If you want to know what makes a great comic work, don't just look at the basic plot, the important monologues, the "writing", as it were. Look at the desks and bookcases and bedside tables of Moore's world. That's the real writing. And then flip through a copy of, say, "Youngblood" and look at how barren everything is. These comics are supposedly set in a grimdark world where heroes are anti-heroes, but quite often, they simply just tell you that and then show you shots of characters monologuing about how complex they are in empty, character-less rooms or just straight up blank voids. [...] These kinds of creators read Watchmen, read The Dark Knight Returns, read The Killing Joke -- works that presented characters as flawed but real and used even desks as characterization and worldbuilding. Works that had, to put it in one word: ideas. But these creators didn't see that stuff when they read those comics. They saw the darkness, the edginess, the grittiness on the surface and tried desperately to recreate that. The appearance of depth mattered more than the real stuff.

To think that the internet allowing fans to feel that they are “not alone as readers” plays to the “clubhouse” mentality that is a large part of what’s wrong with comics today. When you have isolated fans, reading the books on their own and not knowing (or much caring) if anybody else is, then the prime reason for reading is enjoyment—it’s all about the books themselves. It’s not about “getting together” with fellow fans to dissect and deconstruct...

Great comedy is great comedy only if it has an element of truth in it.

It's not movies and it's not "fine art." The beauty of a comic is that it's clear, direct communication. My work is getting simpler and more cartoony because I'm much more interested in communication now than in any illustrative value.

Let's face it; regular monthly superhero comic books have taken on the look and smell of old men's pants. It's hardly a surprise comics lost the teenage audience or that the adult audience is now bored and irritated by the endless recycling of images they've already seen and words they've already read. (2003)

The best kind of comedy to me is when you make people laugh at things they’ve never laughed at, and also take a light into the darkened corners of people’s minds, exposing them to the light.

One of the problems I see with these comics on television, particularly cable television, is, since you can say anything in terms of sex and scatological references and so on, therefore, you should do it. So they all limit themselves to these subjects and this vocabulary. My objection is that it is a lack of articulateness … Irreverence is easy, but what is hard is wit. Wit is what these comedians lack.

When someone asks me, 'Why do you write comics?' I tell them, for the same reason I write editorials, essays, and articles; the same reason I give speeches; the same reason I appear on TV programs, and give interviews. Same message; different forum. There is no universal forum, so the more outreach we can do, the better the chance of forming coalitions.

The 'medium' is unaware of its attractiveness, that's all. Everyone loves comics. I've proven this to my own satisfaction by handing them out to acountants, insurance brokers, hairdressers, mothers of children, black belts, pop stars, taxi drivers, painters, lesbians, doctors etc. etc. The X-Files, Buffy, the Matrix, X-Men - mainstream culture is not what it once was when science fiction and comics fans huddled in cellars like Gnostic Christians dodging the Romans. We should come up into the light soon before we suffocate.

I think the key to a great romcom is to not fight against the genre,” she explains. “The trend more recently has been to apologise, or be snarky, so it’s an anti-romcom.” Out comes that wide smile. “Just lean in and embrace the fact it’s a love story and it’s funny and it’s light. It can still be uber-smart and deal with zeitgeist issues.

RINGGENBERG: Do you think there are any limits about what should be published in a comics format?

My favorite comedy is comedy where nothing is achieved and there is no point.

Dark comedies are my favorite, because I love that feeling – being happy and scared at the same time. It's my favorite way to feel – when I'm on the edge of my seat but I'm happy, that sense of conflicting emotions. And there's a lot of that in the show, I think.

Now they’re called ‘graphic novels’, which sounds sophisticated and you can charge a lot more for them. What appealed to me most about comics is no more, and these innocent and inventive and imaginative superhero characters from the ’40s, ‘50s, ‘60s are being recycled to a modern audience as if they were adult fare.