Posted in: Comics, Top Cow | Tagged: H.P. Lovecraft, horror, Simon Birks, The Thing On The Doorstep, top cow, Willi Roberts

The Thing on The Doorstep: Creators on Adapting Lovecraft for Comics

Simon Birks and Willi Roberts talk about adapting HP Lovecraft's The Thing on the Doorstep for Top Cow Comics with an updated approach

Top Cow is now publishing a new comic adaptation of the H.P. Lovecraft horror story The Thing on the Doorstep by Simon Birks and Willi Roberts, the first new American comic adaptation of one of the seminal Body Horror stories decades before the term was coined for a subsection of horror movies in the 1980s. The adaptation, while set in the 1920s like the original story was, makes significant changes to the story that update and correct certain attitudes that Lovecraft held that would be unacceptable today. We interview the creators about their work on the adaptation.

The Thing on the Doorstep: Interview with The Creators

How did you decide to adapt Lovecraft's story "The Thing on the Doorstep"? Was it a job from Top Cow, or did you pitch it?

Simon Birks: During 2023, when Top Cow was publishing Antarctica, I was speaking to our editor, Elena Salcedo, who said she'd seen we were running a Kickstarter for the Blue Fox version of The Thing on the Doorstep. She loved the idea and was instrumental in getting it in front of Marc and Matt, who loved it. After that, it was just a matter of getting the timing right!

Willi Roberts: The project originally belongs to Blue Fox Comics, Simon Birks's publishing house. We had already been working together on another H.P. Lovecraft adaptation, "The Cats of Ulthar," and other board games based on his cosmic horror universe. While we were working on "Antarctica," Simon mentioned that he wanted to present "The Thing on the Doorstep" to Marc Silvestri and Matt Hawkins to see if they were interested. During the San Diego Comic-Con dinner in 2024, they both expressed interest in publishing it, and it took about a year to take shape. Then they let us know it would be published by Top Cow/Image.

Lovecraft is the original creator of Body Horror and Cosmic Horror. His sense of terror was genuine and autobiographical. He was also a notorious racist and terrified of sex and female sexuality. I've only read the first issue of The Thing on the Doorstep so far, which is all setting up the later reveal of the horror. You've made quite a few changes to the original story, pacing and structuring it closer to an episodic TV serial rather than a pulp prose story. Can you talk us through your decisions?

SB: First and foremost, I loved the opening line to The Thing on the Doorstep – it had me hooked. I knew as soon as I'd finished reading it that it was a story I wanted to adapt. I wanted to begin the adaptation the same way (with a bang!), and then take time building the friends' relationship – each scene I created is mentioned in passing in the original story, but I really wanted the reader to see it unfold, and be involved. The reader has to understand how close the two men are to fully appreciate what's to come. It is mentioned that Daniel has a wife and a son named Edward Jr, so these were key characters I wanted to give agency to. They form a strong support network for Daniel and breathe life and fun into the pages.

WR: Simon did an incredible job adapting this story into a graphic novel with the pacing of a TV series. I think it's more dynamic and easier to digest than the original novel, considering it's a different medium. From my artistic point of view, the project came together very naturally. I think it's the project where Simon and I merged best. I followed his narrative structures, but at the same time, I asked him to give me space to create terrifying scenes that you'll soon see in the following issues. It's extremely difficult to scare people with a graphic novel; you have to find other resources, like camera positioning and playing with shadows and light, knowing what to show and what not to show. The comic is full of hidden images in the panels that will make the reader feel Asenath's presence throughout the entire story without knowing if she's actually there.

On Race in "That Thing on the Doorstep"

Was your decision to make the narrator and main character a black man a commentary or corrective to Lovecraft's racism, since he would never have chosen a person of colour as a protagonist?

SB: I want the comics I write to reflect the society I see around me every day, which is the main reason Daniel and his family are black.

What do you want the modern reader to get out of your interpretation of this particular story of Lovecraft's?

SB: I'd like the modern reader to see a story of a close friendship between two straight men, and the lengths Daniel (and his family) go to to try and help Edward when he gets into trouble. Willi does an amazing job of both creating the emotion and the terror, and I'd like people to love and fear the book equally!

WR: I think it's a more organic version of the original novel, and although it maintains the essence of the Lovecraft universe, aesthetically it takes you straight back to the 1920s. We chose a color palette and strokes that make the graphic novel look like an old oil painting. We tried to make it so that anyone who has never read this writer can connect with a terrifying cosmic universe, where the more you know about it, the harder it is to feel safe.

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