Doing Nothing Gives It Power - An interview with "Darkness Calls" Creators Steve Sanderson and Sean Muir

"Darkness Calls" has all the trappings of any iconic superhero comic book. The protagonist is the kid someone hurt, abandoned, or bullied, who ultimately finds the inner strength to overcome not just the bad guy, but his or her inner demons. The superhero who is in essence one-half of the protagonist’s tortured psyche is a ripped, sword-wielding, awesomely handsome warrior with long hair, a motorcycle, and bad-ass fighting skills; while the bad-guy is the other half, a creepy, demon-like presence with glowing eyes, flames for hair, a skeletal visage, and claws for feet. The climatic battle scene which occurs in an abandoned warehouse, is a wordless display of power where good ultimately triumphs over evil and we all live to fight another day.

So, you recognize the images, you love the stark, yet powerful, drawing, and you think you know the story. But you don’t, not really, because "Darkness Calls" takes all the iconic imagery you have absorbed over years reading Batman, watching the Spiderman movies, and soaking up anything and everything Alan Moore has created, and spins it through a new and different filter - the struggles associated with suicide and the storytelling tradition of Canada’s First Nation population (a group analogous to Native American’s in this country).

"Darkness Calls" follows the story of Kyle an artistic, punk rock listening, bullied First Nation kid with alcoholic parents, his desire to kill himself, and the battle for his soul between Weesakichak, the trickster warrior hero and Wihtiko, the spirit eating demon. The comic was produced by the Healthy Aboriginal Network (HAN) in Vancouver, BC, an organization that focuses on the health issues of aboriginal youth (http://www.thehealthyaboriginal.net/), and written and illustrated by First Nation comic book artist Steve Sanderson. The comic has sold 40,000 copies and is being read by First Nation members and non-members alike, it has crossed into the United States, and HAN is now looking to make a short illustrated film of the story.

With the comic book having taken off, and with more health-related comics to come, I recently had the opportunity to talk to Sean Muir from HAN and "Darkness Calls" creator Steven Sanderson about the creation of "Darkness Calls," the reaction to the comic book, and where they go from here.

Which came first, the comic or HAN?
Sean Muir: "The idea came first, but in order to get the idea funded we had to create a non-profit society. We started with two little comics, black and white, and things went crazy. Started at the regional level, and they were interested in having a health comic. A comic on what youths thought was important. Started with a youth health issue and then suicide prevention. And now we’re focus group testing a diabetes comic and a stay in school comic. They are both federally funded."

Why comics?
SM: "As a kid I collected comics. There was a fund that was asking for innovative health promotion. I wanted to do television, but that was real expensive. I had a memory of a kid who finished his comics real fast. I asked him how he read so fast and he said he didn’t, he just looked at the pictures and got an idea of what was going on."

Is there much of a comic book scene among the aboriginal youth initially targeted by this comic book?
Steve Sanderson: "I really wouldn’t know. I should know. All I know in Canada is I’m one of the only ones out there. In March I’m going to Indianapolis for a Native American comic book forum. Me and some other dude. The one thing I didn’t have as a problem as a youth is I could do whatever I wanted to do. But not every First Nation’s youth has that. And that’s what I wanted to pass on with my comic book. Every kid with the right push could go farther then I have. They get the initial motivation from western culture, but then they think I’m First Nation and I shouldn’t do this. I wanted to give kids the sense that they could do this."

Did you dictate to Steve the model you wanted for this comic?
SM: "No, I have no storytelling ability at all. I’m a producer. I get funding. I just hire the artist. Steve is a youth artist and this story has been batting around his head for years. He considered suicide, and so did a cousin of his."

There are a lot of potential triggers for suicide in the story - abuse, bullying, alcoholism, etc. - did you provide Steve with these triggers so he could incorporate them into the story, did he do research, or what?
SM: "No. First of all, I’m friends with an editor who said I know you got funding and you need to meet this guy. He (Steve) came over on his bike, his motorcycle, I’m six feet tall, he’s seven feet tall, and we sat on my deck for two hours and he had the whole storyboard in his head. I think he had experienced things or heard things. He did it as it happened to him. You would have had to lived it to have it come out like that."

How did you go about creating this comic book - what was the inspiration and what was the process?
SS: "Quite simple. Based quite loosely on myself and a younger cousin. We were both overweight and ostracized for our artistic ability. When he was sixteen he was contemplating killing himself. I moved home for a couple of months and spent time with him and didn’t realize how much pain he was in. He was on the brink. He battled through it. He’s quite the success story. That stuck with me. Not in an egotistical way, but I helped this guy. A sense of achievement. I’ve always had a weird sense of guilt that I never give enough back. I could give something back to First Nation’s youth. I wrote it in a day. I tell a story. And that’s quite traditional. First Nation’s people don’t have a written language. I told people the story. I didn’t write it down, I just went to pencil. I’m a writer, but I am a visual writer. The genesis was my cousin needing help and the idea that there must be a whole bunch of First Nation’s youth like him. Want to give them hope for the future."

What do you hope will be the impact of this piece?
SS: "Two things. The first thing is that First Nation’s youth, whatever age they are, whatever sex they are, that they will do something about it (suicide). Doing nothing gives it power. You don’t give it its power by claiming the truth. The other thing is that so many non-natives are reading it, that there will be interest in First Nation’s stories."

So, do you have any idea whether it is preventing suicide?
SM: "I get that all the time. The comic didn’t come with any evaluation money. It would have been very hard. Are you tracking this for one-year or ten years? I’ve looked at studies and the numbers tend to be incorrect. Coroners report it wrong. Families don’t want it [recorded] as suicide. It can be cultural. I look at it as an icebreaker. Usually with youth the wall goes up. What did you think of that comic? When we first started we came up with a nine-page manuscript. And we tried to get the youth to look at it. Try to get a fifteen-year old to look at a nine-page single-spaced manuscript. So we created a DVD of the storyboard, panning in and out from panel to panel and Steven telling the story. People started asking about the DVD and so we are going to turn it into an animated short. And the kicker is we’re taking the color animated short to a BC First Nation (an Indian reservation) that has a high rate of suicide and the youth are going to redo the dialogue in their native language."

How important was it for you that you touched on aboriginal culture in this work?
SS: "It wasn’t the most important thing, but in my heart it was important. The story had to be a true one. An honest one. People have great bullshit detectors. The fact that it had cultural relevance was important. I can only go with my own culture. I’m Cree, so I don’t know Blackfoot stories. First of all it was about the story, but it was even better to include these old stories. How would I interpret this story?"

What’s next?
SS: "We have two other comics on the way. One is about Diabetes. It’s a serious problem among First Nation people. It was tricky. The other is about staying in school. Also, about myself. I had a younger cousin who wanted to drop out of school. They also want to make a short film (of "Darkness Calls"). It’s terribly stressful. It’s like giving away the baby. It’s hard as an artist. It’s emotional. I want it to be handled to the degree it needs to be. How much control do I want to give away, how much do I want to keep?"