Ambush Interview of a Comic-Book Artist
[This interview with former Archie illustrator and longtime independent comic producer, Sebastian “Seb” Ferris, is excerpted from the February 2002 issue of The Comics Journal.]
Mr. Ferris, your personal website bills you as one of the world’s most respected and renowned comic-book creators. Tell our readers about some of your favorite superhero characters that you’ve created.
Well, the first one I created was Hearing Man. He was a guy who could hear very, very well.
Yes, I actually was reading through some old issues of Hearing Man last night to prepare for this interview today. I was intrigued by this character. What other powers did he have?
Well, that was it. But he could really hear very, very well. Extremely keen sense of hearing. He could hear just astoundingly well when he would blindfold himself.
Yes, I was going to ask about that. So he could only use his hearing powers when he was blindfolded?
Well, yes. Take one sense away and another is heightened. That’s science. And his other weakness, which was related to his power, was that loud noises could him a lot of pain. That was sort of his Achilles Heel, ear-wise. Yin and yang.
… He became part of a group of superheroes, didn’t he?
Yes, The Sensations. There were three others. There was Eye Guy, who could see very, very well. Not necessarily long distances or anything, but just with amazing clarity. A running joke was that other characters would say, “Eye Guy, you could have been a pilot!”
…
But bright lights were incapacitating to him, so he could pretty much only operate at night.
I’ll come back to that. Hearing Man had a catchphrase too, what was that?
Oh yes. He would hear something, like a bad guy’s footsteps in the distance, and he would say, “Did you hear that?” to someone nearby, and they’d say, “No,” and he’d say, “Exactly!”
Clever.
Thanks.
Go on.
There was The Tongue. He had an amazing sense of taste, so he would eat things and lick things a lot, which sometimes came in handy. Then there was Touchy McGee, who had a very highly developed sense of touch. He could read fingerprints on a glass, for instance, by just feeling the glass. Of course, then he’d get his fingerprints all over it, so he tried to avoid doing that. Oh! He could also read things by feeling the ink. He didn’t need braille. Regular ink was braille to him.
Was he blind?
No.
Could he read?
Yes, of course.
So, why… never mind. Let me go back for a minute. You had Hearing Man, who was just good at hearing, basically, and the you pretty much just extended that to the other senses. One character for each?
That’s right. That was part of my creative process.
What about smell?
Well, I did create a character with a good sense of smell, Dr. Schnozberg, but the editors decided not to go forward with it for “political” reasons.
Wasn’t that character considered anti-Semitic?
Some said so. I don’t agree, and I don’t want to talk about it, frankly. Now, if you want to talk about my characters fine, but I’m not here to discuss politics. Anyway, smell isn’t a very big deal in fighting crime anyway, so I just had The Sensations have a bloodhound that they brought along with them on their adventures.
Yes, and what was the dog’s name?
Smelly. Not like he was smelly, but that he smelled things quite well.
Right. Smelly. How big of a deal is taste in fighting crime? Just curious.
If you’re implying that The Tongue did not play a big role in the series, you’re right. But every character can’t be a major character.
Of course. I noticed Hearing Man was originally the leader of The Sensations, but he later faded away from the series. Why?
Creative differences with my editors. That’s all I’m going to say.
Well, fans said Hearing Man had become a one-trick pony. They believed every issue would essentially involve him eavesdropping from really far away on bad guys planning to attack The Sensations, because he could hear so well. Then the villains got wise to this and did all their planning in loud nightclubs where the noise would reduce Hearing Man to tears. Many critics said that this technique felt both contrived and predictable. Also, because Hearing Man had to blindfold himself to hear well, fans observed that if any bad guys came across him overhearing stuff, they could have just shot him or even punched him in the stomach — Hearing Man wasn’t particularly strong — but they would never do that. They would just keep whispering in nightclubs, issue after issue. The last straw with some critics was when Hearing Man was replaced for a while by his son, Hearing Boy, who was exactly like Hearing Man, but even weaker.
Who said that?
Comic books fans, critics.
Who, Steve Ditko? No? Then save it. Those people are not true fans of The Sensations. I serve them, The SenseNation.
Do people really —
When you are a prolific, creative person — like me — people will always try to bring you down. What superhero characters have those “critics” created? Not Hearing Man. Not Immuno, the superhero who never gets sick. Not The Creature of Uncanny Strength. Not Scruples: The Villain With Few to No Scruples. You know how I know they didn’t create those characters? Because I did. So what do they know?
That’s fine, Mr. Ferris. Let me change topics then.
Good.
The Sensations were unique in the superhero pantheon in that they often lost. Can you explain that?
Yes, that was something I didn’t foresee when I created the characters, but it did become a problem. But, why are you focusing on… If I had known this was going to be some kind of hatchet job —
It seems like you might have foreseen the problem, though, given the glaringly obvious nature of The Sensations’ weaknesses. In fact, their respective weaknesses were all really just consequences of their very superpowers. For instance, Touchy McGee had a highly developed sense of touch, but his weakness is that same sensitivity. There’s a particular issue where Touchy McGee loses a fight to your villain, Baby Man — who is really nothing more than a baby, but we can discuss that later —; one weak tap from Baby Man, and Touchy McGee was reduced to tears, allowing Baby Man and his henchbabies to kidnap The Sensations’ resident damsel-in-distress, She Girl. Did you not foresee a problem in creating a superhero whose weakness was heightened sensitivity to pain?
No, that’s all part of it. Their weaknesses complemented one another. See, in a typical scene, you would have Hearing Man, blindfolded and listening intently for clues. But, Eye Guy, would be on the lookout, except if the villains were flashing strobe lights, which they did a lot later in the series once the archvillain, Mind Reader, read Eye Guy’s mind and discovered that bright lights hurt Eye Guy very badly, then Eye Guy would have to wear a blindfold to protect himself.
Right, so then Hearing Man and Eye Guy were both blindfolded, helpless and surrounded by bad guys with airhorns and strobe lights. That was precisely the problem as a lot of people saw it.
Yes, but Hearing Man could still hear really well, remember, and they had the dog to help out. And The Tongue was a decent fighter. Good luck trying to poison him, too. He could always taste the poison.
Yes, but wasn’t it a little late at that point?
Okay, Mr. Comic Genius, what do you want me to say? You want to recreate The Tongue’s backstory? Here’s a pencil. Can we move on?
Sure. Later on, you enclosed Touchy McGee in a giant transparent-steel ball, like a hamster ball, to protect him from the constant physical assualts.
Yes, of course, that way the bad guys couldn’t hit him. I mean, that’s pretty obvious. Problem, solution.
It is, but he could then only touch the inside of the ball.
Well, that’s why we later put him in a big, padded suit.
Yes, but didn’t that drastically hamper his mobility?
Yeah, so he couldn’t fucking move. So what?! He wasn’t Moving Man — Moving Man had his own comic — he was Touchy McGee. So who cares if he can’t fight or move or breathe that well? What is this anyway, the The Sensations Versus the Spanish Inquisition?! (No. 204, April 1991 — ed.) Touchy McGee had his flaws, okay. I understand that. Mistakes were made. We move on.
Except for Touchy.
What?
Nothing. Some critics have said that The Sensations “jumped the shark” when you added Seeing-Eye Dog, yet another canine hero, to assist the often-blindfolded and defenseless Eye Guy. They say Seeing-Eye Dog, like Smelly, wasn’t just a dog with no real superpowers, though that was true, but that he was also nothing more than a plot crutch to cover for the fact that you had incredibly created a superhero who had to wear a blindfold that robbed him of the use of his extraordinary sight, his sole superpower.
I don’t want to talk about Seeing-Eye Dog.
Fair enough. One critic has said that The Sensations were the worst group of superheroes in comic book history. What do you say to him?
What critic?
Um, that was me, actually.
That’s it, this interview is over!
But Mr. Ferris, what about your aquatic anti-hero, Nonopus? You described him in a recent interview as, “An octopus with nine tentacles. Bam. That’s it right there.” Do you really think one extra arm renders an octopus, which already has eight arms, a superhero? …Sir?
