BY JENNIFER M. CONTINO If you think you've had bad vacations, you should see the trouble that Stan and Kay get into on theirs. Of course the fact that they are trying to smuggle enough weed to choke a cow into the country, might be part of the reason their little trip has taken such a turn. Creator Jason Wilson wanted to make his amateur smugglers of Him & Her's Smuggling Vacation likable and relatable, but will their misadventures be a hit with comic fans?
THE PULSE: Besides being grammatically incorrect, what is Him & Her's Smuggling Vacation?
JASON WILSON: It's a soon to be published graphic novel that tells the story of a young binge drinking couple who whilst on vacation discover a ton of cannabis stashed away on a Spanish beach. They in turn attempt to smuggle it back to the U.K, but are pursued by the criminal gang who quite rightly consider it to be stolen, and will go to any means to get it back.
As for the title. It will always defiantly be grammatically incorrect simply because it is a colloquialism that is in keeping with the strip.
THE PULSE: Who are the Him & Her? Were they based on any "real" people in your life?
WILSON: They are largely you and me, or is that just me? Two regular people who work in jobs that don't inspire them, for money that can't buy them the things they really want. They come from an old industrial town called Alleyton which has struggled to move with the times. His name is Stan Johnson and he works in I.T, her name is Kay Brown and she works in the clothing department of Marks and Spencers. They live in a rented flat above a hairdressers with their three legged cat. Their future seems predictable and limited, until fate presents them with this opportunity of a life time.
However, once they realise they're a little out of their depth, they call our third main character; the young man's older brother 'Mikey' who thinks little and shares none of their sensitivities. An ex-burglar, he now works as a locksmith whilst buying and selling whatever comes his way. He considers himself to be straight now. However when he hears of their find he's determined to make sure they make it home with the gear and make their fortune.
So this makes up our trio of amateur smugglers who have some similarities with family and friends but are really an amalgamation of many.
The obstacles to their success, of course, are the criminal gang of Pastille, Rolo, Trebor, Smartie and Polo. Largely based on smugglers and criminals I've previously known, they're far more capable than we'd at first believe, which is the whole idea.
THE PULSE: I know there's a lot of smuggling going on in the world, but where are Him & Her smuggling from on their vacation?
WILSON: They're on the Costa-del-Sol, Spain where the beaches have been the landing spots from smugglers for decades now. There are the more famous towns along there such as Fuengirola and Torremolinos, but also many smaller lesser known towns where criminal gangs base themselves for such work.
THE PULSE: What, exactly, are they smuggling here?
WILSON: They are smuggling 'soapbars' which come from Morocco and until recent years were the most popular from of cannabis to be smoked in the U.K. The area is now radared up which has effected the amount smuggled, plus the downgrading of cannabis in the U.K lead to such a boom in home-growing that weed is now king. It's a subject I hope to incorporate into the next book.
THE PULSE: What made them want to smuggle? I mean, are they bad people at heart or was this just like too good an opportunity to pass up?
WILSON: Excitement, overconfidence and greed made them want to smuggle. Emotions we all have and sometimes help us get carried away and do things that we think quite dumb looking back, unless they worked out of course. The opportunity is key though, and them being clued up enough to know it's big money if they can just get it back home and sell it. And are they really doing such a bad thing? It's down to you to decide.
THE PULSE: It would seem that smuggling is a very dangerous thing to do. How rigid are the customs? How did they try to hide it? What where they smuggling the cannabis in?
WILSON: The story tackles many of the problems to be faced. For a start the gear is so big and smelly and most people will instantly recognise the smell. So where do you put it? How do you get through a customs check? What's the safest route out of Spain? Can it be concealed? They work out these problems the best way they can and with Mikey's help a few tips of the trade are revealed. However, this is all doubly hard when you discover there's a criminal gang schooled in the business who are on your trail.
THE PULSE: Why did you want to do a crime story like this? I mean, most people dreaming of making comic books are thinking of superheroes and costumed villains, why you were you thinking about smuggling?
WILSON: I wanted to write about what I know and felt this would be more enjoyable and interesting than dabbling in a genre I knew little. I've felt for some time that superheroes are an American genre that are best drew by Americans, ditto manga. I don't think I could contribute something new to these genres at all. To try, I don't think would have been enjoyable or fulfilling.
Doing a British strip, set in these worlds I'd known did interest me though. It would be very different and very satisfying..
THE PULSE: Who or what inspired you the most here? I know you said you were collaborating with an ex-hashish smuggler, Tony Spencer here; but was meeting Tony the impetus or was that just the icing on the cake?
WILSON: Once I got to thinking what the strip could incorporate I was inspired to start developing it, though I was quite hesitant at first when I considered the amount of work involved and how long it might take. I developed the characters via a series of gouache paintings and once I'd done this for a couple of months I found I'd ran out of excuses not to do the strip. I had a story outline, the pages worked out and a drawer full of scenes scripted several times over.
Elsewhere, Spencer was at Valdemoro Orison near Madrid. He had got six years, four months. Six for smuggling hashish and four months for travelling on a false passport. He was away for a while and as I'd mentioned previously working one day on a movie script, I though this might interest him and so sent him the first ten pages of roughs with a request he amend some of the smuggling details I couldn't nail down.
Ten days later it cam back with the info I required plus two essays in relation to other ideas I'd mentioned for later pages. How could I not go forward and do the next sequence?
THE PULSE: How long did it take you to create this story?
WILSON: I'd had the essential storyline in my mind for a couple of months but backed off from developing it as I was aware it was a big story and I doubted my ability to draw a comic strip just yet. However I sat down one evening and began to plot it out, About three in the morning I had sixty two pages plotted out, bande by bande. I then kept going back to it every few days to re-evaluate it and each time I thought it worked well.
THE PULSE: How did you decide the art style to illustrate this story? What influenced you the most?
WILSON: I'd always admired the French school of comic drawing but I always wondered why they didn't do more serious stories with it. An adult story, much like a film, under such a comic style I thought would be very effective. I had grabbed copies of the french and belgium albums when I'd been over there and discovered Franquinn, Roba, Janry were part of this Marcinelle school of drawing I knew through reading Asterix as a kid. I thought perhaps I could do a less slapstick more restrained version of this style. and this would combine effectively with the drawing style.
THE PULSE: What kind of response did you get when you published Him & Her's Smuggling Vacation online?
WILSON: Before going online it had already been test-read and questionaires filled in by more than thirty people. Mostly at Valdemoro Prison, but through friends also. It gave me a good idea of what worked as planned and what didn't. When it went online the first to review it were fellow amateur comic creators like me and then 'smokers' who began to find it through forums.
The first reviews were good, and then they got stronger the more pages went up. Once twenty five pages were up the comic people fell into two categories: the majority who accepted it for its differences and praised it highly, and the minority who didn't get it or didn't want to. That they were smuggling cannabis turned off some people, as did the title, the swearing and differing style in both drawing and storytelling.
With the smokers it was different. People would read twenty five pages straight and e-mail me just to say they loved the strip. They seemed far more open minded than many comic readers and allowed themselves to be sucked into the story. This was surprising as up until page 25, no-one had smoked anything in the strip. It wasn't at all traditional smoker humour, but they said that's what they liked so much. Also, Howard Marks(ex-smuggler turned author) and Phil Kliv (Editor of weedworld) were also reading the strip by now and this would lead to developments further down the line.
THE PULSE: What are some of the challenges of collecting and prepping webcomics for print?
WILSON: That the art was done by hand and that I have no skills on a computer at all was a real pain. I had got a friend Nooode to set up the site and put the first pages up, he then moved on and then another mate Tez took who still does that today as well as combing through the art on photoshop to make sure it's cleaned up for print. I'm leaning on his skills as well as those of a local printer who'll be assuring we get good results.
THE PULSE: Who helped you the most learn about the ins and outs of self-publishing?
WILSON: Self-publishing seems no different to making anything else. read some books and then get close to a few people who are in that line of business. I produced some strips of 'Him and Her' for a local magazine called 'Chatterbox' which enabled me to get close to a small publisher and see my work in print. Secondly, Smuggling vacation began a serialistaion in the pages of weedworld this month which enabled me to see the first six page in print. Each time a little more is learnt and it takes the anxiety away from the publishing of the book.
THE PULSE: What was the best lesson you learned about self-publishing?
WILSON: That the printing part is vital and you've got to get that right. But after that is the difficult part - the promotion and distribution. Promotion is essential especially if you are unknown and have something a little different that you think many people will like if they just get a little taste of it. Secondly the distribution is paramount. Without that you could indeed have a great and well printed story, but no-one's ever going to find it never mind read it.
THE PULSE: Are you at all worried doing a story like this that it might call attention to you if you're traveling? Like you might be added to some kind of black book list that has potential smugglers in it based on writing like this?
WILSON: Time will tell in the following months. Spencer, who was released last year, gets pulled at customs all the time. Twice they've seen Smuggling Vacation flyers which state in large black and white: 'A ton of cannabis is leaving Spain for the U.K. Want some? Go to htttp://www.smugglingvacation.co.uk ' On seeing this they've adopted their serious tone and asked what that's all about. He's simply told them and gave them a flyer with a suggestion they check the site out. They're a humourless lot but I'm sure they'll have other things to worry about.
THE PULSE: Where can PULSE readers get their own copies of Him & Her's Smuggling Vacation?
WILSON: They'll be available from the Smuggling Vacation site from the 26th May and from all U.k comic shops the following week. By June they'll be the world over assuming Diamond have agreed to distribute as expected.
THE PULSE: What other projects are you working on?
WILSON: I've three follow up adventures to Smuggling Vacation plotted out entitled 'Brighton Lightz'. 'Day of the Deal' and 'The Road to Fuengirola'. One of these will be serialised on the Smuggling Vacation website at http://www.smugglingvacation.co.uk from August with a print copy out next year.
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