Q & A with Colin Rankine

Red Stylo Media's staff minion, Matthew Erman, gave a short Q&A to Unprofessional Writer, Colin Rankine, as part of our new "Red (Spot)Light" series. Some fun bits in this one...read on!

Q: So Colin, we'd like to know first off, what are major influences as a writer?

A: Jorge Luis Borges, William S. Burroughs, Eavesdropping, James Ellroy, Edward Gibbon, Robert Irwin, Ursula LeGuin, Robert Louis Stevenson, Television, Gene Wolfe...So many others...

Q: That's quite a list! Where's your favorite place to pick up comics?

A: Nominally, Comix Experience on Divisadero Street in San Francisco is my local, though lately I've been trawling ComiXology a bit. I feel guilty about it.

Q: How did you get into comics?

A: How did I start liking comics? Someone gave me a copy of, I think, Thor, circa 1979, about a space giant with mouths in the palms of his hands, and I was hooked. As far as how I started making comics? I am still working on that.

Q: Do you have any long term projects?

A: All my projects are long-term projects!

Q: Who would be your dream team to work with?

A: Rick Veitch. Q: Marvel, DC, or Indie? A: I have enjoyed many Marvel comics in my days, but I feel like your mainstream players are in serious trouble. Indie books are hard for me to keep track of, but they are exciting and inspiring, even when they're awful.

Q: If you could have one super power what would it be and why?

A: I would be solid all the way through, like a potato, all of my biological processes occurring through a sort of biochemical diffusion; a huge hinged jaw like a snake's, with these sort of grabbers on the insides of my cheeks to keep my prey from wriggling loose; the ability to transmit memetic as well as genetic information to my offspring (transomatesis); and a telepathic rapport with a like-minded person of another species in a distant galaxy.

Don't forget to check out Chapter #2 of The Unprofessionals--A Sociopathic Bromance in the Red Stylo Media store!