ICv2 recently caught up with Dark Horse CEO Mike Richardson. In Part 2 of his ICv2 Interview he discusses the success of the Troublemaker graphic novel co-written by bestselling mystery author Janet Evanovich, the potential of Frank Miller’s Xerxes, new comic book publishers with studio ties, and Dark Horse’s current movie projects. In Part 1, of the interview Richardson talks about the challenges of the current marketplace, the financial impact of Borders’ woes, the opportunities and challenges of digital publishing, and Dark Horse’s move into the digital arena. In Part 3, he discusses the current state of the North American manga market, the revival of Dark Horse Presents, and other key Dark Horse projects for 2011.
 
Going back to 2010, Troublemaker was one of the hits you had.  Can you talk about some of the high points for 2010?  Any big surprises in terms of sales?
Certainly, we put a lot of investment into Troublemaker and it received a great deal of attention.  The response at San Diego to the book and Janet and Alex Evanovich was tremendous.  We’re very excited; we’re talking with them right now about another book. 

It was an interesting learning process for us how to reach across to Janet’s readers who are not necessarily familiar with graphic novels.  We saw some comments where people literally counted the words and tried to equate value to the number of words in the graphic novel and the number of words in a novel and trying to make some kind of economic equivalency between the two.  It was very clear that many of Janet’s fans are unaware of graphic novels.  In a way that was a good thing because one of the reasons we wanted to work with Janet and her daughter was not only because she’s a talented writer with a huge following, but also to do some missionary work, to reach out to people who don’t know about graphic novels and maybe bring some people into our market.  That’s always been one of our goals.  For a long time we’ve tried to think of ways to bring new readers in almost from the very beginning.  I think we succeeded in that.  With that said, when we put out the next book we’ve learned a lot about format and how to present it and pricing for that particular audience that we want to reach, so you’ll probably see a different format, a different approach the next time around that helps the people who may not understand the history of graphic novels and what’s involved with a graphic novel.

Over the course of the year we had a number of great projects.  Every few years or so, we start looking to revamp our line.  We’re very excited about what’s coming up with Xerxes and Buffy Season 9, and particularly with Dark Horse Presents coming up.  We’ve had an amazing response to that.  It's been 25 years since we launched that first issue, kind of hard to believe.
 
And that had a digital incarnation for a while on MySpace.
Yeah, we reached out through MySpace.  People ask us, ‘was it successful?’  It was a great success.  We had the opportunity to reach 20 million people with comic books and again, probably most of them were not graphic novel readers.  So whenever we get a chance to reach a large audience, whenever something presents itself, we’re going to take advantage of that opportunity.  The MySpace Dark Horse Presents was a way to put a variety of comics, different genres in front of a new audience and make new readers and we think that worked quite well.
 
You mentioned Xerxes, is that going to come out this year?
Frank [Miller]’s working on the third issue right now, so we’re coming close to the date when we can announce when that will be released.  The book looks tremendous.  We have a preview of it in the first issue of Dark Horse Presents together with an interview with Frank.  He’s really excited about it.  I met with him and had lunch with him in New York recently, and he said he’s having a blast doing it.  I think Frank’s intent on going on and showing that he’s one of the masters of this craft.  The book looks amazing.
 
You said he’s working on the third issue, third of how many?
It’s going to be roughly six issues, but he hasn’t exactly decided yet.
 
That’s got a film tie-in, which leads to the next question.  Dark Horse has always been at the forefront of tie-ins in both directions between comics and film.  Over the last six to eight months we’ve seen a couple of new comics companies come out tied to film companies-- Kickstart and Legendary--what are your thoughts on these new entrants, and on that connection between comics and other media?
It’s there, and we’ve been involved with comics to film since about 1988.  Dark Horse Entertainment has produced roughly 26-27 film projects and we have projects in the works all over town right now.  I’m very upfront about what we’ve done.  I think if comic book companies make very great comics a certain amount of them are going to make great film projects.  I’ve always felt that comic companies that try to make comics that they think will make movies is sort of a dead end if that’s their goal in doing the comics.  The fans respond to the material and there’s a certain authenticity that needs to be there.

In terms of Legendary’s entry, I know those people; I know they’ve been interested in comics for a long time.  They’ve got Bob Schreck who’s certainly been around the comic industry for a long time.  So Bob’s going to go out and make good comics, and a certain percentage of those will probably make great films.
 
To us, we never do a comic just to do a movie.  It may seem like it sometimes but we turn so many down.  People bring us stuff all the time, and the ones that we think will make great comics, sometimes they are also what we feel like will make a good film project.  Certainly we have enough material to take around town and set up.  We’ve had no problem setting things up.  We’ve made a number of announcements this last year and there’s a number of announcements coming.  So that’s definitely a part of the business now. 

It’s not any different than traditional publishing.  Novels are purchased all the time as the basis for film, and that’s always been the history.  If people look back comics and comic strips have been no different.  From the very beginning they’ve been optioned for film and it’s simply because film makers are always on the lookout for great properties that will translate to film.  I’d say it’s really no different than it’s ever been.
 
Do you have any movies coming out this year?
We’re hoping to start shooting R.I.P.D. in the June/July time period.  It’s all coming together. Robert Schwentke will be directing.  Of course we have Ryan Reynolds who will be big in comic readers’ minds because he’s playing Green Lantern coming up.  And then we have Zach [Galifianakis] from The Hangover, who has a huge following, so the movie’s going to be a lot of fun.  We’re really hoping to finally get it off the ground--we’ve been working on this for a very long time.
 
So, no movies out this year, but there’s a build-up in terms of media tie-ins for some stuff that will come out in the next couple of years?
That’s right, a lot of projects in the works.
 
One of the movies that Dark Horse was associated with some years back was Mystery Men.  There’s been an announcement about a comic with another publisher for a Mystery Men title.  Do you have any comments on that?
Well, they can announce whatever they want.  Bob’s been trying to get me to do a Mystery Men series for a while now and we have two pages of a strip already done.  They’re up on our Website.  Mystery Men will return to Dark Horse Presents.  I think it’s an interesting choice.  Bob’s been associated with the Mystery Men since 1988, so I’m not sure what they’re thinking.  I guess what’s even more puzzling is the fact that they even used Bob’s phrase “Who are the Mystery Men?”  I’m not sure what they’re thinking, but we plan to continue to do Mystery Men comics and I guess they’ll do what they do.

For Part 3 of this interview, click here.