Comic Success Quotes

I did stand-up comedy for 18 years. Ten of those years were spent learning, four years were spent refining, and four years were spent in wild success. I was seeking comic originality, and fame fell on me as a byproduct. The course was more plodding than heroic.

My dream in life is to write the one gag that makes everyone in the world laugh.

The mutants I like - Wolverine. The action heroes I like, they have weapons; they are more visceral. So I filled the comic with characters like that, and we got big results.

I make people laugh hard; I'm a comic, that's just the way it is. And I make them laugh because I'm funny, not because I'm filthy. The subject matter is dirty, but the pictures I paint are really funny. A lot of comics don't understand that that's what it's about. It's just, "I'll be dirty and they'll laugh." Nobody's becoming a superstar that way.

One percent of all comics ever reach the level of a Chris Rock or a Jerry Seinfeld. When audiences come to the underground rooms, they have a chance to watch the process that happens along the way - and see the comedians grow.

I'm really ambitious about is being a really good comic and doing it for the rest of my life and getting really big. Not really famous because I want fame or attention, just a little freedom. So, that's where I'm ambitious.

When that character and the X-Force appeared, they took the comic world by storm. You have to look at those numbers. And you see that that isn't Rob Liefeld's only creation. There's all these other things, like Cable and Domino. There's so many things that actually could be fascinating onscreen and unlike anything you've ever seen before onscreen. So I think Fox is in a really nice position where they've got something that feels as wide and different as the Marvel Universe.

Every comic can report a few 'gift from the gods' moments.

I know a lot of people who read 'Sweet Tooth' are the kind of people who don't read a lot of other comics. Whatever it was, I'm just glad it happened.

I believe that a good comic script can succeed despite being drawn badly, but that a bad script can't be saved by good art. Of course, great writing and great illustration makes for a great comic 100 percent of the time.

Good comics stick around. There are people who have TV shows that might be successful, but comics can't really fake it. If you say, 'Hey, I love what you guys are doing - you're funny,' then you're in. It's legit.

As lifelong fans of comic books, Dan Didio and myself, we definitely have our own takes on what make for successful comics and the kind of comics that we want to publish.

In comedy, when you bomb, especially at The Comedy Store in front of a sold-out house? I think it would have been way worse if I bombed there than losing a UFC fight.

Wanted has gone into second, third and fourth printings of the individual issues and the north American printings of Wanted #1 are now close to 100,000.

I think to be a successful comic, you have to be exceptionally smart and exceptionally perceptive.

I don't feel bad about the fact that I notice if a lot of people laugh at a comic, and think, 'That worked; I'll do things like that more.'

'New Mutants' #100 went out the door with over a million copies. It is the highest-selling last issue of any comic ever. And that's when I knew that I spoke fandom. I spoke their language.

I started going to the open mics every day in 2003. You make the comics laugh, they get you work, and you build up your reputation. It was a slow process.