Interview: Hunting the Beast with Belle - Beast Hunter Writer - Dave Franchini

Zenescope are known for taking popular fairy tales and giving them a bit of a tweak.Â Therefore that it makesÂ more than a little senseÂ that long-term Zenescope scribe Dave Franchini would turn his hand to Beauty; although this time rather than being in love with the Beast, she loves to hunt and kill said beast.

With the trade of the Belle Beast due to hit the stores on Jan 16th, we caught up with series writer Dave Franchini:

Â Comic Crusaders: How did you break into comics?

Dave Franchini: I actually went to college for computer science and needed an internship to graduate. I saw Zenescope was in need of an intern. I applied, got the internship, eventually got hired for in-house sales and worked my way up over 9 years to executive editor and writer for them. It took a while to get where I wanted, but was definitely worth it in the end.

CC: What made Zenescope an attractiveÂ proposition?

DF: I was just becoming a fan of the books and the shared Grimm Universe and just happened to be in the right place at the right time. I love comic books and really couldn“t pass up an opportunity to work with them every day. Plus I always loved the fact that Zenescope was taking something we all knew or thought we knew and were reinventing it with a new twist. It kind of opened my eyes that there always so many ways to tell a story.

CC: I know when the book first came out it was billed as “Batman meets Beauty and the Beast”“.Â Now you have had chance to see the whole story does that ring true or are there other stronger influences, such as Buffy?

DF: This definitely has its elements of Batman at least when we touch on her mentor, and gadgets, base of operations, but I feel after those similarities it kind of becomes, at least I hope, its own thing. We wanted to make sure those familiar with the Beauty and the Beast story felt the connections. Buffy didn“t have a direct influence but growing up watching the show I can see some of the elements may have slipped in there like the long lineage and duty as a beast hunter. I really just started with the premise and let it grow and evolve into its own world and mini-universe inside our larger Grimm one.

CC: Who are your writing influences?

DF: For influences I have a ton of favorite writers who I would say inspire me to write. I love the richness and depth J.K. Rowling puts into the Harry Potter world. I love the insanity that Garth Ennis captures in his stories and characters and settings that actually make me laugh or cringe. Kevin Smith“s dialogue; the way Chuck Dixon can lay out a story that seems effortless and leads you right along without a speed bump; Trey Parker and Matt Stone“s ability to tell a story, hitting a million different meaningful angles of a point and still make you laugh at fart jokes. The list is kind of endless as I love to just absorb any type of storytelling I can. Sorry for the ramble there.

CC: Feel free to ramble ha ha.Â Can you describe the writing process at Zenescope?Â Every time I pick up a book I see something like “Story by Joe Brusha, Ralph Tedesco and …Another? In this case, that includes yourself who also gets a writing nod?

DF: The way we do our story development is probably a little different from most companies. We are a smaller company and don“t put out as many issues per month as our competition so we have an advantage to keep the continuity pretty tight and also control more closely how our Grimm Universe unfolds. What we have been doing here is every 3 or 4 months, Joe Brusha, Ralph Tedesco and I get together and begin mapping out our upcoming series, whether it“s a Grimm Universe series or something that stands on its own. We basically all bring ideas and kind of pick and choose the next direction our characters go and flesh out the stories together. Then one of us either writes the scripts based on our ideas/outlines or hire another writer to take what we have come up with and bring it to life. That“s kind of the explanation behind the story by credits as we all kind of have a hand in forming that story.

CC: How was working with Bong Dazo?

DF: Working with Bong was pretty interesting as I couldn“t wrap my head around how quickly he would turn script into art in such a short time. He was finishing 22 pages in about two and half weeks which was insane to me. I also loved that it showed how much he knew storytelling and loved his work. As he would correct me on angles to better the story elements and reveals, like the way he portrayed the beast at the end of issue #3, telling me to save the reveal of what his face looked like, while at the same time we were doing a reveal of him. He was a great artist and from the small amount of interaction I had with him he seemed like a fun and interesting guy. I really just wish I had more time to work and learn from him as I feel I barely got to scratch the surface.

CC: Looking back, which part of the book really works for you and which do you think, “Man, I could“ve done that better?”“

DF: I“m not sure there is a part of the book that doesn“t work for me as it pretty much followed my plan from the beginning. I always wanted to make this first story about introducing Belle, her life, and her family and focusing on how those relationships work in our world. I do wish there was more time to give a little more background on some of the characters but that is always what the next story is for. Other than that I“m pretty happy with how it all unfolded and turned out. I“m just hoping that the fans were satisfied with her introduction and are excited for more stories with Belle.

CC: With the pressure of strong female characters to be shown in comics, how do you manage to create strong characters that counter balance the salaciousness that has become the Zenescope norm?

DF: Separating the comparison of the story from the pinup style has been something we have found to be a little tough. Not in terms of our own ability to separate the two but in getting new readers and comic fans who haven“t read our books yet to know that the covers are what they have always been used for, to catch the eye, to separate us from the competition and waves of comic covers on store walls each week. In truth, comic books are a business and we have a standard of quality in our art we have to maintain for our fans who support us and have been since the beginning.Â Â We go into these stories trying not necessarily to just create strong female characters for the sake of it but to just create strong relatable characters in general. We have been focusing a lot on how to balance between realistic and fantasy as people come to comics to escape the everyday and norm of the world and it will always be an evolving process.

CC: What sort of extras can fans of the floppies expect in the trade?

DF: In the trade we will be including Belle“s first appearance in a short story in the 2017 Armed Forces one-shot we did, which introduced us to Belle and gave us insight into her father“s side of the family.

CC: If you could work on any Big 2 character which would it be and what would be your pitch?

DF: I have always been a huge fan of Green Lantern and Deadpool. So if I had a chance to write those it would be pretty cool. Haha can“t tell my pitch though. You never know when you might be able to use it down the line.

Thanks for taking the time over the festive period to speak to me.Â Good luck with the trade.Â If you interested in the book, feel free to check out the review of the first issueÂ please click here.

Belle – Beast Hunter TBK is out in stores on Jan 16th and can be ordered using Diamond codeÂ MAY182144

Author Profile

Johnny "The Machine" Hughes

I am a long time comic book fan, being first introduced to Batman in the mid to late 70's. This led to a appreciation of classic artists like Neal Adams and Jim Aparo. Moving through the decades that followed, I have a working knowledge of a huge raft of characters with a fondness for old school characters like JSA and The Shadow

Currently reading a slew of Bat Books, enjoying a mini Marvel revival, and the host of The Definative Crusade and Outside the Panels whilst also appearing on No-Prize Podcast on the Undercover Capes Podcast Network