♪ [heroic music] ♪ ♪ ♪ - Hello, and welcome to Comic Culture.

I'm Terence Dollard, a professor in the Department of Mass Communication at the University of North Carolina at Pembroke.

My guests today are J.D.

Amato and Sophie Morse, the creative team behind The Endless Game.

Welcome to Comic Culture.

- Thank you for having us.

We're so excited to be here.

- Definitely.

- J.D., you are the writer.

Sophie, you are the artist behind this book.

So how do you come together to work on a project like this?

Is this something where you have a connection that says, you know, the collaboration would be perfect?

Or is this something where you just knew each other and thought it would be a great way to work together?

- Well, it's actually a funny story.

Sophie, do you want to tell from your point of view?

- Sure.

So I know for me, I had a really great friend from college who had the agent that J.D.

currently has.

And it was that friend who was actually introduced to the project first, unfortunately unable to fully commit at the time.

And this friend recommended me to J.D.

and our agent to hop on board.

You know, I was shown the script, some of the pitch, and it just was super up my alley.

So, you know, I just-- I had to get in there.

- My experience of it was, you know, we were originally-- when you first put a book together as someone who is not in this space, you know, I was being paired with illustrators.

And there was someone that was like, oh, this person would be a fun fit.

And they had a lot going on.

They didn't have the, you know, the bandwidth or time.

And so other names were being thrown out.

And then that artist was like, you should really look at this Sophie Morse person.

And I remember seeing Sophie's byline.

One of her specialties was kids on bikes with flashlights.

And I was like, this is-- this has to be the person.

And so, you know, I think that was mid-pandemic.

And so I think, you know, Sophie got a cold call out of nowhere from us being like, will you please come work on this book?

You are so talented and lovely.

And, you know, it was-- it was fun.

And then once Sophie and I met, it was, you know, I think a match made in heaven because we-- - Totally.

- we shared all the same references.

We shared all the same things we were excited about.

And I think even on our first call talking to each other, we were like, and then we can do this and this and this.

You know, it just kept growing.

And we were like, all right, I think we can do this for a few years and figure this out.

- You say a few years.

I mean, when we think of traditional American comics, they come out monthly.

And we expect the artist to do 22 pages and, you know, pass off their pencils to the inker, to the colorist, to the letterer, and then finally get it into the hands of the reader.

So this is a book that is, what, close to 200 pages long.

I'm imagining the process is a little different because, Sophie, you're doing all the work yourself.

So how long does this process take?

And what's that relationship like?

Because it's one thing to have a story in mind.

It's another thing to see the pages from the artist coming in and saying, oh, I can do this now because this makes it clearer and I can do that because that is a new possibility.

So I'll start with you, Sophie.

So how long does it take you to do 200 or so pages?

- We originally got the project back in 2020.

So it's coming out this year in 2026.

But if we are talking just the basic numbers from when I first did my first thumbnail to submitting my very last colored page, it was a good solid four years or so, mainly because of exactly what you said.

It's just really long form.

Each page is colored in full, almost like a painterly standard.

Traditional publishing, and when I say that, I don't mean DC.

I'm talking like Penguin and Simon & Schuster.

They are known for having these kinds of projects go on for a really long time.

So it's not really something I didn't expect.

I didn't expect it to go beyond, say, three years.

But still, counting it in years is something that I knew would happen in a job like this.

But anyway, yeah, I think a total of four years or so of nearly every day sitting down drawing.

- J.D., when the illustrations start to come in and you start to see your ideas come to life, but maybe in a way that is different or better than you envisioned, how do you adapt what you've written to maybe lean into the strengths of your artist collaborator?

- Well, I think the thing that Sophie and I did that was unique is that we worked together throughout every step of the process.

So I think there's a lot of-- this was a double debut for both Sophie and I. And I think there's a lot of pros and cons that come with that.

And one of the pros is that we sort of got to create our own workflow that worked for us.

And one of the big parts of that was Sophie was really involved in the writing process.

So as I'm scripting, I'm getting notes from Sophie.

And if I get stuck on something, we're talking things out.

And there's characters that come to life that are coming to life because Sophie's like, this is my favorite character.

And I'm like, well, now we have to pull that character through here.

And then likewise, when it got time to illustration, in a way that I think was very magnanimous, is that Sophie was very open to sort of receiving conversation and ideas about how things can look.

And I come from also a film and TV world.

And so there'd be times where there'd be scenes where I was like, OK, here's how I sort of imagined it in my mind's eye.

And instead of being like, get out of here, Sophie was so open to sort of talking stuff out and hearing my point of view.

And so I feel like one of the fun things for me was that every step of the process, it felt like Sophie and I were connected and that we were telling the story together.

I think there's other relationships like this where the sort of writer writes it and then hands it off to the illustrator.

And then you just sort of see what happens.

But for this, we were sort of connected at the hip through every stage of it.

That said, I was not connected at the hip for every single day that Sophie had to be taking out a pencil and pen and crafting all of this.

And that's the thing that I think is so amazing, is it was 250 pages of full color, beautiful illustration.

And there's not a section of the book where you look at it and you're like, well, that's the section where Sophie started phoning in.

Like, every panel is so lovingly cared for.

And I think both of us were so passionate about the story and the characters.

And there's so many characters that we cared about.

And so every piece of it, we just sort of kept on top of each other to make it as good as possible.

- J.D., your background is not comics.

It is comedy and media, television, web series.

So I'm wondering, that's a different workflow.

Yes, it's collaborative because you need to work with the crew to make sure that the cameras and the lights and the audio is recorded perfectly.

And it's got to go through post.

But from what I understand, there is a lot of competition for ideas in the limited amount of screen time.

So how do you sort of turn off that competitive side and turn it into that collaborative side where it's somebody who is 100% supportive of what you're doing and trying to make it as good as it can be without making you look bad because it makes them look better?

- The way that I like to think about TV is TV is a big experiment in collaboration, right?

So one of the most recent shows I did After Midnight, I think we had probably 160 people on staff or something, you know, a number up there of people that-- everyone that touched the episode.

And so the job of a show like that is to work and get all those people to be on the same page, which is a very-- it takes a lot of care and attention.

And it means that individual vision has to go to the side because it has to be the collective vision.

And so I think something like a book is really exciting because it really got to be this one-on-one experience between Sophie and I. And to Simon and Schuster's credit, they really were hands-off in a lot of ways in terms of the big picture creative, and allowed us to sort of tell the story that we wanted to tell.

And so I think the big difference between TV and the comic book is that the collaboration is much smaller.

And so you get to really take the things that are inside your heart and soul and brain and put them on the page and share that with someone else who's doing the same, which in TV, you know, there's not as much room for that because you have so many people that are coming together.

And then you're dealing with also a lot of money and companies.

And there's other things at stake that aren't just about that singular creative expression.

And so it was really a joy and one of my favorite experiences I've had creatively to be able to work with Sophie and just us bounce ideas off each other and create something that we thought was special and cool.

- You are working in television.

How do you go from that to getting, you know, Simon and Schuster to give you a contract for a book like "The Endless Game"?

- Yeah, you know, "The Endless Game" really started as an idea that I wanted to do as a television project.

But if you've read the book, there's a lot of things that would be hard to produce.

And for me, there was a-- you know, in the TV world, there's a lot of focus on existing IP and all that stuff.

And so I said, you know what?

Instead of me trying to convince people to sort of put a spotlight on this project and dedicate all this time and money, thought crossed my head of like, this would be a fun project to be able to execute fully in that same way I was talking about with our creative vision through a book.

And so this was sort of just an experiment to see sort of what would happen if I could take a story to another universe.

And you know, I grew up reading comic books and getting into fantasy and sci-fi and all that.

And so it felt like a dream to be able to take a project and sort of make something like that.

So that's the sort of how I get from TV to publishing is it's a place where you can tell the story that you want to tell, and there's a lot fewer cooks in the kitchen, which is a really cool part of this industry.

- One of the things that they say about comics is that it's easy for someone to produce-- and I put that in quotes-- because you don't have 162 people working on the production crew.

You don't have all those special effects artists.

You don't need the green screens.

You don't need all that technology.

It's just someone sitting down and drawing all of those spaceships and planets and thousands of people in the army.

But there's one person who has to do that.

So Sophie, as you are getting this assignment and you realize you are creating this big cast-- and I could see this as a TV show.

I could see this as a reality show.

I could see it as a narrative.

But how do you sort of figure out what everyone's going to look like, how to present it to the audience, and also not drive yourself nuts because you've got such a large cast in so many locations to work with?

- Yeah, so I definitely did drive myself nuts.

So let's be very clear about that.

But honestly, end of the day, I love drawing.

And I actually love sitting down for hours, spending time crafting these worlds.

So that wasn't really the trial.

I will say it was difficult to kind of keep track of all these characters and to have each location be unique, be different, especially near the middle end of the book.

I kind of felt myself getting too much into a groove.

And I had to kind of back up and be like, I still want to make this unique and distinguished and just still interesting to look at.

But I also used a lot of reference from my own books that I collect, a lot of art books that I collect.

And I would kind of look at how they would construct, say, crowd scenes or huge cast of characters, how they would break it down.

And I would kind of copy those techniques.

- You said you didn't want to get into too much of a groove.

And I know for some artists, getting into the groove means the brain's turned off and the hand and the mind just kind of create the image without really thinking about it.

So how is being in the groove a problem?

- For me personally, by getting kind of too mindless with it, at least in my experience, the work starts to become a little too-- I guess the word I'm looking for is boring and just not very dynamic.

For this book, a goal I had specifically is I wanted to keep it dynamic and keep it interesting and keep it really action-packed from the start to the end, which is why I tried to not get too into this kind of mindless creation or mindless work.

Every single page, every design, every environment, I used a lot of brainpower to make it unique from the last one.

- Yeah, I would say one of the things that impressed me so much is that things like panel composition and point of view and sort of like where the camera of the book is was always changing.

And I think there would be an easier version of illustrating where you could sort of create a template that you repeat.

And I think one of the things that impressed me so much is that every chapter, every section has its own sort of style and language.

And you're always being surprised by panel compositions and where the point of view is and how we're telling the story visually.

And for a story like this, it keeps it alive.

And that's something that Sophie did that's so impressive.

And for 250 pages, it's not easy to keep finding new ways to invent how to sort of depict the story visually.

So it was really, really impressive.

- One of the things the late, great John Buscema, who, of course, was one of Marvel's greatest artists during the Silver Age-- easy for me to say-- one of the things he said was-- a young artist said, do you ever repeat shots?

Because I heard that that's cheating.

And he said, are you kidding?

I repeat them all the time.

It's called getting your work done.

And yet, you would look at his work and never see it as being anything other than a maximum effort.

So Sophie, as somebody who is putting that maximum effort into every single page, is this something where you are using the traditional tools-- the pencil, the pen, the ink-- or are you doing something maybe with Procreate or Clip Studio where it's a hybrid and you're just kind of doing what makes the most sense for you?

- It was definitely a mix of both traditional and digital.

When I was doing the first part, the thumbnails, that was all by hand.

It's just faster that way, much more loose.

I actually printed out this template.

I think it was like-- it would give me 50 pages on one 8 and 1/2 by 11 piece of paper.

And I could just thumbnail that way so fast.

All sketches, though, all my pencils were done digitally.

They were on Procreate.

And then the actual inking, the final touches, the coloring, the panel layout, actually making the panels, that was all on Clip Studio.

I would love to do another book that was totally traditional.

But yeah, there were schedules to keep.

There was work to be done.

So I wasn't able to fully realize that.

So I had to use some digital tools.

But yeah, it was a mix of Procreate, Clip, and just my printer paper.

- And J.D., one of the things that I think is interesting, your career outside of this graphic novel is what I would consider a PG-13 and above audience.

And yet, this seems to be an all ages or a middle grades book.

So what makes you choose this audience for this medium to tell this story?

- A couple of things.

First and foremost is it's something that I wish I had when I was a kid.

So I was a reluctant reader as a kid.

And so getting into books was hard for me.

And when I was growing up, there was the Calvin and Hobbes and the Far Side and the Foxtrot.

And then you got right into prose books.

There wasn't that middle area where you could have these dynamic stories that were really about something that really stretched on for 250 pages that weren't just prose prose.

There were some things, but also I wasn't exposed to those.

They weren't as out there and available.

And so when I was learning about this middle grade universe, I was amazed because I was like, this is the exact thing that would have gotten me into reading and into storytelling a lot quicker.

And this was a story that-- there is a version of this story that is a little more PG-13, that is a little more Lord of the Flies and Yellow Jackets.

But I think what was important for me and Sophie was this is a story that we thought had a lot to offer kids that are in a phase of their life where they're trying to figure out their identity for the first time and trying to understand fitting in and being a part of things.

And I think that age from being 7 to 13 is a place where you really are learning about yourself for the first time.

And so I think this is a story that made the most sense to fit there because the themes of it were for kids that were that age.

- I realize now that we have not talked about-- the basic plot of this is someone who's traveled around a lot moving into a new neighborhood.

And he discovers that the town that he's moved into has a summer game, which is basically capture the flag.

But it has a lot more.

So what is this story really about?

- So like you said, it's about a game of capture the flag that's been going on in this one town for like 80 years.

It's been passed down from generation to generation.

And in the summer, the town is divided down the middle and every kid, this game is their life.

And all the adults in the town, this is their focus, is on this game even though they're not allowed to play, now that they're adults.

And while the story is about capture the flag and sort of some intrigue going on in this world, what it's really about is identity and finding a way to be a part of something larger than yourself.

And that's something that I think every kid goes through, especially at that age, is you start understanding the things that you're good at or not good at or the things that you want to do or the things that you don't want to do.

And that can be a really complicated emotional process.

And so one of the things that was important for Sophie and I is that this was a story that didn't have a singular main character who was the hero.

This is a book where there's not one character that saves the day.

Every character plays a piece of the puzzle.

And every character finds a place within this game and in this universe where they can do the things that they love and that make them happy.

And that's just as important as everyone else's things.

And on top of that, outside of the game, every kid is dealing with a life.

And they have a depth to the things they're dealing with.

And so again, this is a book where we're seeing the sort of at-home life of a lot of different characters and seeing how those are all different now.

Everyone's dealing with different things and the same things at the same time.

So I really think that's what the book's about, on top of the sort of fun adventure and intrigue of the capture the flag game.

- What I think is equally interesting is that the adults in this story are part of the story.

And you can see that they are struggling with identity in the same way that the kids are.

So there is that parallel.

And I think of Fred's mother who is trying to find a job.

And will her husband be able to get the transfer and raise a kid and all this other stuff that's going on?

And then we see Raquel's father who is trying to get her into the math competition.

So there's a lot of different parallels going on there that are so satisfying as a reader.

And also, I guess for the intended audience, would give them a little perspective that maybe mom and dad are going through some similar struggles.

I want to pivot back to you, Sophie, because there's a lot of action in this book.

But there are a lot of quiet moments.

And those sometimes are the toughest to illustrate because you've got to capture an emotion.

So I'm thinking back to when Fred is afraid that he's going to be moving again, even though he's finally found his way in town.

So how do you sort of find the right approach for those quiet moments to bring the emotions out in a way that isn't that typical, traditional, we expect it?

- I definitely had a lot of reference that I looked at.

Not only movies and shows and how they would kind of set up their shots when it comes to quiet moments, but I was really looking at other graphic novels and other comics in my collection.

And how did they approach these quiet moments?

And how did they solve that problem?

And I would kind of take pointers from that.

I think another thing that's very unique with comics is paneling and how that translates to timing.

And I was able to kind of utilize large panels, repeated panels to extend time and extend the reader's stay on a page to fully immerse themselves in these quiet moments.

- Your art style is very open.

It is something that when we're kids, we like to draw our favorite books.

This is something that a kid could aspire to.

As you are looking at the reference, are you looking at the same sort of books that they'd be reading, that this audience would be reading?

Or is it just like, I remember this comic from 1987.

Mazzucchelli really nailed Daredevil there.

- First off, I love his Daredevil run.

And then, yes, I'm looking mainly at graphic novels that are middle grade, more than anything.

Because I'm not its intended audience, but I still love those books.

They've always spoke to me, even as an adult.

So I have a pretty huge collection.

And yeah, I'm using that mainly as reference, because their work is intended for middle grade.

And since this work is too, I kind of see how they approach and what makes their work look so successful.

At the same time, though, I love to look at older comics and see what they did back in the day and what was strong about that and how I can bring it into this middle grade space.

- I see we have probably a little less than five minutes left in our conversation.

The one thing about the rise of the middle grades graphic novel is that we're seeing that educators are leaning into this.

Scholastic, Simon & Schuster, Penguin, they're all putting out these great graphic novels for all age readers and for middle grade readers.

As somebody who is working in this field, how do you see this transition?

And what sort of opportunities does it present?

- I know for me, it's been really awesome as a working illustrator, because it's just more job opportunities.

It also is really satisfying to see illustration be brought into a new respected space.

I feel like with children's illustration, some people kind of trap it within younger children's books.

So it's nice to see that with people or illustrators working in children's illustration, it doesn't have to necessarily be for younger audiences.

It can be for middle grade and high school level too.

- Yeah, and I think I have a niece and nephew who are right in this age group.

And I'm seeing it in them too, is that I think there used to be a bifurcation between that sort of YA space for older kids and for children's literature, as Sophie was saying.

And I think now what we're able to do is we're able to bring stories with a lot of depth and longer narratives and narratives that you can really chew on to younger kids, which I think is actually going to create a lot of amazing opportunity for narrative growth and narrative comprehension and story comprehension.

Because again, there's not that barrier where you're either reading books for kids that are very young kid focused or things that feel more grown up or things that feel more intimidating.

It's a place to really dig into story but not have it feel above your depth, which I think is going to be really important to this generation that's getting this type of middle grade book.

- And when you consider too that it's tough to get someone to read, I think there's a statistic that shows that most adults don't read once they get out of college or high school.

They don't pick up a book.

So something like this is a great way for us to keep reading.

I mean, I'm thinking of Tessa Hull's and the Fantastic Feeding Ghosts, which won the Pulitzer Prize, and it's a graphic memoir.

I mean, it's mind boggling that we've seen this turnaround and this acceptance culturally of the graphic novel format.

Now I see we have just a couple of minutes left in our conversation.

If the folks watching at home wanted to find you on the web, where can they do that?

- I can go.

I am @sopharium, S-O-P-H-A-R-I-U-M, on Instagram.

And I'm j.d.amato on Instagram.

And if you use your favorite search, you can probably find us in other places too.

And keep your eyes and ears out.

We're doing some launch events, one in New York on the 26th and one in Chicago on the 28th.

And I think we're going to be around bookstores and schools around the country.

So keep your eyes and ears open.

We're excited for people to read the book.

- Yeah.

- Well, J.D., Sophie, thank you so much for taking time out of your schedule to talk with me today.

It's been a fun half hour.

- Thanks so much.

- It's been so lovely.

Thank you for having us.

- Thank you.

- And I'd like to thank everyone at home for watching Comic Culture.

We will see you again soon.

[heroic music] ♪ ♪ - Comic Culture is a production of the Department of Mass Communication at the University of North Carolina at Pembroke, giving broadcasting majors professional experience and on-screen credit before they graduate.

♪