by Nulsh

Joe Matt – creator of painfully honest autobiographical comic books - was born in Philadelphia in 1963.  He moved (illegally) to Canada for thirteen years and now resides in Los Angeles.

Joe’s early strips were collected in the book Peepshow , and subsequent books The Poor Bastard, Fair Weather, and Spent all continue the theme and the life of Joe in his ‘cartoon diary’.
The moods of each book change significantly; I read them in order of publication, which I’d recommend to new comers, although each book stands up on its own.
Joe kindly let us interview him via email – and put up with my duff questions.

The intro to this article uses the panel from ‘The Poor Bastard’, when you’re confronted by a reader who recognises himself (and his girlfriend) in your comic and is less than pleased. I remember reading this and squirming. That must’ve been awkward. Did this actually happen?
It did happen, but not exactly the way I portrayed it.  And this is indicative of many scenes in my comics. The germ of what's being shown is factual, but the execution rarely is. In fact, technically, it NEVER is. Everything's manipulated for effect; from dialogue to gestures to timing.

An example might be the scene you described above. In reality, the information conveyed may very well have all taken place on the phone, whereas in my comic, I chose to show it as a confrontation on the street. The actual facts are irrelevant to me. It's the emotional content that guides my instincts, regarding what to show and how to show it.

For the record though, I think that character, Andy, did confront me on the street, alone, with neither his girlfriend, nor Seth and Chester, present. And, he was most certainly less upset and more polite about making his point. In fact, I can guarantee that he didn't smoosh a copy of my comic book onto my head.

I think the reason I was interested in this particular incident was that it was so convincing, therefore uncomfortable (to me anyway!). Did you script this out as a ‘what if?’ or was it a stream of consciousness after the incident?
I never script out any of the scenes in my comics. I make notes that usually consist of a line or two of dialogue, but that's pretty much it. My preference is to work directly on the finished art as I write/sketch panels on the spot.

With 'The Poor Bastard', I was writing completely by instinct - and a scene could run anywhere from a single panel to quite a few. Whereas, with 'Spent'. I was consciously composing long, uninterrupted scenes and trying to make the dialogue feel as natural as possible, while still cramming in portions of my pre-written notes wherever possible. In fact, cramming in the notes was the whole point to me ... as opposed to something like showing Seth ordering meatloaf or another cup of coffee.

you can find the rest of the interview in issue 4, available from
your local stockists or our online store.