If there is one thing that can be said about Jon Chad’s “Bad Mask” without any doubt: It’s ambitious.
That becomes immediately apparent once you hold the big box from publisher Boom! in your hands. Filled with a newspaper, a magazine, a comic book, various files and other assorted goodies, while also promising to take its tale to the web, the sheer amount of things writer/artist/creator Jon Chad came up with during years of development is almost overwhelming.

Of course, we could not resist the urge to dive deep into this daring transmedia project. We wanted to know how Jon Chad makes it all work together and how well its story holds up in comparison to the care and diligence and hard work that had went into it.

CW: Cartoon violence

We always have to consider which perspective is being taken, because the perspective is always changing.

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Introduction

0:55 What is “Bad Mask”?

6:45 The story and lore of “Bad Mask”

13:25 How the various components of “Bad Mask” work together

The internal workings of the “Bad Mask”

21:20 Worldbuilding and characters in “Bad Mask”

28:10 The morals and the tone of the story

32:30 Questions of genre, influences and trope

35:40 Who is this story for?

Similar works in comics and transmedia

41:10 Chris Ware’s “Building stories”, “McSweeney’s Issue 36” by TC Boyle

44:20 “Cathy’s book” and “Dark Art”

47:00 Recommendations

Doro’s recommendation: “Ship of Theseus” by JJ. Abrams and Doug Dorst

Philipp’s recommendation: Is the wrong one. While a fine superhero comic book by itself, he did not mean “The Authority”, but its prequel “Stormwatch” (also written by Warren Ellis) which included by storyline he mentions in the podcast.

Further Reading

 

Our title song is “Witchcraft” from “Go fly a kite” (General Electric)