Posted in: Comics | Tagged: Ande Parks, Comics, dynamite, entertainment, Esteve Polls, Seduction of the Innocent

"Dynamite Originally Approached Me About Doing A Crime Series…" – Ande Parks Talks Seduction Of The Innocent

Published Wed, 16 Dec 2015 14:00:43 -0600

Ande Parks talked with Byron Brewer about his new series Seduction of the Innocent and just how the series came to be. Cover art by Francesco Francavilla.

BYRON BREWER: The origin behind this book is fascinating. Tell us about it.

ANDE PARKS: Dynamite originally approached me (and this was several years ago) about doing a crime series with the Seduction of the Innocent title. The idea was that the book would have a crime element, but would also feature the congressional hearings inspired by Dr. Fredric Wertham's book of the same name. There was a period of bouncing ideas back and forth, and around the time we were ready to make that comic happen, Max Allan Collins wrote a prose novel along the same lines. So … our thing got shelved. It stayed that way for quite awhile.

Eventually, though, Joe Rybandt (my Dynamite editor) asked if I wanted to move forward with the series, but losing the Wertham hearings angle. I love writing crime fiction — especially period crime fiction — so I said "hell yes" and put together a new outline.

BB: What can you tell us about the protagonists?

AP: The book really centers on a young FBI agent named Thomas Jennings. With the ties to Wertham gone, the title of the book became the theme to the story in a different way … it became the story of Jennings' loss of innocence, on a grand scale.

We drop hints at Jennings' past: he was a marksman in the Army. He did well in his first FBI job, in Cleveland. He and his pregnant wife have just moved to San Francisco, thanks to a promotion. Like any young man, Jennings is nervous about being a father. He's nervous about the health and welfare of his wife and baby. The events of our series ramp up all of those anxieties, as Jennings is exposed to horrific crimes. How he responds, and the toll the exposure to such events will take on him, is what our book is all about.

BB: What is the main storyline of this great noir mystery?

AP: Two villains, whose past we will hint at throughout the book, are committing a series of murders in 1953 San Francisco. They are wiping out the leaders of the city's extensive organized crime network. Basically, they are trying to create a power vacuum, for reasons that I'll hold back on for now. In our first issue, they kill a mobster and his family, but not quite … the mobster's two children escape.

The rest of the series has our young agent trying to get to the children before the bad guys can. Things get very messy. It's all set against an era and locale that means a lot to me. My father is from San Francisco. He became an orphan as an early teen, and left the city around '53 to go live with a sibling. I have really enjoyed showing off the various settings the city offers: the Wharf, Japanese Tea Garden, Chinatown, etc.

BB: Why is Esteve Polls the best artist for this unusual book?

AP: I spoke about the settings … how important they are to me, and to the book. Esteve excels at atmosphere. He grounds his characters in reality, without turning them into boring statues. Our book is full of mist and shadows. Esteve is so good at that stuff. You can just feel the damp and cold seeping into you from the page.

He's also good at the small moments — at making you feel it when characters are hit with tough choices. That skill is crucial for a book like ours.

For more information on Seduction of the Innocent #3, click here.

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