Matt Kindt Brings the Future to the Present in PastAways #1 from Dark Horse

Matt Kindt's PastAways (JAN150085) welcomes you to the distant past of 2015, a primitive world of internal-combustion engines and Internet 1.0. Here's an exclusive interview in which he discusses his new creator-owned series from Dark Horse.

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PREVIEWSworld: What was the inspiration behind PastAways?

Matt Kindt: I think I’d just been wanting to do something that was a little lighter in tone—I’ve been doing MIND MGMT for two years and that has a tone and feel that is all its own and a little darker and super dense in content. It’s an intense read that requires a little more work from the reader. That’s the kind of comic I really love—but I don’t love reading that ALL the time. So I think PastAways is a break from that—it’s more fun, a little more breezy—a little bit of an easier read, and it’s a setup that allows me to tell any kind of crazy sci-fi story I feel like telling. It veers into a little bit of darker territory but it always rises back up above that and is intentionally more fun loving. And it’s a straight-up team book—with the classic Fantastic Four family dynamic with a weird twist that I’m really looking forward to playing around with as well. I’ve always wanted to tackle a time-travel story—it’s my favorite subgenre of sci-fi, but time travel is tricky, and if it’s not done well, it can really be a mess…So I’m trying to tackle that in a way that makes sense to me.

PREVIEWSworld: The colorful illustrations and fun concept of PastAways seem like a far cry from your previous work on titles like MIND MGMT and Pistolwhip. What was the creative impetus behind creating a comic like PastAways?

Matt Kindt: I knew I wasn’t going to be drawing this one—so that definitely let me open up the floodgates and put all the things I normally hate drawing into this one (laughs)—you’ll see lots of horses, cars, sci-fi helicopters, dinosaurs, etc.…everything I tend to not like drawing. Also, when I started actually scripting, I asked Scott what he liked to draw. It’s something I always ask an artist who’s working on my scripts—partly to break the ice, but also to get some off-the-wall ideas for things—almost like a writing prompt—and a kind of impromptu writing challenge to see how many things that the artist wants to draw will fit into the actual story I’ve already plotted out. It makes it a little more fun—and sometimes shoots me in a direction I hadn’t thought about. There’s a visual gag in the opening scene of issue #1 that wouldn’t have happened if Scott hadn’t told me he liked drawing dinosaurs. And it’s one of my favorite parts of the first arc now.

PREVIEWSworld: Time travel can be a tricky concept to explore. What kind of time-travel “rules” are you employing in the world of PastAways?

Matt Kindt: Well, applying rules to time travel is definitely the key. If you think about time travel for any length of time, you eventually realize it’s impossible—there’s just too many problems. So the key, in fiction, is to set up the rules early—lay out how it works in THIS particular fiction and then just stick to those rules. So that’s what I’ve done. I chose to do it in the way I thought made the most logical sense. Basically time protects itself or finds a way to protect itself, so there can’t be any conundrums—you can’t kill your father and things like that—time/fate won’t allow it. If you take that to a logical conclusion (within that rule), it creates an interesting situation for characters that are from the future—living in the past. Can you die in the past if you haven’t been born yet? Those are the kinds of questions that will have definite answers and tend to drive the action of the story.

PREVIEWSworld: The concept of having people from the future visit our present opens up a lot of room for fish-out-of-water humor and potential serious social commentary. Was it difficult to find a balance between the two?

Matt Kindt: Definitely—the first drafts that I was writing were all pretty dark, and then Brendan (my editor) reminded me that this was supposed to be my “fun” book (see the answer I gave for the first question), and he was right. I was turning it into something that I usually do, rather than pushing into some new territory and pushing myself creatively. So I went back and reworked it and tried to find some humor—admittedly, dark humor in the situations the characters were in. I just finished the first story arc—and have started on the next one and I’ve got a feel for it now—but it definitely took me about three issues to really come to terms with what this project was and to find its true flavor. I had to make myself have fun with it…

PREVIEWSworld: Was it entertaining to create the future seen in PastAways through the lens and point of view of our present?

Matt Kindt: We’re only going to see glimpses of the future through flashbacks of our characters—just brief snapshots. The series is really about these characters and where they are now, so we’ll end up learning about the future more from how the characters respond and react to our present day than by actually seeing what the future looks like. I thought that would be a more interesting angle to take: to make it less about “What’s the future like?” and more about who these characters are and what’s the common thread of humanity that weaves itself through history.

PREVIEWSworld: PastAways has been referred to as a “vacation book.” What did Steve Sunu, of Dark Horse, mean when he called it that? What type of reader is in need of a vacation book?

Matt Kindt: Ha! I’m not quite sure! It probably means you won’t have to turn the book sideways to read secret codes on the edge of every page (as in MIND MGMT) to get the secondary meaning of the book. Which is true—the tone is lighter. It’s slightly more escapist in nature, and we get to see a lot of fun sci-fi concepts play out. But I’m still having fun with the format and style. There are going to be footnotes and callouts throughout the issue, but those things are going to be a little lighter in tone, a little more fun. I think with MIND MGMT I’m generally shooting for the reader to be emotionally devastated by the end of the issue.…and with PastAways, I’m aiming for the reader to be something more like “bemused.”

PREVIEWSworld: You’re considered an accomplished illustrator. What was it like writing more and letting the artist, Scott Kolins, interpret your vision for PastAways?

Matt Kindt: It was a heck of a lot easier. I’ve become inured to the pressure of putting out a monthly comic book on my own (writing/art/color/letters/design), so it’s kind of nice to write a script, send it off, and let Scott’s fantastic art just roll in. And then Bill Crabtree starts putting his wonderful colors on top of it all—it’s honestly an amazing process to watch unfold every day in my inbox. I grew up (and have been working in the industry for ten years) with the mindset of doing everything myself if I want it to be done right (which is something I’ll never really break out of), but it is liberating to surrender some of that control and watch what skilled artists can do. There’s definitely an aspect of collaboration that I enjoy. There’s the fear of the unknown but then the wonder of seeing something finished that wouldn’t have happened that way without these different hands and personalities working together to make something new.

PREVIEWSworld: What sorts of audiences would be into PastAways? If you had to give it a tag line that retailers could use to sell it off shelves, what would the tag be?

Matt Kindt: It’s a sci-fi adventure via Jack Kirby meeting Philip K. Dick, meeting Frank Herbert, meeting Ursula K. Le Guin, meeting Arthur C. Clarke, meeting Margaret Atwood—and I’m not kidding.

PREVIEWSworld: Is there anything else you’d like readers to know about the new series?

Matt Kindt: I’m definitely approaching this series in a way similar to MIND MGMT. I’m trying to justify the monthly comic book experience rather than catering to trade-paperback collectors. Everything I do will work when collected, but the individual issues are going to be designed to work well as a monthly, with extra exclusive content (back and inside covers), and while it’s a fun and light read, it’ll still be dense with the fun—like the comics I used to get from the grocery store when I was a kid that would have to last me thirty days or more and held up to rereading and study. There’s going to be a lot in each issue.

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