Imprint and Bad Girls with Simon & Schuster’s Gallery 13 imprint provided an opportunity to explore some similar themes and relationship dynamics between women in highly charged settings, which I’ve gathered you may be tackling from a new angle in your Roxy title. For those of our readers unfamiliar with The Backups and Bad Girls, what themes and scenarios do you get to explore in this new story that you haven’t covered in previous work?

AD: Well, it’s a 20-page story, so there’s not nearly as much room for nuanced exploration of female relationships like there was in Bad Girls or The Backups. But there’s a lot around being the new girl and having impostor syndrome/not feeling you belong, on having a crush on someone that you never expected, and on the way a lot of wealthy men treat models (don't worry - the girls get their revenge). 

CBY: Having lived all over the world, cultivating a highly international scope to your work, with stories placed in both grounded and fantastic settings, how do you think your global experience has shaped your narrative voicing? What does seeing more of the world and immersing yourself in experiences with people across cultures lend to your own process of worldbuilding and character development?

AD: It’s exposed me culturally to a lot of situations and experiences that I might not have encountered had I lived my whole life in one place, and that’s definitely helped me think up characters who are complex but relatable. Just existing quietly in places outside your comfort zone and listening is so, so important as a writer. 

CBY: Since you’re working across media formats, I’m a bit curious as to how the relationship varies between agency representation for both literary and film engagement; you’re with The Knight Agency for literary, and Grandview for TV/Film - what do each do differently from each other, and how do they make your creative career a more productive process?

AD: When I finally finish my next prose novel, Knight will take it out on sub and hopefully find a publisher. Meanwhile, my manager at Grandview, who I’ve been with for years, both helps sell my books for TV/film adaptations, and represents me for screenwriting work. Both my literary agent and my TV/film manager are my staunchest supporters, but they’re also not afraid to be direct and tell it to me straight / let me know when I’m full of shit. I’m genuinely fond of them as people, and constantly impressed by them as professionals. 

CBY: So to close, I always like to provide creators with an opportunity to share a bit about the comics, art, music, film, etc., that has been inspiring and engaging you lately, unrelated to the title under discussion. What’s been keeping your attention recently that our readers should make sure they don’t miss? 

AD: Hmm, I’ve been reading the manga King in Limbo, which is a great medical/conspiracy thriller, and I want to grab The Summer Hikaru Died and the new Taiyo Matsumoto, too. There are two giant volumes out now, and one more coming in July, I think. I just downloaded Vajra Chandrasekera’s novel The Saint of Bright Doors, and once I finish Cherie Priest’s The Family Plot I need to get Tananarive Due’s The Reformatory. I’m still listening to the Geese album 3D Country way, way too much. The last film I saw in cinemas was a new restoration of Tarkovsky’s Nostalghia but, like, I am 95% alone in my love of Tarkovsky and I’m absolutely fine with that. 

Other than that, it’s lots of out of print history books for project research, and I can’t tell you more than that. 

CBY: Fortunately, I'm part of the 5% with you on Tarkovsky, so I'll check out the re-release amongst the other recommendations. Alex, thanks for swinging by the Yeti Cave to fill in our readers on your latest work. If you’ve got any portfolio, publication, and social media links to share at this juncture, please let us know what to include! 

AD: I’m most places on social media as @alexdecampi, but I’m pretty boring. (Ed. - she's not - go check out her awesome work!)