On May 22nd, Dark Horse Comics will release "a classic slasher/psychotropic folk horror story to sink your teeth into" in The Butcher’s Boy. This new horror comic book series' creative team includes a story from Landry Q. Walker (The Last Siege) and Pannel Vaughn, art and cover art from Justin Greenwood (The Last Siege), interior and cover art colors from Brad Simpson (All Eight Eyes), and letters by Pat Brosseau (Hellboy). In our latest Q&A, we caught up with Landry Q. Walker and Justin Greenwood to learn more about the origins of this comic book series and their creative process:
How did The Butcher’s Boy become the next project that the two of you would collaborate on?
LANDRY: I have a massive pile of stories that are always in some stage of development. This one clicked, and I saw Justin’s art in my head with it. I knew I wanted to work on at least three books with Justin, and I want them all to fit with his expressive art style. In our medieval war story “The Last Siege” he was the right fit to convey the weary desperation of that world. In “The Butcher’s Boy” his art would frame the heightened sense of paranoia, anxiety, and hunger just right. I was glad he was able to find the time to work on this – I don’t see this book existing without him.
JUSTIN: Yeah, Landry and I had been wanting to work together again and The Butcher’s Boy was the perfect fit for a bunch of reasons. Horror is maybe the one genre I hadn’t gotten to work on in comics yet and this kind of story was right up my alley.
How did you approach creating an iconic boogeyman in the Butcher of La Perdita both visually and in terms of the character’s backstory?
LANDRY: The original “Butcher’s Boy” was a concept from our friend Pannel Vaughn, who worked on the story for this with me. Pannel’s versions were radically different from where we landed here - conceptually - so much so that we purposefully withheld sharing the original sketches with Justin so as not to influence him. Consequently, Justin has been really driving the bus with the designs.
JUSTIN: The initial glimpses that the reader gets initially are only the tip of the iceberg in terms of where it goes, too. Reality gets more and more transparent as the story moves forward so it left me a lot of room to play around with design and not be tied to one specific thing. The idea of one boogeyman becomes significantly less clear as it goes on.
LANDRY: In terms of backstory – here’s where I went a little bonkers. I’ve been writing a mythology – starting at the creation of all reality – complete with a fully formed language, pantheon of deities, original zodiac wheel, etc. This is a massive document called “The Codex of the Cheironeumina” – the Cheironeumina itself being our solar system which is a prison for entropy. All of this is deep lore that just barely affects the background of madness that our characters come into contact with once they arrive in La Perdita. I typically go all-in on projects like this, building a mountain of information behind the scenes that readers will never see. I think that this adds weight to what you do see.
The “six friends on a road trip” tease in the synopsis instantly brings up thoughts of horror classics like The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. Can you tease what’s in store for these six friends?
LANDRY: It goes very badly for them. Very, very badly. Everyone expects this, and so we jump in with page one to start showing you how bad these things will be. It’s a horror book, so know things are going to go to a very monstrous, weird, and anxiety ridden. It’s the “How” that I think is where the story happens.
JUSTIN: Totally, yeah. We’ve talked a lot about where the story goes but I have felt surprised all over again once it’s in context. Landry has brought some great imagery into this story and drawing it will be both gruesome and a lot of fun.
How did your previous collaborations help when it came to collaborating on this comic book series? Can you talk a bit about your creative process working together?
LANDRY: It’s an easy collaboration. Justin and I had been hanging out for a while before we started talking about working together. Generally speaking, I work with friends, so going in I already know enough about the person I am working with to step back and trust their instincts, rather than trying to dominate the collaboration. Comics creation is kind of like a game of telephone, where each participant builds on what came before, making it stronger.
JUSTIN: Having worked together so often, we all have a great sense of trust and appreciation for what each brings to the table. And as Landry mentioned earlier, the story feels relatively straightforward on the surface but he came with so much backstory to draw from! You may not see initially but those extra details absolutely inform where it goes. La Perdita and its inhabitants felt lived in and real from the outset, which makes what happens to our group of friends feel that much worse in some ways. It makes it feel more personal.
What are some of your favorite horror films and/or those you’d recommend our readers watch in anticipation for The Butcher’s Boy #1?
LANDRY: The 1982 Thing is a favorite. American Werewolf in London is another. Return of the Living Dead… I tend to gravitate to horror where someone in a story is changed in some fundamental way, so that they are no longer themselves. I heard a rumor – no idea if it was true – where The Wolfman was originally written so that Lon Chaney Jr was only shown to be a werewolf in his own reflection. Was he a werewolf? Or was it all a part of some kind of psychotic break. Obviously, that’s not the film we got, but it’s an example of the kind of horror that I gravitate to.
JUSTIN: I’ve been down a real Dario Argento hole recently and I think some of that stark violence and overall weirdness can’t help but rub off a bit. I even liked the new Suspirira, although tonally it has a pretty different energy.
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"Dark Horse Comics presents a classic slasher/psychotropic folk horror story to sink your teeth into in The Butcher’s Boy. This new Lovecraftian horror series combines elements of tales such as Midsommar and The Evil Dead, and comes from the creative team behind The Last Siege. The Butcher’s Boy is a four-issue series, with the story by Landry Q. Walker (The Last Siege) and Pannel Vaughn, art and cover art by Justin Greenwood (The Last Siege), interior and cover art colors by Brad Simpson (All Eight Eyes), and letters by Pat Brosseau (Hellboy).
Tucked away far down the backroads of the Pacific Northwest countryside, an entire town fell victim to the brutal cleaver of the Butcher of La Perdita. But that was more than a hundred years ago, and since that time the generational nightmare of murder and meat has been reduced to morbid clickbait folklore for bored travelers to share online.
Yet some say the Butcher still haunts the streets at night, seeking fresh meat for his larder. Is this a true Lovecraftian horror? Or just the feverish dreams of a mentally unstable serial killer? Six friends on a road trip are about to find out…
The Butcher’s Boy #1 (of 4) will be in comic shops May 22, 2024. Both the original and variant cover editions of the comic are available for pre-order now at your local comic shop for $4.99."
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