Wow!
The Crow is twenty years old? Unbelievable, I remember picking up the original print like it was yesterday. This is one of my favorites, and most cherished comics in my collection. To call it just a revenge tale would be incorrect, it's also a book that promotes the power of the loving memories you shared with the departed.
To honor the 20th anniversary, O'Barr is putting out a special edition. He is adding scenes, sequences and artwork never seen before. The new scenes are something he wanted to add originally, but they were too difficult to put on paper. He was worried that they would exploit the death of his fiancee, which was inspiration for
The Crow.
I'll be picking up this special edition and look for to seeing the all new artwork that O'Barr has included.
The following is an excerpt from the Dallas Observer interview:
With The Crow being so personal, did it trouble you to see it become so commercialized with a number of sequels, a TV show and now a remake
of the first movie?
I have kind of divorced myself from all of that. I was heavily involved with the first film, and Brandon was my friend. I kind of feel like I made my movie, and I really have nothing else to say with that character or that scenario. It was never designed to be a Star Trek or James Bond franchise, which is what they keep trying to turn it into. Initially, I thought that they would cheapen the first film by making these bad sequels but in reality all they did was make it look that much better.
Remaking The Crow, a film that is only 15 years old, is kind of ridiculous at this point. I don't think anyone sets out to make a bad film, but the first Crow was a $10 million movie. I don't think it matters how much money you throw at it or what stars you put in it -- no one is going to top what Brandon and Alex Proyas did in the first film.
Frankly, I can't think of any actor that is going to have Brandon's physicality and his charisma. I just can't think of anyone that can pull that off. I actually think of Brandon when I think of The Crow now. That's how closely associated it is now with me. He nailed that part, but he really had to sell me on it too. When I first met him, I thought that while he looked perfect and could do all the physical stuff, he was just too nice of a guy. I had a hard time believing that he could be threatening and scary. So he took that as a challenge to prove me wrong.
I still remember thinking, "Wow, this is Bruce Lee's son!" But Brandon never played on that at all. This was the first movie he made where he felt like he wasn't in his father's shadow. I spent two years traveling around the world promoting The Crow to get people to see if for the right reason because he was proud of the film.
So when people always ask me what I think about what Hollywood has done with my book, I like to reference a Raymond Chandler quote that they haven't done a [frick]ing thing to my book, it's still sitting right there on the shelf like it always was! Read the source material -- films are a whole different genre, and invariably a book is going to be better because it has more depth. Its not going to be constrained by a budget or any limitations on the set, it speaks directly to the reader.
I have my book and my film, so I am content with that.
In the past 20 years, I think The Crow has really become somewhat of a rite of passage. I have watched the first fans grow up with me, and all of a sudden there is a whole new group of 16 year-old Goth girls who, I'm like, where did you even hear about this book from? This has happened with three different generations now, so it's like when you turn 16 you have to read The Crow and own the first three Cure albums.
I am glad that even though the book is set in the early '80s, the message is still valid: As long as someone is loved, they will never die.
If you'd like to find out James O'Barr's next project Sundown, please click the link below for the full article.