Die Kitty Die! Taking a look at my new favorite Comic!
I had the chance to speak with Fernando Ruiz about his latest comic book Die Kitty Die! The new comic hit about a young witch created along side fellow Archie artist Dan Parent. We chat about the story behind the issue, the success of their Kickstarter and what we can expect for Con Season. Catch Ruiz and Parent at this weekend’s Toronto ComiCon March 18-19-20th.
Kassandra: So tell us, What is Die Kitty Die all about?
Fernando Ruiz: Die Kitty Die is about a beautiful young witch who has been living as the star of her own popular comic book series. When the sales of her comic book start to dip, her greedy, ruthless publishers decide to do what a lot of comic book publishes resort to nowadays… They decide to kill off their main character. The difference is Kitty’s publishers decide to kill Kitty in real life! Killing a witch though proves to be a lot more difficult than anyone guessed!
K: What was your initial inspiration in creating Die Kitty Die?
FR:Dan Parent and I were always fans of old TV shows like Bewitched and I Dream Of Jeannie. I remember Dan and I were on a plane to a convention in Dallas and we were talking about possibly working together on our own independent comic book away from Archie. We kicked around a few ideas on that trip and we kept coming back to those old shows. One of us came up with the title and we found it pretty catchy like the old Russ Meyer film title “Kill Pussycat.” The premise just seemed to grow naturally from there!
K: Your Kickstarter funding just blew through the roof in a matter of days! Was this something you both were expecting?
FR: We went in hoping we didn’t make fools out of ourselves by not being able to reach our minimum goal. We were knocked out when we reached our goal in eight days and our final total just blew us away. Many thanks have to go out to our friend, Gisele Lagace, creator of Pixie Trix Comix and our Kickstarter guru. Gisele held our hand every step of the way and really helped us out a lot. We would have made a lot of mistakes without her help and we definitely would not have reached the total that we did without her.
K: Did you find most of your backers were your fans who have been following for years or were there a lot of new faces from using Kickstarter?
FR:We got a lot of pledges from people who just peruse Kickstarter looking for projects to support. I forget exactly the percentage but that was definitely a significant number. We were very flattered to also get a lot of support from fans who have followed our work for years. A lot of them came through not just with pledges but also by hustling for us and helping to spread the word. We’re very, very grateful to them. We could not have done it without them.
K: Die Kitty Die is being released under your new company Astro Comix, Could you tell us a bit about it?
FR: We like to think ahead so we decided to create our own label to release Die Kitty Die. Hopefully we could launch other projects under the Astrocomix brand. Dan would love to resurrect his series The Carneys that he first released through Archie many years ago. The Carneys was a comedy about a family of circus freaks. A couple of years ago, I introduced my own original character, The Iron Ghost in my own independently released anthology, Epics. I’d love to do more with that character.
K: Will Die Kitty Die have its own universe? Who are some other characters we can expect to see within the comic book?
FR: Kitty is definitely part of her own universe and we’ll get to see a lot of that universe in Die Kitty Die. Kitty isn’t the only character to make her living as the star of her own comic book. We’ll get to see a few of Kitty’s fellow comic book characters like Dippy the Dead Kid, Lil Satan, Maxi Millions, and more!
K: Would you ever like to see a Archie Meets Kitty Crossover? Or even a Sabrina?
FR: Nah! One of the misconceptions a lot of people have about this book is that it’s an Archie title. Its understandable since Dan and I have been associated with Archie for so long. We’ve been trying very hard to establish Kitty and Astrocomix as an independent venture separate from Archie. I think once people read Kitty, they’ll see she definitely is VERY different from Archie!
K: I’m looking forward to checking out your booth for Con Season, is there anything special your fans can expect to see this year? Lots of DKD merchandise?
FR: Dan and I are calling this Con Season the Die Kitty Die World Tour. By July, we’ll have the deluxe Die Kitty Die hardcover which we’ll be introducing at San Diego and Montreal. People can pre-order the hardcover now at the Astrocomix web site.We’ll also have a lot more of the swag we’ll be giving to our supporters as rewards for their generous support. I hope people come out to see us!
Thanks for taking the time to talk to us Fernando.Be sure to see Fernando and Dan this weekend at Toronto Comicon!
