Go All In

Nerdvana presents Small Press Saturday – aka, Lessons Learned Self-Publishing Comics

Before I started self-publishing my minicomic, Amazing Arizona Comics, which features local, original superheroes, I had ideas for other comics series. “The Fast Food Wars” is a riff on the throwaway line from “Demolition Man” about Taco Bell winning the Franchise Wars — and it would’ve featured parodies of Ronald McDonald, Wendy, the Taco Bell chihuahua, and their fellow fast food mascots in a battle to the literal death. “Little Christmas” is a year-long story, featuring Santa Claus on earth reconnecting with humanity, and each issue would’ve been themed for its respective month’s holiday, with Santa fighting demented versions of Cupid, Uncle Sam, and even a Thanksgiving turkey. I have a few other old concepts in perpetual development, but these were two of my favorites.

Amazing Arizona Comics took precedence over all of my other ideas when I realized how much people like seeing themselves in the stories they read — so what better way to hold a mirror to the reader than putting where they live on full display? I created original characters like Speed Cameron, who was inspired by a night in which I received THREE traffic camera tickets, going 65 mph in a small stretch of 55 mph highway. For the first issue, I wanted a worthy foe for Speed Cameron, and when the news reported a Sheriff Arpaio-ordered immigration raid at a local McDonald’s, I remembered “The Fast Food Wars,” and that version of Ronald became canon in my story. At the time, I wasn’t sure if that first issue would be my ONLY issue, so why not cram in as many ideas as I’ve ever had?

Fortunately, I built momentum, and issue #19 was scheduled for completion sometime around January 2016. With the beginning of the new year, I remembered my “Little Christmas” concept and decided to fold it into Amazing Arizona Comics. Throughout that year, I scrambled to self-publish monthly, with Santa alongside Arizona’s heroes fighting drunken leprechauns on Mill Avenue in March, an evil Easter Bunny in April, and zombies in October. It wasn’t “Little Christmas” as I’d originally intended, but the idea found a home and I was grateful to get it out of my head.

I was recently listening to a segment from the podcast “Conan O’Brien Needs A Friend,” and Conan shared a quote he once heard from Johnny Carson. Carson, who had hosted The Tonight Show for decades, once said that when you do something long enough, everything in you comes out. I totally get it. I’m on issue #51 of Amazing Arizona Comics now, and the longer I self-publish this comic, the more I pull from personal experiences and any other ideas I’ve had to tell fun, engaging stories. It isn’t always planned; sometimes I’ll look back at a script I’ve written or a page I’ve drawn and see an inside joke with myself I didn’t realize I’d included. So goes the nature of creativity, I suppose, and most certainly today’s mantra —

Go all in.

I understand some concepts are incompatible and can’t be rolled into a single project, and I certainly get the banking of ideas so they can flourish over time, but when you make something of value, it should come from a place where all of you is accessible. Maybe some things SHOULDN’T come out, but what matters most is that they CAN. Every creator is a reserve of experience and influence that informs their art, and I believe the more you make, the less you’re able to hold back. It will all bubble to the surface, whether or not you really want it to. As an artist, it’s your job to use those internal resources wisely.

Also — what are you waiting for?! I’ve heard SO many artists start sentences with, “One of these days, I’m going to . . .” For all that artists have to offer, they’re often the most hesitant of any industry, plagued by pretension, procrastination, or self-doubt. When I finally started drawing Amazing Arizona Comics #1, I redrew the same page about five times before I developed the confidence — or the sense of surrender — to move on. Making art is a never-ending process, and AS a process, it requires PROGRESSION. Dwelling in the “one of these days” mentality is the ANTITHESIS of art. Holding anything back is just what everybody ELSE does.

I’ve recently had a health scare. Nothing fatal, but enough to acknowledge that I’m no longer a young man, and life is a very finite thing. I’d hate to leave this earth with an untold story in my head. As a cartoonist, my ideas are really all I have — they prove my merit as a contributor to culture. Getting everything out there makes mental room for new ideas to appear and perculate, too, so I have ongoing value. If I’m constantly exploiting my most valuable resource — my own imagination — I don’t have time to, say, pounce on Steamboat Willie when he’s suddenly made available in the public domain. How decidedly UNoriginal, to exploit somebody else’s old idea, rather than generate original concepts of my own . . . but I’ll shelf that thought for another mantra someday.

Conan evokes that Carson quote in the context of his blurting an old song he’d heard as a kid once on his late night show — a song so absurd, his audience and crew were both taken aback. Below are the clips of his explaining the moment, and the moment itself. Sure, the little ditty fell flat in real time, but years later it produced a moment of retrospective (and introspective) hilarity.

Even more than the song, Conan still had it in him to share how he knew that song, at all, and the lessons it taught him. He’s constantly going all in, which doesn’t mean he’s out of ideas — it’s given him 30+ years of content and influence in the entertainment industry.

How much do you have in YOU? Isn’t there really only one way to find out?

Russ Kazmierczak Jr.

Russ Kazmierczak, Jr. is a Phoenix-based cartoonist and the creator of Amazing Arizona Comics, a mini-comic book that satirizes local news, history, and culture with superhero adventure. He was the Phoenix New Times’ 2018 Best Storyteller and one of The Copper Courier’s “9 People Who Are Making A Difference in Arizona” in 2023. Russ has taught comics classes at Bookman’s in Phoenix and Mesa, Phoenix Art Museum, Gilbert HD South, and other venues throughout the Valley. Follow his work and inquire about his classes on Instagram @amazingazcomics.