First is Danielle Corsetto, of the webcomic Girls with Slingshots (www.gwscomic.com), a tale of a two girls, Jamie and Hazel, a bar they frequent, and a hallucinated talking cactus. Thanks, Danielle, and long may you continue!
1) So, you've probably been asked this several times, but--is there anything specific that led to Girls with Slingshots' creation? How long had the characters been floating around in your head?
- Well, I've always liked girls with red hair [laughs]. And Jamie...Jamie's kind of like the imaginary friend I never had. She's the sort of person I would want to hang out with if I could completely invent a best friend. I also just wanted to sort of...do something about healthy relationships, which is a large part of what Girls with Slingshots is about.
2) On a related note, what are some other comics that have inspired you, both in print and on the web?
- Oh, gosh, what hasn't? But let's see...I love comic strips, and with those, some big favorites are Zits, For Better or For Worse, and Liberty Meadows. For Better or For Worse especially, that was the first time I'd seen a comic with a female creator, at least one that involved something more than the line, "AACK!" I like a lot of webcomics too, I'm a fan of PVP and Questionable Content.
3) I know it isn't fair to ask you to play favorites, but...who's your favorite GWS character, and why?
- Definitely Hazel. I relate to her so much...which is damn unfortunate. [laughs again]4) Are there any other comics projects in the works for you? If you already have more I'm unaware of, I apologize!
- I've done various small things outside of it, including some illustration for books. I'm also working on a graphic novel, actually...I can't say much about it now but it should be ready by around 2013, and I have a potential new online project I'm planning out. I've also recently handed a lot of the back end of the website management to a company, which will free up some more time for me to work on Girls with Slingshots.
5) In the world of print comics, it seems like female creators are still a big rarity, as well as female characters that are more than just token or relegated to "cheesecake" roles. But webcomics seem to have a lot fewer gender-politics issues--the walls are more broken down on that. Any ideas on why the web enjoys a much more equal balance of strong female characters and creators? And do you think this will eventually have a sronger impact on the world of print comics?
- Wow. Let me think about that for a second...I think part of the issue for a lot of the big publishers, like Marvel, is that when there started being more demand for female readers, they just sort of hired women for the sake of hiring women, without really stopping to think about it much, and we got a lot of cute romance comics, like Mary Jane Loves Spider-Man, but nothing really beyond that--not that there's nothing wrong with cute romance comics, I mean, I kind of write a cute romance comic too. But there was definitely not a lot behind it. On the web, the audience has more ability to pick for themselves, more variety to go off of. They'll read what they want, and it seems to show that that variety is what they really want.
6) Any bits of wisdom you've learned over the course of making GWS that you'd like to pass on for others interested in starting up a webcomic?
- Ohhhh yes. Number one, promise people nice things in exchange for donations! I ran into a lot of trouble with that early on. I kept wondering over whether I should give someone something if they donated a few cents versus someone who donated a few dollars, and I think I made a lot of people mad because I got so delayed on the whole thing. Number two, make sure your website navigation is good. The site framing your comic is just as important as the comic itself, and if you can't get pretty much anywhere on the site in just a couple clicks, people are going to leave and not read your stuff. Third, don't burn any bridges. Webcomics in particular are kind of relient on social networking, with readers and with other creators.
7) Lastly, just for fun...if Hazel and Jamie became a dynamic superhero tag-team, what would their powers be?
- Ha! Well, Jamie's would probably have something to do with diverting attention to her boobs. Hazel...I think she would carry around a magic beer bottle to smack people with. It doesn't sound very inventive to me but it just works so well. Oooh! Ooh! Jamie could carry around a small trampoline!
Thank you so much for all your time!
Girls with Slingshots updates once a day, Monday through Friday, at www.gwscomic.com.Holden Out.
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