If anyone bothers to actually discover Nightstik, there might be a few questions. Here are a few answers to some of the questions I have encountered in my 25 year journey to produce this comic:
What’s with the name? Isn’t there a “c” in stick?
True.
When I first came up with the character, his name was Dark Shadow. I was a fan of the GI Joe cartoon and one of my favorites was the Cobra ninja, Storm Shadow. You will notice that Nightstik in his current incarnation maintains many elements of the Ninja costume. Later, I changed it to Nightstick. I was reading Daredevil at the time, and I noticed that Daredevil carries his ubiquitous billy club that doubles as a blind man’s cane. I always thought the police style billy club looked cool. And so, he became Nightstick.
This was about the time he got “de-powered.” I originally conceived him more as a Superman type. For awhile, he had a power of the week. He could fly, throw laser knives, etc. (I was twelve…)
When he made the transition to more of a Spider-Man level of power, I realized the stories were a bit more fun to tell as he could be hurt or even killed; adding a bit more danger seemed ;to make sense.
As to the name, my little heart sank when I noticed that there was a Target Master Transformer named Nightstick as well as a C.O.P character of the same name. So with the logic of childhood, I simply dropped the c to avoid being sued (again-I was twelve…).
Why Castle Comics?
Some of the first things I liked to draw were castles. In fact the first comic I ever did was about two knights. The name of my “company” is a homage to those beginnings.
What is Gothic Studios?
I just liked the sound of it? No, seriously, Gothic Studios is an imprint within Castle Comics. Down the road, I plan to tell stories that are different than Nightstik in tone and style, not unlike Vertigo for DC. This is away of differentiating the types of stories I plan on telling.
What are some of your other characters?
Stay tuned!
Why isn’t this in color?
Well, as soon as I figure out color, I plan on adding it. At this stage, I’m lucky I got this far. I’ve always been a fan of black and white art, especially Sin City and The Crow. There are plenty of influences in my art from these two seminal works.
Hey, this is good! Why don’t you publish this?
Haven’t I? It’s online.
No seriously, when are you going to publish this?
Sigh. I get this question from people who bless their hearts, have no idea how hard and competitive it is to even get your art out there. The Oatmeal, a great web comic, has the following formula:
Your career + the internet =sad.
A lot of people assume that anyone can put anything online, so that really isn’t doing anything. While any slow monkey CAN put anything online, it really is tough to get this looking decent. The only thing that’s easier is that the artist doesn’t have to get rejected 1000 times before getting his art out there. Now in the digital age, everyone can see the artist grow, fail, grow, and maybe just maybe garner a few views from people he or she isn’t related to. At this point, this is more of a hobby than anything. However, as Stephen King once said, “The other name for hobby is obsession.”