TF Views

Creator interview from oneshallstand.com

In all seriousness, I do not envy Roche at this point. His previous work has set expectations high enough that there is real pressure for him to knock this out of the park. Work that would be passable might be considered sub-par in this case.

He has little margin for error.

Dom
-it is his fault though...should not have set expectations so high.

I dunno--he's got another writer who apparently gets what the series is about just as much as he does, and more importantly--this series has Overlord and Pyro! I'm going to love it no matter what.

The second writer can also act as a lightning rod. if the series does not meet expectations, (reasonable or not), people can easily say "well, it is not all Roche".

I do not anticipate this series being bad. But, I am curious about how well Roche will meet expectations, and how the fandom will react in any case.

Dom
-is actually fairly optimistic.

Hopefully, the fandom will think it rules. I know I will, there's no way it can't.

There is a difference between a comic being "good" and being "excellent". Roche's track-record is excellent, if short.

But, excellence is difficult, if not impossible, to maintain. Guys like Dixon are notable for having low *failure* rates. But, they have correspondingly low rates of true excellence. In their case, it is not harmful because the exopectation is of basic competence, not excellence.

My worry is that Roche may be unfairly criticized for not reaching the high expectations some readers may have. Roche may not have the luxury of "normal" expectations.

Dom
-will be happy if Roche delivers beyond expectations.

It's kind of interesting that Roche has gotten all these high expectations after only *two* excellent comics. Mind, they've been *really* excellent comics, but that's still a very small body of work to form a judgment based on. Admittedly, it's because of those two comics that I have such high hopes for this series, but that doesn't make it any more right.

Of course, this series also looks like it'll feature a decent amount of Kup, who I'd say has already become Roche's signature character. That's a good sign.