Katie Cook's spotlight at Anaheim's WonderCon
2014 shined a light on the popular writer/artist behind comic book titles
such as "My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic," "Fraggle
Rock," "Star Wars" and her creator-owned webcomic
"Gronk." Speaking to a small but dedicated group of fans, many of who
were dressed as My Little Ponies, Katie and moderator Thom Zahler kicked the
panel off as Zahler told the audience that he started a hashtag, #askkatiec,
and encouraged the audience to tweet questions.
RELATED: Cook Adds Horsepower to IDW with "My
Little Pony: Rarity"
"The first question I got was 'Mommy, did you get me a
Frozen dress?'" Zahler said as Cook laughed.
"Did you know the only thing my daughter wants is the
only thing you can't get at the park, which is the Elsa dress?" Cook said.
"The high-end one. The expensive one," she added as the
audience laughed.
Cook plugged her work, pausing as fans cheered for "My
Little Pony," and jokingly recalled telling her father about her spotlight
panel at WonderCon.
"He said, 'I bet five people show up and one of them is
the moderator,'" Cook recalled, the audience booing and shouting that she
should take a picture to prove him wrong. "I'll just copy and paste you
guys over and over," she laughed.
Cook then spoke about working with artist Andy Price on
"Friendship Is Magic," joking that whenever they disagreed on a part
of the book she would add more ponies for him to draw. Immediately opening the
panel to audience questions, Zahler pointed to a little girl dressed in a pink
Spider-Man costume who asked if Cook was going to write more Queen Chrysalis in
the "My Little Pony" comic book.
"I hope so! I really like Chrysalis; I think she's a
great villain and just the right amount of a little scary and a little
funny," Cook said, adding, "I'd love to use her again.
A fan who labeled herself as the mother of a ten year old
asked Cook how she balanced appealing to both kids and adults in her writing.
Cook said that she felt her "Fraggle Rock" work was the best example
of hitting both and named the Muppets as the prime example of characters and
stories that kids and their parents both enjoy.
"Think about 'The Muppet Show!' That was a prime-time
sitcom that was made for an adult audience, and now everybody thinks of it as a
kid show, but it worked on both levels...I hold that as the gold standard of
making both parties happy," Cook said. "I want stuff for me and my
kid. I don't want to be sitting there during 'Yo Gabba Gabba' and going, ugh,
when is it over?"
A fan asked if Cook would write a story arc in "My
Little Pony" that lasted longer than four issues.
"I really think Four is the most you can do with a kids
comic before you lose attention...this is not 'Crisis On Infinite Earth,'"
Cook said.
An older male "My Little Pony" fan then asked Cook
about her "personal interpretation of the divinity of the royal pony
sisters," as on the Internet, and to his mind, "very clearly [show
creator Lauren] Faust intended them to be goddesses, and then when Jayson
Thiessen took over [as showrunner] he took them down quite a bit, but in the comics...there's
a lot more room to do things they couldn't do on the show."
"I like taking them down a notch...one of my least
favorite superheroes is Superman because he can do anything," Cook said.
Clarifying that she had no plans to expand the main characters' powers, Cook
added, "Everybody riffs on 'Celestia's hurt and can't help again.' Well
the reason is...she'd solve the problem and the episode would be four minutes
long."
"I like people to have problems they have to overcome
and if you have a godlike character...that's annoying. So no," Cook said.
A woman shouted from the audience she always thought of the
ponies more as Greek Gods, powerful but not omnipotent. "You will like
issue #19 of 'My Little Pony,' then," Cook told her as the audience
laughed.
Cook also stated that while she knew some of the people who
worked on the "My Little Pony" TV show, other than getting notes and
occasionally changing plots so as not to contradict the show she does not work
closely with the writers.
Cook cheered as a "Gronk" fan asked her to speak
about the webcomic. Explaining that she came up with the idea of a strange
little creature, it took seven years before she put pen to paper and created a
website to host her creation. "Four years later I'm still on Thursday night
saying, I gotta work on Gronk!" Cook said.
A teenage fan asked if she had always wanted to be a comic
book writer and artist. Cook stated that when she was young she wanted to make
comic strips. "I have no backup plan, if this falls apart I have no other
survival skills. I'll go to the Starbucks and say, I have a minor in art
history and they'll say, 'You're hired!'" Cook joked as the audience
laughed.
Speaking about her Marvel work, Cook said that because she
was a funny writer and artist she did a lot of short gag stories for the
publisher, like having Hulk go through the stages of grief (with one of the
stages being "smashing").
"I'd love to do something longer but I'm kind of the
niche market of cutesy-smootsey," Cook added.
In response to a fan who wanted to know how she went from an
artist to a writer, Cook said it was not by design and that she fell into
writing "My Little Pony."
"Let me tell you the broad, elaborate tale of how I got
picked to be the 'My Little Pony' writer: I tweeted, 'I like this Pony show!
It's cool!' Two days later, [IDW editor] Bobby Curnow said to me, 'I saw your
tweet. You want to write the comic?' That's the entire story. I was like, ok, I
will do that, work, yay!" Cook said as the audience laughed.
"People come up to me at conventions to sign their pony
books and go, oh, you can draw too? And a little part of me grows blacker and
dies," Cook added as the audience laughed again.
The next audience question came from a fan who wanted to
know why Cook painted watercolor commissions at her booth in artist alley. Cook
stated that she had been creating watercolor paintings at every convention for
the past ten years as she wanted to be able to interact with people while doing
art. "When I get weird requests it sparks a conversation," Cook said.
An audience member asked if there was any moment Cook had to
censor herself on her books. "I think at one moment Applejack said, 'Buck
this,' and I thought, I probably shouldn't do that!" Cook said.
RELATED: "My Little Pony" Writer Katie Cook
Declares "Friendship is Magic"
Speaking about her "Clone Wars" webcomic and her
Topps trading card illustrations, much like "My Little Pony," her
work was all the result of being a "giant Star Wars" nerd and running
into those who worked on 'Star Wars' while networking.
"Eventually it was like, hey you like 'Star Wars,' I
like 'Star Wars,' I work for 'Star Wars,' you want to do something for 'Star
Wars?'" Cook said.
"Old Star Tours or new Star Tours?" an audience
member asked, citing the changes Disneyland made to their "Star Wars"
ride.
"Alright," Cook said, pushing back from the
onstage table and rolling up her sleeves as the crowd laughed.
"My biggest problem with new Star Tours is that I've
now ridden in Orlando and here eight times, and I always get Kashyyyk!"
Cook continued, naming the version where the ride goes to the Wookie home
world, as the audience laughed again. "I'm at a point where if Chewbacca
hits the front of that thing one more time I am going to Hulk out in that gift
shop!"
As for whether she prefers "Star Trek" over
"Star Wars," Cook told the room that her parents were huge "Star
Trek" fans and that growing up they even decorated their Christmas tree
with "Trek" ornaments.
"I defected to 'Star Wars' in college -- for a long
time as a child I thought the movie 'Space Balls' was 'Star Wars,'" Cook
said.
Going to a question from Twitter, Cook said she was excited
to see "Star Wars" episode seven, immediately shaking her head as one
fan booed.
"What is wrong with people who are mad about more 'Star
Wars!'" Cook said. "It's like the most delicious pie you have ever
had, and you're offered more. Do you say, no, I might not like it this time?
No, you say I would like some more pie!"
Cook added that she felt the same way about the possibility
of an Indiana Jones reboot, rumored to be in the works with star Bradley
Cooper. "Anybody who claims they don't want Bradley Cooper in things is
male!" Cook said as the audience laughed.
Cook also spoke about doing the Princess Luna micro-series,
telling a young boy that writing for "My Little Pony" was fun but
intense.
"The current arc that just started is giving me
nightmares over how people are going to take things," Cook said, adding
that she has gotten emails and Tweets from a small part of the Pony community
"Who do not like me...and write me very long emails."
RELATED: Archaia Returns to "Fraggle Rock"
"What part of the fandom?" an audience member
shouted out.
"4Chan," Cook said as the audience laughed.
Cook then said she didn't mind the "Pony" fandom but
she couldn't handle "Doctor Who" fans, prompting a young man in the
audience dressed as the Ninth Doctor to ask why.
"I was doing one of my paintings and this woman comes
bay and asks if I can do a David Tennant 'Doctor Who' picture. I'm like, of
course I can! She had a photo album that she was clutching...and as I'm
painting it she leans over and goes, do you want to see my scrapbook?"
Cook said.
"I took it from her and it was a white wedding album
that was lovingly scrapbooked with very expensive scrapbooking stickers and
flowers of photos she had taken from the Internet of happy couples -- where she
had photoshopped in her face and David Tennant's face," Cook
continued as the audience gasped. Cook told the room that as she flipped though
the entire book, past more doctored photos of their "wedding day,"
eventually she hit a single blank page.
"She said, I'm going to put your painting of David and
my day at the convention here.' I'm like, I know how David Tennant dies! If he
disappears while filming a movie in Seattle I'll say I have information that
will help!" Cook said as the audience cracked up.
"I have a cap of craziness that I have now seen...and
not even the person who introduced a fox puppet as his son was weirder than
that!" Cook added, shaking her head.
Cook's animal variant for "Secret Avengers" #1.
The same "Doctor Who" fan then wanted to know if
Cook had ever written a story that was rejected or censored. Cook confessed she
wrote a Pinkie Pie story that her editors deemed "too weird," but she
was still trying to push it through. She also said she doesn't read fan fiction
as she doesn't want anyone claiming she stole from them.
"Some people call what Andy and I do glorified fan
fiction, and its like, not if Hasbro pays for it!" Cook added as the room
cracked up.
A fan asked if Cook would say yes to writing an episode of
the "My Little Pony" TV show, to which she replied she would but had
not been asked. This lead a cosplayer dressed as Ash from the "Evil
Dead" series to ask Cook's opinion on the end of season three --
specifically of Twilight Sparkle's transformation into a full princess -- and
what she, as a writer, would have done differently.
"I would have had it be more of a quest to the ascension;
I really think the problem with that episode is that it's so short, there needs
to be more lead-in to that happening, or finding clues or solving some great
mystery," Cook said. "I would have made it longer and I would have
made it a quest, a goal."
However, Cook named Twilight as one of her favorite
princesses because she "earns it." Cook also said she knows what the
keys are for but won't spoil it for fans. A women then asked Cook what else she
would like to work on.
"I'd love to do an all-ages Wonder Woman title,"
Cook said as fans cheered. She added that she would also love to do an ensemble
Marvel book with Squirrel Girl and MODOK and other unlikely team-ups. However,
the major project she wanted to do but would never happen was to an all-ages comic
about the Marauders from "Harry Potter."
"I want Scottie Young to draw it and I write it -- it's
James Potter and Sirius and Wormtail and what they were like as students,"
Cook said.
Naming herself a fan of the webcomic "Girls With
Slingshots," Cook admitted that she didn't read very many other comics.
Cook also told the audience if she had a time machine she would go back in time
to the '80s and claim to write the "Harry Potter" series. To a
"Star Wars" fan Cook stated she felt that the reboot of the "Star
Wars" expanded universe made sense because there was too much conflicting
continuity.
"If they do that after every movie, be mad, but
everybody gets one," Cook added.
Cook told an aspiring artist to draw every day, and that she
draws traditionally with pen and paper rather than a computer. As for writer's
block, Cook stated that she reads and watching "Toddlers And Tiaras"
to take a break and come up with ideas in a different way.
"How do you feel about Equestria girls?" A
teenager fan asked. Cook replied that she enjoyed the DVD, stating that because
it takes place in another world, "You can pretend it doesn't exist if you
don't like it."
Cook told an Adventure Time fan that she loved her first
episode of that show. "My favorite character is Root Beer Guy," Cook
said, adding, "But the Lemons give me nightmares!"
Cook also told the audience that if fans came to her booth
in artist alley she would teach them her favorite drinking song. "I know a
lot of drinking songs. It's probably not that great for an all-ages
writer," Cook jokes as the room cracked up, bringing the panel to a close.
Source:http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=52328
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