Michael May is the proprietor of Michael May’s Adventureblog and he is the writer of Kill All Monsters, a graphic novel from Dark Horse Comics.
Michael May is a fiction author, blogger, and podcaster. He’s the writer of Kill All Monsters, a graphic novel co-created with artist Jason Copland and published by Dark Horse Comics in 2017. He lives in Saint Paul, Minnesota with his wife Diane, their son David, and Luke the Wonder-Hound.
Dark Worlds Quarterly: Your comic Kill All Monsters is set in a Kaiju-infested world that fans of Pacific Rim or Cloverfield and the old stand-bys like Godzilla will enjoy. Obviously you are a fan, but what specific movies and characters inspired your comic?
MICHAEL MAY: Not too many kaiju movies, surprisingly. I love kaiju movies, but one of the things that often frustrates me about them is the struggle to balance out the giant monster action with the human drama. The original Gojira and a few others do that really well, but so many don’t.
I really wanted Kill All Monsters to be driven by the characters, so I pulled inspiration from other places. One of the biggest that I usually cite is the original Star Wars trilogy. The relationships and banter between Luke, Leia, and Han was something I wanted for the core group of characters in Kill All Monsters.
I’m also a big fan of post-apocalyptic stories like Planet of the Apes and Kamandi. The quasi-barbarian, underground people that the heroes meet in Paris at the beginning of the book are absolutely inspired by those kinds of movies and comics.
DWQ: What kinds of stories can writers of Kaiju monsters tell besides big monsters knocking down buildings?
MM: There’s no limit as long as the focus stays on the characters. You could have kaiju stories in any genre, really. Horror, obviously, but you could also do comedy or a heist story or a mystery. You’re gonna have to have some big monsters knocking down buildings, but my opinion is that that’s the spice, not the meal. The important thing is that readers care about the characters.
They don’t have to necessarily be the human characters, either. Cartoonist Zander Cannon has a series called Kaijumax, which is a prison drama set on what’s essentially Monster Island from the Godzilla movies. It’s brilliant and unique with intelligent kaiju that form gangs based on various kinds of giant monsters. So cryptids are one group and Toho-style monsters are another, etc. And the prison guards have Ultraman-like uniforms that allow them to grow giant-sized and interact with their prisoners on even footing. Lots of dramatic potential there and that’s what makes a good story.
DWQ: Dark Horse Comics released the entire run in hardcover last summer. What kind of a thrill was that?
MM: Oh, wow, SO big a thrill. I’ve been collecting comics since the ‘80s, but I didn’t get really serious about it until the ‘90s and Dark Horse was a huge part of that. From Hellboy and Next Men to Concrete and Sin City. And so many of those amazing, classic comics started in the pages of Dark Horse Presents. So when Dark Horse offered to not only publish the hardcover, but also to serialize an all-new Kill All Monsters story over three issues of Dark Horse Presents and give us the cover on one of them!? Dream come true doesn’t even describe it. It took me days to learn how to breathe again.
DWQ: Anyone who follows your blog knows you are a huge movie fan. I am sure you’d love to see Kill All Monsters as a film. How would you see such a project fulfilled?
MM: Absolutely! The first collection is a complete story, so it’s all ready for a big screen adaptation. Jason and I would love that. Gareth Edwards directing.
Surprisingly, I haven’t given a lot of thought to casting, but top of my head I’d say Jason Statham for Dressen and… I’m really trying not to say Rinko Kikuchi as Akemi, because she’s already played a mech pilot in Pacific Rim, but hey, this is dream casting and she’s amazing. I’m also crazy about Rila Fukushima from The Wolverine and that’s probably the more interesting choice.
For Spencer, I’m totally influenced by recently seeing Black Panther, but Chadwick Boseman would be perfect. He pretty much already looks exactly the way Jason draws him.
There’s more to this interview. Read the rest in issue #4 of Dark Worlds Quarterly. It’s chock full of other fun and interesting articles and it is absolutely FREE! Simply click on the Current Issue box at the top of this page or click on the box below: