Summer has come and gone, and in its wake we are left to reflect on the blockbuster superhero films we were presented with.  Whether or not you liked The Avengers, The Amazing Spider-Man, or The Dark Knight Rises one thing is clear: COMIC BOOKS RULE!

People often ask me what my favorite comic books are and I usually provide the perfunctory answers: Green Lantern, Batman, Superman, Captain America.

But recently, that answer has changed to include one new, and amazing comic book: True Hero.

Created by two talented writers and artists, Rich Genesy and Mike Cisneros, True Hero tells the story of 19 year-old, Mark, who wants nothing more than to be a superhero.  While this is a dream many of us have often had, for Mark, the dream becomes a reality when he meets the mysterious woman, Faith, who gives him, and his friend Josh, the opportunity of a lifetime.

What makes True Hero so great is that the characters are real to us.  We can relate to them.  This isn’t the story of some downtrodden billionaire who decides to fight crime or an alien sent from another planet.  This is a guy, just like us, going through those awkward teenage years who is given the chance to live out his dream.  There’s action, humor, and whole lot more.

We recently got a chance to interview Rich and Mike to get a little more insight into the origins of True Hero and what we can expect from the series going forward.

TSH: How did you two come up with the idea for this comic, and how long has it been in the works? 

M: I originally wrote the first arc as a short film for a class in college. It was based on this really terrible idea a friend and I thought up in High School about two friends who fight crime together in a place where there is none. The premise alone reeks of zero conflict. But there was an err of humor and something real about the characters that I loved, so I reworked the story with tons of conflict… then kinda put it on the shelf till I met Rich.

R: Yea I met Mike through a friend probably, like, 8 years ago. It was actually this other cat that suggested I help with a comic book after seeing my drawings. We were originally going to do a book called FBI 4V. It had pot smoking aliens and cows falling from the sky. Awesome. Lol, but then we kinda didn’t go anywhere with that and dusted off True Hero instead.

TSH: Soooo, Mark and Josh look a BIT like you two.  How much of your personalities did you two put in the characters?

M: Yeah, the main reason Mark looks like me is because Rich said that it would be easier to model him after me since he sees me all the time. At the time I was just excited to work on a comic book, so I figured anything I can do to help would be fine with me… but now, I kinda face-palm whenever I see this character. I kinda wanna maim him to eliminate the resemblance, haha! Although, it’s really funny that people think that Josh looks like Rich… it must be cuz he’s brown.

R: Haha. Yea the brown throws em’ off! Naw, basically the character designs for Mark and Josh came about due to the facts that 1. The characters were so much like these two dudes I knew at the time and 2. I had no idea what I was doing, haha! Also, just to clarify, Josh is totally not modeled on me. My ego is not on that level, haha.

M: I gotta say, the characters were essentially a pussified version of myself, and an uber assholish version of my friend. But I’ve grown up a little since then; yet these characters still have that 19 year old naive voice… and I think it really rings true for that stage in life. I guess at the time, there was a lot of my personality in Mark… but now, I think I’m closer to Josh.

TSH: Can we expect to see a villain appear in a near-future issue, and is it possible it could be Josh?

M: Oh absolutely. Issue #3 as a matter of fact. It’s probably my favorite issue in the first arc as we see what great power can do to two very different people… and in True Hero, anything is possible… including a villain named… wait for it… “Captain Kink”.

TSH: We noticed the Niagra Falls picture on the wall (with the kid climbing the railing) and we wanted to know if that mirrored a real  incident from your lives and if so, are there any other hidden tidbits in the comic that you pulled from your own life experiences?

M: Rich has a habit of drawing lots of little things in the book that I’m almost certain no one will see but me… so I’m not sure whether he’s doing it just for me or just for his own sanity. The Niagra Falls photo was not in the script… so I guess Rich would know better than I.

R: Well, the script offered me quite a bit of… freedom… in the way it was written, haha.  A lot of the little things I threw in were minor attempts at quirky humor and some of it was to lend some of my own sense of depth and personality to the images. Plus, I didn’t know what I was doing. That’s my excuse in case I failed, haha. In the case of the Niagara, I was just trying add to the overall vibe of Mark’s family. They strike me as a family that would have a bunch of photos of odd moments. I haven’t actually been to that waterfall. Mark has. He tried to swim in it.

TSH: Who was the inspiration for Faith, and are we going to find out what her backstory is and who killed her?  Can you give us a hint?!

M: To be quite honest, there is no inspiration for Faith. I wrote a snarky girl who’s so mysterious you’re not really sure on whether to trust her or not. Her backstory is something that I really can’t wait to get into… when you find out who Faith is and where her character arc is going over the series, you’ll be blown away. But for now, I can tell you that we’ll find out who killed her an whether or not she’ll survive this time around by the end of issue #5… and it’s not what you think.

For more great information and up-to-date news on True Hero, be sure to check out their Facebook page and to buy a copy, head on over to Graphicly.

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