Creators Gerry Duggan (X-Men, Deadpool) and Garry Brown (Catwoman, The Massive) are teaming up once again for the release of the oversized art book edition of their Image Comics series Falling In Love On The Path To Hell, now available for preorder on Zoop.
The series fuses samurai and gunslinger mythology into a supernatural love story that spans life, death, and the afterlife. In the East, Asami, an Onna-musha warrior, refuses to surrender her weapons during a sword hunt. In the West, the gunslinger MacRaith pursues revenge to his final breath. Mortally wounded a world apart, the two awaken together in a purgatory ruled by a society of damned warriors. Falling In Love On The Path To Hell blends action, the undead, and romance into a strikingly cinematic experience.
We caught up with Duggan to discuss the creation of their genre-bending epic, the freedom that comes with telling this story independently, and what readers can expect from the new art book edition, including signed copies, sketches, remarques, and original art.
DIEGO HIGUERA: I’m genuinely excited about this. Falling In Love On The Path To Hell has been one of my standout titles of this year. I knew we needed to feature it on The Beat.
GERRY DUGGAN: Yeah, it’s a labor of love. Garry and I had been working on it for quite a while before it debuted. I’ve been so grateful at the response to this. I’d never really tried my hand at a romance, and I know I picked something that was a little left of the beaten path. Garry’s work on it is just incredible. He and I share the authorship, and I got to listen to Ray Bradbury once, 20 years ago, talk about [how] you have to name what you love and drive towards what you love and put love into the universe and see what comes back. That was really the goal here, only to let ideas and story and characters, and things that I loved into this comic book, and for me, that’s why it’s special. Even the church in the first scene is a restaurant here in town that I love called Viviana, and it was deconsecrated in the Northridge quake. It was damaged, and so they saved it. I love that place so much. I put it in there, little things like that. It’s been very gratifying to hear folks tell me that they love it.
HIGUERA: I thought that was really cool because I had known about that little fact. You have a whole bunch of fans making their own Twitter threads that are dedicated to this book. I love reading through them. I’m based in San Diego, but I go to LA whenever I get the chance, so it was great seeing the little tidbits of factoids you had in there because your history, to the extent that you had in there, it’s all accurate. So as a reader, you’re actually following along. Next thing you know, you’re literally dragged into hell. There are monsters and aliens, and I could tell, from the first issue, that there was so much love poured into this. It’s great to hear you say that love was poured into this because that’s exactly the vibe. I remember when the first issue came out, I picked it up because you had a variant cover that was an homage to A New Hope.
DUGGAN: Yeah! Garry took a swing at that cover. He inked it, and we had so much time. Sometimes, when you start things, new projects can take a little bit longer to gear up as you get comfortable in that skin. He had enough time, and then he painted the cover. So there’s kind of two covers. We loved that, and obviously, the masked mempo character would come back around in issue #9 with our guest artist, Mark Torres. We took a little bit of historical fiction, and clearly, we are bending some things, but it’s a world where I am writing this, and I also feel like I’m dungeon mastering it a little bit.
HIGUERA: Oh, 100%. The worldbuilding in this comic is one of the main reasons I enjoyed this series. The thing that stood out to me the most is that Garry’s artwork is phenomenal, and I’ve been a fan of your writing for a long time. I loved your X-Men run. I remember there’s one panel from the first issue that really stuck with me, where Asami and MacRaith sit down at the beach on opposite sides of the world, and the panels interconnect on top of each other. They’re both looking at the island, and there’s this small part where it looks like the Statue of Liberty is holding something up. When Asami looks out at it and MacRaith looks back, it just appears as a spire and some rocks. I can’t stop gushing about it because it’s beautiful. I was reading through that issue, and honestly multiple issues, and I kept hoping it wouldn’t end anytime soon. I really wanted people to keep buying it, and they did.
DUGGAN: I was just really happy with that. In issue #10, we’ll find that some of the things we think about the island are lies that have been told to us by the authoritarians at the top. It is a love story. It is seemingly right at the gates of hell, but I think we need to be aspirational and provide hope. A lot of the back end gets really hectic for these characters. The goal is that if we can double our page count, I’ll get through what we’re calling book one.
We had to make a choice, and comics is at the intersection of art and commerce. We basically had to say, do we do more guest artists and keep going in a monthly fashion, or do we want to hit pause, go on a hiatus, let Garry sprint ahead, and then begin publishing again? We decided on the best option, and because this is Garry’s world, that’s what we’re doing.
That was the impulse for our Zoop crowdfunding effort: to give fans who love this book the chance to own something special in a format that I don’t think we’re going to reprint again. You’ll get an art edition of the first book at a slightly larger scale. It’ll be hardcover. There are tiers where we can sign and number it, and those will be fulfilled for everyone during our hiatus. Any funding that comes from this can also help keep the lights on as we continue to move ahead.
This is a peek behind the curtain of independent comics. We’ll print the end of the book at my home for all of my creator-owned work at Image Comics. This is a good opportunity for us. Zoop has been a wonderful partner. They’re going to take on a lot of the burden of ordinary crowdfunding, allowing us to continue to make the book.
We’ll show up. Garry is going to offer some sketch covers. We have a limited amount of issue #10 sketch covers that will go to him as add-ons for folks who want an original of Asami or MacRaith. I’m just thrilled to be in this spot. It is rarefied air. Comic books are at a point where we’re about to see more growth. These are also uncertain times, with printing difficulties and all the Diamond stuff, but we’ve weathered it well. Image has been wonderful partners, and I know Zoop will be too.
If you loved our first trade, I think you’ll love seeing it: Garry’s inks raw, with the letters, a couple extra bells and whistles, and some designs and so forth.’
HIGUERA: That’s phenomenal. Honestly, I think that’s going to be one of the key points that attract so many people to this. If you’re already a fan, you’re going to be there, but I’m genuinely looking forward to all the extra things you mentioned that will be included. I know recently they released an DC W.I.P. for Absolute Batman that people went crazy over for Batman Day, a huge one they brought out. Knowing you’re doing your own for Falling in Love on the Path to Hell just seems incredible.
DUGGAN: Nick is wildly talented. Garry is also so talented, a graduate of the Kubert School, where I think he came out fully formed, a special artist who does so much. There are so many things I love that I can point to in this book that inspire me. Garry’s storytelling is so good. I think he’s one of the best storytellers working. There are these sunset panels that he did where he basically broke out the sun as this blob that’s kind of melting. I am so happy now that we get to share Garry’s work the way it shows up in my email box. That inspired me to write a second version of the script for Joe [Sabino], Chris [O’Halloran], our letterer and colorist, and Elliot [Gray], our designer. Elliot is also doing the designs for this book. Everything you love about the book at Image, you’re going to love about the first volume, stripped down and raw at Zoop.
HIGUERA: I have to ask about your premise: blending samurai, gunslingers, romance, and the supernatural. I remember flipping through that first issue and seeing that centipede demon. I was like, What the hell is this? What first sparked the idea for bringing these worlds together?
DUGGAN: It was definitely during COVID that it did feel like the darkness was oppressive, and the world had stopped moving. So many of the things I loved, I couldn’t do anymore. I loved traveling, taking photos, and walking around, but we were all stuck at home. There was this impulse to say, okay, this isn’t going to last forever. What kind of light can we put into the darkness? Garry and I had been talking, and I was eager to work with him on something. I thought, we have to find something, and we have to do an Image book where you own your material.
We found this project. I know for the folks reading it, this might not make sense, but I have a [Sergio] Leone poster on the wall behind me. I love samurai movies. It takes a lot of love and propulsion to do a creator-owned book because you’re wearing more hats and pushing harder than you would otherwise. When I worked at Marvel, the Disney machine was behind projects like Godzilla destroying the Marvel universe, but with a creator-owned book, it has to be pure of intent. This felt like the right way to go.
I couldn’t believe that nobody had done a romance between a gunslinger and a samurai before. I went and looked; I wanted to make sure I wasn’t going down a path someone had already mined. Then I pitched the idea to Garry, and that was the litmus test: how excited does your partner get? By coincidence, I had the chance to attend a convention in Dallas with Frank Miller. I told him I didn’t want to interrupt his lunch, but I wanted to thank him for his work and the inspiration it gave me. So much of what he brought to my brain had been marinating for so long, and it bubbled back up to help create this comic called Falling in Love on the Path to Hell. He looked at it and said, “Oh, I love this.” I asked, “How much do you love it?” That moment confirmed what Mr. Bradbury’s advice had said all along.
That’s how Celine and Frank came into my orbit and also did a lovely cover for us. I’ve been very privileged in both collaborators and assignments over the years. When I try to have fun and do something I love, my collaborators also enjoy it and care for it. If those things are true, then maybe our audience will love it, care for it, and share it with their friends and advocate for this. That’s why we do this. If we were out to conquer the world, there are other ways to do it. We’re out to make art.
I had been through some ringers over the last couple of years, as I think we all have. Life had kind of dumped on me a little bit. I wanted to grow something beautiful out of it, and I think we succeeded. Even if someone might not say I’m their favorite writer or this is their favorite comic, what Garry, Chris, Joe, and Elliot have done is indelible. This is a truly special series. I’m very grateful for Image’s support, our fans’ support, and now Zoop’s support.
We’re hitting pause now so that we can go out and come back to finish the story the way we want it to be finished and maybe set up more. I’m really excited because I’ve known what the end and the back half of this story would be from the beginning. I told Garry that, in case I get hit by a bus, he would be able to draw it. He’s got the Glengarry leads in terms of being able to finish it. Hopefully, I’m not going to get hit by a bus, but I’m so privileged to be able to make this comic the way I wanted.
It scratches an itch. It’s something I wanted to see in the world that didn’t exist, and I’m so grateful for all the support. If there’s anyone who has been enjoying the book, there will be preview pages of what you can expect and some really cool incentives. I’m not sure how limited that material will be, but there will be signed and unsigned editions. I believe there’s going to be a retailer bundle as well so that we can support the retailers who supported us and helped make us a hit.
HIGUERA: You mentioned earlier, Asami and MacRaith are both defined by their refusal to surrender. It’s something I picked up on throughout the issues. They’re very different, yet at some points, they feel uniquely connected. How did you shape their voices and motivations so that they feel distinct, yet destined to connect?
DUGGAN: Well, it’s a great question. We always think about orbits and trajectories, and in a story that starts with love, you need to have some really complicating things after that. I knew they would be so different and from two different worlds. Although they were both warriors who didn’t surrender, they shared that commonality. What I think is interesting is how you then explore that. As we get to issue #10, we realize Asami’s surrendering to her heart is something she rebelled against. It cost her family, her status, and potentially her life. She has this wonderful internal struggle of becoming potentially a mother and definitely a lover, and writing that has been a joy.
MacRaith is a little more romantic than her, and I admire that. The fun of it is that the thing that made her knees buckle or made her swoon was actually the kindness he showed that deer on the island. Deer have a very special status in Japan. My son and I visited national parks where the deer will walk right up to you because they have no fear of people, and that idea carried into the story. What won her over wasn’t a horny cowboy drawing her nude in his notebook, that wouldn’t have worked with her, but rather his kindness to this animal in an unkind world. That became the bridge to romance.
Every creative endeavor is a roll of the dice. Will it find an audience, and can you sustain it? Both questions have been answered positively for us, and that doesn’t happen for everyone. There are stories I wish had continued but didn’t. This one will have a beginning, middle, and end that belong on a bookshelf, and maybe an extended future, we’ll see. I’ll be very proud of this story when we finish it next year.
For everyone buying the book in single issues or trades, the second volume of the trade will be out in late quarter four, in time for holiday shopping. We’ll also have the Zoop book, which will serve as our interlude, our real “Long intermission”, for what we hope will be just a short time. That’s Falling in Love on the Path to Hell.
HIGUERA: The deer scene really stood out to me because, as you said, it’s the small moments that matter most especially on an island filled with chaos and dangerous characters.
DUGGAN: Yeah, there are definitely some bad folks there. But you’ll notice we didn’t take a Judeo-Christian approach to the world. These souls are more like energy, they want to move, to travel, and right now, that system is broken. So by the end of our second arc, we get into some really strange, exciting territory, the kind of stuff that can only happen in comics. I think readers will realize that things on this island aren’t quite what they seemed. Maybe these so-called “demons” crossing the River Styx are just other souls that have been demonized.
A lot of stories end in big, violent, Odysseus-style homecomings, but this one plays out differently. There’s still plenty of action and great antagonists, along with new revelations—like how the island really works. I wanted to build in that mystery so readers could spend time with these characters, grow attached to them, and watch them fall in love as the story unfolds.
HIGUERA: Both of you have worked on some major projects before. What’s it been like creating Falling in Love on the Path to Hell independently with Image? What did working through Image allow you to do that you might not have been able to elsewhere? What stands out to you the most about that experience?
DUGGAN: What it really represents is freedom. We’re diving into a story that plays a part in the future of our work, but MacGraith comes from a time and place we’ve already established, Bleeding Kansas. It was a period when there were two state governments, one pro-slavery and one abolitionist, and the balance of power could have tipped the Senate. It was a brutal, divided time, and that’s the world this character comes from. He’s someone who’s suffered his own abuse and carries the weight of that history.
There might be reasons why you wouldn’t normally try to mix something that could be viewed as fraught with something more romantic or hopeful, at least in pop culture terms. But for me, that’s part of what makes it interesting. You can look at it and maybe find parallels to our own times, and if someone sees that, great. If not, that’s okay too, because there’s so much else going on in this story.
Having “no notes” is a rare and valuable thing in our business. That’s not to say feedback can’t make things better, it often does, but this project is something pure. It’s something made by just a few hands, a bespoke story we’re telling for our time. And at its heart, it’s okay to simply fall in love, to advocate for love, and to be in love.
Falling In Love On The Path To Hell stands as a rare blend of romance, brutality, and myth, filtered through Gerry Duggan and Garry Brown’s distinct creative lens. It truly has been something special, and with their upcoming oversized art book edition, the team invites readers deeper into their vision. It’s a haunting yet heartfelt saga that explores what it means to love, to fight, and to find redemption in a world between worlds. For fans of striking visuals, complex characters, and stories that linger long after the final page, this release is one worth descending into.
English (US) · 