Comic Book Men begins its 6th season this Sunday and continues its entertaining celebration of comic books, collectables, and pop culture. To get the inside scoop on what to expect at the Stash this season, Comix Asylum’s Kwame Mason chatted with Comic Book Men’s very own Bryan Johnson.
KWAME: Comic Book Men’s sixth season premieres this Sunday, October 23 on AMC. First of all, can you believe it’s already been six years that you’ve been on the air and what are some of the highlights of the show during that time?
BRYAN: Kevin always says that he’s amazed that we got past season one. It’s funny because every year up until the fifth season we heard the same thing. In the first season they said if you get a second season then that’s it because the second season is the hardest to get. Then once we got the second season they were like third season man, once you get the third season you’ve got it made. Eventually we were like if it happens it happens and then you hope for the best. I never dreamed that it would be on for six seasons. I think it was the retooling in the beginning that sort of saved us — taking it from an hour down to a half hour, concentrating on us messing a round a little bit more rather than the very involved stories and lets face it by following The Walking Dead, we could be in a much worse position.
KWAME: Yes you’re in a good spot and plus the genre is taking center stage right now. You guys came along at the perfect time.
BRYAN: Yes exactly. Over the course of the six years a lot of the really good super hero movies came out. That really stirred people’s interest in the medium which in turn made us a little bit more viable. It seems that we haven’t become any more or less popular. Our ratings seem to be the exact same almost every episode, every season. We’ve got that 12:40 am audience locked down (laughs).
KWAME: Yeah they aren’t going anywhere. You’ve also been able to have some incredible celebrity guests on Comic Book Men including Stan Lee, William Shatner and Lou Ferigno. Who can viewers look forward to seeing on the show this season?
BRYAN: This season we have some people that we’ve wanted for years and it never worked out. Lindsay Wagner, the Bionic Woman is on the show, we have Elvira this year…
KWAME: Ah, come on!
BRYAN: Elvira is great! We had heard rumblings that she was difficult so we were wondering how it would all turn out. Now I’m not saying this because I’m honest about these kinds of things but she was the sweetest woman, so fun and nice and quick and was right there with you with the joking around and stuff.
KWAME: Is she still beautiful? I mean as a kid it was like, come on now!
BRYAN: It really is hard to tell the difference between Elvira now and Elvira from 20 years ago. She came in and I was like Holy S#!*, that’s amazing! Day by day I age and look worse and for this lady 20 years had no effect on her.
KWAME: What’s the craziest, most interesting collectible that’s ever been brought into the Stash?
BRYAN: This year some guy brought in Mechagodzilla that they made a very limited run of. If you’re a Mechagodzilla fan this is the piece for you. It’s unbelievable how accurate it is to the screen, not only in terms of looks but also in terms of action. The claws lightning up, the toe torpedoes lighting up, that was a really cool thing. Mostly, I don’t care about the stuff that comes in. I like the people. The people who come to me are what get my attention. Some guy brought in a Beatles game and the game itself I was not that excited about but the guy was such a character. That’s what makes the show so fun for me. It’s the people who are right there and present and can go back and forth, interact and hold their own.
KWAME: You’re not necessarily a comic book guy but fans got to see you geek out last season when you were at the Jaws Museum. What is it about that film that strikes a chord with you?
BRYAN: It was actually the first movie that I saw theatrically twice. First my mom brought me to see it and we’re talking, what was it 1975, so I was eight years old. It’s the kind of thing that nowadays kids would get taken away from their parents for showing them (laughs). As an adult you watch it and think how does this hold a kid’s attention because you don’t see the shark all that much. But it was such a time where you were going to see movies that weren’t Disney stuff or kids stuff. You were like eight, nine, ten and you were going to see movies that were maybe a little more mature and you’re like oh my God there’s this whole world of monster movies out there that are gory and sort of brutal compared to the stuff you’d seen on TV. Jaws, to me, I was consumed with it. I can’t draw for s%#! and I drew the poster over and over and over again because once the movie was out of theaters that was it. There were no VHS or DVD so you couldn’t re-watch it. You had to reimagine it in your mind.
KWAME: You know what’s interesting to me about that movie is that when I was a kid there was a 45 record that had the soundtrack on it. I’d be at my parents’ basement party and they’d play it and I’d literally have to leave because it scared me so much. I’d beg my dad to stop playing that song but they’d keep playing it over and over and over again. It was such a heavy film and that’s probably the first time that I recognized how music can influence how you feel in a film.
BRYAN: Yeah, I think that you’re totally right and it has to be in the top ten most recognizable film scores. You just have to hear “dun-dun” and you can name that tune in the first two notes.
KWAME: So, the guys on Comic Book Men always look like you’re having fun. It’s almost as though you have a dream job sitting around talking pop culture, meeting celebrities and checking out the cool collectibles that roll into the Stash. Can you speak on how much fun it is to work with the guys on the show?
BRYAN: It is sort of cliché to say that it’s a dream job but really I couldn’t design a job that’s more suited to my personal tastes. I get to come in, hang out, make fun of my friends, have them make fun of me and have conversations and talk about things that you like to talk about. I live in Jersey and it’s getting more and more crowded with commuters. Sometimes when I bring my kid to school I’m like my God I can’t imagine doing this every day. It’s not only sitting in traffic, but it’s sitting in traffic going to a job I know I don’t want to do. I literally have zero complaints about it. Everyone at AMC is super nice, everybody on the crew is super cool and the job itself is like go in, talk, meet cool people, go home and then go do it again the next day. I wish I could do it year round (laughs)!
KWAME: (laughs) I can imagine on the off days you’re just itching to get back there and to start working.
BRYAN: When the season ends there is a certain melancholy that comes with it. I’m a very disorganized, unstructured person and it gives me focus and structure and I do something every day. I go home at the end of the day and I don’t feel like it was a wasted day. I feel like we got some good stuff, good jokes and good material with whoever came in. I couldn’t ask for anything more employment wise.
KWAME: Your film, Vulgar was here in Toronto for TIFF back in 2000. There was some talk about a sequel being made. Is that still in the works?
BRYAN: It is. I’m writing it, not as we speak, but I started a week or two ago.
KWAME: Can we have a crazy character named Kwame in there? You can kill him in the first five minutes if you want to.
BRYAN: I’ll tell you what, I wouldn’t rule it out (laughs). It’s going to be much like the first one in terms of not knowing what to expect but just way bigger and wilder. You can do so much more now with less money. When we first put it out I never thought a distributor would pick it up. Lionsgate picked it up and I thought if this movie ends up in the cult section at Amoeba, to me that’s success. When I went to L.A. one time I went to Amoeba and checked under the V’s, there it was and I was like alright! Since we’ve been doing the podcast Tell ‘Em Steve-Dave! with Walt and Brian Quinn from Impractical Jokers there’s always new people discovering it now. So it still has a life and to be making a sequel twenty years later with almost all of the same people and being able to do it on a relatively modest budget, why wouldn’t I do it.
KWAME: Now you and Kevin go way back and you’ve been in some of his films. Did you want to be a filmmaker/actor before meeting Kevin or was it something he pushed you into?
BRYAN: The thing with the town that we come from is that it’s a very small working class town. People were either going to be contractors or go to college, and move out of town and you’d never see them again because they were going to do something meaningful. Kevin just happened to be the person who said, well I’m going to try to do this, and at the time before he went to film school Walt and I were like okay, sure because you’re not brought up to imagine that for yourself. So when he did it and he made Clerks and it kept going, it was like wow! He did do it. He’s the kind of guy that is like don’t settle. It’s not just like hey I’ll bring you along for the ride as though you’re part of the entourage, don’t settle and do stuff. Go forward because you have something to say whether it be through podcasting or the TV show. So many opportunities have sprung up because of his encouragement. He is the most supportive and encouraging friend that you can imagine. The guy is beyond generous.
KWAME: You’re an actor, writer, comic book creator, director and podcaster. Which one of your many talents brings you the most satisfaction?
BRYAN: Hands down the podcast. The TV show is a very close second. I didn’t go to college. Kevin didn’t go to college. Walt didn’t go to college. My college back in the day was when Kevin and I worked at Quick Stop and RST, we sat around talking all day. Making stuff up, creating scenarios, bulls#!ing back and forth was preparation for what we would do eventually. With the TV show I get to do that but within certain restrictions. I can’t just say anything, especially these days because people get offended really easily. With the podcast you can say anything you want. You have one-hundred percent total creative freedom to do what ever you want. We don’t go out of our way to be offensive, but if we do there isn’t someone there to overthink it or strike it down. We’ve been doing it for six plus years so we can’t be too awful.
Comic Book Men begins its 6th season this Sunday, October 23 on AMC.
