Tripwire Talks To Chris Weston About Dark Horse’s Paranoid Gardens With Gerard Way, Now In Trade, And Shares A 10-Page Preview

Enter The Gardens Of Paranoia

Chris Weston is longtime friend of Tripwire, and with a new trade paperback edition of his latest work Paranoid Gardens, written by Gerard Way with Shaun Simon, now available from Dark Horse Comics, our contributing writer Paul N Neal decided to chat to Chris to find out a little more about the comic…

TRIPWIRE: Hello Chris, Tripwire has spoken to you on a few occasions, but this time around can we ask about Paranoid Gardens? Can I just start by asking how this project with Gerard Way came about?

CHRIS WESTON: Probably the usual way: with an email from the editor. I think I was Gerard Way’s first choice for the artist job as he was a big fan of 1990s Vertigo books and I had done quite a few of them (like The Filth, Swamp Thing and The Invisibles). I felt like some seasoned old session musician brought back from obscurity to guest on a trendy rock star’s new album, in Gerard’s case, a genuine trendy rock star. It was editor Daniel Chabon who got in touch with me and the whole deal seemed too good to turn down.

TW: How did the collaborative process between yourself and Gerard Way work?

CW: Oh, there was very little collaborative development. Gerard and Shaun already had the story worked out and broken down. They knew what they wanted. Gerard had even drawn a page of character designs himself, and they were great. I said to him: “These are really good. Why do you want me to draw it? You could do it yourself!” He insisted I was vital, so I put his designs through a process of “Westonification”, which basically means adding lots of wrinkles to the characters’ clothes and other unnecessary details.

TW: Paranoid Gardens has just been released as collected edition. For the uninitiated, can you describe to comic fans what they should expect? What sort of fan will the storyline appeal to?

CW: Imagine Cocoon directed by David Cronenberg. It’s a very surreal and humorous tale that flirts with horror but, hopefully, can also be quite touching. There are elements of The Prisoner to it as it takes place in a seemingly benign enclosed community that may literally hide weird and sinister elements within its walls. Fans of 90s Vertigo would enjoy it: it’s a deliberate throwback to that era, hence my employment as artist.

TW: Can you offer a brief spoiler-free description of the basic premise of the series?

CW: It’s hard to spoil as there are so many strands to its tapestry. But, basically, it follows the adventures of Loo as she goes about caring for the strange residents of the Paradise Gardens Care Home. Within its walls, Loo encounters ghosts, aliens and a traumatised super-hero. Paradise Gardens is also a character in itself: a worn out, run-down building in need of its own care and attention. Loo might be the ideal person to provide it, but only if she can fix her own problems first.

TW: Long-time comic industry veteran Dave Stewart colours your art for this project. Bearing mind in the past you have produced fully painted art how does your relationship with a colourist work? Do you ever provide any notes to a colleague like Dave Stewart, or do you have a more hands-off approach?

CW: I was completely hands off. I’d already done full-colour character designs for the series, so he knew what colours to use on their clothes. Dave’s a talented and seasoned pro so I had no need to instruct him in any way beyond supplying those designs. I thought the work he did on the series was very similar to the way I colour my own work and it blended seamlessly with the full colour art I did on the covers.

TW: As it currently stands, is Paranoid Garden an entirely self-contained storyline or can comic fans expect further adventures with the characters you have brought to life from your partnership with Gerard Way?

CW: There are no plans for another series at the moment. It works as a complete story, but I’m sure Gerard and Shaun could open it up more if there was interest from the readers.

TW: Do you have any other projects you would like to shamelessly promote?

CW: I’m in limbo at the moment:  Rob Williams and I have submitted a pitch to DC Comics and we’re waiting to hear back about that, but the industry is in so much turmoil that it’s hard to know if it’s what they want -or need- at the moment.

I’ve just completed my crowd-funded project that reprinted “Time Breakers” for the first time in a collected edition. Gosh Comics in London have a pile of them for sale on their shelves. So, if anyone is interested in checking out my work from nearly thirty years ago, that’s the only place to get it. I think it holds up well. I’ve also done some covers for Mad Cave’s Endless Night series and some illustrations for a collection of Harlan Ellison short stories that Joe Michael Straczynski (my collaborator on The Twelve) is editing.

TW: On the Dark Horse website, Paranoid Gardens is described as “an all-new surreal comic book experience that’s ER meets Doctor Who… on acid.” Can I just ask, from your perspective, is that an accurate description?

CW: Hah. I wasn’t sure about the “on acid” line. That’s such an old cliché! Do kids these days even know what acid is? Haven’t they got their own psychotropic hallucinogens?

I suggested: “Ricky Gervais’ Derek collides with Doctor Who in six psychotic episodes”. Mind you, I’d never actually watched Derek, so even that was a bit of a gamble. But I knew its themes and they seemed to match. I came up with loads of slogans for the sales pitch and this was my favourite: “a cosmic tale that will bend your mind and melt your heart.”

Here’s that 10-page preview of Paranoid Gardens out now from Dark Horse Comics