Gilbert Hernandez

Dennis the Menace was probably the most realistic comic book ever done. No space aliens ever invaded! ”

I felt like challenging myself and challenging my readers with something darker and heavier. I don't know how to explain it, because I'm not a political person. I have two political stories, and that's it: 'Human Diastrophism' and 'Poison River.' ”

Our father died when we were very young, so our mother raised six kids. We saw the world filtered through her eyes, being a minority woman raising six kids. ”

I grew up being really insecure and dumped on, over-feeling certain things in a negative way. So I thought I had something to prove. ”

I think I related more literally to the early 'Spider-Man' comics from Steve Ditko because it could be upfront and direct about the problems of being a kid. He captured being a teenager so beautifully. ”

I wanted to do pretty much a purely boy story, yes. The girls are kind of the bad guys in 'Marble Season', although that wasn't my intention. It's also a world without adults. ”

I happen to think Latinas, Latin women, are the most beautiful women in the world. So that's what I'm going to draw. I love women from all cultures, of course, but if I was going to deal with any of them, that would be No. 1 for me. ”

It wasn't until I started to do 'Poison River' that the readership started falling. 'Poison River' started out very slowly and simply, but then it got really dense and complicated. I don't know, I think the readers just got fed up or burned out. They started dropping off. ”

We grew out of the superhero comics, but we still liked comics, so we started putting our own experiences in the stories we were doing for our own amusement. ”

Reviewers and critics can be overly cynical. If something the least bit sentimental comes up, they'll often start flying off the handle. But I'm like, 'Wait a minute, you've had those times in your life. Everybody has.' ”