Now that we are on the cusp of the release of 12-Gauge Comics “THE BOONDOCK SAINTS: ALL SAINTS DAY” ‘deleted scene’ “IN NOMINE PATRIS” the wheels begin to turn once again for one of the most successful cult franchises of the past decade. Inside you can read my group exclusive interview with the creative minds behind the illustrated adaptation of the series, including series mastermind Troy Duffy! Read on for the full interview where the guys talk about the upcoming 2 issue mini, the process of adapting the story from the screen to the page, future projects, and the possibilities of a third film! Read on for the skinny!

“Written by BOONDOCK SAINTS creator/writer/director TROY DUFFY and comic scribe J.B. LOVE, (with art by newcomer GUUS FLOOR and covers by CHRIS BRUNNER) “In Nomine Patris” is the perfect companion to the recent movie. Conceived as a “deleted and extended sequence”, the comics expand on the story and characters in ALL SAINTS DAY and delve deeper into the secret origin of the “Original Saint”, IL DUCE.”

THEoDEAD:”First of all thank all of you for your time in doing this. Before we jump into “The Boondock Saints: In Nomine Patris” why don’t we have everyone introduce themselves to the readers?”

Eben Matthews:”I’m the Founder/Creative Director of INNFUSION and the producer of the Boondock Saints Comic Series. INNFUSION is a creative idea company. We develop and produce cool stuff in a variety of media and comics and motion comics are two of the areas we focus on and love.”

Troy Duffy:”WRITER/DIRECTOR OF BDS1 AND 2.”

J.B Love:”My name is J.B. Love and I co-wrote the comics with Troy Duffy.”

Chris Brunner:”Illustrator/Cartoonist”

THEoDEAD:”With “IN NOMINE PATRIS” readers will be able to add to the awesome experience that they already had with “ALL SAINTS DAY” as the series has been compared to a deleted scene from that film. What is “IN NOMINE PATRIS” exactly?”

J.B Love:”It’s essentially as the sub-title says, ‘The Secret History of Il Duce’. We get to see the decisions, interactions, the process that led from him becoming a victim of violence to becoming the mob’s own personal boogy man. Il Duce’s story starts in 1959 and closes in 1975, when he went to prison, which is where we find him, 20 years later, in the first Boondock Saints film. During this story we’ll be intercutting another ‘deleted scene’ with Connor and Murphy, which takes place before the assault on ‘The Roman’s’ estate at the end of the ‘All Saints Day’. So we get the evolution of hardcore badass-ery along with some day-to-day badass-ery.”

THEoDEAD:”I’m not going to lie, but when I was walking out of the theater after seeing “ALL SAINTS DAY” I had the thought that BDS would make a natural transition from film to comics. How long has this been an idea? Was the intent to make this move something that was very recent or has there always been interest?”

Eben Matthews:”I’ve been working with Troy and Co. for over five years doing web development, branding and marketing / design work for them. A few years ago the same thought hit me – that the Saints were perfect for comics. I got in touch with JB and asked him to write up a short comic style script to have something to then show to Troy. At that point they were settling a lawsuit and dealing with some other issues and it wasn’t even possible to bring the Saints into other media so I sat on the script and the idea until the lawsuit was settled and it was possible. After that I sent the script over to Troy and he responded positively to it. We then had a series of meetings with Troy and CB (his producer) and ironed out the details followed by creative and story meetings and Boom! Boondock Saints in Comics!”

Troy Duffy:”I’M STILL LEARNING THE COMIC WORLD. THOUGH MANY HAVE THOUGHT FROM THE BEGINNING THAT BDS WOULD TRANSLATE BEAUTIFULLY TO COMICS, WE ACTUALLY TOOK A DIRECTION THAT IS NOT TECHNICALLY A PART OF THE TWO MOVIES. FILLING IN THE BACK STORY AS IT WERE. SO THOUGH IT “FEELS” A BIT LIKE BDS, ITS QUITE A DIFFERENT EXPERIENCE. MOSTLY, IL DUCE’S HISTORY.”

J.B Love:”Well, Troy’s the one best suited to speak on this, but Eben and I couldn’t stop talking about all the comics possibilities once we’d seen the first film. And as I’m sure Troy will mention, being able to do pretty much anything in comics and not having to worry about FX budget opens up the world to all kinds of awesome. I think as far as why it came about when it did, this has to do with everything with the rights getting straightened out and the group of us coming together. Stars aligned and shit.”

THEoDEAD:”I know that there seems to be a more central focus on the eldest of The Saints, but will the brothers also play a major role as well?”

Troy Duffy:”THE STORY IS DUCE EXPLAINING HIS BLOODY PAST TO HIS SONS, SO YES. YOU WILL SEE SOME CHARACTERISTIC BROTHERS GIGS EVERY NOW AND THEN.”

J.B Love:”Yeah, we’re going to get to see the Saints in action. While the main focus of ‘IN NOMINE PATRIS’ is going to be Il Duce, we’re also flashing forward to ‘present day’ — which technically takes place on the night before the climactic battle at the end of ‘All Saints Day’ — as Connor and Murphy take out a couple of contract guys working for Yakavetta. We have a big show-down in a chop shop/scrapyard and lots of shit gets fucked up in the best possible way.”

THEoDEAD:”With so much positive feedback from fans about the series, and with “IN NOMINE PATRIS” sure to be a hit come May, is there any chance of seeing more mini0series down the road? Is there any possibility of an ongoing BDS series?”

Eben Matthews:”There will definitely be more mini series’ coming down the road. It’s unlikely that we’ll do an ongoing in that we really like to focus on telling a specific story with each series much like the films – there’s a beginning, middle and end to each series and yet each series will tie into the overall Boondock story and mythos. One of the coolest things about the whole project is how involved Troy is in the development and scripting of each issue. These stories are “in canon” and will be respected as part of the Saints’ legend wherever they go from here. We really like books like Hellboy that do continue the overall story from series to series and yet do it in mini-series form so that each one has the time, attention and love it needs to be just plain awesome. And yes, we’re already working on the next one (wink, wink).”

Troy Duffy:”WE’LL SEE I GUESS. IF THE FANS LIKE IT, SO IT SHALL CONTINUE.”

J.B Love:”Well, we’re not planning on doing a regular monthly ongoing series, but we’re in the early stages of another story at the moment. The idea is to do a Brothers-centric story now, with a more typical Boondock Saints-style plot. Whatever we end up on, I have no doubt it will be a blast to write. A lot of this is dependent on Troy’s availability, because we don’t make a move without that guy sitting down and looking over everything. This is his baby, and he’s rightfully protective of it. As we’ve said before, this isn’t something with his name slapped on it. When you read the comic you are reading words Troy himself wrote. Dirty, dirty words.”

THEoDEAD:”Artistically “IN NOMINE PATRIS” looks to be fantastically rendered. What went into the process of choosing the art team on this? What goes into the process of rendering the actors so vividly onto the page?”

Eben Matthews:”Guus Floor is the artist (pencils and inks) on In Nomine Patris. He is a real gem and we feel really lucky and excited to have found him. We looked at a bunch of artists and even went a couple steps down the road with a few of them as far as getting sample pages, character designs etc. At the end of the day we felt that Guus’ style really fit the Saints beautifully and this story in particular. He has this fantastic ability to capture the look of the characters without being a slave to rendering the actors’ likeness – which can make drawings stiff and boring if the concern is doing little portraits of actors – he is drawing Connor and Murphy MacManus, Il Duce and the other great characters we know, love or met in the films and he’s done it in a way that boils down to the essence of the character and really brings them to life on the page. It’s also been amazing watching him develop as an artist on this series. We get so excited when new pages come in because literally each one is better than the last. The stuff he’s doing on Issue 2 is literally blowing me away. We’ve had such a great time working with him that we are really hoping we can entice him to stay on for the next series and beyond. We couldn’t be happier with the awesomeness he’s producing.

All in all, you can tell we’re really really happy with the creative team and I’d love to take this moment to publicly thank them for all their time, hard work and exceptional creative output. Add that to Troy and JB’s kick ass scripts and I could not be happier with the Boondock Saints arrival in comics. We knocked it out of the park (If I can say so myself) and we think fans and newcomers alike are really going to dig it. ”

Troy Duffy:”IN TERMS OF THE ART TEAM, I LEAVE THAT TO EBEN AND JB. THEY’RE THE PROS.”

J.B Love:”Guus Floor is the Tits.”

Chris Brunner:”Hunting down good reference first, finding the shots and expressions that capture the characters. If you think about how often a photograph of yourself really looks like “you”, and how different you can look from picture to picture, this ends up being a tricky task. For every 10 I find, maybe 1 will be useful. After that a bit of drawing and a lot of erasing! Hammering out the likeness, exaggerating where there’s room, and getting the damn thing to look alive.

Coming up with the design and composition has a lot to do with it, Poppa Duce can end up looking like Zeus if you don’t give him enough context. Sometimes cool is better than accurate. Luckily the brothers have pretty distinct features, though I don’t quite feel I’ve nailed it yet.”

THEoDEAD:”This will probably be a question that is more so for Troy, but if I didn’t ask it the readers would probably lynch me: will there be a “BOONDOCK SAINTS 3”? With such an open plot-line at the end of “ALL SAINTS DAY” can fans expect to see the films turned into a trilogy?”

Troy Duffy:”YES. BUT AS I SEE IT, IF 95% OF DIRECTORS MESS UP SEQUELS, THEN 99% FUCK UP TRIQUELS. IT WILL TAKE SOME HEAVY THOUGHT AND PREP. THAT SCRIPT HAS TO BE TIGHT AS A HORSES ASS DURING MAY FLY SEASON. I’D ALSO LIKE TO GET A COUPLE OTHER NON BDS FILMS UNDER MY BELT BEFORE TACKLING THAT.”

J.B Love:”God I hope so. If there isn’t I might just start hearing heavenly voices compelling me to kill gangsters. As I am incredibly weak with poor hand-eye coordination, this would be a very bad idea.”

THEoDEAD:”Do any of you have any projects coming up this year that fans should keep an eye out for?”

Eben Matthews:”We’re always working on a bunch of cool stuff. Right now we’re developing a digital comics platform called ComicStore which debuted with the launch of the iPad. Right now you can actually get a Boondock Saints short story on there that celebrates the return of Rocco in a comic called “The Lost Gig” as well as other titles from 12-Gauge and other publishers to be announced soon. We’re also developing projects for film and television. We optioned a feature script earlier this year and have a TV pilot in development with many more in the pipeline. Additionally we’re developing other comics projects and INNFUSION is 50% of the best Motion Comics production company on the planet – M2 (www.m2action.com) where we are doing a bunch of cool stuff for entertainment and advertising and are the only ones doing motion comics in 3D. We also did a BDS motion comic teaser which is really cool as part of getting this whole project moving – check that out for sure… So, yeah – lots of cool stuff coming up later this year and beyond!”

Troy Duffy:”I’M GOING OUT WITH 2 SCRIPTS. BOTH T.DUFF ORIGINALS. ONE IS “THE GOOD KING” A PERIOD PIECE BUDDY COMEDY. THE OTHER IS A SERIAL KILLER THRILLER CALLED “THE BLOOD SPOON COUNCIL”.”

J.B Love:”I’ll be working with Innfusion and M2 on a few other things as well as moving forward with a couple of different creator-owned comics projects. Also I will be inventing safe and effective means of teleportation and building up the Hello Kitty backpack collection that Troy started for me.”

Chris Brunner:”Working on a crime/romance comic called “Loose Ends”, with Jason Latour and Rico Renzi, that’ll be coming out through 12 Gauge as well. It’s the first project any of the 3 of us have put together ourselves, so we’re really pulling out all the stops.”

THEoDEAD:”Can readers expect to catch any of you guys out on the convention circuit this year?”

Eben Matthews:”We’ll be in San Diego for sure and are looking at a couple of other events this year and next. In San Diego we’ll be at the 12-Gauge booth (with some super hot booth babes I might add) which is a fantastic place to be. There are some other big announcements coming out at ComicCon and the next BDS series may just be one of them 🙂 ”

Troy Duffy:”WE SHALL SEE. GOT A LOT TO DO BUT MAY BE ABLE TO HIT SOMETHING. ”

J.B Love:”I’ll be at SDCC, attached by a small frayed bit of string to Eben’s back pocket.”

Chris Brunner:”I’ll be at HeroesCon, sweating out commissions and playing the bashful salesman like usual; with an eye towards NYCC. ”

THEoDEAD:”Is there anything you’d like to say to the fans before we let you go?”

Eben Matthews:”Just THANK YOU! This project is in many ways a dream come true and the culmination of something I started with JB in 8th Grade. We made our first comic together back then and while it was a horrible, horrible X-Men rip-off (that we thought was the most awesome, original idea to come out in years) it started us on this path of making comics together and it thrills me to have that plan be realized now with such a cool project and such a fantastic group of people. We love the Saints and we love Saints fans and are thrilled to now be part of this property and to do it in such a cool way. Boondock Saints in comics will continue to depend on the fans interest and support and so far it’s been really great so again – “Thank You!!!!” and Cheers!”

Troy Duffy:”KEEP IT STIFF. T.DUFF”

J.B Love:”Yeah, THANKS. There aren’t many fans out there who are as passionate and as cool as Saints fans. Their enthusiasm is infectious and really gives you a charge when you need it. And I’d like to give a special mention to @Grania3 and @Jade_Kadir over on Twitter, who lead the ‘Boondock Betties’ brigade (a group of lady Saints fans) and have been ridiculously supportive and are working hard to get the word out about the comics series on Twitter and elsewhere. These ladies are truly serving up, on a daily basis, some WHUP-ASS FAJITAS.”

Chris Brunner:”Yea, thanks. Look forward to meeting the BDS fans, I hear they’re some rabid folks.”

Everyone here at Bloody-Disgusting.com’s Graphic Content Section would like to thank Troy, J.B, Chris, and Eben for their time in doing this interview with us.

“THE BOONDOCK SAINTS: IN NOMINE PATRIS #1” Hits Shelves Thanks To 12-Gauge Comics This May!