Interview: Michael Lent and Brian McCarthy on Zenescope’s Brimstone

Brimstone #2 Sejic cover

Brimstone #2 Sejic cover


Writers Michael Lent & Brian McCarthy have teamed up to bring readers Brimstone, a horror/western published by Zenescope. Westfield’s Roger Ash recently contacted the duo to learn more about this book.

Westfield: For those who haven’t read Brimstone yet, what should they know about it?

Michael Lent: Brimstone is a supernatural western with a grind house twist. The story is about a team of the deadliest cold-blooded killers in the West sent to retake the mining town of Brimstone, site of the richest gold strike ever discovered. The group quickly discovers supernatural forces at work as they are themselves hunted by a new breed of undead.

On the book, we have an amazing lineup of artists including Ben Templesmith, Greg Horn, Ivan Nunes, Stjepan Šejić, EBAN and incredible newcomer Hyunsang Michael Cho. The creators and writers are me, Michael Lent, (Prey/Marvel/2007 and Stephen King/Bluewater/2011) and Brian McCarthy (Keith Richards/Bluewater/2011 and JRR Tolkien upcoming from the same publisher). Brimstone is a big deal for us – four years in the making with 752 panels of completed, full-color art.

So far, we’ve made a lot of pull lists and racked up cool reviews. Best of all, in less than three months, nearly 200,000 people have visited our Brimstonefans page on Facebook.

Westfield: Who are the main characters readers will encounter in the book? Do you have a favorite character?

Brian McCarthy: The team, or what we call the “Un-magnificent 7”, consists of Skerritt — a hardened war hero turned head of security for the mining company; Jebediah “Cracker Jack” Jackson — a disgraced AWOL confederate soldier; Jake “Black Jack” Jackson – an escaped slave and mountain of a man (but his brutish strength masks a keen intellect); Chen – a Chinese immigrant who came to America to find his fortune but found other men’s money easier to get than the gold in the Sierra mountains; McFarley – an undersized Irish thief whose greed causes him to attach himself to stronger men; Victor “The Viper” – a legendary gunslinger renowned for his brutal exploits… and his unbeatable speed.

In town, they also find Annabelle, the lone survivor of Brimstone. She’s tough as nails, hot as hell and has a tongue faster than even Victor’s guns. She’s his match in almost every way.

Do we have a favorite? I’d have to say Victor, who is the hero of the book. But that’s a hard call because I find that I love some of the villains because they’re just so reprehensible and nasty. You have to have wicked villains to make the hero great and we’ve got really horrible, conniving bastards in this book. It was a blast to write them.

Brimstone preview page. Art by Hyunsang Michael Cho.

Brimstone preview page. Art by Hyunsang Michael Cho.


Westfield: How did you all come together on the book?

Lent: Brian and I admired each other’s work back when we were members of the AWG, a non-profit writers’ group. Then when he became president, I became his vice president. That went really well so we started looking for something we could work on together which turned out to be Brimstone. I had this mash-up image in my mind of an impossibly quick gunslinger fanning a six-shooter at something moving along the ceiling faster than the eye could track. B and I built a seven book story from that one image.

McCarthy: And we did it quick. We were both stunned how fast the project came together when we sat down. I’ve never written anything that fast before and I don’t think Michael has either.

The harder part was finding the right artist. Most artist portfolios only feature the clean ink style seen in super hero books and we knew that the book needed an energetic line style and more muted color palette. We looked at hundreds and hundreds of portfolios and we were really lucky to find Hyunsang Michael Cho. He penciled, inked and colored every panel, on every page for the entire 7 issue series. His work has staggered us.

Westfield: Why a western horror story?

Lent: Brian and I both went to film school where studying westerns is a rite of passage and everybody tries to figure out new ways into the genre. Four years ago when we started this process, mash-ups were still considered a kooky, weird concept. When we told people what we working on they were like, “Huh?” then they threw garlic at us and tried to cast out our demons. For us, we loved slamming together the panoramic vistas and taking a grind house tone to modernize iconic characters of the west with the short depths of field and the sight and smell of blood boiling you get from horror.

Westfield: You’ve received a number of accolades for the first issue. Anything you’d like to say about that?

McCarthy: Yes. We want to say, “thank you” to all the critics and readers who’ve been so kind. And, if you think book #1 was good, grab yourself a copy of issue #2 and hold on. It only gets better from here on.

Westfield: What does the future hold for the series?

Lent: We finished the story in seven books, but we see a way into continuing the series beyond that. When you’re dealing with the undead, they’re just mostly dead and always pissed about something.

McCarthy: Absolutely. I think we’ve done the opposite of what you’re seeing now where franchises are going back to the beginning and doing origin stories. This is the origin story. It only grows from here.

Brimstone #5

Brimstone #5


Westfield: Any closing comments?

Lent: For a long time, it was just Brian and me working on this thing and we were like a pair of crazy prospectors in a gulch muttering to ourselves while we searched for gold. But we kept at it and pretty soon some really talented people like our art director Lance Laspina and artist Hyunsang Michael Cho joined our little quest and things got really interesting. Fast forward to now, it’s both humbling and awe inspiring to see how well readers are responding to Brimstone. Brian and I are pretty excited to start the process again with a new story from a concept that B came up with. Stay tuned.

McCarthy: YUP. I want to reiterate Michael’s praise for Lance as well. We both are HUGE fans of H.M. Cho, but we’d be remiss if we didn’t praise Lance. He’s one of the smartest and most talented guys I know and he has kept all of us “on the same page”, so to speak, through the whole process.

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Brimstone #5

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