In the hilarious world envisioned by cartoonist Jeffrey Brown, Darth Vader has custody of little Luke. Yes, that’s correct, Darth Vader as a father, and all that entails. One of the quirkiest and funniest books to come along in a long time, Savas Abadsidis talked to Jeff about the book, fatherhood and his favorite Father’s Day Memory.
Where did you get the idea for Darth Vader and Son?
Back in 2010 I was contacted by Ryan Germick from Google about drawing some sketches for the Father’s Day home page doodle. Their idea was to do something about how awkward everyday father-son moments would be with Luke and Vader. My son was four at the time, so I immediately thought of making Luke four and putting Vader in the same parenting situations I was going through. Google decided to use something else for the doodle, but I knew I still wanted to do something with the idea.
How did you get the book approved by Lucas?
I’d done a couple books with Chronicle, and they’ve done a bunch of Star Wars book, so I took the idea to them and they took it to Lucasfilm. Based on the handful of sketches I’d done, Lucasfilm got what the book was about right away and knew they wanted to have it happen.
How did you decide which situations to illustrate? You make it so seamless–it’s almost like they were intentionally written for this project.
I watched the movies again and again, making special note of all of Luke and Vader’s dialogue, and then just tried to let those moments bounce around in my head while I thought about parenting situations. Some of them took a while to think of, but as soon as they came they were pretty intuitive.
How much of this book is based on you and your son’s relationship?
Quite a bit. We’ve never played baseball, I have to admit, but pretty much everything else in the book has been something we’ve gone through in some similar way.
What else do you have in the works?
I recently finished my next autobiographical book, A Matter Of Life, which is about fatherhood and religion and will come out next spring. The movie I co-wrote, Save The Date, has also been picked up for distribution by IFC Films, and should be released sometime after this fall. Currently I’ve started working on the sequel to Darth Vader and son, which will feature Princess Leia as the rebellious teenager…
What’s your favorite Father’s Day memory?
Last year – I was in Grand Rapids where my parents live, so got to spend the day with him as well as my son, who had drawn me this really great card and picked out a little fossil model to give me.
Jeffrey Brown is the author of over a dozen graphic novels, including Clumsy, Funny Misshapen Body and Incredible Change-Bots. He lives in Chicago with his wife and son. www.jeffreybrowncomics.com
Reprinted from original source: www.escaperepublic.com
Photo courtesy of Jeffrey Brown