One of the benefits of doing a show for as long as I’ve done this is not only meeting and talking to new folks, but checking back in with previous guests to see what they’ve been up to since we last talked. Today’s episode is one of the catching up variety.

My guest was last on the show back in April of 2022 for his miniseries, Six Sidekicks of Trigger Keaton, with collaborator, fellow cartoonist, and studio mate Kyle Starks. Do yourself a favor and check that out if you haven’t done so already because it was, and still is, a hoot to listen to. He is a multiple Eisner, YALSA, and Stumptown Award-nominated cartoonist.

He has also been, at one time or another, according to the internet, takes a deep breath, a hotel manager, movie theater projectionist, martial arts instructor, set builder, church music leader, process server, bartender, sixth grade social studies teacher, janitor, speakeasy proprietor, video store clerk, field hand, deckhand, kids TV puppeteer, muralist, kickboxer, pancake mix factory line worker, and, dramatic breath, a professor at the Savannah College of Art and Design, teaching narrative theory, comics theory, and character environmental design.

His published works include The Crogan Adventures graphic novel series from Oni Press, the nonfiction graphic novels The Roanoke Colony: America’s First Mystery, and Maker Comics’ Fix a Car! with an exclamation point at the end, and other collaborations with the aforementioned Kyle Starks, including a shockingly good Mars Attacks miniseries.

At the end of his last appearance on this show, he mentioned just starting on pencils for a comic he was intending to serialize called Outlaw’s Apprentice. And it’s that comic and the Kickstarter campaign for its first volume that brings Chris Schweitzer back on the show today.

[This episode is number 840 in a series.]

CHAPTERS

00:00 – Intro
05:52 – Series Pitch and Setting
08:12 – Twenty Years Cartooning
09:40 – Legacy and Creative Stakes
13:53 – Appalachia as Foundation
18:19 – Character Craft and Monologues
23:38 – Lessons from Crogan
33:09 – Tools Paper Sizes and Materials
36:30 – Serialization Feedback and Editing
46:26 – Art Style Shifts
55:15 – Why Swords Fascinate
01:02:05 – Ethics Of Violence
01:16:01 – Libraries And Access
01:23:08 – Outro